Operation: Midnight Tango (22 page)

“Get her onto the gurney!” Marcus Underwood ordered from his position near the door. “Strap her in.”

Strong arms wrapped around her forearms from behind. Another set of arms closed around her calves. Emily twisted and tried to lash out with her feet, but the two men were well trained and amazingly strong. The next thing she knew, she was being lifted and placed on the gurney.

“Help me!” She screamed as one of the men began securing the straps. Thick nylon restraints were stretched taut over her legs. Two over her torso. Another around her neck. Two more for each arm. She was totally immobilized.

She didn’t want to think about what would happen next.

Marcus Underwood looked down at her and shook his head. “You should have minded your own business, Emily.”

“Don’t do this, Marcus,” she pleaded. “It’s not too late to stop this.”

The other man’s expression was strained. But there was no comfort in knowing he wasn’t enjoying this. “Wheel her into the testing chamber,” he said. “Let’s get this over with.”

Emily threw her head back and screamed. She cried out Zack’s name as one of the men pushed the gurney into a stark, windowless room tiled from ceiling to floor. The sandy-haired man kicked down the brake on the gurney so it would stand in place. Then he left the room.

Emily stared up at the ceiling. She could feel the panic pulsing inside her. A scream building in her chest. Tears stung her eyes when she thought of Zack. He’d been shot. Trying to save her. Oh, please, God, let him be all right….

“That will be all,” she heard Underwood say. Then he was standing over her. Terror spread through her when she saw the tiny vial in his hand. “Do you want me to explain to you what’s going to happen?” he asked.

“I want you to let me go.”

He pursed his lips. “I’m going to leave this vial in the room with you. The waxy outer core will begin to melt when the room temperature reaches eighty degrees. It will take the wax approximately four minutes to melt. Once that happens, two billion
particles of RZ-902 will be released into the air. Within seconds you will ingest enough into your lungs to shut down your central nervous system. Your mucous membranes will bleed. There will be some skin irritation. Headache. Abdominal pain.”

“Don’t do this.” Emily panted with fear.

“I don’t have a choice.” He dropped his gaze, then crossed the room to a small tiled table and set down the vial. “I’m sorry, Emily,” he said. “I’m very, very sorry.”

“No!” she screamed. “You can’t do this!”

The door slammed. The lock turned.

“Oh, God. Oh, God!” She struggled against the straps binding her, her body bucking, but her efforts were futile. She thought about Zack and her heart broke.

“Please be all right,” she choked. “Help me.”

Then it was just her and the vial and the terrible wait for a slow and agonizing death….

ZACK SPRINTED TOWARD THE door at the far end. He’d always perceived physical pain as an issue of mind over matter. But then, he’d never been shot in the side before. Pain racked his body every time his feet hit the ground. He was bleeding profusely and leaving bloody footprints. A trail very easy to follow….

But he wasn’t going to let any of that stop him. He had to keep Underwood and his thugs from killing Emily.

Hang on,
his mind chanted as he covered the ground at a swift pace.

He loved her. He’d loved her since the moment he laid eyes on her. Because of the circumstances he just hadn’t realized it, or maybe he just hadn’t been brave enough to acknowledge it. And now she could be dying….

The thought of losing her filled him with pain ten times worse than any gunshot wound. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her face. Her smile. The way she’d looked at him after he’d kissed her. The way her eyes had glazed when he’d been inside her. Emily Monroe was decent and good and kind. The world needed her.
He
needed her. There was no way in hell he was going to let her die.

At the end of the corridor Zack paused. He was sweating profusely, his face burning as if with fever. He set his hand against his aching side, felt the sticky ooze of blood. He looked down and his palm was slick and red.

“Damn it,” he muttered, leaning against the jamb and willing his head to clear.

He needed help. If he passed out or was captured before reaching Emily…
No,
he thought. He wouldn’t let himself go there. He had to reach her. If it was the last thing he did, he would get her out of here.

Voices reached him through the haze of pain. Clutching his side, Zack backtracked a few steps and slinked into the alcove of a doorway and peered down the hall. A male corrections officer was walking toward him, speaking into his radio as he approached. He was looking down at the bloody footprints on the floor.

“Subject has definitely been this way. Blood looks fresh. Advise. Over.”

“Roger that. Subject is armed and dangerous. Approach with extreme caution. Lethal force has been authorized.”

“Roger. Out.” The officer shoved the radio into its sheath as he passed the alcove.

Zack waited until the man had taken two steps past him before he crept from the alcove and tapped him on the shoulder. The officer went for his pistol as he spun, but Zack was prepared. A palm-heel strike to the nose sent the man sprawling backward. In a flash Zack was on him. A single punch to the solar plexus and the man was incapacitated. Using the man’s own cuffs, Zack quickly secured his hands, gagged him and relieved him of the pistol and radio.

“Don’t mind if I borrow these, do you?” he asked and left the officer groaning on the floor.

But the physical exertion took a heavy toll. Dizziness and nausea washed over him as he entered the prisoner receiving area and closed the steel door behind him. The sergeant’s desk was vacant. He passed by it and paused outside the prisoner holding area. Peering around the corner, he spotted the sergeant with the two operatives Zack had been sent in with.

Kendra Michaels was wearing a skirt and heels, her right wrist cuffed to the bar embedded in the wall above the bench. Jake Vanderpol was already in a cell. From where Zack stood he could see that the other man’s face was bleeding and he knew Jake had put up a fight.

Feeling the press of time, Zack silently entered the room. Kendra made eye contact with him, then moved quickly to gain the attention of the sergeant. “I have to go to the bathroom,” she said.

“Too bad,” the man snapped.

“That’s no way to treat a lady.” Zack jammed the pistol against the sergeant’s spine. “Unlock those cuffs or I’ll put a bullet in your back.”

The sergeant went rigid, his hands shooting up.

Zack reached for the man’s pistol and handed it to Kendra. “I think you can put this to better use than he can.”

Smiling, she trained the gun on the sergeant’s heart. “Get these cuffs off me,” she said. “Now.”

The sergeant’s hands shook as he unlocked her cuffs. “You won’t get away with this.”

“Watch.” When the cuffs were released, she motioned toward the cell where Jake Vanderpol was standing. “Open it,” she said to the sergeant.

“What the hell took you so long?” Jake said as the sergeant unlocked the door. Then he noticed the blood on Zack’s side and grimaced. “Jeez, Devlin, you’re leaking like a sieve.”

“How bad?” Kendra asked, coming up beside him.

Zack didn’t care about his own gunshot wound. “They’ve taken Emily Monroe to the testing chamber,” he said. “I’ve got to get to her before they release the RZ-902.”

“You’re in no condition to be saving anyone, Devlin.” Kendra shoved the sergeant into the cell and slammed the door.

“She’s right, Devlin,” Jake said.

“I don’t have a choice,” Zack said and started toward the door.

“What the hell are we waiting for?” Jake said to Kendra, and the three of them went through the door as a single combined force.

THE DRIPPING OF THE MELTING wax onto the tile tormented Emily. For the first time in her life she was totally consumed with terror. She felt every heartbeat like the ticking of a death knell.

From where she lay bound she could see the two-way mirror. She wondered if Marcus Underwood, Clay Carpenter and the man from MIDNIGHT who’d betrayed Zack stood on the other side, gaining some sort of perverse satisfaction from her impending death.

Zack.

A sob broke from her lips when she thought of him, of all the things they would never do together, of all the things that would never be. Even though she would die here today, she would at least go to her death knowing she’d loved with her whole heart, body and soul.

That would have to be enough.

The wax had stopped dripping.

Emily choked back another sob, closed her eyes and waited for the pain to begin.

ZACK DIDN’T BOTHER WITH a warning when he burst into the testing chamber receiving area. He took out
the security officer with a single shot to the head. The man dropped without even looking up. Kendra darted to the fallen man and quickly confiscated his weapon. Jake Vanderpol headed toward the administrative offices. Pistol drawn, Zack sprinted down the narrow corridor toward the observation room. Darkly tinted glass was set into a tiled wall. A red light flickered In Use, and he knew Emily was inside.

I’m too late.

The thought besieged him as he barreled toward the glass. He couldn’t bear the thought of her dying. She was the only thing that mattered. Not his own life. Not justice. All he wanted was for her to be alive, because he couldn’t imagine the world without her.

“Devlin, don’t!”

Zack heard Jake’s shout, but he didn’t hesitate. Using his coat to protect his face, he hurled himself through the glass. The window shattered on impact. Shards flew like razor-sharp pieces of ice. Then he was inside the small tiled room. Emily was strapped to a gurney. Tears streamed from her eyes. A cry tore from her throat when she raised her head and saw him.

“Zack!
No!
Run! The RZ-902—”

“Quiet.” Slashing the straps with his knife, he pulled her from the gurney. The urge to take her into his arms was powerful, but Zack knew the gas may have already been released into the air.

“Devlin, get out of there!” Jake bellowed.

But Zack was already pushing Emily through the shattered observation window, then following her through. On the other side Jake Vanderpol put a pistol to Marcus Underwood’s cheek. “You have two seconds to tell me how to neutralize that gas or I’m going to throw you in that room and let it take you to hell.”

Underwood’s eyes bulged, his throat worked convulsively. “W-we modified a fire extinguisher, filled it with a neutralizing agent.”

Kendra Michaels crossed to the red extinguisher, yanked it from its hook on the wall, then hopped through the broken window to spray the melted vial of RZ-902.

Zack couldn’t get Emily far enough away from that hellish room. He let her help him, but only because he liked the way it felt when she put her arms around him. Besides, he was a little dizzy. A tad nauseous. He made it as far as the prisoner receiving area before he collapsed.

“Zack! My God, you’re bleeding.”

“Just a flesh wound,” he said.

Emily went to her knees beside him. “It’s bad.”

Jake was already on the phone. “Care Flite chopper is en route. ETA ten minutes. Hang tight, buddy.”

“Hope they bring food. I’m starved.”

Choking out a sound that was part laugh, part sob, Emily took his face in her hands and kissed him full on the mouth. “You saved my life.”

“Just doing my job.”

“You did a lot more than your job.”

“You’re right. I wouldn’t take a bullet or jump through a glass window for just anyone.” He smiled, but it was becoming a struggle to keep his eyes open. “But I’d do it all over again for you.”

She closed her eyes briefly, and tears began to roll down her cheeks. “I didn’t want to die without telling you I love you.”

“Thanks for clueing me in,” he said. “That’s one hell of an incentive for a guy to pull through when he’s shot.”

“There’s a hundred more where that came from, Zack Devlin.”

“I’m feeling better already.” But he could feel consciousness slipping away. He didn’t want to leave her. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to find his way back. And she was so damn good to look at.

“I’m here.” She grasped his hand and squeezed hard. “Zack.
Zack!
Don’t you dare die on me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he murmured and drifted into space.

Epilogue

One week later

Emily stood in the cold Idaho wind, hugging her leather coat against her, and stared down at her father’s headstone. Kneeling, she set her hand against the date of his death. “I owe you an apology, Pop,” she said.

The trip to the cemetery was long past due, but this afternoon was the only time she’d had in the last week to come here. She’d spent most of the last week at the Boise Memorial Hospital with Zack while he recovered from a serious bullet wound. The rest of her time she’d spent with different branches of law enforcement and even the brass at MIDNIGHT, answering questions and making statements as they tried to recreate the events that had led up to the showdown at the Bitterroot prison the night she and Zack had nearly died.

Avery Shaw, Marcus Underwood and Clay Carpenter were in jail, each of them awaiting trial on
various charges that would keep them behind bars for the rest of their lives. Thanks to Zack.

She looked at the granite headstone and smiled. “And you, Dad. I’m sorry I doubted you all these years. You were a hero, and now I’m going to make sure your contribution to ending the horrors of RZ-902 are officially recognized.”

“I might be able to help with that.”

Emily rose and spun at the sound of the familiar voice. Then she was staring at Zack Devlin and the rest of the world melted away. He’d lost weight in the week he’d been hospitalized. His face was pale. But he was smiling, and at the moment it was exactly what she’d needed.

“I didn’t know you were being released,” she said.