In three other cruisers, three guys sat in the back seats. From the way they sat, Ethan assumed they were handcuffed.
Brita looked up but not making eye contact with him when he approached. From the distant stare in her eyes, he already knew she wasn’t doing well. He leaned into the doorway and wrapped his arms around both of them, holding them tight.
“Love you, baby,” he whispered in Brita’s ear.
She didn’t reply. He wasn’t even sure if she’d heard him. Then he realized her hearing might still be coming back and didn’t want to scream it at her.
“AuntieBee shot the bad guy, Uncle Ethan. He was coming after us.”
Hell, poor Jordan sounded like she’d reverted a little in age, from the sound of her voice.
“I heard.” He straightened, once again focusing on Brita, mentally willing her to look at him, to meet his gaze.
She wouldn’t.
So he focused on Jordan, stroking her long brown hair, which today was pulled into a single braid on the back of her head. “You okay, JJ?” he asked, his nickname for the girl.
“Yeah. AuntieBee’s a hero.”
He rested a hand on Jordan’s shoulder. “Sure she is, squirt.”
“She better not get in trouble.”
“We’ll get it sorted out.”
Dave McConnell walked over to join them as someone waved in the coroner’s van and parked it to block the public’s view as much as possible. From the way Dave tipped his head at Ethan, he knew the man wanted to discuss this with him away from Jordan.
And possibly away from Brita.
They walked to the front of the cruiser. “What the hell happened?” Ethan asked, keeping his voice low.
“Suspect was some Internet prankster. Went by PwnerInChief. Real name’s Jack Stankliskwi, twenty-seven years old. California ID on him. This is going to be a media shitstorm when it gets out, I’m telling you right now. Apparently this fucker is really famous online.”
“Oh, no.”
“Yeah. Those three jokers we took into custody are his film crew. Not only did they film everything, deceased was mic’d and had a body cam on him.”
“Security camera footage from Mote?”
He nodded. “We’ve got them pulling it for us. And the bird sanctuary.”
“Clean shoot?”
“I’m saying so, based on the footage I ran back on one of the crew’s cameras and other witness statements. Stand your ground, cut and dry. The dad who was with the group flat-out said he thought Brita was going to die, before she drew her gun. I can’t believe the state attorney’s office would dare charge her. Reasonable expectation of death or serious bodily injury to herself and almost seventy young kids, and it’s all on film.”
“What the hell were those jerks doing?”
“The crew admitted the plan was for him to run right up to some kids and get in their faces. They were hoping for a group of kids with only like one adult, but when they saw Jordan’s class, they thought that was a perfect opportunity. It almost looks like maybe he was trying to comply with her order to stop when he saw her gun, but he was running too fast and lost his footing and tripped just before she started firing. From her angle, it probably looked like he was trying to tackle her.”
Dave ran the toe of his tactical boot over some loose shell and gravel on the asphalt to demonstrate his point. “Or maybe he didn’t see her gun at first with the stupid hoods he was wearing. Maybe he didn’t hear her orders to stop because of them. He was screaming and yelling and roaring at her to appear even scarier. She gave him multiple orders to stop and drop, and warned him she had a gun and would shoot. I couldn’t tell the fucking knife wasn’t real until I was on top of it. Put myself in her shoes? I’d have shot him, too. Probably sooner than she did.”
“What do the three assholes with him say?”
“One of them literally shit himself. They’re lucky none of them got shot. They came running up behind him, dressed in black, with bandanas over their faces. I think Brita showed great restraint in not shooting them, under the circumstances. They were going to one-and-done a big scare here, leave in the confusion before anyone could stop them, then hit Siesta Key for another film session. They weren’t even going to tell people it was a joke and get film releases, just blur faces in post-production.”
“Fuck me,” Ethan muttered. “That’s exactly what we need, terrified tourists stampeding on the busiest beach in the goddamned county.”
“Right?” McConnell shook his head. “They said they picked the kids because they were such a large group and there weren’t a lot of adults with them. They’d almost decided to leave to try somewhere else when they saw them come out.”
“I heard a little girl was hurt?”
“Rock cut her knee when one of the parents grabbed her and dragged her out of the road. Nearly got hit by a car. Kids naturally spooked when the idiot came at them. Plus Brita yelled at them to run as she put herself between him and them.”
He looked at Ethan. “Despite how bad of shape she’s in, she still put herself between him and them.”
Dave was a good friend and had been there the day Brita had been injured, arriving on scene immediately after the shooting. “I wouldn’t expect any less from her. She’s still a cop. Doesn’t matter she doesn’t have a badge anymore.”
“Poor driver plowed into a palm tree trying to avoid hitting everyone. Different lady than the one almost hit the little girl.” He turned and pointed to where the wrecked car sat crumpled against the leaning palm tree on the other side of the road. There, an elderly woman talked to a uniformed deputy, giving him her statement.
“She okay?”
“Yeah. Pretty shook up. She was only going about twenty and the airbag cushioned her. She’s seventy-eight. Tried to transport her, but she insisted she’s okay. More worried about the kids than anything. Going to make sure she doesn’t get a ticket. She wasn’t speeding, and considering the circumstances, and her age, I think she did a damn good job not hitting any kids or other cars. She’s a Mote volunteer who was arriving to help out with Jordan’s class this afternoon.”
Ethan ran a hand through his hair. “Jesus, this keeps getting better, huh?”
“You ain’t kidding. We’ve got a PIO on the way because it looks like the Sarasota TV station was listening to the scanner. They’ve already called dispatch for more info. Plus”—he hooked a thumb over his shoulder toward the eastern end of the spit where the Ken Thompson Parkway ended and a couple of other businesses were located—“the radio station down there sent someone already. I backed his ass up behind the cordon, but he had a cell phone out and was videotaping before we got a sheet over the body.”
“Oh, good god.”
“I need a medic over here!”
They turned again, and now the officer who’d been talking to the elderly driver was easing her to the ground. Her skin had turned an unhealthy grey color Ethan suspected wasn’t good.
“Oh, shit,” Dave said as both he and Ethan and several other officers and EMTs ran in to help.
Less than a couple of minutes later, she was being transported by ambulance for a suspected heart attack.
As Dave and Ethan headed back to the cruiser where Brita and Jordan still sat, Ethan leaned in close to speak to Dave. “Recommend to the state attorney’s office that those three assholes get charged with as much as possible.”
“Already ahead of you. Hopefully that driver will sue the pants off of the production company, too.”
“If she survives,” Ethan grimly observed.
* * * *
Brita never had to shoot someone in the course of her time in law enforcement, or in the military. Draw her weapon while a cop? Sure, several times, but never actually shoot someone. She’d never had to fire her service weapon except at a range for training.
In the aftermath, as she sat there tightly holding Jordan against her, a functional emotional numbness had set in. First, there’d been pain all through her body, stress f
rom the running and subduing the men, an adrenaline jolt that now left her feeling shaky and weak. She wasn’t even sure she could drive, much less should drive.
They’re never going to let me chaperone a school trip again.
On the heels of that, another thought, that she needed to call Alisse and John and tell them what happened before they heard about it on the news and panicked.
The other kids, teachers, and parents had been herded into Mote’s auditorium by two uniformed deputies, who were standing watch over them. The little girl who’d been hurt was quickly patched up by EMS and also returned to the group so she wasn’t able to see the dead body on the ground.
Brita had refused to release Jordan once she’d had the little girl back in her arms.
Another source of physical misery, because Brita had lifted her to carry her as soon as she’d laid her hands on her. Jordan didn’t seem inclined to let go of her, either.
The deputies would also have to get statements from all the adults, and the kids. But they couldn’t question the kids without their parents present.
And now it looked like the poor woman who’d crashed her car while trying to avoid the kids was also being transported.
What if I had waited to fire?
But she’d thought the knife was real. And it wouldn’t have stopped the kids from stampeding.
The whirlwind around her seemed to pick up speed and intensity by the moment.
Ethan and Dave returned and crowded around the car door. “Hey, JJ?” Ethan started. “How about you and me go inside to the gift shop for a couple of minutes, okay?”
Jordan’s grip tightened around Brita’s neck, painful, but she wouldn’t force Jordan to let go. “I want to stay with AuntieBee!”
“We’ll come back to her, honey. AuntieBee needs to talk to our friend Major Dave here, and tell him what happened.”
“AuntieBee shot the bad guy. The end.”
Brita closed her eyes and struggled against the laugh that threatened to burp free. “Honey,” she said, her throat now feeling raw and hoarse from the screaming she’d done earlier, “please go with Uncle Ethan for a few minutes. It’s okay. He’ll bring you back.”
Jordan sat back so she could stare into Brita’s eyes. “I don’t want to leave you alone, AuntieBee. You look like you’re in pain.”
“I won’t be alone, honey. Dave’s a friend of mine. We worked together when I was still a deputy. You’ve met him before, but you were probably too little to remember it.”
“They won’t arrest you, will they?”
“No, sweetheart,” Dave said. “AuntieBee’s not in any trouble.”
Jordan turned to look at Dave, a dark scowl on her face. “You’d better not arrest her. She saved us!”
“We know, sweetheart. But I need to fill out paperwork and have to talk to her. It’s adult stuff. It’s okay.”
“Please go with Uncle Ethan. Oh.” Brita pulled her phone out of her pocket and handed it to Ethan. “Please call Alisse and John for me and tell them not to panic. Sooner rather than later.”
“Roger.” He held his arms out to Jordan. “Come on, JJ. I have a credit card itching to buy you a new stuffed animal.”
Those were the magic words, apparently. She climbed off Brita and into Ethan’s arms and he carried her toward the main building.
Dave stepped in. The look of concern on his face nearly made Brita start crying. “You okay, hon?”
She shook her head. “I hope we can talk like this, because I honestly don’t think I can stand up right now.”
“You’re not going to be able to drive, are you?”
“Probably not. I’ll let Ethan drive us home and come back for my car later, or have it towed home.”
“We’ll get someone to drive it for you.” He took out his notepad and a pen and leaned against the cruiser’s door.
She wasn’t so out of it that she didn’t know he was using his body to shield her from view from the growing crowd of bystanders being held back by the cordon.
“Let’s get this over with as quickly as possible, hon,” he said. “Go through it with me.”
She did, and there wasn’t a lot to go through. It had happened so fast, and she’d been focused on the attacker, and then the three men, so she hadn’t seen everything that had happened behind her at the road with the kids.
He was starting to read his notes back to her when his radio went off, in the car and echoing through his shoulder mic, paging him, updating him.
That’s when Brita finally did start crying.
The elderly driver had been pronounced DOA at the hospital, adding another round of charges to the three idiots now in custody.
* * * *
Ethan dreaded this call. He decided to handle John first, hoping he’d react more calmly than Alisse. While he followed Jordan around the small gift shop, he waited for the man to pick up.
“Hey, B. How’s Mote?”
“John, it’s Ethan.”
The man’s tone changed immediately. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Jordan’s fine, and Brita’s fine, but there was an incident at Mote this morning. I’m here with them now.”
“Incident?”
“Yeah.” He gave brief details, hoping the man didn’t flip out.
There was a moment of silence from the other end. “She…shot the guy?”
“Yeah. The knife looked real. No way Brita could have known it wasn’t real. And he was wearing a costume, a creepy cloth hood, leather gloves with fake blood on them, completely dressed like a horror movie monster. I’d have reacted the same way. It was that PwnerInChief asshole.”
“Oh, shit,” he whispered. “That guy’s famous.”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll get out of here and be over there in about thirty minutes.”
“No, you can’t get in anyway. They’re not letting anyone in right now who isn’t emergency services or works at Mote. Please call Alisse and let her know before she hears about it on the news. I’ll stay with Brita and JJ at Brita’s. Come pick her up there at the usual time.”
“Okay, I will. Can I talk to Jordan?”
“Sure. I’m going to put Brita’s phone on silent after we’re done here and hold it for her, so call me on mine, not hers. But I might not be able to answer. If Alisse can avoid calling, that’d be better.”
“But Jordan and B are okay?”
“They’re fine, but Brita needs to give her statement, and so does Jordan.” He got Jordan’s attention. “Daddy wants to talk to you.”
Jordan grabbed the phone and apparently didn’t even wait for him to talk. “Daddy! AuntieBee saved us from a bad guy!”
As Ethan listened to her talk, he thought about what might have happened had Brita not been there. The guy might not have died, but there was a good chance kids could have been seriously hurt, or died, because of running out into traffic. Had the one father not grabbed the little girl’s arm and pulled her out of the way, she would likely be dead or on a helicopter to a trauma center.
His mind flashed back to Brita in the ICU and remembered now his discussion with the nurse about the practical joker. At the time, it’d washed over his head like so many other things had during that period, not to be processed then, mere filler while he waited for Brita to recover enough to open her eyes and look at him and speak and be okay.
It was a clean shoot. There was no doubt in his mind about it.
But would Brita ever forgive herself for taking an “innocent” life, even if the guy basically set himself up for an unintentional suicide-by-cop scenario?
Chapter Ten
Ethan let Jordan pick out three stuffed animals—a sea turtle, a dolphin, and a shark. When he realized Jordan hadn’t eaten, he walked her around to the auditorium where the other kids and teachers were being kept, carrying her as she held the bag with her stuffed animals.
When they walked in, he wasn’t sure what reaction he expected, but the stunned silence from the teachers and parents was im
mediately swallowed by loud, raucous cheers and clapping from all the kids, some of whom ran up to them.
As he set Jordan down, he could barely make out their words, they were talking over each other so loudly.
“Your aunt is cool!”
“Is the guy really dead?”
“Your aunt didn’t get into trouble, did she?”
“She’s awesome!”
“Is she going to come back and eat lunch with us?”
“I love your aunt!”
He’d expected the kids to be shell-shocked, but even one girl, who wore a bandage on her leg and looked like she’d been recently crying, was calling Jordan’s name from the back of the mob and trying to get her attention.
One of the teachers, the older of the two, looked grim as she walked up, but she quickly pasted a smile on her face. He didn’t miss that her gaze dipped to the badge on his belt before focusing on the kids again.
“Everyone, please take your seats and finish eating.”
“She needs her lunch,” Ethan said.
“We saved it for her.”
Jordan looked up. “Uncle Ethan, can I get it and take it back out to eat with you and AuntieBee?”
“I already ate. You stay here until AuntieBee or I come get you, honey.”
“Jordan, Miss Matthews has your lunch. Go see her, please.”
She ran over to another woman, whom Ethan recognized as Jordan’s teacher. The parents were huddled together in a tight ball and staring at him as if he were a grizzly ready to pounce.
The older teacher, Ethan thought her name was Mrs. Atkins, pointed at the door.
Shit.
After letting the door swing shut behind them, she crossed her arms over her chest. “She brought a gun on a class field trip?” she hissed. “How irresponsible is that?”
“I think you’re missing the bigger picture here. You do realize she’s retired law enforcement, right? A detective from Sarasota County. She was injured in the line of duty four years ago. And she’s a licensed federal firearms dealer, as well as a certified firearms instructor. I can assure you, there are very few people more qualified to carry than her. Not to mention she was in the military.”