In His Keeping

“Ari is here,” Zack said, pointing to a blinking light at the end of a long corridor. “As you can see there are three heat sources there. But none between the cell where she and her parents were held and the room she currently occupies. Which means she mowed down anyone in her way.”

“And none there,” Dane murmured, gesturing toward one of the hallways that was bare of any heat source.

“The rest are here.” Zack pointed to a concentrated area where ten dots overlapped one another on the screen. “If we get lucky, we can slip down that first hallway that is across the compound from where Ari is, take out whoever the two blips are in the room with her then take her, and get the hell out before the others decide to come looking for us.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Beau muttered.

Beau would normally be more proactive in planning missions down to the minutest detail. But he had no objectivity for this one and he knew it. He also knew he couldn’t trust himself to make sound, unemotional decisions. Not when it came to Ari.

So he’d allowed Zack free rein, which probably didn’t sit well with Dane, but if it bothered the other man he didn’t show it. All he displayed was his usual determination to see a mission through successfully. Beau appreciated that particular trait, now more than ever. Because this mission was deeply personal and if it went to hell, Beau would go right to hell with it.

As they approached the wall of the prison cells, the pitched roof in the middle of the facility simply collapsed and flames roared upward, licking toward the sky. Smoke billowed in black clouds and the fire began to race across the rest of the roof.

Ash, cinder and burning debris blew hard over them, pelting down like a hailstorm.

“Your girl is wreaking some serious havoc,” Zack said, awe in his voice. “I think I might be in love.”

Beau merely stared, more worried than ever, as they closed the remaining distance, picking up speed until they were at full sprint.

They ducked inside the gaping hole in the wall and streamed one by one into the hallway. Dane and Capshaw took the others’ sixes by turning so they walked backward, guns up, scanning the hallway behind.

When they got to the doorway that opened into a large circular room with a glassed-in dome, they paused only long enough to ensure Ari’s position hadn’t changed and that they weren’t in for any unexpected surprises.

The mostly vacant area of the complex they were standing in was likely at one time either a nurses’ station or a reception area with each of the corridors branching off housing different wings of the so-called hospital. Obviously the more serious threats to society were housed in the filthy, vermin-infested barred cells, and Beau was sickened that anyone would be treated with so little humanity. Even if the criminals were the worst sort of human beings.

Here they were reduced to the furthest thing from humanity one could get. Most animal shelters and, hell, modern prisons, for that matter, offered better accommodations.

But then the bastards who’d put their hands on Ari, who’d stuffed her parents into a tiny cell with deplorable conditions, deserved far worse, so Beau would reserve his judgment in the future before offering blanket sympathy to anyone.

“We got a problem,” Zack said grimly. He turned halfway so he stared at the hallway to the far lower right. “Got movement in the northern wing. Headed this way.”

Dane tensed, immediately shifted so his hands held a weapon in each. Then he nodded at Cap and Isaac.

To Beau and Zack he said, “Go and retrieve Ari. We’ll provide cover here and make sure they don’t get past us. Let us know when you’re coming in, though, so neither of you gets your balls shot off.”

“Thanks,” Zack said dryly. “I’d rather not part ways with my dick.”

Restless, Beau started down the hallway. Toward Ari. Toward his life, leaving Zack to catch up. Or not. He wasn’t waiting another goddamn minute. He trusted Dane and the others to do their job and keep the men creeping toward them at bay long enough for them to tag Ari and get her the hell out.

No sooner had they taken two steps down the corridor than the floors buckled and rolled like ocean waves beneath their feet. The walls shook, knocking already askew paintings down to clatter on the tile below. The ceiling and rafters creaked and groaned in protest, swaying until it felt as though the entire building was in motion. The sound was ominous, the signal of impending collapse.

Relying on Zack’s techno recon, Beau ran toward the end. Toward the one closed door that Ari was behind, paying no heed to the barren rooms that lined either side of the hallway. Zack was hot on his heels, guns in both hands, arms up, his piercing gaze missing nothing. Beau knew he was being reckless, but he counted on his partner to cover his stupid ass. Zack had never failed him yet in their rather short acquaintance.

Beau slowed only enough to let Zack catch up so they could kick the door in. But before they made any motion to do so, the door splintered apart, breaking free from its hinges and sailing down the hallway in pieces.

Both men ducked, barely in time to prevent their heads from being taken off.

“Down!” Zack yelled, shoving at Beau as he started to get to his feet once more.

A man went flying down the hallway after the door, crashing into the far wall. He punched a hole straight through the Sheetrock, forming a cavernous opening.

“Holy shit,” Beau said, his face a mask of shock. “She’s kicking some serious ass!”

“Uh, yeah. What was your first clue? Three dozen heat signatures suddenly vanishing? Oh wait, make that one more in the ‘ticked off the list’ column. Ari thirty-eight. Bad guys ten. Or maybe it was the huge-ass hole in the roof with an inferno blazing and erupting like a fucking volcano. Or perhaps—”