Hearts on the Line

by Margaret Daley

  Switching on the engine, Becca saw the clock on the dashboard. Two minutes until—Her sweaty hands slipped on the steering wheel as she turned the sedan toward the back door, the pounding inside her head matching the frantic beating of her heart.

  Quinn dropped down from the heating shaft in the ceiling into the storage area behind the nursery closet. The space was small but thankfully there weren’t many boxes in it. While Sam descended to the floor, holding the only flashlight they could find, Quinn crouched down in front of the half door into the closet. With breath held he inched it open. Only the darkness of the closet greeted him. He eased through the opening with Sam following right behind him.

  In Quinn’s mind he heard the ticking of the clock, counting down the minutes they had left until Escalante started shooting children or blowing up the room, killing himself and anyone else in the vicinity. Were the police here yet? What was Becca doing? Was she a safe distance away with the others?

  When all four men crowded into the closet, the light from under the door illuminated the small area even more. Escalante’s rants could be heard over several of the children’s cries. A woman’s voice pleaded for Escalante to let the children go and just hold her.

  Sam pressed his ear to the door, his hand on the knob.

  “The children are my ticket out of here, lady,” Escalante said. “Or no one will leave alive.”

  From the sound of Escalante’s voice, Quinn didn’t think he was near the short hallway where the closet and a bathroom were situated. If their luck held, they could sneak into the corridor undetected.

  Sam turned the knob slowly and pushed open the door inch by inch. Over Sam’s head Quinn saw that the hallway was empty. Sam, with his gun drawn, clambered out of the closet. Quinn came right behind him with Brendan and then Alessandro.

  Removing his gun, Quinn flattened himself against the wall, clasping his weapon at his chest, his gaze fastened to the mirror on the nursery wall, set up at an angle that offered him a partial view of the room. But he didn’t see Escalante.

  “What’s taking her so long?” Escalante shouted over the whimpers of the children. “She doesn’t have much—”

  The ringing of the phone by the door cut into Escalante’s raving. Each man was against the wall, poised to move on Sam’s signal. Escalante shifted into Quinn’s sight.

  The dark-haired man snatched up the phone. “You got a car?” A pause. “I don’t want to see anyone. If I do—” Another pause. “Okay. I’m coming out with a few hostages.”

  Sam dropped to the floor and snuck a peek around the corner into the main room, the hallway hidden by the row of cribs nearby. He popped back, murder in his eyes.

  The pounding of Quinn’s heart thundered in his ears, nearly drowning out Escalante’s next sentence. “I know I am dead without a few insurance policies.” The cackle that followed that statement chilled Quinn to the marrow of his bones.

  The slamming of the phone ended the conversation. It would be now or never.

  Becca called the mayor, who was still in the office she had used. “Max, he’s coming out with some of the children. Please make sure everyone is out of the way. If he sees anyone—”

  “Got you.” Max hung up.

  Becca pocketed the cell, not knowing when she would need to use it again. It looked like it was going to be her, Escalante and several children heading to the airport.

  As she waited, all she could feel was the thudding of her heart against her rib cage, as though it were ticking off the seconds until Escalante came out with his human shields. Sweat ran down into her eyes, stinging them.

  “I want that kid and that one. You are coming with me to take care of the brats.”

  “I can only handle one of them,” Mercedes said in a steady voice.

  Quinn remembered meeting her once at Michael’s ranch. He had admired her poise then and now.

  “You’re lying. You’re carrying my son and that little girl. You don’t have a choice. Pick them up now.” There was a pause for several seconds while Mercedes did as he demanded. “That’s better. I’ll take this baby.”

  Footsteps approached the set of cribs. From the mirror on the wall Quinn saw Escalante place his gun on the bed while he scooped up Sofia Vance, the sudden movement startling the baby, who began to cry. Escalante cursed.

  Sam gave the signal to move. Quinn surged forward, totally fixated on tackling Escalante before he could retrieve his gun from the crib. Quinn had a score to settle. The man had hurt Becca.

  The commotion pivoted Escalante with Sofia held out in front of him in both of his hands. His eyes widened. With a glance toward his gun, he started to twist back to get it. Adrenaline-driven, Quinn slammed into Escalante while Sam wrestled Sofia from the man’s hold.

  Quinn and Escalante rolled on the floor strewn with toys. Something poked into Quinn’s back as he mowed over it. Pushing all pain from him, he concentrated on pinning down Escalante. The man’s vise-hard grip on one wrist threatened to snap it. With all his strength, Quinn brought his other hand down on his tormentor’s grasp, severing its lock about him. He heard something break. Shock flooded Escalante’s expression. Quinn moved quickly and sat on the man’s chest, his arms held plastered to his sides with Quinn’s knees.

  Then Quinn pummeled his fist into the man’s face, again and again. In his mind’s eye all he saw was Becca lying in the hospital bed, bandaged, in pain. Then the children’s faces seeped into his thoughts with their cries for their mommies and daddies echoing through his brain. Escalante was not getting away this time to rise again to torment the people Quinn cared about.

  A hand on his shoulder halted Quinn’s next swing.

  “Quinn, leave something for the rest of us,” Sam said in a shaky, teasing voice. “It’s over. You’ve got him.”

  Quinn stopped in midair, his hand still clenched so tightly that he began to feel an aching throb. He looked up and surveyed the nursery while a moan issued from Escalante’s swollen mouth. The children were okay. Trembling, Mercedes and her friend were all right, although Mercedes’s assistant sobbed in the rocking chair while holding Colin Fletcher to her chest.

  “What about the door?” Quinn asked, not moving from his position even though Escalante struggled to get a decent breath. He didn’t care. He didn’t want the man to pull anything.

  “Alessandro’s checking it out,” Brendan said, hugging Sean Montgomery to himself.

  “I have handled it. Thankfully, it wasn’t a complicated device.” Alessandro straightened, turning the knob.

  Quinn tensed.

  Alessandro pushed the door open. Fresh air, not laced with sweat and baby smells, rushed into the room, heralding that the horror was over. The siege had ended well. Alessandro stepped out into the hall.

  Max’s voice boomed through the silence. “Is anyone hurt?”

  “Only Escalante, but he’ll survive to stand trial.” Alessandro came back into the room.

  “Let’s get everyone out of here,” Sam said, holding his gun on Escalante, who still lay on the floor, his face cut and bleeding. “I’ve got him covered, Quinn. You can get up.”

  Slowly Quinn pushed to his feet, hovering over the man as though daring him to make a wrong move. His chest rose and fell rapidly as he dragged air into his lungs. He curled and uncurled his hands at his sides as the adrenaline flow ebbed.

  “Are you okay?” Sam asked, pulling Quinn’s attention from Escalante.

  He nodded.

  “Good. Then help get these kids to their parents. Jessica will be beside herself until she can hold the twins in her arms. Will you take care of them for me?”

  He concentrated on Sam’s words, shoving down the rage that had seized him when he had seen Escalante. “Consider it done.”

  Quinn lifted first Isabella, then Dario into his arms and hugged them, relishing their sweet scent. Sam’s daughter explored his left ear while Dario squirmed, wanting to go to his father. “Your daddy is busy, but I bet your mommy will be glad to see you two
.”

  Quinn walked out of the nursery, past Max in the corridor by the office where he was on the phone and into the foyer, needing to see Becca, needing to hold her after he turned over the twins to Jessica.

  Sam’s wife flew across the parking lot, ignoring the police barricade that had been hastily set up. An officer tried to stop her, and she shook him off. Tears streamed down her face as she approached Quinn and took her babies, burying her face against them.

  “Where’s Sam? Is he okay?”

  “Yeah. He’s holding Escalante.” Quinn scanned the crowd, his gaze briefly touching on Amy cuddled against Lidia Vance, before moving on. “Where’s Becca?”

  Jessica pointed toward the back of the church. “She was waiting for Escalante at the back door in Max’s car.”

  The rage he had managed to suppress surged to the foreground. “Why?”

  “Because that’s what he’d demanded or he was going to start killing the children.”

  “But—”

  “Quinn, what would you have her do?” Jessica asked in a tight voice. “That’s Becca. She thinks of others before herself.”

  Plowing his hand through his hair, Quinn started for the back of the church, saying, “I know. That’s one of the reasons I love her.”

  “Quinn Montgomery, you can’t say that and walk away,” Jessica shouted after him, but he kept walking, needing to hold Becca and tell her somehow they would work things out. There was no way after what had happened—how close they had come to death—that he wasn’t going to insist they try.

  “Thanks, Max. I’m coming inside.” Becca snapped the cell phone closed and climbed from the Lexus still parked at the back door.

  Relief lightened her steps as she covered the short distance to the building and walked inside. The cool air-conditioned air washed over her, chilling the film of sweat blanketing her. She saw Brendan carrying two children from the nursery and hastened forward, needing to see for herself that everything was over.

  Hoping to find Quinn and make sure he was all right.

  All Escalante could think of was that his only living son was crying for his mommy, and they were taking him away from him, Manuel’s rightful father. Anger, hot and burning, gripped him in its talon, blinding him to any dangers. He ignored the pulsating throb in his wrist and centered all his energy on one thing: escaping to find his son.

  Manuel belonged to him!

  The wail of the last child as Donita left the room drew Vance’s glance toward the door. In that split second Escalante kicked out and up, striking his enemy in a vulnerable place. He doubled over and Escalante leaped to his feet, flinging himself at one member of the Vance family.

  He wrenched the gun from Vance’s hand, pistol-whipping him with it. Vance crumpled to the floor, his eyes fluttering closed. As Escalante gave him a kick, leveling the weapon at Vance’s forehead, a faint sound behind him caused him to spin around to find Becca coming toward him. She froze when he raised the gun and pointed it at her chest.

  “Well, well. We finally get to meet. I enjoyed our little chats on the phone. Do you have the car out back like I requested?”

  “Yes.” Becca’s gaze fixed on Sam, lying unconscious or worse on the floor. Blood flowed from a head wound, saturating the brown carpet.

  “Let us leave before anyone figures out what has happened. Your life will depend on them not knowing.” Escalante motioned for Becca to leave first with him right behind her, the gun sticking into her back.

  “You can’t get away, Escalante. Where do you think you can go that the police won’t find you?” Please, God, let Sam be alive.

  “I have places I can hide. I’ve been hiding for the past six months.”

  “But we found you.”

  As he hurried her toward the exit, he jabbed the gun hard into her back to remind her she was only a bullet away from death. “Only because I wanted you to. I led you to my cabin when the time was right. I needed you all to think I was dead so I could get to Manuel. That’s why I staged that explosion. With the cave system under the cabin, it was easy. All I had to do was to find a homeless man to be me.”

  Becca wanted to point out that his plan had ultimately failed, but the man had a weapon aimed at her and no one knew that he had escaped. The hall was unusually silent and empty.

  She thrust open the back door, sunlight streaming into the building. She blinked at its brightness and nearly faltered in her step to the black Lexus.

  She started to open the passenger door when Escalante said, “You’re driving.”

  A few minutes after entering the church, Becca sat behind the wheel of the getaway car again. Thankfully this time it was only her and Escalante, no children involved. She could live with that.

  He hunkered down low, keeping the gun leveled at her. “Drive out the back way. Stop for no one.”

  Quinn came around the side of the church and started to call out to Becca, who had emerged from the back door. His words died in his throat when he saw Escalante right behind her with a gun trained on her. He ducked back out of sight, torn between wanting to go for help and rushing in to rescue Becca, which he knew wasn’t a good idea. Before he could make a decision, Becca started the car and peeled away from the building, using the back road.

  Pivoting, Quinn ran toward Max and a police captain. “Escalante’s got Becca and they’ve taken off in your car.”

  “What? I thought—” Max thundered.

  Sam staggered out of the church, holding his head, blood coursing down his pale face. He fell to his knees. Jessica screamed and raced for her husband. Max, Quinn and the police captain followed.

  “Escalante—he’s got my gun. He’s—gone.”

  “That man has more lives than a cat,” Max muttered, stooping down next to his son. “He’s got Becca in my car. They’ve left.”

  Sam looked up, pain and worry reflected in his expression. “It’s my fault. I took my eye off—”

  “Son, that won’t do us any good.” Max put his arm around Sam on one side while Jessica did on the other.

  “What about the SWAT team? Did they try to stop him?”

  “We never set up our perimeter because the problem had been contained,” the police captain said.

  “I’ll take care of this,” Max said, lifting his son to his feet as a paramedic brought a gurney toward them. “Don’t worry about Becca. We’ll get her back. And Escalante.” After helping Sam to lie down, he turned to the captain and gave a description of his car and its license number. “It’s got a GPS system in it we can use to track it.”

  Quinn listened as the mayor and the police captain coordinated the search for Becca. Knowing where she was and setting her free were two different things.

  Lord, I need You now more than ever. Please watch over Becca and bring her home to me. I know You gave me something precious that I didn’t know what to do with. I won’t make that mistake again. My trust is in Your hands.

  “Faster,” Escalante shouted, waving the gun near Becca’s face.

  Her body shook with the vibration of the ruts in the dirt road. “If I go any faster, this car will fall apart.”

  “I won’t let them win. Manuel won’t be raised by the Vances. I will make him love me and forget those people.” He spit out the words those people bitterly.

  “It’s over. Why don’t you turn yourself over to the police before you end up dead in a shootout?” She hated to think what would happen to her in the middle of a standoff. She was in God’s hands now and determinedly put that worry away.

  “They have to find me first. I’m good at eluding the police. I’ve had a lot of practice over the years. Don’t you think I thought about what I would do if something went wrong at the church?”

  The constant jarring made her jaw ache, intensifying the pounding in her head. Escalante seemed to know the city streets better than she, especially the remote ones. In less than ten minutes he had navigated them to this isolated back road. Where were the police? Did they even know she was gone?
Was Sam all right?

  Once they arrived at his destination, Becca didn’t think he would keep her alive. It was going to be left up to her to get away. God, I need You. Help me.

  “What kind of life can you give your son, always running from the police, looking over your shoulder? That’s no way to raise a child. He deserves more than that.” Although her adrenaline pumped rampantly through her, Becca schooled her breathing to deep inhalations and her voice to an even, calm level.

  “He’s mine. My blood. He’s not a Vance,” Escalante screamed.

  He was losing control, Becca thought, grasping onto that fact as maybe being her only chance to get away from him before he killed her.

  Escalante motioned with the gun, saying, “Turn here.”

  As Becca braked quickly, an idea popped into her mind. She made a hard turn, sending the car into a skid toward a tree. Jerking the wheel at the last second, she braced herself for the impact. The Lexus crashed into the cottonwood on Escalante’s side, the shock wave from the collision streaking up her length. The sound of metal crunching assailed her ears, vying for dominance over Escalante’s screams of outrage.

  As the airbags deployed, she twisted to wrestle the gun from Escalante, who had flung his arms out as though that action would protect him. He didn’t have his seat belt on and his head struck the side window, bouncing off the glass and shattering it.

  The airbag pummeled her chest, trapping her before she could get the gun.

  “We have them. The car’s stopped up ahead,” Max said in the front seat as he listened to the dispatcher, tracking the Lexus.

  “We’re five minutes out.”

  Quinn heard the words, but all he could think of was Becca at the hands of Escalante and what he had done to her because she had been dating Quinn. He desperately needed to hold her and tell her he loved her. He didn’t care what she did for a living. He’d rather be with her for a short time than never with her.