“And leave behind all the innocent victims that killers like Harold Wood got their hands on?” he asked.
“What about Owen here? And Olivia? What about Jo West and Benning Reeves? Claire has been falsely suspected in helping you cover up Harold Wood’s murder. What about those innocent lives?” she asked. “None of them deserve what you’ve done. Are you going to be able to live with that for the rest of your life?”
“I never meant for any of them to get tied up in this.” He cast his gaze to Owen behind her, his expression stoic, and a hint of the agent she’d known returned. The thick beard growth along his jaw and around his mouth aged him another ten years in an instant, and for a moment hope blossomed behind her sternum. He was telling the truth. He hadn’t wanted any of this, but that didn’t excuse him from what he’d done. “I knew the moment Benning Reeves called you, we’d be here. With you on one side and me on the other. Even after realizing you played your own part in what happened to Samantha Perry, this isn’t what I wanted. I meant what I said before I pushed you through that window. You were always one of the good ones.”
That small sense of hope shattered as tension flooded his shoulders and arms, and she leveled her chin with the floor. “So were you, but we both know I can’t let you walk away from this, Ericson.”
“I know. That’s why this is going to hurt me more than it’s going to hurt you.” He arced his right arm back, and Ana reached for the first thing she could get her hands on along the shelves behind her and Owen.
Threading her fingers through the handle of a heavy gallon jug of bleach, she swung it into Ericson’s head as hard as she could. Her former partner stumbled back into the door he’d come through a few minutes ago and it slammed open against the wall behind it. He didn’t take long to recover. Rushing toward her, Owen’s scream loud in her ears, Ericson swung his fist aimed at her face. She thrust his wrist out of alignment, barely missing the knuckles to her jaw, but the pain from the explosion slowed her down. She wasn’t fast enough to block the second swing. Lightning struck behind her eyes as momentum threw her around into the shelves and pinned Owen between her and the metal. A kick to the back of her injured leg brought her down. She clutched onto the shelves for support but couldn’t get to her feet in time.
“I’m sorry, Ramirez. I really am, but I can’t let you take me in.” Ericson closed in again, his massive outline blocking the light from the bulb hanging from the ceiling. “I’m not finished with what needs to be done.”
“Leave her alone!” Owen rushed forward, beating his small fists against their kidnapper’s leg, but it wouldn’t be enough. Ana struggled to regain her balance as the boy did everything he could to protect her. “I’m going to tell my dad on you!”
With a single swipe of his hand, Ericson shoved Owen out of his way and into a collection of brooms and mops in the corner.
She pressed her weight into palms on one of the shelves and cringed as pain flared from the bullet wound in her chest. This was it. Her chance to get him back to Benning. Ana latched on to her former partner to keep his focus on her. “Owen, get out of here! Run!”
The six-year-old ran into the darkness on the other side of the door just as Ericson’s right hook slammed her into the floor. She bounced off the cement as his boot landed in her side, knocking the air from her lungs. Searing pain spread across her scalp as he fisted a handful of her hair and dragged her back into his chest. “It’s just the two of us now, partner, and only one of us is getting out of here alive.”
“You’re right.” She hauled her elbow back into his solar plexus. “And it’s going to be me.”
BENNING PUMPED HIS legs as fast as he could. He hadn’t mistaken that scream. Ana had yelled for Owen to run. His son was here. He was alive. He turned another corner where he thought the bastard in the mask had disappeared but collided with a pint-size child instead. He hit the ground, the surprised scream coming from the boy barely registering over the crowbar pinging off cement. Owen. Locking his hands on his son before he could dart away, he pulled the boy to his chest. “Owen! Buddy, it’s me. Daddy. I’ve got you. You’re safe. I’ve got you.”
He threaded one hand through his son’s hair, holding on to him as hard as he could without crushing him.
“Daddy!” The six-year-old seemed so much smaller than he remembered then. More frail. His son shook in his arms. His skin was clammy with a thin sheen of sweat and cold as sobs racked through his tiny frame. The overwhelming relief Benning felt in that moment was all consuming. But in an instant Owen pulled away, latching on to Benning’s hand to try to get him to his feet. “Daddy, she’s hurt. The man is hurting her. We have to help!”
Ana.
Dread clenched in his stomach. Unfiltered terror at the idea of leading Owen back toward his kidnapper flared hot under his skin. After everything they’d been through, the last thing he wanted right then was to let his son out of his sight, but Ana needed his help. She’d sacrificed herself before, to save him and Olivia at the safe house, and nearly died for it. He couldn’t let her go through that again. “Owen,
