“Noonan? You copy?”
Tall’s—Noonan’s—hip-slung two-way radio squawked just as Jake was about to lead the two hospital guards toward room 422. To Grady, right now being held at gunpoint. Maybe. They had no idea what was happening. And the clock was ticking. Though that might be a good thing.
“You standing by?” the guard’s radio asked.
“Ten-four,” Noonan answered, looking at Jake, acknowledging his lie. “Me and Palmeri.”
“There’s video of the shooter,” the radio voice went on. “We’re trying for ID. Continue to stand by. HRT arrives in five. Over.”
Jake’s phone buzzed. Then, with a blast of static, his own radio clicked on. They had him.
“Detective Brogan, this is BPD dispatch. What’s your location?”
His phone buzzed again.
“Detective Brogan?” dispatch persisted. “You copy?”
Crap. Noonan and his partner Palmeri fidgeted, their eyes darting toward 422, then back to the elevators.
“We should wait,” Noonan said.
“Screw that.” Palmeri lifted his weapon. “Brogan says we go.”
“This is Brogan.” Jake shook his head. No way out of this. Keyed his radio. “At BCH. I’m aware of the situation. I have a—” He looked at the two guards, unabashedly listening to everything he said. They could not find out Grady was an informant—it’d kill the kid’s cover. “I have a known hostage. I’m going in.”
Jake’s phone rang again. Kidding me? “Are you contacting me by phone, too, dispatch?”
“Negative,” dispatch said. “Supe says stand by. Do not move. Do not take action. HRT arriving in less than two.”
“You’re breaking up,” Jake said. “Reception’s no…” He paused, clicking the transmit button a few times. “… you anymore.”
He clicked off his radio, and with that, accepted the inevitable consequences and the unavoidable repercussions of disobeying orders. So what. Grady, who he’d promised to protect, needed protection. Jake was the only one who could provide it.
“Let’s—” he began, and then his phone rang again. Jane. She’d better not have left that closet.
He answered. Probably another terrible decision, his better judgment buried by responsibility. And guilt. His fault she was in this mess, too.
“You okay?” He needed to be sure.
“It’s Grady,” Jane was saying. “The hostage. Your Grady.”
“I know,” Jake said. “How the hell do you know?”
“From Isabel. And, Jake?”
He heard something in her voice. Hesitation. Fear? He had to hang up, but what if he never saw her again?
“I love you,” he said.
“I know, and ditto. But listen, Jake?” she said.
The phone went static, crackled, went silent. The buzz of connection returned.
“Jane? What?”
“Jake? Did you hear me?” she said. “I know who the shooter is, too.”
JANE RYLAND
Grady. Grady Houlihan. The confidential informant Jake had told her about, the one she’d warned him to be careful of. Bad enough he was the BCH hostage. But that wasn’t even the whole story. What had churned her stomach even more … When the surveillance video had finally downloaded, Jane had recognized the intruder.
Baby face. The guy who’d confessed to the hit-and-run. The one McCusker linked to the Sholto crew. She’d promised not to discuss it, but Jake needed to know. She could not, under any circumstances, allow him to walk cluelessly into a life-and-death face-off with a member of the ruthless Sholto organization because of an agreement she made with the DA. This very moment proved exactly why lines should never be crossed.
Now she had to cross. Phoning a cop who was on the trail of a hostage-taker had been a ridiculous move, but her only other option was to open the closet door, go out, find him, somehow, and tell him in person.
Now she could hear the tension in his voice. I love you, he’d said. As if it might be the last time.
“The shooter is Rourke Devane, he’s twenty-five, twenty-six or so,” Jane went on. “A Sholto lackey.”
“How do you know that?”
“Too long to explain,” she said. “Trust me.”
“Are you still in the closet? With that girl? Do not come out, Jane, either of you. This is about to go down.”
“Yeah.” She nudged Isabel, who Jane knew had heard it all, including “I love you” and “about to go down.” She smiled at her—We’re in this together—but the girl did not smile back. “We’re safely here,” she told Jake. “Behind closed door.” No need to mention she was about to broadcast live.
“Do not move,” Jake told her. And clicked off.
U all set? The text from Wu pinged on her phone. We got a 2:30 commercial break, Marsh sez go after that. Anchor intros u, u take it. Open-ended. Calling u now.
Jane, huddled in the dim bleach-stench of the closet, pictured what was about to happen. Thought about her live broadcast, from Jake’s point of view. What if the TV was on in Grady’s room? What if the shooter was watching? What if her live broadcast put Jake in danger? And Grady?
It was a jaw-droppingly bad idea.
She certainly couldn’t report that cops were in the hallway, or that something was “about to go down.” Might her broadcast make a terrible situation even worse? Her worlds were colliding. Was there any way to stop it?
Her phone rang.
It was her job to report breaking news. That’s what kept local TV stations in business. It would warn people away from BCH, and allow those now cowering inside to have some inkling, however murky, of what was going on in their building. So yeah, there was value in what she’d been told to say. But that wasn’t the whole story. Even for a reporter, sometimes it was better to say nothing.
The phone rang again.
“Ryland.”
“Connecting you to control,” Wu said. “Stand by. You’re on in two.”