Getting up, she drew a deep breath to steady her nerves, then proceeded to the next container, eager to get the night's work done and get back to the apartment.
With her nervous tension in check, she quickly moved to the next container. Once again it only took her a few seconds to pick the lock, then she eased open the door and stepped inside.
Her penlight showed that it was packed with crates. The packing invoice described the contents as pottery and glassware. The crates were packed from floor to ceiling on either side of a narrow aisle.
Using the hand scanner, she worked her way from front to back, the air quickly becoming stifling as she moved toward the very back of the enclosure.
As she ran the scanner across one of the crates in the very back of the container, it lit up like a Christmas tree. She froze, stunned, and held the scanner out once again. No doubt about it, the reading was clear. Something in one of the crates didn't belong there.
Breathing shallowly, fear suffusing her, she moved closer and saw that on the side of the crate that had lit up the scanner appeared to be a timer of sorts.
Bomb!
She'd found it.
The chatter that Blake and his agency had gotten had been right. There was a bomb.
"Nick, container 16002. The bomb's in here. Contact Blake. Tell him I found the bomb. Container 16002."
Out! She wanted out. She had to get out of here.
Her job was done and all she had to do was get to safety. She backed away from the crate, wondering what kind of timer it was on, when it was set to explode.
For all she knew it could go off before she made her way out of the container. It appeared to be big enough to take out half the wharf.
She turned to exit just in time to hear the sharp bark of a dog. The door of the container crashed down. For a long moment she stared at it in horror. Busted!
She was caught like a rat in a trap.
Inside the container.
She was trapped inside the container with the bomb.
Panic ripped through her.
She had to get out. She had no idea when the bomb was set to detonate. If the choices were life in a prison cell versus being blown to smithereens, she'd take the cell every time.
Working her way down the narrow aisle to the door she tried to lift it, but it didn't budge. Whoever had closed it had apparently secured it, as well.
Think! Think Lynn, she commanded. For a long moment she felt as if she suffered some sort of brain freeze. She couldn't think. She couldn't act. She could do nothing but stare at the door that held her captive.
Frantically she used her penlight to survey the walls of the container, looking for a weakness she could exploit, a way out other than the door. But, there was none.
"Hey! Somebody let me out of here," she cried and banged on the door with her fists. The pounding of her hands against the metal door sounded muted compared to the frantic beating of her heart.
The walls seemed to close in on her and she was struck by a horrifying wave of claustrophobia. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't get enough air. It was too hot. The walls were too close.
She slid to the floor next to the door and fought back tears of defeat. She couldn't get out. The bomb could go off at any minute and she wouldn't be able to escape.
She was only twenty-three years old and one way or another her life, for all intents and purposes, was over tonight.
It didn't matter that Nick was married and unattainable. If the bomb didn't go off before the door opened, eventually she'd be arrested and nobody would come to help her.
"Nick, I'm in trouble," she said softly. "I'm locked in the container with the bomb and for all I know it could go off at any moment." She fought back a burst of hysterical laughter. Although logically she didn't think it would detonate, she knew that the terrorist probably had plans for the bomb. At the moment, emotions were stronger than logic. "They showed me how to find a bomb, but they didn't teach me how to disarm one."
She leaned her head against the door and was able to hear the sounds of men talking. They were probably trying to decide the best way to handle the situation.
"If I manage to get out of this container, then I'm headed to jail for a very long time. You know all the charges that are pending against me." She drew a deep breath and squeezed her eyes tightly closed as all the moments she'd had with Nick in the past two weeks rushed through her head.
The heat of his kiss, the sweet touch of his hands, all of it swept through her, bringing with it a grief so profound it momentarily stilled her fear. She'd always remember that smile of his. She loved the way he could make her laugh. Whether she lived another twenty years in a jail cell or was blown to bits in minutes, she'd have him in her heart.
She had no idea what the truth was where he was concerned, but it didn't matter now. She'd never see him again. The average, normal life she'd hungered for was never going to happen.
It wasn't fair. She wanted a future. She needed more time, time to get to know her father better, time to be with her sisters and share their lives. She'd wanted children. Dammit, she'd wanted a future.
She bit her lower lip, willing tears away. "Nick, I know you have your orders and I'm on my own here. I just want you to know that I wouldn't take back any of the time we had together."
A tear escaped to run down her cheek and she swiped at it angrily. "Even knowing that you're married, I wouldn't take back making love to you. I love you, Nick. I just wanted you to know that."
She reached up to touch the tiny transmitter on her collar and froze. The transmitter was gone.
Chapter 14
In a new panic, she frantically raked her hand across her neckline, but the tiny bug that had connected her with Nick wasn't anywhere.
A hysterical burst of laughter nearly choked her. She was baring her heart to nobody. He hadn't heard a word she'd said. He didn't know she was in trouble and he didn't know about the bomb.
Alone. Just knowing that Nick could hear her speak, could listen to her final words, had comforted her. Now that comfort had been torn away and she knew she was truly alone.
The transmitter must have fallen off when she'd hit the ground so hard earlier. She must have jarred it loose.
The phone! She fumbled in her pouch for the phone Nick had given her to carry. She flipped it open and in the tiny display saw the words, No Signal.
Once again she bit back a burst of hysterical laughter. Of course there was no signal. Why make things easier on her?
The knowledge that she was truly alone, that Nick couldn't even hear her thoughts, galvanized her. She might be going down, but she wasn't going down easily.
She stood and emptied her pouch. She took out the lock-picking kit and the phone and hid them along with the scanner behind one of the crates. When they got her out of here, she didn't want to be found with those items.
She banged on the door once again. "Hey, come on, let me out." she screamed, certain that they could hear her. "It was just a stupid dare, okay? Come on, don't be a bunch of hard-asses. My friends are waiting for me down at the bar."
It was a gamble, but she figured her best chance of getting out of this whole debacle was to play dumb. If she could just get outside maybe she'd have an opportunity to escape.
"I'm getting really freaked out in here," she yelled. "Please, open the door. I…I can't breathe in here."
"It's a girl," one of the men outside the door said. "It sounds like she's in there by herself." The voice sounded young and she thought it might have been the person who'd been talking about his wife earlier.
"I only saw one person in there when I shut the door," another deep voice replied.
"What do you think, should we open it?" It was the younger-sounding male voice.
"Please, help me. I'm so scared. I'm going to be sick. You gotta let me out of here!" She banged on the door once again and nearly sobbed as she heard the latch on the door turning.
She gathered all the strength she had and stood p
oised as the door slid up. Her intention had been to spring out of the container and run as she'd never run before. Two guns pointed directly at her changed her mind.
"Oh, thank God," she cried and half collapsed on the ground just outside the container. As she pretended to suck in air and sob, she kept an eye on the two guards, looking for any weakness they might display.
A Doberman stood on either side of the older man, the dogs looking at her as if she were a particularly juicy filet mignon. They vibrated with excitement, their powerful haunches tensed.
"Aufhalten," the man said.
He couldn't know that Lynn's education had been extensive, including learning languages such as German. Stay, he'd said and although both dogs whined plaintively, they remained still. She'd heard somewhere that guard dogs were often trained in a foreign language so that most people wouldn't know what commands to give.
"Stand up," he commanded her in English. "Who are you?" He had no German accent, adding to her speculation that only the dog training had been done in the German language.
She pretended to struggle to her feet, her arms clenched around her stomach as if she might throw up at any moment. "My name is Lynn and this was all a stupid bet with my friends. We had a couple of drinks and one of the guys came up with this stupid idea."
"You bunch of idiots," the younger man exclaimed. "What were you thinking?"
"I don't know. Oh God, oh God, my parents are going to totally kill me." She boo-hooed like a baby, wailing loudly and watched slyly as the two men exchanged uneasy glances.
"Okay…all right. Calm down for crying out loud," the older man said and lowered his weapon. "You can tell it all to our supervisor when he gets here."
The younger guard lowered his weapon, as well. It was all Lynn had been waiting for. She sprang, kicking straight out and knocked the gun out of the older man's hand, then she spun and roundhouse kicked the other gun.
"Angreifen! Angreifen!" The older guard yelled, then cursed soundly.
Attack!
The dogs leaped forward as Lynn took off running. She knew she had only seconds before the guards would recover their weapons and less time before one of those dogs would make her his next meal.
She darted around the corner of one row of containers, then around another. She would have felt better if the dogs barked and growled, but they were ominously silent as they chased after her.
She skidded around another corner, gasping as she nearly fell. If she tripped, if she stumbled and fell, she would be finished. The dogs would be on her like diamonds on a debutante.
All she needed was enough time to get out of the holding enclosure. At the moment she felt like a sitting duck, waiting for the bite of sharp teeth or the sting of a bullet in her back.
The guards yelled to each other and it was easy to tell from their voices that they were furious. If they caught her they wouldn't fall for her poor little girl act again.
She was in the center of the yard and the containers formed a maze. She kept her gaze focused on the distant wall that separated the yard from the streets.
The problem was, once she got to that wall, if she got to that wall, there would be a brief period of time when she'd hang like a target on a hay bale.
She had genetic gifts, but she couldn't leap tall buildings in a single bound. Her heart banged with a rhythm that threatened cardiac arrest, but she didn't slow her pace.
She stifled a scream as a gunshot resounded, the bullet pinging into a container nearby. Give up, a small voice whispered inside her brain. Wouldn't a life in prison be better than being dead?
"Lynn!"
She gasped at the familiar voice. Looking up she saw Nick hanging over the top of the wall. "Come on," he yelled. "I'll cover you." She'd never been so happy to see anyone in her life.
"There she is!" a voice yelled from someplace just behind her.
As she ran toward Nick he fired off a round of shots, providing the cover she needed to get to the wall. She leaped up and her fingers barely grasped the top. At the same time something clamped around her left foot.
She glanced down to see one of the dogs with her tennis shoe in his mouth. The dog shook his head and pulled, threatening to jerk her off the wall.
Her fingers trembled, threatening to slip as the dog pulled harder. "Aufhalten! Aufhalten," she cried, hoping the dog would heed the command.
"Come on, come on," Nick said urgently as he fired off another round.
The dog held tight to her foot. Once again a frantic fear ripped through her as she struggled against the dog's weight and grip to get up and over the wall.
She didn't want to seriously hurt the dog, who was only doing what he'd been trained to do, but she wanted him off her.
With an effort that made her entire body tremble, she moved her leg and tried to smash the dog into the wall. Once…twice…three times and he finally yelped, released her and fell to the ground below.
She scrambled over the wall to discover that Nick had used the roof of his car to gain access to the top of the wall.
"Get in," he said, not moving from his position.
She hit the roof and quickly scrambled down and into the driver's seat. She started the engine with a roar and threw it into gear. With her foot on the brake she tensed as Nick came off the wall and flew through the passenger door.
"Go! Go!" he exclaimed.
Grabbing the wheel tightly, she tromped on the gas and headed down the nearest street. "Head for the apartment," he said. "There's no way they could see the car. We'll park it in the lot in the back."
"You weren't supposed to be here. You broke the rules."
"Yeah, breaking rules, that's another nasty habit I have," he replied.
"How did you know I was in trouble?" She shot him a sideways glance but he was half-turned in the seat, staring out the back window.
"You went silent. For a few minutes I thought you just weren't talking to me, then I realized something was wrong with the transmitter. The last thing I'd heard was the faint sound of the guards' voices then nothing."
She wheeled into a parking space next to her car in the lot and turned off the engine. "They shut me into a container." She suddenly realized he hadn't heard her report. He hadn't heard anything she'd said after she'd hit the ground. "Nick, the bomb. I found it."
"Where?" The word shot from him.
"Container 16002."
"I've got to contact Blake," he said. Together they got out of the car and hurried up to the apartment. Once there Nick grabbed his cell phone from where he'd left it on the table and dialed.
"Stingray Wharf. Mission accomplished. 16002." He repeated the information once more, then hung up.
Lynn stood at the window, half expecting police cars to roar up the block. But the streets remained deserted.
"What happens now?" She sank onto the edge of the sofa bed. Now that the adrenaline rush of danger had passed, she found herself trembling once again. That had been far too close for comfort.
"Somebody will visit the yard and the bomb will be disarmed. Nobody other than the men directly involved will ever know it was there."
She raised an eyebrow in surprise. "You mean this won't make the morning news?"
"There's no way anybody wants the people of this country to know how vulnerable the ports are despite all the efforts to make them secure." He raked a hand through his hair and his gaze was soft, tender as it lingered on her. "What happens now is you get your life back."
Leaning her head back she closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. It was over. She was free. She could go back home and pick up her life where it had left off.
She pulled herself up from the sofa and went to the table and sat in front of her laptop. "What are you doing?" he asked as she punched the on button.
"I'm going online and I'm booking a seat on the next available flight out of here to Phoenix." As she made the arrangements, she consciously kept her attention on the task at hand and away from the man who stood so near.
All she'd ever wanted was an ordinary life, the kind that hundreds of thousands of people enjoyed on a daily basis. Certainly living with Jonas had never been ordinary.
She'd dreamed of everyday things such as sharing coffee over a kitchen table in the mornings, working hard and eating mac and cheese for dinner. She'd wanted a life filled with normal worries—whether her kids would catch the flu or if the air conditioner would last another year.
Nick was an FBI agent and his life would always be filled with danger and drama. There would always be another assignment for him, another risk. An ordinary life would never work for Nick Barnes even if he wasn't married.
Travel arrangements made, she shut off the laptop. "I'm on a flight home at seven o'clock tomorrow evening." She looked up at him.
His features were inscrutable. "Can I take you to the airport?" She hesitated. It would be so much easier to say goodbye now. "Please, Lynn. I'd really like to see you off."
"Won't that interfere with your job?"
"I'll figure out a reason to be gone a couple of hours," he replied.
"All right," she said relenting. "Why don't you pick me up about four-thirty tomorrow afternoon." A glance at her clock told her it was after four. "And now you'd better get out of here." She was grateful he didn't try to talk about them, for there was nothing left to talk about.
"Yeah, I've got to get." He started for the door, but she stopped him by softly calling his name.
"You took a big risk, coming after me tonight. If you'd been caught you wouldn't have only been arrested, but you would have screwed up the other assignment you've been working."
"No big deal. Taking risks is what I do."
"I know." And it was the reason they could never, ever have a future together. "Still, I owe you one."
He grinned, but it was a sad kind of a grin. "Let's hope you never have to repay the favor."
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