Nic laughed and keyed his mic, “Commander, we’re coming toward you with shields. Fall in step behind us, and we’ll get your boys out of there.”

“Loud and clear,” the SWAT team leader responded.

Nic and Carter held the two panes of glass up in a wedge formation and moved toward the fallen men. The team leader and two of his other men fell in behind the shields, staying low to make sure they were under the protective cover.

Carter said, “If this gets me killed, Nic, I’m going to haunt your arrogant—”

“A little faith, boss. I got this.”

They reached the fallen men without any fire raining down on them from the sentry guns. The commander and his men grabbed their fallen teammates, and Nic and Carter backpedaled out of the building to provide them with cover.

Once his men were safe and receiving treatment, the FBI SWAT commander grabbed Nic by the arm, looked him straight in the eyes, and said, “Thank you. More than you’ll ever know. Now let’s take this son of a bitch down.”

Chapter 96

Assistant Special Agent in Charge Samuel Carter had mentored a lot of young men and women over his career. He had felt a strong connection with several of them. But nothing like he had felt with Nic and Burke. He had only known them both for a short period of time, but there was a bond between them that he couldn’t deny.

Nic never had a real father. His biological father was a pure psychopath, and his surrogate, Uncle Romeo, wasn’t much better. Nic was a grown man, a capable and impressive man, a leader and a hero. But there was still a part of him that needed the approval of a patriarch. Carter could feel it from him. And God or fate or destiny had brought them together.

And then there was Burke. He had never known another person like the young doctor. He was so intelligent and yet so lost. Like all of us, God had given Burke inherent gifts and inherent challenges. Burke’s challenges were merely greater than a normal person’s. And intrinsically, his gifts were proportionate with the level of his pain.

Carter felt a strong calling that God had put him in such a place as this for such a time as now. A time when two great men needed his wisdom and experience to achieve their true potential.

He just hoped that he could rise to the challenge and guide these two men onto the correct paths. To be the father and friend that they both needed so desperately.

As they ascended the stairs to the thirty-third floor, which was no easy task for his aged body, he thought of his wife and the way she had burned her art. The point had never been her own glorification, but the raising up of others. She wanted to inspire others to follow their dreams, to find their callings, to dare to achieve greatness. Not for their own egos, but for a higher purpose, to honor God and to honor humanity as a whole.