Cindy Gerard - Killing Time

“How long have you been out? Hours. Many, many fucking hours. It must be close to noon.”

Okay. Pissed off had officially muscled out worried and scared.

“So what was the plan, Brown? Was there a reason you invited Simmons to beat the snot out of you?”

How one small woman could pack so much venom into a whisper was beyond him.

“Yeah… sure.” He struggled to sit up, sucked in a breath when fire shot through his ribs. “Damned if I can remember why, but I must have thought it was a good idea at the time.”

Actually, he’d wanted Simmons’s focus on him. The big man had been working his way into a mean, dark snit, and rather than take a chance of him going off on Eva, he made sure Simmons unleashed on him.

“He could have killed you.”

Because he heard more regret in her voice than anger now, he figured she’d forgiven him. “But he didn’t. At least not yet.”

“Because Lawson wants you alive.”

He grunted, then regretted it. “For the time being. No doubt he’s got big plans for us. We’ve got to get out of here before that happens. More to the point… we need to head off Gabe and Green.”

The two men would be arriving anytime, unaware that they’d been found out. He couldn’t let them walk into an ambush.

With Eva’s help, he staggered to his feet. Through swollen eyes and a blinding headache, he checked out their prison. Slivers of daylight filtered in through windows that were boarded shut. July heat seeped through the walls, searing and suffocating in the stagnant air. The main light source was from a triangular ventilation grate like the one in the armory, where the back wall met the peaked ceiling. The room was approximately twelve by twelve. Bare-bones construction. Plywood floor, open rafters, and wall studs.

“Do you know where we are?” he asked.

She wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her bound hands. “It’s the overflow food storage shed—empty now, but I’m guessing it’s where they keep their winter supplies. Why wouldn’t they have a jail or a brig like any other military operation, since Lawson fancies himself a general?”

He hadn’t wanted to tell her this before, but there didn’t seem to be much point withholding it now. He shuffled over to a wall, leaned against it to keep from keeling over. “Remember my buddy, Bucky? He made it pretty clear one day that I needed to keep my nose clean. You break a rule around here? You cross the boss? One shot. Back of the head. The coyotes eat well that night. There is no discipline. Just death.”

“Well. It’s efficient, I’ll give him that.”

No whimpering. No hand wringing. Way to take it on the chin, Eva . God, he loved this woman.

“How many guards?” he asked.

“I counted six—three at the door and three more stationed around the perimeter of the building. Inside? It’s just you and me and the mice.”

“So… thoughts?” God, his head hurt.

“None that I see working. Even if I could climb up to that ventilation grate and get outside without making enough noise to raise the dead, I’ll never get past the guards. And you? Right now, you’re pretty much worthless thanks to your smart mouth.”

Okay. So she wasn’t totally over being pissed at him.

“But you’ve got a plan, right?” He knew she had one. Eva wasn’t a reactor. She made things happen.

“Yeah. I’ve got a plan. But you’re not going to like it.”

“Try me.”

“We wait for Gabe and Green.”

He carefully let his head fall back against the wall. Closed his eyes on a fractured breath as sweat trickled down his spine. “You’re right. I don’t like it.”

“You don’t have to like it. We just have to do it.”

Now she was throwing his own words back at him. Guess he had that coming.

“At least with them inside, we’ve got enough numbers to make something work. And unless you sprout wings and a machine gun, we aren’t going anywhere anyway.”

Very slowly he sank back down to the floor. Breathed through the pain. “Fine. We wait.”

He closed his eyes and dozed on and off, so he wasn’t sure how much time passed when a key rattled in the lock and the door swung open. He squinted up to see Simmons standing in the threshold, carrying his shotgun. Then he flipped on the light switch and an overhead bulb blinked on. “Special delivery, asshole.”

Simmons stepped aside and Wagoner and Bryant shoved two men into the room, their wrists bound with flex cuffs, their heads covered with hoods.

Even though he’d been expecting it, it ripped a hole in Mike’s chest to know that he was responsible for putting Gabe and Joe in this position.

He propped himself up on an elbow. “Four people? This small room? Gotta be breaking some fire code for maximum capacity. Who do I see about lodging a complaint?”

Simmons backed toward the door. “You’re a real funny guy. What do you wanna bet you aren’t laughing tomorrow at this time? Oh, wait. Tomorrow at this time you’re gonna be dead. You and your bitch and your buddies. If it was up to me, the deed would already be done. Make a joke about that.”

He stomped across the room, flipped off the light, slammed the door, and locked it behind him.

Mike swallowed back the lump in his throat, feeling a despair unlike anything he’d felt since Afghanistan. He thought of Gabe’s little girl. Of the baby on the way. Of Jenna and Stephanie—the wives and lovers these men might never see again.

“Sorry, guys.” His voice broke. “Didn’t exactly see it going down like this.”

Both men reached up and wrestled off their hoods.

And for the first time that he could remember, Mike couldn’t have uttered a sound if his bare feet had been held to a fire.

He squinted his eyes into focus, certain he was hallucinating, but there was no getting around it. It wasn’t Gabe Jones staring back at him. It wasn’t Joe Green.

“Long time no see, Primetime.” Bobby Taggart stood there grinning at him as if he’d just checked into a resort and eight years of hating Mike’s guts had never happened.

What the hell?

“You just can’t help yourself, can you?” Jamie Cooper’s Hollywood smile was as blinding as it had ever been. “Always landing your sorry ass in a sling.”

What the holy hell?

“And dragging us along for the ride,” Taggart added, then directed his attention to Eva. “Ma’am. It’s a pleasure to meet you—present circumstances notwithstanding.”

All Mike could do was stare. At those far-too-familiar faces that looked so much like he remembered, yet had changed in ways he understood too well. He still couldn’t believe what he was seeing. After he’d left a message on Jamie’s machine and never heard back, he’d figured that the bridge was well and truly burned.

“Wh…” He stopped, shook his head, unable to form the words. What are you doing here? Why did you come? “What happened to Gabe and Joe?” Even before Cooper spoke, he knew. Cooper hadn’t just gotten his message—he’d believed him. Then he’d convinced Taggart and, knowing Taggart, he’d needed a helluva lot of convincing.

“Your buddy Jones says ‘hey,’ ” Cooper said.

“And to not fuck this up,” Taggart added.

Since they both had candy-eating grins on their faces, Mike knew Gabe had probably had a lot more to say.

The fact that the two of them were here, though, said everything he needed to know. When they couldn’t reach him, they’d called the number he’d given Cooper to reach Gabe, who had read them in on the mission, and they’d asked to take his and Joe’s place.

Pig simple. And not simple at all. They were here because they needed to be. They were here because they had to be.