Cold & Deadly (Cold Justice: Crossfire #1)(53)
No way was she letting Sheridan or his pals figure it out.
Charlotte walked past on the way to her seat and gave her a reserved smile and squeezed Dominic’s arm which made the HRT guy on her right tense.
Interesting. Did the HRT guy know the female negotiator or did he want to? She had a feeling it was the latter and couldn’t help a smirk.
After an hour on the transport, the smirk was gone. A storm front had made the ride rocky, her butt was sore, and her head ached from the roar of the engine. She white-knuckled the webbing on the seat as they came in for landing and exhaled a happy sigh when they taxied to a military hangar where they could unpack the Hostage Rescue Team in relative secrecy.
“Scared of flying?” Dominic asked her when they were finally able to talk again.
“Scared of crashing,” she corrected.
They exited the aircraft and left HRT to sort out their equipment. An agent from the Buffalo Field Office picked them up and took them straight to the prison, a low gray affair with more razor wire than no-man’s land.
Half a mile from the main building, an outer perimeter had been established to prevent the press or public getting too close and to prevent any enterprising inmate from taking advantage of the situation to stage an escape.
The negotiators arrived at the main door and hurried inside the building to be greeted by another agent from Buffalo.
“Who is talking to the hostage-takers right now?” Dominic asked. He’d been furiously writing notes on the journey up.
“We have a Bureau of Prisons trained negotiator on the line.”
“Good. Are they talking? Making a list of demands?” asked Dominic.
Ava had to walk fast to keep up with them all. Dominic seemed to have forgotten his injuries and had ditched his sling despite doctor’s orders. Charlotte Blood and Eban Winters followed close behind. Ava felt like a bit of a fraud pretending to be one of them, but she knew how to stay out of the way.
“They have a long list of demands but…”
“But what?”
Ava recognized the blistering authority in Dominic’s voice.
“Each of the hostage-takers has a different list of demands.”
“Great. Who’s the leader?”
“Two of them are vying for top spot. A former drug dealer out of Albany, Frank Jacobs, who swears he’s born again, and an old mobster hitman called Gino Gerbachi, AKA Gino-the-snake.”
Ava stumbled, and Dominic caught her by the arm before she fell flat on her face. Gino Gerbachi couldn’t be here. He was in Otisville, Orange County…
“You okay?” Dominic asked.
“Yeah. Sorry. Thanks. Tripped.” Her heart pounded as if someone had plugged her into an electrical socket. She forced herself to step away from Dominic’s support.
Did she tell him she had a connection to this guy or not?
“The third guy is a convicted serial killer.”
“Who?” Dominic asked.
“Milo Andris.”
Dominic scowled. Ava wondered what the man had done. “We have any visuals on them inside the kitchen?”
“We have cameras and audio in there that they seem unaware of at this time.”
“Any women in there?” Dominic asked.
“The warden is female.”
A shiver ran over Ava’s shoulders at Dominic’s closed expression.
“What weapons do they have?” Dominic fired questions at the man.
“Kitchen knives and other implements. I expect they all have at least one homemade shiv on their person.”
Ava didn’t want to interrupt this exchange. Lives were at risk. If Ava told Dominic about her connection to “Gino-the-snake” he’d remove her from the prison, and if he removed her she couldn’t act as his bodyguard. And if she wasn’t his bodyguard then she was pretty sure she’d be back on suspension until Aldrich figured out a way to get rid of her.
She rubbed the Mati bracelet on her wrist. It was supposed to protect from the evil eye. It might only be an old superstition but she wasn’t above a quick prayer.
It wasn’t like she’d have to deal with the inmates. She’d stay in the background. Strictly anonymous. Gerbachi wouldn’t even recognize her if he saw her. Her name was different now, and Kanas was common enough in Greek communities as to make tracking her mother and siblings difficult. She could work on leads from the murders while Sheridan did his thing, sleep when he slept. These separate worlds did not need to collide.
She set her teeth against one another. All the times Dominic had accused her of not being able to work as part of a team came back to her. But it wasn’t just her secret she was protecting. It was her mother and siblings and niece and nephew. This wasn’t the sort of secret you shared, it was the kind you buried.
But she would tell him.
Eventually.
Just not in front of all these people.
“Where’s the Incident Commander?” Dominic asked as they strode along past multiple locked doors and crowds of uniformed cops and correctional officers.
The local agent opened a side door. “Right in here.”
She followed behind Dominic. Eban and Charlotte were right behind her. The idea of anyone getting to Dominic in here seemed crazy but until they figured out who the baddy was, Ava wasn’t going to relax her guard. Maybe it was a fellow agent with a hidden agenda? She eyed the other two negotiators and Eban met her gaze quizzically.