Metal was screeching. Glass shattering. Katherine’s seat belt bit into her shoulder, and the gun she’d grabbed flew from her fingers.
Someone was calling her name. Someone was screaming.
A trap. A deadly trap. One last punishment to send us all to hell.
Then the car hit the water. And the screams stopped.
“What do you mean, you ‘lost them’?” Meadows demanded as he crouched behind John. “There’s a brand-new tracker on that vehicle. It was installed five minutes before they left!”
“It stopped sending a signal.”
“Get me someone on that chopper.”
The transmitter flashed on. The call was routed through the center, then pushed into the microphone speakers. “Sir?”
Meadows stood at attention. “Tell me you have a visual on our car.”
“Negative.”
No f**king way.
“They turned down a heavily tree-lined road a few moments ago. We should regain aerial visibility momentarily.”
No, they wouldn’t regain that visibility. Because Valentine was playing his games. Trying to kill his detectives.
“The watches,” he said, the word close to a snarl of desperate frustration,. “Tell me you’re getting a signal from them.”
“Not from Detective Mac Turner,” John told him.
Shit, shit, shit.
“But I’m reading a signal from Katherine Cole and Detective Black,” John continued, voice cracking with excitement.
Damn straight.
“Get patrols out there right now.” Meadows sucked in a deep breath. His gut was twisting. “Get SWAT, get whoever the hell we need. And you, flyboy,” he added, because he knew the helicopter pilot could hear him, “you get these coordinates we’re sending you, and you find a place to land that chopper. Give those men on the ground backup!”
Before they’d lost the radio signal from the car, Meadows had heard the screams. Heard the shriek of metal. And he’d also heard…
Laughter.
You aren’t killing my men, Valentine.
Because if he did, those deaths would be on Meadows. He’d made the deal. He’d sent the detectives out with that bastard.
Had he sent them to their deaths?
Water was filling the car. Hell. Dane felt it sloshing around his legs. His head hurt like a bitch—it had slammed into the side window, and a chunk of metal dug into his side.
“Katherine?” There was so much silence…and darkness. “Katherine!”
“I’ll take care of her,” a voice whispered from the darkness.
Valentine.
Couldn’t the SOB have just died in the wreck?
The metal twisted in his side. Dane groaned at the pain and realized Valentine was the one twisting the metal. No, not metal. Broken glass. Valentine’s cuffs were gone. He’d shoved Dane’s bulletproof vest to the side, and the psycho was using a giant piece of glass to saw into Dane’s flesh.
“The…fuck…you…will…” Dane growled. He reached down, jerking under the water to try and find the gun he’d had before. He ignored the pain. His fingers closed around the weapon. The gun had still better fire.
The car was tilted on its side, sending all of the water pooling toward Dane. He was sinking, but Valentine was protected, his side of the vehicle was still elevated and—
Valentine’s door flew open. “Get away from him!” Katherine screamed.
The glass was gone from Dane’s side.
“Katherine, you’re hurt!” Valentine’s voice was dripping with concern. “Didn’t I tell you to put on your seat belt?”
Then Valentine was out of the car and lunging toward her. Valentine had the glass. Katherine was stumbling back as Valentine rushed through the water toward her.
Dane’s fingers closed around the gun. “Get back, Katherine!” he yelled.
Then he fired. The bullet plowed into Valentine’s body and the man fell, face-first, onto the bank.
Dane realized that the impact of the crash must have knocked him out for a bit. Valentine—the bastard—had stayed conscious and gotten out of his cuffs, and he’d been working on him with that glass. “Mac?” he called.
No answer.
“Dane…” Katherine was there, pulling him from the car. There was no moonlight to spill down on them. Clouds blotted out the sky. But he could just make out Valentine’s body, slumped over on the small bank area.
“Where’s Mac?” Dane managed to ask. His left arm was wrapped around Katherine’s shoulders. He was holding her tight. His right hand gripped the gun.
“He’s in the car. I couldn’t get him to move.”
Fuck.
His gaze flew over the killer. Valentine was still slumped on the bank. Not moving.
The car was sinking deeper into the water. Dane backed away from Valentine and tried to open Mac’s door.
“It won’t open,” Katherine said. “I tried. Mine wouldn’t either. I had to crawl out. The windshield was smashed. I got out that way.”
Dane wasn’t going to let his partner sink. He gave Katherine the gun. Tightened her fingers around the weapon. “If Valentine so much as twitches, shoot him in the head.” He ignored the pain in his side and didn’t tell her about it. She hadn’t seen the wound, couldn’t see it in the dark.
He pushed deeper into the water. Prayed there weren’t any gators swimming around because he couldn’t deal with that shit, too. He climbed onto the hood of the vehicle. Made his way through the broken glass. Wrapped his arms around Mac. “Buddy, you’re gonna owe me,” Dane muttered as he started to pull Mac out.
The car shifted beneath him. More water rolled in, and then—
Then metal groaned. Screeched.
And the whole f**king car went totally under the water.
“Dane!” Katherine screamed when the car lurched and sank beneath the water. She ran for the bubbling water.
“You don’t want to do that.” Hard arms wrapped around her stomach, and Katherine was hauled back against a big, muscled body.
Her fingers clenched around the gun.
“That water is so much deeper than it looks from up on that incline, and someone might have set up some small detonations in that spot recently, to weaken things more, to make it easier for a big object to sink fast.”
He’d planned everything?
Valentine’s hand slid down and curled around the gun. “Just give this to me, Kat.”
“You never intended to let Maggie and Ross go.” Her lips felt numb as she spoke. “You set this whole road up as a trap for us.”