She could barely hear him over the thunder of blood as it rushed to her ears. “I don’t plan on dying in the middle of the fifth floor of Smithfield Enterprises or going down for Dr. Hammer’s kidnapping, so anything that moves gets hit.”
“That’s the spirit.” His finger hovered for one more second. “Ready?”
His directions and bossiness were making her nuts. “Push the darn thing.”
A smile tugged at the corner of Liam’s mouth right before he pressed down. “Yes, ma’am.”
The screeching boom blew the lock inside the room and shook the floor beneath them. Puffs of smoke rolled down the hallway toward them. Glass crashed and metal crunched. Dust fell from the drywall around the doorjamb.
She coughed as the particle-filled air reached them. “You’re very good at your job.”
“Let’s hope that continues.”
Before she could answer, Liam jogged toward the busted door. He stood with his back to the wall and crouched down to look inside, standing up only long enough to motion her closer. As she reached him, he slipped his arm inside the hole.
“What are you doing?” she asked in a harsh whisper.
“Getting us in there.”
The lock clicked and the door swung open. After everything it took to get there, she feared taking one more step. “I’m not sure we’re safer in there.”
“Me, either, but that bolt I stuck in the stairway door is only going to hold it shut for a short time. We keep moving forward or…”
“Yeah, I get it.”
She expected to walk into an expensive lab. She stepped into a windowless living room. The small room had a couch and chair. Not a piece of equipment in sight.
“What the heck is this?”
“I have no idea.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “Stay here.”
She ignored the order and followed him with her hand wrapped in the back of his shirt. “I’d rather stick with you.”
“Apparently.”
Liam led with his gun as he walked into the kitchen area and the small bathroom next to it. A space off to the side hid a double bed. Spare furniture. No obvious places to hide. No closets. Only a rack of clothes and lab coats and a few piled boxes next to the bed.
The layout didn’t make any sense to her. “It’s an apartment in the middle of a floor of an office building.”
“It’s internal. I don’t see a window or any access to light.”
“It’s like a cell.”
“It doesn’t take up the entire floor, so there’s some thing else up here. We just have to figure out how to get to it.” Liam smoothed his hand over the walls as if looking for a secret entrance.
“I’m still trying to figure out why this is here. It’s so out of context.”
“It gives Hammer somewhere to live while he works.”
She spun around in a circle, taking in every inch of the makeshift studio. “He gave up his big house and trophy wife for this? I don’t get it.”
“Money.”
“What?”
“This is a temporary situation. There must be a pot of cash in this for Hammer somewhere.”
“He already earns good money. He has patents which bring in other income.”
“He’s earning government scientist money. I imagine his findings could be significantly more lucrative in the private sector.”
“If that’s true, where is he?”
A creaking by the front door had them both swinging. Liam’s gun came up as fast as his head whipped around. Her instincts misfired. She stood there with her finger on the trigger and the muzzle pointed at her feet as if her mind refused to telegraph a different message to her hand.
She expected a rush of guards to storm through the opening. Instead, the hole went dark as something snapped shut in front of it. One minute she saw shadows in the hallway. The next she stared at a seemingly solid door. “What just happened?”
“Someone locked us inside.”
Chapter Twelve
“Has your sister always been a criminal or can we blame this on your friend, the scandal-prone police officer?” Rex Smithfield used the remote to stop the image, rewind and show it again.
Dan refused to answer. His mind still hadn’t adjusted to seeing Maura alive. The first time she appeared on the screen his heart actually jumped. The heavy darkness of the last few days lifted. Or it did until he saw what this man was doing to her. Dan tried not to look at the monitor as pain raced across Maura’s face and the door slammed shut, locking her inside the bizarre apartment-like area.
Dan didn’t know where he was, where all of this action was unfolding, because he’d been unconscious when he arrived. But he did know that his sister and best friend were in huge trouble. The egotistical whack job pacing around in front of Dan was setting them up, luring them in and watching every move.
“What do you want?” Dan asked the question over the burning in his shoulder blades and the debilitating fear rumbling around in his stomach.
“What every businessman wants. To run his office in peace and without interference from meddling women.”
The guy might think the expensive suit made him legitimate, but the ropes biting into Dan’s wrists suggested something else. He twisted his hands behind his back to find a better position. With each tug, the bindings grew tighter. When moisture landed against his fingertips, he knew he had rubbed the skin raw and it had started bleeding.
“Let us go and you can do that,” he suggested. “We don’t care what’s happening here. Hell, I don’t even know who you are.”
“Rex Smithfield.”
Dan cultivated business contacts. He knew Smithfield by reputation. Divorced, reclusive and pathologically driven. He didn’t mingle and insisted on the best of everything. As far as Dan could tell, the other man resembled many men of his position. He had an oversize ego and the bank account to match, but no scandals that jumped to mind.
“You’re an honest businessman.” Dan had no idea whether that was true, but he decided to go for the man’s biggest asset—his overinflated sense of his self-worth. “You don’t want to mess with this sort of thing.”
“I’m afraid it is too late for that. You see, your sister got in my way.”
“She did her job. That’s all she ever does.”
“Apparently not.”
Dan ignored the comment and pressed ahead with the pleading. “She cares about her lab, not the business angles. Just let everyone go, let her get back to her re search, and we can all move on.”
Smithfield’s cold laughter filled the small abandoned office. “I believe what she is researching is Mr. Anderson.”
That was the third time Smithfield had referred to a relationship between Maura and Liam since Dan recovered from the crack to his head and woke up. Even now, he didn’t believe it. If anything, Liam and Maura had always gone out of their way to avoid each other. The pseudo separation made Dan nuts. Having the two people closest to him hate each other ruined most holiday get togethers. He’d never understood except to assume their stark differences made them little more than tolerant of each other.
But now he saw something soft in Maura’s eyes when she looked at Liam, the same feeling that was mirrored in the way Liam touched her. Either the circumstances drove them together or something else did.
“They actually make an interesting couple, don’t you think?” Smithfield asked with a heavy dose of amusement in his voice as he froze the frame on their faces. “The bright young lab assistant and the dirty cop.”
Dan’s gaze flipped to the screen and then back to Smithfield’s empty smile. “What does Liam have to do with any of this?”
Smithfield tapped the remote against his chin. “If I were you, I would question the cop’s influence here. Did she break into buildings and set fires before she started sleeping with him? I bet not.”
Dan blocked the man’s deep voice from his mind. He refused to let the words seep in. Liam and Maura would get out of there safe and unharmed. There
was no one in the world Dan trusted more with his sister’s safety than Liam.
Smithfield stepped over and stood right in front of Dan’s chair, forcing him to look up. “It’s a shame, really.”
“We’re done talking.”
“Your sister had so much potential. If I had realized how inventive she was, that she was not the mousy isolated creature Hammer insisted her to be, I might have talked to her about my plans, as well.”
“She never would have listened to you.” Dan had no idea what this man planned except that he wasn’t above killing people to get what he wanted. No way would Maura get roped into that sort of mess voluntarily.
“I admit I find her attractive in a scientific experiment sort of way. A brilliant mind and curvy body are an interesting combination.”
Dan kicked out, hoping to hurt this smug guy, but his feet were tied down. The chair teetered. He only avoided falling over by throwing his weight in the opposite direction.
Smithfield stepped back. “Settle down.”
“If you touch her, I will kill you.” In his furious haze Dan knew he could do it. If his hands were free, he’d wrap his fingers around this guy’s neck and stop whatever madness he had planned.
“I am afraid she has already outlived her usefulness. The evidence for the lab explosion points to her, but I cannot have her around to contest it.” Smithfield tilted his head to the side. “I am sure you understand.”
Bile rushed up the back of Dan’s throat. “Liam won’t let that happen and he’s too smart to let you catch him.”
“Which is why you’re here.” Smithfield set the remote down on the television stand. “I think your friend will risk his life to save you, and that is when I will have him. So, really, I should thank you for snooping around your sister’s house. You made it easy to hatch a new plan.”
“WE HAVE TO FIND THE OTHER way out.” Maura slid her hands over the plaster walls.
“We will.” Liam sat down on the couch. He needed a second to think. He expected to fight off guards. He didn’t anticipate a locked studio in the middle of an office building. His mind rebelled against the new facts.
She spared him a brief glance. “Get up and help me. They could be planning anything and we’re trapped.”
That wasn’t right. Something bigger was happening here. This was about more than taking a scientist and stealing his findings. This was a sick game of cat and mouse. Every time Liam got them to the next level, an unseen force pulled the strings and sent them careening in a new direction. Getting in the building, through security, away from the guards—it all unfolded at a pace and in a way to suggest someone else was controlling it. The entire evening had been a well-played trap.
He had to get Maura out of there.
“We should leave. Get down the stairs and out of the building. I can call Spanner from the street and convince him to get a warrant to search this place.”
She shot him an are-you-crazy glare. “On what grounds? Without Dr. Hammer or the evidence, we have nothing.”
Liam balanced his elbows on his knees and studied the floor. “We’re still alive, which is more than I can say for that guard in the stairwell.”
“We’ve come too far to turn around now.”
“Don’t you get it?” He shoved up from the cushions and stood there staring at her, willing her to understand and leave with him before she got hurt. Her life was too precious to risk in this way. “They, whoever they are, want us to find the other entrance and use it. We’re just playing into someone else’s twisted game.”
She dropped her arms to her sides. “So, you’re suggesting we sit here and wait for the guards to come for us? How is that a better option? At least if we go in shooting we have a chance of winning.”
“Those odds aren’t good enough for me.”
“You can’t tell me you’ve never fought through worse. I’ve heard the rumors, listened as Dan bragged about you. This can’t be the hardest job of your life.”
“This one is different.”
“Why?”
He touched his fingers to his forehead. He hoped the right words would pop into his head, but nothing came. Rather than come up with a fancy sentence he said what he felt. “You.”
The tension seeped out of her face and the strain over her eyes eased. “Liam.”
“It’s taken nine years to get you to talk to me without turning away or cutting me off.”
Red splotches stained her cheeks. “This can’t be about an incident when I was a teenager.”
“It’s about everything.”
“You know what I think?” The embarrassment turned to anger. It sparked in her eyes and vibrated down to her clenched fists and stiff knees.
“What’s wrong with you?”
She threw her hands out wide to her sides. “You and your secrecy. You and the blame you take on even when it isn’t yours to wear.”
The clicking sound was his brain shutting down. It happened every time anyone tiptoed into this topic. He saw it coming and avoided.
“Now isn’t the right time for this conversation. You were right. We should keep looking for an exit.” He tried to scoot around her but she grabbed his arm.
“You walked into a domestic dispute and tried to reason with an abusive jackass. You used all of your training and said what you were supposed to say. You played by the rules because that’s what your supervisor told you to do, and the guy shot his wife anyway.”
The words bounced right off him. “I know what happened. I was there.”
Her fingers tightened on his arm. “It shook your confidence, maybe it even changed you, but you know what? You’re a rescuer by nature. It’s who you are no matter how much you try to bury it. Even now, even though you hate that part of you and it scares you, your instinct is to step in and protect me.”
“I couldn’t stand it if something happened to you.”
“You can’t lose confidence now. Don’t you get it? If you spin out of control, I will follow along, and I can’t afford to do that.”
The trembling started in her hands and took over every muscle until he thought she’d split into a hundred pieces. The realization that he’d brought her to this, not Hammer or the situation, humbled him. He never would have guessed he had that power.
“Damn, I’m sorry.” He massaged her arms, trying to warm her chilled skin.
“I can’t do this alone.”
“And you’re not going to. We’re going to calm down and figure this out.”
“Are you kidding? I can barely breathe.” She bent over and inhaled loud enough for him to hear the labored sound as if it were right near his ear. Her hair fell over her shoulders and her whole body shook.
It was as if all of her bones turned to mush, leaving her limp and almost lifeless. He rubbed her lower back, trying to soothe her with soft words and an even softer touch. “Hey, it’s going to be fine.”
She continued to gulp in large mouthfuls of air. “How can you say that?”
With her weakening, he had no choice but to be strong. “Have I been wrong so far?”
She peeked up through strands of silky brown hair. “You do understand we’re stuck in here, right?”
“Stand up.” He helped her do just that.
“I’m going to strangle Dr. Hammer if we find him.”
“We will and you can’t.” When she started to argue, Liam rushed to explain. “Well, not until he tells Detective Spanner you’re innocent.”
“And if my idiot boss won’t make that admission?”
“We’ll take turns cutting off his air supply.”
She finally smiled. “Look, I know we’re walking into an ambush, but I can’t sit here.”
She was right. They’d figure out how best to go through the hidden door once they actually found it.
“I’ll check the kitchen.” He turned to head into the small room at the far left end and stopped when he realized he was the only one moving.
Maura stood in the middle of the room
with her hands on her hips.
“Taking a break already?” he asked.
“We’re going about this the wrong way.”
“We haven’t really started.”
“This is a doorway Dr. Hammer would use.”
“Well, yeah.”
“Despite the high I.Q., my boss is inept in many ways. He depends on his wife to usher him around for speaking engagements. He relied on me to keep the office running. Heck, he couldn’t fix the copy machine if it got jammed.”
“So?”
“The entrance is something simple, almost obvious.”
Liam’s mind went right to the only personal items in the entire place. “The bedroom.”
They rushed to the side of the bed. Hangers squeaked against the metal rod as they shoved back the clothes and unstacked the boxes sitting on the floor. There, on the wall, was the faint outline of a door. The opening was so thin the door had to scrape against the frame when it opened. If Liam could find the knob he’d do just that.
“Push.” Her voice barely registered above a whisper.
He understood the solution without her assistance. The point was to go in strong and not get killed. That meant keeping Maura back and heading in first. He pointed at her and then pointed in the corner.
She shook her head in response. The mutinous tight-lipped scowl told him her position. She didn’t need the words. But that didn’t mean he agreed. If he had to protect her and shoot at the same time, he’d do it.
When she held her ground, he gave in. Sort of. He motioned behind him, then shifted her hips until his body blocked as much of hers as possible. With his left hand raised, he counted down the seconds to entry. As the last finger fell, he slammed against the door with his shoulder. It flipped open with a loud scratching sound.
He entered gun up and yelling. Pointing in every direction, he waited for someone—anyone—to jump out. He saw only shiny surfaces and equipment he didn’t recognize. Notes littered the floor, and strings of data showed on every computer screen on a long desk that seemed to function as a workstation.
“This definitely is the lab,” Maura said as she stepped around him.
Night Moves Page 10