Nemesis (FBI Thriller 19)

“Hold on!” Cal slammed down on the brakes, sending them into a spin. The SUV slammed into one of the construction blocks, sending smoke pouring from under the hood. They all stared beyond at the overturned Camry. The driver’s door was shoved open and Basara, blood streaming down his face, rolled out and came up to his knees. He saw them on the other side of the concrete blocks, cars stacked around them at an angle, their blaring horns filling the air.

He raised his gun but saw they were blocked in, and ran across the traffic circle toward the Lincoln Memorial and its crowds of tourists.

Sherlock and Kelly were out of the SUV, running after him, weaving through tourists and traffic. Kelly held up her creds and yelled, “FBI agents!” every few steps, but a father didn’t jerk his small child out of Kelly’s path fast enough. She tripped and went down. Sherlock was ahead of her, saw Basara running toward the Lincoln Memorial, people parting in front of him at the sight of his gun and the blood running down his face.

Please, don’t let him grab a hostage.

She yelled, “Everyone down!”

Basara heard her, stopped, and she knew he was going take a teenage girl standing on the steps, but in the last instant, he turned, deaf to all the screaming people, and his eyes met Sherlock’s. He fired three shots, and the last one hit her in the chest. Sherlock staggered back with the god-awful pain. For an instant she couldn’t breathe. She fell to her knees, wondering blankly if her ribs were broken under the Kevlar. She flattened herself onto her stomach and forced herself to calm, held her Glock steady with both hands, her eyes never leaving him. Before he could fire again, she got off three shots. She watched them strike his neck, his shoulder, his chest. He froze on the wide step for a moment, his eyes locked to hers before he collapsed and tumbled down the steps.

She jumped to her feet and yelled, “Stay back!” as she ran to him, kicked away his gun that had fallen to the first step. He was lying sprawled on his back, at an angle on the steps, his chest heaving, blood fountaining out of his neck. She dropped to her knees beside him.

She heard Dillon shouting, but she didn’t look away from Basara.

His eyes were filming over, but still he whispered, his words thick with blood, “I wanted to bomb you to hell.”

“That didn’t work out for you, did it?”

He licked the blood off his lips. “I can’t die. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”

His head fell to the side and his eyes stared up at the sky, seeing nothing now. He was dead. It didn’t make up for Nasim’s murder, but it was all they’d get. Sherlock stared down at him, aware now of a dozen people beginning to crowd around her. She heard Dillon’s voice ordering them back. Kelly came running up to fall on her knees beside Sherlock, Cal on her heels.

Sherlock rose slowly, Basara’s blood covering the front of her white shirt, and felt Dillon’s arm go around her.

It was over.

SAVICH HOUSE

GEORGETOWN

Tuesday night

By the fourth verse of their sing-along of “The Little Kid with the Greatest Mom,” Sean was finally down for the count. It was a country-and-western song Savich had written for him when he’d been two years old. The words weren’t all that good, but then again, neither was Sherlock’s voice. It wasn’t a problem. Sean didn’t know any better. They stood together, looking down at their sleeping son. Savich kissed her temple. “Welcome home.”

She turned in his arms and pressed her cheek against his neck. “I hated being away from you and Sean.” She gave a little laugh. “I’ve told you that half a dozen times since I walked in the door.”

“Keep saying it, makes my heart settle down. I don’t know who was happier to see you, Sean or Astro. It was me, actually.” He pulled her tight against him again.

“I always had agents around me, Dillon, you know that.”

“You could have been under a blanket of agents and I’d still feel the same way.”

She reared back, touched her fingertips to his face. “I feel the same way about you, but it’s over now, finally over. Basara is dead.” She blinked. “Hard to believe it all started less than a week ago at JFK.” She saw Nasim’s face, Marie Claire’s face, and turned it off. “The thought of Basara using terrorist acts to cover up his assassinations—murdering hundreds of people for the sole purpose of murdering one—and all for money. I think about all those people now dead because they happened to be riding the TGV in France. And what if he’d succeeded in bombing Saint Patrick’s and Saint Paul’s? I wonder how many years this goes back? How many people he killed? He was a psychopath, Dillon, evil to the core.”