The Target

The decision to abandon the relationship made her world sway. All at once, she remembered something Quinn had told her…how when a bomb exploded, the universe shifted, and things were never the same again. Ever.

She usually didn’t get Quinn’s mystical pronouncements and this one had been no different, but she suddenly understood. Turning as if to stare out the window, she blinked rapidly and told herself she was doing the right thing. She had no other choice if she wanted to keep her self-respect and have the family she’d always dreamed about. After a few painful seconds, she forced everything to the back of her mind—she had to concentrate on the moment. Nothing could take away her focus from what was ahead.

That’s how bomb techs got killed.

They headed northeast, speeding up South Broad, toward the rough side of New Orleans and the Central Business District, Quinn taking the corners on two wheels, the sidewalks still busy with a late-lunchtime crowd of locals who flashed by the window in a blur. Ten minutes later, as the truck neared the site, they were forced to a crawl on a street already packed with TV cameras and excited reporters, each hoping for some blood for the five o’clock news. Hannah cursed the milling crowd under her breath—half the thrill for the bomber was witnessing his chaos on television. She was convinced EXIT’s number of calls would be drastically reduced if the nuts who made the bombs were deprived of their publicity.

With Quinn blasting the horn, they finally got past the media, and Hannah spotted the Metro Bomb Squad’s rig, two blocks down. The two-ton truck carried the local team’s equipment: their suits, X ray equipment, the PAN disrupter and demo kits among other things. It also pulled the TCV—the high-impact steel globe could suppress an entire explosion inside its inch-and-a-half-thick walls. All the techs had to do was pick up the bomb with their Andros robot, put the package inside the basket, then move the TCV to a safe place for controlled detonation. Contrary to the movies, no one grabbed the device at the last minute and tossed it out a window to save the day.

Unless, of course, they had to.

Mark cursed loudly and Hannah turned. He pointed to the neighborhood and she nodded slowly. It was a dismal and depressing place. A elementary school in need of paint sprawled directly across the litter-filled street from the TCV. The buildings were ringed by a chain-link fence, but in too many places to count, the wire had been pulled away and folded back to create gaps and holes. Gang graffiti decorated the walls.

On the other side of the ragged pavement, an even sadder building sat, fronted by a lopsided sign that announced Tiny Town for Tots. Built of concrete blocks with a low flat roof above, the day care gave off a shimmer of almost visible hopelessness. The windows were locked and barred, the empty playground filled with dilapidated toys. Hannah felt a wave of sympathy for the “Tots” who visited this “Tiny Town.” Their mothers must have felt the same way, but with no other options nearby what could they do? Another pang hit Hannah, this one even harder, but again she pushed it aside.

Spotting the commander of the local city team, she jumped from the SUV before Quinn had time to fully stop. Tony LaCroix had a little too much testosterone floating through him for Hannah’s taste, but he did a good job. She decided he looked relieved when he saw the team this time, though. With EXIT there, he was no longer responsible for the situation; they were the feds. The other techs caught up with her as she reached Tony’s side.

“Am I glad to see you guys,” LaCroix confessed, confirming Hannah’s suspicions. “I think this might be the guy you’ve been tracking. I was just about to put in a request for assistance.”

“Give us the rundown,” Quinn ordered.

NOPD-Central had caught the call about the suspicious box first, LaCroix explained, then a second telephone warning had come into the Metro bomb squad itself. The messages were the same, short and to the point. There’s a box by the back door of the Tiny Town Day Care. It’s got a bomb in it. Tell them to leave from the front and do it now.

The uniforms who had responded confirmed the caller’s story. In the alleyway, leaning against the rear entry of the center, was a shoe-box-size container. Wrapped in stained brown paper, the unlabeled, lopsided package definitely looked suspicious.

“Everyone’s out?”

LaCroix looked at Hannah as if she’d lost her mind. “Yes, Hannah. Everyone’s been evacuated.”

Quinn spoke. “Have you X-rayed yet?”

“There’s not enough room to get the machine in there.”

“So Arnold’s too big, too.”

LaCroix nodded at Quinn’s assessment of the robot they used. “Way too big. Our mini’s out of service and the four-by-four won’t fit. The alley’s less than three feet wide.” A pained look crossed LaCroix’s face. “We can’t ray it and we can’t bring the damn thing out.”

“How about BIPing it?”

LaCroix shook his head at Mark’s idea. “We blow that puppy in place, and the shit’ll hit the fan.” He jerked a thumb toward the back of the building. “There’s low-income housing behind that fence. The mayor would have a cow.”

Everyone’s stress level increased. “Have they been evacuated, too?”

He nodded at Hannah’s question.

“Then we’ll have to try the PAN,” Bobby said. “It’s all we’ve got left.”

Bobby was a specialist with the bomb disrupter. The device fired a variety of projectiles and was designed to disarm bombs without detonation. So far, they’d had no luck with it on any of Mr. Rogers’s bombs.

“I don’t think we can get it in there, either. The damn alley is so full of trash and crap—” Before LaCroix could continue, a minor riot seemed to break out near the perimeter of the cordoned-off area, then someone screamed—a piercing shriek that sent a sharp chill down Hannah’s spine. She turned in time to see a black woman in a flowered housedress push past a uniformed officer, her face contorted with agony.

Mark cursed again, and Hannah cut her eyes to Quinn. He was staring, too, but of all the people there, he would know what to do. He was great at his job, but he was even better with people. His ability to connect with them amazed her; Hannah would rather deal with a live bomb than an upset civvie.

The woman half ran, half stumbled to where they stood. Quinn stepped out to meet her and she collapsed in his arms, tears and sweat streaming down her face, her words coming so fast they were unintelligible. Hannah stood by helplessly, the same way, she imagined, Bobby felt as he looked on, his dark eyes rounded with concern for the clearly distraught woman.

“My babies!” the woman screamed, clutching Quinn’s arm. She jerked a trembling hand toward the center. “My grandbabies are in there! They’re in there! They’re gonna be blowed up—”

Quinn’s voice was low and calm. “We got everyone out, ma’am. The children have all been evacuat—”

“No-o-o-o,” she cried. “They didn’t get ’em. They forgot they were there. They didn’t count ’em when they brought the rest of ’em out! Charles Junior and Sister. They forgot ’em both!”

Bobby sucked in an audible breath as Hannah felt her stomach constrict, a hot sickness suddenly turning her inside out. Above his beard, Mark’s face actually paled.

Quinn held the woman’s arm and spoke gently. “Are you sure, ma’am? Are you positive they didn’t just slip out—”

“Yes, I’m sure!” She flapped her hand behind her and the four of them looked over her shoulder. Another woman, this one younger and better dressed, stood by the uniform, obviously arguing with him. “Ask her! She’s the one done left ’em there!”

Quinn called out and motioned to the cop to let the woman through. She ran to them, then spoke breathlessly, her eyes full of fright. “Two of the children are missing! We counted all of them twice, but Louetta—” she nodded toward the older woman in the flowered dress “—she came in late and I forgot to log them in.” She shivered visibly in the cool January sun, her fingers knotting together. “They must have hidden when we left.”

“How old are they?”

When Hannah asked the question, the woman glanced at her in a daze. “Charles Junior—he’s five—and Sister.” She gulped. “Sister’s only two. She does everything he does. He—he probably told her they were playing a game or something and they hid. They’ve done it before.”

“Where do they go?”

She turned back to Quinn, her eyes swimming with guilt and fear. “Th—there’s a closet by the back…back door. They like to climb inside. It’s where we keep the nap pads and blankets.” She started to shake, then she gathered herself with a visible effort and reached out to clutch at Quinn’s arm. “You’ve got to go in there, mister. You’ve got to go in there and save those babies.”

LACROIX SENT FOR ONE of his team members. She came quickly and led the two women away, making sounds of sympathy and doing her best to calm them. As they stumbled off, even more tension filled the space where they’d been, narrowing the choices the team had of how to proceed. Everything had changed. It was one thing when a building could suffer damage—it was a different situation when lives were at stake. Especially children’s lives.

Bobby spoke first. “I’ll go. This—”

Quinn interrupted. “No.” His voice was firmer than usual and both of them knew why. “I’ll do it.”

“C’mon, man,” Bobby persisted. “I know the area. I think I can get the PAN in there and then—”

“No. I’ll go and get the kids, then I’ll decide how to proceed.”

Quinn felt the curious looks from Hannah and Baker as his authoritative words registered, but he couldn’t take the time to explain. He hurried toward the SUV.

Hannah caught up with him as he swung open the back door. She grabbed his arm. “Let me go, Quinn! Those kids won’t leave that place with a man. I’d have a much better chance—”

“No way.” He pushed aside his heavy protective suit. It took too long to get into. He’d throw on his SRS-5—a lighter outfit—and hope for the best. “They won’t know the difference once I’ve got on the helmet.”

“This is crazy, Quinn,” she cried. “You can’t just crash in there—”

“But you can?” His fingers found his jacket and he turned to her, holding it out so she could help him into it. She responded automatically, and he stiffened his arms as she put the coat on him, the protector hard against his spine, a trickle of sweat already rolling down his back.

She buckled him in and he saw that her hands were trembling. “We haven’t done enough recon yet—”

“Hannah, for God’s sake! We don’t have the time for that.” He plucked his helmet from the rear of the SUV, gave the plastic shield a swipe, then thrust it on his head. “We’ve got to get those kids first. Then we’ll proceed.”

“No,” she said, almost in a whisper. “This is wrong…all wrong….”

He stared at her in puzzled surprise. Her face was flushed and her blue eyes were glowing with alarm. She was the least superstitious, the most logical of them all.

Why this? Why now?

Lifting the visor, he reached out and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, the silk curl soft and fragrant. “Everything will be fine, baby. We’ve got a date tonight, remember? I wouldn’t do anything to mess that up.” He bent down and kissed her, the taste of her lips lingering against his own. Then he ran into the building.

He was barely over the threshold when the bomb detonated.

The blast was deafening, the force incredible. A shock wave of heat and light sent the back door flying, and then the walls. They exploded upward in a choking cloud of dust and debris, the roof immediately following with a shriek. Wood and metal, concrete and glass, toys and furniture—everything inside the building and outside for a twenty-foot radius was sucked up by the pressure. A moment later, a deadly shower of shrapnel rained down. The noise was unimaginable, then everything went quiet.

CHAPTER TWO

THE DOCTORS TOLD HER he might not live.

Describing Quinn’s wounds in detail, they explained to Hannah how badly he’d been hurt. His right leg had been violently broken and a piece of metal had pierced his chest. The burns weren’t too bad, but the blast injuries were severe. His hearing would probably return, then again, it might not—they weren’t sure at this point.

For a week, she didn’t leave the hospital. The nurses would occasionally try to get her to go home, but most of the time they left her alone, unwilling to face the battle she always put up and usually won. In the waiting room outside the ICU, she’d fall asleep sitting up on one of the chairs and have nightmares about the two children who’d died. The images haunted her and she suspected they always would.

Disregarding their own safety, she and Bobby and Mark had rushed in to pull out Quinn while Tony’s team had searched the rubble for the children. Trying to stem the blood flowing from Quinn’s chest, she’d looked up in time to catch a glimpse of LaCroix running out of the now-flaming building, a limp form cradled in his arms, another tech behind him carrying an identical burden. Bobby had followed her stare. When their eyes met a second later, his had been full of tears that spilled out and made two dark paths down his dust-covered cheeks. Hannah had wanted to scream at the heavens and curse, but instead she’d held her sobs inside and turned her attention back to Quinn. But every time she closed her eyes, she saw those babies again.

In the end, she left the hospital for them.

Hannah’s mother had told her she should go to the double funeral, and because Barbara Crosby was usually right about things like this, Hannah went, stopping at home first to dress. It felt strange to walk inside her house and take a shower and put on a suit. She went through the motions like a zombie, eating the hot lunch her mother forced on her, then heading for the service.

The church was two streets over from the day-care center. Hannah drove by the devastation with her eyes averted, finally locating a parking spot down the next block. After turning the engine off, she sat quietly and tried to gather her composure, breathing deeply and counting backward from ten. It was a trick she’d taught herself years ago and it usually worked. But not this time. She hadn’t even whispered “eight” when a couple walked by, obviously on their way to the service. The woman was already dabbing her eyes and the man had his arm around her protectively, his expression fierce with an angry grief.

If her mother hadn’t been waiting at home, Hannah would have fled.

Instead she closed her eyes and finished counting. Entering the church a few minutes later, she took a seat and then lifted her gaze. The first thing she saw, at the front of the church, were the two tiny caskets. All at once, she wished even more desperately that she’d escaped when she’d had the chance.

Now it was too late.

Hemmed in by more than just the other mourners and a palpable grief, Hannah was trapped by her own emotions. There was nothing in life she wanted more than children of her own. Put in the place of the desperately grieving mother, Hannah thought she might have simply taken out her service revolver and ended her agony.

A wave of rising murmurs signified the entrance of the family. Hannah’s initial view was blocked by others in the pew, but she could feel the heartache surging from the family members now moving down the aisle.

She got her first glimpse of them when they sat down. Like most of the mourners, they were dressed totally in black. They filled two pews and part of a third, the grandmother in the front row. Hannah wanted to close her eyes against the sight. The poor woman had aged ten years. Tears streaming down her face, she slumped against the two young men, grandsons, maybe, who sat on either side of her. Beside those three, a mute, shell-shocked couple, the children’s parents, waited in silence for the service to begin.

She’d learned the details of their lives from Bobby. Beverly Williams, the mother, worked the second shift as a printer’s assistant at the Times-Picayune. The father, Aloysius, ran a bakery, his hours starting as hers ended. The grandmother, a shampoo assistant at a local hairdresser, helped out by taking the children to the day care before going to work herself. They ate dinner together in the evenings before the torturous schedule started over again the next day.

Hannah could only wonder at the agony they must be experiencing. The Williamses wore the stunned expressions of people who’d been through an explosion themselves, their eyes blank, their faces empty. Their world was gone.

The service began with a woman stepping up to the dais behind the coffins. Quietly dignified and impeccably groomed in a spotless suit, she introduced herself as the mistress of the ceremony and welcomed everyone to the homecoming of the two children. After that, a young man seated at the piano began to play. A soft melody filled the church and Hannah instantly recognized “Amazing Grace.” But to her ears, the people around her seemed to be struggling to sing, their voices straining to maintain the song’s hopeful message.

She couldn’t even try. Instead she bent her head and stared at her shaking hands. One minute, those babies had been playing a game of hide-and-seek, and the next minute, they were gone. All the hopes, all the dreams, all the plans for the future that this family had for them…destroyed in one terrible moment. A moment designed by a madman.

She lifted her eyes to the caskets once more, where their shape shifted and grew. The white changed to mahogany, and instead of the Williams family sitting in the front pew, she saw herself.

Quinn’s death or theirs? Who had decided? The minute she formed the question, Hannah knew the answer. There was no plan to any of this, no fairness, no justice. Those children died, but it could have just as easily been Quinn. Or her. Life offered no guarantees. All you could do was go out there, pray for help, then give it your best. Nothing else was under your control.

Hannah covered her eyes and fought her emotions. If she didn’t begin to seek the things she held so dear—a family, children, a man to love—they weren’t ever going to be hers. Things like that didn’t simply arrive on your doorstep. They didn’t come to you of their own accord. You made them happen.

Or you didn’t. It was up to no one else.

Lost in thought, Hannah didn’t realize the service was over until the pew began to empty. A few minutes later, she found herself outside, standing on the fringe of the grief-filled crowd now moving en masse toward a white-striped canopy. The cemetery shared the church grounds, she saw suddenly, and they were heading for the grave sites. She stopped, turned and walked against the flow. She couldn’t handle any more. No one seemed to even notice; they continued toward the graves, moving around her like water surging past an island. She kept her composure until she reached the car, and then she broke down completely.

Back at the hospital, she longed to talk to the still figure beneath the covers, but she ended up saying nothing about the funeral. The following week, Quinn was moved into a private room. Staying beside him during the day, but sleeping in her own bed at night, Hannah walked a thin line of anxiety, torn between guilt and love. She knew she should leave Quinn—she needed to move on—but something she couldn’t deny held her in place. Besides, he had no one else. She had her mother, but Quinn had already lost both his parents, and like Hannah, he’d been an only child. Hannah couldn’t abandon him.

Quinn remained remote; drugged for the pain and deaf to all sounds.

She had no idea if he knew she was there.

HE KNEW SHE WAS THERE.

But little else registered. The days and nights merged together, and Quinn marked the passing of time by the level of his agony. His consciousness was a transitory thing, the pain a wave that pulled him into alertness, then sent him tumbling back out again. When he could think, he was sure he was going to die; when he couldn’t, all he did was wish he would. He knew he had failed and the children had been killed. He slept as much to escape that fact as anything else.

After a while—minutes, hours, days—he wasn’t sure, his awareness began to return. Slowly at first, then more quickly, images and sensations came to him. He smelled the smoke and saw a tiny shoe, he heard a woman’s grief-filled scream and felt the heat. His body would eventually recover, but the grief he felt for the children was a wound that would never heal.

A MONTH AFTER THE BOMBING, Quinn was moved to a rehabilitation hospital.

Hannah continued to come every day. Always laden with messages from the other team members, she kept him abreast of their work and everything that continued to happen in the real world, including the fact that Bill Ford had left and appointed Bobby Justice as the new team leader. Quinn acknowledged the news with a nod and nothing more. Hannah had never learned of Quinn’s promotion, but what did it matter now? He concentrated on her, instead. Beneath the mundane conversations, Quinn had begun to sense a growing withdrawal. Hannah was pulling away from him, and he suspected he knew why.

The team had suffered losses before this, but not since Hannah had joined. Ever since the funeral, she’d been quiet and subdued. She was grieving for the children, just as he was, and in true Hannah fashion had decided to keep her feelings to herself. He’d reached the point where he simply tried not to think about them at all. It wasn’t a healthy way to deal with the situation, but it was the only way he could cope. The children stayed alive in his nightmares and that was more than enough for him.

But a week later, he decided the time had come for them both to confront the issue. Their emotions about the incident would only grow and eventually consume them if they didn’t bring everything into the open.

He was reaching for the phone to call her when his doctor entered. Six foot plus and built like a linebacker, Jorge Barroso was the best orthopedic surgeon New Orleans had ever seen. Born in Brazil, he looked as if he’d be more at home on a soccer field than in an operating room, but his hands were delicate and slight. They’d saved Quinn’s life.

Dr. Barroso asked his usual questions, then made notes on Quinn’s chart. After a few minutes he tossed the clipboard down and examined Quinn’s battered body. When he finished, he pursed his lips. “I think it’s almost time to kick you out of here, McNichol.”

“Sounds great. I’m ready.”

“No, you’re not,” the doctor said. “But we need the bed.” He grinned at his own joke, then his demeanor went serious. “You still planning on going to St. Martin?”

Quinn’s complete recovery would take months and they’d already discussed the fact that he needed somewhere quiet to recuperate. He’d decided that place was where he’d spent his childhood. An hour from New Orleans, St. Martin was a small town, up the river from where he still owned property that had been in his family forever. On temporary medical leave, he could retreat to the bayou and exercise until he dropped. Then Barroso would examine him again and reinstate him. Or at least that was the plan.

“Absolutely. In fact, I’ve already talked to the physical therapist who lives there,” Quinn said. “He sounds pretty good.”

“He’ll be able to help you quite a bit.” The doctor’s eyes met Quinn’s, his brown gaze as direct as his words. “But he’s not going to make you into the man you were before this, Quinn. He’s not a miracle worker.”

They’d discussed this before, too. Quinn tensed. “I’m going to return to the team. I’m going to recover.”

“That’s certainly a possibility. But you and I both know there’s another one. You might not be able to work again. Don’t pretend that chance doesn’t exist, my friend.”

“That’s not going to happen.” Quinn’s voice was level. “I won’t let it. If I work hard enough, I’ll be—”

“You’ll be fine,” the doctor interrupted smoothly. “But you might be fine while having a different career.” He reached across the bed and tapped Quinn’s leg. “Your injuries were very severe. Your recovery, complete or otherwise, is not going to happen overnight. I don’t want to see you in here again because you’ve hurt yourself trying to do something you can’t.”