Critical Condition

by CJ Lyons

  All Amanda could hope was that the bad guys hadn’t sent anyone over to the tower because all the noise they were making, sounds bouncing back and forth and up and down the concrete-walled stairwell, reminded her of the herd of cannibal hippos she’d seen on a nature show. A stealth operation, this was not.

  Jerry and Lucas went down the stairs together—Lucas leading, pretending he wasn’t there to catch Jerry if Jerry fell. After a few failed attempts to use his cane, Jerry finally hooked it over his shoulder, pocketed his gun, and faced the stairwell wall, using both hands on the railing as he side-stepped down.

  Amanda was the one who kept stumbling, tripping on the hem of the ball gown, now inches too long since she’d abandoned the stilettos. By the time they reached the second-floor landing, she’d ripped the hem in several places, soiled the beautiful silk, and bruised herself too many times to count.

  “Let’s take a break,” Lucas said, holding the landing door open for them.

  Jerry stole a glance at Amanda, nodded, and said, “Recon.”

  By the time Amanda crossed through the door and out into the elevator lobby, Jerry was leaning against the picture window, peering down into the atrium that separated them and the auditorium. The snow had slowed—or the wind had, it was hard for Amanda to tell. She gazed out at the landscape transformed into an alien world by the storm.

  The only lights were the ones from Angels; everywhere else it was dark, as far as she could see. But there was enough light to reveal the snowy swirls and dunes and drifts shaped by the frenzied wind. Small mountains heaped one against the other, stacked against the nineteen-foot-high glass walls of the atrium, almost to the roof. No one could get through that. Not without some serious earthmoving equipment.

  The atrium’s glass roof was steeply angled and clear of snow, giving Jerry a good line of sight to the space in front of the auditorium’s doors.

  “Nobody moving,” he reported.

  Amanda slumped to the floor, kneading her eyes with the heels of her palms. They really were trapped. It was hopeless—there was no way help could reach them, not for hours, maybe not for days. Which meant all those people’s lives depended on them.

  She sniffed, tried to muffle it without success. She was not going to cry. She absolutely, positively was not. She was too tired, too scared for tears—but then again, tears might be the perfect response to parading around an abandoned hospital actually searching for men with guns. It made as much sense as anything else that had happened today.

  “Lucas, do we have money left in the wedding budget?”

  He chuckled in response.

  She jerked her hands down from her face. It wasn’t a funny question, not at all. Suddenly there was no room in her for tears. She scrambled back onto her feet. “Don’t you laugh at me, Lucas Stone. This is serious.”

  Lucas grinned, as if he actually thought this was some kind of game, but one glance at her and he sobered up, fast. “Money? A little. Why?”

  “Because we’re going to have to buy Gina a new dress.”

  Now he looked concerned, worried that she’d lost it. “Amanda, don’t you think that’s the least of our worries?”

  “No. It’s not.” Her voice took a right turn into soprano range, spiced with a little shrill panic.

  Jerry turned to look at them, opened his mouth to say something, caught the expression on Amanda’s face, and turned back, concentrating on the view. He might not be as quick thinking as he’d been before getting shot, but there was nothing wrong with his instincts for survival.

  Amanda stood, considering her options and her less-than-helpful fiancé. Then she grabbed the shears from her sash, raised her skirt, and slashed at the underskirt and crinoline. The only sound was the fabric ripping apart, a piece of art mutilated, vandalized.

  She wobbled a bit, her aim blurring at the thought. But it also felt good, releasing her anger and fear into destructive action.

  “Gina won’t mind,” Lucas said as he steadied her with one hand. The layers of silk and taffeta fell to the floor.

  “But I do.” She was shaking so hard she thought her tears would shake loose. When Lucas’s head was turned away, she swiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

  “Amanda—”

  She brandished the shears on him. “I’m not going into our marriage with a debt to a friend hanging over our heads, do you understand?”

  It had nothing to do with Gina or the dress or the money, not really. It was about believing that despite everything happening tonight that their wedding would happen. It was about finding the faith that they would all make it through this night alive.

  Lucas was wise enough to understand that. He swept the scissors to one side and bundled her into his arms. This time Amanda couldn’t hold back the tears. God, she’d never felt so terrified in all her life. Not even a few months ago when she’d been sick and had been afraid she might die. She’d been scared, sure, but it was a different kind of fear than this.

  This was sheer terror. Terror that she was making all the wrong choices, that she’d get Jerry and Lucas killed because of her choices, that if they failed, then so many other people might die as well—all because of her.

  Lucas made no empty promises, simply held her tight until her panic subsided. She wiped her runny nose against the shoulder of his lab coat and he didn’t even flinch—that was how much he loved her. And she loved him, every germophobic, anal-retentive inch of him. That was one thing she could believe in, no matter what else happened.

  Reluctantly she pushed him back. “Help me cut the overskirt.”

  He knelt at her feet and, with a swift and sure hand, snipped a good foot off the ball gown, leaving it hanging just below her knees. God, she must look like Daisy from Li’l Abner. Some kind of hillbilly prom queen.

  “Okay. Let’s go.”

  Lucas stood, leaving the shreds of the ball gown behind. “Where?”

  Jerry pointed through the window. They joined him there. He was pointing to the left of the atrium, to a row of windows. “There.”

  “The cafeteria?” Lucas asked.

  “The kitchen,” Amanda said. “It shares a wall with the auditorium. They cater events in the auditorium and atrium. They might have access.”

  “So we’re just going to waltz through the atrium? And do what, take cover behind the ferns? They’ll spot us for sure.”

  “No choice,” Jerry said grimly. “I’ll go first.”

  As a diversion, Amanda realized. Jerry expected to get caught. And killed.

  TWELVE

  GINA RAN TO HER MOTHER. “LAROSE! I CAN’T BELIEVE the radiology tech left you here.”

  LaRose shook her head vehemently. “Man took the tech. Guard. Didn’t see me.”

  “A guard?” Gina exchanged glances with Ken. “Where to?”

  “We need to get her the TPA. But what about the”—he glanced at LaRose, choosing his next word with care—“guards?”

  “I only saw six of them,” Gina said. “That’s not enough to cover all the floors of the hospital and watch over the people in the auditorium. The eighth floor is mainly rehab, closed for the holiday, so they might just give it a cursory look. Or we could beat them to it, if they’re working their way up from the ground floor.”

  There were several flaws in her reasoning—but what choice did they have? She had to get LaRose the TPA, had to find Jerry, had to protect them both, and getting to the eighth floor seemed the best way to do that.

  “What’s going on?” LaRose asked, tugging at Gina’s sleeve with her good hand. Her voice was clearer now that her blood pressure was back to normal. Gina didn’t want to agitate her, risk raising her blood pressure again. But she had to tell her something and her mother deserved the truth.

  “Some men have taken over the hospital. They’re holding a bunch of people hostage in the auditorium.”

  LaRose somehow managed to look contemptuous and unimpressed at the same time—a hard feat with only half of her facial muscles working. She
gave a one-shouldered shrug, divorcing herself from the ugly situation. “Call the police.”

  “I did. Hopefully they’re on their way, but with the storm—” Gina looked to Ken for guidance. “If Janet got my message there might already be a SWAT team on the way.” It was a big if, but a more palatable scenario than its alternative.

  “Maybe we should stay here, try to hide,” Ken suggested.

  “No.” Even thinking that made her feel guilty—as if she were abandoning Jerry and the others. “Anything we do is a gamble, but I say we go up.”

  “It would help if we knew where the bad guys were.” Ken thought for a moment. “If they’ve jammed the cell phones, they must be using radios to communicate.”

  “They are—I saw them. They’re just like our trauma radios.” She unclipped her own radio from her belt. “Maybe we can hear them?”

  The small radio had a knob that accessed several channels—Gina had only ever used the first one, had no idea what the others were or how easy it could be to access other radios. But it was worth a try.

  “Can I see that?” Ken asked. She handed him the radio. “UHF, sixteen channels. There’s a good chance we can pick them up with this.” He began trying the other channels. Silence or static greeted him until he hit channel eight. Then a man’s voice came through.

  “That’s him,” Gina said. “That’s Harris, the guy pretending to be a DEA agent.”

  Ken adjusted the volume and held the radio for them to listen. “Auditorium is secure,” Harris was saying. “Team One, deploy to block the stairwells and exits, then we’ll start floor by floor, ground up.”

  “Roger that. Team One Oscar Mike.” There was a short squelch, then silence.

  “Sounds like you’re right.” Ken handed the radio back to her. Gina turned it off so that it wouldn’t give them away while they were on the move. “We should be safest up on the eighth floor. And from there, we can cross over to the research tower, hide out there.” He looked both ways down the hall. “No signs of anyone.”

  Gina pushed LaRose’s wheelchair out into the corridor and followed Ken.

  They made it through radiology to the doors that opened onto the main hospital lobby without seeing anyone. Ken edged up to the window of one of the swinging double doors and scouted the lobby. He waved them back.

  “It’s no good,” he whispered. “There’s a guy with a machine gun out there. From where he’s standing he has both the main elevators and the patient elevators in view as well as the hallway to the auditorium.”

  Gina wheeled LaRose into the nearest procedure room. It was one of the interventional suites, kept sterile and as well stocked as an OR. Ken closed the door behind them.

  “What should we do?”

  “We could try to draw his attention using the radio,” he suggested.

  “But that might backfire—bring more of them to us.” She left LaRose in the chair and began to pace the room, taking inventory. “There has to be another way.”

  “We can’t go back, we’ll just end up in the ER. They’re sure to find us.”

  LaRose beat her good fist against the arm of the wheelchair, getting their attention. “Leave me. You go hide.”

  Gina stopped midstride, frozen in place by her mother’s words. That wasn’t the LaRose she knew—could the stroke have done more damage than she’d thought? She turned and saw that her mother’s face was streaked with tears. For the first time in Gina’s life, LaRose actually looked her real age—no, she looked even older than her fifty-eight years.

  “No.” The word was out before she could consider the ramifications. She crouched down to LaRose’s eye level and took her left hand, squeezing it firmly. Her mother’s wrist felt like skin and bones, in danger of being crushed by Gina.

  “I’m not leaving you, LaRose.” Gina arched her head to meet Ken’s gaze. “But you can, Ken. I understand—you don’t owe either of us anything.”

  Understatement of the year. Ken said nothing, just shook his head and returned to his post at the door, edging it open far enough to watch the corridor.

  LaRose also was silent, her gaze fixed on their joined hands. Gina could have sworn that she was trying to find words, but even before the stroke any sentiment of mother-daughter bonding or approval would have been beyond LaRose. Now wasn’t the time to start.

  Gina turned away, not wanting to embarrass LaRose and ruin the moment. Her gaze caught on the oxygen tank that sat under the head of the examination table. Maybe there was a way.

  She disengaged her hand from LaRose’s and retrieved the tank from under the table. “Ken, can you find me some tubing?”

  He left the door and began to rummage through the supply cart. “What do you have in mind?”

  “A diversion. One that hopefully won’t blow up in my face.”

  LYDIA TUGGED HER GLOVE OFF WITH HER TEETH. She held her body away from the box as she dared to lower her hand into it. The penguin’s feathers were thick, layered together, soft like fur. She stroked it; it felt warm to the touch and she could feel its heartbeat skittering.

  She jumped back as its body quivered. Then it turned its head. Its neck was white with a black streak and its beak was layered black, white, and tan. It blinked at her, then nuzzled its head against her hand. “I think it’s okay.”

  The bird made the honky-quacky noise she’d heard earlier outside.

  “Good. There should be eleven more.”

  “I’ll go put this one inside Bessie, crank up the heat.” She closed the container, put her glove back on, and carried it outside. The temperature had dropped, creating a slick coating of ice over the top of the snow and ice that already lay on the road. The absence of any lights except Bessie’s headlights was startling and unexpected for someone who was used to measuring the city’s pulse by its lightscape. And quiet—it was as if they were on the moon with no one else near.

  Squonk, squonk. Make that no one else except some runaway penguins.

  The noise had come from very close, near her feet. Lydia stood still, scared that she might step on one of the creatures, and looked around, her eyes adapting to the darkness. There, only a yard away, was something moving, jerking its way through a tire track like a Mexican jumping bean.

  Lydia approached slowly, afraid of startling the bird as much as she was afraid of what it might do to her if it was startled. The bird in the box she carried must have realized another one was close by, because it began to squawk and move around, making the sides of the container bow out and threatening to burst the flimsy cardboard box wide open.

  “Hold still,” Lydia muttered, wishing she spoke penguin. Another step and she was right beside the second bird. Carefully, she lowered the box down in front of the bird, blocking its path.

  It stopped, cocking its head, its beak bobbing like a conductor’s baton, quizzically tapping the box. Now both birds were chattering away. With the second bird immersed in exchanging pleasantries with the first, Lydia lunged forward and scooped it up with her good hand, pulling it tight up against her chest.

  To her surprise it didn’t resist. She tensed, waiting for it to turn and attack her. Instead, a ripple shuddered over it from head to tail, its feathers rustling, then settling into place. It stroked her parka with its beak—probably liked the smell of the down insulation, she thought. She held her right arm close to her body and the bird settled into the crook of her elbow, resting its weight on her cast. Good thing it didn’t weigh more than five or six pounds.

  It appeared she had a new career as a penguin nest. Lydia glanced at her left hand, the one that had caught the bird. Her glove was coated with tiny, fuzzy feathers. She grabbed the box and resumed her skating routine across the slick, irregular road surface. The smell was incredible—fermented fish oil. She’d never be able to wear these clothes again.

  As she approached Bessie, a wave of laughter overcame her. The bird nestled in her arm glanced up, then tucked its head back down as if a woman shaking with laughter and stinking of fish were normal
in its world. But it was too funny to ignore—the universe was such a crazy, insane place that sometimes you just had to stop and laugh with it.

  Despite the stench, she felt calm for the first time all day. The wind and snow slapped at her cheeks and they felt ready to crack with the cold, but she couldn’t stop grinning. The only thing needed to make this moment perfect was . . .

  “You’re a sight,” Trey’s voice came from behind her. He steadied her, one hand on her hip, as he yanked open the passenger-side door to Bessie with the other. “Hey, you caught another one, good for you.”

  “Hey, yourself,” she said, turning to face him. “Come closer, I want to show you why Eskimos rub noses.”

  He took the box from her hand and set it down inside Bessie. She grabbed his sleeve and pulled him to her, the second bird nestled between them.

  “You smell,” he said, his eyes crinkled with mischief. He rubbed his nose against hers, then kissed her.

  “Now you do, too.” They parted and she released the second bird into the front of the rescue vehicle. Trey carefully shut the door. “Two down, ten to go.”

  Zimmerman came running up, waving his arms. “I found them. They’re all huddled together over here in this snowbank.”

  Trey chuckled as they followed Zimmerman. “Wait till I write this run report up.”

  “You mean thirteen reports—one for Zimmerman and one for each penguin. Hmmm”—she bumped his hip with hers—“you might just have to stay home writing reports for the rest of the night.”

  He took her hand in his, ignoring the sticky feathers covering her palm. “Wouldn’t that be nice?”

  NORA STARED AT THE GUN AIMED BETWEEN HER eyes. She was certain she was supposed to feel something: terror, panic, bravado, regret, sorrow, hope . . . something. Instead, her body felt absolutely frozen, unable to think, breathe, move, feel.

  Her vision collapsed to take in the very large, very black gun and Harris’s finger on the trigger. The rest of the world faded into a distant blur of color. The auditorium had gone silent, so silent that Nora’s ears felt like they were trying to pop.