A Father's Sacrifice (12 page)

He nodded, still frowning. Then he blinked and moved across the room to his virtual surgery model.

“Great,” he said shortly. He sat and picked up the pad and stylus.

After retrieving the printout, Natasha turned. “I’ll work on this in my office.”

Dylan nodded without looking up. His cheeks were stained a faint pink.

Just like hers. She knew because her face felt hot.

She needed to get out of there, away from his intensity. She had to think logically, analytically, and that was becoming more and more difficult when she was close to Dylan. She reached for the doorknob.

“Wait,” he said, standing and pushing his chair back. “Come with me. I’ll show you the ‘secret passage.’”

She stared at him. “Seriously? There really is one?”

He stepped over to a door on the east wall of the room. She followed him through. On the left as she entered was a door—a heavy steel door.

Dylan used the fingerprint reader and the pass code device to open it.

“I’m sure Alfred told you there are only four people who are allowed access to certain areas? This is one of those areas.”

He opened the door. Inside was dark, but as they stepped in, lights came on, projecting a weak beam onto the walls and floor of a tiny alcove.

As the door eased shut behind her, panic tried to crawl up her throat. She looked frantically around the walls, ceiling and floor. A second steel door was in front of her, and to her right her shoulder nearly brushed against a solid wall. To her left was a long dark corridor.

“From the inside, these doors open like fire doors—just push the panic bar.”

Dylan’s voice surrounded her in the close space. There was barely enough room for the two of them to stand shoulder to shoulder between the doors. Her throat tightened and alarm burned her scalp. “What is this?” She was afraid she knew.

“An escape tunnel. I told you Alfred likes triple redundancy.”

“Triple—”

“From the lab there are three exits. Only Alfred, Charlene, me and now you, know about this one. The other two are the main exit via the elevators, and the back stairs that lead to the living quarters.”

“So that’s why you have the back stairs. I wondered, because they make the family wing much more vulnerable.

“I had to have a fail-safe escape route for Ben. Alfred designed the security system.”

They emerged into a glass-walled room next to her office.

Natasha took a deep breath, thankful to be out of that tight dark space. She thought about what Mitch had said, and about the psychiatrist’s concern that she wasn’t ready for fieldwork because of her claustrophobia.

She’d been confident she could handle it, but now, still shaken from her reaction to the dark tunnel, the question dug at her gut.
Could she if she had to?

“I could,” she murmured.

“What?” Dylan glanced over his shoulder at her as he opened the door to her office.

Had she spoken aloud? “Nothing. How long is the corridor and where does it lead?”

“Long enough. And you wouldn’t know the place. It’s an abandoned shack on an abandoned road.
What you need to know is that there’s an old Toyota hidden thirty feet south of the exit, and a key for it above the exit door. Inside the car is a cell phone with a battery pack and directions to the nearest police office.”

He turned to her, the blue fire in his eyes bright and hot. “If anything happens, priority one is to get Ben to safety.”

“Of course.” She knew that Dylan was counting on her. His single-minded resolve to protect his son was fast becoming her top priority, as well. She could brave anything, even the dark tunnel, if it meant keeping Ben safe.

“Dylan, I need to know everything. And Storm and Gambrini need to know where the tunnel is and how to get to it. Is there access to the tunnel from outside?”

“I can print out a map for you that shows the tunnel exit, the vehicle and the fastest route to town.”

She frowned as a chill ran up her spine. “That information is in your system? Where?”

Dylan looked stricken.

She grabbed his arm. “Please tell me it’s in the encrypted area with the interface program.”

He wiped a hand down his face, a hand that trembled. “It’s not.”

Chapter Six

“Aha. There you are, Natasha,” Tom whispered. He grinned and scooted his chair up closer to his computer screen. “I’d recognize that code anywhere.”

After the diversion the night before, he was sure they were all working twice as hard today. He’d been trying to penetrate the secure section of Stryker’s system since the truck’s explosion.

His plan had gone off without a hitch. He knew from his inside connection that his timing had been perfect. The truck hit. All available manpower went to the front gate. The police were called.

Meanwhile, his accomplice had had plenty of time to plant evidence of a second breach—one that had come uncomfortably close to Stryker’s child.

Close enough to scare the crap out of Stryker. The neurosurgeon had redoubled his efforts to finish the computer-generated model of the neural interface. And the code he’d just managed to extract told him that Natasha had created an impenetrable firewall.
She thought.

He smiled to himself. “If you can build it, Nat, I can break it.”

He knew her too well. Granted it had been eight years, but even though technology had advanced, people didn’t change as easily. Natasha would still code the same way.

He’d managed to frame her eight years ago by duplicating her signature. He could do it again—this time to gain access to Stryker’s program.

And that wasn’t all. He’d spent months altering his own way of coding.
Changing his signature.
There probably weren’t twenty people in the world who were good enough to do that.

Natasha wouldn’t know it was him until it was too late. He shuddered as a thrill arrowed through him.

This was better than sex.

He flexed his fingers and sent them flying over the keyboard. Even if the impossible happened and he was unable to break Stryker’s security, his backup plan was ready to go.

One way or another, within a few days he’d have the supersoldier technology.

S
HE FELL
,
CRASHING
to the ground, the impact knocking the breath out of her. She looked up just as the rifle bullet slammed into her shoulder. Pain split her in two, stole her sight for an instant. She lifted her weapon with one hand and pulled the trigger.

A horrible rumbling filled her ears as her world turned black. She struggled to move, but she was crushed between the cold dirt under her and the suffocating debris on top of her. She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see.

She was buried alive.

Natasha gasped and sat up. Her heart was racing, her pulse throbbed in her temple. She panted, trying to control her breathing as sweat trickled between her breasts.

What was it with the nightmares? She hadn’t had dreams like this since childhood. Obviously the stuffy, close bedroom was feeding into her deepest fears. She exercised the breathing techniques she’d learned to combat her claustrophobia.

After a few seconds her heart rate returned to normal and the sweating subsided. But she knew it would be an hour or more before she could go back to sleep.

She grabbed her fanny pack and slipped out her door and down the hall. She pressed her thumb against the reader and entered the current pass code. The lock clicked softly in the silence.

In the atrium, she raised her face to the skylight and took a full, deep breath. Then she lifted her hair off her neck. The knots of tension in her shoulders and back began to relax. The pounding in her temples faded.

“Agent Rudolph? Everything all right?”

Natasha turned toward the quiet voice. “Hector. I’m just getting a breath of air.”

“Yes, ma’am.” His gaze boldly raked her from head to toe. She had on a pink camisole top and long drawstring pajama pants, but Hector’s blatant stare made her feel undressed.

She turned her back on him and headed for the main entrance. As she approached, a middle-aged guard she didn’t know opened the glass doors for her.

“Thanks,” she murmured, noticing that he made a note on a logbook as she passed through. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. I just need some air.”

“Yes, ma’am, Agent Rudolph. I can call a guard to accompany you.”

“No. I’m fine.”

The covered turnaround in front of the house was brightly lit. The lights lined the paved road all the way out to the massive front gates. The green area right around the house was softly lit with solar lights. But Natasha didn’t want lights, she wanted stars. So she walked west along the large circular drive until it curved to the north. She continued west on the grass, down the hill toward the door that led to the living quarters and the lab.

Across the field and up the hill was where the unknown trespasser had gained entry to the estate. A brand-new, heavier-duty metal fence had been brought in early in the afternoon to reinforce that section.

She walked a few steps up the hill, eyeing the area where the evidence of the breach had been found. Then she looked up.

The lights off to the east obscured the weaker stars, but she could see the brightest ones. She drew in a lungful of sweet night air. After spending hours searching the computer code and only finding one error then waking up from a nightmare, she was stiff and tired.

After a few minutes of indulgence, she turned her attention back to the foliage that hid the fence. Somewhere out there beyond it either Storm or Gambrini was on duty. One of them was working security while the other was helping with the questioning and background checks of Dylan’s staff. She pulled her wrist-COM unit from her fanny pack and spoke into it quietly.

“Rudolph here. Storm?”

“Hey, Nat.”

“Where are you?”

“Bored to death in Guardhouse Alpha.”

Natasha smothered a chuckle. “Guardhouse Alpha?”

“Yeah. In case you haven’t noticed, Sergeant Mintz is a born and bred military type.”

“I noticed. What do you think about his security?”

Storm paused. “Top-notch. What I don’t get is what’s the point? I understand the No Such Agency offered Stryker ironclad security in one of their super-secret facilities.”

“You’d have to know him. He doesn’t trust anyone else to protect his child.”

“So
you
know him?” Storm drawled.

“Stop it, Storm. Not everything is about sex.”

Despite Storm’s implication, she considered his words. Did she know Dylan? During the few days she’d been here, she’d come to respect his expertise. She’d begun to share his obsession with keeping Ben safe. If Ben were her child, she’d die for him.

“Who said anything about sex?” Storm chuckled.

“Never mind.” She sighed, a tiny smile tugging at her lips.

“Yeah, let’s change the subject. Where are you? In bed? Whatcha wearing?”

“Nice segue, Mr. One-Track-Mind. Am I going to have to kick your butt again?”

“Again?” Storm laughed. “You haven’t kicked it the first time. Although I’d be happy to let you see what you can do.” He paused. “Sorry, sugar. I can’t help it. It’s lonely in Guardhouse Alpha.”

“Maybe you should take advantage of the time alone and work on your social skills.”

Storm laughed.

“Okay, Storm. Listen. My COM unit doesn’t work inside the house,” she told him. “Neither do cell phones. When you get the photo-analysis of the fibers caught on the fence, call me on the landline or send me a message through Mintz.”

“You got it, sugar.”

“So has Mintz briefed you on the layout of the house and grounds?”

“Yep. We know where everybody sleeps. We have a blueprint of the entire estate. We’re set.”

“Did he show you
absolutely
everything—including all the exits?” Natasha said carefully. She knew better than to assume their channel was totally secure.

“He sure did. All of ’em.”

“Good. Stay safe out there. I’m out.” She turned off the COM unit and stuck it back in her fanny pack.

She’d wandered up the hill while talking to Storm. Above her head, a quarter moon shone brightly. Natasha took another refreshing breath of cool night air and curled her toes in her thong sandals, shivering as the cool dampness of the dew spilled onto her toes.

A twig snapped behind her.

She laid her hand on her fanny pack and slid open the nearly silent zipper.

The crunch of leaves had her whirling, slapping at her fanny pack.

“Hey!” Strong hands gripped her upper arms. “Whoa. It’s me, Dylan. What are you doing out here?”

She pulled away from his grip. Had he heard her exchange with Storm?

“It was stuffy in my room. I wanted
some air. And I spoke to Special Agent Storm for a moment.” She frowned at him. “Did you come out here looking for me?”

Dylan shook his head. “I had to get out of the lab for a while. It’s nice out here tonight.” He looked up at the sky. The moon was bright, sending faint shadows across the ground and sprinkling pale gold glitter on Natasha’s hair.

It floated across her shoulders, making his fingers itch to touch it, to capture it between his hands and bury his nose in it. He took in her slender, sturdy body, encased in the sheer pink material of her pajamas. The delicate bones of her shoulders and her slender, muscled arms made his mouth water and his body ache.

He ran a hand down his face. He was more exhausted than he’d realized. He was drifting off into dreamland while standing upright.

Natasha angled her head at him. “You’re so tired you’re falling asleep standing up.”

Not falling asleep, he thought. Daydreaming certainly.

“I don’t think you’ve slept since I’ve been here,” she continued.

“I’ve caught a few naps with Ben. Knowing he’s right there, beside me…” He shrugged.

Natasha’s face softened. “He’s such a sweet little boy.”

“Don’t let him fool you. He can be a handful.” His voice nearly cracked. He looked away, toward the fence. “So how’s the hacker-tracking going?”