A shout snapped her head up for her to catch the sight of Rogers sliding on his ass through the doorway. His arms flailing, searching for purchase. The hand he held his gun in—empty.
He slammed into the toilet, his head connecting with a solid clang against the base. This was her chance, probably her only chance to get away. Carefully, she maneuvered over everything blocking her path to the exit, climbing with one hand and her elbow, making her way one inch at a time.
Rogers groaned and clamped onto her knee with a weak grasp. She kicked his hand away, balanced on a jug and jumped. Gripping the leg of a shelf with one hand, Bailey pulled herself up.
Just a few more feet. Thank God the room was twice the size of a prison cell with more accouterments.
Rogers clamped a hand around her ankle. This time she couldn’t kick him away. All she could do was hold on as he climbed up her body. The hand holding the grenade cramping, sweating. The hand gripping the metal leg, slipping. Letting go of either meant certain death. Muscles straining, now screaming, she had to make a choice.
“You’re not going anywhere. You’re staying with me.” Rogers reached for her.
“Okay.” Breathless she managed to answer and blinked the sweat from her eyes. “On one condition…” She looked down her body and met his crazed gaze. “You hold this.”
Bailey shoved the grenade into his outstretched hand. The fury on his face was a beautiful thing to see, from afar. Up close, it was chilling. Her calculated risk, balanced on the decision that at the end of the day, they all wanted to survive.
His fury morphed into terror as he depressed the safety lever and held on. Her gamble paid off.
Bailey had no time to enjoy the fear darkening his eyes. A well-placed kick to his chin sent him flying backward into the toilet again. Stupidly, she watched his impact, cringing when his hand hit the tank.
“Bailey!”
Her head shot up at the sound of her name and her gaze latched onto Emmet. Blood ran from his temple down his gray skin to his jaw and dripped onto his chest. Panting heavily, face drawn up in pain, he leaned against the jamb, in one hand, his raised Glock. His other hand clutched his bleeding thigh. Though dark, by the blood dripping from the bottom of his pants, it was soaked.
She wanted to shout with joy. He was alive… But not for much longer. He couldn’t shoot Rogers, not with him holding the grenade.
“Move your ass!” he wheezed.
With focus she’d never realized she had, Bailey climbed.
"You bitch! You think you've won? I release this grenade, and we all die together."
Bailey kept her trap shut and kept climbing, using the legs of the shelf as handholds. Never had she regretted more giving up her workout regiment when she learned Taekwondo. I'm hitting the gym tomorrow. And the mat. And the treadmill. Get me out of this, God, and I’ll never skip the gym again.
“You think I won’t release it and kill us all? I will,” Rogers screamed.
Another tearing sound registered, and the tilt of the room increased another couple of degrees. Oh shit! She held onto the leg for dear life.
The guns, secure behind the glass cabinet in the foamed insert, came free. The glass door swung open, and like manna from heaven, a Sig Sauer tumbled out. It landed with a loud clank and skidded toward Rogers.
It’s empty, right? Who leaves a loaded gun lying around? A hitman, that’s who.
“Bailey!” Emmet stretched out a bloody hand for her to clasp. She wasn’t even close to making the connection. The metal foot locker was wedged on a leg she needed to climb over to reach Emmet. If she could get it out of her way, she’d have a chance.
She pushed with her hand, then her shoulder, which did not a damn thing. Whatever it held kept the locker in place, even in the tilted room. She prayed a bit more weight wouldn’t change that and squeezed between the top of the locker and the bottom of the shelf.
The footlocker shifted. Bailey froze.
Below her, Rogers fumbled with the gun. She couldn’t see it but heard enough to know his only option was to get the weapon and tip the balance back in his favor, even as the room collapsed around them.
Bailey cleared the small space and landed on the other side, so much closer to Emmet. Now, all she had to do was stretch and grab the last leg, then pull herself up to reach Emmet. Carefully, using the locker as a stool, she balanced on the side and jumped for the final leg above her head. Which was all the footlocker needed for it to break free and ski down the sloped floor aimed at Rogers.
Dangling again, she paused to look, couldn’t help herself.
“Damnit, Bailey!”
Emmet was above her, the last hope of getting out of harm's way. With her final bit of strength, she pulled herself up and slapped her hand into Emmet's bloody hand. Heat rushed up her arm the moment they touched, followed by a wealth of strength as if he gave her what little he had left.
He pulled her up, and out of the safe room, then shoved her into the adjacent wall layered with designer suits and pressed his hand to a console on the wall next to him. The door slid closed as the footlocker met flesh and bone, and an explosion rocked the room.
Emmet flung himself on top of her. The world crashed all around them and narrowed down to the two of them, holding onto to each other, slipping and sliding into darkness.
“I love you,” she cried and prayed if those were her final words, he heard them.
Chapter Thirty-three
Bailey went from a world absent of light and sound to her eyes peeling open on a kaleidoscope of color and a heavy metal band shredding her eardrums. Fighting to be free of it all, she punched her way to an upright position, screaming for Emmet.
Hands grabbed her shoulders and pinned her down. She didn't have the energy to fight for her freedom because everything hurt. A face hovered over her, EMT by the uniform. His lips moved, but she couldn't hear a word he said.
“Emmet. Where’s Emmet?” Her throat hurt like a sonofabitch, but didn’t stop her from repeating, “Where is Emmet?” Didn’t he understand? She had to lay eyes on him. She had to know… The screeching in her ears cleared enough for the EMT’s voice and lip movements to sync.
"He's alive, and they're working on him."
She gasped and cranked her head around to find ambulances and firetrucks, firemen running back and forth, policemen holding back a crowd, a black limousine parked at the curb, and Emmet being wheeled into an ambulance by two EMTs. Her relief was swift and short-lived.
“Hank, my father. Where is my father?” she croaked. Her vocal cords died on the last word.
“They brought him out of the house five minutes ago and resuscitated him. He’s already on the way to the hospital.”
He’s not dead. That's all she could think of. Exhausted, Bailey flopped onto the stretcher as every bone, and every single muscle in her body suddenly screamed in vehement protest.
“She’s going into shock,” someone said.
And that was the last thing she heard.
◆◆◆
“She’s coming around, but I don’t know how long that will last.” The voice came from a distance, as if at the end of a tunnel. The world was a blurry, fuzzy, washed out picture, lacking definition until she blinked. A heavyset man in a jacket that had seen better days hovered over her. A gold shield and police ID hung from his neck.
“What happened? Who are you? Who was in the safe room? Who owned the house and the weapons?” Rapid fire, the questions came at her faster than she could answer.
From the corner of her eye, the flair of a white coat exiting the limousine caught her eyes. It was a woman, an African American female, no more than five feet in height, with hair the same color as her coat. Backed by men in black suits, she marched up to the officer with stripes on his shoulder bars, flashed an ID, and pointed at Bailey. The officer glared at the woman, glared at the ID, and shouted, "Detective Homer."
“Yeah?” Annoyed, the detective turned away from Bailey and shuffled over to his superior a
nd the lady holding everyone’s attention.
Bailey couldn’t hear the conversation, but she could see the results. Detective Homer flung up his hand and marched away. He didn’t return, and the questioning didn’t resume. She suspected she’d just had a brush with a member of the agency. An important member. One with more clout than Hank.
Should I thank her? Or pray to fly under her radar? Under the radar, she decided and slid back into unconsciousness.
Ten hours later, she lay in an uncomfortable hospital bed in a private room with a guard in an expensive suit positioned at the door. A guard she didn’t hire.
She had a concussion. Not news to her. Scrapes, bruises, everything hurt, even with painkillers, but she was better than Hank and Emmet. Carved up, missing three fingers on his dominant right hand, and shot in the abdomen, Hank had lost so much blood his heart had stopped, and the doctor wasn't sure he would make it. Shot in his thigh and impaled by a piece of wood through his side, Emmet was still in surgery.
Strung out from exhaustion and worry, she waited for news about her men, which Whiskey delivered four hours later when he breezed into the room. He’d come straight from the airport after flying directly from London. Calm and confident, he sat on the edge of her bed. “Emmet will be fine. He’s got five broken ribs and a ruptured spleen, probably from the fall, and damage to his liver from the wood. He survived.”
Her head bobbed like one of those toys stuck to a dashboard, trying to process how close she came to losing him. Too damn close. “And my father?” she whispered. Even with all the medication they pumped into her, her vocal cords were still bruised and swollen, yet better.
“He’s still in surgery, Bailey.” The gravity of his voice wasn’t lost on her.
“He can’t die, Whiskey. Neither one of them. I can’t lose either of them.”
He covered her hand with his rough palm. “You’re not going to. Those two bastards aren’t going anywhere.”
Throat clogged with emotions she didn’t know how to express, she croaked, “You are so right.” And changed the subject because she had no more tears to cry. “Who’s the suit at the door? And don’t lie to me.”
“The agency taking care of their own.”
“Now they care?” She snorted.
He shrugged and somehow managed to look suave as he did it. "To the victor goes the spoils. We won. Now we're back on the payroll."
“We won? My father and Emmet are in the O.R. How is that winning?”
“You’ve lost when they’re six feet under. Not before. Don’t ever forget that. As long as they’re breathing, and the enemy ain’t, it’s a win.”
Daisy arrived, and Whiskey bailed. Bailey caught her up to date, well, as much as she could, and fell asleep for what seemed like three days but was only twenty-four hours.
Emmet and Hank were the only things she cared about when she woke.
“How are they?” she asked a nurse who came in to check her vitals and bring her breakfast.
The nurse lowered the guardrail and turned to retrieve Bailey’s meal. “They’re in ICU.”
“I want to see them.” She whipped the covers off and slid to the edge of the bed. The nurse was there to catch her when her legs gave out.
“All right, you’re stable enough for a trip to ICU. I’ll take you after you eat and get cleaned up. You’re a bit ripe.”
After breakfast and a shower, a volunteer wheeled Bailey down to ICU. Turns out, they were side by side in glass cubicles with matching suited men guarding their doors. The staff tiptoed by them, clearly intimidated. Fuck that.
In a hospital gown, Bailey ignored her protesting muscles and climbed to her feet. She shuffled up to the guy blocking Hank’s doorway. He knew who she was, of that she had no doubt. “Move.”
He paused to curl his lips into something that resembled a smirk, then stepped aside and opened the door for her to enter. Bailey burst into tears at the sight of her father hooked up to multiple machines. Bandages covered his entire chest and arms. This wasn't the indomitable man she'd loved and hated for most of her life.
“He’s not as bad as he looks.”
Bailey jumped at the unexpected voice behind her. A nursed rushed past her, tapping on a tablet as she studied the machines around him.
“Most of the cuts were shallow, and the burns are second degree.”
Burns? Bailey hadn’t considered burns. Why wouldn’t he be burned with her tossing grenades and the house exploding around them. How she escaped without being charred was a miracle.
“Injured as badly as he was, he’s recovering remarkably fast.” The nurse was young, pretty with wavy, dark hair and an olive complexion.
“Really?” Bailed asked afraid to believe.
The nurse nodded. “He was awake earlier, making demands. I had to tell him to slow his roll. He yelled at me. Nobody yells at me. A sedative took the bite out of him.”
Bailey laughed. “I like you.”
The nurse moved a chair closer to the bed and patted the seat. “He should be awake in a bit.”
Bailey sat but stopped the nurse before she left. “My…” Lover, boyfriend, what were they? Everything was so fresh they hadn’t put a name to it. “Emmet Streeter. How is he? Do you know his condition?”
“I’m also his nurse, Lydia, and aren’t you his wife?” She winked at me. “Because I can only give his family members any information about his condition.” She winked again.
The woman was a saint. “Yes. I’m his wife.”
“He woke in recovery screaming for someone named Bailey. Any idea who that could be?”
Bailey couldn’t contain her smile, a smile Lydia returned.
“He wouldn’t calm down, so they sedated him. He’s been in and out, a bit combative, which isn’t good for his stitches. When he wakes up, I’ll come and get you.”
“Thanks.” Bailey touched the nurse’s arm.
"De nada." She exited the room, and Bailey heard her say, "You get in my way one more time, and it's gonna be nighty nighty for you, big boy. I have access to a lot of drugs and sharp needles."
Bailey glanced through a part in the drawn curtain and through the glass wall into Emmet’s room next door. All she could see was his feet and the nurse moving around the bottom of the bed.
Hank groaned, and she shuffled to her father’s bedside. Thick bandages covered his entire chest. A mesh bandage covered a burned area stretching from his left shoulder down to his elbow. Another large bandage covered the bullet wound on his right thigh. Blood and other fluids hung from IV poles while machines tracked his vitals with steady beeps.
Tears coasted down her cheeks. “Damn it, Hank. Don’t you die on me.”
She gasped when his eyelids fluttered, and waited patiently for them to open. He blinked a few times, and his eyes rolled around in their sockets until his gaze settled on a spot on the ceiling. She was about to clear her throat to gain his attention when his eyes shifted, and his gaze landed on her. His lips moved, but she couldn't hear what he said through his oxygen mask. With his good hand, he pulled the mask to the side. Tears welling in his eyes, he whispered, "You alive?"
Too emotional to reply, she nodded.
“Not ghost?”
She shook her head.
He sobbed, and tears streamed from his eyes to his temples. “You real? Not dreaming?”
She nodded and took his hand in hers. "I'm here, and I'm fine."
“I thought they lied to me. I couldn’t survive if you weren’t here.”
"Oh, Dad." The words sounded awkward on her tongue as if it had five syllables and not one. She did it for him, not for her.
"I fucked up. I know I did and I'm sorry. I'm sorry I did this to you." With each word, his voice lost strength.
She leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “It’s okay. Everything is okay. You can make it up to me when you get out of the hospital.”
The tension left his body, and he sank back into the bed, his eyes still glued to her. "Sweetheart
, forgive—"
“Bailey!” Emmet’s bellow echoed through the glass walls.
Startled, she jumped and sought the gap in the curtains. Hank squeezed her hand. God, she'd forgotten all about him. "I have to—"
“Go to him.” He finished in a raspy whisper. She could see the concern and love in his eyes for Emmet, and that was okay because she loved Emmet too. She loved both of them.
Bailey kissed her father on the forehead. “I’ll be back later. I promise.” His eyes were already closed by the time she pulled away and placed his oxygen mask back on over his nose and mouth.
She shuffled into Emmet’s room as quickly as her aching body allowed. Lydia and both guards were trying to restrain him, but Emmet wasn’t having it. He thrashed around, yanking out his IV, spraying fluid and blood everywhere. Alerts blared from the machines. Lydia saw her and said, “I have to knock him out before he ruptures his stitches.”
“Wait!” Bailey shuffled past the guard and captured Emmet’s face between her hands. “I’m here, Emmet. I’m right here.”
Instantly, he calmed and in the nick of time. A nurse rushed in with a syringe in her hand.
“Do not give him that,” Bailey ordered. “He’s fine, aren’t you, babe? Tell everyone you’re fine and you’re gonna behave.”
She basked in the intensity of his icy blue eyes, eyes lit with a cold fire burning hotter than an inferno. “Hey there. Took you long enough to wake up. Are you in pain?” Her strained voice cracked with each word, but she didn’t care.
His Adam’s apple bobbed, then his lips parted, and he croaked, “Not anymore. Thought I lost you.”
“Not possible.” She kissed him gently and felt his lips trembling against hers.
“Were you hurt?”
“Cuts and scrapes. I’ll live because you saved me.”
He shook his head and groaned at the motion. “Not me. You. You took care of Rogers and saved us, Bailey.” His eyes widened, and he gripped the rails of the bed. “Hank. Where’s Hank?”
Plain Jane and the Hitman Page 23