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  Final Stand

  NORTHWEST COUNTER-TERRORISM

  TASKFORCE BOOK 5

  Lisa Phillips

  Copyright 2019 Lisa Phillips

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Publisher Lisa Phillips

  Cover design Lisa Phillips

  Edited by www.jenwieber.com

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  St. Petersburg, FL. Tuesday 11.12p.m.

  The air outside was thick with a coming storm. A heavy and oppressive heat that made sweat slide down the small of her back.

  Black leggings. Black, sweat-wicking, long-sleeved running shirt. Beat-up, black Converse shoes. If anyone saw her, she could easily argue being out for a run. At night. In Florida.

  Ponytail. Black headband. She’d even stuck a device that looked a whole lot like a phone in the side pocket of her leggings and she had Bluetooth earbuds in.

  No music playing.

  A woman alone, jogging at night and listening to music? Not unless asking for trouble was the mission objective.

  Victoria ran down the sidewalk through the retirement community like any other jogger. Two streets ahead of where she wanted to be, Victoria ducked off the sidewalk between two trees.

  Second building on the left. Fifth apartment. Sliding door from the tiny, fenced-in patio. It was open a couple of millimeters. Far enough that cool air from inside wafted out through the gap.

  “Probably a trap.”

  She wasn’t naïve. Maybe she never had been, given everything that’d happened to her since the day she was born. Then again, after what happened the past few months, she should probably be a little more relaxed than normal right now. She was basically on vacation—though it didn’t look like anyone’s ordinary idea of taking a break. No one would find her at some beachfront tiki bar celebrating the massive victory of bringing down a whole cabal of dirty FBI agents laced throughout the agency on the West Coast.

  Bribery. Corruption. It made her sick, the things people with power did to those who couldn’t defend themselves. She had a particular hate for people who were supposed to work for truth and justice—for good—and yet used that position to hurt others. But she’d exposed them. After five years of work, Victoria and her team had brought darkness out into the light of day.

  A couple of their suspects had gone to ground, running and hiding like rats headed back to the dark, but the majority had been caught. Victoria had no doubts the others would be rooted out as well. Soon enough.

  But this mission had nothing to do with that. Her job with the Northwest Counter-Terrorism Taskforce was done.

  Mission accomplished.

  Victoria slid the patio door open and listened. Sure, she could use the front door. But what kind of former spy would she be if she walked in the front door, her face on camera for all to see?

  She shoved the door closed so all the air conditioning didn’t leak out into the night. She might be an old spy, but she wasn’t reckless.

  Then she made her way between the armchair and coffee table, over to her grandfather’s bedroom.

  Something’s wrong.

  Those latent instincts hadn’t ever failed her. Not once. Victoria reached for the device in the pocket of her leggings. Before she could get her fingers between the stretchy material and the hard plastic of the stun gun, someone slammed into the back of her.

  Victoria hit the linoleum of the hallway floor. Her knee and hip—and almost her nose—cracked the floor. She hissed out a breath between pursed lips as a much heavier body landed on hers.

  She wriggled, trying to get him off.

  His hands roamed places they shouldn’t. “Been waiting for you.”

  Old fear fingered at the edges of her consciousness, frozen talons waiting to scratch her until she couldn’t move from the onslaught.

  Victoria bent one leg, planted her foot and pushed off the floor. She rolled to the side and the man slid off. She scrabbled out of reach, pulling out her stun gun as she moved and got up.

  Light.

  She reached to flip the switch, but he was up. And he was on her again. The press of his body against hers, pinning her to the wall. He grabbed her ponytail, tugging her head back. She winced but didn’t let up, fumbling for the switch.

  There.

  Light flooded the hallway. He moved enough in his surprise that Victoria could twist her arm around. She jabbed him in the side and twisted, following it up with an uppercut that glanced off his chin.

  The hallway was wide to accommodate her grandfather’s occasional need for a wheelchair. She lifted her foot and utilized the extra space to kick the man in the stomach.

  He dropped to the floor.

  Victoria tugged off the man’s ski mask while he moaned. He tried to kick out at her with his boot. She shifted out of the way, then rolled him and sat on the back of his thighs. From that spot, she could rifle through his jeans pockets. No phone. No wallet. No visible tattoos that might clue her in as to who he was and where he’d come from.

  “So who are you?”

  This was no random breaking and entering. He was here because she was here.

  When he didn’t answer, she tried a different question. “How did you know I would be here?”

  And where was her grandfather? He should be in his bed sleeping. This guy better have left him there, or he would find out quick, the consequences of hurting someone she cared about.

  Victoria reached around the front of his thigh and pressed her fingers into the man’s sciatic nerve, halfway between his knee and groin.

  He shifted immediately. A hiss of pain. An attempt at escape, to make the sensation stop. If she did let him up, he’d have to try and stumble away with a numb foot.

  “Who do you work for?”

  Before he could answer, she heard a noise. The hallway. Someone was coming.

  Ditching the pressure point, Victoria used the stun gun to zap the man with her into unconsciousness. She pulled the closet door open and dragged him in there. She just had time to pull his feet inside before the voices turned the corner into the hall.

  “The light is on. He’s probably hiding.” It was a woman, though she evidently had a smoking issue. “Crazy old coot says his granddaughter is a spy. Like the CIA, you know? He says she visits him after every mission.”

  Victoria stared through the crack between the door and the frame, praying they wouldn’t see her. No. She already had plenty of evidence to know prayer didn’t really work. No matter that everyone on her team now believed. They were all about praying a
nd sharing what God was doing in their lives. She’d already decided it wasn’t for her, and she didn’t want to be around when they learned it was all a farce.

  If she was found here, stuffed in a closet with an unconscious man, then she would deal with it. On her own.

  Like she dealt with everything else in her life.

  She ducked back deeper into the closet as they walked past the door. Down the hall to her grandfather’s room.

  “Jacob?”

  Victoria waited.

  “Jacob, are you here?”

  She heard the shower door open, then the click as it was closed again.

  “Alert security. We need to know if he’s still in the building.” The footsteps back down the hall to the front door were much more clipped. The sound of someone moving quickly and taking charge of the situation.

  The man on the floor behind her moaned.

  They were going to look in here. Of course they would, because they’d have to search everywhere for her grandfather. Which meant she needed to come up with an explanation fast.

  She heard the front door squeak, and peeked out. The hall was clear.

  Victoria tied the guy’s hands behind his back with a winter scarf her grandfather did not need for those humid Florida seasons. She’d been meaning to borrow it from him this year, but at least it would come in handy now.

  As soon as he started to wake enough to move, she hauled him to his feet and dragged him down the hall to the bedroom so she could look around.

  He hadn’t packed up to leave. His suitcase was still here, as was his medication.

  “Where is he?”

  She shoved the man against the wall beside the window so his nose squished against the paint. Very satisfying. He put his hands on her because he thought he could do whatever he wanted to. She wasn’t going to let that go without a little recompense. That was the way the world worked.

  She put pressure on him until he winced. “What did you do with him?”

  He hissed out a breath between clenched teeth. There wasn’t time to get the answers she needed. Not here, at least.

  Victoria relieved some of the pressure off the man in order to unlock the window and push it up. It would throw off the cops, or whoever investigated his disappearance, but there was nothing else that could be done.

  She shoved the man out the window, then jumped out herself. She yanked him by the arm and walked him across the lawn to a utility shed, picked the lock and then pushed him inside. He stumbled over a lawnmower and ended up sitting on the wheel.

  “Talk.”

  “Not gonna happen.” His voice held a slight slur, probably from being unconscious.

  “Where is my grandfather?”

  There were no other leads to follow unless he talked. This man had been sent here, and she had to know what he knew.

  “Are you FBI? Someone with a beef who thinks I wronged them?” Plenty of those in the world. Didn’t matter that she’d been working for the US government. She had enough enemies to fill a recital hall.

  Sometimes that fact hit her. Like a wave broke over her, and she wondered if she should just give up. Go home…or to a quiet place.

  But trouble would follow her there, too.

  It always did.

  “Who sent you here?” Victoria balled her fist and punched the guy. “Took my grandfather, waited around for me to show up. You have to know who I am. So who sent you?”

  Why here.

  Why now.

  She couldn’t get bogged down with the questions.

  “Thought you’d strike a blow to his operation.” He spoke around bloody teeth. “High and mighty, but not invulnerable.”

  “So this is revenge?”

  “He wants you put down. Fast and hard, he said. Recompense for what you did in California.”

  Victoria didn’t move. She didn’t react either, at least not outwardly. She had negotiated with a very bad guy to turn state’s evidence against a group of corrupt FBI agents who he had bribed into working for him.

  And in return, he’d targeted her grandfather?

  No. That was just…no.

  It had been a last ditch effort to make the best of a bad decision. Yes, she’d let someone that one of her team members cared about swing in the breeze. That had backfired in a serious way. If Sal hadn’t gotten to her fast enough, Allyson would have been carved up. Literally and figuratively.

  Allyson was safe now.

  Victoria had fulfilled her mission objective. She’d uncovered those FBI agents who had been associated with Allumbaugh’s bad business. Most had been arrested. Some were still on the run. It wasn’t her job to wipe the floor after, even if it was her mess. She wasn’t the kind of person they wanted to stay around and help, only to reinforce the fact her presence had been necessary in the first place. No FBI agent wanted to be reminded there had been a disease in their ranks. Official word was that the agency planned to do their own cleanup.

  Which left her…where?

  Here.

  Police sirens rang outside. The cops had been called, possibly even responding to a resident going missing. Or maybe the break-in and possible abduction.

  “Where is my grandfather?”

  “You think finding him is going to be the end of it?” He grinned, flashing blood and enamel. “He’s after blood, and he’s only just getting started.”

  Victoria secured him to a barrel of sand and left a note for the cops to read when they discovered him here.

  Two minutes later she was back on her jog, pounding the sidewalk to where she’d left her rental car.

  Chapter 2

  Seattle, WA. Tuesday 8.42p.m.

  He pulled out the chair and sat. “I’m Assistant Director Mark Welvern, Seattle FBI office.” He motioned to the man sitting beside him wearing a considerably nicer suit. “This is Dennis Pacer. Assistant US Attorney.”

  All the while his stomach twinged, reminding Mark he’d had his insides shredded by a high caliber rifle round only a couple of months ago now. Too bad. No time to wallow, there was way too much work to do.

  The man across from them didn’t look up from the table. The two week growth of beard shifted though, a face made for only himself. He knew this was Seattle. He’d been flown here just yesterday. One of six FBI agents they’d recently arrested.

  So far, they’d attempted to climb the pecking order of this criminal group. At least, as best they’d been able to figure out who was who and where they fit.

  This one was at the top.

  “And you’re Steven Bordeaux. Born and raised in Tennessee, but you dropped the accent pretty quickly at that Yankee college, didn’t you? Criminal justice major.” Mark glanced up from the paper. “Guess you didn’t learn much.” He studied the file again, though he knew it all by heart. He’d been knee-deep in this guy’s personal and professional life for hours now. “Joined the FBI. Played at being the good guy, doing all the right things. Under the table, you’re taking bribes. Payoffs. Banking cash in a Cayman Island’s account.”

  The man shifted in his seat, handcuffs clinking. Orange jumpsuit. He’d be an old man before he saw the light of day as a free man. What would it take to get him to give up what he knew in exchange for a deal?

  “You’ve lost a lot. I’ll give you that.” Mark leaned back in the chair, refusing to allow either of the men in the room—or anyone watching through the window, for that matter—know his wound hurt still. Sure, they knew he wasn’t yet fully recovered. He was on desk duty only. He was also the boss of the whole office, answering only to the director of the FBI.

  Mark continued, “All those cards, fallen down now. Nothing to do but pick up the pieces and try to salvage what remains of your life.”

  “You’re gonna do that for me?” His face was carefully blank.

  “You should know by now, you don’t get something for nothing.” This man knew better than most. He’d been an agent for nearly two decades. Almost as long as Mark who’d spent his forty-fourth birthday unconsc
ious in the hospital a few weeks ago.

  “So I roll over on…who? And I get a deal, or something?” A tone leaked into Bordeaux’s words. He shifted one shoulder, like a half shrug. As though he had nothing better to do, and there was nothing major happening in his life right now. Like an indictment.

  Mark glanced at the A-USA, as though he hadn’t already discussed this option with Pacer.

  The man sat stone faced as he stared down the corrupt FBI agent. “That all depends on what you have to offer.”

  “You aren’t the one in charge, Bordeaux. You’re not the head of the snake, but I think you know who is.” Mark folded his arms as though, like the agent in cuffs, he had all day to wait instead of it being after nine at night now, and after a seriously long day.

  Actually, it had been a long month.

  The dirty FBI agents they’d uncovered had been entirely too coordinated in their efforts to not be in communication with each other—or at the least, receiving orders somehow. From someone. Had they found any indication at all that there’d been messages, coded or otherwise? Nope. Nada. It was starting to irritate Mark, cleaning up this mess. Seemed like with everything they uncovered, it was worse than they’d previously imagined.

  Men and women who had used the badge—the same one he wore—to hurt people. To try and get rich. Mark said, “We need to know who is in charge and where to find him.”

  “So I just roll over? Then he finds me in prison, and I bleed out on the floor.”

  Pacer said, “Protection can be part of the deal. If necessary.”

  Mark didn’t figure that would be effective, given who they were up against—FBI agents with contacts on both sides. A foot in polite society and the other in the underbelly, where people took cash to end someone’s life.

  Bordeaux shook his head. “If I’m in prison, I’m still breathing. I talk. That’s done.”

  Someone with reach. Someone with the reputation of disposing problems.

  Pacer flipped the page in the file and tugged over a slip of paper no bigger than a cocktail napkin. Bordeaux read it as well, though from upside down. The letters were small but block capitals. Mark watched him absorb what was there without even asking the question. He saw the flex in the man’s jaw muscle as he bit down on his molars.