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Mason frowned at him. “Jack?—”
“No, I won’t put you in danger too.” He checked his gun, then handed Mason Gray’s phone. “Call Roberson again.”
Mason slid over to the driver’s seat. “Be careful.”
Jack nodded. He walked toward the bar, his stomach knotting as he got closer. What if he was too late and Gray was already dead? No. He couldn’t, wouldn’t think that way.
Morales’s bar was a few blocks down the street. It was well before opening time, and there weren’t any lights on. Jack walked around the side until he found a half-busted window. When he peered in, he saw Gray on his knees. A muscularHispanic man—possibly Morales himself—loomed over him and a thug with an assault rifle stood behind him. Gray’s hands were tied behind his back. Metcalf, another junior detective who was working the case, lay on the floor beside him. Dead? No, Jack saw his chest rise and fall, but the pool of blood under him didn’t bode well for him staying alive much longer. Had Roberson sent him in or had he not gotten the word to call things off either?
“Tell me whose been ratting me out to you fuckers!” the man yelled at Gray.
Gray acted as if the man wasn’t there, but how much longer could he hold out? And where the fuck was Roberson?
Jack contemplated going in. Could he take both men? Probably not. But maybe he could lure one outside. He picked up a rock and tossed it through one of the panes that still existed on the window.
“What the fuck?” The man questioning Gray gestured to the man with the rifle. “Check it out.”
The man headed toward the back of the bar, and Jack raced around to the front door. A screech of tires drew his attention down the street. The cavalry was coming, but they were several blocks away. He couldn’t wait.
He rested his hand on doorknob and turned. He glanced down the road again. Several officers were running his way. He froze. He should get the hell out of there and let them handle it.
Gray grunted, a sound filled with pain, and Jack burst into the bar, gun ready. “Police. Drop your weapon.”
The dealer raised the gun and aimed it at Jack.
“No!” Gray screamed.
“Drop it,” Jack ordered.
The man fired on him a fraction of a second before Jack took his own shot.
Pain exploded in Jack’s chest. Holy fuck. The bastard had shot him.
“Jack!”
The last thing he heard was Gray screaming. Then a whooshing filled his head and darkness closed in on the edges of his vision.
Stay on your feet,he told himself.
“Police. Stop, police.” Someone came in behind him. He tried to turn his head to see, but he fell to the floor. He saw Gray struggling against his bonds; then the world went utterly blank. No sights. No sounds. Nothingness.
The next time Jack was aware of anything, he heard beeps and low murmurings. Mason’s and Gray’s voices might have been part of the buzz around him, or he might have imagined it. When he tried to force himself awake enough to grab hold of any of their words, pain smashed into him. Something was pressing on his chest, squeezing all his air out. He ran from it back into unconsciousness.
Sometime later—an hour? A day?—the voices began to tease him again, calling to him, making him want to wake up. Hetried again. The pain was still there, but it wasn’t bone-crushing this time. He tried to breathe, but something was wrong. Why couldn’t he breathe? He grabbed at his throat. Why was there a tube there?
“Jack, don’t!”
Gray.
Jack opened his eyes. Gray was pale, his eyes bloodshot.
“Jack, it’s okay. Mason’s gone to get a nurse. We’ll get the tube out.”
Jack nodded. Sleep was trying to take him again, but he fought. Graywasreally there. And Mason.
What the hell had happened to him? He tried to remember, but nothing came to him.
Mason and a nurse stepped into the room. After she’d checked him over, she said, “I’ll be back as soon as I talk to your doctor.”
