by Rachel Lee
“Hell.” He banged again. “I guess we should walk around outside and look.”
Her radio crackled and she heard Sarah’s familiar voice. “Darcy? The guy who lives in that ranch that Alex asked about? Vietnam vet named Warren Trimble. Apparently he’s been ill for years and is dying of some kind of leukemia. That’s from a vet who’s talked to him a few times. Anyway, be warned. Trimble is an angry man. He was the victim of Agent Orange.”
Darcy and Alex exchanged looks as she hooked the radio back onto her belt.
“Sounds like a good prospect,” he said. Then without another word, he stepped back, raised his foot and prepared to kick the door in. “You aren’t going to see this.”
“Emergency doctrine,” she retorted. “We think Jack is being held prisoner in here.” But just as quickly, she reached out a hand and said sharply, “Don’t. We’re dealing with a bomber, remember?”
Alex seldom swore, but he raised a cloud of blue language that stained the air. “What the hell...”
Darcy pulled her radio again, raising Sarah. “We’re going to need help. No one’s home, and if this is the bomber...”
“I read you. We’re on our way.”
“So what do we do?” Alex asked, frustration lacing his voice. “What if he’s in there?”
“Let’s walk around, calling for him. If he’s in any of these buildings and still alive, he’ll answer. Maybe he can even give us some intel, like whether there’s a bomb.”
She could easily understand Alex’s frustration. She shared it. But it wasn’t going to do a single soul a bit of good if they blew themselves up. That was one thing her line of work had taught her: if you got anywhere near a bomber, you had to look out for traps.
It was awful, though, trudging around slowly, scouring the ground and windows for trip wires, for anything that looked out of place.
It was when they reached the outbuilding way to the back that their calls were finally answered.
“I’m here,” they heard Jack shout. “But don’t come in. He’s wired some kind of bomb to the door.”
The two of them froze, then Darcy looked for a crack in the wall. “Jack? You okay?”
“I’m chained up, but I’m okay.”
“Did he wire the bomb just to the door?”
“I think so. But I don’t know what kind of switch he used.”
Alex frowned at the door, then looked at her. “Back window maybe?”
“Not dressed like this,” she answered. “Bring my truck over here?”
“Sure.” He took the keys from her and ran fast back to her truck.
She put her mouth to the crack. “We’re going to try to come in from the back. You look around carefully and if you see anything that doesn’t look right, you have to let me know.”
“I don’t think he went near the back.”
“Can you be sure?”
“I can’t be sure of anything. He knocked me out when I first saw him.”
Great. Darcy’s heart was pounding with awareness. One wrong move and she could kill Jack. She wasn’t nearly as worried about herself. But it was her fault Jack was in there with a bomb. And no, she wasn’t going to excuse herself. She should have stomped on him with both feet instead of trying to be nice.
“Darcy?”
She leaned closer to the wall. “Yes, Jack?”
“I shouldn’t have been so stupid. I’m sorry. And I don’t see any other possible triggers for the bomb. He was in a hurry. Maybe he thought the door would be enough.”
“We’ll talk about you later. Right now I just want to get you out of there in one piece.”
Then her truck rolled up. She called, “I’m coming in, Jack. Just hang on.”
“You’ll need some bolt cutters.”
“First I have to get in.”
* * *
Jack realized he was feeling weak. He’d been trying to preserve his supplies. The best thing he could do, he’d decided, was eat and drink so he wouldn’t be useless if Darcy could get to him.
God, he hoped he was right. He hoped he hadn’t made another inexperienced mistake. But honestly, he hadn’t seen the bomber attach that bomb to anything but the door. Just the door. Kinda like he was hoping it might not be triggered.
“Jack, hang on. I’m coming.”
* * *
Alex hated this. He hated it with a passion beyond words. Helping Darcy suit up in protective bomb gear made him sick. He should be doing this. Someone else should be doing this. He hated it when he saw that the suit left her forearms and hands unprotected. He understood why, but he hated it. She’d need her dexterity for dealing with the bomb.
But this was Darcy’s job; she had the equipment and she knew how to use it. God willing, if that bomb exploded she’d be okay. But then there was Jack. That made him even sicker. That young man didn’t deserve to die just because he’d got too big for his britches.
When she finally looked like an olive green Pillsbury Doughboy, she gazed at him through a faceplate. “In the back there’s a blanket that looks like this suit. When I manage to get inside, pass it to me. It’s a blast blanket I want to throw over Jack.”
He nodded, feeling the grim set of his mouth and jaw.
“Stand back while I pull these boards away.”
That was too much for Alex. If that bomb was going off, he wasn’t going to be hiding behind her truck. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself.
“Did you tell the sheriff to bring a bomb squad?”
“Such as they have,” he answered. “Darcy...”
She paused. “I know,” she said quietly. “Now, get behind the truck.”
But when she reached for the first board, he reached for the one beside it. He was determined not to let her do this alone.
Four boards were all she needed. No explosion, thank God. In the distance she heard the wail of sirens. She pushed herself through, then turned to grab the blanket from Alex.
“Now,” she asked, “will you get behind the truck?”
He scowled, but this time followed directions. There was certainly nothing else he could do right now.
* * *
Inside, the light was dim and dusty and she paused a moment to let her eyes adjust from the bright morning sunlight. Then she switched on the flashlight over her faceplate so she could see better.
“Here,” said Jack.
Stepping carefully, searching for any possible trip wires or triggers, she approached him.
She could scarcely believe the way he was chained, like some kind of animal. “I’m going to throw this blanket over you,” she said. “It’ll be hot, but it’ll protect you. It’s a blast blanket, okay?”
“Okay,” he said.
“Where’s the bomb?”
He pointed. Her heart stuttered when she saw the ammo can. Micah had been right. For all she knew, the state lab was about to call with the results of their examination of the twisted metal they’d recovered. It didn’t matter now.
“Here’s the blanket,” she said.
It was hard to move inside the suit. Her usual agility was beyond reach. But she was capable of drawing the thick blanket over Jack’s head. “I need to go back for the bolt cutters. Don’t move.”
She turned and went back to the opening she’d made in the wall. The bomb suit didn’t release her body heat and she was warming up considerably. Only the coating on the face shield was keeping it from fogging over on her.
The bolt cutters lay on the ground where she’d left them. Wrapped in tape, with only the metal jaws exposed, they shouldn’t be much of a spark hazard, but she’d seen the dust in that place. Dust could be extremely explosive all by itself. She might hurt Jack without ever triggering the bomb.
When she got back to his side, she knelt with difficulty. “When I cut the chain off you, I want you to g
et up and move slowly to the opening I made in the wall. Keep the blanket around you. Make sure the bulk of it is toward the bomb for maximum protection. You can do that?”
“I ought to be able to get at least that much right.”
Another time she’d worry about his load of self-blame. Right now, however, she was more worried about getting him out of here in one piece.
The sirens outside were getting closer. “Alex?”
“Yo.”
“You told them this building is wired?”
“I told them every building could be wired. No chances.”
“Thanks.”
Then she tugged the blanket to one side and looked at the chains. Tight around his neck and ankle. Impossible to cut with the tool in her hand. But that didn’t matter. A length of it was hooked to the post behind him, and she could cut there.
Grabbing the cutters in both hands, she surrounded the chains with the strong blades and snapped them together. The chains fell away at once.
“Anywhere else?”
“No. I’m just stiff from not being able to move much.”
“Okay, I’ll help you up, then we’ll get you out of here. Walk in front of me. I’m extra protection for you.”
She hardly noticed how hard her heart was galloping. All her focus, every cell of her being, was intent on getting this right, getting Jack out of here and then dealing with the waiting bomb.
There was no room in her for anything else. Not one thing. The cold that crept through her, freezing her in the moment for Jack’s safety and her own, was contradictorily as hot as hell. She could feel the sweat running down her back, over her body, wetting her hair. It prickled and she didn’t care. The damn suit was hot.
She finally eased Jack to the opening and urged him through. “Take him away from here,” she told Alex.
“What about you?”
“Someone has to deal with that bomb. You got a bomb squad around here?”
His silence answered her. Small towns rarely did. Small towns almost never needed them. The best they had was probably Charity, the arson investigator.
“Make sure Jack calls his parents. They must be sick with worry. Oh, and bring me the black case from the back of the vehicle before you drive him away. Tell everyone else to back off. We know we have this bomb, but I’m not sure there aren’t others.”
“I know” was all Alex said as he urged Jack into her truck, then brought her the black bag. “Are you sure about this?” he asked as he passed it to her.
“I’m the tech” was all she said.
And she was. The only trained tech they had. While she wasn’t called on to defuse bombs as a rule, she knew the principles. Now she’d need to apply them.
She waited until she heard the truck drive away. Then she turned to look at the bomb. A shaft of sunlight had found its way through a crack, illuminating the dusty air and falling right on the ammo can.
With her case, she walked slowly over to study it.
* * *
Alex was now living out his own version of hell. He’d got Jack safely away from the building and was pouring bottles of water into the boy while cops gathered, but Darcy was still inside, about to try to deal with a bomb.
At a safe distance from all the structures, tense deputies waited. Then three guys from the FBI appeared, looking travel worn in their jeans and FBI windbreakers.
“Seems we’re late,” Josh Hargreaves said to Alex after introducing himself around.
“Far from it,” Alex said. “Jack here says the bomber is trying to get even and he talked at some length about Agent Orange. You might want to background the guy who owns this place.”
Josh nodded and took his crew to one side where they plugged a laptop into a satellite connection in their car and began to check things out. The sheriff, Gage Dalton, joined them to share all he could about Warren Trimble.
A fireman came over to remove the chain from around Alex’s neck. All that remained was a raw line where it had rubbed.
Warren Trimble. The name seared itself into Alex’s mind. He’d never heard of the guy. At this point, he didn’t especially care. He wanted Darcy to walk out of that ramshackle building in one piece, the sooner the better.
* * *
Darcy doubted the guy’s other bombs had been built like this one. A four-inch piece of det cord was plugged into a hole in the side of the can, surrounded by caulk. Once lit, that cord would burn hotter than hell.
But running away from it were slender wires coated in plastic. They undoubtedly led to the trigger mechanism that would have sent a spark through the wires to ignite the det cord.
Wishing she could wipe the perspiration from her forehead, she knelt and studied the setup. She couldn’t see any possible way that det cord could ignite without a charge coming through the wires. He hadn’t put a double detonator on it, from what she could see.
Without the det cord, the ANFO would be a dangerous but unexplosive lump of fertilizer and fuel oil. Being cautious, she looked around the entire bomb, seeking another trigger while taking care not to disturb the black wires running back to the door.
No, that was it. He’d either been in a hurry, or only cared that he slowed everyone down. Did he really believe they’d just come busting into this building without looking for a bomb?
Maybe. Maybe the guy had gone so far around the bend he wasn’t thinking clearly. Remembering that Alex had been ready to kick the door of the house in, maybe the bomber wasn’t that far around the bend after all. Regardless, he must have known that if Jack were still coherent when they found him, they’d be warned about the bomb.
Screw it, she thought suddenly. It was getting so hot inside this suit that she might well start to suffer from heat stress and do something stupid.
She opened her bag and grabbed a fully insulated pair of wire cutters. These shouldn’t even send a spark along the electrical line. Maybe.
Then she paused, took one more look and made up her mind. Without hesitation, she grabbed the det cord and pulled it out of the box.
Just in time. A spark shot down those wires and the next thing she knew that det cord was burning with white heat. Moments later it melted into a twisted piece of plastic on a blackened floorboard.
Well, she’d made the wrong choice. Maybe. Evidently pulling the cord had caused the original detonator to register movement and it had sent the necessary spark.
It didn’t matter now, though. She had disarmed the bomb. The next thing she needed to do was follow the wires back to the detonator and make sure it wasn’t a threat, either.
Damn, she was hot!
* * *
For Alex, a lifetime seemed to pass before the door on the distant outbuilding opened and Darcy emerged. She was practically staggering, and she pulled her headgear off immediately.
He ran to her, forgetting everything else. When he reached her, she was struggling to open fasteners with fingers that didn’t work. Her hair was plastered to her head.
“God, get me out of this,” she said.
He was glad to oblige, even though he didn’t really know his way around it. Tugging at tapes, he helped her until finally the suit fell to the ground. She looked as if she’d been through a shower or heavy rain.
“Let’s get you some water.”
“Let’s find out who this bastard is.”
“We can do both,” he said mildly. He could tell the heat had made her irritable, but it didn’t bother him. “Want me to bring the suit?”
“Leave it. We can get the car to pick it up and use it again if we need to. But everyone’s okay?”
“Everyone except you,” he answered. “Jack is reeking of embarrassment.”
She just shook her head as they started walking toward the car and the crowded cops. Then her step hitched. “FBI?”
“Three of ’em. They’
re looking into this guy’s background right now.”
“Hallelujah. Why do I think it’s more important to find him than to check out the rest of these buildings?”
“From what Jack said, he’s on a mission of vengeance. On the other hand, there might be clues inside.”
“So how much time are we going to waste checking these buildings out for bombs? He’s already been found once. You don’t think he’s in a hurry now?”
Alex couldn’t argue with that. But the FBI agents were busy checking out Warren Trimble, and that might provide the only information they needed without taking additional risks by breaking into his house.
* * *
Finally Darcy propped herself against the side of her truck and guzzled the water he passed to her. The morning air felt positively frigid after the blast furnace of that suit. She saw Jack standing over by the agents and walked that way.
“Are you okay?” she asked immediately.
He gave her a shamefaced look. “I’m fine. I was so worried about you, though, and it was all my fault.”
She shook her head a little. “All’s well that ends well,” she said, then sighed. “Jack...just hang on. In the future let the pros do the work, okay? On the other hand...”
“If you hadn’t found me, or someone had come busting through that door, somebody would be dead,” he said seriously. “I was stupid and I know it. I won’t do that again, I swear.”
As she shed the excess heat, and tendrils of her wet hair began to dry, she felt a faint smile dawn on her lips. “I sincerely hope you won’t have to. Anyway...because of you, we know who we’re looking for now.”
“I guess. The FBI agents got the name from the sheriff.”
Alex joined them, passing them each another bottle of water. For a few minutes, they watched the crime scene techs enter the outbuilding with cameras and other equipment to log everything in there.
Darcy spoke again after draining half the bottle. “So I guess we wait to see what we can learn about him. I honestly don’t want to break into the house unless we can’t find out enough. It might be wired, too.”
“Jack says he wants to get even and it has to do with Agent Orange. The sheriff said the guy has been suffering from illness for a long time. Cancer now, he thinks.”