Amy Rench - Fallen Rogue

She waited in silence, throwing an uneasy glance over her shoulder, chasing shadows. Ahead of her, Rome began moving forward again, rounding the corner as quiet as a summer breeze.

Following him closely, she once again marveled at how silently a tough guy like him could walk down a dim, sterile hallway. Every step she took sounded like a bass drum to her, but his strides were featherlight.

Rome slowed as they approached a closed unmarked doorway to their right. He flattened his hands against the surface and leaned in his head to listen. One of his hands brushed the door handle and tried it slowly. Locked.

He waved down the hall, signaling they’d try the next door, about twenty paces away. But that one was locked, too.

He gestured to a small panel on the wall with numbers and a tiny red light. Harper hadn’t even noticed it. Pointing to it, he wiggled his fingers like he was typing. What the heck? She wasn’t trained in special-agent signs. She was winging it here.

Holding her hands palms up and shrugging in the universal sign for huh? she waited for clarification. Rome rolled his eyes and moved close to her, brushing his mouth softly against her ear.

“Disable this,” he whispered; his warm breath against her skin caused her to shiver. He then pulled back slightly and gave her a questioning look, tilting his head toward the panel on the wall.

Oh. She nodded. She moved her fingers to the panel and pointed to the red light, giving him a cautious look. He nodded back, so she figured it was okay.

Removing the panel cover, she carefully fiddled with the wires, much like she had with Rome’s alarm at his warehouse. In less than a minute, the light flicked to green and she heard the lock snick.

Rome moved his hand to the doorknob and twisted it slowly, opening the door just a sliver. He peeked through, then opened it wider and quickly moved inside, yanking her along with him.

He shut the door but didn’t turn on the lights. The room was illuminated by two dim fluorescent bulbs, one hanging from each end of the ceiling.

Curiously, the room was very cold. It boasted several stainless steel tables and assorted laboratory equipment, not unlike the machines she’d been hooked up to while in captivity.

On the tables was a scattering of lab beakers, rubber tubes, and glass vials. Shuddering with unpleasant memories, she padded across the room to the laptop resting on the desk in the corner, careful not to touch anything along the way.

Rome was examining some of the equipment as he moved toward a bank of large metal cabinets that lined half of the wall in the back of the room. She continued to watch as he reached for a drawer handle and pulled on it, raising his eyebrows at her when it unlatched easily. He gave it a good tug.

A body slid out.

Harper choked and covered her mouth with her hand. Considering all the dead bodies she’d seen-well, caused-in the last week, the grisly sight shouldn’t have shocked her. But this one wasn’t a victim of self-defense like the others. Against her better judgment, she went to Rome’s side.

On a metal slab, the dead body was similar to the men who had attacked her-large and muscular, built for power. And almost familiar. But this corpse was withered and appeared annihilated, as though like it had been beaten thoroughly by some unbearable force of nature.

Then it hit her. This was the leader of the camouflaged group that chased her through the woods and cornered her at the Barracks.

And murdered her brother.

Her blood heated in rage, flushing her body. This corpse was a casualty of the psi-power war they started with her. This guy got what he deserved. And before this was all over, the rest of them would, too.

She blinked, then glanced at Rome and realized he was watching her, a probing look on his face she couldn’t discern. She shook the greedy avenging thoughts from her mind.

Rome pulled out a folder filed in the small partition at the front of the drawer. He swung his backpack around and tucked the folder in it as he closed the drawer with a heavy click. She watched him open the next one and take its file as well. He continued down the line until they heard an electronic beeping near the door. Yikes. Someone was coming.

Zipping the backpack, Rome quickly replaced it on his back and closed the drawer quietly. He put a finger to his lips and pulled her with him along the wall to crouch together behind one of the enormous machines in the corner.

Blindingly bright incandescent light showered the room, forcing her to squint. Peering through the thick levers and pipes of the creepy apparatus, she watched a tall man with a white lab coat walk in, his attention glued to the open files he had in his hands. He hadn’t noticed the two of them at all.

A shrill ringing pierced the silence. Harper nearly jumped out of her skin at the sound. In an instant she realized just how foreign all this was to her. Rome laid a calming hand on her thigh. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone.

“Yes?” he said, answering the phone, his voice a tad nervous. “No, the latest tests failed.” A pause as he listened to the caller. “You’re coming here? Now?” He sounded anxious, as though the person on the other end was supremely unhappy at his negative response. “Okay, I’ll meet you here. Yes, at the lab.”

Disconnecting the call, the man mumbled something harsh and slammed the folders on the desk next to the laptop. He swiped his brow with a clearly shaking hand, then stamped out the door.

Harper turned to face Rome. His blue gaze appeared troubled and excited at the same time as it met hers.

“Let’s get out of here and into the ducts.” He glanced upward. “I want to see who’s coming to the lab to meet with this guy.”

She nodded in response and followed as he crept soundlessly around the side of the ugly machinery and headed for the door. He held up his palm, mouthing to her to wait, while he checked to see whether there was anyone in the hall.

At his signal, she followed him out of the room. They turned back the way they had come and tread quietly down the sterile hallway.

Another few steps and Rome stopped abruptly, almost causing her to collide with him in the cloak of near darkness. The comforting warmth of his strong body seeped into her while she watched his hands sweep along the flat surface of the wall. Looking for something.

Her eyes adjusted to the dark, and she saw the outline of a door flush with the wall, but no handle.

He reached into his back pocket, his hand brushing against her stomach, inadvertently causing little flutters.

“Not sorry.” His low chuckle came from the darkness.

“Not a problem,” she answered with a soft laugh of her own.

Harper heard a muted snap, then some scraping, and figured out that Rome was attempting to pry open the buried lock with his secret-agent-spy gadget that looked like a simple pocketknife, but had many special little tools inside of it.

With a faint click he pulled the door backward. She backed off slightly to allow him to replace it in the back pocket of his jeans, though she was sorely tempted to lean in for another indulgent fondle.

She took another step backward as Rome tugged harder on the door and stepped inside after a quick peek. His nod was barely discernable in the dim entryway. She followed him across the threshold and pulled the door softly shut behind them, enveloping them in a closefitting and slightly muggy passage.

As they moved cautiously upward through the enclosed space, she could easily see why he’d favored the ceiling ducts. According to the plans, these particular channels ran above the working laboratories, where she and Rome figured they could gather the most information in the least invasive way.