WAR: Intrusion (46 page)

“Okay. Now I’m really ready.”

“You are a very strong woman, Dr. Kirk.” With a nod of approval, Mrs. N’Dorah led Helen back down the corridor to the place the rebel had left the lantern. Helen followed meekly. She didn’t feel strong. She felt shaky with fear and shock.

At the end of the hallway, Mrs. N’Dorah extinguished the lantern flame, then peered out into the corridor. “All clear.”

The sounds of gunfire in the main cavern had stopped. Did that mean that the sniper was gone?

Were they alone now?

Helen took a deep breath. Mrs. N’Dorah was right. She’d had no choice. That didn’t make it any easier to deal with, but she had to focus on the immediate danger. Right now she couldn’t afford to be a compassionate doctor. She had to be a survivor.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

BENDING
LOW TO the ground, Natchaba skirted the body of his bodyguard and dashed into the main tunnel, his remaining bodyguard by his side. He slapped his hand over the button set into the wall and a metal door slid down, protecting them from the sniper’s bullets. Then he dusted himself off and straightened his sleeves. He had no doubt that Lachlan MacKay was the shooter. Since he’d been told earlier that MacKay was a prisoner, he’d have to kill the man who’d let MacKay escape.

“Tell the men to capture MacKay. Wound him, if necessary, but I want him alive.” MacKay would be the perfect bait to bring Dr. Kirk and Mrs. N’Dorah back under his control. Not only that, but he would be a perfect actor in the next attack.

He had no idea how MacKay had found this base, but the rest of his WAR team would be close behind. He had to stop them from entering. They could not be allowed to destroy what had taken him months to assemble.

“Order the men to begin removing the weapons to evacuation point one,” he told his bodyguard. He turned and hurried down the corridor. He would have to remove the few sensitive papers he kept here, although he kept most of the critical documents at his main office. Plus, there were the latest boxes of miniature explosives packaged as mobile phones that he must see properly relocated. Natchaba fingered one of two such devices that he’d slipped into his suit jacket pocket earlier, in case a need arose for them.

His bodyguard finished relaying the evacuation order over the walkie-talkie and looked to him for more instructions. Good man.

“Tell the command center to detonate the explosives under the bridge and lock down the front door.” If WAR’s forces had found the back door, he would activate the booby-traps back there as well. However, since that was also the route his lorries needed to take, blowing up that area was a last resort.

“Sir, there’s no answer at command.”

“Ah.” He’d have to assume that somehow MacKay had eliminated his man. Holding his silence, he waited for the communications center to come into view at the end of the corridor. The window was dark. A sure sign that the center had fallen under attack. He motioned for his bodyguard to go first.

When the man gave the all-clear, Natchaba stepped inside. All the monitors had been shot to worthlessness, along with the expensive console. His man lay on the floor, dead. Natchaba straddled the body so he could lean forward and examine one section of the console. Had the detonation button for the bridge been pushed before being destroyed? He thought so, but could not be certain. Just as he could not tell if the front or back doors had been opened.

He straightened up and moved to the center of the room. “Send teams to check both entrances and report back as quickly as possible.” A quick survey of the room showed there was nothing worth saving here. “We should hurry. There may not be much time left.” For now, he would act as if WAR would arrive any moment. Mindful of the slick leather soles of his loafers, he broke into a careful jog. It was for possibilities like today that he had been working out regularly. He would not allow himself to grow soft in the middle like his father had. The image of his portly father gasping and panting as he attempted to run along this corridor was so ridiculous that he smiled.

As he jogged toward his office, Natchaba mapped out his strategy. First he would see to the proper packing and removal of the necessary items. Then he would go after MacKay, Dr. Kirk, and Mrs. N’Dorah. But MacKay would be first, as it was likely his men had already recaptured the women. After their ordeal, they would not be thinking clearly and would be easy prey. He would allow any rebels who caught them to dispose of them as they pleased. They no longer interested him. As long as they died by the end of the day, he didn’t care what else was done to them.

MacKay, however, presented an interesting challenge.

So. Should he lead MacKay to the back door, knock him out, then throw him onto a truck and hold him prisoner until it was time for his next attack?

No. Perhaps he should assemble a small team, head back to the main cavern, and capture MacKay. Then he would tie the man to the scorched surgical table, and leave him as an explosive present for WAR.

Yes, he much preferred that option.

LACHLAN
EYED THE metal door over the entrance to the main corridor and cursed. While he’d been shooting into the crowd to give Helen and Mrs. N’Dorah a chance to escape, Natchaba and his surviving bodyguard had disappeared into the corridor. With the door blocking Lachlan from entering, the only way he could follow Natchaba was to take the side tunnel he’d explored earlier.

But…

No. First, he had to find Helen and Mrs. N’Dorah and make certain they made it safely outside. Then he could come back and hunt Natchaba.

Lachlan fired one last burst into the nearly deserted main cavern. The few remaining rebels fired back at him from behind the stage, but without much enthusiasm. Good. They were tired of this already.

A sound caught Lachlan’s attention. He paused to listen. From somewhere behind the row of stalagmites across the cavern came the distinctive whine of a forklift’s engine. So, Natchaba was attempting to move the weapons out, was he?

With any luck, shooting up the console would have destroyed the controls for the back door. The rebels likely had an override lever, but the more time he bought, the more likely his team would arrive in time to capture the rebels.

He attempted to fire one last burst, but discovered that he’d used the last of his ammo. Right, then. He slid quietly from his current perch, slung the rifle over his shoulder, and pulled out the pistol. Deciding that it would be faster to cut across the poorly-lit cavern to get to where he’d seen Helen and Mrs. N’Dorah disappear, Lachlan blended into the shadows between the stalagmites. He’d gone about a quarter of the way, treading carefully across the uneven cavern floor, when he heard a muffled “Ouch!” back in the direction of his abandoned perch.

He froze. He’d recognize Helen’s voice anywhere. Cursing silently, he picked his way back to where he estimated the sound had come from. But two darker shadows carrying the unmistakeable outline of AK-47s reached the spot first. One of the men motioned to his right. Lachlan bladed his body along a stalagmite. When the rebel was within reach, Lachlan grabbed him and killed him with his knife.

Lachlan lowered the dead man to the ground, then repeated the process with the second rebel.

Lachlan heard a soft gasp to his right. He grimaced. Brilliant. Of course Helen would have to witness him killing two men.

The scuff of a shoe against the rock to his left warned him just as a third rebel rushed him. A fourth shone his torch in their direction, probably thinking to help his mate. But it only destroyed everyone’s night vision. Trained to fight blind, Lachlan didn’t hesitate. The third rebel gave a cry of dismay when he realized that his headlong charge had ended up impaling his chest on Lachlan’s knife.

A shot fired and the fourth rebel fell, his torch clattering to the ground and rolling. As the light arced across the darkness, it illuminated Helen holding a pistol in firing position. Their eyes met. Her face revealed a determined resolve Lachlan had never expected to see.

His doctor had taken a life.

Lachlan gave her a nod of respect, and of thanks. Then the torch rolled away, throwing Helen into darkness.

The changing arc of the light thankfully revealed no approaching rebels.

Lachlan yanked his knife out of the dead man’s chest and quickly cleaned it on the back of the man’s shirt. A search of the three bodies failed to uncover any extra AK-47 magazines. Just his luck. Snatching up the fallen torch, he shut it off and stepped toward the women.

The sound of several booted feet announced the arrival of a small group of rebels. They burst into the cavern and immediately began firing in Lachlan’s direction.

He lunged into the protection of the stalagmites.

The women were behind the large rock formation he’d used as one of his sniper platforms. As bullets shattered the stalagmites behind them, he grabbed Helen’s hand.

“Run!” he ordered, pulling her forward. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her take hold of Mrs. N’Dorah. With the women stumbling along beside him, Lachlan ran toward the perimeter corridor.

The rebels in the cavern blocked the exit to the main entrance. In a break between bursts of gunfire, he heard more soldiers running toward them along the perimeter corridor. Damn it, that left only the ancillary passage as a place to escape. If there wasn’t a door that he could close, the rebels would end up herding Lachlan and the woman right into Natchaba’s arms.

He raced with Helen and Mrs. N’Dorah into the unlit ancillary corridor. Lachlan stopped just inside, but shoved Helen forward. “Keep going,” he said quietly. “I’m going to look for a door mechanism. I’ll catch you up.” He desperately wanted to pull Helen into his arms and make certain she was okay, but reckoned they had at most a minute before the rebels reached this tunnel.

Mrs. N’Dorah leaned against the wall, trying to catch her breath. “Here, take this rifle. It’s too heavy for me.” She passed Lachlan an AK-47 and two magazines.

He raised his brows in surprise. “Thank you.”

Mrs. N’Dorah gave him a smile, then grimaced, wriggled her shoulders and reached behind her back. “The door mechanism is here,” she murmured. A second later there was an electronic whir and a metal door slid down from the ceiling.

“Brilliant. Let’s go.” Lachlan turned on the torch. He set his empty AK-47 on the ground, reloaded the rifle Mrs. N’Dorah had handed him, then led the way down the corridor. They’d just rounded the first bend when bullets slammed into the metal door. Knowing the door wouldn’t hold for long, Lachlan broke into a slow run.

Behind them, the metal of the door groaned under a heavy impact. It wouldn’t be long now before the rebels were on their heels. He urged the women to move quicker, but they struggled to keep up.

“I’m sorry,” Helen gasped. “We’re moving…as fast as we can.”

Hearing pain in her voice, Lachlan stopped and spun around. “What’s wrong?” The light from his torch picked up the smears of blood from the cuts on Helen’s arms, but what really caught his attention was a dark, wet spot on her shoulder. “Bloody hell, woman. No wonder you’re barely able to keep up. You’ve been shot.”

His heart kicked. “How serious is it? How much blood have you lost?” He reached for her, but Helen shook her head.

“Leave it. It’s just a flesh wound.” Her eyes gleamed as she said it, and some of the tightness in his chest eased. She couldn’t be too badly hurt if she was joking about it.

Trusting her judgment, he nodded, barely refraining from kissing her. “All right, let’s move.”

“Can’t we hide in one of these places?” Mrs. N’Dorah asked as they jogged past the doors to the household storage rooms. “Or down one of the side tunnels?”

“No. The rebels will conduct a thorough search for us. If we tried to hide in one of these rooms, we’d be found out. And since I don’t know where the few side tunnels lead, we can’t risk that they’re dead-ends. Just keep going. It’s not far now.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

“
NO
. ABSOLUTELY NOT,” Helen protested fifteen minutes later. They’d taken refuge inside a storage room next to the ruined communications center. “You can’t leave us here.” Her stomach sank. If Lachlan left without her, she feared she’d never see him again.

“There’s no choice, lass. You and Mrs. N’Dorah are flagging.” Lachlan’s gaze fell on the blood staining her shirt. His lips pressed into a thin line and his eyes narrowed.

Unfortunately, she knew he had a point. Her mind was fuzzy. She hadn’t lost a critical amount of blood, but enough that it contributed to her overall exhaustion. She didn’t trust herself to make the right decisions. And Mrs. N’Dorah looked about ready to collapse.

“Please, Lachlan. Don’t leave us.”

“You’ll be fine, Helen. My men will be here shortly,” Lachlan reassured her. “Lock the door after I leave and I’ll lead the rebels away.”

“No.” The edges of her nerves had frayed too much already. She couldn’t stand the anxiety of hiding here in the dark, waiting either to be killed or rescued. “There has to be another option.”

Lachlan shook his head. “You and Mrs. N’Dorah escaped the cavern. You’re tougher than you think.” He nodded at the butt of the pistol sticking out from her cargo pocket. “Just sit tight and all will be well.”

He strapped his watch to her wrist. “Take this. It emits a special locator signal that will allow my teammates to find you.”

“But—”

“We’re out of time. I hear the rebels coming.” He searched her face for a moment, then placed a fast, hard kiss on her mouth. “This is what I do, love.” He backed out of the room and shut the door.

Helen’s breath backed up in her throat as the room was plunged into darkness except for a thin band of light around the edges of the door. She quickly locked the door.

A moment later, she heard booted feet pounding along the corridor and men shouting in excitement. Helen pressed her fist to her mouth to keep from crying out and held tight to Mrs. N’Dorah with her other hand.

Tears slid down her cheeks and pooled on her knuckles.
Please let Lachlan survive. Please let Lachlan survive.