Red Hot BOX SET: Complete Series 1-4: A Patrick & Steeves Suspense (13 page)

J
ack shuffled through the tunnel
, shining the large light ahead. Miguel followed, laden down with supplies. They were running out of options. He hadn’t found his phone - that bitch Emily must have taken it. He should’ve know she’d be trouble after that mess she was mixed up with in Afghanistan. Although she’d been honorably discharged, he’d heard rumors. He needed his damn phone. If the boss didn’t hear from him, he’d send someone else to clean up the mess they’d left.

And this time, the clean up would include him and his men. His life depended on getting Rico and Chuy out of the damn hole before someone showed up. There was a chance, if he could get out of here and find the firefighter, that he could redeem himself. Maybe even turn things to his advantage.

Silence greeted him as he stepped into the cavern. He approached the shaft and shone the light directly down the hole, illuminating two black shapes at the bottom. “Get over here with that rope,” he ordered.

Miguel dropped the sack on the ground and fished out the rope. “Wake up on the wrong side of the bed, boss?”

“Shut the fuck up, Miguel. We need to get the hell out of here. Put your arms up.” This was what hiring idiots brought him. Trouble, conflict, wasted minutes.

His eyes narrowed. “I’m not going down that hole again.”

“Think again, cowboy. I’ll harness you.” Jack waited, toes tapping inside the over-sized boots. “Put your arms up. Now.”

Miguel shook his head. “No. You don’t have the strength to pull me back up. You go down this time.”

“I don’t have the strength to carry them back up.” He took a step closer to Miguel, lips pursed.

“I’ll haul ‘em up,” he argued.

“You’re wasting time, Miguel. Put your damn arms up.”

Miguel squinted at Jack but raised his arms to allow him to rig a harness around his chest. “You damn well better get me back up here if I pass out again.”

“Quit yer bitchin’.” Jack stepped away, rifled through the sack, and tossed a checkered cotton kerchief at Miguel. “Tie this over your mouth and nose.”

When Miguel was ready, Jack led him to the hole. “Talk to me all the way down,” he said. “Just grab whoever is closest and bring him back up.”

The big man stepped into the hole, foot reaching for a solid spot on the metal rungs. He shot a look of poison at Jack, then disappeared from sight.

“Talk to me,
amigo
,” shouted Jack as he guided the rope down the hole.

“Yeah, all good,” Miguel yelled back. Another five feet. “Good.” Five feet more. “Good.”

“How close are you to the bottom?”

“Can’t tell. Shine the light down.”

“I have two hands asshole and they’re both on this rope. You wanna get out of there again, or not?”

“Fuck, Jack.”

The rope went slack in Jack’s hands.

“I’m here. Shine a light down.”

Jack put his boot on the rope to secure it in place, reached for the large light and shone it directly down the shaft. “Move to the side, I can’t see anything.”

“There’s nowhere to go.” Jack watched as Miguel hefted the man over his shoulder and started back up. “Keep the light on the ladder.”

Jack moved the beam to the rungs.

“Not in my eyes,
cabrón
.” Miguel’s huffs of exertion echoed off the narrow walls.

“What did you call me?” Jack flicked the light off.

“I’m doing the work here, help me the fuck out,” he growled.

“You’d be smart to watch your mouth, Miguel.”

“You want your fucking guy back or not?”

Jack relented and shone the light farther up the rungs to guide him. As Miguel’s head poked above the surface, Jack leaned forward, hauled the man off his shoulders and laid him out on the ground. He leaned over Chuy and put his hand in front of his mouth. Nothing. He pressed his fingers against the side of his neck. “Shit.”

Behind him, Miguel grunted. “He’s dead.”

“Not yet. He’s mostly dead.”

“Mostly dead?”

“He’s got a very faint pulse. We need to get him outside into the fresh air.”

“First we get Rico.”

“Fine, as long as you’re quick.” Chuy was his best man, he didn’t want to lose him.

Miguel collapsed to the ground, wheezing. “I can’t go back down.”

“You’ll have to.” Time was passing, the clock ticking, and all Jack could think about was someone holding a gun to his head. They had to get out of here. “Buck up, you can do it.”

There was a moment of tense silence before Miguel wretched darkened phlegm onto the ground. He shook his head and looked up at Jack. “You’ll have to go. I’ll make sure you get back up.”

“You don’t even have the strength to stand up.” Jack paced in front of Miguel. “We’ll come back for Rico later.”

Miguel grabbed his shin, his fingers dug deep into his flesh. Jack wrenched his leg away.

“We’re not leaving him here, you bastard. Look at the shape Chuy is in. Rico’s been down the longest. If we don’t bring him up, he’ll die.”

“Fine, fuck, help harness me then.”

M
iguel pushed
up onto one knee and raised his arms while Jack lifted the rope off his shoulders. “Get me up.” Jack put his shoulder under his arm and helped him stand. Reaching behind his head, he untied the kerchief and passed it toward Jack. He squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them, there were still two of Jack. His vision blurred, his stomach dry-heaved. All he wanted was to sit down.

“Let’s go,” Jack said, waving circles in the air. “Put the rope on me.”

As best he could, focused hard on the simple act of staying vertical, Miguel knotted the rope into a harness around Jack’s ribs. “Ready?”

Jack nodded. “Make sure you have the rope.”

“Don’t worry. Get Rico.”

Jack put one foot down the hole, looked into the square darkness and back up at Miguel. “I can’t carry him back up. I need to take a second rope down so you can pull him up.”

“Fuck, Jack, I barely have the strength to stand. I can’t pull him up.”

“You have a better plan?”

“Yeah, carry him up. I carried Chuy.”

“That fat little fucker? Not happening. It’s gonna take a few minutes for me to get the rope on him. You’ll get a second wind.”

“Right.” Not likely. Miguel reached for the second rope, tied a large knot, placed it under his foot, and dropped the other end down the shaft. He moved to the edge and threaded the rope through his hands as Jack descended. “What’s taking so long?”

“It’s pitch black. I’m feeling my way down this damn ladder.”

When the rope finally went slack, Miguel shone light into the hole.

“Move the light to the right,” Jack yelled.

Miguel watched as Jack lifted Rico and tied the rope under his arms. “Let me know when you’re ready. I’ll bring him up.”

“No,” Jack yelled. “Wait for me to get up the ladder.”

“Jesus, Jack, he’s been down there forever.”

“I thought you didn’t have the strength to pull him up? I’ll climb out, and we’ll pull him up together.”

Bastard. But for once he agreed with him. “Fine. You ready then?”

“Yeah, I’m coming. Keep the slack out of my rope, they’re all tangled up.”

Miguel slid the rope through his hands as Jack made his way up the ladder. A strong pull on the rope threw him off balance. Rope burned through his grip as several yards of it yanked downward. He caught himself, corrected his stance, careful to keep his foot clamped on the second rope that was now attached to Rico.

“What the hell? What’s going on?”

When Jack didn’t respond, Miguel stepped closer to the edge. “Jack!”

In his hands, the rope was slack. He reached for the light and aimed it down the shaft. Jack laid prone at the bottom, half-covering Rico, his arm thrown out over Rico’s back.

Miguel groaned and slumped to the floor. He prayed aloud to the saints, pleaded to the Madonna, whispered to his dead father. With borrowed hope, he drew himself to a standing position and wrenched the rope around Jack tight. This would not be the end of him, or the end of Rico. Hand over hand, he hauled Jack’s weight up the shaft. Sweat beaded on his forehead, slid into his eyes. He swiped at his eyes with the back of his hands, lost his grip on the rope, cursed. He wished he’d grabbed gloves from the barn. Breathing labored, he rested to the count of ten.

Jack’s body swayed midway up the shaft, banging against the walls and iron rungs. Miguel huffed, braced himself and continued dragging him closer to the surface. Almost there. He could see the back of Jack’s shoulders, practically within reach. The rope snagged. Putting his back and full strength into it, he heaved and realized that he was pulling more weight now. Damn it. The rope beneath his foot jittered. Best he could tell, the rope was tangled and he couldn’t haul Jack up without bringing Rico’s body with him.

He threw his head back and bellowed. “Maria.” His voice bounced off the walls of the cavern as he called his wife’s name. In the thin light of the flashlight on the ground, he watched the rope dance and twitch. It couldn’t sustain more weight. There was always the option to drop the rope and walk away. Let that bastard Jack die down the hole. He could live with that.

What he couldn’t live with was leaving Rico behind. He dropped to the ground, extending his arms to their full length. If he could bring Jack up a few more inches, he could grab his arm. He strained against the rope with all he had, but couldn’t budge him. In desperation, he tugged in short bursts creating a bouncing. His fingers brushed the sleeve of Jack’s jacket, but the material slipped off the tips of his fingers. He bounced him again, got a grip on his arm and edged himself backward.

The muscles in his arm vibrated, his lungs burned with exertion. Inch by hard won inch, he brought him closer to the surface. He held steady, drew a breath, then heaved it out and used what remained of his strength to drag the top half of Jack’s body onto solid ground.

D
al shifted his weight
. Mere inches above his head, the burnt eggs curdled on the grill. They actually smelled good to him. He was starving. But hunger was the least of his worries. He had to figure a way to get them all out of danger. Kris had been his best friend for a long time. It had been selfish to put him at risk. Why hadn’t he just told him to sail the hell away as fast as he could?

“We need a plan,” Emily said. “Any ideas?”

He took a deep breath, exhaled slowly. At least she was talking to him again. He hadn’t meant to take his frustration out on her and regretted snapping at her earlier. They were in this together and he wanted to smooth the tension between them. “Let’s see. There’s no one coming to save us. Your boss is playing both sides and working for the guy who wants to kill me. There’s a thug up top with a gun in my best friend’s face. I need some time to digest this.”

“You’re worried about Kris.”

“I’m worried about all of us,” he said, instantly regretting the bite in his words. “We’re tied up like Christmas trees - how are we going to take this guy down?”

She shrugged and leaned her head back against his. “At some point, he’ll let down his guard.”

“And then what?”

“We overpower him. Take back control.”

“That sounds good in the movies, Em, but I don’t see it happening here.”

She rocked against him. “It has to happen here. I’m not going to sit here and wait for this asshole to kill us all.”

“More likely he’ll just deliver us to someone else who will kill us… with any luck, they won’t torture us first.”

“I understand your frustration - I do - but this is going to work better if we can focus on finding a way to get out of this.” She paused. “Kris said something to me about you being an American hero. What did he mean by that?”

Damn him. He’d left them alone for what, ten minutes?

“Dal?”

He squeezed his eyes closed, then focused on the tap dripping into the sink. “The big fire.”

“Which big fire?”

“The last one I fought. The one that put me on indefinite leave from the department.”

“I thought you were on vacation?”

“Yeah, well, that’s what they called it.” He laughed, a broken sound in the small space.

“So tell me,” she said.

“Nothing to tell.”

She pushed out a breath behind him. “Clearly there is, though. Tell me. Please, it’ll give me something else to think about.”

“Fine. A few months ago, there was a fire in a highrise. We had a lot of trouble with it. Burned hotter than hell. Accelerant will do that.”

“Someone set the fire?”

Apparently she was going to push for all the details. “The investigators think so. They haven’t completed their report.”

“Why were you put on leave?”

He sighed. “I was hospitalized for smoke inhalation.” And trauma, but he wasn’t going there in this conversation.

She tried to turn against him, her chin resting against his shoulder. “So the smoke inhalation the other night… that just exacerbated an earlier problem?”

“Yeah, it’s going to take a while for my lungs to function normally again.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice soft. “I didn’t know.” Silence grew between them, the vibration of the engine a pleasant distraction. “But that doesn’t explain his comment about being an American hero.”

He shrugged. “It was a big fire. A lot of people died. A lot of people.” He paused, counting the drops falling into the sink. “Including some of my friends. And I came out alive.”

“Surely others came out alive, too? Why didn’t I hear about this?”

“I don’t know. It was all over the news for days, weeks. The media hounded me at the hospital, at home --”

“Wait a minute… you mean the fire where Senator Green’s baby was rescued?”

“That’s the one.”

“It
was
all over the news. I was overseas but I saw the clip on the news station. They ran it for days - it’s etched in my memory for life, I think. The firefighter stepping out of the window onto the ladder with the child in his jacket… the shot of him handing over the baby on the ground… Dal?”

He focused on the tap over the sink. Stainless. Kris kept it in top shape, he wished he could reach up and stop the dripping.

“You’re the firefighter who saved the Senator’s baby.” A statement.

“Yes.” He took a breath in, the chaos of the scene on the ground, the charred and wounded bodies flared in his memory.

“That video got almost as much attention as the police chase with O.J. Simpson in the white Bronco.”

“I know,” he grunted. He couldn’t even buy a burger in San Diego without someone recognizing him. When he’d first gone home, he lived on take-out and delivery. Even the damn delivery guys knew who he was.

She leaned her weight against his back, intending to comfort him. “Whatever you think went wrong in that fire, a hell of a lot went right. You saved that baby’s life.”

“Can we stop talking about it now?”

“We can.”

Finally. The last thing he needed to do was revisit how many of his men he’d lost. Their faces haunted his dreams. Deep down, there was a part of him that felt he deserved this. Deserved to be facing death. Deserved to be left hanging, wondering when the ax would fall.

But once again, he was going to take the innocent down with him if he couldn’t figure a way out of this. Emily didn’t deserve to die. Kris sure as hell didn’t deserve to die.

The trauma specialist had told him, repeatedly, that he wasn’t responsible for the deaths of his co-workers in the fire. Blah, blah, blah. He didn’t have to live in his skin - what the hell did he know?

Emily changed the subject. “Let’s make a plan.”

“We just have to watch for an opportunity,” he said. “If he lets down his guard, we’ll go for it. Whatever you want to try, I have your back.” The phrase floated on the air. He imagined the words hanging over their heads - where they were tied back to back - in a big cartoon bubble with red letters and plenty of exclamation marks. He chuckled.

She butted her back against his, but snickered until she snorted, and that set him off. He laughed harder, silently, until his stomach hurt. Emily’s whole body shook against his back. The release felt good. Really good.