Firewolf

by Jenna Kernan

  “Who else is here?” asked Jack.

  “My housekeeper,” said Katrina. “My mother picked her.”

  The implication was clear. Katrina was worried her mother would find out she was speaking to the enemy.

  She swept them past her housekeeper and told the young woman that she was not to be disturbed. Once inside, she shut the door and pressed her back against it as if to bar the castle gates.

  Dylan glanced about the room, seeing a white leather couch edged in chrome opposite a glass coffee table from two matching chairs. The banks of windows provided impressive views and were anchored with a long, curving cabinets in ivory, which hugged the bend in the exterior wall. Her glass-and-chrome fireplace dominated the room. The only color was a cheerful bouquet that sat on the coffee table beside her television remotes.

  “What are you two doing here?” She spoke in a whisper that held a definite edge.

  “Where is she?” asked Dylan.

  She lifted a finger. “You’re bleeding.” She stared at his neck and spoke as if to herself. “I should call security.”

  “She said you looked out for her,” Dylan said.

  Katrina sucked in a breath and her chin trembled.

  Dylan bowed his head and spoke in a calm, gentle voice. “She needs you now more than ever.”

  Katrina folded her arms around herself and began to rock, thumping back against the closed door. Finally she shook her head. “You should go.”

  He wasn’t going. Not until he knew where to find her. “Katrina, they’re going to kill her.”

  “You’re as crazy as she is.”

  “If you’re right, it won’t matter. But what if I’m right?”

  Katrina stopped rocking and glared. He waited, knowing that the one to speak first in this standoff would lose.

  “She’s at Flagstaff Mental Health Hospital,” said Katrina, her voice low and conspiratorial. “They’re holding her for observation and I never told you. Now get out.”

  “A psychiatric hospital?” asked Jack.

  “She asked me to bring her.”

  “Your mother?” asked Jack.

  Katrina nodded.

  “Because Meadow trusted you,” said Dylan.

  Katrina flinched, then lifted her chin in an attitude of defiance. “They found barbiturates in her blood.”

  Dylan paused. “Want to know who put them there?”

  Katrina turned her worried eyes away. “You should go.”

  Dylan was already heading for the door and Katrina swept out of the way. “You won’t get her out. It’s very secure.”

  Dylan didn’t know how he’d get to her, but he knew one thing for sure—he would get to Meadow.

  Jack followed him out. Once back in the tribal police unit, Jack hit the lights and then the highway, driving at high speeds and using the siren to move distracted drivers out of their way.

  Dylan turned to his friend.

  “We need to break her out.”

  “You have a plan?” Jack asked. “Because I have zero jurisdiction and no friends down here. I might as well pull up on a Segway dressed as a mall cop.”

  “Steal someone’s ID card?”

  “Illegal.”

  Dylan swore. “Every plan I come up with will be illegal.” He wondered what they were doing to her right now. “They could stage a suicide attempt.”

  “Not if she’s under observation. She’d be under added supervision and it will be harder for anyone to hurt her.”

  Dylan hoped Jack was right.

  Dylan felt his stomach drop. “Drive faster,” he said.

  Jack pressed the accelerator slowing only when they reached their exit. He took them to the facility, which had a high metal gate and security booth at the entrance.

  “That’s bad,” said Jack.

  “Obviously.” Dylan scratched his head and found the smooth surface of the staples they had used to close up his scalp. “What about a laundry service or food service truck?”

  “Still check ID and we wouldn’t have access past the delivery area. What you need is someone who can go anywhere, even to the lock-in floors.”

  “Impersonate a doctor?”

  Jack gave a halfhearted shrug.

  Dylan’s throat hurt. His head hurt. But, most of all, his heart hurt. Meadow was in there alone, and he had to get to her before her mother finished what she had started.

  Someone who could go anywhere, he thought, and then the idea came to him, all at once and completely formed.

  “That might work,” Dylan muttered.

  “What?” asked Jack.

  “Fire inspector,” said Dylan.

  “I don’t follow,” said Jack Bear Den, still staring at the front gate to the mental-health facility.

  “I’m a certified fire inspector.”

  “On Turquoise Canyon,” said Jack.

  “No. Statewide. I can inspect any public facility, including group homes, residential-care facilities and medical facilities.”

  “But not at night,” said Jack.

  “Oh, yeah. Especially at night. If they do business in the evening, like a bar, or 24/7, like a hospital, I can inspect them anytime, any day.”

  Jack sat back and smiled. “Ain’t that a kick?”

  “They’re inspected quarterly and they are not supposed to know ahead of time.”

  “What if they just got inspected yesterday?” Jack asked.

  “Doesn’t matter. I tell them that there has been a complaint of a code violation.”

  “You have a badge or something?” asked Jack.

  “I do, but not with me. But I have an ID card in my wallet. Two, actually—state and international.”

  “My vehicle says Tribal Police,” said Jack.

  “Yeah, we need to lose this. Where’s Ray?”

  “He’s back on the line, fighting the fire. They’re making progress now. He says it’s seventy percent contained. We could rent a vehicle.”

  “A red or white SUV.”

  “City vehicle would be better,” said Jack. He threw the SUV into Reverse. “Shouldn’t be very hard to find one to borrow at this time of night.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  “Once we find her, how do we get her out?” asked Jack.

  “I might need your help on that one.”

  Dylan used Jack’s phone to find city hall. Round the back on West Aspen Avenue was a really nice parking lot with a variety of white vehicles all with the city’s colorful insignia on the door panel. They had vans and midsize cars, SUVs and several pickups. Dylan walked along with Jack as he selected a pickup that was shielded from the street by three other cars.

  “They’ll have cameras on this lot,” said Jack.

  Which was why they had left the tribal police car down the street and walked here with Jack’s bag of tools. His friend routinely broke into cars for various reasons.

  Dylan glanced about as Jack used the slim jim to pop the door open. He wedged his big shoulders between the seat and wheel well and had the truck started soon after. Dylan drove the truck, pausing only to drop Jack at his vehicle before retracing his course back to the facility holding Meadow.

  He felt the pressure of time pushing down on him. Was her mother’s plan merely to discredit Meadow or did she mean to kill her?

  Jack flashed his lights and then passed him as he turned into the residential neighborhood close to the hospital. He parked on the street and then joined Dylan.

  “Okay, let’s go.”

  At the gate they found a sleepy attendant who snapped into action as Dylan identified himself and presented his ID.

  “Usually we know ahead,” said the pink-faced attendant as he studied the red-and-white identification card.
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  “You’re not supposed to have advance warning. Who’s been doing the inspections?”

  That got the young man twitching. He closed his mouth and scribbled down Dylan’s name and ID number. Then he lifted the phone in the booth.

  Jack leaned across the seat and yelled, “Gate!”

  A moment later the lever arm lifted and they drove on.

  He did and they rolled up to the facility. They had not even disconnected the starter wires when a woman came rushing out to meet them.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Meadow woke with the taste of copper in her mouth. Her head pounded and her vision rippled like moonlight reflecting on deep water. The cotton dressing gown stuck to her wet skin and sweat puddled beneath her flushed body. The movement of her eyes caused sharp pains at her temples. She hadn’t felt like this since she’d stopped drinking Jack.

  This was a hospital. She knew the look of the sterile walls and room layout. Meadow tried to lift her hand to scratch her nose and found her wrist secured to the bed rail with a clear plastic tie. Above the fastening was a white hospital bracelet.

  The panic bubbled up inside her as the intake process rose in her mind like a backed-up toilet. She’d been stripped. She’d been searched. They’d taken her clothing, earrings, underwear, blood and, finally, her dignity. When she’d refused their tests they’d injected her with something.

  Where was Dylan? Did he know what had happened to her? What if they had hurt him? The last she’d seen him was in the emergency room, where he was being treated for a bullet wound. Shot by her mother’s crony.

  Oh, the blood. So much blood.

  Meadow squeezed her eyes shut. This was all her fault. She’d dragged him into this nightmare and he’d stayed and it had nearly gotten him killed.

  She prayed he was alive and safe. But in the meantime she needed to get out of here.

  “Hey,” she yelled. “Hey! I need to use the toilet.”

  Someone stepped into her room. She knew him. Meadow gasped as the face of Joe Rhodes came into focus. He was dressed like a male nurse or orderly in green scrubs and white tennis shoes. His left arm was casted and now rested in a black sling. If Meadow found any solace, it was in knowing that Dylan had broken Joe’s arm in the fight at the ridge fire.

  “Good evening, Princess.”

  “Joe, whatever my mother is paying you, I’ll double it.”

  He smiled. “She said you’d try to bribe me, so she cut off your funds. They’re her funds. You don’t have anything without her.” He stepped nearer. “Oh, your blood work came back.” He ticked the items off on the fingers of his injured arm. “Oxy. Barbiturates. Pot, of course. And heroin. Looks like you’ve moved up from binge drinking.”

  “You know she put all that in my drink.”

  “No, actually, I did. I had a tranquilizer in there, too, but it didn’t come up on the test. Must have worked it out of your system.”

  He stepped nearer.

  “I’ll scream.”

  He grimaced. “Oh, please. Someone is screaming in here about every three minutes.”

  “Stay back.” She used her legs to push as far away from him as her bonds allowed. Panic zinged through her like speed and her heart crashed into her ribs. She was going to die here in this stupid bed with the sheets tangled about her legs and everyone in the world would believe she was just another train wreck.

  “You’re on suicide watch,” Joe said, now at her bedside. “I wrapped the IV tube around your neck, but someone came in before I finished. Got you restrained, though.”

  “How are you going to explain my killing myself while restrained?”

  “Bit your tongue.” He reached for her, grabbing her head and sealing her nose shut.

  She struggled and finally had to open her mouth. He pushed a wedge of plastic between her jaws. Meadow was not ready to die. She rolled her knees to her chest and then exploded outward like a diver before entering the water. Only, instead of extending toward a perfect entry, she kicked Joe’s casted arm with all her might.

  Joe screamed and fell back, landing hard on the floor. Meadow spit out the wedge and shimmied down in her bed, gnawing at the restraint on her right wrist. Joe was on his feet and cradling his arm as she pulled one wrist free.

  There was murder in his eyes as he approached her bed for the second time.

  * * *

  DYLAN ADDRESSED HIS attention to Louisa Crane, the night manager on call, who had drawn the short straw for taking the inspectors throughout the facility. She was dressed in a black skirt and maroon blouse, and her black hair was drawn back in a neat ponytail. She was young with anxious eyes.

  “Let’s start with the sprinkler systems,” said Dylan to Louisa. He knew that the sprinklers were on every floor and every room. It was a way to get to Meadow quickly. But, when and if he found her, how would he get her out?

  “Oh, all right,” said Louisa.

  “And the fire exits. You can’t have equipment blocking stairways.”

  “Oh, we never do,” said Crane, but she was sweating now, her dark blouse showing even darker stains down the center of her back.

  She swiped her employee card in a slot to summon the elevator and again inside to access the top floor, level three.

  “This is a lock-in ward with some of the residents who wander. It can be noisy.”

  “When was your last fire drill?” asked Dylan.

  Crane wiped her upper lip. “I’d have to check the records. I’m only here at night.”

  “You have to run drills day and night. Practice is important,” said Jack, sounding as if he knew what he was talking about.

  Crane’s hand went to the junction of her neck and shoulder where she rubbed. Dylan smiled. Apparently Jack and he were becoming a pain in her neck.

  “I need to check the dates on the extinguishers and see the sprinkler heads in every room,” said Dylan.

  “Every room?” Crane did not keep the exasperation from her voice. “That will disturb the patients.”

  “I need to see eighteen inches of clearance under each sprinkler head.”

  He began his inspection in the room to his left and continued to the next and the next.

  The crash brought them all around. A male voice roared and a woman shouted for help. Dylan glanced at Jack and nodded. He knew that voice. It was Meadow.

  Dylan turned in the direction of the commotion and charged down the hall.

  “Hey!” called Crane.

  The sound of something striking metal reached him as he barreled into the room.

  Jack followed Dylan and the two men skidded to a stop in front of the hospital bed and the two struggling combatants.

  A man in a sling choked Meadow as she thrashed, her heel striking the bed rail and making it ring as she clawed at the hand clamped to her throat.

  Crane arrived and gasped. “What is going on here?”

  Her attacker released Meadow, but she continued to swing, her arms and legs flaying as she fought for her life. His brave warrior would not go down without a fight.

  “Meadow,” Dylan called.

  At the sound of his voice, her eyes popped open and her body stilled.

  Crane gaped. “You know her? What is this?”

  The man now faced them. Dylan braced as he recognized Joe Rhodes.

  Crane drew out her phone and started pressing buttons.

  Dylan inched along the opposite side of the bed from Rhodes as Jack stepped past the foot of the bed to block Rhodes’s exit.

  Tears rolled down Meadow’s face as she looked at Dylan.

  “You...you came,” said Meadow,

  Had she doubted that he would?

  Dylan reached for the small knife clipped to his belt and flipped open one of the blades.
r />   “Weapons are not allowed in here,” said Crane.

  Dylan ignored her as he sliced the bond holding her left wrist to the bed rail.

  “You can’t do that,” said Crane.

  Meadow threw herself into Dylan’s arms. He gathered her up and held her, whispering in her ear.

  “I got you.”

  “I need your ID badge. Now,” said Crane to Rhodes.

  Rhodes spoke to no one in particular. “We’ve got company.”

  “He just called for backup,” Jack said.

  Rhodes reached into the sling. He drew a pistol at the same time Jack drew his sidearm from his shoulder holster. Rhodes pointed his weapon at Meadow, now on the opposite side of the bed, as Jack leveled his service pistol at Rhodes.

  Crane closed her mouth and inched back toward the door.

  Jack did not move. Dylan knew Jack was an excellent shot, but he was not fast enough to stop Joe from firing at Meadow.

  Stalemate.

  “I’ll step aside and you can go,” said Jack, who did not move aside but kept his weapon raised and ready.

  “Lower your weapon,” said Rhodes.

  Jack didn’t move. Dylan eased Meadow to the floor and then stepped in front of her.

  Rhodes shifted his attention to Dylan. “Bullet will go right through you and then hit her. It won’t even slow down.”

  Jack spoke again. “You should go.”

  Rhodes did not take his eyes off his targets. “Put the gun on the floor, Bear Den.”

  Dylan knew that Jack would not do so. If he did, there was nothing to keep Rhodes from shooting all of them.

  Dylan spoke in Apache. “Shoot him.”

  Jack said nothing, just kept his weapon poised and ready. Rhodes was sweating now, the beads rolling down his face and into his eyes. He shrugged his shoulder, but with the cast he could not wipe his face.

  Crane continued her backward tread until she inched from Dylan’s view behind the wall and the corridor that led past the bathroom and into the main hallway. A moment later, Dylan heard a shot coming from the hallway. Rhodes’s gaze shifted away from Meadow and toward the door.

  Jack fired.

  Chapter Twenty-Four