Memory Zero (30 page)

“They said they were going to call at six, and every
ten minutes after that. They said if I didn’t answer, they’d kill her.”

He shook his head. After all Karl had seen with the Federation, he should have known better than to trust the word of a man like Kazdan. “Have they called?”

“Yes.”

“And?”

Karl closed his eyes. “They were supposed to call back an hour ago with the details of her release.”

“I’m sorry I dragged you into this, my friend.”

Karl shrugged. “I knew the risks when I joined the Federation. Jan and I discussed it. I just didn’t think they’d go for my family rather than me.”

“Sethanon probably wouldn’t.” To date, Sethanon had confined his attentions to active operatives of the SIU and the Federation. “This is Kazdan’s doing.”

“And Kazdan’s worse?”

“Much worse.” Sethanon seemed to have limits, lines he wouldn’t cross. Kazdan appeared willing to go to any length to get what he wanted. And right now, that was Sam. “Are the kids really with Jan’s folks?”

Karl nodded. “School holidays, remember? They go up there for the week Jan can’t get off. I’ve sent Harvey up there to guard them.”

However much Karl felt Harv was ready to join the Federation, Gabriel doubted that Karl’s eldest had the training or the skill to deal with the likes of Kazdan’s men.

Karl’s brown eyes were full of torment as he continued, “They won’t release her, will they?”

“I doubt it. Jan’s proven valuable. He might find other uses for you.”

“Bastard,” Karl muttered, then took a deep breath.
“I thought something like this might happen. That’s why I bugged his car.”

He stared at his friend for a long moment. “You bugged his car?”

“And the cretin with the gun. I used the new plastic type; detectors can’t pick them up.”

“Then why are you just sitting here?”

“Because I knew you’d realize something was wrong. I knew you’d come here first.”

Gabriel grimaced. “I should have picked it up far earlier than I did.” Karl’s tension should have been warning enough. He’d just been too preoccupied with his own problems to be concerned. He sighed heavily, then rose. “Let’s hope the cretin and the car go to wherever they’re holding Jan.”

Karl clasped his fingers together, cracking them loudly. “And if Jan’s not there, it will be my great pleasure to thump the information out of the fellow.”

“To think you were a pacifist a mere ten years ago.”

“Reality has hit me since then.” Karl walked to the bar and pulled a small tracer unit from behind a whiskey bottle. “I used the long-range type. We should be able to pick up a signal from the city.”

“That wouldn’t happen to be the same type you used on me, would it?” Gabriel asked, not sure whether to be amused or annoyed. “Because it wasn’t the damn twin bond that enabled you to find me so fast.”

Karl raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t deny the accusation. Gabriel snorted. The order had no doubt come from his brother, which meant he’d have to have words with Stephan once this was all over. In the meantime, they had people to rescue.

He slapped Karl on the shoulder, then headed for
the door. “Let’s go find some heads to smack, my friend.”

T
HE EVENING MEAL CAME AND WENT
.
Sam sat on the bunk and watched the shadows creep farther and farther into the cell. Outside, a storm was brewing. She could smell the hint of rain in the air and could see the occasional flash of light weave its way across the darkening sky. Electricity seemed to buzz through the air, a sense of power that tingled across her skin. She breathed deep. Energy flowed through every pore, every muscle, filling her with that power. It was almost as if she were one with the night—one with the storm.

The shadows flowed into the darkness of true night. She rose. The only light she could see in the room beyond was the one coming from the cell that held the two women.

Why were there no guards? It was unlike Jack to be so careless. She glanced at the ceiling and saw what she’d failed to see earlier. Small monitors that were hidden within the lights themselves.

Jack knew she could get out. Knew she’d talked to the two women earlier. So why hadn’t he taken the decoder? Maybe he wanted her to escape. Maybe he’d given her the time and the chance as another test.

Frowning, she stared at the dark lightbulb. Why was she seeing the monitor now and not before? Was it somehow linked to the sensation of power that ran through the storm-held night, the power that burned across her skin? Or was it something more, something to do with the extra abilities Jack seemed so certain
she had? Was that the real reason he’d given her until morning? Not to let her think, but to see if she could escape and how far she could get?

Even if this
were
nothing more than a test, she had no choice but to run with it. She had to get the two women out of here. Then she needed to find out just what Jack was really up to.

She slipped the decoder from her boot and pressed it against the lock. The click of it opening seemed as loud as the thunder rumbling overhead. She frowned and slowly opened the door. A slight whine sounded as the monitor tracked across the cell and focused on her.

She swallowed to ease the sudden dryness in her throat. She shouldn’t be able to hear something like that. The energy of the storm was somehow heightening her senses. The night was as clear as day, and sound had become something she could almost touch.

Was this one of the abilities Jack had mentioned? Or was the fear lying like a stone in the pit of her stomach lending wings to her imagination?

The light from the cell at the far end of the long room beckoned like a beacon, but if Jack was watching, that was the one place she couldn’t go. First, she’d have to take out the monitors, and whoever was watching them.

She turned left and headed for the stairs. The monitor buzzed into the silence, following her movements. She ran up the winding, open staircase and tested the handle on the door at the top. Unlocked. She grimaced. It was a test for sure. Jack wouldn’t allow his men to be so careless.

If he wanted her to go this way, it was the one way
she couldn’t go. Surely there was another way out. She turned and leaned against the banister, studying the room below. Her gaze stopped when she came to a vent close to the floor, halfway between her cell and the cell of the two women. From where she stood, there didn’t appear to be any screws holding it in place. It was simply sitting there.

It was almost too good to be true. Maybe even a trap. And yet, the vent hadn’t been disturbed anytime recently. The rust and the dirt that caked the cover would have revealed any sort of recent movement.

Jack knew of her fear of tight spaces. It was the last place he’d expect her to try.

The monitor would have to go. Otherwise, they’d see what she was up to and be down here before she could escape. She pulled off her boot and took careful aim. Luck was with her. The bulb shattered, and the soft whine of the monitor faded. Would the watching guards come down to investigate? Or would they give her time so they could see where she went?

She retrieved her boot and moved back to the door. The two corridors beyond were dark. Monitors buzzed to her left and her right. She stepped out, and then hesitated—more for the watchers than anything else.

After a moment, she headed left. When she was directly under the monitor, she stopped. Gripping the end of her boot tightly, she swung it hard at the lightbulb. Glass shattered, spraying across her face and hair. She jerked her head away, closed her eyes, and then shook her head. The glass fell to the floor, as soft as rain. When she opened her eyes again, the monitor lay at an odd angle, one wire torn away from the base.

She repeated the process with the monitor down the
other hall, and then she went back to the cellar. With any luck, Jack would think she was destroying the monitors as she went, and he’d hold off any attempt to stop her until it was too late.

She crossed to the vent and squatted down. Air stirred, heavy with the scent of the oncoming storm. She forced her fingers through the wire grate covering the vent and tugged hard. Dirt and rust sprinkled across her fingers. She tugged again and felt the grate give slightly. After several more attempts, it came free. She lay on her stomach and peered inside. The walls were damn thick, if this vent was anything to go by. It was more a small tunnel than an actual vent, and it was at least three feet long. It was also large enough for her to squeeze through, and it led directly outside, not to some sort of duct, as she’d presumed. At the other end, there was a small square of concrete and the bottom of a bluestone wall. Neither gave any indication of what else she might find. She’d have to risk squeezing through.

She pushed forward. The walls closed in instantly, pressing against her shoulders and tearing at her shirt. She shuddered, trying to ignore the image of being trapped like a rat in a hole, as she wriggled and forced her body through the vent until she reached the end’s opening. She shoved the wire covering off, dragging it back into the hole with her before peering out.

Trash bins lined the wall, overflowing with paper and food wrappers. To her right were half a dozen large buildings, some with lights glowing brightly, some dark, and farther down the slope were several cars. She knew how to hot-wire a car. Jack had taught her.

To her left was a high wire fence. It was electrified.
She could hear the high-pitched whine running through the wire, could feel the dance of power—a sensation that was similar to yet somehow different from the touch of the storm.

She pushed the rest of the way out and climbed to her feet. Beyond the whine of the fence, beyond the thunder of the approaching storm, someone breathed. A guard was close by. His cologne stung the air, a sharp mix of spices that tickled her nose.

After taking a deep, calming breath, she stepped around the corner. The man was alert, raising his gun so fast it was little more than a blur. But with the night seeming to feed her energy, she was much faster. She clenched her fist and smashed him in the mouth before he could fire the weapon. Like the man in the morgue, he went down like a ton of bricks. She caught him, grunting under the sudden strain of his weight, and slowly lowered him to the ground. She’d hit people before, and often in anger. Never had she gotten a reaction like this. So what had changed? Had
she
changed in some way, or was it something to do with the weird sense of power running through the night?

She grabbed the man’s gun—a laser, just like the one she’d found under Jack’s bed. It would slice through the wire as easily as a fish through water—but doing so might well short out the fence and warn Jack of her location. Something she couldn’t afford just yet. The slope beyond was tree-lined and rocky, but a pregnant woman desperate to see her husband again would have no trouble climbing it.

She stepped over the guard’s body and walked to the next corner. No guard, but a monitor on the far corner. If she shut it down, Jack would know where she was. She didn’t want that just yet.

She moved back to the vent side of the building. Where was the main power source? Did it come in off the state’s resources, or was there a generator of some kind here? Her gaze came to rest on a small structure on the far side of the encampment, close to the parking lot.
Generator
, she thought,
and housed in that building
. Why she was so certain, she wasn’t sure. Nor did she have the time to worry about it.

After squeezing back through the vent, she walked down to the cell that held the two women. Both glanced up expectantly when she opened the door.

“We heard the noise and hoped you would come,” Lyssa said softly, rising from her bed.

“You’re going to have to climb through a rather small vent.” She glanced at Lyssa’s stomach. “Though if you’re a shapechanger, it might be easier to simply shift shape.”

Lyssa rubbed a hand across her stomach. “I can’t. Not when I’m pregnant. Shifters might be able to, but no changer can. It’s too dangerous for the developing child.”

Sam raised her eyebrows. “Why wouldn’t the same rule apply to shifters?”

Lyssa shrugged. “It’s something to do with the fact that we take on animal forms, whereas shifters remain human, regardless of which shape they are in.”

“It confuses the DNA, and can often abort the child,” Jan added.

And that was not a risk any pregnant woman was likely to take, even to escape a prison. “It’s going to be tight,” Sam said.

“I would crawl across glass on my hands and knees, if that’s what it took to get out of here.”

Which was basically what she had to do. “Then follow me.” She led them back to the vent. “Jan, you first.”

The older woman got down on her stomach and slithered into the tunnel. It was a tight squeeze, and it was only after several minutes of indelicate pushing that she made it through to the other side.

“Okay,” Jan whispered, and moved back from the vent.

Sam glanced at Lyssa. “Ready?”

Lyssa nodded and began to push herself through the small gap. Although she was much smaller boned than Jan, she was six months pregnant, and her stomach scraped firmly against the rough bluestone walls. She gasped several times, and slight smears of blood touched the blue-gray stones. But she didn’t stop. Once her belly was free at the other end, the rest of her slid through easily.

Sam squeezed through after them, and as she climbed to her feet, she listened to the night. Nothing stirred. The strengthening wind brought with it no sound of movement. They were safe for a few minutes longer. She led the two women around the corner and checked the pulse of the man she’d belted. Alive, but still out cold.

“You know how to handle one of these?” she asked, handing the laser to Lyssa.

Lyssa nodded, flicking the safety off and sighting the fence. Sam touched her hand, halting further movement.

“The fence is electrified. You shoot now, and they’ll know.”

“Then what do we do?”

Lyssa’s blue eyes studied her for a moment, trusting and yet shrewd. Something in her gaze reminded Sam of Stephan. Even Gabriel. A determination to do what had to be done, perhaps.