Page 63 of Cast in Shadow
“Check it out,” Manelli said.
The unknown guy moved closer. “Looks like a cave or something.”
“Fuck. What do we do?” Higgins asked.
Zeke considered their options and realized they didn’t have many. “Stay here,” he commanded, pulling the camo hood up over his head.
“Are you nuts? Where are you going? They’ll kill me!”
“No, they won’t.”
Zeke slipped out from the overhang and stayed close to the rocks. He crouched behind the scrub that flanked the opening. The two men approached, Manelli bringing up the rear.
“Samuel Higgins. This is Agent William Banks of the FBI. Come out slowly, hands where I can see them.”
Zeke had no idea if Banks was dirty, but he knew Manelli was, which meant if Higgins surrendered, he was as good as dead. He wasn’t about to let that happen.
Apparently Higgins had the same thought.
“Why?” Higgins shouted from within. “So you can waste me like you did Hanlon? I don’t think so.”
“Nice try, Higgins. We know you pulled the trigger. The guy had a wife and kids, did you know that?”
A shot rang out, and Banks dropped like a stone. Manelli stepped closer, pointed his gun at Banks’s prone form, and fired again.
“Enough of that.” Manelli approached the opening. “Hello, Sam. You know why I’m here. Give me the drive.”
“And what, you’ll just let me walk away?”
A dark laugh. “I think we both know that’s not going to happen. You killed two federal agents, and in the course of evading capture, you were mortally wounded. The only question is, whether or not your death was the result of an instant kill shot to the head or a shot to the stomach, causing you to bleed out slowly and painfully over the course of the next several hours.”
“How about C, none of the above?” Zeke offered.
Before Manelli could turn around, Zeke disabled him with a swift and brutal strike to the head. He kicked Manelli’s gun to the side, and then he pulled zip ties from one of his deep pockets and tossed a few to Higgins.
“Get his feet, then help me drag him farther into the cave.”
Higgins’s hands were shaking, and he looked like he was going to be sick, but he did what Zeke told him to do.
Zeke studied Manelli’s face, remembering Aggie’s description of the man who’d hit her. Pale, pockmarked skin, check. Dark, close-cropped hair and darker eyes, check. A wide nose that looked as if it had been broken a few times, check. A faint, thin scar that ran from his left ear to his jaw. Check and check.
Cold fury welled inside him. He broke Manelli’s nose, dislocated his ankles, broke the fingers of his dominant hand, and, remembering Aggie’s bruises, turned him on his side and delivered several swift kicks to the guy’s kidneys. Sam stared at him with wide, scared eyes.
“This is the guy who hurt Aggie,” Zeke explained.
“Oh,” Sam said, his expression turning angry. “In that case...” Sam pulled his leg back and delivered a few kicks of his own. “What about the other guy?”
Zeke shook his head. “We can’t help him, and we’re better off not disturbing the crime scene. Ballistics will show it was Manelli’s gun that killed him. Grab your stuff.”
“We’re just going to leave them here?”
“They didn’t come alone, and backup won’t be far behind. We don’t want to be here when they show up.”
This time, Higgins didn’t argue.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Aggie
