Erica Orloff - The Golden Girl

Madison had once read a newspaper story about a woman attacked by a pit bull. In the article, she vaguely recalled something about advice during a dog attack. She kept backing away from the dog.

“Easy there, buddy. Easy…”

When she got to the warehouse, she climbed backward up the fire-escape steps. The dog was still barking and snarling. Then it started lunging at her. Madison thrust the two-by-four forward, wedging it in the dog’s jaws. She prayed she could hold the guard dog off until she found an unlocked window or door.

On the second-floor landing, the door was locked, but a window next to it wasn’t. In fact, it was shattered.

“It’s now or never,” Madison said aloud to herself—and the dog.

With all her strength, she shoved downward with the plank, sending the dog careening backward down the metal stairwell, his paws slippery on the metal. Quickly, she climbed through the broken window, careful not to touch a few remaining shards of glass on the sill.

Once inside, she allowed her eyes to adjust to the darkness. She tried to imagine the elegant Claire coming here and navigating all that Maddie had just gone through. That made Maddie wonder—perhaps she hadn’t. Maybe whomever Claire was meeting had made sure the gate was unlocked, the dog gone, the doors unlocked. The more Maddie thought about it, the more she was certain that Claire knew who she was meeting and was greeted in a more hospitable fashion.

Maddie wandered the second floor, trying to avoid letting the cold fear in her gut take over. This was where Claire had been killed. Down on the first floor, peering over a metal railing, she could see yellow police tape still strung around a spot on the floor with a dark stain. Maddie felt queasy.

However, any thoughts of queasiness were soon replaced because she could hear the sound of a car’s tires crunching on gravel, and the dog began its fevered barking again.

Maddie looked around. Whoever it was would know she was here. They would search the warehouse until they found her. She decided if that was the case, she’d at least be in a good vantage point to take a shot or two at her enemy. And if that enemy turned out to be her father? She’d have to see what the heck he wanted and tell him to come clean. That worry—what she’d find about her father if she came here—had kept her from alerting anyone to her plans. Now she realized how rash she’d acted.

Moving quickly, Maddie opted to hide behind a shipping container. She could peer around the side of it, and she was protected from any returned gunfire.

Whoever was after her, they had the key. From her vantage point, she saw the downstairs door open—a big, wide door, wide enough for a small truck to drive through. Two men came in—neither of whom she had ever seen before.

One made hand gestures, indicating he was going upstairs, and his partner was to look downstairs. They separated, and Maddie readied herself in a shooting stance. Not that she was prepared to kill anyone now or ever.

The guy who was coming upstairs started taunting her in an accent that sounded vaguely Eastern European.

“Come out, Blondie. Come out, come out, wherever you are. We won’t hurt you. Much.” Then he cackled.

When he reached the upstairs landing he started creeping from side to side in the hall. Moving target, in the dark. Maddie knew as soon as she fired, her position would be revealed. Her heart racing, now her conscience was hoping she could hit him. He had a gun drawn—she had no idea what type it was, but it had a silencer on it, and it looked big. Then she saw a red dot on the wall. Great, she thought. He’s got infrared, the better to see me in the dark.

Maddie lined up a shot as best she could, not wanting to kill, just stop him.

She gently squeezed the trigger, aiming for his thigh—she hit him.

“Son of a fucking bitch! I’m hit!”

Whoever he was, he had stood about six foot three, and now he crumpled like a sack of potatoes, falling to the ground, his gun clattering across the metal floor.

From downstairs, his partner in crime called up to him. “You okay?”

“Shit! I’m bleeding like a stuck pig. Get up here.”

Maddie listened, but the guy’s partner sure didn’t sound as if he was rushing up to his aid. Eventually, the other guy did appear on the landing. He had his gun drawn, too, and then went and stood over his partner. Taking aim, he shot him casually in the head.

Maddie’s eyes widened, her adrenaline already pumping after shooing the first guy. Christ, she thought, if he’ll do that to his partner, what the hell is he going to do to me?

“Come out, bitch. And I won’t kill you.”

He started toward her, and she fired off two rounds, both missing wildly. “I’ve called 911!” she shouted.

He seemed to buy her bluff. He retreated, kicking his partner’s body on the way out and muttering something in Russian. She was fluent in French, German and Spanish, but she had a smattering of Russian and Greek. Then she heard the second man running down the metal staircase. She heard another shot and the whimper of the dog. God, who were these guys?

She came out from her hiding spot and then ran outside, avoiding looking at the dead body on the way. She had never been close to a dead body before except at a couple of funerals. Seeing the taillights of their car, she squinted but was unable to get a plate number. She walked across the parking lot and prepared to climb over the fence again.

“Damn them!” All four of her tires were slashed. Her precious Aston Martin. Now she was really mad. Stuck there, with a dead body on the second floor, she realized she had no choice. She took out her cell phone and called Troy. She was an agent for all of a few days and already he was having to come bail her out.

Chapter 7

“Are you out of your mind?”

Troy Carter stared at her. He’d obviously thrown on jeans and a sweatshirt and come straight from bed. His hair was rumpled, and he had major beard stubble.

“No.”

He was surveying her car’s tires while inside a team of FBI agents processed the dead body.

“Look…I understand that you’re used to calling all the shots in your company, and that you are, in some weird, competitive, type-A insane way, cut out for this. But I already feel responsible for what happened to Claire, and I sure as hell don’t want to come and find you with yellow police tape around your body. So do me a favor and operate just a tiny bit less like a one-woman commando and more like part of a team. Me and you…Here…” He handed her a tiny device that looked like a hearing aid.

“What’s this?”

“It’s how we keep in touch. It’s like a wire. You come to do something like this again, you let me know, for one thing. We do it together. In law enforcement, we have what is called backup. It’s an amazing concept, backup—I cover your back so you don’t end up in a dirty warehouse with two guys wanting to kill you. And then you wear this, which beats a cell phone. We can be in constant contact. And I’ll know if something’s going down.”

“Very James Bond.”

“Yeah. Wait till you see some of the gadgets we have for you ladies…. See, you actually get better gadgets than even me.”

“How come?”

“Well…we do need you. But we’re also aware that most of you come from backgrounds where, no matter how well we train you, there is no way you can be prepared for just how low the bad guys will sink. Not to mention, if something happens to you to blow your cover and word gets out about this undercover team, it’s a lot of people’s asses—mine included. I don’t relish the idea of a desk job in Butt Fuck, Alaska, you know?”