The bodyguard pressed his lips together and leaned back in his chair, exchanging a look with the governor. Lara prayed that they wouldn’t underestimate the attackers and try something stupid.
Among the hostages, she was the only one who knew about Jimmy’s and his cousin Joey’s background. And she was willing to bet a year’s supply of filet mignon that they were exactly right about the amount of explosives.
Reid came in through the roof, straight into the ventilation system, and was met with a helluva surprise. Enough C4 was rigged all over the place to take down the building and then some, almost certainly setting off the explosion of the propane main line. The charges were distributed evenly throughout the vast ventilation ducts, from what he could see so far.
The good news was, he was in the building and had the location of the bombs. The bad news was, although he wasn’t a complete novice, he wasn’t a bomb specialist. It would have taken him a day to disarm them all, if he was very, very lucky.
And they definitely didn’t have a day, or even half of one. Only one hour was allowed by Jimmy Briggs. Out of that hour, Reid had already used fifteen minutes getting into the place unseen.
Didn’t look good so far. But he was ready to do anything to get the hostages out, save them or die trying. The odds were pretty long on the
die
part. And there was a chance that Lara and the twins were trapped somewhere below him.
He couldn’t stand not knowing how they fared, what they were doing. Walking away from them had sounded great in theory. He hadn’t realized until now that it was mission impossible.
He got his cell out and texted, Bombs confirmed, vents, to the team leader waiting outside. He didn’t want to risk talking; the vent system would have carried his voice. They had a team of explosives experts as well as a robot, but they couldn’t get them onto the roof. It was one thing for a commando secret soldier who was trained in escape and evasion to get in. A whole team with their clumsy protective suits would never make it.
He was alone in this.
For the first time ever, the thought of that didn’t make him happy.
Lara and Zak and Nate, not to mention the rest of the hostages, depended on him. The best he could do was start disarming the bombs where he was and keep going, get as much done as possible before time was up. He wouldn’t be able to get to them all. He would go down with whatever was left over. But there was a small chance that the hostages were in the part of the building that he would make safe.
He began with grim determination, pulling his tools from a small pocket in his boots. Blue wire or red wire? He followed each from start to destination. The blue, he thought, then clipped, holding his breath, sweat beading on his forehead.
The unit didn’t blow.
His shoulders slumped with relief.
He moved on to the next device. On this, the wires were green and yellow, so his experience with the first one didn’t mean anything. Once again, he sweated it out, held his breath and succeeded.
Five minutes had passed. He’d disarmed two bombs. There had to be at least a hundred throughout the building. And, at any time, his luck could run out. That he wouldn’t set off a single bomb, would get the wires right every single time, was statistically impossible.
The perfect time for swearing his heart out, but he was a father now and just yesterday he had promised himself to let go of that habit. “Fudge cookies,” he said instead, with feeling. Then cringed. If his SDDU buddies could hear him now…
His cell phone vibrated in his pocket.
Speaking of the devil.
We’re here, the text message from Cade said.
Reid’s mouth tightened. Cade was about to be a father himself any day now. He had no business being here. Nobody expected it of him. It wasn’t his mission. He didn’t have to get hurt. They weren’t a team.
Here where? He texted back while moving on to the next bomb.
On the roof.
He looked at the wires, sweat rolling down his forehead. How many?
Me. Carly. Nick. Spike.
At each name, Reid blinked. How on earth had Cade brought a dream team like that together? And why on earth had they come? Each was or had been with the SDDU. Each was legendary. He knew them, sure, but they weren’t best friends. Each had kids. Why would they risk everything for him?
I work alone, he texted back, then put the phone down to cut the red wire. Held his breath. Nothing blew.
He picked up the phone. He had a message waiting. Not anymore.
A strange feeling filled him. All these people showing up. For him. He felt a little choked up, to be truthful. But he didn’t have the time to analyze what it meant, how it fit into his lone-wolf rules. He wrote, Vents are filled with C4.
We’ll handle that, Cade wrote, go get to hostages.
Reid moved forward, abandoning the guesswork with the wires, looking down every time he came to a grate. Every store he could see was empty. He headed to the north wing where the security offices were. Even if Jimmy Briggs and his men weren’t there, a guy must be keeping an eye on the monitors. And that guy could tell him where the rest of them were and what they had in the way of weapons.
He’d gotten a glimpse at the mall’s blueprint before he’d sneaked into the building and was navigating now by memory. Ten endless minutes passed before he came to a point where the ducts were so corroded he knew without a doubt that if he put his weight on that section, he would fall right through the ceiling.
Half an hour of Jimmy’s ultimatum was gone.
Reid backed up until he hit the nearest restroom. He came out of the vents there, opened the door a fraction of an inch. Pulled the silencer from his pocket and twisted it on. Aimed for the security camera in the ceiling.
All of that took no more than three seconds. There were hundreds of security cameras in the mall. The images they transmitted most likely rotated through the screens at the security office. And whoever was surveilling the monitors couldn’t watch them all at the same time. Chances were, they would just notice that one camera was no longer functioning. They wouldn’t know what had happened.
“W
E GOT A VISITOR,”
Joey was saying. He froze the image on one of the monitors, a bathroom door opening an inch or two, the barrel of a gun coming out, the image going grainy.
The whole thing lasted seconds, and the gap in the door showed only a sliver of the man’s face, a long straight nose, part of his lips. It meant nothing to Joey.
But Lara knew those lips. Her heart slammed against her rib cage.
“Daddy’s here,” she whispered to her babies.
Jimmy was swearing loudly, sending two of his goons off to find the intruder. Four of them remained. But she and her kids were the only ones untied among the hostages, so overpowering those four men was out of the question. Although…she’d seen the governor’s bodyguard straining against his nylon cuffs whenever their captors weren’t watching. Maybe if he got free…
For now, she did the best that she could, which was to slowly draw closer to the metal filing cabinet in the corner. It looked heavy enough to take cover behind when all hell broke loose eventually. If Reid was here, he was coming for her and the twins; she had no doubt about that.
He came for us.
That had to mean something.
She could almost see him, rushing forward in that half-crouch commando move of his, running into the fight to save whoever was in trouble. To save her and their babies. And then her heart turned over in her chest. No matter what she’d tried to pretend since he’d left her at the hotel, whether he wanted them or not, whether he was the exact opposite of a family man or not, she was still, and probably would be forever, irrevocably in love with him.
Gunfire sounded somewhere outside the office, coming from the direction of the food court. Zak started crying. Nate wiggled down from her lap. She let him, holding on to him with one hand, not wanting him to go anywhere near the bad guys. She had no illusion of them holding back for small children.
She was kissing the top of Zak’s head—trying to calm the crying before it annoyed anyone with a gun—when the governor’s bodyguard bumped her in the shoulder. She glanced back. The man stared forward, toward Jimmy and his men. Lifted his hands behind his back. His wrists were bloody, but he had somehow gotten free.
More gunshots came from outside. Jimmy sent two more guys to see what was going on. Only he and Joey were left. It was now or never. She set Zak on the floor, too, pushing both boys toward the filing cabinet, rolling her chair in front of them. Then she exchanged another glance with the bodyguard.
Joey was smaller than Jimmy so she lunged for him, caught him by surprise, brought him down hard as the bodyguard went for Jimmy. Joey’s head smacked against the sharp edge of the table—pure luck. She was kneeling on his windpipe when a deafening shot went off behind her.
By the time she whipped around, all she could see was the bodyguard on the floor with a hole in his head, and Jimmy’s gun pointed at her. She stood immediately, hands in the air. Jimmy backhanded her with the gun. Her head spun, but she held steady.
Zak and Nate were screaming, running to her. Jimmy shoved them back roughly, then grabbed her by the arm. “Do I know you?” He examined her closely.
The old lady, who’d looked ready to faint the whole time, was now holding the boys with her legs, to keep them from coming back and getting into more trouble. Lara shot the woman a grateful look, shaking her head in response to Jimmy’s question. He shoved his gun barrel under her chin and lifted her head. Just as the door crashed open.
Reid stood in the demolished doorway, legs apart, both hands on his weapon, murder in his eyes. It was the most glorious sight she’d ever seen.
Jimmy released a sound of surprise, moving his gun to Reid, but grabbing Lara’s arm to use her as a shield. “How the hell are you alive?”
“Let her go,” Reid ordered.
And for a split second it looked like Jimmy was considering it, glancing at the governor, probably thinking that he ought to be holding the most valuable hostage. Then his gaze went from Reid to her and a cold smile stretched his lips. “I’ll be damned. I knew I knew her from somewhere. Old lovers reunited. How sweet it is, heh?” He laughed. “Man she was hot that night. You were busy when we came for you, so we let you finish. You were gonna die anyway, why not let you have that last piece of meat. I might not be a saint, but I’m not a complete bastard.”
Reid’s face went a shade darker.
She about died of embarrassment. Jimmy and his men had watched them make love? Her skin crawled at the thought.
“I always thought I’d come back for her, but things came up.” As did Jimmy’s hand to cup her breast.
And that was that.
The next second he was blown back, blood squirting from his chest. He could have squeezed off a last shot, but instead he dropped his gun and reached for his pocket.
She dove for her boys, Reid dove for her, putting his strong arms around them. Not a second too soon. An explosion of apocalyptic measures shook the building.
A
COUPLE OF MONITORS
got shaken off the walls. The ceiling tiles crashed to the floor. But the room remained standing, thanks to Cade and the others. Every bone in Reid’s body had been shaken, and when he’d dived for Lara and his boys, he’d landed on his bad hip. The pain was about killing him. So he decided to stay down. The rescue team was on its way. They could handle the rest.
“Reid? Are you all right?” Lara was brushing the dust off his face.
“As long as I got you and Zak and Nate.” He wouldn’t move his arms from around them. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Good. Stay still until medical rescue gets here.” She was checking him over with one hand, checking the kids with the other.
They looked fine to him. They weren’t crying any more, content as long as they had their mother. They were examining him curiously. He must have looked a sight with all the dirt. The ventilation ducts hadn’t been kind to him.
“I meant long term. I’d like to stick around.”
She tilted her head. “What about the lone-wolf thing?”
“I was wrong. I need people. I need you. All three of you. Thing is, I love you, Lara.” That was the God’s honest truth, and the best reason he could give her. If that wasn’t enough…
But it must have been, because she was kissing him the next second.
He felt the boys tugging at her from behind.
“Santa Claus?” Nate was asking pretty clearly for his first official words.
“Henry Hero,” Zak said.
Lara was laughing and crying at the same time as she pulled away and gathered the boys between them. “Even better, guys. This is your daddy.”
They blinked solemnly. Then flashed the sweetest baby grins he’d ever seen, and his heart melted.
“Mine,” he said as he put his arms around all three, the word coming from the most primal part of him.
“Forever,” Lara promised.
“I’m closing.” Lara stopped in the doorway that connected the two shops, glancing outside through the window to her right, watching the falling snow for a second. She was ready to go home to the kids.
It’d been a busy day. Business was booming. The twins had become the mascots for the two stores, running from one to the other all day, the babysitter—or Grandma when she was visiting, which was often—gamely following. They were only taken away for walks in the park and taken home for a few hours each afternoon for a nap. Of course, in a few months that schedule would change. They were almost four. They’d be starting preschool soon.
Reid wiped his hands on a cloth, then came closer, took her lips in a searing kiss. “I’ll go home with you for a while. The bread needs time to rise.”
Something between them clearly didn’t.
He nudged her against the wall and deepened the kiss, exploring her mouth with his clever tongue, caressing her breasts with his knowing hands. He was incorrigible.
“Slow day?”
“All the villains of the world must be taking time off for the holidays. I sent the guys home,” he told her.