His stomach pitched and rolled, bile burning the back of his tight throat. Oh, fuck, he was gonna be sick. “Erin,” he croaked, aware that he was breathing too fast, that he was shaking all over and couldn’t stop it. She needed him, might be hurt, and he couldn’t fucking get to her. He sucked in an unsteady breath, forcing back the panic clawing at him. “I need you to call her—”
“Already had someone try and there was no answer,” Robert said. “I’ve got a helo inbound to pick us up, ETA twelve minutes. Meet me at the bottom of the gangplank. The pilot will fly us in as close as possible to headquarters, but everything’s gonna be shut down tight. With the radiation threat I can’t guarantee we’ll even get near it.”
“You gotta get me in there.” Wade didn’t care how the director made it happen, just as long as he did. Wade had to get to Erin now.
“I’ll do whatever I can, but I can’t make any guarantees. Now move your ass and get down here.” Robert disconnected.
Everything faded out. The noise around him disappeared. Frozen inside, Wade cast one final glance down at Rahim’s body before turning away, a curious sense of numbness stealing through him as he looked at the man he’d protected with his life for the past few years. There was nothing. No grief, no regret that Rahim was dead. Only the horror and regret that he hadn’t been able to protect Erin and prevent the bomb from going off. Oh, Jesus, he couldn’t handle the thought of her hurt, maybe dying or even—
A wounded sound tore free of his chest, terror and grief crushing his lungs and heart.
One of the medics caught his arm as he turned away. “You’re bleeding pretty badly. Let me take a look and get you bandaged up.”
Wade shook him off with a warning snarl and limped away as fast as his wounded leg would allow, hurrying through the stream of people rushing toward the stern. Two of his teammates caught up with him. They each banded an arm around his waist and hustled him through the crowd, down the gangplank. Wade spotted Robert immediately, standing with his own security team as he spoke on the phone.
The director’s gaze dropped to the blood streaming down the leg of Wade’s fatigue and he put a hand over his phone long enough to say, “Get that patched up before the helo gets here.”
He didn’t want to get patched up—didn’t want to waste a single fucking second waiting here when Erin needed him—except there was nothing he could do but wait for the helo, and he needed to stop the bleeding if he was going to be any help in the rescue effort. But inside his head, his mind screamed.
He prayed silently, an endless litany in both English and Pashto. Since getting kicked off the case he’d felt lost, a man between worlds without a home, but now he knew exactly where his home was. With Erin.
Don’t take her. Please, anything but that.
“Here, use this.”
He looked up at Anderson, who handed him a phone.
“Hope you get through to her.”
Right. His teammates would have overheard everything he and Robert said. Wade thanked him and dialed Erin’s cell number. It rang and rang then went to voicemail. He tried a text, waited endless minutes for her to answer while the medic stitched up his hip and thigh. The gash was deep but he was bleeding way worse on the inside. Dying little by little as the seconds ticked past with no response. The repeated prick of the needle was nothing compared to the torture of wondering what had happened to her as he waited for her to reply.
But no answer came.
His pulse drummed a hard, terrified rhythm in his ears. Come on, sweetheart. Give me something. Tell me you’re okay.
He didn’t think he could live with the alternative.
Wade looked up from the phone when Robert pushed his way through the circle of emergency responders a few minutes later. His face was grim, his dark eyes unflinching as they locked gazes. A block of ice settled in Wade’s gut, every muscle in his body snapping taut as his instincts screamed in denial.
“Damage is bad,” Robert told him. The distant throb of rotors rose over the noise on the dock, mixing with the roaring in Wade’s ears. “The lower portion of the south side has collapsed, and the entire area’s been contaminated with radiation. No one’s getting in or out until HAZMAT can clear the area.”
Danger Close: Chapter Twenty-Two
Disoriented, Erin opened her eyes to find herself locked in a waking nightmare.
Dark. Trapped.
It was pitch black and she couldn’t move. Something was pinning her in place. Hard, cold. Sealing her in a concrete tomb.
No! Panic blasted through her, robbing her of the ability to think or breathe. The terror was all consuming, paralyzing. She automatically struggled to break free of her prison when a sudden jolt of pain tore through her left forearm in a vicious, searing bolt that stopped her cold. Her breath froze in her lungs.
Through the blazing pain, her brain slowly came back online. Other things began to register.
Her head ached, her ears were ringing and she was pretty sure her left arm was broken. She didn’t know how long she’d been unconscious, she only remembered heading for a coffee when the walls had suddenly imploded.
Trapped. Think. Have to get out.
Pulse racing, she tried moving again. She was wedged between what felt like two slabs of concrete. Being unable to see or move intensified the claustrophobia. Her mind instantly took her back to that cold, black mine shaft, immersing her in a suffocating panic. All her old fears came up to haunt her, closing her throat off as though someone was choking her.
No. Stop it. You have to think.
After some wriggling she managed to pull her legs up and use her feet to push her body into a better position. Her heart was slamming so hard against her ribs it made her nauseous, her breath rushing in and out of her starving lungs in a constant hiss of air that seemed overly loud in the unnatural silence. She ached and throbbed all over, the worst of the pain in her left arm and the back of her head. “Hello?” she called out in a shaky voice.
No answer. Only a faint echo. Nothing moved.
She swallowed, fought back the terror that threatened to drag her back into screaming mindlessness. “Hello!” Her shout was absorbed by the debris around her. “Can anyone hear me?” Her voice shredded on the last word, tears of horror and fear flooding her eyes. She couldn’t go through this again, trapped and alone in the dark. Craning her head back, she frantically scanned her surroundings. There was no light, not even a sliver of it to give her some bearings. She was trapped alone underground with no way out.
“I hear you!”
She froze at the muffled shout that seemed to be coming from her right. “Where are you?”
“Medical room.”
She sucked in a breath. “Brady?”
“Erin! Thank God. Are you okay?”
She licked her lips, the rush of relief making her light-headed. She wasn’t alone down here. They’d work together to find a way out. “I think my arm’s broken. You?”
“I’m…pretty banged up.”
His words made her go even colder, because for him to admit that meant he was hurt bad. “Can you move?”
“Not much. You?”
“No, I—” She wiggled around, using her right arm to feel her way along the seams of concrete. Her fingers found a gap. She traced its edges, cradled her busted left arm against her chest as she struggled to maneuver her way toward the hole. “I’ll try to come to you,” she called back. Had he damaged his lung more? “Can you keep directing me with your voice?”
“Yeah. Take it slow—no telling when something might shift.”
She shuddered at the thought of being crushed to death by a slab of concrete, or worse, lying pinned beneath it while she died of internal bleeding. “Slow’s all I can do anyway,” she answered back. “Can you see anything?”
“Can’t see jack. You?”
“No.” She had no idea how much of the building had caved in around them. And they might be completely sealed off from the outside, which meant these pocket
s of air might be all they had. If the air ran out… Stop it and move.
Digging down deep for her mental discipline, Erin inched her way along the rough concrete wall beside her. She had to twist onto her back to push head first into the opening she’d found and squeeze through, the whole time terrified she’d become trapped or be crushed in the rubble. Every movement hurt. Jagged shards of pain splintered through her broken arm with each shift of her body. The uneven edges of the concrete scraped against her clothes and tore through her skin. She hissed in a breath when a sharp piece of rebar sliced into her leg as she dragged her way along.
“Say something so I can follow your voice,” she called out. The pain and terror would overwhelm her if she let it. Keeping it at bay right now was the hardest thing she’d ever done.
“Think I’m to your right.”
Sounded that way to her, too. She crawled closer, feeling her way. The debris angled up sharply for a few yards. She inched her way up, used her feet to feel a route down. A shower of dust rained down on her, small bits of concrete pelting her. She coughed as the dust hit her lungs, squeezed her eyes shut. “Have you got my phone still?”
“Dropped it. My arm’s pinned…can’t move it.”
His voice was getting closer, even though it was still muffled. She slipped and wriggled her way through whatever opening she could fit through, moving blindly through the darkness and praying she wouldn’t fall into a hole or bring anything more down on top of them. “Brady?”
“Still…here.”
The strained quality of his voice registered. Oh, shit, his lung. “Okay. Don’t talk. I’m coming. Just hold on.”
“Yeah.”
Her foot hit another barricade. Her right hand felt along the wall, finding another gap. She drifted her fingers along its edge, snatching her hand back when she unexpectedly encountered human flesh. Immediately she grabbed for it again. Fingers. A hand. Still warm. She gripped it, gave it a little tug and recoiled when it came loose in her hand.
“Shit!” She flung it away in reflex, her skin crawling with revulsion. Not even all her medical training could have prepared her for a grisly shock like that, here in the stygian darkness. Her stomach rolled. How many others were dead or dying in here?
“What’s…wrong?” Brady demanded.
“Body,” she answered, gritting her teeth and pushing herself forward. Body part. She knew there had to be many more trapped in this mess. “I’m getting closer. Your voice is clearer.”
She knew she and Brady were lucky to have survived the explosion at all, let alone the collapse. Officials obviously hadn’t found the bomb in time. Had Wade found Rahim? Was he okay? Did he know headquarters had been hit and was he coming for her? Holding firm to the hope that he had, she pressed onward.
Fresh cuts and scrapes stung and burned all over her, the pain of her fractured arm covering her in a cold, clammy sweat. She edged over another broken wall and slid down it on her backside like a ramp. Too fast. Afraid she was going to plunge to her death, she shot her right arm out to grab at whatever she could find to slow her descent.
She winced as she caught something, its sharp edge slicing her palm open. She’d stopped, but the blood made her grip slip, making it impossible to hold on. Swallowing a cry, she fell and plunged to the ground. Her feet hit something solid, her legs crumpling beneath her. She landed on her hands and knees, a thin scream ripping from her as the fractured bones in her left arm buckled under the impact.
“Erin!”
She rolled to her side and cradled her left forearm against her body, the pain stealing her breath. It consumed her for long moments until at last it ebbed enough for her to suck in a shallow, shaky breath.
“Erin…answer me!”
“H-here,” she called back, trembling all over. Fighting through the haze of agony enveloping her, she refocused on the direction of his voice. It had been close. Almost directly beside her. And below her. “I’m close.”
“Up and…to my left.”
Turning onto her back, she used her legs to drag herself down the slight incline to where his voice seemed to be coming from. It wasn’t pure black anymore. Some tiny light source was still getting through because there was just enough illumination for her to make out the faint impression of the jumble of debris in the area. Lots of concrete, but plaster too, and what she thought was office furniture.
“How about now?” she asked.
“Close.” It came from under her, close to where she was standing.
Crouching down, she felt around as her eyes adjusted, hungrily drinking up that tiny bit of illumination. With her feet she shoved the moveable bits of debris away.
“Dust,” Brady managed, and she understood she’d shifted something that was raining dust down on him. He was right beneath her.
Hope rose so hard and swift it formed a painful knot in the center of her chest. Her right hand sifted through the rubble, searching for a gap. And found one. “Can you lift your arm up?” she asked, lying on her side to stick her arm through and move it around. Seconds later, she made contact with warm flesh. And this time when her fingers curled around the hand, it didn’t come loose. “Gotcha,” she told him, closing her eyes in relief.
“Hey,” he said, giving her hand a squeeze. “How…deep are…we?”
Holding tight to his hand, she turned her head and squinted above them. A long slab of concrete lay directly overhead, the broken and twisted spikes of rebar sticking out of its edges. Moving anything more risked bringing the rubble down on top of them. “Can’t tell. It’s lighter here than it was where I started from, but I can’t see daylight.”
Brady grunted in reply but didn’t answer.
Stretched out on her side, cold and hurting more badly than she ever had in her life, Erin clung to that hand and prayed a rescue crew would find them. “Let me know when your arm gets tired,” she told him, grateful when he squeezed in reply. Having him close helped take the edge off the claustrophobia.
She didn’t know how long they stayed like that. Her right arm was completely numb and Brady’s had to be too, but he didn’t let go. Every so often one of them would squeeze the other’s hand as a reminder that they were still together. Erin suffered through the pain, trying to escape somewhere else in her mind. She thought of her parents, her friends, but mostly she thought of Wade. If he was alive and knew about the bombing, he’d be frantic to get to her.
“Wade’ll find us,” she mumbled, shivering from shock and pain.
A firm squeeze around her hand answered her.
She was so deep in her own thoughts as she struggled with the pain that it took her a few moments to realize the voices she heard were coming from above them. The muted wail of sirens had never sounded so beautiful.
She raised her head, a renewed surge of hope flooding her as she stared above them. “Rescue teams,” she told Brady. She could definitely hear them, hear a low rumble up there. She licked her lips. “I’m gonna let go now, so I can try to get their attention.” When he squeezed in reply she let go and painfully climbed to her feet, every muscle protesting the movement.
“Can anyone hear me?” she shouted, craning her head back to direct her voice at the ceiling of debris. “There are two of us trapped down here!”
No answer.
Frantic, she searched around her for something to make noise with. Her fingers landed on a loose piece of rebar. Grabbing it, she carefully climbed her way up the few feet she needed to reach the bits of rebar sticking out of the concrete slab above them. She hammered at it, using the metallic clang to signal anyone above ground. Three rapid strikes, three spaced ones, three more quick ones. Over and over she repeated the pattern.
SOS. SOS. SOS.
She kept going until her arm ached and her fingers were numb from the grip around the steel rod. Desperation drove her, kept her going long after her muscles had exhausted themselves. Please hear me. Someone please hear me!
Something wet dripped onto her cheek. At first she tho
ught she was crying, but then another drop landed on her forehead. She stilled, tilted her head back as yet another drop hit her face. Not tears. Rain.
Knowing that daylight had to be just above the slab overhead, she swung the rebar with renewed strength.
SOS. SOS. SOS…
A shaft of light suddenly appeared above her. She dropped the rebar, raised her hand to shield her eyes even as a cry of relief broke from her. “I’m here!” she screamed.
“We hear you!” a voice shouted back, much closer than she’d even dared hope. “Are you alone?”
“No, there’s a man here too. He’s trapped below me and badly injured.”
“What’s your name?”
“Erin. Erin Kelly.”
“Stay where you are, Erin. We’ll come down and get you. Everything’s gonna be okay now.”
Erin dropped to her knees in the rubble and let the tears come. Sounds of people and heavy machinery moved around above them. She went back to the hole and laid down to put her right arm through it. “You still with me, Brady?”
His hand found hers, locked tight. “Good…job,” he managed.
She gave a watery laugh and held on to him. The shaft of light became brighter and brighter, and then scuffling noises reached her.
“Erin?”
She released Brady’s hand and stood. “Over here.” Straining to see in the darkness, her heart leapt when the beam of a headlamp flooded the space.
“She’s here,” the man called back to whoever was outside.
More shuffling, the rattle of bits of concrete as they fell through the rubble, disturbed by whoever was moving around up there.
“Erin!”
Her breath snagged in her throat at the sound of that familiar, deep voice. “Wade?”
She heard his exhalation of relief. “Sweetheart, I’m coming to you. Stay there, okay?”
She reacted without thinking. A sob tore free and she launched herself toward the opening above her. Her feet scrambled over the slippery layer of debris overlying the concrete. A figure dropped down through the opening, the silhouette backlit against the bright daylight streaming in from outside. She reached for him. Strong arms caught her, came around her and pulled her to a tall, hard body.
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