David Morrell - The Protector

Sunlight revealed the silhouettes of Grace, Edgar, and half a dozen armed men.

Cavanaugh stepped on the burning sleeve to extinguish it, then grabbed his belt and pulled Jamie into the shadows of a room. He didn't know what he hoped to accomplish, but anything was better than standing in the open. He removed the matchbook from his pocket and tore off several of the matches, along with a quarter inch of the abrasive paper, putting them in a different pocket. Then he crushed the matchbook inside his fist.

Heavy footsteps indicated that the armed men came down the steps first.

Grace and Edgar followed. "Show yourselves," Grace said. "If you make us search for you, we'll throw flash-bangs into each room."

The threat of ruptured eardrums was enough to persuade Cavanaugh to emerge into the corridor, Jamie coming with him.

"I smell smoke." Grace glanced toward the ashy remnants of the burned sleeve on the floor.

"For light," Cavanaugh said.

"How'd you set fire to the clothing?"

"Matches."

Grace gave Edgar a look of disgust.

There was enough light spilling through the entrance for Cavanaugh to see that the gunmen didn't have the distinctive bulky look that came from wearing Kevlar vests under their shirts. They wore utility belts with two-way radios, Beretta pistols, extra ammunition, and flash-bang canisters.

Cavanaugh shifted his gaze toward Edgar's baggy pants pockets. Something heavy weighed down the right side, presumably one of the pistols that Edgar had taken. The clip on the Emerson knife was secured to the outside of Edgar's other pocket.

"Toss the matches over," Grace said.

Cavanaugh obeyed.

"What did you do, run over them with a car?" Looking disgusted, Grace picked them up, their mutilated appearance making the missing quarter inch of abrasive paper seem normal. "I've got a computer in the car and access to the Internet." Grace gestured with several computer printouts. "Before the good doctor gets here, maybe you'd like to refresh your memory the easy way. Troy Donahue." The sunlight behind Grace allowed her to read from one of the pages. "Tall, blond, blue-eyed teenage heartthrob known for his wooden acting. Peak of popularity-late fifties, early sixties. Major hits: A Summer Place. Susan Slade. Par-rish. Rome Adventure. Palm Springs Weekend.' Do any of those sound familiar?"

"All I saw was the box for the video," Cavanaugh said. "I have no idea what the movie was about. The female costar's name was on the box. Mention some actresses."

Grace frowned at the page. "Connie Stevens. Sandra Dee. Suzanne Pleshette. Stefanie Powers."

"Sandra Dee," Cavanaugh said, knowing he had to keep Grace patient by giving her something. "The one with Sandra Dee."

"A Summer Place." Grace read the plot summary. " 'Love at a resort town in Maine.' Maybe Prescott was planning to go to Maine." She looked at another printout. "Clint Eastwood movies. You said 'thriller'?"

"It definitely wasn't a war movie or a Western."

"Dirty Harry."

"No."

"Magnum Force. The Enforcer. The Dead Pool."

"No."

"The Eiger Sanction. Play Misty for Me. Thunderbolt and Light-foot. Tightrope."

"No." With a rush of emotion, Cavanaugh suddenly remembered the title of the movie. He managed to keep his face blank, concealing his reaction.

"You're starting to annoy me. The Gauntlet. The Rookie. In the Line of Fire."

"No."

"A Perfect World. Absolute Power. True Crime. Blood Work."

"No."

"Definitely annoying me. End of list. End of discussion. The doctor'll be here in thirty minutes. It'll be a pleasure watching him do his magic on you."

Grace turned angrily and left. Edgar and the armed men followed. The concrete door again descended. Again, Cavanaugh savored the last moments of light. Again, total darkness surrounded them.

This time, the blackness was so palpable that it seemed to squeeze them.

Jamie sounded as if she was having trouble getting enough air. Cavanaugh's legs were so unsteady, he wanted to lean against a wall and sink to the floor. He struggled to resist. "One thing's in our favor."

"I can't imagine what," Jamie said.

"They still didn't take our belts." His attempt at bravado failed as he felt his way into the room where they'd tried to hide. He brushed his shoes along the floor and found where he'd dropped his belt. "Give me the sleeves we tore from your blouse."

"What good will that do? Grace took your matches. We've got no way to set fire to the sleeves."

"Actually, there's another thing in our favor." Cavanaugh hoped he sounded confident. "I didn't give Grace all the matches." He removed one from his jacket and scraped it against the quarter-inch of abrasive paper.

Nothing happened.

Jesus, maybe I didn't tear off enough of the paper, he thought. Heart pounding, he tried it again, and this time the match flared, providing enough illumination for him to see the near panic on Jamie's face, which the faint light only partially alleviated.

She pulled the sleeves from her blazer pocket. He attached one to his belt buckle and put the match to it. As if it were the flickering of their lives, they watched the fabric start to burn.

"Thirsty," she said.

"Me, too. Something else to blame adrenaline for."

"My mouth's so dry… If only I could get a drink of water. If only they hadn't removed the plumbing fixtures."

Suddenly, even in the dim light, Cavanaugh saw Jamie's eyes flash as if she realized something.

"What?" he asked.

"Where would the bathroom have been?" She moved haltingly along the corridor.

Cavanaugh's buckle scraped, its echo emphasizing the dark closeness of their confinement as he pulled his belt and the burning cloth. "What are you thinking?" She told him.

"Maybe," he said. "We might be able to do it." "But it all depends on water," Jamie said. Desperate, they checked the rooms along the right side of the corridor, finally coming to the next-to-last room, where pipes projected from the walls, the vestiges of sinks and urinals that had been removed.

"Damn it, they're capped," Jamie said. "I hoped for valves that could be opened. This could've worked."

"It still can work." In the dwindling light from the burning sleeve, Cavanaugh studied a pipe that was bigger than the others. Its screw-on cap was square-shaped.

"But we don't have a wrench to loosen it!" "Take off your belt."

"What good will…" Even as Jamie questioned him, she took off her belt and gave it to him.

Thankful to have the distraction of doing something, Cavanaugh lit the end of Jamie's other sleeve, then used its light to examine her belt's double layers of leather, the grain on one strip going in the opposite direction from the other. "Let's see how strong this really is."

He put the tip of the belt through the buckle and made a noose. Then he slipped the noose over the square cap on the pipe and tightened the belt. When the leather firmly gripped it, he pulled on the belt, putting torque on the cap. The leather dug into his hands. His arms strained. His feet had trouble keeping a purchase on the floor.

The cap wouldn't budge.

Jamie grabbed the belt with him.

They pulled. The cap made a high-pitched sound, budging a little. They braced their feet, tugging, and suddenly leaned back as the cap twisted freely.

In a rush, Cavanaugh released the belt and used his hands to untwist the cap. He hoped water would start dripping, but even when the cap came fully away, the mouth of the pipe was dry.

"There's got to be a main water valve," Jamie said. "It's turned off where the water comes into the building."

Dragging the burning sleeve, Cavanaugh followed her to the shadows of the final room on the right.