Bitter Root (33 page)

“It’s going to be okay, I promise.”

Swiping a hand across her mouth, Adi nodded. The driver was
standing beside the car waiting for them.
Get
it together. You can do this.
Adi pictured Bertie, her smile wide,
sitting on the porch. Her words came back to her then. “
You all have things to do in that
world. That’s why you’re there. Be sure and do them. Don’t be stuck. Let life
take a hold of you and fly free.”

But this time there was more to her message, and she heard
Bertie’s voice loud in her head.
“This
is your time, Dink. Don’t you let that man stop you. You’re meant to stop him.
Get yourself moving, girl.”

She stumbled forward and climbed back into the car.

“Let’s go,” she said.

The square had a smattering of early morning tourists admiring
the cathedral. Griffith leaned casually against the iron rail surrounding
Colonel Jackson, but Adi couldn’t be still. She walked back and forth, dreading
the coming reunion. J.B. would have his people with him; she knew that. When
she had last seen him, he was small potatoes, but now, he was huge. He wouldn’t
come unprepared. She tried her best not to stare at the assorted agents around
the square. She knew there were two agents on rooftops with sniper positions,
in case things went really wrong.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“It’s five minutes past the last time you asked me. Try to calm
down. Worrying won’t make this any easier. He should be here in the next ten
minutes,” Griffith said.

As she was about to respond, Griffith’s phone rang.

“It’s him,” she said, “Hello?”

“McNaulty. I decided it would be nice to have a coffee while we
meet. Why don’t you and Merley walk on over here to Café du Monde?”

“That’s not what we agreed to. Merley isn’t comfortable being in
an enclosed space with you yet.”

“Let me talk to her.”

“Hold on,” she said. “He wants to talk to you. He wants us to
walk over to the café.”

“If he wants to see me, he can come to the statue as we agreed.”

Griffith conveyed the message.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that. Too exposed. I’m here, if she
changes her mind.”

She shook her head to let Adi know the situation and went back to
the call. “I’ll talk to her. Give me ten minutes.”

“Clock’s ticking.”

Mike’s voice came through the earpiece Adi was wearing in her
sunglasses.

“Do not comply.
We can abort the whole operation. Repeat, do not comply.”

Adi took the shades off to halt the shouted commands.

“We can’t go in there. You’d be unprotected,” Griffith said.

“I want this over. He needs to pay for what he’s done. Isn’t that
place full of tourists? Won’t we be okay?”

“There’s no guarantee, and Mike can’t protect us in there. I say
we wait him out. If he refuses to come to us, we call it off. It’s a game of
chicken, and we don’t want to duck first.”

“But I need this finished. I need to be free of him.” The
microphone in her sunglasses started making noise again, and she put them back
on so she could hear.

“New
parameters. Café street entrance covered. Agents in place inside. Suggest a
meet at outer edge of patio. We lose snipers, but target covered.”

“I don’t like this,” Griffith said.

“Just call him.”

Griffith called and they headed toward the café, on the corner of
Decatur and St. Anne. Adi watched to see if she noticed the movement of the
various agents, but found it hard to determine who was who. As they neared the
corner, the brave front she’d put on began to slip and her nerves kicked in.

Am I crazy?
What am I doing? J.B. wants nothing more than to kill me. He has no intention
of letting me walk away from here. Bertie? If you can hear me, watch out for
me, huh?

They crossed Decatur with a horde of tourists who pushed between
them, forcing her to let go of Griff’s hand. Griffith walked slightly ahead and
to the right of her, trying to move back but swept ahead by the crowd. Her
steps slowed, and Griffith moved farther away, another woman keeping pace
beside her.

As they turned and approached the outside corner of the café, she
heard the racing of a car engine. There was a flash and the booming sound of
gunfire. Everything moved in slow motion as she watched the red mist that
haunted her dreams erupt from Griffith’s chest. Her body crumpled to the
sidewalk like a rag doll. Two, three others, fell, then return fire came from
the café and street as agents responded. The driver of the car appeared
determined to get clear, but his luck had run out. The black Kia coasted toward
the restaurant across the street, crashing into one of the supporting posts.

And then time was moving again, people screaming, running. Hands
held her down on the sidewalk. Sirens.

Confusion and panic filled her. She fought against the weight on
her back. “I need to get up. Let me up! Griff!”

“Ms. Bergeron, stay down. We have to make sure the threat has
passed.”

“Griffith, she’s been shot.”

“Yes, ma’am. Agents are with her. They’re doing all they can.
Just please stay down.”

“Did you get him? Is he here?”

“I’m unclear on that, ma’am. We’ll sort it all out once the scene
is secure and all casualties are dealt with. I’m not moving until I hear from
AIC Hague. My job is to secure you.”

The moaning and cries of pain entered her awareness, and she
struggled to see Griffith.

“Can you tell me how bad it is? Is she going to make it? Please,
please let me go to her,” she cried.

“I can’t tell. We should get an all clear soon. Just be patient.”

Local police and emergency personal swarmed the area. Adi was
finally allowed to sit up. An EMT assessed her and released her from care. She
looked at the space where Griffith had fallen, but only a red stain remained on
the pale sidewalk. She ran to one of the ambulances, but there was an injured
man inside. She turned to race to the next ambulance when a firm hand on her
wrist stopped her. It was Mike Hague.

“Ms. Bergeron. Wait. It isn’t safe for you to be running around.
Come over to the car.”

She let him guide her to his sedan and help her sit in the back.
He climbed in beside her and tapped the driver to get him moving. Adi panicked.

“Where are we going? Where are you taking me?”

“Calm down. It’s over now. We’re going back to headquarters. Your
friend is there, Mr. Michaud?”

“What about Griffith? What about J.B.?”

“We believe this was an ambush. We don’t have reason to suspect
that Nerbass was even present. We thought we had eyes on him, but he had a
look-alike in place, and we didn’t know it until the man tried to run. You need
to be extremely careful, Ms. Bergeron. Apparently, your concern that he means
to kill you is valid, more so than we believed. The only positive thing from
all of this is the recording we have of him and Griffith. We have something
concrete to charge him with now. It’s only a matter of time until we catch
him.”

“What good is that to me? And you didn’t answer about Griffith.
Where is she?”

“She took a slug to the shoulder. They transported her to
University Hospital. The trauma team is fantastic there.”

“I want you to take me there.”

“I don’t think that’s—”

“Take me there now, or stop this car and let me out.” She fumbled
with the door handle, panic surging through her.

“Wait, wait. We can do that. Just hold on.” He directed the
driver to change course and they soon arrived at the hospital.

Adi tried to bolt out of the car to get to Griffith, but Hague
stopped her.

“Listen, it will be much easier for me to find her. Stay with me
and we’ll get to her.”

He led the way into the trauma center. After talking with the
admitting nurse, he let her know that Griffith was in critical condition and
was on her way to surgery. “There’s nothing we can do but wait. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry is worth about as much as bayou mud. You said you had it
covered. You said…” Adi hugged herself and turned away from him. Mike had the
driver return to the office to inform T’Claude and transport him to the
hospital. Adi paced until he arrived, and the moment he came in she felt she
could breathe, at least a little bit, again. Being in a waiting room with T was
something familiar. He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her.

“She’s going to beat this, kiddo. No doubt about it.”

“I hope you’re right. This is all my fault, T. I shouldn’t have
done it. I should have kept running till he couldn’t find me.”

“Now, don’t you go finding fault. This is all on that ass,
Nerbass. You didn’t create this. Right now you need to focus on helping
Griffith heal. Don’t you dare beat yourself up. She knew the risks, and she thought
it was worth it to help you. Heck, I bet that woman has been in worse
situations and pulled through fine.”

Hague moved away to talk to other agents who began appearing in
the waiting room. Something was happening, but Adi couldn’t make herself care.
They’d let them know, eventually. Her only concern, the only thing she could
think about, was Griffith. She watched the clock, wondering how long it would
be before they had any news. She couldn’t imagine for a second what life would
be like without her, even though they hadn’t been together all that long. It
was amazing how the right person could feel like someone you’d known forever
and wanted in your life for the rest of always.

“Well, we have some news about the shooter,” Mike said. “It was
Rafael Ortega, a thug known to have ties to the Sinaloa Cartel. He’s in surgery
now and likely to survive. This could be a big break for us. If we can get him
to talk, we can nail Nerbass to the wall.”

“That’s good. What about the others who were shot?”

“There was one fatality, the woman who was walking beside
Griffith. The others should survive.”

“That was meant to be me. He thought that was me,” Adi said.

“Hush now, you don’t know that, and even if it’s true, it’s still
not your fault,” T’Claude said.

“McNaulty?” called a voice from the doorway.

“Here,” Mike said.

“The bleeding has been controlled. Luckily, no major vessels were
hit. Looks like Ms. McNaulty will have a full recovery. She should be in a room
in about two hours.”

Relief washed through Adi as his words filtered in.
She’s going to be okay
.
T hugged her hard and shook her shoulders a bit.

“What did I tell you? It’s all going to be okay,” he said.

It wouldn’t be okay until she could see Griffith and know in her
heart that all was well. It wouldn’t be completely okay until J.B. was in a
tiny concrete cell. It was all so overwhelming. She needed some space to
breathe.

“I need to get some air. Can I go?”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“I have to get out of here, please,” she said.

“I’ll go with you. We can go out to the courtyard,” T’Claude
said.

“Fine. Porter, go with them.”

Adi paced across the open courtyard. She really needed a run more
than anything, but neither T nor the agent would allow that. She did her best
thinking when she ran, and she really needed to think.

Griff is
going to be okay. Thank God. What am I going to do now? Will she want to be
with me after this?
She couldn’t guess at the answer. One thing she
knew was that she was done with being afraid. No more would she live in hiding.
If Griffith wanted, they could stay here in New Orleans for a while. Or maybe
they could go to LA. Either way, she knew she would be okay. J.B. was finished.
Now he would be the one hiding, until they caught him. That couldn’t happen too
soon, in her opinion.

I can do
anything I want
. Maybe she’d open her own restaurant, a little café
where she could get to know her patrons. Where Griffith could sit and write her
articles and they could be together. She liked that idea.

In fact, she liked thinking about the future. She’d never had
options before, and now, suddenly, there was no end to them. She couldn’t wait
to get back to Griff to start her life, for real.

Griffith woke, realizing after a second that she was wearing
an oxygen mask. Her shoulder burned, but it was bearable. There was no one with
her, but she could see people moving around just beyond the partition that
marked her space. She closed her eyes and must have drifted back to sleep,
because the sound of Adi’s voice in her ear roused her.

“I’m here. You’re going to be okay,” she said.

“Hey,” she said and cleared her throat. She didn’t recognize her
own voice, which was muffled by the oxygen mask.

“It’s okay. You’ve been shot, but the doctor says you’ll heal
just fine.”

“What happened? I don’t remember anything.”

“They ambushed us. They thought the woman beside you was me. She
didn’t make it. Mike says they have enough to get J.B. now for sure,” she said.

A nurse entered the room to record her vitals. She removed the
mask and switched Griffith to a cannula. The thought that someone had died
right next to her, someone that could have been Adi but for the crowd, brought
tears to her eyes. She squeezed Adi’s hand tighter. “My shoulder?” she asked.

“Let me get the doctor. She should be able to answer any
questions.”

“Thank you.”

Griff closed her eyes. An ambush. It wasn’t surprising, but she
was angry anyway. The DEA had nearly gotten them killed. That Adi was whole and
Griffith was alive was a miracle. That Nerbass had taken the risk and attacked
them on a public street spoke of his desperation.
No wonder Adi ran.
A few minutes later,
Dr. Long arrived and introduced herself. Adi started to step out, but Griffith
asked her to stay. Adi sat in the chair beside her bed and held her hand.

“What’s my prognosis?”

“Well, the bullet entered here.” She pointed to a spot high on
her own shoulder, about an inch below her clavicle. “It tunneled pretty
harmlessly around the bone and muscle to lodge in your third rib in the back
upper left quadrant. We left it in place. Digging it out could have done more
damage than leaving it, due to the nerves surrounding it. You were extremely
lucky.”