Tushar continued forward even though Kate wished he would trade places with her. He eased along the wall, holding his weapon at the ready. When he reached the first door, he glanced at Kate and nodded across the hall. They couldn’t be sure where the voices were coming from yet. Left or right?
They waited. Kate held her breath, offering a silent prayer to whoever might be willing to help them.
Something crashed.
She jumped in her spot, itching to rush forward. Tushar reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her.
Someone screamed. Graham?
Then she smelled smoke. She yanked free of Tushar and ran down the hallway toward the smoke. Gun raised, she stepped into the doorway of the conference room. The two men from earlier had their backs to her. They were standing over a huge metal trash can dousing it with lighter fluid. She knew in an instant they had burned the hard drives.
Graham was tied to a chair, shouting. Neither man paid any attention to him, though Graham was bouncing the chair forward as if he could stop the madness.
Kate knew the moment Tushar was next to her. He lifted his gun and took a shot. The first man’s knees buckled slightly as he grabbed his thigh.
Kate took the second shot, aiming for the other man’s leg and hitting her mark, even though she hadn’t shot a weapon since being reanimated. Both men spun around, guns drawn.
Kate jumped out of the doorway as shots were fired. She searched for Tushar, but he hadn’t been as fast. He’d gone down.
Panic swallowed her whole, causing her to reach around the corner without regard for her own safety. If Graham hadn’t been behind the men, she would have fired off the entire chamber and been done, but she couldn’t take that risk, so instead, she glanced around the doorframe, exposing her head.
Before she could do anything else, several more rounds went off inside the room. People screamed. She couldn’t tell who, but she didn’t waste another moment. She spun fully into the doorway.
The two men who’d been holding Graham were on the ground now. Tushar was in front of them, gun lifted as he shifted it back and forth between them. Graham was still sitting in the chair, eyes wide. “Tushar’s been hit. Get help, babe.”
“I’m fine,” Tushar said from the ground. “Flesh wound. Get Graham untied.”
Kate kneeled in front of Tushar first, ignoring his command and checking him out. He had dropped the gun and was holding his left arm with his right hand. Blood was oozing between his fingers.
Kate peeled his hand back and winced. “More than a flesh wound.” She grabbed the base of his shirt and yanked it over his head, and then she wrapped the dark blue scrubs around the wound and tied it off. “Hold it tight with your hands.”
She jumped up and rushed toward Graham. His gaze was on the fire. “Put the fire out first,” he exclaimed.
She spun around, grabbed the fire extinguisher from the wall, and doused the already dwindling flames. Dropping the canister, she rounded Graham and worked the tight knots at the back of the chair.
Tears stung her eyes from the smoke.
Someone appeared in the doorway, and Kate jerked her attention that direction to find Trish behind them.
“Oh my God,” Trish exclaimed, kneeling at her husband’s side. She was shaking, her eyes wild.
“I’m fine,” he reassured her.
Trish took a look at her husband’s arm and then frantically touched him everywhere as if to ensure herself he hadn’t been hit anywhere else. “I can’t believe you did this. You could have been killed.” She batted his hand away and applied pressure to the wound herself.
Tushar set his hand on her forearm. “Trish,” his voice dropped lower, “I’m okay.”
She shook her head, her face flushed and tears streaming down her cheeks. “Don’t try to placate me. I’m pissed. You ran into a dangerous situation without thinking. Of me. Of us. You scared the hell out of me. You could have been killed. I nearly died when I heard the shots.”
Tushar didn’t try to argue with Trish, but he did pull her head into the crook of his neck. He gripped her tightly, holding her close, mouthing something Kate couldn’t hear into her ear.
Trish was still breathing heavily, but she nodded.
Kate returned her attention to the ropes. Finally, she managed to free Graham, whose gaze was locked on the trashcan.
Tushar stood, staring at the same spot.
No one said a word. They didn’t need to. The damage was obvious.
Kate knew better, but it didn’t matter at the moment.
What mattered was two men had infiltrated the space that should have been the safest place on earth and tried to kill her man. What mattered was that the bunker where she’d spent three years of her life didn’t feel safe.
What mattered was that nothing in her life felt safe anymore. She could run, hide, lie, change her name, color her hair, leave the country, or even pretend to be homeless and sleep under a bridge. Whoever was trying to take down DEEP, and everyone involved, would find her. The only way she could be safe again would be to leave DEEP, leave the project. Leave town. Leave this life. The message was received loud and clear: Anyone meddling with this project would be hunted.
None of them were safe, and she was tired. She wanted out. She wanted to go home, see her parents again, meet her niece, sleep, live life. She couldn’t do this for much longer. Living on the run was not in her blood.
Tushar kneeled to check the pulse of both dead men. “Who are they?” he asked.
“No idea,” Graham responded as he shook the ropes free, pushed off the chair, and grabbed Kate, hauling her into his arms and dipping his face into her hair. When he seemed satisfied that she was okay, he lifted his gaze to everyone else, but he didn’t release her. He probably had no idea he was holding her so tight it hurt.
“What did they say?” Kate asked him, tipping her head back to look up at him. She was numb. She wanted to get out of this bunker. This city. This state. Her ears were ringing from the alarm and the gunfire.
Her energy was zapped.
“Not a lot. They came here to do a job, and they did it.” He shifted his gaze to Temple as she appeared in the doorway.
Temple’s face was red with some emotion Kate couldn’t read. Fear? Shame? Remorse? Guilt? She dropped her gaze to the floor, her shoulders drooping. “I swear I had no idea.”
“Why did you let them inside?” Graham shouted. “Why would you let two strangers question us? If Tushar and Kate hadn’t entered when they did, I would be dead.”
Temple ran a hand over her face. “They convinced me you were the mole. They even had evidence to prove you’d snuck in here and logged into the system. They showed me how many hours you’ve spent downloading the data.” Her voice rose. “They convinced me you had stolen the data and then deleted it from the system.” She stood taller. “Not to mention the fact that all of that is true.”
Graham flinched. His voice rose again. “To save it! Not to destroy it. I put it on those hard drives to save it. And I’m not the one who deleted it. I’ve been working day and night to save it before it would be deleted.”
Temple glanced at the trash can and cringed. Her hand went to her forehead again, rubbing back and forth. “If you’re not the one who deleted the data, who is?”
“How the hell should I know?” Graham asked. He was still holding Kate, his body shaking.
“How did you know someone was going to delete it?” Temple asked.
“Inside tip,” was all Graham gave her.
Temple rolled her head back to stare at the ceiling, hands on her hips. “I’m the one in charge here, Graham. Not you. If you don’t give me all the information, how the hell am I supposed to help? Are you telling me that you and other members of your team have been hiding things from me?”
Tushar stepped forward, holding his shirt over his arm still. So far, he hadn’t gotten involved. Now he looked fit to kill. “Temple, you’re compromised. You might not like to admit that, but it’s true.
Information that comes to you gets dispersed to someone who misuses it every time.”
Temple jerked her gaze to Tushar.
The room was silent for long moments before she finally relaxed her shoulders and nodded. “Okay, you might be right. It’s happened far too many times to be a coincidence.”
While everyone spoke, Kate stood next to Graham shaking. She wanted to get out of this bunker. Now. Run as fast and as far as she could.
Temple’s voice was calmer when she spoke again. “I assume you have more secrets than just this one.”
“Yes,” Tushar readily agreed. “Though I’m not privy to them. I’ve been here with you. But yes. I can assure you there are people working to solve this problem.”
She nodded slowly again and glanced at everyone in the room. “Then you have my support. I don’t want any member of your team in danger. Whatever you know, keep it to yourself. Because you’re right, it would seem any information I’m privy to gets used against your team. This conversation stays in this room, though. If my superiors find out I’m helping you, I’ll be implicated.”
“You have our word,” Tushar agreed.
Kate wanted to scream that she was done, that she didn’t want to know another detail either. She glanced at Graham to see a determined look on his face. He was staring at Temple. “We will get to the bottom of this if it’s the last thing I do on this earth.”
Temple nodded.
Kate nearly swallowed her tongue. Of course Graham would be committed to seeing this through. That was the kind of man he was. Dedicated. Devoted to the job, to the bunker, to the team.
But Kate wasn’t with him anymore. They weren’t on the same page. He was furious, shaking, anger fueling him into action. He looked like he might personally sprint across the room and rip these two men into ten pieces even though they were already dead.
She was done. She wanted out.
Chapter 17
“Do you believe her?” Kate asked Graham three hours later as they drove away from the bunker.
“Yes. I don’t see how she could be lying after everything we went through today.” He’d considered everything Temple had said from several angles. “If she’s lying, she’s a damn good actress, and she’s been at it for at least eleven years. Probably longer.”
Kate gripped the steering wheel of the silver Toyota Corolla they’d borrowed from Blair. It turned out Blair had left her personal vehicle behind months ago, so it worked out perfectly that Graham and Kate could use it. After all, they were headed for Montana anyway. It provided transportation and reunited it with its owner.
Tushar had given them the keys.
Kate kept licking her lips. Graham knew she was stressed. He was too. Even hours later, his blood was still pumping with the adrenaline rush, but he hadn’t wanted to spend another night inside that bunker, and he hadn’t wanted Kate inside either. So, they’d left. No one even tried to stop them.
But something more was going on with Kate. She’d changed. Her shoulders were low in defeat. She hadn’t said much in the last few hours, instead letting everyone race around her as if she were in shock. She also hadn’t met his gaze in a while. She was distant. Detached.
She sighed. “Do you think it’s possible someone actually sabotaged our work from the beginning? Causing our exposure to AP12 in an effort to kill everyone and put an end to our research?” Kate’s words were expected. Her tone was filled with defeat, however.
“I can’t even begin to come to grips with that.” He rubbed his thighs with both hands. “It would destroy my faith in humanity.” Though I’m losing that faith right now as I try to read you. She was making him nervous. He needed to reach her.
She nodded, biting her lower lip before releasing it to continue. “Someone sabotaged us today. Do you think Spencer was involved and he’s duped everyone we know?”
“I don’t know. Hopefully, someone can get to the bottom of it. If we’ve been compromised as far back as eleven years ago with the broken beaker that put all our lives in peril in the first place, Spencer couldn’t have had anything to do with it. He would have been eleven. But we don’t know how long this Blue Cell organization has been in operation, nor do we know how many employees they have.”
“How do you suppose those two men found us?”
“The ones with no identification and fake uniforms?” he asked, dripping with sarcasm. He was furious to find out no one would be able to track down where the two men came from. It pissed him off more than anything else that had happened that day. “I don’t know, but I hope our assumption is true, that this Blue Cell group tapped into my computer and saw what I was doing. If Spencer knows anything about it, though, I’ll personally hunt him down and kill him with my bare hands.”
“I keep worrying he set us up.” She shuddered.
Graham gritted his teeth. If they’d been fooled by this Spencer guy, as was certainly possible, Graham would lose his shit. So would Dade and Ryan and about a dozen other people who had fallen for the man’s story. All of their lives were in jeopardy.
“You think Tushar is going to be okay?” She frowned, her expression worried.
“He’ll be fine. No bone was hit. Clean shot. Shelby stitched him up.”
Kate blew out a breath. “Trish was frantic. Out of her mind.”
“Yeah, I noticed that. I was kind of surprised. She and Tushar have been through a lot. I’ve never seen her that unhinged before, though. Trish has always been a rock under pressure. Even when we were all facing death.” Graham frowned. Something was going on with them. That was for sure.
Kate shot Graham a glance. “Not one person mentioned the elephant in the room.”
“Which elephant, babe?” There seemed to be a dozen.
“The lost data.” Kate shivered. “When I saw that fire…”
Graham smiled. “Do you think Temple and Tushar truly believed the data was totally lost?”
She shook her head. “They can’t be that stupid. Surely, when they stop to think about it…”
“Well, it’s done now. The hard drives would have been nice, but I’m sure someone is creating new ones as we speak. Assuming Spencer isn’t a total fuck and didn’t stab us all in the back. It’s easier for now if everyone believes the data is gone. Or at least for Temple to believe it. And tell her superiors. As long as we don’t specifically tell her the data is safe, she has no choice but to report its total loss to her bosses. I’m sure that’s why she never asked and never brought it up.”
“You think someone above her did all this? Someone working for this Blue Cell? It’s so incomprehensible.”
“I don’t know what to believe.” He pointed at the next exit. “Pull off. Let’s get a phone and touch base with Dade.”
She took the next exit, easing the car up to a gas station before cutting the engine. The next moment, she sighed heavily, her hands dropping, her head leaning against the headrest, her eyes closing.
Graham reached across to grab her hand. “You okay?”
“Nope.” She didn’t open her eyes.
He needed to get her someplace where she could unwind as soon as possible. “I’ll run in and grab a phone.”
“’Kay.”
He hated leaving her, but there weren’t many choices. He jogged into the mini-mart attached to the station, grabbed a burner phone and two bottles of water, and was back in the car in less than three minutes.
Kate hadn’t moved. Her eyes were still closed. She was breathing heavily.
Graham ripped open the phone and dialed Dade’s number. Luckily, Dade answered on the second ring.
“It’s Graham.”
“Thank God. You two safe?”
“Yes. Have you heard?”
“Yes. Tushar spoke to Ryan. Ryan called me. Listen, I know you have Blair’s car. I’m going to text you an address. Go straight there so someone can sweep it.”
“You think the car could be bugged?” Graham asked.
Kate flinched and then wrapped her arms aro
und herself and rubbed her biceps. Her eyes were still closed. It felt like she was hiding from him. And it was starting to scare him to death.
“Who narced on us, Dade?” Graham asked, forcing himself to focus on the call when what he really wanted to do was shake Kate and make her look at him.
“I don’t know yet.”
Graham sighed. “You sure you trust your hacker? Because I’ve gotta say, I’m incredibly suspicious.”
“I do. We’ll talk more later. Get the car swept before you do anything else.”
“Okay. And then we’re going to find a hotel. We’re both too shook up to drive very far tonight.”
“Put some miles under you after the sweep first. I don’t want it to be easy to find you. I’m not fond of you stopping at a hotel where you might be recognized. Let me see if I can line up a safe house between there and here. I’ll text you that also.”
“Sounds good. I don’t like anything about this. We need to figure out what the fuck is going on and fast before someone gets killed.”
“I agree. You sound strong. You able to make the trip here without an issue?”
“Of course. I’ve been almost full-speed for days. Hell, I’ve been awake for nearly three days straight downloading the data. Please tell me you’ve verified it’s safe.” He cringed. If this car was bugged, all of Blue Cell knew too much already. Hell, Graham and Kate had discussed the data even before this call.
“It’s safe. You succeeded. We all owe you, man.”
“You don’t owe me anything. I’m one of the team. But I’m anxious to get to Montana and help get this resolved as fast as possible.”
Kate still hadn’t looked at him, but she turned her face toward the driver’s side window and seemed to be staring out at nothing.
“Listen, we need to get moving. I’ll call you if we have any problems.” Graham opened his door and climbed out of the Toyota as he ended the call. He rounded the car, opened the driver’s side door, and reached for Kate’s hand to pull her out.
“What are you doing?” she asked, finally meeting his gaze.
Reviving Graham Page 17