Explosive (The Black Opals) (33 page)

Tears rushed to her eyes.
Suddenly, she didn’t know what she was combating against. It all seemed so meaningless, so unimportant. He was Jayce. Always Jayce. So deeply embedded in her heart, she couldn’t find the strength to move on, though she’d left him behind once. He wanted her, scrapes, bruises, and scars included. And God how she wanted him.

“I love you.”
She barely realized the whisper had escaped her lips as she lowered herself into Brice’s chair. If she didn’t sit, she was going to faint. She blinked to clear her bleary vision, but Jayce wasn’t smiling. His expression hadn’t yielded, and she wasn’t certain he’d heard her confession. Or if he had, if it hadn’t come too late. Breathing deeply, she forced the tightness out of her lungs and braced her hands on the arm of Brice’s chair to push herself to her feet. “Jayce, I—”

“Don’t fucking move.”
His quiet order held a lethal edge. “Sit down.”

“What?”
Confused, she squinted at him.

“Now!”

Without giving her time to react, Jayce rounded the corner of the desk and pushed her down into the seat. He kept one hand firmly on her shoulder as he sank to his knees beside the chair and dipped his head to look under the seat.

“Fuck,” he exhaled.

“What?” Panic crept into her ribcage, cinching her lungs back into the same familiar knot, as he lifted his head, his expression grave. Her voice raised in pitch as her throat tightened. “Jayce, what’s the matter?”

He pulled in a deep breath, let it out slowly.
His gaze searched hers, reflecting emotions she couldn’t decipher. “It’s really important you don’t move, baby doll.” Leaning in close, his chest pressed her deeper into the seat as he brushed his lips over hers. “I love you too, but you’re sitting on a bomb.”

T h i r t y – s i x

I
nstinct had saved Jayce’s ass on more than one occasion, enough so he knew better than to dismiss that sixth sense when it struck. When Alyssa’s body surged into his, he was damned glad he followed the urge to explain her circumstances with his mouth as close to hers as possible. His chest held her in the chair. Beneath his lips, her squeaks of protest gradually ebbed.

When she’d stopped fighting, he broke the kiss and held her frightened gaze.
God help him if she could feel the sudden shaking that infused his own limbs. She’d never calm down then. And he needed her calm. Because if she panicked, he couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t also. Bombs were one thing. When the most important person in his life was sitting on one, he’d entered an entirely different game of cards.

“I need to look at it again.”
He took care to keep his voice low and even. “I need you not to move. Do you understand?”

Her eyes as wide as saucers, she answered with the barest nod of her head.

“I’m pretty sure it’s pressure sensitive.” Otherwise, she wouldn’t be here. But he didn’t add in that gruesome fact. “Like the landmines you see in old World War II movies. It’s trigger will fire when the pressure lets off.” He talked for his sake, and hers—the more he kept his mind working, the less he’d become wrapped up in the reality. “Only that’s all Hollywood—landmines are designed to explode on impact, mostly. This method is designed for the psychological effect.”

He eased onto to his hands and knees and peered under the seat again.
The good news was, the bomb didn’t have an actual timer, lessening the pressure that resided on his shoulders. On the scale of bombs, it was relatively simple. Remove the casing without triggering the detonator—assuming it wasn’t armed with some sort of anti-handling measure—and strip out the fuse. But the damned thing was a bitch to get to, and they’d rigged the pressure plate inside the seat, increasing the odds that disarming it would negatively impact the pressure.

“Someone wanted to fuck with McTavish’s mind before they took him out.
Brutal bastards. It’d have been simpler to set a clock to count down.” He frowned at the interlacing wires—those didn’t belong on something so evidently simple. “Course then he could have run away.”

“Jayce,” she murmured, her voice oddly high-pitched.

“Hm?” He scrunched his shoulders and twisted sideways to better see the path of the wires.

“C-can you…get me off this thing?”

“Yeah.” But not fucking easily. Those damned wires connected to a secondary device, the bottom portion of which just barely poked out from where the column that lifted the chair disappeared into the seat. Son of a bitch. He scooted further toward the column. Strained to lift his ear closer.

Muffled by the heavy padding, a faint
beep…beep…beep
resonated from inside the cushion.

Oh hell.
Someone was damned certain McTavish wasn’t getting off this chair. If the first trigger didn’t catch, they’d armed
that
to a more standard, automatic, countdown delay. How much time was on that fucking clock?

Jayce lifted a hand to pluck away the vinyl.
Making matters worse, his hands were shaking.

“Alyssa?”

“Yes?” she answered, her voice tight and strained.

God bless her—she was doing her best to keep it together.
“Is there a letter opener up there somewhere? A paper clip? Scissors?”

“I c-can’t….”
She paused, drew in an audible breath. “Reach the drawer.”

Jayce levered himself off the spindly legs and pushed the chair closer to the desk.
“How about now?”

While she rummaged in the desk, he withdrew his cell phone, then thought better of it.
On the off chance a signal could power this device, he turned his phone completely off and for good measure took out the battery. He tossed both as far from him as he could.

“Here.
I have a staple remover.” Something rattled across the desktop as she fumbled her grip. “Damn it.” Again, she took a deep breath; her exhale shuddered in the quiet.

From Jayce’s peripheral vision, he sighted the quivering of her thigh.
He smoothed his hand over her leg, waited for her to collect herself.

“Here.”
Trembling fingertips dipped below the arm of the chair.

He reached up, and she dropped the staple remover into his hand.
“Hold tight, baby doll. I’ve got you. You’re going to be just fine.”

Carefully, he went to work prying off the vinyl covering.
What he found beneath had him swearing, despite the rush of relief that flooded his system. Sixty minutes was more than enough time. But outside of specialized organized crime outfits, he hadn’t seen anything this complicated. Wires, crossed wires, false wires—it was as if they’d decided to slap a whole bunch on just for the sake of being able to do so.

He closed his eyes and silently swore.

“Pick up the desk phone, baby doll. Call your house. Get Kane and McTavish here.”

“O-okay,” she stammered.

She dropped the phone twice, before he heard the clicking of buttons. Satisfied she was appropriately distracted, Jayce closed his eyes and took a moment to choke down his own emotions. If he lost her…

No.
He wasn’t losing her. He’d get her off this chair one way or the other. If he didn’t, well, they’d depart this world together. He wasn’t leaving her side.

The sound of her voice as she spoke to McTavish soothed the chaotic jumping of his heart.
He pulled in a deep breath and opened his eyes. The wires stared him in the face; ice blue numerals ticking away steadily. Fifty-five minutes. Willing his hands to remain steady, he traced a solid white wire into the casing box.

* * *

Alyssa set the phone back in the receiver. To quell the need to move, to escape, she smoothed her hands over Brice’s desk blotter. Her throat was tight, her chest felt too small for her lungs. She refused to panic, though she hovered on the verge. If her number was up tonight, she intended to go out with dignity, not amid hysterical blubbering. But it was requiring all of her self control to hold on to some semblance of calm.

So this was how it ended.
Funny how fate worked. Just when she began to believe she might actually have the future she’d always wanted, that she and Jayce could overcome the past, fate decided it wouldn’t be that easy.
Oh, God.
Emotion threatened to choke her. She swallowed it down hard.

“Jayce?” she asked quietly.
She closed her eyes, picturing the handsome face she couldn’t see. God, she wasn’t ready to leave him. If she survived this, she’d do whatever it took to repair things between them.
Please let me have another chance. Please.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I’m sorry.” She swallowed hard to stave off the cracking of her voice. “For everything.”

“Hey, none of that.
You can tell me here in a little bit.”

Right.
Weren’t those words used with people on their deathbeds? She squeezed her eyes shut and banished the thought. No, they were used by bomb specialists who knew how to save lives. She must have faith.

Good lord, who’d have ever thought she would appreciate the fact he worked with dangerous explosives on a daily basis?
She swallowed an inappropriate chuckle, further evidence she was barely clinging to sanity.

Long moments of oppressive silence passed.
The quivering in her thighs intensified, and she clenched her knees together to stop the annoying tremble. Another inappropriate thought surfaced, then slipped free without her permission. “I have to use the restroom.” Wasn’t that cliché? She’d have sworn she heard someone in a movie say the same thing. Nevertheless, mother nature was mother nature.

Beneath her, Jayce chuckled.
“Wet your pants.”

Gah!
“I am
not
wetting my pants.” The ridiculous remark assuaged her frazzled nerves. Despite her circumstances, she let out a soft laugh, then quickly stifled it. She shouldn’t be laughing. She didn’t want to die. Not when everything she wanted was at last within her grasp. Jayce—she’d confessed she loved him. He’d repeated the precious words. There must be a way. Things couldn’t end like this. They just…couldn’t.

The quiet hit her again, like heavy bricks flung down on her shoulders.
She resisted the urge to fidget. Clamped her teeth into her cheeks to keep her body still. But the more she strained against the lack of noise, the more deafening it became. She opened her mouth to alleviate the silence, when a faint, rhythmic,
beep…beep
filtered into her awareness.

Another dose of fear coursed through her veins.
Ever so slightly she straightened her spine. “Jayce, what’s that sound?” She didn’t want to know. Really didn’t want to hear the answer.

“Timer.”

“Timer?” To her shame, her voice pitched a higher octave. A bomb. She was sitting on a bomb. Somehow that solitary word brought everything down to a narrow focus. This wasn’t a game. Her
life
was on the line. She cleared her throat, willed her pulse to steady again. “I thought you said it was pressure sensitive.”

“It is.”

His lack of additional explanations told her he wasn’t conveying the full truth. But right now, she didn’t think she really wanted to ask. Really, she knew everything that mattered. She was sitting on a bomb.

Oh, God.

The thought blasted through her, reminding her of the gravity of her circumstances. She crossed one ankle over the opposite foot that braced her in place, and stared at the front window, gnawing on her lower lip to contain a sob. Would it hurt? Would she even know it happened? She didn’t want to die like this; she had yet to visit Rome. Hadn’t seen the sunset on an island beach. Hadn’t held her own child in her arms.

One by one all the things she hadn’t accomplished in life fast-forwarded through her mind.
So many things. But the most important fiddled beneath her chair, and the prospect of losing Jayce had tears brimming in her eyes. She was so close to forever. So close to everything she’d ever dreamed of.

Before the tears could break free, headlights flashed in the parking lot.
Hope she couldn’t explain pulled her out of the arms of despair. Kane and Brice? She glanced at the wall-mounted clock. No, it took ten minutes to make it from her house here.

“There’s someone here.”

“Kane might have called someone.”

“Oh.”
But I didn’t tell him why to come.
Jayce must not have been paying attention. And she really ought to stop distracting him. But the conversation was making it possible to stay somewhat still.

Frowning, she watched a shadow come up the walkway.
The broken front door creaked as it opened. Alyssa tensed all over again. She gripped the arms of the chair in a viselike hold.

“Jayce Honeycutt?” a masculine voice called.

Alyssa blinked. Maybe Kane
had
sensed something and called someone after all.

“Yeah?” Jayce called from beneath her chair.
She could feel his fingers prodding just beneath her thighs.

She watched, obediently motionless despite the rigid nature of her spine and the cramping in her thighs.
An athletic silhouette approached the doorway. To her surprise, she recognized him. It was the same blond man in the grey sedan who’d asked her for directions, then waved just before she’d been kidnapped.

Only now, instead of his teasing grin, he was armed with a gun.

“Jayce.” She whimpered. “Jayce, he’s got a g-gun.”

“Alyssa,” the man nodded at her.
“Sorry you’re caught in this crossfire. Need to have a word with Honeycutt.”

Sorry?
Fury coursed through her veins. If she could move, she’d throw this chair at his head.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Jayce slide out from under her chair.
He lay on his back, fiddling with something beneath his suit jacket. Gradually, she realized he was freeing his own gun. With his jacket unfastened, he rose to his knees and peered over the top of the desk. “Who’s asking?”

“I am,” the blonde answered.

“Sorry, but that doesn’t mean anything. You are?”

“It’s really not important, but I’ll give you a name.
Toledo. I’m afraid you’ll have to come with me for some questioning.”

* * *

Toledo.
So this was the bastard who’d convinced McTavish he was a government guy. He had the right build. The arrogance too. But evidently he didn’t know jack about investigations. If he did, given he knew Jayce’s full name, he’d have discovered Jayce was government too. And a damn sight more dangerous than this little piss-ant.

All the more reason to believe McTavish had been fed a line of bull.