Return Fire (Sam Archer ) by Tom Barber Read Free Book Online Page A

through her legs.
    ‘Can’t sleep?’ she asked, the two of them standing near one of the main exit doors of the plane.
    ‘Not right now.’
    She paused for a moment, working her ankles. ‘How are the dreams?’
    He looked over at her, surprised. He hadn’t slept for a second, so she couldn’t have seen or heard him struggling with nightmares.
    ‘Vargas told me,’ Marquez added, seeing the look on his face.
    ‘Yeah. They’re still there.’
    ‘What happens in them?’
    He thought for a moment. ‘I’m stuck somewhere. There’s no way out. I know something is coming to kill me, but I can’t move, like I’m caught in treacle. It’s coming closer and closer, but I’m trapped. I’m thrashing and shouting, but there’s nothing I can do. Then it goes black.’
    Marquez watched him closely and he forced a smile.
    ‘Gee, I wonder what that stems from,’ he said.
    There was a pause.
    ‘Two weeks ago I tried to go up the Empire State with Vargas and her daughter but I couldn’t even get into the lift. I’ve never headed towards an exit so fast. It’s been four months since that night and it still freaks me out when I have to enter a tall building.’
    He shook his head.
    ‘Bit of a handicap in New York, right?’
    ‘Don’t beat yourself up,’ she said. ‘That was one hell of an ordeal you guys went through. To bounce straight back from that into an everyday routine was never going to be easy. It’ll get better in time.’
    She paused.
    ‘And everyone’s afraid of something. It isn’t sensible, or rational, it’s just what it is. Fear’s nothing to be ashamed of. It doesn’t make you a coward; it’s what makes you human.’
    Standing beside him, she looked down the cabin and smiled, nodding at Josh.
    ‘He’s terrified of spiders,’ she said, looking at Archer’s partner who was fast asleep, his large frame almost overflowing the seat in the pod. ‘Put him up against big dangerous suspects resisting arrest and he won’t even breathe heavy. But tell him there’s a spider anywhere near him and you watch him jump around like a schoolgirl on Halloween.’
    Archer glanced at her and grinned . ‘Are you serious? I never knew.’
    ‘He keeps it quiet. You know what some of the guys are like in the Bureau; he’d be finding spiders everywhere.’
    Still smiling, Archer turned his attention to Shepherd, who was awake and studying Stanovich and Payan’s files, lost in concentration with his back to them.
    ‘I can’t imagine much frightens Shep,’ he said, lowering his voice even though it was unlikely he’d hear over the noise of the aircraft.
    ‘Horses.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Horses, I swear to God. I took a call with him once to Central Park and discovered that little secret when a series of horse-drawn carriages rolled by.’
    This time Archer laughed. ‘Where the hell does that come from?’
    ‘God only knows.’
    ‘So what are you afraid of?’ he asked her.
    She didn’t reply. Turning, he watched her smile fade.
    ‘Hospitals.’
    Archer paused.
    ‘Why?’ he eventually asked.
    She thought for a moment, then forced a smile.
    ‘That’s a story for another day.’
    Standing beside her, Archer didn’t push it, feeling guilty that he’d stirred a memory in her that clearly made her uncomfortable. He glanced at his fellow detective and close friend; Marquez was a tough, guarded woman and there was a lot about her he didn’t know.
    He treasured his own privacy but she valued hers like solid gold.
    ‘What’s the most afraid you’ve ever been?’ he asked quietly.
    She paused, considering it. ‘Four months ago. Had a gun pulled on me from behind. Thought that was it.’ She nodded at Josh again. ‘Thankfully he showed up just in time.’
    ‘He has a habit of doing that.’
    ‘What about you?’
    ‘When I was a kid,’ Archer said. ‘Eight years old.’
    She tilted her head, surprised. ‘Not something from when you were a cop?’
    ‘This was way worse.’
    ‘What