The Elizabeth McClaine Thriller Boxed Set

by Catherine Lea

  ***

  The Associate

  With his heart thudding painfully in his chest, the burning sensation from the bullet that had grazed his wrist, and the sting of sweat on his brow, he hurried back to the twentieth-floor elevator.

  Damn his stiff old joints. Damn his decrepit body.

  Pausing at the elevator to catch his breath, he pounded on the button with the side of his fist and swiped the sweat from his face. The second the elevator doors opened, he shouldered his way in and thumped the close button. But just as the doors met, a figure in his peripheral vision made him physically jump. In the mirrored walls of the car, the aghast expression of a gray-haired, parchment-faced old man stared back at him. From nowhere, a rush of reality hit him like a train.

  In the all-too-familiar form before him, all he could see was a man he barely even recognized. Who in God’s name had he turned into? Where was the sweet-mannered man he’d always been? What faced him now was nothing but a criminal no better than those he’d repeatedly railed against. A monster every bit as vile as the one who had tormented him.

  This wasn’t him. Before this, he’d never raised his hand to another man. He’d never even raised his voice to his children.

  A sweet man. Isn’t that what Elizabeth had called him?

  You are a slave to your emotions. Even a monster had seen that.

  Both knew him better than he knew himself.

  In all his sixty-five years, he’d been the perfect gentleman, a pacifist, a wonderful father and dutiful husband. The real him was the respected VP of Finance to one of Cleveland’s largest construction conglomerates. In truth, he was just another old fool with a hopeless crush on a woman young enough to be his granddaughter. Why couldn’t he have seen that earlier? And how could he have ever been so stupid?

  And yet, in these past few days he had murdered five people! And what had he achieved? Five people dead. Five lives lost in his juvenile quest to be with a girl young enough to be his granddaughter. And what could he possibly hope to achieve now? To wind up dying in this God-forsaken cesspit that was the cause of his fall from grace in the first place? To be carted home in an unmarked box and buried in shame?

  Not this day. Not while he still had breath in his body.

  If he hurried, he still had time to turn this disastrous situation around. He could still be a man of honor in Katarina’s eyes. Even if he had to let her go. He could do so knowing she could still respect him. But first, he had to save her.

  Holding his hand to the aching breath in his chest, he raised his eyes to the light panel to discover the car hadn’t moved. It was only when he jabbed the button again for the next floor that he realized the panel lights had gone out. And now, when he thumped the open button the doors remained shut. The power to the elevators must have been cut.

  Shit! That meant the stairs. He didn’t even know what floor Katarina was on.

  He squeezed his fingers into the gap between the doors, and pried them apart, feeling every muscle in his arms and shoulders complain at the effort. Ignoring the pain, he shouldered his way out and made for the stairwell. Bursting through the stairwell door he hurried on trembling legs, down the first flight, then the second. At the sixteenth-floor landing, he paused to catch his breath, then shoved through the smoke door to be met by the scream of the alarm and a gaggle of frightened girls staring wide-eyed at him from the halfway along the hallway.

  After a brief discussion among themselves, one girl in a bathrobe hurried up to him. “What is happening? What will we do?”

  He glanced up at the siren speaker and pressed one hand to his ear, grimacing at the noise.

  “Go downstairs,” he shouted, pointing toward the stairwell, then realized the body of the fire could be racing through the lobby by now and heading up through the lower floors. “No, wait! Stay here. I’ll come back for you. Just stay here,” he said, patting the air downwards so they’d understand.

  Despite the utter terror in her eyes, the first girl nodded, hugged herself, and shouted something to the others, who also nodded in terrified compliance.

  He took the girl by the shoulders, fixed her gaze, and spoke slowly and clearly. “Tell me: Katarina. Do you know where Katarina is?”

  Her desperate gaze cut to where wisps of smoke were now curling from beneath the closed elevator doors and her expression grew more desperate.

  “I won’t leave you here,” he assured her. “I promise I’ll get you out of here. Just tell me where Katarina is.”

  “She is on the sixth floor,” she said.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  DAY THREE—7:38 PM—ELIZABETH

  Elizabeth had been pacing the fourth-floor hotel room, silently praying the girl outside wouldn’t desert her, when a distant explosion shook the building like an earthquake and an alarm burst into life. It shrieked through the room at a deafening volume forcing her to clap both hands over her ears. Any minute she’d been expecting the sprinklers to go on, but when she scanned the ceiling, nothing happened. Almost at once, she detected the faintest hint of smoke spiraling from the air-conditioning unit.

  She raced to the door and pounded on it.

  “Help! I’m in here!”

  Almost at once, she heard the insistent rattle of a key in the lock and the door swung in on her. Outside was the girl she recognized immediately from the photo as Wendy O’Dell.

  “Come this way,” Wendy said. “We have to get everyone out.”

  She hooked Elizabeth around the shoulders and drew her out into the hallway, shooting glances back and forth.

  “They took my purse. They locked me in,” Elizabeth babbled in shock and confusion as Wendy released her.

  “I know. Come this way.” Walking quickly now, Wendy led her along the hallway, speaking over her shoulder. “We have to move quickly. A fire’s broken out in the basement on the east wall of the building. I have to get as many people out as I can. This way,” she said and turned in the next hallway.

  Gathering her senses, Elizabeth scurried after her, grabbed her sleeve and jerked her around to face her. “Are you Wendy? Wendy O’Dell?”

  “Correct,” she replied and looked feverishly around. “Listen, it’s a long story, Mrs. McClaine. I’ve got you and twenty-two girls to get out of this place. Come this way.”

  She went to grab Elizabeth but she jerked out of Wendy’s grip.

  “I can’t. Somewhere in this stinking dump is Laney Donohue. I can’t leave her here.”

  For a second, Wendy blinked in confusion. Then she jerked her head towards the stairway and started walking again. “Laney Donohue. She’s the sister of the disabled girl Katarina was caring for, right?”

  Elizabeth hurried after her. “Um…I guess so, but—”

  “An older man fell in love with Katarina and tried to help her escape. He used my identity to hide her at Sunny Springs.”

  “An older man?”

  “He met her here.”

  “But why didn’t he—”

  “I’m sorry, it’s a long story and I don’t have time to explain. I need to start clearing people from the ground floor up. We’ll have helicopters waiting on the roof.”

  This whole turn of events had thrown Elizabeth. “We? On the roof?” Gathering her thoughts, she paused to shout after her. “Wait! Who are you?”

  Wendy spun around, trotting backwards as she spoke, “Like I said, no time to explain. I need to get you to safety. How fast can you run on the stairs?”

  For a second, all Elizabeth could do was blink at her. There was no way she could walk out of this building and leave others to die. No matter what. So she steadied herself with one hand on the wall, wrenched both shoes off, and cast them aside. “As fast as I need to. But I’m helping you evacuate this building.”

  Wendy hesitated, then kept walking. “You don’t have to, you know.”

  “Where do we start?” Elizabeth said as she hurried after her. When she caught up, they strode out shoulder-to-shoulder. Wendy glanced across at her.
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  “Are you sure about this?”

  “Sure as I’ll ever be.”

  “Okay. You ready?”

  “You lead the way,” she said.

  With Wendy trotting ahead, they charged through the stairwell door and headed downstairs.

  ***

  The Associate

  He was leaning heavily on the railing at the fourteenth-floor landing, catching his breath, when the distant sound of a slamming door echoed up the stairwell over the shriek of the alarm. It had come from way down below. Maybe several flights.

  He leaned right over the railing, peering down. All he could see was the gathering haze of smoke obscuring the lower floors of the stairwell.

  Could it have been Katarina?

  Desperate now, he ignored the aches and pains racking his frame and hurried down the next flight. At the thirteenth floor, he paused again. Sweat ran into his eyes. His breath burned in his lungs. His old legs throbbed. And whereas his aging body complained at the sudden exertion, now a dull ache crept from his shoulder to the elbow of his left arm. How he’d ever get back upstairs was anybody’s guess. But he could not stop now. He had to find Katarina.

  Forcing himself into motion, his feet stumbled from one step to the next, descending as quickly as he could.

  Twelve…eleven…ten…

  On the ninth-floor landing, he collapsed against the wall with his hands on his knees until the burning in his thighs and the knife-like pain in his chest abated. After getting his breath, he removed his jacket, bunched it into a ball, and pressed it to his face. Still, the smoke stung his eyes and prickled his nose until he sneezed. On the eighth floor, with his vision blurred by tears and his nose streaming, he paused to gulp in whatever air he could. But at the first gasp, smoke caught in his throat and sent him into a coughing spasm that wrung his lungs like a sponge. He fought for control but a second coughing fit folded him right over, gasping for air with tears streaking his face and a stream of mucus dangling from his nose. Even more determined now, he swiped it away with his sleeve, dashed his jacket across his face, and pushed on.

  He had to get to Katarina. Or he’d die trying.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  DAY THREE—7:59 PM—LANEY

  Laney felt like a hunk of meat in the butcher’s shop window. With the manacles cutting into her flesh and her feet barely touching the floor, the sound of the alarm had brought her a glimmer of hope. At last, surely he’d release her.

  Now, she realized that hope had been in vain. Jerko was only intent on saving his own crazy-as-shit ass and leaving her to die.

  “Just cut me down. That’s all I’m asking!” she shouted for what felt like the millionth time.

  No way was he listening. It seemed like from the moment the old guy had slammed the door shut, she’d evaporated from his mind. Even Fatso was stuck in indecision, shouting panic-filled questions in his own language and casting questioning looks at Laney when he got no reply.

  Jerko had gone straight to the top of the stairs and rattled the freezer door handle. Finding it locked tight, he’d stepped back, taken out the handgun, and aimed at the door. After he fired four shots that simply pinged off the door, a bullet hit the handle. He dashed over, ignoring Fatso shouting questions in his wake, only to find the handle wouldn’t budge. As Fatso marched up behind him, demanding attention, Jerko stepped aside and aimed at the handle again. Three shots pinged, ricocheted off the metal, but the fourth thunked into the handle. Behind him, Fatso fell back, going down like a tree and hitting the floor on the flat of his back with a perfect black dot of a gunshot wound right between the eyes.

  “You killed him,” Laney yelled, surprised by her own anger and resentment.

  Again, Jerko tried the handle. Still nothing.

  A surge of rage burst in Laney’s chest. “Did you hear me? You killed the guy.”

  Racing back to the surgical table, Jerko hauled out a drawer and upended it on the floor with a crash of steel on marble. Kicking instruments aside, he snatched up a bone saw and a pair of long-handled metal cutters and returned to the door.

  At the door again, he inserted the back of the sawblade into a gap around the metal housing of the handle. Gripping it with both hands, he threw all his weight onto it. Amid the din of the siren it let out a pained groan, and a yawning gap opening up in the uppermost edge of the faceplate. Readjusting his position, he thrust downwards over and over, until the handle broke away from the steel door and a wisp of smoke drifted in through the hole.

  Laney could just see him taking off and leaving her here to die.

  “Please, please, please cut me down,” she begged.

  When he shifted position to get a better angle on the steel door, she thought he was going to shoot, so she shrugged her head down and squeezed her eyes shut. Instead, Jerko snatched up the cutters, latched them onto something in the mechanism, and used all his strength to snap them shut. Even over the shriek of the alarm, the clack of snapping metal echoed off the white tiled walls.

  Jerko yanked something out of the hole in the door, then swung it open. A whiff of smoke whirled in through the open door on a wave of hot air. Casting the cutters aside, he twirled around, aiming the gun at her. She hunched to make herself a smaller target, eyes closed until she heard the click of the empty chamber. She opened her eyes.

  “You’re in luck. You live a little longer,” he said, pocketing the gun. Next thing, he was gone.

  Rattling the restraints in a mix of rage and terror, she screamed at the top of her lungs. “Come back, you asshole! Just cut me down!” Realizing he’d gone, she shouted, “Thanks a bunch, Jerk-off,” after him as a visible wisp of smoke snaked in through the open door.

  Oh shit!

  Now, all she could do was scream and pray someone would hear her.

  Because she didn’t even want to think about what happened next.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  DAY THREE—7:59 PM—ELIZABETH

  Wendy charged for the stairwell door, shouldering it open onto the ground floor landing, only to fall straight back in the face of a churning wall of thick, black smoke that rolled out to meet her. She hauled the door shut, but not before raging drafts of boiling air and ash roared through the gap. It swirled on the hot air then streamed upwards like a wraith searching for freedom in the upper reaches of the stairwell. As if to block the advance of an oncoming enemy, Wendy turned and leaned her back on the door, her expression grim.

  “There’s no way we’re going in there.”

  Elizabeth shot an aching look at the door, but Wendy pushed off it and grabbed her arm.

  “No one could survive in there,” she said, and tugged her up the stairway.

  On the first-floor landing, she repeated the exercise. “No one’s going in there, either. It’s too dangerous,” she said and went to move on.

  But Elizabeth hesitated, desperately wondering if they were leaving innocent people to their deaths.

  “What if there are people in there?” Elizabeth called after her. “I’ll go.”

  Wendy paused on the stairway, then hurried back. “You can’t. I won’t let you.”

  “I’m not moving until I know we’re not leaving anyone behind.”

  Wendy shot a look up the stairway, then back at the door. “Wait here,” she commanded, then began unbuttoning her shirt.

  Realizing what she was about to do, Elizabeth stopped her. “Wait.” She shrugged out of her jacket, and handed it to Wendy. “Use this.”

  Wendy nodded and bunched the jacket at her mouth and nose, took a deep breath, then punched her way in through the doorway again. Ducking against another wave of boiling smoke that rolled into the stairwell, she yelled a muffled, “Is anybody in here? Shout if you can hear me!”

  Nothing but the sound of crackling flame and the alarms.

  In the face of the billowing heat and choking black air swirling out, Elizabeth gathered the front of her blouse, pressed it to her face, and pushed into the room behind Wendy. The fumes burn
ed her eyes and blistered her throat. Through the tears, she could just make out the décor. The room looked like the entrance of a casino.

  “What if they can’t call out?” she shouted.

  Wendy returned to the door and pulled it open, sucking in air from outside. Then she grabbed Elizabeth and drew her back into the stairwell. Just as the gap in the door narrowed in their wake, the muffled sound of a voice cut through the wail of the siren.

  “Someone’s in there,” Elizabeth said urgently.

  “We can’t go in.”

  “Who’s likely to be on this floor?”

  Wendy bunched her mouth while she thought. Then she gave Elizabeth a pained look. “The croupiers. Any of the bosses would have run at the first hint of trouble.”

  “Then let’s get him.”

  “It’s too dangerous.”

  Elizabeth stabbed a finger back at the door. “I’m not leaving someone to die in this building.”

  She turned and went to push back in through the doorway, but Wendy grabbed the back of her blouse, stopping her.

  “Then we’ll go together. Here, you’ll need something.” She offered Elizabeth the jacket

  “Keep it.” Elizabeth unzipped her skirt, and shimmied it to the floor, leaving her only in her blouse, slip, and stockings. She balled up the skirt and pressed it to her face, and together they pushed through into the casino again.

  The inside of the room was black with smoke. Elizabeth’s eyes streamed against the thick choking blanket, cheeks flushed from the heat. On this level, they found one enormous open area, the space once conference rooms, now filled with gambling tables and bars. Broken glass now lay in pools of alcohol, obviously having been knocked from the shelves with the first explosion.

  “Where are you?” Wendy yelled.

  “We’re here,” called a man’s voice. “Please help us!”

  With the balled-up garments pressed to their faces, they raced to where a heavy free-standing pillar in the center of the room had toppled onto an oak roulette table, scattering chips and counters over the floor like a tawdry shower of confetti. Beneath the pillar, twisted at an odd angle, was a small man dressed in a suit and tie, black smudges of soot already marking his cheeks, both legs pinned under the weight. Two men, one on either side, were trying to lift the pillar but each seemed almost overcome by the smoke and heat, their energies spent.