Chapter 10 — Allies of Coincidence

  Jeremy practically leapt out of Lani's car as it skidded up to the curb. He threw it in park, engine still running, with a mental apology to his absent partner for his poor driving. The bar was already surrounded by the Tacoma police, and they weren't about to let anyone nearby. Even him.

  "Who the fuck are you?" asked a patrolman, moving to stop him. They were just beginning to set up barricades around the area.

  "Jeremy fucking Ashe, Federal fucking Bureau of Investigation," Jeremy snarled. He waved his badge in the young man's face. "Get me whoever's in charge right the fuck now."

  "FBI?" asked a nearby lieutenant, looking up from his binoculars. He'd been trying to see anything inside the shuttered bar windows. Jeremy vaguely recognized the man, but the lieutenant definitely remembered him by the way his face fell. "Goddammit, not you again. The hell are you doing here?"

  "I'm taking over. Give me a radio."

  "Aren't you outside your jurisdiction?"

  Lani, if you don't recover fast, I'm going to end up shooting one of these fuckers soon. "I have blanket jurisdiction on any crime involving a firearm in the Cascadian region right now. Permit of my investigation into the Rallsburg incident. That includes this whole fucking state, if you weren't clear on that." Jeremy picked the man up and shoved him against the nearest van. "Call it up the line, motherfucker."

  As the hapless lieutenant did so, Jeremy took a pair of binoculars from a visibly intimidated patrolman and took a look at the bar. "Someone brief me."

  "Nine confirmed armed hostiles," came a sharp report from his side. A sniper, braced against the hood of the car with one knee on the ground. Former military. No cop calls 'em hostiles. "Minimum twenty civilians. Shots fired."

  "Casualties?"

  "Unknown."

  "What are the fuckers using?"

  "Glocks and sawed-offs, sir."

  Thank God for competent troopers. "Thanks." Jeremy leaned over to match his sightline, but it wasn't any better. He turned back to the lieutenant. "Any demands?"

  "No, sir." The lieutenant looked like he'd just been reamed from on high yet again, to Jeremy's satisfaction. "They haven't said a word."

  "We haven't communicated with them at all?"

  "Bar phone is disconnected, and they're using a jammer to block cell service. We didn't want to risk approaching and losing the hostages."

  "Good call." Now that Jeremy had authority, he was beginning to calm down. He didn't need to antagonize anyone unnecessarily. "Perimeter secured?"

  "One minute."

  Jeremy nodded. "I'm going in."

  "You're what?" the lieutenant asked, aghast.

  "I need to talk to these motherfuckers alive, and I'm not going to wait around for them to get shot coming out."

  "What about the hostages?"

  Fuck 'em. I've got bigger fish. "I'll make every effort to secure their release." He grabbed a vest from the back of the nearest truck and strapped it on. "Cover me."

  "No backup?" asked the sniper.

  "You volunteering?"

  He grinned. "All yours, sir."

  Jeremy knew he was being irrational and reckless, but at this point he didn't care. After so many false positives, so many armed crimes in progress that turned out mundane and ordinary, this time had to be different. It didn't follow any pattern at all. A strange location, no demands, and an armed and organized group? In the same region the presumed-dead Hailey Winscombe was supposedly sighted only the night before?

  If they weren't connected, it was such a crazy-ass coincidence that Jeremy would be letting his superstitious partner down if he didn't pursue it.

  They'd identified the body of the man that had gone to Canada to kill Boris and Dan as a virtual nobody. The guy was a hourly wage drone and frequent sport hunter. Absolutely nothing to tie him to the men he'd tried to murder—except that he was from Elma, the nearest town of any size to Rallsburg.

  Jeremy had combed the town thoroughly with a practical army at his back, Aderholt included, but they'd found nothing. The chief was following up other leads to the west along the coast, while Jeremy took the Olympia and Tacoma areas. Any violent crime involving firearms, or even the hint of some kind of organized crime activity, and the local cops were sure to get a visit from their local feds.

  He might have enjoyed getting to pester them so much if he weren't still flying solo.

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  "Give me some direction," he asked the sniper directly, ignoring the protesting lieutenant.

  "Best we can tell, they moved everyone to the back, then started sending them into the front one by one. It's fucking bizarre, sir."

  Looking for someone…? "Is there a back entrance?"

  "Locked up tight. When we approached, they took a shot at the ground to warn us off."

  "Locked up but they took a shot?"

  "There's a window. They put one guy there."

  "Excuse me, sir," interrupted the lieutenant. Jeremy rounded on him with a glare, but he stood firm. "If they aren't making demands and they haven't started killing anyone, wouldn't it be better to wait?"

  "That we know of," the sniper pointed out.

  "Shut up, Stebbins." The lieutenant scratched his head. "Why risk them killing the hostages? They've gotta come out sooner or later."

  "Do we have any drone cameras? Snakes? Anything to get us a view inside?"

  He shrugged, infuriating Jeremy. Don't you know your own fucking equipment? "SWAT's still on the way. Maybe fifteen minutes."

  "How the fuck did I get here before your SWAT team?"

  "We only have the one local one, sir, and they were off the clock. Had to call them in."

  A muffled gunshot and a flash of light filled the spaces around the blocked windows, causing them all to flinch.

  Jeremy shook his head. "Too late. I'm going in through that back door to negotiate."

  "You're fucking insane," the lieutenant shouted as he ran off, dropping all pretense of chain of command.

  Yeah, probably. But I've got two friends hurt by this mess now, not just one. Jeremy picked up the radio he'd grabbed from the truck, running an earbud up underneath his vest as he ran. He handed off his sidearm to the barricade a hundred feet away from the back door, then held up his hands and started walking down the alley.

  The back door was set into a plain stone wall, with a dumpster and a small shattered window on one side. Jeremy could see the bullet from the warning shot lying up against the wall, an ominous mark that served as a line in the sand. He stepped across it apprehensively, his hand raised in clear surrender.

  "Turn back, Agent Ashe."

  …I really hate being famous. "I just want to talk."

  The voice that answered sounded as nervous as he felt, but Jeremy refused to turn around. "I don't want to shoot you."

  "And I don't wanna get shot, so how about we figure this shit out?" Jeremy took another step forward. "I'm unarmed."

  "I— I saw." Even stammering. Fuck, this guy is either high as a kite or scared as a little kid. Either way, dangerous to have a gun. "I still can't let you in."

  "No one else is with me." Jeremy tried to dredge up his hostage negotiation training. Keep him calm, don't make any sudden moves, try to build rapport. Easy. "What's your name?"

  "I don't think I should tell you that."

  Jeremy smiled. "Smart. Well, you already know my name, so I can just skip that part." He glanced over his shoulder briefly, making sure the police weren't moving.

  "What are you doing?" the voice asked.

  Jeremy snapped back to his original position and froze. "I was just making sure my friends back there don't do anything stupid." In his ear, quiet radio reports gave him an update on the incoming SWAT teams and the building in general. No change, but there was no way out of the bar. They'd even checked for sewer exits, legitimate or secret.

  "O-okay."

  "We're pretty confused though. You guys haven't asked for anything. That's kind of the next step here."

  "I don't know how these things are supposed to go." Everything about this voice sounded a bit off to Jeremy. It wasn't angry, or bitter, or even crazy. Scared, for sure, but it didn't fit any of the other usual profiles he'd expect for a hostage-taker. The fuck is their agenda?

  "Well, you started off right. Got your building, secured it and the people inside, no weak spots. You did good there."

  "Thanks?"

  Jeremy was confusing him in the right way. Complimenting them would both serve to build up their relationship, and make them think they really were secure. It was true they hadn't missed an entrance, but it wasn't exactly hard for SWAT to make their own.

  He took another step forward, and to his relief the voice didn't react. "But you're supposed to go to step two now, where you tell us your demands. If we don't know what you want, how are we gonna make this all go away for you?"

  "I'm... not really in charge here."

  Jeremy smiled again. "Well you're doin' a great job so far. But the guy in charge didn't tell you what he wants?"

  "No, he did, but I can't tell you that."

  This bullshit is getting old. Jeremy took another step forward. "Nothing at all?"

  "Well, he's gonna want us to be let go. Just go without being charged or anything."

  Don't ever say no in a negotiation. Don't say yes either, but you can't just shoot them down. One more step forward. Jeremy was almost at the door. "If nothing bad has happened in that building, then we might be able to work that into a deal. But you gotta be straight with me."

  "Can you do that?"

  "I outrank all the shit behind me. You've seen me on TV, right?" Might as well use this bullshit fame for something. I doubt he knows a damn thing about police hierarchy. "I'm a federal agent. That means I'm above the state level. I can make a lot of things go away in a deal, but only if you can give me something in return."

  "I don't know… I don't think I was even supposed to talk to you."

  "Talking's the best way out of this, trust me." Jeremy took another step. He could probably grab the door if he reached out for it, but he could also get a pile of bullets in his chest. Not the time to see if this damn vest works… "But you guys gotta be communicating back. I'm unarmed, and you outnumber me almost ten to one. If you let me in, we can start talking and find a way out of this mess."

  "...I should ask them first. We're doing something important here. We can't just stop."

  And make me start this whole shit over again? Fuck that. "You can't do that though."

  "I can't?"

  Start bullshitting like you've never bullshitted before. "You guys don't have enough people. If you leave the door, my friends back there will try to break in. They've got tons of firepower itching to go. Military surplus shit. I don't want that, and you don't want that either. But if you just pop it open a crack and keep your guns locked and loaded, they can't move a muscle, because we all just want to go home without getting shot. Just like they're doing now, right?" Jeremy shrugged. "What am I gonna do on my own in there?"

  "...I'm opening the door. Make sure they don't move."

  "You got it. I'm reaching for my radio button, okay?"

  "Okay. Go slowly."

  Jeremy reached up to the button on his earpiece and tapped it. "I'm going in now. Stand by."

  "Solid copy, standing by. Over."

  The door slid open, just wide enough for Jeremy to squeeze in. The bright spotlights made it almost impossible to see anything inside beyond their view. All he could make out was the tip of the pistol owned by the voice he'd been making friends with, just barely sticking out into the light. Not taking a single chance.

  The pistol waved a little, prompting him forward. Jeremy took a few steps inside, hand still raised in surrender. As soon as he'd entered, the door slammed shut and the room plunged into black.

  Well, I made it in. Now what the fuck do I do?