Hard Target: Elite Ops - Book One (26 page)

A
RED FIRE
alarm was mounted about ten feet away down the hall. The only problem was it was too far for him to reach and pull the alarm from the recessed doorway. He would have to time things perfectly.

He bent down and watched the nurses chatting. Ever aware of the clock ticking, his chance came when one of the women went into Zach’s room and the other turned her back to him and hunched over the desktop computer.

Slowly he stood and rushed down the hallway to the stairwell, just close enough to reach the alarm. He pulled the white bar down in one smooth action and dashed back to the room as the klaxons began shrieking.

Anna was still out cold on the bed. The sounds of running feet and shouting voices passed the door. He didn’t know how long it would take them to check on things or figure out that this was a false alarm, but he only needed a momentary distraction to get Anna and Zach out.

He cracked open the door as one of the nurses rushed past along with Antonio and Rivera. Dr. Morales and the other nurse were nowhere to be seen. This was the riskiest part. He was counting on Rivera and the doctor staying with the more important patient, Rivera’s wife. Hopefully, the nurses weren’t carrying guns. That was a big gamble, but there was no other way.

He slid outside once again and headed for the nurse’s station. Ignoring the computer screen, he went for the desk drawers. The first held pencils, pens, office supplies. The second contained alcohol swabs, syringes, a bottle of pills, and the rubber strap used to tie a patient’s arm when taking blood.

The bottle of medication rolled to the right, putting the label in full view. Zach Mercado was the patient listed. It was Atenolol, the white pills from the hotel. They would most likely need those for the trip home.
When
they got out of here. Leland pocketed the bottle.

He glanced up and down the hall, very conscious that time was slipping away and he wasn’t finding what he needed. He opened the bottom drawer to a handbag that looked like it would qualify as a piece of carry-on luggage with the airlines. Maybe this was the jackpot.

He dumped the contents of the purse in the drawer. Breathing a sigh of relief, he fished a cellphone out of the mysterious jumble that was a woman’s pocketbook. He gave the bag another upside down shake and realized there was something else in the large side pocket.

He recognized the shape before opening the zippered compartment and smiled darkly. This angel of mercy carried a Smith & Wesson snub nose .38 Special. Apparently her compassion was a tad selective.

The revolver was fully loaded. He checked to make sure there was a bullet in the chamber before he slid it to the waistband of his new jeans and turned on the phone.

Sin servicio
glowed in white letters.
No service
. There were no bars indicating reception. Of course, they were underground.

He scanned the computer screen. It was open to a webcam in an operating theatre. White-coated individuals moved around the sterile room.

He considered the idea of sending an email to Gavin but dismissed it when he heard voices and looked up. Someone was about to come around the corner. He was completely out of time and ran across the hall as best he could with his boot to Zach’s room.

Not knowing if anyone was with the boy, he quietly pushed the door open.

“Hey! What’s going on?” Zach sat up in bed.

“Do you trust me?” asked Leland.

Zach studied him before answering, “Yeah, yeah I do.”

Leland gave him a quick nod. “We’re getting out of here. I know you have a lot of questions. I can’t answer them until we’re safe.”

“Okay?” Anna’s boy sat up straighter, the puzzlement obvious on his face and in his voice.

“Can you get around on your own?” Leland was concerned about the heart situation.

“I can’t run a marathon, but I can get around.”

“No worries. I won’t be running any races here, either.” Leland ignored the vicious stab of pain in his ankle. He didn’t have time to worry about that.

Zach slid off the mattress. He wore gym shorts and a t-shirt with a huge pocket on the front. Slipping his feet into flip-flops under the bed, he removed the wireless heart monitor from his oversized t-shirt pocket, along with a finger monitor. The lines on the machine behind him went flat and started beeping. The alert was loud, but the fire alarm was louder.

Zach reached up and bumped a button to silence the machine. “It’ll go off again in about three minutes.”

Okay. So they had a timeline laid out. Leland did some quick mental calculations.

“Don’t run yourself down following me. I can help you. Let me know if your heart gets wonky.”

Zach nodded and Leland slid his arm around the boy’s shoulders as he opened the door. The hall was still empty.

“We’re going to the stairwell and I’m getting your mom. Got it?”

Zach nodded again. His eyes grew round with worry, but he didn’t ask questions. They hurried down the hall.

Realistically, Leland was past being able to run with his boot. He couldn’t move so fast that Zach would get into trouble. But once they were up the stairs, it would be a different story.

The fire alarm was still screeching, hiding any noise that they were making but also hampering Leland’s ability to hear others approaching.

They dashed past Anna’s room and into the stairwell. The stairs were like those in an office building with a large open area underneath the bottom set. The pressurized door was open on the landing above and they were halfway up when Leland heard steps coming from the top floor.

He stumped back down the stairs, pulling Zach with him. Together they slipped beneath the open area beneath the steps. A nurse, talking on her phone in Spanish, was on the landing just above them. The alarm reverberated off the walls.

Leland could make out her saying, “
Falsa alarma
.” That meant it was only a matter of seconds before they figured out which alarm had been set off and who had done it. She stood on the upper stairs, finishing her conversation, and walked partway down the steps they were hidden under.

Leland pulled the pilfered phone from his pocket, checking for service again. Grateful he’d memorized Nick’s number, he typed a text explaining where they were.

Immediately the phone vibrated with a returning message. He squeezed the case tight, praying the noise wouldn’t register with the woman above him over the wailing alarm.

He need not have worried. She was having some kind of argument and was oblivious to their hiding below the stairs.

A wave of relief washed over him as he read Nick’s return text: “Already here. See you in a few.”

Thank God. This half-assed plan of his might just work.

L
ELAND WAITED TILL
the woman walked all the way down the stairs and through the pressurized door.

“Wait here,” he whispered to Zach.

He counted to ten before slipping out from under the stairwell and hurrying to Anna’s room as best he could. The boot was feeling heavier and heavier. She was still out. If he was lucky, the nurse would check on Zach first before coming here, then most likely she’d freak when she realized her patient was gone.

He bent to pick Anna up as someone knocked on the door.

Damn. So much for luck.

He slid behind the door as the nurse breezed inside. Her eyebrows were already raised in question at seeing Anna lying on the bed when he grabbed her from behind and put the .38 Special to her temple. The woman didn’t fight him as he pushed her forward to the wall and moved a hand to her neck, using the same vagus nerve pressure point he had with Anna.

The nurse was out immediately. He laid her gently in the easy chair and gathered Anna in his arms to hustle down the hall. Anna’d been out for less than ten minutes. That was all the time he was going to need or this wasn’t going to work at all. He hoped Nick would show up soon.

Zach poked his head around the corner as Leland stumped into the stairwell. “What’s wrong with her?” he demanded.

“She’s alright. She’ll wake up in a few minutes.” Leland figured he’d get more cooperation if he didn’t tell the boy that he’d knocked his mother out cold with a nerve compression move he’d learned in martial arts class.

“We’ve got to get upstairs. Can you make it on your own?” Leland asked.

“Yeah, I can do it.”

They started the climb. Leland headed up slowly, partly because he was carrying Anna and partly because of his ankle. Zach travelled at a steady but sedate pace behind him.

“I’ve got your white pills if you need ’em,” Leland said, glancing over his shoulder.

Zach looked relieved. “Great.”

The alarm continued to reverberate in the stairwell. They were halfway up the stairs when the klaxons stopped clamoring. The quiet was ominous. Now everyone knew this had been a false alarm. They had only moments to get out of the compound.

A door on the landing above slammed open and footsteps sounded on the stairs. There was nowhere to go. They were too far up and too slow to race back down.

“Get behind me,” Leland ordered, pulling the snub nose .38 from his waistband.

Then Nick was standing in front of him, his Sig Sauer drawn and an AK-47 slung around his shoulder as well. “Well, hell,” said Nick. “What took you so long? I was about to get worried.”

Leland laughed quietly. “It’s only now you’re worried? Wonderful. I thought maybe we were in trouble.”

Nick grinned. “Seriously, man, I’m glad to see you. I just finished up.”

“Finished up what?”

“Tell you in the car.” Nick started to take Anna, but Leland shook his head.

“Help the boy,” he said and kept moving up the stairs. At the top of the stairwell he peeked out into the entryway, hoping his new luck would hold.

He glanced back at Zach, trying to monitor how the boy was doing. His skin was pale, but he wasn’t breathing heavily. His eyes were alert, all good signs.

Leland’s ankle was screaming with pain, but their lives depended on his ignoring it for now. Anna was coming to in his arms, but he couldn’t take the time to put her down. No one was in the entryway so he shifted her to his shoulder in a fireman’s hold as he, Nick, and Zach headed for the front door.

Two empty SUVs were parked in the driveway. Where was everyone? He opened the driver’s side of the first car, but there were no keys so he hobbled to the second vehicle hoping he was saving time.

Bingo. Keys swung from the ignition.

From further down the drive, he heard another vehicle approaching and felt his phone vibrate against his hip.

At the same time Anna spoke. “Where am I, dammit?” She punctuated her question with a sharp slap to his back.

She was mad. That was a good sign, and he felt a fleeting moment of relief. He slipped the phone from his pocket to read a text from Marissa.

“We r here.”

He lowered Anna to the ground. Her eyes were glazed but slowly filling with rage as she stared up at him. “You . . . you,” she stuttered, then she saw Zach and Nick beside him. Myriad emotions washed over her face—confusion, anger, love. She ignored Leland to gather Zach in her arms.

He settled inside. They’d sort this out later. For now, they’d move faster with her awake.

Shouts in the doorway behind him had him swinging around to see Rivera and two gunmen.

“Stop!” shouted Rivera.

A banana yellow Hummer was thundering up the drive, but Leland wasn’t positive it was his ride. He couldn’t believe AEGIS would be arriving in such a conspicuous vehicle. Either way the Hummer wasn’t going to make it in time to stop Rivera’s men from shooting him, Anna, Zach, and Nick.

The other empty SUV was between the gunmen and Leland’s small group as he made a split-second decision. The thing he’d been thinking about since Rivera had said he wanted Anna’s lungs. He pulled Zach from her arms and pushed Nick and the boy behind him.

Holding her in front of them all, he slid the revolver from his waistband and put the gun to Anna’s temple.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“J
ESUS,
L
ELAND,” HE
heard Nick mutter behind him. “What the fuck you doing?”

“Mom! No!” shouted Zach at the same time.

Leland ignored them all, concentrating instead on the woman in his arms and the men pointing their assault rifles at him.

“Alto!”
shouted Leland.
Stop.
In English he spoke directly to Rivera. “Shoot me, I’ll kill your wife’s donor.”

He heard Anna’s sharp intake of breath and felt her body stiffen in his arms.

“Do you trust me?” he whispered only to her.

“Leland? What are you doing?” Zach pulled at his waist.

“Stop it, kid!” Leland’s voice was ice cold and his hands were rock steady, but his heart was quaking.

“You can’t—” argued Zach.

“Shut up!” He couldn’t fake this, not if the boy was fighting him.

“It’s okay, baby,” Anna said. “It’s gonna be okay.”

At first Leland thought she was talking to him, then he realized she was trying to soothe her son. He couldn’t see her eyes. Did she really think he would pull the trigger?

“Trust me,” he murmured into her hair.

His hand was around her waist and he pulled her tight up against him in a grim parody of a lover’s embrace. He made a show of shoving the gun against her breast.

“No chance for harvesting lungs if I shoot her in the chest.” Leland was betting that Rivera’s men thought he would indeed kill her.

His only hope for saving them from a bloodbath lay in the men not shooting for fear of hitting Anna. Despite the coverage of the empty SUV, he, Nick and the boy were dead if he lowered his weapon.

“You’d kill that woman to shield yourself?” sneered Rivera.

“I have no choice,” said Leland. Repeating Rivera’s words from earlier, he squeezed her waist at the same time, desperately trying to communicate to Anna that this was all a ruse on his part.

He heard the Hummer pull up behind him. He was so screwed if this was another group of Rivera’s men and not Marissa.

“Our ride’s here, man,” said Nick, the only person who didn’t appear to be completely freaking out over the situation.