Rescue on the Run

by Jaycee Bullard

And if Abby had called for help, backup would be on the way.

  He peered around the side of the table and took stock of his shooters’ positions. One of the gunmen had barricaded himself behind the cashier’s station. The other was lying on the floor, clutching a bloody hand to his chest. So he hadn’t missed with his shot. From the way the fallen man was moaning, the injury appeared severe enough to count him out.

  One down and one to go.

  Cal pulled himself upright, his gun at the ready. He had a clear shot at the first gunman, and the chance to end this now.

  But when he twisted his head, his stomach clenched. A tall woman was standing in front of the door he’d entered minutes ago, her brows bent into a deep frown as she pressed her pistol against Abby’s head. Abby’s eyes met his with a look of abject disappointment.

  “Drop your weapon now,” the woman said. “And kick it over to me.”

  Cal’s finger froze on the trigger. He could probably still get off a shot. But as he looked at Abby, he knew the risk was too great. Her face was pale and drawn against her jet-black hair. But there was fire and determination blazing in her eyes.

  He had run out of options. There was no other choice but to obey the woman’s command.

  Setting down his gun, he nudged it out of reach and raised his hands in surrender.

  The younger of the shooters, a man in a black T-shirt, stepped around from the cashier’s station. With a slow and steady gait, he walked across the lobby, the snarl on his lips daring Cal to move.

  Cal’s eyes didn’t waver as he held the robber’s taunting gaze.

  Two steps closer, and the man was at his side. Without speaking a word, he raised his .44 Magnum and brought it down hard on the back of Cal’s head.

  And everything faded to black.

  TWO

  Abby bit back a scream as Cal’s body crumpled to the floor. She glanced around the lobby, struggling to come to terms with the scene unfolding before her.

  The place looked like a battle zone, with bits of wood and plaster and brass scattered across the floor. The mahogany desk had been upended. The deposit slips and notepaper that once filled its drawers were strewn on every surface like confetti caught in the wind. To her left, one of the robbers—an older man with a beard and a moustache—was propped up against the wall, clutching his hand and moaning with pain. The body of the security guard was still in front of the door, his eyes open and lifeless. Zander Phillips, husband, and father of three grown kids. Rest in peace.

  “Well, hey, there, Martina. Looks like you were right about securing the outside of the building,” the younger robber in a black T-shirt said. The sheath of a long thin knife swayed against his hip as he moved across the room. “I’ll take care of Tomas while you take the hostage to the break room. We’ll deal with this one later.” He nudged Cal’s prone body with his boot. “Come back and help me move him. I want to clean up the lobby in case we have any more unexpected visitors.”

  Where would they move him? And was Cal seriously injured or just temporarily out of commission? She swiveled her head to check as the woman—Martina—pushed her forward toward the hall.

  Abby’s brain flashed to her next move. Should she try to break free and make a run for it? Her assailant had loosened her grip, and she sensed an opportunity. But would she be quick enough to make it out the door? And if she reached the parking lot, what then? The consequences of failure hung like the acrid smell of gunpowder lingering in the air.

  Too late. Martina’s long fingernails dug deep against the sleeve of her parka. Abby tried to go limp, but her assailant clamped down harder, pulling her into the corridor, dragging her past two closed doors until they reached a room at the end of the hall.

  Martina pulled a key from her pocket and fitted it into the lock.

  “Wait!” Abby turned to face her. “I’m a paramedic. And I’m worried about my friend, the tall man in the overalls who’s still lying on the lobby floor. Can you bring him...?” The rest of her words caught in her throat as Martina slid her hand against the small of her back and shoved her across the threshold.

  Abby’s legs buckled under her as she landed hard on the carpeted floor. The door slammed shut behind her, plunging the room into darkness. She pushed up on her elbows and swiveled her head. Hot tears pricked at the backs of her eyes, but she blinked them away. She took a breath to calm her racing heart. The air felt warm as it filled up her lungs, and the quivering in her body began to slow down.

  Calm, steadying breaths. Calm, steadying breaths. She refused to give in to panic. She was trained to deal with emergencies. At least once a week, she answered a call where a victim was in shock. It was all about turning negative emotions into a constructive response. She pulled herself upright and traced her hand along the wall until she found a switch. The overhead fluorescent fixture flickered twice, illuminating the windowless room in a dim yellow glow. She tried the door. Locked. No surprise there. Slipping her arms out of the sleeves of her parka, she kicked off her wet pumps and surveyed what looked to be a typical break room. In one corner, there was a refrigerator with an old-school television propped by its side. Next to that was a trestle table with four sling-back chairs.

  The clock on the microwave flashed the time. Five thirty-two. It had been almost forty minutes since she arrived at the bank, and it was hopelessly apparent that help was not on the way. How different this would be if Davey was already living with her. If there was someone who might worry when she failed to arrive home as promised and call the police to report her missing.

  Had she really just wished for something that existed only in her deepest imaginings? There was no child at home that needed minding, no worried babysitter to wonder why she hadn’t returned. At least not yet. No one would miss her until Monday morning, when she was slotted to start her shift.

  As her eyes grew acclimated to the dim light of the break room, she noticed what looked like a human form stretched out on a sofa by the back wall. What! Who? She rushed forward to investigate. Curled up under a light sheet was bank teller Isobel Carrolls. Nine months pregnant and asleep.

  “Isobel?” Abby reached over and touched her arm. “Are you hurt in any way?”

  Isobel opened her eyes and blinked. “No, but... What are you doing here, Abby? Do you know about the robbery? It was horrible. One of the men held a gun to my head and said if I moved, he would shoot me. Zander tried to help me. Is he okay?”

  Abby shook her head.

  “Oh, no,” Isobel wailed. “He was so brave. Ohh.” She gasped and clutched her sides. “My stomach aches so much.” She rocked her body from side to side, her face tight with anguish. Her writhing lasted for a couple of minutes and then ended as suddenly as it began.

  Could the bank teller be in the early stages of labor? Abby pulled in a long, deep breath. She knew from their time together in Bible Study that Isobel’s baby was due any day. “How long have you been experiencing these pains?”

  “Not too long. They started right after the robbers dragged me into the break room. I was screaming, and the older one said he would give me something to calm me down. He had a bottle of pills and forced a couple of them down my throat. I didn’t want to take them, but he made me.” She raised her head and pushed her tears away. “But everything must be okay since you’re here now. Did the police catch the robbers? Can I go home?”

  Regret and self-recriminations pitted in Abby’s stomach. If only she hadn’t wasted so much time searching for Cal’s phone, she might have called 911 and help would be on the way. She shook her head. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but the robbers are still here. I’m a hostage just like you.” She expected the look of disappointment that played across the bank teller’s face, but not the way Isobel’s entire body seemed to shudder as her head dropped back against the sofa.

  “Iz. I’m really worried about your pains. Can you tell me how close together they are?
”

  The answer to the question came as a quiet snore. Apparently, her patient had fallen back to sleep.

  Abby blew out a deep breath of frustration. It didn’t make sense that Isobel would choose to nap at a time like this. Unless... Isobel had said that one of the robbers had forced her to take some tablets. Had she been given sleeping pills to calm her hysterics? That wouldn’t be advisable for someone in her condition. Especially if she actually was in labor, which could easily have been jump-started by the trauma of the robbery. These kinds of early warning pains could last for hours, sometimes even days. But it was impossible to predict which would be the case.

  Either way, she needed to get Isobel out of here—and fast.

  Pacing across the floor, she considered what she remembered about the building’s layout. When Keystone Bank opened its doors in the eighties, its unique A-frame design had made it a landmark in Dagger Lake. But the decade had passed, and its architecture had become dated. In recent years, the ceiling in the lobby had been opened up to provide a brighter, more open space. But the offices in the back occupied the dark and windowless part of the original structure. Which meant that she and Isobel were stuck in a room with only one point of exit—a locked door.

  From the hall came the soft slide of rubber soles against a tile floor. Was it Martina—or one of the others—returning to kill the hostages? She needed to act while she had the chance. If she could overpower the person who opened the door, she could run to the lobby and phone for help.

  Her shoulders tightened, and the hairs on the nape of her neck lifted in fear. There was no time for a well-thought-out strategy. She crouched down to search for a weapon, something, anything she could use against her assailant. Under the counter, she found a heavy metal tray. She grabbed it and took a position along the wall. Raising her weapon above her head, she waited as the handle turned. The door swung open, and the man in the black T-shirt stepped inside.

  Abby didn’t hesitate. With a hard swing, she brought the tray down on his head.

  “Ugh!” Black T-shirt dropped with a thunk the load he was carrying, and staggered forward, his face a mask of twisted fury and pain.

  Pinpricks of fear danced down Abby’s spine. It had been a mistake to think that a man of his size would be disabled by a blow to the head. She hadn’t hit him hard enough to knock him out. All she had succeeded in doing was inflaming his anger and raising the stakes. He flung himself at her, his eyes murderous as he pushed backward, slapping her face until the sting of his fingers burned against her flesh. Her legs bowed beneath her, and she crumpled to the ground. Instinct guided her actions as she pulled her knees up against her chest and backed into the corner. Her entire body trembled with terror as he moved toward her, the long edge of a knife glimmering in his hand. Her stomach roiled as he bent down and pressed the blade against her neck. It bit into her skin, and the sticky sensation of blood flowed down her collar. A sharp pain pierced below her jaw, and she could feel her defiance and courage wilting.

  “You’re a foolish woman.” His breath was warm against her ear. “But I am pleased to see that you are quite resourceful, for the time might come when we require your help. But remember this, and remember it well. If you refuse to comply with any of our requests, you will end up dead, like the security guard on the lobby floor.”

  Abby squeezed her eyes closed. Her body felt taut, as if all of her muscles were being stretched ridged. A second ticked by, and then she felt a cool shaft of air against her neck as the blade was pulled away. She relaxed her muscles and opened her eyes. Her tormentor had sauntered back toward the doorway and was squatting down to pick up what looked like a pair of old boots. The woman—Martina—stumbled in behind him, helping to haul Cal into the room.

  The two robbers dropped Cal’s body next to the table.

  Black T-shirt bent to brush off his jeans as Martina glanced around the room, her eyes fixing on the tray in the corner. “She hit you hard, Max.”

  “Not so hard.” The man in the black T-shirt—Max—reached up and touched a spot on his head. He looked down at his hand. “There is no blood, see? Come. Let’s go. We have more important things to do at the moment than waste our time with hostages.”

  As the door clicked shut, Abby rushed across the room and knelt beside Cal. His eyes were closed, and at first glance, she couldn’t tell whether he was alive or dead. She placed her fingers into the groove of his wrist to check his pulse, her own heart beating double time in her chest.

  * * *

  It felt like he had been transported from a bad dream into a painful nightmare. Cal didn’t know where he was, but it sure wasn’t comfortable. The surface beneath him was hard and cold. His brain felt thick and fuzzy. And he couldn’t even begin to describe the agony emanating from the back of his head.

  He looked up and blinked. Possibly his eyes were playing tricks on him, but the woman bent over him looked a lot like Abby Marshall. A veil of thick black hair covered most of her face, but he’d recognize that determined expression anywhere. And then he remembered. He was at the bank. Abby had gone to his truck to call for help. But instead she had been captured and dragged into the middle of the gunfight.

  “Cal?” Abby’s gentle voice brought him back to reality. “Are you okay?”

  For a moment, he thought he saw tears in her eyes. Unlikely. Abby was as tough as they came. This was the woman who had stitched up Jake Radley after his wood-chopping accident. Who had cauterized Mayor Hovland’s thumb after removing the ice pick. No, there would be no signs of sentimentality from Abby Marshall. She was far too professional for that.

  He stared at her. The freckles sprinkled across her nose stood out more than usual, and her eyes were softened with concern.

  And there was a trail of blood on her neck and a large, red imprint above her jaw.

  “What happened to your face?”

  She reached up to touch her swollen cheek and flinched as if surprised by the tenderness. “The robber named Max retaliated when I hit him with a tray. I thought that if I knocked him out, I could run through the door and escape. It’s no big deal. I can’t even feel it.”

  No big deal? Facing down an armed opponent twice her size? That sounded like a pretty big deal to him.

  As Abby knelt by his side, every fiber of her being seemed to radiate confidence and control. “Hold still for a minute while I examine the cut on the back of your head.”

  “I’m fine,” he said. But as he pushed himself up, the floor seemed to move beneath him as a wave of nausea ricocheted up his spine. He closed his eyes to regain control and then opened them up and looked around. “So we’re in the break room.”

  Abby nodded. “Isobel Carrolls is in here with us, too. As far as I can tell, she’s the only other hostage. But she seems to be in the early stages of labor.”

  Cal blew out a long sigh. The situation had just gone from bad to worse. He turned and quickly surveyed the room. No windows. One door. There would be no easy paths of escape.

  “I’m guessing that the woman who hauled you into the lobby stopped you before you could call for backup.”

  Abby nodded.

  “Abby?” Isobel sat up on the couch and looked around the room. “I heard you talking. Is there someone else in the room with us? I’m having another pain now. I’m really scared.”

  “Sheriff Stanek is here now, but don’t worry. I’m going to stay right here with you until the pain passes.”

  Cal watched Abby as she bent over the couch, massaging Isobel’s shoulders and hands. In the past, he and Abby had gotten along about as well as oil and vinegar, but... He scratched his chin, feeling the start of a five-o’clock shadow. It was impossible not to admire Abby’s kindness and competence. Not to mention the courage she had shown in trying to escape.

  He turned his attention back to Isobel. “Can you remember any details about how the robbery went down?”


  Isobel shook her head. “It’s all pretty fuzzy. It was a little before four, and everyone else was gone for the day. There were only two of us left to close up. Me and Zander. Two men and a woman burst through the door with their guns drawn. Zander tried to protect me, but they shot him before he could even pull his weapon.”

  Cal shook his head. “What about the alarm?”

  “I would have hit it, normally. But this morning, a repairman came in to upgrade the system, and he shut the whole system all down.”

  Hmm. That was suspicious. “Was the bank manager aware of the work order to disable the alarm?”

  “I don’t know. I came in late because I had a doctor’s appointment, so I heard about the whole thing secondhand.” A shadow of panic crossed her eyes. “Do you think the repairman was one of the robbers?”

  It made sense that someone would need to recon the space and take out the alarm ahead of the robbery. “What reason did the manager give for leaving early?”

  “She found out last week that she won a weekend getaway to Miami Beach, and she was in a hurry to catch her flight.” Isobel must have clocked the look of skepticism on his face because she quickly continued. “I see where you are going with this, but Tessa would never help anyone steal from the bank. She loves her job. And she’d never put me in any danger. She didn’t want to leave me alone, but I insisted. West Security stops by for a midafternoon pickup, and it usually stays quiet after that. Agghh.” Isobel clutched her stomach and rolled sideways.

  Abby reached over and took Isobel’s hand. “It’s okay, Iz.”

  Isobel’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Abby, it hurts. Will you pray with me? I’m worried about my baby boy. I just wish I knew for sure that everything was going to be okay.”

  “I will. But let’s talk to God together. Remember that He said, ‘Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.’”

  Matthew 18, verse 20. Cal knew it well.

  There was a short pause and then Abby began to pray. “Dear God. We know that You have a divine plan for all of us. Help us to place our trust in You. We need Your protection. All four of us. Isobel. Cal. Me. But most especially this little baby boy who in just a short time will be entering the world. In Jesus’s name, we pray. Amen.”