Whispers in the Dark

CHAPTER 40

A tear slid down Shea’s temple and disappeared into her hair. It worried her that she seemed to slip away with each passing hour. She was beyond the pain. She didn’t really feel it any longer. But she had a hard time conjuring up the simplest of things.

Her mind was a vast landscape of nothingness. Every once in a while she would try hard to remember what her purpose was. There was something she had to do. But when she did so, she was immediately assaulted with more pain and so she let herself slide farther into the abyss because there the pain wasn’t present. Her fear and anxiety faded to nothing. And she floated. Free.

Even as she knew this was all wrong, she was helpless to change it because she no longer had the strength to fight. She’d been brought to this place to be poked and prodded. Studied and observed. A nameless, faceless test subject with no feelings or rights. Her humanity had been wiped away as if it had never existed. Here, she mattered to no one.

She heard whispers in her mind. They called her name, but she desperately shoved them away and closed herself off, wanting to avoid the inevitable crush of pain if she allowed them to grow louder or, God forbid, she responded.

What did these people ultimately want? Did they already have Grace? Was it why they weren’t questioning her about her sister? It was Shea’s worst fear, that everything she’d done in the last year was for nothing.

A distant explosion rocked the tube she was imprisoned in. It shook one of the electrodes free, but there were still three attached, and fire sizzled through her body as fear spiked her brain waves. Above her one of the fluorescent lights crashed to the floor, just missing her makeshift prison.

The lab went into chaos. Screams, yells, equipment falling and being turned over as they all scrambled like rats to flee the room.

Shea strained at her bonds but there was no budging the bands. Panic set in and she started hyperventilating as the tube seemed to close in on her. Oh God, she couldn’t breathe. What was happening? Was it an earthquake?

Her mouth opened in a silent scream and then she yelled hoarsely as another electric current bolted through her body. She closed her eyes and retreated back into the void where insanity was the preferable alternative. To a place where there was no pain and no fear while everything around her went to hell.

JOE slammed back against the wall just as Donovan flattened himself against the other. Bullets zinged from the opposing hallway and into the wall a short distance away.

“Motherfuckers,” Donovan swore. “On my count, you go high and I’ll go low. One, two…three!”

Joe turned the corner as Donovan went to the floor, guns up. Joe took out the two armed guys on the left while Donovan downed the remaining one on the right.

“Let’s go,” Donovan barked.

An explosion rocked the building and Joe reached back for the wall to steady himself. “Sounds like Garrett’s already having his fun.”

“It’s going to get interesting now. Keep your eyes peeled. Shoot first and don’t get your ass shot.”

“You have such a knack for stating the obvious,” Joe muttered as he broke into a run down the hall.

They passed the downed men, and Donovan stopped long enough to snag a security badge from one of them.

“Oh, come on,” Joe said. “You’re telling me the king nerd can’t get anywhere without a security clearance card?”

“Eat me,” Donovan growled. “This’ll take less time. Provided it works. If it doesn’t, we’ll just blow our way in.”

Joe grinned. “I like the way you think when you don’t have your head stuck in a computer.”

“I’m so kicking your ass when this is over.”

They ran down the corridor until they came to an open door. Donovan held up one hand then kicked in the door and went in, gun up as he swept the room.

“Clear here,” Donovan said.

They continued their path down the hall, finding evidence of hasty exits. There were overturned equipment, papers scattered everywhere, even a running faucet.

When they came out of the current room, a shot sounded and Donovan went down. Joe turned, laying down a heavy spray of bullets as he hit the ground to cover his brother.

Joe nailed one in the chest and he fell heavily. The other, Joe got in the leg and he disappeared around the corner before Joe could get off another shot. He turned his attention to his brother.

“Van, goddamn it, talk to me. Are you hit?”

“Get the fuck off me. I can’t breathe,” Donovan growled. “Fucker just winged me. I’m all right. Let’s clear the rest of the hall.”

Joe carefully pushed himself off his brother but kept careful watch as Donovan picked himself up from the floor. When Joe glanced down, he saw blood smeared on the white tiles.

“You’re bleeding, goddamn it. Where did you take the hit?”

Donovan put a hand to the tear in his sleeve. “It’s just a graze. Few inches over he’d have hit the Kevlar and then we wouldn’t be having this stupid conversation about blood.”

They moved more slowly down the hall, each facing a different direction. Donovan walked forward and Joe backed his way after his brother. At each open doorway, they stopped to clear the room but left frustrated each time.

“This is bullshit,” Donovan said into his receiver. “We’re coming up empty. What about the rest of you?”

“Steele and company are engaged. Phillips is helping round up everyone running from the building. They haven’t been able to clear their section. We’re making our way back as fast as we can,” Sam said.

“Us too,” Nathan relayed.

Joe could hear the frustration in his twin’s voice and the ache. He was afraid for Shea. Afraid he wouldn’t find her but also afraid of what he’d find if they came across her.

“We have to find her,” Joe said in a low voice to Donovan.

Donovan nodded and continued their path through the maze of rooms.

They burst into a room and quickly scanned the interior. Joe frowned, and for a moment it felt like someone had punched him in the stomach. He lurched forward, ignoring Donovan’s order to be cautious.

He turned in a circle, staring, remembering what he’d seen during his brief connection to Shea. “This is it, Van. This is where they had her!”

Donovan hopped over a chair on its side and turned the corner of the L-shaped room. Joe came up beside him and froze as he stared at the cylindrical cage. And it was a cage. There were no bars but it was no less a prison.

“Dear God,” Donovan whispered.

Joe bolted forward, his hand running along the top of the enclosure where Shea lay, her eyes glassy and fixed on the ceiling. Electrodes were attached to her head, though one had fallen off and lay by her ear. The monitor that he’d seen was to her left.

“Son of a bitch! We have to get her out of here, Van.”

Joe dropped his rifle and clawed frantically at the lid, trying to figure out how it opened. “Damn it, Van, how do I get her out?”

Donovan hurried around to the work station where the computers were and began tapping furiously at the keys. Joe stalked around to the other side and cut the lines that fed from the electrodes to the machine monitoring her brain activity. Then he leaned over the enclosure, pressed his hands to the plastic and put his face over hers.

Shea, can you hear me. Talk to me, sweetheart. They can’t hurt you now.

She didn’t move. Didn’t acknowledge him in any way. He felt nothing through their pathway. Just silence and nothingness. Calm. Eerie calm.

“Goddamn it, hurry, Van! She’s not doing good. Not at all. We have to get her out of here.”

“I’m doing the best I can. I’m flying blind here. It’s a complicated system. I’ll get it. I’ll get it.”

Joe continued to stare down at Shea, his fingers splayed out, pressed to the cool surface. He only thanked God that it wasn’t Nathan who’d found her. He’d have gone ballistic and there would have been no controlling him.

Suddenly the top lifted and started to open toward him. He backed off and ran around to the other side. The locks around her neck, wrists and ankles popped open, but she didn’t react.

Gently, Joe reached in and lifted her from the enclosure. She was limp against him and her head lolled onto his shoulder. Shit, this was scaring him.

“We have Shea,” Donovan said tersely. “I repeat, we have Shea. Give us your status.”

“Go out the front,” Sam barked. “We’re engaged in heavy fire. Back is not secure. P.J. will be covering your exit. Take one of the SUVs and meet us at the rendezvous point. Once we’re clear, we’ll meet you as scheduled.”

It fried Joe’s ass to even think about leaving his brothers behind, but they couldn’t carry Shea into the line of fire. And he couldn’t send Donovan because he was Joe’s only cover, since Joe was carrying Shea out.

“You heard the man. Let’s go,” Donovan bit out.

AS Nathan listened to the exchange between Donovan and Sam, he nearly went to his knees in relief. They hadn’t said anything about Shea’s condition, but they had her and that was all that was important. She was safe. His brothers wouldn’t let any harm come to her.

“Throw a fucking grenade and let’s be done with this shit,” Garrett snarled from across the wide-open area that was at the heart of the facility. All hallways led from the huge epicenter, and it was at the center where the security forces for the lab had taken a stand.

What the fuck they had to fight for was beyond Nathan, but maybe they feared certain death if they simply surrendered. While Nathan would love to accommodate them, Resnick wanted to do it by the book. Maybe he was still angling to keep his job.

Steele and his team, along with Resnick, were closing the gap and they’d soon have the holdouts between them. Sam, Garrett, Nathan and Ethan had taken position while bullets zinged by them and kicked up plaster from the walls.

“I’m coming in behind you.”

Swanny’s voice came over the radio, and Sam frowned. “What the fuck are you doing out of position? You were supposed to be with Steele.”

“I got a little sidelined with an issue,” Swanny drawled. “It’s all better now.”

Nathan grinned.

“Fall back then,” Sam directed. “Rendezvous with Joe and Donovan. They’re going out the front with Shea. They’ll need cover. P.J. is manning the front. We have it here.”

“Roger that.” There was a long pause, and then Swanny said, “Don’t worry, Nate. I’ll take good care of your girl.”

“I know you will,” Nathan murmured.

“Coming your way, Sam,” Steele barked. “Waded through the riffraff. Phillips is rounding them up. Let’s finish this one and head to the house.”

“That gets a hooyah from me,” Ethan piped in.

“Hooyah, baby,” Cole echoed. “This is like ducks in a row at the fair. Too easy, drill sergeant. Too easy.”

“Move in,” Sam ordered.

Garrett lobbed a flash grenade and then they swarmed.

“Stay low! Stay low!” Sam yelled.

Some of the combatants had already given up and lay flat on the floor, hands over their heads. Others stumbled unsteadily and attempted to raise their guns to shoot.

Nathan dropped to one knee and laid down a round of fire, taking down two targets as they took aim at Garrett. He did a quick scan of the room as his brothers pushed through.

“Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” Sam ordered. “Targets are down. I repeat, targets are down.”

Nathan could see that Steele and his team had pushed through and now stood across the center of the complex. As he started to rise, pain seared through his side, knocking him sideways.

He stared down in disbelief to see that one of the fallen security forces had plunged a knife into his side. It was reflex to yank the knife back out. It hadn’t gone to the hilt.

He let out a guttural cry but threw aside the knife before leaping forward onto the man who’d downed him. He grasped the man’s head and wrenched sideways, until he heard the snap of the other man’s neck.

He threw the man down and then put his hand to his side, feeling sticky warmth spread over his palm.

Shit.

He glanced up in time to see his brothers rushing forward, uncharacteristic fear on their faces. He tried to push himself upward but started to tilt forward instead.

Garrett got to him first and caught him before he could pitch forward.

Nathan pulled his hand away and stared down at the dark red that coated his entire palm.

“That son of a bitch stabbed me!”