Second Chances: A PAVAD Duet (19 page)

Richison scooped the blonde
into his arms, holding her as she coughed and cried. He yelled at
Dan as he carried her toward the emergency exits. “Last I saw they
were in Brewster’s office! Fifteen minutes ago! Sam’s
asthmatic!”

“
Go! Get that girl out of
here! Responders are on the way!”

Dan turned toward the doc’s
office, where he’d left her just that morning. He took the final
turn in the hallway into the area where he knew her lab was located
next to her office. She and Kelly should have been there somewhere,
but smoke made it nearly impossible for him to see the doors. There
was far more smoke than fire. That was good, wasn’t it? The
sprinklers were raining down, but the smoke seemed to be getting
thicker. He covered his mouth and moved as carefully through the
smoke as he could. Where was the doc? Was she already outside? He
was not stopping until he’d searched every nook and cranny of the
lab and offices.

His foot hit something. He
heard a moan. He’d found someone. He dropped to his knees and felt
around. It wasn’t the doc; someone taller. He pulled Kelly into his
arms. She coughed. Thank God. His daughter was alive. But where was
the doc? She and Kelly were partners. Were never too far away from
each other while working. “Kelly! Where’s the doc?”

“
Somewhere. She was right
here.” His daughter cried out after she spoke, then bit back a
moan. She was hurt. But alive.

Dan pulled his daughter to
her feet, hoping she'd be able to stand. “Go. Get out of here,
now!”

“
Not without Ally!” Kelly
pushed his hands away though she was obviously struggling. “Get
her, Daddy! Hurry!” She dissolved into a fit of
coughing.

“
Get out, kid. I’ll get the
doc. You, go!” Black smoke made visibility nearly impossible. “If
I’m not out within three minutes, you send help down here! I’m not
leaving without her! Go!”

"Not without you
two!"

"Dammit, Kelly, I don't
have time to argue! Go!"

“
I’ve got Kelly, Dan!”
Josh’s voice came through the smoke, strong and assured, over the
sound of fire alarms and the tin voice instructing everyone to
evacuate. “You have two minutes to join us!”

Dan wasn’t sure where the
boy had come from, but he was eternally grateful Josh was there.
“Go! I’ll get the doc!”

He could hear Kelly yelling
at Josh as he dragged her out of the burning lab. Could hear her
yelling for him and the doc.

Dan stayed low to the
ground where faint visibility remained. The office and attached lab
weren’t very big, maybe thirty by fifty. She was in here somewhere.
It took him precious seconds to find her though she wasn’t far from
where he’d found Kelly, lying partially behind the mangled remains
of her metal desk. What the hell had happened in here?

The smoke was getting
worse, and the flames had spread from her desk to the rug on the
floor. It took him more precious time to get her over his shoulder.
He felt his way to the door, and carried her into the hallway. She
hadn’t moved. How bad was she hurt? What the hell had happened in
here, anyway? A bomb or something? Chemical leak?

He carried her out the
emergency exit as fire personnel rushed the labs. He yelled at them
to keep searching when one tried to take the doc from him. He had
her, he could get her out. They still needed to make sure everyone
else on the basement level made it out.

Outside, he was met by a
scene of controlled chaos. Ambulances waited, and fire responders
had swarmed the building. He’d passed two more on his way out, but
he refused to give her over to them. Little Doctor Bellows, his
teammate, oversaw a triage area near the ambulances, directing her
medical staff in treating minor injuries, while paramedics saw to
more complex.

Dan carried the doc
straight to a waiting ambulance. He shoved uninjured people out of
his way and laid her on the gurney. “She’s pregnant with twins! I
found her in the lab near the source of the explosions.”

“
Step back, sir. We’ll take
it from here!” The EMT tried to push him aside. Dan stepped out of
the man’s way, but stayed at her side.

“
Sir, we'll take good care
of her.” The EMT’s impatience was clear as he strapped an oxygen
mask over the doc’s face.

“
I stay with her! She’s
mine!” Dan waited until they lifted her into the ambulance. “And
I’m the father!”

Someone was holding her
hand, talking to her. It took Ally a moment to recognize the voice.
She opened her eyes to see Dan’s middle daughter leaning over her.
Where was she? It took her another moment to recognize where she
was. A hospital. Why? What had happened? The last she remembered
was avoiding Kelly all afternoon. “Emma, what happened?”

The girl smiled, through
her obvious worry. “Hey mommy-dearest. About time you woke up and
joined us.”

“
Why am I here? Was there
an accident? Where are the kids?” Ally tried to sit up, but the IV
in her arm prevented it.

“
They’re fine. Gracie has
them, with the Hellbrooks. Dad had them picked up at the school
when the Hellbrooks picked up their little boy.” Emma’s hand
brushed the hair off Ally’s forehead. Hair that smelled like smoke.
Why would her hair smell like smoke?

“
Oh my God! Where’s Kelly?
Was she hurt?”

The door opened before Emma
could answer. Ally’s eyes darted to Dan’s. He was pale and smoke
streaked. “Doc. You’re awake.”

“
Dan? What happened?
Where’s Kelly? Was she hurt? Was anyone? I don’t really remember…”
Anything. Other than her and Kelly ignoring each other through most
of the day.

“
Kelly’s down the hall.
She’s had some burns. Parts of your chair hit her and landed on
her. She’ll eventually need plastic surgery for the scars. The
doctor believes she can have the surgery at the same time they
handle the gunshot scars, as well.”

“
What happened? The last
thing I remember is lunch with Marianna.”

Dan motioned Emma out of
the room, then he closed the door. “Someone set off several
explosions in the labs and basements using chemical technology we
haven’t identified yet. You and Kelly were less than five feet from
one of the detonations.”

Ally gasped. That
close?

“
Yeah. Apparently you and
Kelly were talking. You hugged her, then you both realized what was
happening. She pushed you to the floor and covered you with her
body just as the charge exploded.”

“
That’s how she got the
burns.” Oh, Kelly. Ally felt tears hit her eyes.

“
And you hit your head on
your way down. And had some chemical and some smoke
inhalation.”

“
And the
babies?”

“
They’re fine. The doctors
checked, then I made them double check. You—we—were all lucky.” He
sat on the mattress beside her. His hands trembled when he touched
her abdomen, then her cheeks. “I could have lost you. All of you
today. I can’t do that. You’ll need to promise me that won’t
happen, doc. I can’t go through that kind of loss again,
ok?”

Ally looked at him, her
headache fading away, her worries for the rest of the people she
worked with dissipating. He wasn’t telling her that he wanted her
just because of the situation. He was telling her that he cared for
her. More than cared for her. “I can do that."

“
Good. Because, doc, I
realized something when I was running through the smoke and flames
to get to you.”

“
What?”

“
I don’t want to lose you.
Even if the babies weren’t a reality. Even if Kelly and the other
kids were no longer in the picture, anything. I don’t want to lose
you. I don’t know what it means yet, but I’m going to do my
damnedest to find out.” He leaned over, and kissed her through the
tubes and monitors.

Ally raised her free hand
to his hair and wove her fingers through the reddish strands. She
waited until he lifted his head and looked at her. “I’d like that.
Very much. I think I could love you, Dan Reynolds, given half a
chance.”

“
I’ll take that chance, and
give one of my own. Come home with me, doc. The instant the doctors
turn you loose. Come home with me where you belong.”

Ally thought that sounded
wonderful and like something she could definitely do.

Something she would
definitely do. Tomorrow their second chance would begin.

He was the kind of kid
others liked to beat up on, but then went on to make billions of
dollars in the global market. He looked like trouble, blond hair
sticking out at odd angles, blue eyes sullen and rebellious behind
thick glasses, wearing a ratty t-shirt that he’d probably had
for years. He looked nothing like his dark haired mother. Except
for the blue eyes. The kid had her eyes. He didn’t even look like
his six brothers.

Ed Dennis flicked a glance
outside his open door, where those six brothers sat. Each one was
dark-haired and strong. Nothing puny about the lot of them. This
one, though, he stood out. Ed hid his smile.
This
kid was probably a real pain in
the ass.

Ed looked at the boy then
the boy’s mother. “This is serious, doctor. I don’t have to tell
you how seriously this division takes security breaches of this
magnitude. And he’s old enough to face adult
consequences.”

He didn’t miss the fear
that hit her pretty eyes. “He’s only eleven, sir. And he’s never
done anything like this before.”

“
Still,
there were
people
in that elevator.” Ed frowned as he recalled exactly how he’d
felt knowing that one of those people stuck in the elevator had
been his daughter. Another had been her close friend, a woman nine
months pregnant and in labor. “Ana McLaughlin and the baby—it could
have had serious repercussion.”

He’d deliberately lowered
his voice to its lowest, its coldest. Scariest. The kid flinched,
the mother trembled. He smiled then, deliberately. He knew his
reputation for being cold and terrifying. And this woman, a new
transplant who’d started in the division that very morning,
wouldn’t know it was all show.

Not yet, anyway. He took
advantage of that. He kept the glare at full power for a long
moment—until the rebellion slipped out of the boy’s eyes and a
worry slipped in.

The boy’s mother shifted,
her long legs crossing nervously. Ed fought the urge to run a quick
eye over those legs.

They were great legs, but
now wasn’t the time. Plus, Ed Dennis didn’t ogle his subordinates
in his office—it just wasn’t done. He flicked his eyes in her
direction, almost against his will. Her lower lip was caught
between her teeth; her eyes were soft and wide, scared. She kept
glancing between this one boy and the six waiting outside the
office. Seven. Ed refrained from shaking his head in wonder. The
long, lean vision in front of him did not look capable of having
carried seven boys.

His ex-wife put on fifty
pounds when she’d carried Georgia. One reason why she’d refused to
have another.

Still, this woman in front
of him looked damned good. Of course, seven sons probably ran her
ragged, burned off excess pounds. God knew, his grandson Matthew
kept him fit when he had him. And this one, this middle one, had
somehow hacked the computer system controlling the entire St. Louis
field office of the FBI. He’d screwed with or shut down every major
maintenance system in the building.

He was good, but Ed knew
the truth; the people in
his
unit were better. More experienced. And if it
hadn’t been for his people, it was possible Ana McLaughlin would
have bled to death after giving birth to her daughter in the damned
elevator.

“
Ted understands what he
did, sir.” She chewed on her thumbnail as she spoke. “I can assure
you he will be properly punished when he gets home.”

“
Still punished at home is
a bit different in this type of situation. Taking away his video
games doesn’t exactly suffice.” He didn’t miss the way her
shoulders jerked, and her chin tilted up. She didn’t like that. He
smiled again, grim and cold.

Her eyes flashed, a touch
of temper making them brighten. “Trust it will be taken care
of.”

“
It will. But not by
you.”

“
Excuse me?” She stiffened,
one hand falling protectively on her son’s narrow
shoulder.

“
When does Ted return to
school?”

“
Thursday. I wanted them
to have a few days to settle from the move. They are in a year
round program at Brynlock Academy. Why?” Ed didn’t miss the way she
trembled, or stood, blocking her son with her body.
Instinctively.

He understood that. There
wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do to protect his child. “Every day
after school, for the next ten weeks, Ted will report directly to
my assistant, Agent Len.”

“
Excuse me?”