Page 126 of Prodigal Son

“Yeah. Here’s what we’re gonna do instead.”

A better plan.

They moved up the line, up the line. Then a hand on his shoulder. “Go, go.” And they went down the long, lighted catwalk.

Several paces ahead, Evan staggered a step, and Reese knew that the bright lights and their contrast with the shadowed audience had disoriented him a moment. Reese narrowed his gaze against the onslaught of the glare and scanned the audience as he began his walk. He couldn’t make out the faces of anyone in the back, but he didn’t have to.

Walsh and Shane, dressed in black – Walsh even had a pair of black-rimmed dummy glasses perched on his nose – had seats in the front row, faces illuminated by the stage lights.

On cue, Evan tripped just before he reached them. Wobbled, wind-milled his arms. Gasps rose up from the audience. Reese kept walking, and plowed right into him, and they both tumbled off the stage right at Walsh and Shane’s feet.

Shouts of alarm.

Evan gave a loudoofwhen he hit the ground – on his back, like a civilian.

Reese tucked as he fell, landed on his shoulder, rolled, and scrambled upright, gun already slung over his back and secured by its strap.

He caught a glimpse of Walsh’s face, gaze wide, but expectant behind the useless lenses of his glasses. He held out a hand, ready to take the ID card.

That was the original plan: hand the card off to Walsh, pretend to be injured, and allow Walsh and Shane and Evan to lead him off into the shadows, where they could regroup and then proceed forward with their part in the assault on the penthouse level of the building.

But Reese had never worked as part of a team.

He dodged Walsh, kept the card, and ducked between two chairs.

There was no reason, after all, that so many people should risk injury or death in the execution of this plan. Not when Reese was made for this, and could handle it just fine alone.

~*~

“What the fuck?”

Walsh didn’t get worked up like this often. Mercy took him by the shoulders. “Hey, hey, it’s alright.”

Walsh twisted away and pushed a hand through his hair, yanking and cursing under his breath when all the gel made it difficult.

“Felix,” Ian said mildly, leaning in, “I don’t think your improvisation will be taken well.”

“You?” Walsh whirled around to face him again, brows jumping. “This was your idea? Merc,what the fuck?”

Mercy held up both hands, palms-out. “Hey, it’s alright. The kid made a valid point, and I took it seriously.”

“A valid…” Walsh clenched his jaw tight. He spoke through his teeth. “That ‘kid’ is an emotionless robot who hasn’t had a rational, human thought in his life. And you sent him off after my sister alone?”

“We’re gonna follow him,” Mercy defended. “And give him a little more credit than that. He likes us. He knows this is important.”

“I can’t–” Walsh bit off the next words. He shook his head and undid the buttons of his silk shirt with clumsy movements, biting his lip viciously. “You should know better,” he muttered under his breath. “You should fucking know better.”

“King,” Shane tried, and set a hand on his brother’s shoulder.

Walsh shrugged him off.

“Where’d he go?” Evan asked, note of panic in his voice.

“He looked at the building plans same as all of us,” Mercy said with a sigh, and started stripping out of his own finery. “He’s going to find Cassandra.”

“Alone?” Evan asked.

Everyone ignored him, though Walsh grumbled something unintelligible.

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