“I have to make a phone call.” His voice was muffled as he lifted the mouthpiece to it.
Brian cleared his throat, “Yes, I’m calling to inquire about the status of one of your patients. Philip Bartholomew Pulkowski.” A pause, and then, “yes, I’ll hold.”
All right, maybe she didn’t want to make eye contact, but there was nothing wrong with a show of moral support. She reached over and touched his hand, and reflexively his fingers linked with hers.
“I see, and is the doctor addressing that right now? Do you need me to send somebody in, I mean, Mart—Mr. Pulkowski only has his wife, there are no family members in the area, so if it’s a matter of expenses—”
Emily felt the tension in his grip, but she sustained it.
“Let me leave you my cell phone number. If there is any change, will you call me?” Almost indiscernibly those fingers relaxed. “Thanks. Thank you, and well, please just take care of him.”
As he slipped the phone back into his jacket pocket, Brian turned towards her. The churn of pain and despair made his gaze so bleak she nearly pulled the car over so she could reach for him. It was not so much witnessing the vulnerability in his normally defiant glance; it was the fact that she could have been looking into a mirror.
Guilt, anguish, revenge—a kaleidoscope of despair.
And with that one defining glimpse, Emily proved herself right. She knew that by looking into Brian Morrison’s eyes one more time, she would discover that she was falling in love with him.
CHAPTER XIII
“What did they say?
Brian jolted.
Emily was looking at him, and she had such a penetrating stare that it seemed to delve far beyond his ocular path, deep enough to stroke his heart. Never before had a woman looked at him in such a manner, where it felt like a fusion of minds, a place where empathy and tenderness lived and lulled him into believing there was a future.
It scared the hell out of him.
“Stable condition.”
“No more details?” She asked.
In the glow of the dashboard, Brian saw the strain at the corners of Emily’s lips, and a frown he had come to know so well. He had also grown accustomed to her habit of swiping her hand at bangs that were never really in her eyes to begin with.
“Bruised sternum. At least he had his seat belt on. Broken fibula, potential neck trauma. He’s going to be okay.”
Brian could feel the dull throb of his own injuries, as if his body cried out in sympathy for his friend. Funny, he had never really associated the word friend with Phil. Now that he tested the title out, he thought it truly fit. That revelation bewildered him. It was the first sign that he was becoming a civilian.
In the Navy he never had the opportunity to form true friendships. He was never part of a team. He was always the lone agent on assignment, where friends and trust were the worst vices a man could have.
“Thank God for that.” Emily seemed to breathe easier herself, but he heard her breath falter as she turned down the back lane that would ultimately lead them to NMD.
“How about you?” The tension crept into his blood. Aside from acknowledging his newfound friendship, he was harboring fantasies of something permanent with Emily.
How could he have been fortunate enough to find two people he cared about at this stage in his life?
And how could he have been so negligent and not predict that Barcuda would tamper with the Blazer. He was losing his edge. He couldn’t afford to slip up again like that. Not with Emily.
“I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but I mean it Brian, I feel awful that your friend was injured because of me.”
“It wasn’t because of you, Em. It was because I wasn’t thinking. I need to be a step ahead of Barcuda. I’ll give him the past two days because I was still catching up on the facts, but from here on out, George Barcuda is not going to call the shots.”
Emily turned and raised a single eyebrow. “How? God knows what that man is thinking. I looked in his eyes once. There wasnothing there. No emotion. It was like looking into the eyes of a stone statue. Or like looking into the eyes of a vampire. You know,light’s on, but I’m still in my crypt.”
His smile was forced, but Brian’s knew what she meant. He wanted to offer some words of comfort, but they were only two blocks away from NMD.
“Pull over, Em. I’m driving in.”
Her mouth opened to emit a protest, but he halted it with one look. She pulled the car to the side of the road and said nothing.
Rolling down the residential road with the Impala’s headlights switched off, the forbidding gate to the NMD compound loomed ahead like the entrance to a prisoner of war camp.
On the surface, the complex was rather staid, with a bank of brick buildings forming an L-shaped wall around a gated parking lot. Acres of snow-covered lawns flanked the facility, the back lot tapering down to a high cliff that overlooked the Thames.
“I’m coming in with you.” She whispered.
To the casual observer, the families that lined this residential road in their colonial two-storied houses, no one would ever imagine that deep underground, beneath their swing sets and deckchairs existed the most sophisticated nautical technology.
“Are you going to make me point out that I know the layout of this complex much better than you? Surveillance is my job—this facility is my desk.”
Brian had pulled over to the curb and cut the engine. In only a matter of seconds, the cold assaulted the interior of the Impala.
“Are you going to make me point out that I was able to slip through your scrupulous security system and steal classified data right from under your nose?”
Damn. She had him there.
“When this is over,” he said, “we’re going to sit down and have a long talk about that.”
Emily rubbed her hands together to induce warmth. “Brian,” She looked through the window which was now frosting up. “He’s my brother.”
The gruff plea said it all. She would sacrifice everything to protect Colin. Brian recognized that guilt was at the core of Emily’s motives. Yes, she loved her brother. There was absolutely no doubt about that. But this remorse stemmed directly from the anger and jealousy she harbored the moments before her parents died. He would never be able to negotiate with that type of pain.
The hazy glow of a streetlight bathed a portion of Emily’s face, revealing earnest eyes and a tense, heart-shaped jaw. No matter how much he threatened her, Brian would never be able to make her stay behind.
“Dammit woman,”
It was as if those words were admission enough. Emily grabbed the door handle and wrenched it open.
Brian lurched across the seat and clamped down on her arm before she could get out.
“If you go in there, you have to listen to me. You have to trust me, Em.”
With the streetlight behind her, gold-spun cinnamon ruffling in the slight breeze—Brian found his angel again. In that eclipsed glow he saw that same ethereal but weary smile and wished desperately that he were anywhere else in the world with this woman.
“You know I will, but are you going to trust me, Brian?”
Brian released her arm, only to reach up into that soft haven of hair and cup his hand around the back of her neck. In slow motion, as if they had all the time in the world, he drew her towards him, and whispered against her lips, “I just might.” And then his mouth closed over hers.
It was a solemn kiss, a slow exchange that pained them both, but at the same time, offered a glimpse at stronger emotions still unspoken. When Brian drew back, their eyes locked, and neither breathed.
“Brian?” She whispered.
It was painful and poignant to come to the conclusion that he was falling in love with this woman.
“Brian, are you all right?”
Brian wrenched his gaze away from hers, up to the hazy streetlight above. With a brisk cough into his clenched fist, he lurched out of the car and avoided Emily’s gaze across the r
oof.
He had no choice though. He had to keep her near.
“Come over here.” His hand was out.
Emily circled the car and reached for it. That connection warmed more than his hand, but the frigid air permeated his lungs and brought the reality of their predicament back into vivid focus.
“There are cameras atop those two poles. They have a 360-degree range, but it takes twenty-five seconds for them to complete a rotation. If the gate is opened it will trigger a signal to the security station, so the guard will be looking. When that camera starts to cycle away from us, we’ve got twenty seconds to climb over.”
Brian reached for her shoulders. “This is your last chance, Em. I’m asking you to stay behind. Please.”
Emily smiled. She reached up and traced his jaw with the tip of her finger, tilting his head slightly to inspect one of his lingering bruises under the streetlight.
“Dammit, Em. Don’t look at me like that,” he uttered huskily, “I can’t handle these feelings right now. I need to stay sharp. We need to stay sharp.”
Emily jolted and her eyes shot up to his. “Uh-sorry, I didn’t realize I was caring.” In less than a heartbeat her attitude changed. “Of course I’m coming with you. Maybe you have the advantage of knowing the ins and outs of NMD, but don’t forget we’re here to find my brother. I know the way he thinks.”
Brian relaxed into a smirk. “Yeah, I’ll definitely concede that point to you.”
His gaze shifted to the miniature cameras mounted atop the black rusted shafts, the muted hum of their motors blending with the whisper of the evergreens.
“Next rotation. We go up together. You have to make it up in three steps, roll over the top, drop and jump behind the base of that brick stand…all in about twenty seconds.” Brian let go of her shoulders. “Can you do it, Emily?”
“Piece of cake.” She said brashly, but he could detect a waver in her voice.
Wishing there was another way, but with no time to come up with a plan, Brian stepped from the shadows. “Okay, get ready—”
Emily hit the ground on her feet, but the frigid dirt sent shockwaves of pain up her ankles and calves. There was no time to dwell on it. She could sense rather than hear Brian drop beside her and tuck his long body against the brick base of the gate. Grateful that her ankles cooperated, she mimicked his action and went the step further to suck in her breath as the hum of the camera continued its revolution.
“Good job.” Brian commended from the dark.
“Shhh.”
“There’s no audio recording, you can sing if you want to—they’re not going to hear.”
“I don’t sing.” Her voice wavered.
Brian waited the count of the next rotation, nodded and then in three crouched steps, inched further down the brick embankment. He motioned her to follow.
“Okay, now it starts to get tricky.” Brian whispered as she joined him. “We’ve got exactly twelve seconds, half the rotation to sprint to that bank of dumpsters.”
Emily followed his finger toward a concrete stockade holding four garbage dumpsters over a hundred yards away.
Was it already fifteen years ago that she ran a hundred-yard dash in eleven seconds in high school? One of the jocks from the varsity football team refused to believe that a girl could top his record, and had challenged her to a race. She lost, but barely.
“No problem.” She said with more confidence than she felt.
Age cramped up muscles that used to move so fluidly and could compete with a varsity football player, but if it meant the difference between being caught or not, she could sprint as fast as Mercury.
Brian touched her, and she jumped. He squeezed for encouragement, and then began the countdown.
“Now!”
Again, she didn’t beat the jock, although she came in right on his heels and lunged behind the dumpster.
“Wheww,” Her lungs pumped, but she felt remarkably alive. “That’s tough in the cold.”
They were plastered against a wall of cinderblocks, hunkered down, and out of sight. Beside her, Brian barely sounded winded. She heard him shift and then felt his palms against her cheeks, his fingers gliding into her hair, and to her astonishment, she felt his lips on hers. They were cold for a moment, but they warmed, and tasted of life and passion, and she smiled against them because the act had been such a pleasant shock.
Brian drew back, his forehead still propped against hers. “You never cease to amaze me.”
“You’re—” She choked. “You just kissed me. In the middle of all this. You never cease to amaze me.”
“You just impressed me so damn much. I had to.” He took her hand and began to inch along the base of the dumpster.
Emily lifted her palm to his shoulder, using it as leverage—a stabilizer as she followed him blindly. “If women who crawl around on their hands and knees around garbage dumpsters impress you, I’m not so sure that I’m flattered.”
A floodlight switched on above, exposing them. Emily gasped and flung the back of her hand over her eyes, stung by the shrill beam, waiting for the hit squad to open fire.
“Shit.” Brian pitched around the corner of the dumpster, dragging her along with him. In the shadows she heard his gruff litany, “Damn motion detector. Usually the rats trip it off.”
Unconsciously, Emily searched the frozen blacktop. “There are no rats in this climate.”
He didn’t seem to hear her. “Well, the good news is that it’s not me or Phil in there manning the monitors right now. If it were, that door would have slammed open already and you’d be staring down the barrel of an AK-47.”
Emily gaped into his sharp eyes. “And that’s supposed to reassure me?”
Lost in thought, Brian uttered, “Yeah.”
Crouching, he continued to advance through the dumpsters, his fingers on the sleeve of her jacket, ensuring she was with him every step of the way.
In the ghostly silence of winter, Emily strained to hear any sign of pursuit. She was ready for the door to slam open just as Brian had illustrated, but all she distinguished was the rustle of Brian’s coat as he released her hand long enough to fish in his pocket.
“W-what are you doing?”
“Storm door,” Brian flattened back allowing her to peek over his shoulder at the heavy metal panels imbedded in the snow. “It’s used by maintenance for lawn care, but there’s access to NMD from in there.” With a twist of the key and a wrench of his wrist, Brian lifted the panel high enough to reveal a black chamber.
A doorway into oblivion.
For a second—for just the span of a vaporous breath, Emily wondered if she were walking into a trap. Blindly she had followed Brian. For one so traditionally cynical, Emily had extended her faith—and extended her heart.
In the dark Brian reached for her hand, his fingers linking with hers. Their quick squeeze of assurance helped to dispel some of the uncertainty. In that warm connection lie the truth. She had felt it that night on a frozen highway, when she touched the hand of a stranger and sensed something remarkable in the connection. It was a foretelling of their union, or was it a glimpse of a past from a different lifetime?
It was a simple truth. She wanted to be with Brian Morrison. She wanted him to feel the same. The mystery of entering this abyss was tantamount to their fate as a couple.
With a shuddering breath, Emily followed him into obscurity.
This was a world that she was not familiar with. Emily knew she was within the bowls of NMD and recognized the stilted air and the ubiquitous smell of the rumbling heating system. But the extensive, narrow corridors with their string of halogen bulbs, and the somber echo of their own footfalls—this was a surreal parallel to the formidable establishment.
“Where are we?” Though she whispered, Emily started at the resonance.
Before her, Brian’s broad shoulders filled the tight passage, and his grave voice drifted back. “There are a series of corridors designed for emergency evacuation,” He hesitated,
and then added cynically, “although, there were never any signs posted inside to alert the personnel of that.”
“Anyway,” Brian reached before him to brush aside a durable cobweb. “They’re almost never used.”
If she were a claustrophobic, these narrow walls would project her into a state of paranoia. Instead she fixed on the back of Brian’s leather jacket as it gripped his muscles, and she could tell by his carriage that the extent of his injuries and fatigue were beginning to take their toll.
She needed to find Colin and bring this disaster to a conclusion. Think. Think. If she concentrated enough maybe she could telepathically focus on his location.
“Well Em,” Brian drew to a halt, although she could perceive nothing beyond his wide back. “Now it gets tricky.”
His tone set her teeth to chattering.
“So what you’re saying is that so far we’ve had it easy.”
“Hell yeah.”
Emily’s pensive nod went undetected. “I was afraid so.”
Brian stooped to hoist open a two-foot wide airlock entrance in the floor. Cold air emanated from the opening, along with the scent of dead earth. Whatever this doorway was—it hadn’t been opened in ages, but it now was propped ajar and the shaft seemed bottomless.
“We-we’re going in there?” Her words echoed back at her from the hollow tomb and the reverberation sounded like laughter.
Brian stood up and gripped her upper arms. “If I thought there was another way, I wouldn’t put you at risk like this.”
“Damn, you could have said something assuring, however deceitful it might be. Something like that shaft is only a few feet deep. Something like, this isn’t dangerous. It isn’t risky.” Wild eyes jerked from the ominous entrance to meet his. “You could have said something like that.”
“I could have,” He agreed quietly, “but it would have been the first time I lied to you.”
In his grasp Emily’s shoulders slumped. Her feet, heavy with dread stepped up to the panel as she poked her toe along the edge and calculated the distance to the first rung of the ladder about a foot down. Frigid air slapped her face, nearly propelling her back into Brian’s arms. She crouched and peered down the narrow shaft.
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