She could give a damn about Conroy. “How badly is Agent Peterson hurt?”
The voice on the other end snorted. “We’ll let you know once we get that doctor.”
It wasn’t going to go like that. If she let Fiske get the upper hand in the bargaining, everything would be lost. “You don’t get a doctor—you don’t get anything—until I see Peterson. Is that clear?” Behind her, she heard Janice sobbing.
“Doctor first,” the young man snapped. “It’s not negotiable.”
Lukas placed his hand over the bottom of the cell phone. “I’ll go,” he told her.
But Lydia shook her head, vetoing the idea. She had enough to worry about without thinking of him being in there, as well.
“We’ll get someone else,” she told him. Placing the cell to her ear again, she returned to negotiations. “Okay, how’s this? I’ll trade you a special agent for a special agent.”
The pause on the other end was ripe with confusion. “No. He stays here.”
She had to get Elliot out. Nothing was going to go forward until she saw her partner safely away from the supremacists. She wouldn’t allow it.
“Look,” she began tersely. “If he dies, he’s not going to do you any good and killing a federal agent is punishable by death, I don’t have to tell you that. No fancy lawyer is going to be able to get you off. He dies, you die. That’s the law and it’s written in stone. Now, what’ll it be?”
There was a pause on the other end of the line and then Fiske told her, “I’ve got to talk this over with the others. What’s your number?”
She gave it to him. The line went dead.
With a sigh, Lydia snapped the cell phone closed. “He’s going to talk it over.” She spat the words out. Frustration clawed at her.
“You can’t be serious.” Lukas’s tone rebuked her. She raised her eyes to his, not catching his drift at first. “You can’t go in there.”
It was her job to go in, to bring about peace at a decent price. Did he think she was just playing at law enforcement?
“You are.”
He waved away the comparison as just so much nonsense. “That’s different. I’m a doctor. There are people in there who need medical attention.”
If there was a difference, she didn’t see it. “And one of them’s my partner. Who wouldn’t be in there if I hadn’t suddenly decided to trade with him.” She worked her words past the lump in her throat. “Well, I owe him a trade. He said so last night. This is it.” She looked at Lukas. “This isn’t negotiable, Doctor. He’s in there because of me.”
Lukas understood that, understood her guilt. But not her recklessness in proposing to change places with the other man.
“I can treat Elliot—”
Lydia looked at him. Was he that naive, or did he simply not understand that the scum beyond the barricade did not subscribe to the same noble principles that he did?
“Conroy’s too weak to make it out of here in his present condition. Those men in there with him are not going to let you do anything until you bring about some kind of miracle for Conroy.” She saw the impassive look on Lukas’s face. She knew it frustrated him that she wasn’t listening to reason—his reason, not hers. “I don’t answer to you, Lukas. This is something I need to do. We need someone on the inside and that someone is me.”
Rodriguez had been standing to the side, listening to the exchange. He moved forward now. “Special Agent Wakefield, I could go in—”
She stopped him before he got any further. “No offense, Rodriguez, but you’re still learning.”
He did his best to appear as if he was on top of things. “Best place to learn is on the inside.”
He was smiling, but she detected the nervousness just beneath the surface. Not that she blamed him. Nerves were healthy. They kept you from doing stupid things and kept you alive.
She placed her hand on his shoulder. “I need you out here, Ethan. You get to face the assistant director when he comes,” she reminded him. “Personally, I’d rather face these maniac supremacists.” The phone in her hand rang. She exchanged looks with Lukas. “Looks like it’s showtime.” She tried one last time before flipping the phone open. “I can’t talk you out of this?”
His eyes on hers, Lukas shook his head. “Not a chance.”
Lydia sighed. “I didn’t think so.” She pressed the button on her telephone as she turned to face the man on the other side of the barricade. This time, he was sitting up at the desk, the phone to his ear. “Did you come to a decision?”
“We’ll trade the agent for you. As long as we get the doctor, too.”
“Smart move,” she said, only praying that she was making one that was smarter.
Chapter 14
Back on the telephone, Marlon Fiske made his first demand.
“Send the doctor in first.”
“No.” Experience had taught Lydia that if Lukas went in before the trade for Elliot was made, no one would be coming out. “We need a show of good faith on your part. Send out Agent Peterson.”
Fiske’s face contorted. “Do you think we’re stupid?”
Worried, angry at the terrorist and at herself for not being here when this had gone down, Lydia looked through the glass directly at the man. Hell, he looked no older than a college freshman. He should be lounging around in a frat house, sneaking in a beer and planning what to do on Friday night, not terrorizing coronary patients.
It was hard holding on to her temper and keeping her voice calm.
“I think you know that you’re in a very precarious position. You have other hostages. I already told you that if anything happens to Agent Peterson, you won’t be in a position to bargain for anything. Now send him out,” she said evenly. “I’ll meet you halfway. I’ll take a step for every one he takes. An equal trade, like I said. And then you can have the doctor.” She couldn’t help adding, “That’s more of a fair deal than you gave anyone at the mall.”
Fiske looked at her angrily from across the barricade, his brow furrowed in indecision.
“Take it or leave it,” she told him when his indecision stretched out the silence.
Lukas covered the cell phone in her hand with his own. She might have her agenda, but he had his. He couldn’t risk the lives of any of the patients behind the barricade. Jacob Lindstrom, the man he’d operated on just before Conroy arrived in the E.R. had mercifully been transferred to his own room yesterday afternoon, but there were others there, others who had to be terrified by what was happening.
“I’ve got to go in there, whether or not he agrees to the trade.” According to what a nurse had just told him, there were five patients currently in the CCU, not counting Conroy. Four were post-operative and one, his uncle, was pre-operative. All of them required close monitoring. There were hospital staff members trapped inside with them, but he couldn’t count on them being able to handle an emergency situation.
Lydia looked into his eyes. She understood where he was coming from, but it didn’t change anything. “We have to do it my way. You can only come in from a position of strength, otherwise, we lose them all.” She saw the doubt. “I know what I’m talking about, trust me.”
It all boiled down to that. Trusting her. Trusting someone else to handle things. It wasn’t something he was accustomed to doing.
“What are you two whispering about?” Fiske demanded, his voice rising out of the cell phone.
She turned back to look through the glass. Fiske was peering at them uncertainly. Almost nervously, she thought. She had to use that to their advantage.
“That it’s a nice day for a negotiation,” she said simply. “So, what’ll be?”
“Okay,” he barked angrily. “Come ahead.”
She placed her hand on the door. It wouldn’t budge. There were chairs and a table piled against it. “You’re going to have to clear off some of the debris before I can get in.”
Fiske took two steps toward them, then stopped. “Back up!” he ordered, loud enough for his voice to car
ry through the doors. “Stand where I can see you.”
“We won’t rush you,” Lydia promised. There was nothing to be gained if they did. The other man inside the unit could easily kill the hostages in retaliation. “You have my word.”
Fiske sneered. “The word of a government pig doesn’t go too far.”
A smile with no humor behind it curved her mouth. “Pig senior-grade carries some weight on this side of the door, even if not on your side,” she assured him, taking several steps back. “Nobody will make a move on you.”
Her eyes never left Fiske as the supremacist, balancing his weapon under his arm, managed to pull back one of the barricades.
“Okay, you can come ahead.”
But she made no move to go in. “First, get Agent Peterson. Equal steps, remember?”
Frustrated, Fiske backed up, not willing to leave the corridor unmanned now that one of the obstacles had been removed. He kept his gun trained on the doors until his body was level with the second set of double doors. Pushing open the door with one hand, he glanced in, then immediately looked back at the special agent he resented having to deal with.
“You, nurse, bring the wounded guy over here.” Sparing only another glance, he motioned to the woman he was addressing with his weapon.
Lukas lowered his head so that only Lydia could hear him. “I don’t want you to do anything stupid in there,” he whispered in her ear.
She looked at him sharply. She thought of last night. Of how vulnerable she’d made herself, being with him. Who knew how disastrous a mistake that could have been if she hadn’t retreated this morning?
“No more stupid than anything I’d do out here.”
Lukas thought of the way she’d been with him initially. “That’s not very reassuring.”
His eyes swept over her. A myriad of emotions pushed their way to the fore. Everything had suddenly taken on a different cast in light of the dire situation. He realized that within moments, she would be at the mercy of men who had next to no regard for human life. And he didn’t want her to be at their mercy, he wanted her to be safe.
“I mean it,” he told her fiercely. “Don’t get them angry.”
Too late, she thought. “They were born angry, Graywolf.” She paused to smile at him. “You ought to know a little about that. Here, hang on to this.” She gave him her cell phone. “He might want to say something to you before you go in.”
Movement beyond the glass caught her attention. Lydia sucked in her breath as she saw Elliot emerge from the communal CCU area. Leaning heavily on the young nurse who seemed to be doing more than her share to prop him up, he was taking shaky steps forward. There was blood all along his left pant leg.
Her heart constricted. “Oh, God.”
Lukas turned to summon one of the people behind him. “Get a gurney and take Peterson down to E.R. the second he comes out,” he ordered.
When he turned back, Lydia was opening the door. Aware that his heart had suddenly lodged in his throat, he caught her by the arm.
Startled, she looked at him quizzically. If she was going to ask what the hell he thought he was doing, she never got the chance. Her mouth was beneath his in a kiss that tasted of concern, of fear, and of other things she didn’t have time to decipher. There were too many emotions colliding within her for her to handle any more.
Releasing her, Lukas stepped back, seeing Lydia for the first time. Seeing himself, as well. It crossed his mind that they were living in an insane world where things became clear just when they were the most complicated.
“Be careful.”
Nodding, Lydia pushed open the door.
“Okay,” she said to Fiske, using her calmest voice. Fiske was watching her every move intently, nervously. She knew she was dealing with a volatile person who could pick any time to go off. It wasn’t a comforting thought. “I’m coming toward you. Remember, a step for a step.”
“Remind me one more time, bitch,” the kid terrorist warned her, “and it’ll be the last time you remind anyone of anything.”
I’m going to get you, junior, Lukas silently vowed as he watched Lydia slowly make her way toward the other end of the corridor. And make you eat every damn word out of that smart mouth of yours once this is over.
When she was halfway there, Fiske’s eyes suddenly widened and he snapped to attention as if he’d just been poked in the back by a cattle prod. “Hold it! Take your piece out.”
“My piece?” she echoed incredulously. What was he, a veteran couch potato who spent his life watching old crime dramas? Nobody used that word anymore.
He obviously took her repetition as ridicule. “Your gun, bitch,” he snarled, shifting from foot to foot. “Take your gun out of your holster and put it on the floor. Now!”
Very slowly, holding her jacket open with one hand, she carefully plucked the service revolver out from its holster with the other. Securing it, she held the gun aloft with two fingers. If she wanted to, the weapon’s hilt would have been in her palm in an instant and she could have easily gotten a clear shot at the baby-faced supremacist. But there was the chance that before he went down, he could get off a shot at either Elliot or the nurse who was propping her partner up.
Either way, she couldn’t risk it. She needed to get the drop on Fiske when he could do the least amount of damage. And when a shot wouldn’t have his partner in the other room reacting and retaliating.
She bent and placed the gun on the floor in front of her.
“Good. Now kick it over here,” he ordered. When she did as she was told, he nodded. “Get your hands back up over your head and keep walking.” He saw her look toward Elliot. She wasn’t taking a step. He cursed roundly, then looked at the nurse. “You, do the same with the lead weight.”
Lydia gauged her steps to Elliot’s until they were finally parallel to one another. Hands above her head, she spared one glance toward her partner. “I’m really sorry, Elliot.”
He offered a weak smile. “Just when I thought it was safe to get off disability.” His breathing was labored. The wound hurt like a son of a gun. “It’s not your fault, Lyd.” He pressed his lips together to lock out the pain. “Watch yourself.”
The exchange, too low for Fiske to pick up, only succeeded in agitating him further.
“Hey, hey, hey, no talking. You got something to say, say it out loud so I can hear.” To emphasize his point, he waved the gun first at Elliot, then Lydia.
She was almost next to him now. It wasn’t easy bridling her contempt as she looked at him. “Okay if I put my hands down now?”
“No, get inside the room.” His hand to her back, Fiske pushed her toward the communal area. “And you out there,” he shouted into the telephone, “send in the doctor or the FBI agent dies.”
Breaking communication, he slammed the receiver down into the cradle.
The moment the outer doors parted and the nurse emerged with Elliot, Lukas waved the gurney forward. Elliot’s wife was beside him, grasping her husband’s hand even as they laid him on the gurney.
“Get him to the O.R., now,” Lukas ordered. “He’s lost a lot of blood.”
The resident took over. Lukas pushed open the door and stepped inside the inner corridor. Fiske was coming toward him. “I’m Dr. Lukas Graywolf.”
Fiske stopped in his tracks. Small, cold, amber eyes looked him over with contempt. For one moment, Lukas was propelled back to his past, looking into the eyes of people who thought themselves superior to him.
Fiske’s thin lips curled. “Damn it, you Indians are everywhere, aren’t you?” He spat out the words.
Lukas wasn’t about to allow himself to be rattled a by low life. He’d endured far more from better men than the one standing in front of him.
“We’re all part of some minority or other,” Lukas told him mildly. “Even you.”
The fair complexion reddened with rage at the insinuation. “My people go way back.”
Lukas merely looked at him, not stating the obvious. That hi
s went back further. He wasn’t here to antagonize the small-minded man, only to treat the patients.
Fiske used his weapon as an extension of his hand and pointed it toward the black bag Lukas was holding. “What’s in there?”
Because he’d learned long ago to suffer fools and endure their stupidity, Lukas remained calm. “Medical supplies.” He’d had one of the nurses put it together the second he knew he was going in.
Moving backward, the supremacist motioned him over to the desk.
“Open it.”
Lukas complied. With the tip of his weapon, Fiske moved things around within the medical bag, more for a show of strength than anything else. Satisfied that everything appeared to be in order, he indicated the other doors.
“Okay, now get in there and fix Conroy.”
The ludicrously simplistic command demanded some sort of response. “He’s not a broken toy to be mended,” Lukas told him evenly, preceding him into the large room.
A dozen beds separated by Plexiglas walls and sandwiched in between monitoring machinery were arranged in a large semicircle. There was a patient in every other one. His uncle had been put in the bed closest to Conroy’s area. The nurses’ station was the focal point of the unit. The hospital personnel who had been within them when the two terrorists had rushed the area were huddled by the far wall where they’d been ordered to stay. Three nurses and an orderly.
And Wanda.
Lukas saw the fear in her dark eyes. He nodded at her as reassuringly as he could. “It’s going to be all right,” he promised.
“Only if you and the government bitch don’t mess up,” the other supremacist, Bobby Johnson, warned him. A big man, he looked older than his age, with streaks of gray running through his reddish hair. “Otherwise—” Johnson turned his weapon on Lydia. He was holding on to her by her bad arm, Lukas realized. “Bang, she’s dead.”
Lukas looked at Lydia. She looked completely passive, as if she weren’t even listening to what had just been said. Damn it, she shouldn’t have to be here. None of them should.
“I thought the whole point of this was for you to get out of here with Conroy. You kill her and they’ll never let you out alive,” Lukas said.
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