Debra Webb - Colby Lockdown

Lucas shook his head. “I don’t know the details yet. Ian asked that I meet him here ASAP.” A glimpse of worry flashed in the man’s eyes before he moved forward, leading the way through the door. At the hostess’s questioning look, Lucas gestured toward the stairs beyond the serving counter. She nodded as if she understood exactly what was going on.

Slade sure as hell wished he knew what was going on as he climbed the stairs behind Lucas. Well into his sixties, Lucas was damned fit, but he’d lost a leg in a long-ago war and the prosthesis he wore slowed him down a bit. But Lucas Camp didn’t need any sympathy from Slade or anyone else. The man could be lethal when the need arose. He’d worked numerous deep-cover operations with the CIA for years. Even since retiring he still returned to D.C. monthly to advise the agency on the best way to conduct upcoming operations.

On the second floor, the big single room was cluttered with boxes of paper goods. Across the room near the windows overlooking the Mag Mile, Ian Michaels waited. He turned to face the new arrivals and there was no mistaking the grim expression he wore.

Whatever was going down, it was bad.

“What’s going on, Ian?” Lucas demanded as he and Slade weaved their way through the stacks of boxes.

“Jim is on his way,” Ian advised, avoiding a direct answer to the question.

Slade stared at the building across the street as he neared Ian’s position. His gaze zeroed in on the windows of the floor where the Colby Agency suite of offices should have been buzzing with activity. It was Monday morning after all. From the outside the situation appeared to be like any other snowy January day. No smoke billowing, no shattered glass, no official emergency vehicles in the vicinity of the building. What could be wrong?

“That’s good,” Lucas said in response to Ian’s statement regarding Jim, “but that doesn’t answer my question.”

Ian shifted his attention to the windows of the Colby Agency offices Slade still surveyed. “At seven forty-five this morning, a group of armed men dressed as SWAT agents laid siege to the agency and everyone inside.”

“That’s…crazy….” A chill penetrated deep into Slade’s bones. Mondays were early days. The weekly briefing. Not only was Victoria—Lucas’s wife and the head of the agency—in there, but so was every single member of the staff except for Slade and Ian…including Ian’s wife, Nicole.

“How many men?” Lucas asked the question before Slade could gather his wits and utter the same.

With an uncharacteristic shake of his head, Ian turned once more to face them. “I don’t know for certain. Nicole managed to get a call through to my cell but she was cut off before…” He swallowed with difficulty. “Before she could fully assess the situation. She mentioned five, then seven. But there could be more.”

The same terror humming beneath Ian’s tone had claimed the usually unreadable expression on Lucas’s face. “Was Nicole aware of any injuries?”

“She didn’t get a chance to relay anything more.”

“The security guards on duty have most likely been neutralized,” Slade suggested, now visually measuring the front entrance. He hoped no one had been killed but there was always that possibility. Anyone else from the businesses housed on the other floors who might have opted to go into work early that morning had likely been taken prisoner or were dead. “We should call LSS and have them issue a warning to stay clear of the building.”

LSS, Lockdown Security Systems, were the folks in charge of the building’s physical security.

“That was going to be my next—”

“That was the first call I received this morning,” Ian said, cutting off Lucas. “LSS called to inform me that the building was in lockdown mode due to a gas leak and no one was to enter until the all clear was given. Before I could question the directive or pass along that the agency already had people inside, Nicole’s call came in.”

Lucas surveyed the building in question once more. “I don’t see any official vehicles. No city maintenance crews.”

“I assume the so-called leak was a ploy to enact lockdown. I’ve had no further word from LSS so I have to assume someone is running interference there.”

Ian was right. Whoever had set this game in motion had done their homework. “Have you called the Chicago P.D.?” Slade asked. Since there were no cruisers in the vicinity he imagined the answer was no, but Ian could certainly have informed one of the agency’s many contacts within Chicago P.D. to come in dark. The real SWAT folks could be on standby out of sight.

“That’s not a move I want to make until I fully comprehend the terms of this situation.”

Understandable. Until the terms were known, their hands were tied to a great degree.

“What’s happening, Lucas?”

All three turned as Jim Colby crossed the room. The man hadn’t made a sound on the stairs. Slade never ceased to be impressed by Victoria’s son. He’d been trained as a mercenary as a boy. Could kill a man in mere seconds with nothing but his bare hands. As tall and muscled as he was, he could still move as stealthily as any predator of the jungle.

Lucas quickly explained what little Ian knew at this point. The fury that started to throb in Jim’s temples warned that he would not stand by and wait for terms. Slade wanted to act as well. But, as Ian had shown already, this was the time for patience and levelheadedness. Jim Colby possessed neither.

“I’ll assemble my team,” Jim announced. “We’ll move in within the hour.”

Jim ran a private investigations shop. But his staff worked around the law more often than not. They called themselves the Equalizers. In sharp contrast, the Colby Agency maintained a stellar reputation, going to great lengths to cooperate fully with law enforcement. Victoria and Jim didn’t see eye to eye on the way business was to be conducted.

“No.”

The single syllable echoed in the silence that followed. Only two men on this planet had the guts to stare Victoria’s son in the eye and tell him no: Lucas Camp and the one who’d just said the word—Ian Michaels. This was about to get hairy.

“If we’re not going in,” Jim growled, his gaze narrowing with the rage climbing inside him, “then what are you suggesting we do?”

“We do nothing,” Ian said flatly, “until we know what the terms of this takeover are. Any step we take might be the wrong one. We wait for the man in charge to make his demands.”

Jim walked two steps away, his hands planted on his hips, apparently to regain some measure of control. Or maybe to mentally pull together an entrance strategy.

Lucas took a breath. “Jim,” he said as calmly and quietly as could be expected under the circumstances, “Ian has a valid point. We have to think tactically here. Allowing an emotional reaction could cause more harm than good.”

Jim glared at his stepfather, then at Ian. “Reacting is not my specialty. This calls for action. Now. ” He said the last with a pointed stare at Ian. “Waiting will only allow the intruders to gain a stronger foothold.”

Ian’s grim expression remained in place as he held the other man’s lethal glare. “I am Victoria’s second-in-command. I am and will continue to be in charge. We will proceed with caution.”

Jim reclaimed the steps he’d taken, putting him toe-to-toe with Ian. “Victoria is my mother. We’ll do things my way. No negotiations.”

Slade shared a look with Lucas. The circumstances were sensitive to say the least. Both men were strong-willed and each had a legitimate point. But, as a staff member of the Colby Agency, Slade’s alliance had to be with Ian. Jim was operating solely on emotion. Bad business at a moment like this.