Charity's Passion (17 page)

"Shea's hurt," I say to Justin. "Doesn't look critical, but he's bleeding pretty good.

Justin starts the car. "Call Dr. Cooper. Tell him we're on our way now."

SURGERY WAS QUICK AND
easy. Dr. Cooper was out a while ago to give us the details.

The bullet was removed. It was a ricochet, Dr. Cooper could tell simply by looking at it before we even explained what had happened. It was slowed down by the table it hit, and it was flattened like a pancake—Dr. Cooper's words. So the bullet was moving slow and it was flat when it entered Arthur Shea's hip, and that saved him a world of damage. It shredded some veins and nerves, and damaged a small area of his hip flexor muscles, so walking is going to hurt like an MF for a bit. But once the bullet hit bone it stopped dead.

Stitches, pain meds, maybe a little physical therapy, and he'll be right as rain. It could have been so much worse.

We waited the couple hours it took for Shea to shake the anesthesia and we are in his room with John Roberts now.

He is so pissed, even more than I expected. "That little shit shot me," he says through a heavy, drug-riddled slur.

"He did," John Roberts replies. He seems genuinely concerned. "He almost got me too." John Roberts fiddles unconsciously with the holes in his shirt.

"If it helps," Justin says to Shea, "I don't think you were his target."

Shea doesn't react, but John Roberts does. "Was it me? Was I the target?"

"Yes," I say flatly. John Roberts deserves honesty. "You were the target before you even got to the bar; Marker was not expecting us—that's probably why you're alive right now. We screwed up his plans by coming with you."

"I'm not sure about that," Justin says. "Most of it is right, he wasn't expecting us, but I don't think the plan was to kill you." He pauses briefly. "That shot he took, he was aiming really low. I think he meant to hurt you, but not kill you. He's better than the shot he took."

"Those guys we're fighting him," I remind Justin. "He's lucky he got
any
shot off at all."

Justin shakes his head. "For a guy like Marker, they were nothing he couldn't handle. There's no good reason Marker was shooting so low. He was trying to hurt you—not kill you. Hitting Arthur, that was just bad luck, maybe John Roberts zigged when Marker expected a zag—as simple as that."

"Why, Justin? Why not just kill me?" John Roberts asks.

"You're not the big target," I answer, anticipating where Justin is leading us now. "You would have flushed us out, got us where he wanted us when he expecting us."

Something is very suddenly wrong. Justin is writhing in his own skin and it instantly scares the shit out of me.

"Where would he have expected you?" John Roberts asks, his confusion obvious.

Now I understand. It wasn't according to plan, but the result is the same. Marker found out what hospital we use; if he wounded John Roberts he would know right where we would be—here.

Fuck!

"Call Garrett! Tell him to get Malcolm and get here as fast as they can," Justin orders, his tone having no room for doubt or hesitation. "Tell him we'll need one secure exit out of here and a permanent guard on Shea."

Shea, even still slightly drugged, is getting the picture. "You're going to leave me here? He's going to kill me."

"No, he won't," Justin says dismissively. "You're safe in here; the guard is an extra precaution. You're not in here under your real name. You're not even charted as a gunshot. He can't find you unless he goes from room to room, and that will never work. The security here is mine. If Marker was planning to wound John to get me here—his plan was to get me on the way in or out. We're the ones that have to worry; you're safer than we're about to be."

I follow his instruction and call Garrett. He's on it, but this is going to be a long, long twenty minutes. I've already swallowed my panic back down twice.

"I played right into him, didn't I?" Shea asks somberly.

Justin is in no mood to play to egos. "Yes, you did. You're the reason you're lying there right now."

Poetic.

That strong, dependable side of Justin is out in full force and sexier than ever. Even now, in this situation, he has everything under control, and it's not fear on his face but power and anger.

He steps confidently toward the door of the room and opens it far enough to see out. It looks like he's watching for Marker, but I know him and that's not it. He's planning, visualizing the escape.

John Roberts looks as tough as ever, but I know he's hiding a real, mortal fear. "You know we're as good as out of here. He won't fail," he says smiling to appear as if he's not worried at all, but we both know that's crap.

What feels like hours later, Malcolm calls in to Justin. They're here with a few members of the team, ready to start an entry. Justin tells him what exit he wants to use.

"It's going to be a little bit," he warns.

I know exactly what's happening. They will clear every door in a hall and post a guard until there's a clean path out. That won't be quick.

Eventually, after the minutes have ticked away agonizingly slow, there's a knock on the door and when Justin opens it Garrett is there with a man from the team. Garrett gives me a smile and a wink.

"You're staying?" Justin asks his soldier.

"I got it," he answers with a steady nod.

"Thank you," Justin says honestly. "We'll work out a rotation tomorrow for as long as he needs to be here." He nods his head toward Shea.

"You ready?" Garrett asks.

"Damn right!" John Roberts answers, genuinely eager to start moving. "Let’s get the hell out of here and get me a new shirt."

Crossing the wide, exposed nurse’s station was extremely dangerous but thankfully quick. We pick up our first guy in the hall by the elevator that we need to take down. This soldier confirms with the soldier guarding the elevator doors downstairs that we're cleared to come down and all of us, even the soldier from the hall, get into the elevator car. Collecting the team as we go is not just efficient; the closer to the end we get, the higher the risk. This way our team is growing as the risk increases.

It's one of the many tactics Justin has taught me so that I'm prepared in these situations.

Garrett, the soldier, and Justin all have their weapons out in the elevator and pointed at the door with John Roberts and I shoved into the back corners. When the doors open, the soldier we'd radioed from upstairs should be standing there.

He isn't!

There's spatter on the far wall; not enough to tell us what happened, but enough that we know something did. Garrett calls him over the headset but there's no answer.

"We have a man down," Garrett directs on the radio. "Everyone report."

I see him counting in his head.

"Is everyone else in place?" Justin asks with a new anger in his voice, frustrated that he doesn't have a headset of his own.

Garrett nods. "Number two position, move to the end of the hall and get eyes on us."

Just moments later we see another one of our soldiers at the end of the hall in front of us using a hand signal to acknowledge his position.

John Roberts suddenly stands in front of me making himself into a shield. "I know you have more training for this than I do, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let anything happen to Justin's girl."

I know how pointless protesting would be.

We move into a line formation. Justin is in the lead aiming straight and left. Garrett is behind him watching the right side. The other soldier has the field behind us.

It's so damn quiet down here the sounds of our feet echo off the walls. It's not clear what part of the hospital this is or why there's no staff down here, but Justin knows exactly where he's going. He leads us steadily toward the end where our guy is waiting, covering our approach.

If Marker so much as pops his head into the hallway it's going to get shot off.

I think I know exactly what happened, but now is not the time to ask.

Our soldier at position two is working to keep us save without losing focus on the next hallway we have to take. We get to him pretty quickly and they move into a diamond formation now that we have the resources to complete it.

"Position one?" Garrett asks into the headset.

Seconds later we see his hand signal at the end of a much longer hall than the one we just came down. Justin motions back and the soldier takes position.

The antiseptic smell of the hospital is getting to me, everything is getting to me. I don't like sitting in the middle being protected; I should be helping.

From now on I'm carrying everywhere I go!

Little more than half way down, we hear a noise come from behind one of the closed doors we have already passed.

A chill passes through all of us as the whole group freezes in place, Garrett whipping his weapon around and taking aim with the soldier behind us.

Do we go back and check it, see if it is Marker so we can end this now?

No, not with targets in play—Justin and I being targets right along with John Roberts.

After a moment we press on, ignoring the smell of fear surrounding John Roberts as he now moves behind me to protect my back now that he senses the danger is behind us. Terrified or not, he is insistent that I am more important than he is.

The position one soldier does not join our formation. Garrett wants his eyes to stay on the hall where the noise had come from, so he orders him to stay. We can now see to the end of the last, short hallway and the door we will leave through if we make it.

Malcolm is there with another soldier, keeping a Panther SUV running and the door clear for exit.

I'm even more certain now that I know exactly what happened, why a soldier is missing and where Marker is.

Once we are clear and heading away, the Panther team will sweep the hospital as quietly and discretely as they can. They're going to find a friend of theirs, a brother, dead and discarded like garbage.

I pull my focus back for the last thirty yards. We're not out yet. No one says a thing and that's a horrible mind fuck. Every echo must be Marker coming for us. My imagination hears every door open.

Justin reaches back for my hand and I desperately grab onto him as we finish the walk. He would never have done that unless he was sure, like I am, that we are safe now.

We reach the door with Malcolm and the other soldier taking over the back of the formation as we climb into the SUV.

The fucking relief is intense. John Roberts begins to tremble even though he clearly despises it.

"Sweep it!" Garrett orders. "If our guy's alive, get Dr. Cooper on him."

All of them besides Justin, Garrett and Malcolm eagerly rush back into the building. There's a life at stake, and the targets are safe.

"Why didn't he take his chance?" John Roberts asks.

"Because he's gone already," I answer. "He's been gone since the elevator."

John Roberts looks concerned.

"Marker was hoping to have the jump on us; hit us on our way out while we felt safe. When he saw our team coming in under maneuvers, he knew his window was gone and he needed an escape."

"He killed one of your men?" John Roberts pleads.

A red flash of furry crosses Justin’s face. "Yes, and he did it just for a distraction—just to show me that he could."

"PACK YOUR THINGS," JUSTIN
commands as soon as we are alone. "We leave in an hour."

"What?"
Why do I sound shocked, I knew this was coming.

Justin stops moving long enough to give me a look.

I get it. "I know, I know—I just wasn't expecting only an hour. Every time I went over it in my head I thought there would be enough time to get ready. There's so much to do." My panic isn't settling.

He knows me, this isn't the time to be pushy. Justin takes a breath to steady himself and he comes to me, protective arms covering me. "I'm sorry," he whispers. "I know it's not ideal, but we've already waited too long. Marker should never have gotten this close; I should never have allowed it. You know that."

"I do, I know it.
We
waited too long, not you, and today was too fucking close for both of us. When I first saw the blood on the floor in the kitchen of the pub, I thought it might be you." My throat closes on me, cutting off anything else that I might have said.

Justin squeezes me tighter, making me feel safer than I have in a while.

"It wasn't. I'm okay and I'm going to stay that way. That's why we have to go," he says, kissing the top of my head gently. "No one's expecting it, most of all Marker. He thinks he has us on the run, so we're going to give him a run. Feel bad for everyone we're leaving behind, because when he can't find us, they're all in danger."

And that's kind of the point. Without us as targets, Marker will have to change tactics. When we aren't in his direct sight—we can get to him first.