Nerves of Steel (2 page)

Fentephex, or FX, was the drug industry's latest "miracle" analgesia that had crossed over from hospital use to street abuse.  Already this year, the drug had killed six of Cassie's patients.  She wasn't about to lose a seventh.

Eddie finished securing the IV line. He ran his fingers over the purplish raised needle tracks lining the girl's thin arms. "She's been shooting it."

"Push the Narcan.  I'll set up a drip."  There were at least two dozen pills twisted into the baggie.  How had the girl gotten her hands on that much FX?  Cassie shoved the bag of drugs into her pocket and reached for a syringe.

Without warning, the helicopter dropped.  Gravity grabbed Cassie, tearing her away from her patient.  Her stomach somersaulted, and she scrambled for a handhold.  She looked up.  One of the pinnacles of the PPG Tower rushed toward them.  Normally the glass tower with its fairytale spires stretching toward the sky was one of her favorite Pittsburgh landmarks.  Tonight it seemed a nightmarish dagger.

The Sikorsky lurched.  "Damn it, Zack!" Eddie's voice sounded through her headset.

Cassie couldn't tear her gaze away from the gleaming lights of the tower.  They pulled at the helicopter, a siren song beckoning them to their doom.  The helicopter pitched to the right.  She squeezed her eyes shut.

A blink of an eye.  A split second.  If anyone knew how fast a life could change, it was Cassie.  Who would come to her funeral?  She had no family left. 

Careless of her to lose everyone like that--how foolish of her to be the last one standing.

The helicopter climbed, then dropped once again, engines screaming in protest.  Acid scratched at the back of Cassie's parched throat.  She forced her eyes open.  The tower filled her window.  Thirty years weren't enough, she decided.  Not nearly enough.  Her mind filled with a vision of twisted steel, smoke and fire.  Would there be anything left to bury?

Focus on your patient.
 
You're not dead yet.
 
Neither is she.
 Cassie reached for her patient's wrist, her fingers automatically feeling for the pulse.  Stronger now that they had fluids going, but there were a few irregular beats.  And the girl's skin was still deathly cold.  All this jostling around wasn't helping her over-stressed heart.

The glass tower loomed over them.  With a shriek and a final howl of its engines, the Sikorsky righted itself, swerving away from disaster. 

A few minutes later, the lights of Three Rivers Medical Center came into view.  Before they could land, the shrieking of monitor alarms filled the cabin. 

"V-fib."  Cassie reached for the girl's carotid artery.  "No pulse."

"Hell." Eddie began chest compressions.

Cassie charged the defibrillator.  She forced air into the girl, squeezing the bag valve mask.  The defibrillator buzzed, signaling its readiness.

"Clear!"  Cassie planted the paddles on their patient's chest.  Electricity shot through the girl's chest.  "Nothing."  She exchanged the paddles for the epinephrine and injected the heart medication into the IV. 

The helicopter thudded down onto the landing pad.  The doors slid open, and helping hands reached in to move their patient.  Cassie took over chest compressions.  She wove her fingers together and pistoned her palms against the girl's breastbone.  The wind hurled wasp-stings of sleet against her skin.  Cassie ignored it, pausing only to fling her hair out of her face with an impatient shake of her head.  The barrette that once restrained it was long lost, probably at the bottom of the river.

Damn it, Cassie thought in rhythm with her chest compressions.  You are not going to die.  Not on my watch.

CHAPTER 2

If Detective Mickey Drake closed his eyes, the rain pounding against the dumpster lid sounded a lot like gunfire from a modified TEC-9. 
Splat-patta-pat-pat.
  Not as loud as the movies made it out.  Less bang, more pop.

Drake didn't close his eyes.  Instead he kept them riveted on the third floor window of the East Liberty apartment building where Lester Young was rocking the night away with his woman.

The wind did little to dissipate the stench of urine, rotting chicken, and sour milk that clung to the alley.  Gray mist swirled past Drake in tatters as transparent as promises from old lovers.

He shifted his weight, crammed his bare hands deeper into the pockets of his Navy peacoat, and tried to ignore the thud of the rain against garbage bags overflowing with moldering, dirty diapers.  The only light on the block came from the apartment's naked window and one overworked street lamp whose yellow glow struggled to make it as far as the pavement below. 

Yesterday was Drake's first day off in two weeks.  But when Lisa Dimeo, the straitlaced prosecutor working with the Pittsburgh Police Bureau's FX Taskforce, called to tell him she'd finally convinced her boss that they had enough probable cause to go for a warrant, he had joined in the hunt.  No way he was going to let a little thing like sleep stop him from bringing in Lester Young.

Drake had scoured all of the drug-dealing, murdering, sonofabitch's hideyholes until, about one in the morning, he tracked Lester to his strawberry's Ruby Avenue apartment.  Drake had been a good boy, called for backup, waited for Kwon to arrive with the warrant.  Lester wasn't walking on any technicality.  Not this time.

"You need some help out there, DJ?"  Janet Kwon's voice drilled through his earpiece.  "Thought you went to take a leak.  That was twenty minutes ago."

Her voice was good humored, but colored with concern.  Not solely concern about his well being.  Kwon's concern was that he'd done something to screw up.  Again.  Which was why he stood out here, freezing his butt off, instead of trapped inside the Intrepid with Kwon and her discerning glances.

"Found a better vantage point," he said into his radio.

"I think we should go in now.  Nothing's moving up there last half hour, good time to catch them sleeping."

"Or with their pants down," interjected Summers from his position at the rear of the building.  He sounded excited by the prospect, but then Summers was young, his gold shield so fresh it squeaked.

Drake wanted Lester more than anyone.  Taking down Lester would be better than sex--at least better than Drake remembered sex.  Last six months, he'd been living like one of those monks up the mountain in Loretto.  All part of getting his life back together.  Seeing that Lester got what he deserved was a big piece of that.  But still....

"There's a kid in there," he told the others.  With his binoculars he could see a red jacket, too small for an adult, hanging on the back of the door.  Beside it was a backpack emblazoned with the iridescent green figure of the Incredible Hulk.

"What kid?" Summers asked.  "I didn't see any kid." 

"If there is a kid," Kwon put in, "he'll be in the rear bedroom.  We can contain him."

"Too risky.  We wait."

"Could be fucking forever," Summers muttered.

"Don't worry, Eric," Kwon assured him.  "Lester's got to come out for more Viagra sooner or later."  The caffeine and adrenalin jazzed cops chuckled. 

Drake was silent.  He waited, rain puddling under his wool peacoat, soaking his jeans and canvas hightops until he couldn't move without squishing.  He watched, despite the fact that he'd been averaging less than four hours of sleep a night and his eyelids scratched like fifty-grit sandpaper.

 He blinked against the sting of sleet against his face.  Lester's window blurred, then refocused once more.  Lester left the front bedroom and walked naked in front of the curtainless window. 

Yes, come on down, Drake urged.  Time to play the
Price is Right
.  Or better yet,
Truth or Consequences
.  Because he had a little truth for good ole Lester--you didn't shoot at a cop, miss him and hit a van full of kids and walk away on a technicality without sure as hell paying the consequences.  Damn, it was going to feel good to nail Lester.  It was the drug dealer's third strike and he was O-U-T. 

Lester stepped into his pants.  Drake raised his radio.  "Actor's getting dressed.  Looks like show time." 

Kwon and the other team members acknowledged.  Drake crept through shadows to the end of the alley, until he stood directly across from the tenement, his gaze never leaving the window.  Lester reached for his shirt, his jacket. 

Come on, come on. 

Lester jerked upright, his mouth open, calling to someone as he fumbled through his jacket pockets.

Lester's strawberry sauntered from the bedroom, wearing only an unbelted chartreuse kimono.  Her expression went from seductive to fearful in one quick blink.  The words "double cross" and "whore" filtered down to the street.  The woman was speaking rapidly, backing away.  Lester struck her with an open handed slap, and she went down.  He hauled her up, shook her, hit her again; blood flew from her nose.  Lester twisted his fingers in her cornrows, drew his gun and pointed it at her face.

A little boy in Superman PJ's came out of the hallway, rubbing his eyes.  He saw the woman and ran over, tugged on Lester's arm, his mouth open in a scream.

Drake flew across the street, pounding through the puddles, up the stairs leading into the building.  He took the slippery concrete steps two at a time, shouldered through the heavy glass door, shouting into his radio for backup.

His chest was tight, his grip on his Glock sweaty as he raced up the steps to the third floor apartment.  Drake braced himself, waiting to hear a gunshot, certain that once again he was going to be too late.

CHAPTER 3

"Wait for backup, damn you, Drake!"  The voice shouting from the radio, loud enough to be heard over the pounding of his heart and his feet, was Kwon's.  Drake skidded to a stop outside the apartment door, caught his breath.

There was a kid on the other side.  And a woman.  And a man with a gun. 

SOP in a hostage situation was to call in the boys from Special Response.  Unless there were civilians in imminent danger.  Drake leaned against the wall, straining to listen.  He heard a woman crying—or was it the little boy?  Sounded like imminent danger to him.

He'd love to bust in and shoot the bastard, take him out of the game permanently, but Lester was his only lead to the source of the FX flooding the streets.  Drake needed him alive. 

Kwon reached the top of the steps, put a hand on Drake's shoulder while she murmured into her radio, checking on the rest of the team's positions.

A woman's scream pierced the flimsy door, cut short by a heavy thud.  The sound of breaking glass followed.

"Where is it, bitch?" Lester bellowed. 

It was totally against regs, but there was one sure way to draw Lester's attention away from the civilians.  Lester had a hard-on for Drake, knew Drake was behind his impending downfall.  If he busted through that door, there was no way the dealer would refuse the bait.

"I'm going in," he told Kwon.  He squeegeed water dripping from his hair out of his eyes, wiped his hands on a dry patch of T-shirt, and adjusted his Kevlar.

"No.  We wait."  Kwon was meticulous, almost as by the book as Dimeo.

"When I go in, Lester will turn on me.  You get the kid and mom out." 

For once Drake was thankful for the Housing Authority's penny pinching.  The door was so cheap, Lester's shouting had it rattling in its frame.  Drake raised his Glock, nodded to Kwon, and popped the door open with a well-placed kick.  It dangled crooked on its hinges and scraped across the pine floor as he pushed through.  Kwon followed him.

"Lester, old buddy, old pal," Drake called out, focusing the drug dealer's attention and gun on him, while Kwon moved behind him.  His gaze raked across the room.  The boy looked to be okay, huddled in the far corner, crying.  The woman was down but breathing.  He stayed near the door, giving Kwon more room to work so she wouldn't be at risk of crossing his line of fire. 

"We gotta talk, man," he continued his singsong patter, ignoring the Taurus Raging Bull Lester aimed at him.  Not easy, given the revolver's six inch barrel. 

The room reeked of marijuana and Southern Comfort.  White gleamed all around Lester's pupils, and the overhead light bulb reflected off sweat beading across his forehead.  Lester was smiling, a dopey grin, all teeth, that made Drake wonder if he'd broken his rule and sampled some of his own product. 

"Neighbors complaining about you making too much noise."  Drake's focus narrowed to the few feet separating him and the drug dealer, alert to the slightest shift in Lester's weight, tightening of his muscles, flick of an eye.  He forced his smile to mirror the drug dealer's.

Lester stumbled toward Drake, ignoring the bloody woman Kwon dragged out of the line of fire. Definitely high on something.  Lester was crazy enough to take potshots at a cop on a crowded street when he was stone cold sober.  How would he act now?  Drake's finger curled around the Glock's trigger guard, prepared to send Lester to the morgue if he had to.

"Drake, you lil' fucker.  Been a while.  Thought they finally fired your drunken ass." 

Lester waved his cannon of a gun, aiming it at intimate parts of Drake's anatomy.  Drake swallowed back his joke about the size of a man's weapon.  State Lester was in, he might take it the wrong way, but watching Lester lovingly stroke the chrome barrel of the Taurus, it was damned hard to resist.

"You wear that thing to bed?  What happened to the TEC-9 you used to carry?"

The drug dealer's smile widened.  Dudes loved talking about their guns.  "Jammed on me one time too many.  'Sides, I'm a big man, got big needs, know what I mean?"

Kwon closed the bedroom door, the civilians safely behind it, her own weapon now aimed at Lester.  Drake could hear the rest of the team running up the steps behind him.  He didn't turn to look.  Lester and his foot long, bad boy revolver had his complete attention.

"Guess'n maybe
s
you don't," Lester continued, his voice slurring.  "Heard how your bitch died on ya."

Enough of this shit.  Slowly, Drake holstered his weapon, extended his hand, palm up, toward Lester.  "C'mon Lester, you can insult me all you want on the ride over to the House."