Chapter Eleven
Aaron had barely said the words when the ceiling tile popped open. In that same instant he pulled his weapon. Risa didn’t have time to even breathe before a man dropped down in the middle of the elevator car. He never lost his balance as his feet hit the floor. His gun stayed steady, too.
Identification proved easy. He was dressed like his friends, head to toe in black, and wearing a grim face that promised pain. It was as if the bad guys had an endless supply of these thugs. Except for the kid upstairs, they all looked as if someone had bought them out of some sort of mercenary, gun-for-hire magazine.
Refusing to get caught off guard again or put Aaron in the position of having to fight for her life, she pressed her body back against the corner of the elevator. No one was going to grab her from behind and use her as a bargaining chip. Not this time.
She ran her fingers over the buttons and jabbed the Door Open one, then winced when she heard the click.
The attacker shook his head. “Don’t bother. I control the elevator.”
Of course he did, she thought. It was that kind of night.
With their guns aimed at each other, the two men faced off. As Risa watched, the attacker’s barrel slid until it drew a line straight to Aaron’s heart. Depending on how fast he shot, Aaron could hit the floor without ever firing.
The thought turned her blood ice cold.
Her fingers wrapped around the small weapon he’d given her. She’d shoot if she had to. Those were words she never thought she’d vow, but a woman could be driven to act. She’d reached that turning point.
“Let me guess.” Aaron almost sounded bored with the newest assault. “You came for the woman.”
“I came to stop you.”
“Sounds like the plan changed. I’ll consider that progress.”
Aaron’s jacket covered his back, but Risa knew he had a second weapon there. Between them, they were well armed and had to outgun this guy. Still, the attacker looked confident.
And that scared the crap out of Risa. Except for the kid who got separated upstairs, these guys came in pairs and attacked in waves. Seeing one of them in the middle of the room didn’t mean there wasn’t a second one roaming around. Where one existed, another hovered in the background, though she hoped this one was the second to the kid upstairs. Her only comfort was that if she’d figured it out, so had Aaron. He’d be looking, anticipating a potential secondary attacker.
But there was a limit to his line of attack. The space couldn’t be more than five by five.
She glanced up, calculating the chance someone could stay hidden on top of the car but still shoot through the ceiling. If that happened, Aaron would be the likely target. He was the dangerous one. Risa wondered if
she was now the add-on. That couldn’t be a safe position to be in.
“What’s the plan here? We shoot each other at close range and just hope the angle lets us crawl out of here before we bleed to death?”
She hated the sound of Aaron’s plan. “You could let us go,” she said.
The attacker made that annoying tsk-tsk sound. “That is no longer an option.”
“Because we messed up your plan A,” Aaron said.
“I don’t know what that means. I just know my pay went up when I agreed to take care of you.”
Sounded as if Aaron and Royal were right. This was an inside job and the person running it was here, watching and adjusting as things fell apart. Knowing they could see all the angles and didn’t think twice about adding her to the attack list made her shiver. Her, a complete innocent stuck in the wrong place at exactly the wrong time.
The cold raced up her spine and exploded at the base of her neck. She wondered if she’d ever feel warm again.
“Put the gun down or I shoot the girl.”
“No.” Aaron didn’t bother with negotiating or issuing a warning. He let that one word sit out there.
She almost wished he’d expanded a bit. To increase her odds, she pressed back harder into the elevator corner. Buttons bit into her back, and the raw skin of her wound burned, but she ignored it all to stare at the men in front of her.
“You’re saying you don’t care what happens to her.”
“I’m saying if one more person threatens her, or even looks at her funny, I’m taking him out. You might want to think about that before you pick your next move.”
The attacker shook his head. “I think you should—”
Aaron kicked out. His heel caught the guy’s chin and sent his head reeling back. Instead of falling, the guy bounced back. The gun didn’t so much as bobble.
Aaron pounced. With a roar he barreled into the other man’s midsection and knocked the guy back and into the wall. The hand with the gun whacked against the inside of the car. When the guy held on to his weapon, Aaron grabbed his wrist and crashed it against the wall repeatedly.
With his lower body pinning the guy to the wall, Aaron kept attacking. He kneed the man in the stomach and threw an elbow to his jaw.
Risa thought Aaron had the battle won without taking much of a beating on his end until the attacker shoved back. He groaned out a new threat as the punches flew. A fist connected with Aaron’s stomach, doubling him over.
Then they both went down. Arms and legs flew through the air as each struggled for the upper hand. Bones crunched and feet and hands pounded against the floor. A gun skidded out from the human pile.
She trapped the weapon under her foot and felt a surge of satisfaction. She tried to figure which man it belonged to, but she didn’t know guns. Add to that the multiple opportunities each had to hide a gun, and the chances for bloodshed tripled.
With a hard flip, Aaron landed on his back, pinned to the floor by the attacker. She looked around for anything to slam into his head and came up empty. She wanted to hit him with the gun, but he kept moving and she feared missing.
The hidden gun in her possession, thanks to the guy’s complete cluelessness in not checking her for weapons, gave her another chance at saving Aaron. So did the one crunching under her foot. She refused to play either card too early.
But she no longer had a choice. The attacker straddled Aaron’s thighs as he landed a punch on his cheek. She winced at the contact and the dull thud it produced.
The gun appeared out of nowhere. One second the attacker was using his fists and the next he had a weapon aimed at Aaron’s head. He bucked his hips and tried to shrug the guy off, but he didn’t budge. After expending so much energy, he fell lax and his shoulders eased.
Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth as his head lolled against the floor. He hadn’t passed out, but she feared that was the next terrible step in this battle.
If she didn’t act, she would watch Aaron die in front of her. The mental image almost folded her in half, made her drop to the ground like some broken spring toy. The thought, so horrible, refused to leave her head. Trembling with a mix of rage and terror, she drew her weapon and stepped closer to the men on the floor.
With her hand shaking and her heart thundering through every pore, she stepped up prepared to fire into the back of the head of a perfect stranger. All thoughts of the sanctity of life fled. This was a kill-or-be-killed situation. Worse, it was an unwinnable game where her choices consisted of watching someone she cared about lose everything or sacrificing a bit of her soul.
She needed her head to stop spinning and the bile to leave her throat. The gun was in position with her finger on the trigger when Aaron went from what looked like a near unconscious state to a blur. He whipped a second gun out of his pocket and pressed it into the other man’s chest. Without warning, he fired.
“Aaron!”
The shot vibrated through the small space as the large man dropped on top of Aaron. He exhaled on a whoosh of unspent breath as the man sprawled over him. Aaron lay there for a second before shoving the guy to the side.
She was on her knees beside him a second later. “Are you okay?”
He struggled to sit up. His hand went to his side as the color left his face. “That’s going to hurt in the morning.”
Blood stained the floor and the crisp white of his shirt. Following his earlier example, she padded her hands over him. As far as she could tell, none of the blood came from him.
With a hand under his arm, she helped Aaron to his feet. They both groaned and more than one bone creaked. She wondered if the bruises would ever heal and how many showers she’d need to feel clean again.
He leaned down, swearing as he went, and grabbed two guns. With his foot, he rolled the attacker over. Blood flowed from his chest as his dead eyes stared up at them.
Feeling leeched from her body. Once minute she stood there aching and hoping for an end. The next, numbness raced through her. It was as if her body stopped functioning. But her mind wouldn’t shut off.
Death hung all around them. She closed her eyes and saw the bodies pile up. When she opened them again, her mind played tricks on her, adding Aaron’s broken and bloody body to the stack.
She swallowed back a scream. No sound came out, but Aaron appeared at her side. “What is it?”
“How do you live like this?”
His spine stiffened, making him grow a good two inches. “This isn’t a normal day.”
“I hope not.”
But something set him off. Amazing a phrase made him tense like that but a fight to the almost death barely phased him. There was so much about him and his life she didn’t understand.
His gaze traveled over her face, but he stayed quiet for a second. Just when the silence threatened to strangle her, he moved. He didn’t bother pushing the call button on the elevator panel; he went right for the phone.
When he didn’t answer any questions or say anything other than hello, she assumed the emergency system wasn’t working. Not a surprise. Nothing functioned the way she expected it to.
Trapped again.
“Step back.”
Before she could ask why, he slammed his elbow into the small panel above the phone. The first shot produced a crack, but everything stayed in place. The second hit knocked a chunk out of the wall.
Ripping off the cracked piece of metal exposed a mass of wires. “Know anything about electricity?”
“I was hoping you did.”
“Let’s try this.” He yanked two wires. Bending the protective coating, he exposed the ends. “Ready?”
“No.”
“Me, neither.” He started to touch the ends together.
The casual playing-with-potential-fire thing had her eyes popping. She knew without looking in a mirror,
her face registered shock. “Wait, are you sure?”
He touched the wires together and a crackle broke through the room. A second later the electricity whirred to life around them. Blue emergency lights popped on and a steady hum vibrated from above them.
She half waited for another man to drop on top of them. Aaron must have been wary, too, because he stayed away from the middle of the car and had her hug the door.
For the second time he punched the button for the lobby floor, and the car began to descend. “Let’s see if we can get there this time.”
“Royal must be going nuts.”
“Unless he ran into trouble, I’m guessing he’s jogging up and down the steps, trying to figure out how to get the car to move.”
She could imagine him doing that. Aaron might be joking, but she could see either of them flying into a rage at the idea of the other being in danger. They were
those
guys. They rushed in when others dove under a table. Rescuers by nature and by heart.
“Very dependable of him.”
Aaron double-checked his gun. “I know how to hire an assistant.”
“After this assignment you should make him a partner.”
“I like to be in charge.” The car stopped as he finished the sentence. He shifted their bodies so his blocked hers.
She didn’t bother to nudge him to the side or point out that she didn’t want him to die for her. He acted on instinct and nothing she said would ever change that.
When the door opened, Royal stood there with his gun up and aimed. He didn’t shoot, but she guessed another man would have. Something in his training had taught him to make that split-second decision, and she wondered how often he got it wrong, if at all.
“Whoa. It’s us.” Aaron issued the warning, but Royal’s
gun was already down.
“Glad you finally got here.” Royal leaned over and looked at the body behind them. His expression barely changed. “Rough ride?”
Aaron shrugged. “I’ve had worse.”
She’d bet that was the truth. Bloodshed and a barroom brawl in a malfunctioning elevator seemed like a regular Thursday for Aaron.
Royal continued to look into the car. “Who’s that?”
Aaron glanced down at the newest victim of today’s strange activities. “I didn’t ask, but I’m betting he has a friend around here somewhere. You see anyone?”
“Our guys are outside. Looks like they loaded everyone into an outbuilding. In bigger news, when the emergency system clicked on, the external doors locked. Probably some sort of end-of-world protection, but it means we’re locked in this stupid resort and they’re locked out.”
“This conference center has everything.” Risa let the sarcasm fly because she didn’t have much else left in the way of conversation. The snotty comment matched her prickly mood.
“Except a viable way to get out.” Aaron stared out the huge windows to the darkened shadows outside. “These are tinted, right?”
“We’ll figure out a way to get their attention. Someone can go to get help, if they haven’t already.”
As far as she was concerned, her partners in crime-fighting were missing the bigger point. While she cared about the people outside and was sure they were pretty grumpy about being out in the cold, she was more concerned with the warm bodies inside.
Especially the ones with guns and a grudge. Now that they’d moved from what the kid had described as some sort of harmless kidnapping to hunt-them-down actual murder, her priorities had changed. “Any chance we’re running out of bad guys here?”
Aaron blew out a long, hard breath. “I’ve found that rarely happens. The world seems to be filled with bad guys.”