by Becky McGraw
Dave patted the gauze to the wound, she hissed, and his eyes flew to hers. “I’m sorry,” he said his stomach rolling.
“I’m fine,” she grated through her teeth. “Just do it.”
Logan carefully wiped all around the wound, took more gauze from the box and packed it on top of the wound. He jerked the end of the tape loose with his teeth to secure the gauze, then stood and swallowed hard. “That’s the best I can do. I think you’ll need stitches.”
“It’s perfect, thank you. I’ll be fine now.” Susan stood and pulled her skirt back on then tucked the .38 into the waistband, before she popped the clip on the Sig and checked the loads. “Let’s get out of here,” she said then looked thoughtful. “When we first came here, we thought maybe the women’s part of the compound was connected to this hallway somehow. The only rooms we haven’t checked in this hallway are the ones beyond this room. Let’s go to the left out of here and see what we find.”
Dave was afraid to know what they would find anywhere in this clinic. What they’d found so far was a helluva lot of trouble that wasn’t their own. This case had gotten so out of hand and complicated, he couldn’t even wrap his mind around it all. But Susan’s determination and his damned white-knight-complex would not let him quit, or say die.
They were going to survive, if it killed him.
Susan opened the door, glanced up and down the hallway, then walked out and Dave followed her. He shoved his hand into the pocket of his suit coat and the cold steel of the weapon Susan had taken from the guard gave him a measure of comfort. Mario had taken his weapon, and since then Dave felt naked and at their mercy. Thanks to the very capable woman in front of him, he wasn’t at their mercy now. She was leading the charge, and Dave was very happy to let her do that right now. If Mario or his men met her first, they should be very afraid.
“You check the rooms to the left for doors at the back of the rooms. I’ll check the right,” she said, and Dave moved across the hallway from her. Stopping at each room, he peered through the glass window in the door, or the through the glass front of the room.
Susan suddenly shouted, “Bingo, baby!”
Dave spun to see her twisting a doorknob, and she stopped to slam her fist against the door. “We’ve got to get inside this room,” she said, then her eyes lit up and she slapped her palm against her forehead. “For a smart woman, my memory sucks! I have Warman’s keys,” she said with a laugh, shoving her hand into the small pocket of her suit jacket.
This morning at his compound Dave had thought she looked fresh and beautiful, gorgeous. He had to fight the urge to take her into his bedroom and make love to her for the rest of the day. Right now, covered in blood, her hair sticking up everywhere, and her makeup smeared from ear to ear, Susan had never looked more beautiful to him.
Looking back over her shoulder, Susan smiled at him when the third key she tried worked in the door. “Pray the women are back here,” she said, as she pushed it inward. A powerful electrical surge caused the lights to flicker for a long second, startling Dave.
“Wonder what the hell that was?” Susan asked, frozen in the doorway.
The lights flickered again, buzzed then settled. She leaned out to scan the hallway, before she shrugged and waved to him as she moved inside the room. Dave caught the door and followed her inside. Susan was already at the back door of the large room. He surveyed the room as he walked toward her, and from the regimented rows of tables, the toaster and grill on the counter, and the refrigerator, he figured this must be some kind of cafeteria.
The door at the back was keycard entry only, so Susan swiped one through the slot, the door buzzed, and she twisted the knob. A loud explosion rocked the building, and Dave’s heart stopped. Because it was automatic inside of him, a programmed response, he dropped to the floor and covered his head as the whole building vibrated.
When he didn’t feel heat or shrapnel, only a little dust raining down on him, he peeked toward the door. His heart pounded, and he almost blacked out as a massive dose of adrenaline and relief shot through him when he saw Susan standing at the door staring at the ceiling.
“Something is going on outside,” she announced, and Dave laughed.
“No shit, Sherlock,” he said as he got to his feet and walked over to her. “At least it’s not inside.” Because he couldn’t stop himself, Dave pulled her to him and hugged her tight. He kissed her hair, before he pushed her away. “Always look for trip wires before you open a door, sweet cheeks.”
He stepped around her and ran the doorframe with his eyes, then inspected the knob. “This one is good, thank God,” he said, as he opened the door to find a little clinic of some sort. Another door at the back of that room was also keycard protected. This place was tighter than Fort Knox, he thought, as he walked inside and Susan followed him.
With a cafeteria and a clinic with this level of security, Dave knew they had to be very close to finding where the women were being held. When Susan opened the door at the back and gasped, and he heard frightened whimpers, he knew he was right.
She ran inside, and Dave caught the door just before it closed to enter the barracks style room lined with double decker cots. Thank God there were only nine women here right now. The place could hold thirty, and he wondered if it ever had.
Another explosion rocked the building, the lights flickered, and the women screamed. Dave fought the urge to hit the dirt, and his brain went into overdrive. The timing of the explosions was regular. About three minutes apart. They had to be from something the admin and mobsters were doing. Those bastards were bugging out, so in all likelihood they were blowing up the clinic to destroy evidence before they left. That obviously included these women, Susan and Dave. It was the only thing that made sense.
They’d probably wired the whole damned compound to go in timed intervals. Most likely, they were already gone. Logan’s blood ran cold as he sprinted over to Susan who was comforting a girl who looked to be about sixteen years old.
“Susan, we’ve got to get out of this building now!” Dave growled, and the obviously very pregnant girl flinched, burying her face in Susan’s chest.
“She’s in labor, we can’t,” Susan said, holding the woman’s head to her breast.
“I don’t give a damn! She’ll have to deliver that baby on the fly, because we are not staying inside this building. It’s wired with explosives. I think the crew has already left.”
Dave surveyed the other women. Two more were obviously pregnant, and the other six looked sick. The sickest was curled up on her side facing the wall, and another girl sat there rubbing her back. That woman was not walking out of here, he thought, as he ran over to her.
“Ask them how we get into the courtyard,” Dave said as he shoved his arms under the girl on the bed, and lifted. She moaned, and was basically dead weight in his arms, as he carried her back over to Susan.
Susan pushed the woman in her arms away and spoke to her in Russian, then looked back to him. “A door in the room beside the cafeteria.”
Another explosion happened then, and the beds shook against the wall. They needed to hurry, the explosions were getting closer. “Tell them to help each other, and lets go, sweet cheeks. I’ll carry this one, and you help her.”
Dave suddenly heard rotor blades, and became even more concerned. Maybe they hadn’t left after all, he thought, afraid now to go out into the open. Those snipers who manned the guard shacks could take them out if the explosions didn’t. Dave guessed he just needed to choose which way they were going to die. His heart in his throat, he said, “Let’s go to the courtyard. Maybe we can find a break in the fence.”
It was then he heard the machine gun fire, and knew they were screwed either way. Today was a good day to die, he thought, repositioning the girl in his arms, as he walked to the door. Susan walked ahead of him with her arm around the woman in labor. As she slid the card into the slot, she yelled instructions to the group. She opened the door, and Dave followed her, holding the door open, until all the wo
men filed through.
When they reached the exit to the compound, the gunfire got louder, but was intermittent. Then it hit him right square between the eyes. Why the fuck would he be hearing gunfire? Nobody was here except the guards and the admin. Hope blossomed inside of him. “Baby, I have good news,” he said and Susan looked back at him.
“We need good news, pookie,” she replied.
“I don’t know how, but I think the cavalry is here.” Another explosion sounded, this one louder. Dave flinched, because he couldn’t cover his ears, and they rang. “That chopper we heard could’ve been Hawk.”
Sympathy and despair filled her voice, as she reminded, “He’s not supposed to be back until after dark.”
Dave heard more gunfire a pause then return fire. “They’re here,” he said more confidently. “We need to let them know where we are. Let’s go.”
Susan pushed the lever on the door with her good hip, and left the girl holding it. The sight of the line of five black SUVs at the back of the building surprised her. The doors were open wide and she could see the clinic guards were using the doors as cover to fire toward the woods at the back of the compound. Two guards lay in a pool of blood beside the back end of one of the vehicles. Rifle fire came from the woods. A round pinged off of one of the trucks, then embedded into the side of the building very near her shoulder. Susan grabbed the door and ducked back inside the building. “Someone is out there in the woods, you’re right.”
“It’s the team,” Dave said proudly, then grinned. “They’ve come to pull our fat out of the fryer, sweet cheeks.”
“We need to leave the women here and help them. The guards are using the SUVs as cover, so we need to take them out. Once we shoot one though, they’ll either scatter, run back into the building, or shoot us because we’re closer than the guys in the woods.”
“Why shoot one of them?” Dave asked with a laugh. “If we shoot the gas tank on one of those gas hogs, I think our problem will be solved.”
“I have no idea where that is located,” Susan said with a laugh.
“No worries, Ms. Mensa—I know exactly where it’s located. You just cover me, if I need it,” Dave said walking to the door.
“Logan?” she said with a tremor in her voice. Dave looked back at her, after he slid the keycard into the door and opened it. “I’ve got your six, but you watch your twelve.”
“Don’t worry, baby. I’ve got this,” he said, with a helluva lot more conviction than he felt after he opened the door and saw his men were on the wrong side of the fence.
Easing around the door, Dave scanned the area for cover that was within range of the pistol he had. He found nothing, not a tree or bush for at least twenty yards. He huffed a frustrated breath. The only hope he had was his guys would see him and lay cover fire to keep the goombahs occupied. They had to see him though, and letting them know he was there would also broadcast that fact to the mobsters.
Caleb was behind that sniper rifle in the woods, and that rifle had a bad ass scope on it. Maybe, he thought, removing his suit jacket, and tossing it on the ground. The white shirt would automatically draw his sniper’s eye. Dave sprinted across the courtyard diagonally, holding his hand up in the hold fire sign they had for the team, until he was beyond the line of SUVs. Immediately, he felt the bead of that rifle on him, felt Caleb’s icy stare, and grinned as he changed his sign to flip his sniper the bird. Logan zig zagged back behind the line of SUVs, and laid on his stomach to take aim at the gas tank under the last SUV in the line.
He squeezed the trigger on the semi-automatic pistol and pumped nine bullets into the gas tank, then covered his head. He felt the heat and shrapnel from the explosion this time. It was so hot, he thought the back of his shirt was on fire. Waiting until the echo faded and the flames crackled, Dave rolled in the dirt just in case.
Scrambling to his feet, he dodged a couple of bullets, as he zigzagged back toward the door. Heavy cover fire came from the woods, and a chill raced through Dave. He loved his bad ass team—so fucking much. Almost as much as he loved the woman who held the door open for him to run back inside the compound. Before Dave went inside the door, he glanced back and saw his guys scaling the fence like monkeys.
The invasion of Ardmore had just occurred, he thought, as he ran inside and the door shut behind him. Deep Six Security was in the house and those Mafiosa were about to meet their match, if not their maker.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Dave spun the ink pen in front of him on the table again. Mesmerized by the rotation that reminded him of the blades on his helicopter. The guys lined the table, laughing as they talked about their successful mission at the clinic. Only six of the guards survived to be arrested, and all of the women at the clinic were in federal custody. The feds and the prosecutor said they had all they needed now to put every single one of the people involved away for a very long time. Even the mad professor and the bursar at the college were going to prison.
Although Dave had called this mission briefing, he hadn’t participated at all. He didn’t really care. One fucking iota. As low as he was feeling right now, he almost wished he’d have taken one of those bullets at the clinic. That would probably have created a smaller hole in his chest, and hurt less.
“You look like you lost your best friend, Logan. I’m sitting right here, so I know that’s not the case,” Slade said with a laugh, and Dave suddenly noticed all the guys had stopped talking to stare at him. “As stubborn and aggravating as you are sometimes, I’ll always have your six.” He looked around the table, then rephrased. “We’ll always have it.” He pushed his chair back to stand. “With that said, we are hereby calling an intervention, my friend. Dave Logan you need to get your head out of your ass and fix it.”
“Fix what?” he asked confused. No, he hadn’t been sleeping. At all. But he didn’t think he’d lost his mind. What the fuck was Slade talking about? An intervention for what purpose?
“We all miss her, and you’re the only man who can bring her back. You should never have dropped her ass off at that house after she was released from the hospital. She’s just as much a part of Deep Six now as we are. We’re pretty damned pissed you did that.”
Dave sighed, and looked down at the pen again. “It’s what she wanted,” he said, setting it spinning in another spiral. The same spiral he felt like his life was in. An unrecoverable death spiral right down the toilet.
“We’re so pissed that every one of us is looking for another job. For real this time. No joke—you either bring her back, or this team is disbanding. You have proven these last two weeks that you are a useless bastard without her.”
“I’m not useless, and she has another job too, so all of you leave. I don’t fucking care,” Dave replied, that spiral tightening. His throat closed and he felt like he was drowning. It was an effort to drag in breaths, as his eyes felt like they were going to explode out of his head.
“See, that’s the thing. You don’t care, but we do. She cares too. It was as obvious as the nose on your face to all of us that Susan Whitmore loves you. Otherwise, the Barracuda definitely would not have put up with your crap like we do.”
Dave’s hand slammed down on top of the pen, and he shot to his feet. “Get the fuck out of here, you’re all fired!” he grated, then pushed away from the table to head for the door.
Slade stepped in front of him, blocking his exit. “I will kick your ass if I have to, Logan. You know I can do it. We’re not letting you leave. No more running. Fucking admit you love her dude, and slow down enough to do that. She’s not Sarah.”
“She left for the same reason,” Logan grated, his nose in Slade’s shoulder. “I’m just not cut out for that shit.”
“She didn’t leave, asshole, you let her go. Susan would’ve stayed if you told her you wanted her here. You dropped her off at that house without telling her that, or telling her you cared one shit for her.”
“Why don’t you just go visit Carmen and let me worry about my love life,
Slade.”
“Carmen was arrested yesterday. Carlos Ramos determined she was the mole at the agency, and I imagine she’ll be tied up for the next thirty years or so. C’mon, Logan, don’t be a hardass. At least go talk to her, and offer her a job. The rest can come later.”
“I’ll think about it,” Dave said, grabbing the doorknob. That’s all he had been doing anyway. Thinking, reliving and going fucking crazy from it.
Slade shoved him. “Well, think about this too. I heard from a friend at the DOJ that there’s a guy over there sniffing her rear end.”
“If you don’t pull the trigger, you won’t hit that blind squirrel, Logan,” Caleb said with a laugh. “Go get the girl, before someone else does.”
“Her sister is out of the hospital and living with her, until she can go back to school.” Dave knew that, because he called the hospital every day until Jenna Whitmore was released. “They have enough on their plates right now, without me adding to it.” Logan twisted the knob, and pulled the door open. “She’s happy at the Department of Justice. It’s a good job for her.” A desk job, and a lot safer than being on his team for sure. There was no chance of her getting shot again over there. Another reason to leave things as they were, he thought, as he walked out.
Useless bastard…let her go…pull the trigger…get the girl. His men’s words replayed in his mind like a broken record so loud, Dave covered his ears with his hands as he stormed into his office and slammed the door.
He didn’t sit, he paced back and forth, as the words got louder and louder. His heart felt like it would explode from the pressure inside his chest.. The room spun, and he stopped in his tracks. “Fuck!!!” he roared, and the word echoed through his skull, as he bent to clutch his gut, taking short breaths, feeling like he might pitch over at any minute. When Logan’s world righted again, a blindingly bright light shone behind his eyes. He thought he might be dying, but then Susan’s face was there. Happiness like he’d never felt before consumed him, warmth spread through his entire body like that sunlight.