“Good. Thank you. I take it you got the presents I left for you.”
“Sure did,” she said. “I appreciate the help in nailing a couple of these guys. But do you want to clue me in on what’s going on?”
Jordan glanced at the other thug lying unconscious in the car’s front seat. “I can do you one better. I found out where they’re keeping Chris and that doctor from the UMMC.”
“Haynes?”
“Yep. You familiar with Tallicor Consulting Group?”
“Never heard of them.”
“Figured,” Jordan said. “They’re out in Frederick. Apparently, it’s all an elaborate front.”
“Okay. Is the company somehow related to Senator Sharp?”
Jordan sighed. “That’s the funny thing. I didn’t find a concrete connection between the two. But according to my informant, the senator is there now.”
“Seriously? Good God, I’ve got to get a warrant to get in there. I need to get this to the FBI. What else can you tell me?”
“I’m afraid I don’t have too much more to report. How soon do you think your people will be able to storm the place?”
The line went silent for a few moments. “Emergency warrant. Get the response squad together...maybe a couple hours or so if everything goes through smoothly.”
Jordan bit his bottom lip and stared out the window. He could wait, let the Feds bust into Tallicor and find Chris. But two hours at the earliest...there might be nothing to take care of by the time they actually broke into the offices.
Despite his years spent developing connections within Baltimore’s underground enhancement community, he’d never heard of Tallicor being involved before. This company— and the shadowy organization it shielded—had apparently remained under the radar. He thought back to when he’d been in the business of illegal enhancements. He’d always been able to stay a step ahead of the authorities by paying off a federal agent or two.
An organization large enough to need a front like Tallicor would undoubtedly maintain the same precautions Jordan had. If the Feds issued a warrant, the FBI would likely find nothing of interest when they broke down the doors of the purportedly five-hundred-person tech consulting agency.
And the real organization behind Tallicor would take Chris away with them. “Hold off on that warrant.”
“What? Why?” Dellaporta asked, her voice tinged with agitation.
“Keep this between you and me for now. If you involve too many on your end, these Tallicor people will find out.”
“No way,” Dellaporta said. “I can keep this on the down-low. I know an agent and a judge I trust.”
“Don’t,” Jordan said, his words sharp. “Give me time to get Chris and the doctor out of there. Hell, maybe I’ll save our senator friend so we can see what he’s been up to.”
“Thompson, stay out of it. Let the FBI take care of this.”
“How long did it take you to find my alleged enhancement labs?”
“What? What the hell are you talking about? I’m standing in your lab.”
“Exactly,” Jordan said. “And the only reason you’re there is because I let you find the damn place. Do you know how many years that place ran untouched and unknown by your colleagues? And do you know why that was?”
The line remained silent.
“We can’t trust other people,” Jordan said. Thoughts of Hugh’s suggestion that a crooked cop on the scene of the TheraComp break-in might have disrupted their genetic sequencer flickered in his mind. It was a wild guess on Hugh’s part, but there might be legitimacy behind the accusation. He wondered if he should even trust Dellaporta. Besides, his breaking and entering wasn’t strictly legal, and he didn’t intend to get wrapped up in the semantics of the law when Dellaporta’s friends intruded on him. “Let me get Chris out of there, and then you can tell anybody and everybody.”
“You know I can’t just sit on this and do nothing.”
“Fine. Give me two hours. Whether you hear from me or not, you can send in the Feds and scare these people away where you’ll never find them again.”
He ended the call. Disabling the autodrive on the car, he slammed his foot into the pedal, and the electric motor whined. He raced onto Interstate Seventy. With no real idea of what he would face, he thumbed the stunner tucked into the waistband of his slacks and glanced at the unconscious man in the passenger seat. From the glove box, he took out his captive’s pistol that he’d stowed and, with one free hand, checked the magazine. He had found only a couple extra fully loaded magazines.
Like some kind of modern Don Quixote armed with pistol and stunner, he prepared to brazenly and probably stupidly take on an organization bristling with gunmen and beastly enhancers, and he had just told Dellaporta to stall reinforcements. At least, if she held true to her word, he’d have the element of surprise.
If there was any way to get Chris out alive, he would find it. However fleeting the chance to save his friend, he would take it.
Chapter 39
Veronica’s heart raced as she watched Chris and Robin prep their solution for the senator. Trevor and his gang had brought in a couple of rolling benchtops equipped with a menagerie of equipment and monitors she vaguely recognized.
She no longer feared losing her life. Unadulterated anger burned in her. These people had tortured her, threatened her family, and she doubted their intentions were any different for Chris and the doctor. Human beings were disposable to these people.
And she’d had enough. She wished Chris would just refuse to treat the senator. Let the man rot and die of his greed and hubris. Let the cancer take him.
She tried to yell out at Chris to stop, but the gag mangled her words.
“Settle down, girlie,” Lianna said. “You aren’t going anywhere.”
The woman patted Veronica on the back before giving the ropes knotted around her wrists a tug. Lianna left her and joined Trevor as the two watched Chris and Robin to ensure they didn’t try any last-minute sabotage.
But Veronica didn’t care if they did. Worst-case scenario, Chris let the senator die and then Trevor would kill her in recompense. She almost didn’t mind. This nightmare would be over.
As her nose twitched in a snarl, pain coursed up her arms. Her muscles quivered. Trevor had administered the enhancements days ago when she was tied up on a hospital bed. He’d told her the first was a muscle enhancement intended to induce cell growth and proliferation. The second injection contained the telomerase enhancement supposedly designed to prolong life.
But he promised it wouldn’t extend her life.
Quite the opposite. The combination of enhancements flowing through her blood was deadly. This combination of gene mods was behind the cancer sweeping through the enhancer community, and Trevor told her she would be dead within weeks, maybe days, if Chris and Robin didn’t come up with a therapy.
Anger tore through her again, and she lashed around on the stool. She wanted Chris to stop. Again she tried to cry to him to cease treating the senator. Don’t help these people.
Both Lianna and Trevor ignored her as she writhed.
Then she heard a slight tearing sound. That caught her captors’ attention. Trevor lunged toward her, his brow furrowed. A look of worry flashed across his face. It must have been the moment he realized the enhancements he’d given her had also yielded something he’d underestimated: her increased strength.
Veronica yanked on the rope again, tugging with all her might. It splayed and ripped as Trevor grew near.
Free from the ceiling but with wrists still bound, she lunged at her captor. She dug her shoulder into his stomach and knocked the breath out of him. As he crumpled, she pulled her hands apart, and the rest of the rope fell from her arms.
His face still scrunched in pain, Trevor struggled to his knees and pulled out his pistol.
She leapt at him and wrapped a hand around his wrist. She squeezed but couldn’t stop him from pulling out the gun. The enhancements he’d given her, while new and only p
artially effective, still produced cancerous cells spreading along with the new genes. Pain coursed in her muscles as she moved.
Trevor threw Veronica backward, and she spiraled through the air. With the instinct ingrained by years of dance training, she twisted to land on her feet and tore the gag from her mouth. She knew she didn’t have the strength of this man. His own enhancements and cells had had years to develop and mature.
And she’d never trained as a fighter, but she wouldn’t let that stop her now.
As Trevor leveled his gun, she sprinted at him and then jumped, spinning again. He fired three times. All three shots slammed into the wall behind her, and she landed beside him.
He swung at her head, but she dodged. She grasped for his pistol with both hands and yanked his wrist back. He punched again, and she ducked. Pulling with all her might, she managed to peel off his fingers, and the gun skittered across the floor.
She dove for it. Her fingers grazed the metal pistol grip, but Trevor grabbed her ankle with one hand and pulled her toward him. Her arm shot out, fingers splayed, desperate.
As Trevor jerked her back, she managed to grasp the gun and pointed it at him. He recoiled, fouling her aim.
Two blasts echoed against the walls. Her eardrums rang as she stared at Trevor. He froze.
“Stop!” A voice called out. “Or I kill Chris!”
She wanted Trevor to fall over dead, wanted to see the life drain out of her tormenter’s eyes.
But he still stood before her, his eyes as vibrant as before and still locked with hers. She hadn’t been the one to fire first.
“You could’ve hit her instead of the goddamned wall,” Trevor said, backing away.
Liana huffed. With her arm around Chris’s neck and the muzzle of her weapon pressed against his forehead, she said, “At least I got her attention. And goddammit, we might still need her.”
Trevor held his hands in the air and took another step backward.
“Don’t move.” Veronica’s hand trembled as she pointed the gun at him. Her eyes flickered to Lianna then back to Trevor.
“You shoot and I do too,” Lianna said. “Sound fair to you?”
“Even if you do somehow shoot me and escape, Veronica, where the hell do you think you’re going to go?” Trevor licked his lips. “You think they’ll just let you walk out of here? You think we’ll leave your family alone?”
“What the hell do you want?” she said, her face still hot with anger.
“We want the two doctors to fix the boss up. We need him back in commission. Look, keep that damn gun pointed at me if it makes you feel better, and we’ll make a deal. You let them inject the treatment, and we’ll let you out the back door.” Trevor raised both eyebrows. “You can leave, disappear, do whatever the hell you want.”
She knew that was untrue. From her time at Tallicor, she had discovered the senator’s involvement, and she’d seen the face of Trevor’s real boss. They wouldn’t let her go; the threats to her family’s lives wouldn’t cease.
More dour thoughts percolated through her mind as she realized maybe the threats would cease. They would no longer be necessary because Trevor would kill her, kill Chris, kill the doctor. And now that she had come so close to seeing him dead, to watching the life drain out of his body, she wanted to live. The taste of revenge motivated her enough to set aside the earlier acceptance of her impending death.
But she couldn’t shoot Trevor now without also condemning Chris to his own execution. She lowered the gun.
“Good, good,” Trevor said. He stepped forward, his hands held out in a placating gesture. “Now would you please give me back my gun?”
She glanced at Chris. He stood still and stolid. He gave her no hint as to what she should do.
A realization struck her. These people needed him and the doctor. It seemed Robin and Chris held the keys to the fabrication of the therapy. They knew how to manufacture the cure that would revitalize the organization’s consumer base.
They couldn’t kill Chris. She might be dispensable, but he and the doctor were not.
But could she risk it all on that logic?
With a flick, she raised the gun again and fired three shots into Trevor’s chest. His eyes went wide as he crumpled to the floor.
Chris wriggled from Lianna’s grip as the woman trained her pistol on Veronica. Lianna shoved him backward, and his head smacked against one of the lab benches. She marched forward, firing as she did.
Veronica dove and used Trevor’s thick body as cover. She felt the impact as bullets thudded into his flesh until Lianna’s pistol clicked uselessly. The woman was out of rounds.
As Lianna replaced her magazine, Veronica jumped. She aimed the pistol but couldn’t risk firing. Chris, Robin, and the senator were behind the woman. Veronica had never trained on a gun range. She’d been lucky enough Trevor had already released the safety for her, and he’d been close enough to make his chest an easy target.
But she couldn’t hedge any bets on hitting Lianna. The woman provided a much smaller target and situated herself on the other side of the expansive room.
Veronica ran to the opposite corner to get a better vantage point. Lianna followed, the fresh magazine clicking into place. Again, the woman placed herself between Veronica and the others. She knew what she was doing.
With the pistol in her right hand, Veronica shot forward and lunged before Lianna could aim. She tackled her, and they sprawled across the floor. Veronica struck out with a fist and then a knee as Lianna swung. Both still clutched their pistols, but neither could get the muzzle pointed at the other.
Adrenaline rushed through her, but Veronica didn’t know how much longer she could keep the woman down. Lianna was an enhancer, too, and her strength was evident. Veronica had only benefited from surprise and sheer determination. But now that was flagging.
Another person, a flash of motion in her periphery, joined the conflict. An arm lunged out with a needle. It plunged into Lianna’s neck. The woman howled, and her pistol fired twice. Both shots slammed harmlessly into the ceiling above them. Dust and debris from the broken tiles rained down.
Unconscious, Lianna fell. Robin stood over the woman, the empty syringe still in one hand. She held the other out and helped Veronica stand. “You okay?”
Veronica nodded, panting.
Near the lab bench, Chris still lay, knocked out by Lianna’s blow. “Is he okay?”
Robin rushed over to his side and checked his pulse. “Yeah, I think so. But what the hell do we do now?”
“They want to keep the senator alive, right?” She sidled up to the man’s bedside. His eyes remained half closed, and his breathing sounded strained. “You think we can use him as leverage to get the hell out of here?”
Robin rolled Chris on his side and cradled his head to keep his airway open. His eyes slowly opened, but he said nothing.
“What happened to those two goons outside the door?” Robin asked.
Veronica cocked her head.
“There were two guys guarding you out there when we came in.” Robin glanced at the front door. “I would’ve thought they’d step in as soon as there was gunfire.”
A victorious grin spread across her face as she recalled Trevor’s words when he’d suspended her by that rope just like he’d done back in her apartment. The room was equipped with state-of-the-art soundproofing and noise-cancellation equipment. He’d told her no matter how loud she screamed, no matter what they did to her, her voice would never escape this room. She’d never escape this room, he had said.
He’d certainly been wrong about one of those statements.
Chapter 40
“Chris, are you awake?” Robin asked.
He dumbly nodded.
“Can you stand?”
Again, he nodded and used a hand to push himself to his feet. “I think so.”
“Whoa, slow down,” she said. “Let me help.”
He slung an arm over her shoulder. One eyelid still drooped. “What happened?
My head...”
“That’s going to hurt for a while,” Robin said. She was happy to see him stand on his own. She thought about trying to hoist him somehow into the rolling hospital bed with Sharp, but there wasn’t room for the two of them, and with the senator’s condition, heaving Chris’s full bodyweight across the man would suffocate him.
“Any other weapons I can take?” Chris asked, though he leaned heavily on Robin.
She scoured the lab bench. “This is the best we’ve got.” She handed him a scalpel. “Let us keep the guns. You’re probably suffering from a concussion and, I’ll bet, some temporary confusion. Don’t need to add firearms to the mix.” She turned to Veronica. “You think you can lead us out of here, then?”
“Maybe,” Veronica said. “I think I remember how they led me through those back halls to get here.” She pointed to the door where Sharp had been wheeled in. “Worst-case scenario, I guess we get to see how badly they want Sharp alive.”
She flipped the gun over in her hand before giving it to Robin. “Can you use this?”
“I can try.”
“Great,” Veronica said and picked up Lianna’s pistol. She rifled through both Lianna’s and Trevor’s pockets and retrieved their comm cards. “The cards are locked, so we can’t make any calls out.”
“But you don’t need to unlock them to open a door,” Chris said.
“Exactly,” Veronica said. “And if we’re lucky, they’ll get us into a company car or something.”
“God, I hope so.”
“No use procrastinating any longer.” Veronica kicked open the rear door and peeked down the hallway. “We’re clear.”
Veronica dragged Sharp’s bed behind her as Robin helped Chris out into the maintenance hall. Bare pipes clawed up from concrete floors. Besides the rustle of air pushed through the ducts overhead, they ventured out into relative silence.
“I think we go this way,” Veronica said, leading them on.
Robin glanced behind them, watching for any unwanted followers. “So do you know what the hell is going on here? They said the senator isn’t their real boss. What’s that mean?”
The Black Market DNA Series: Books 1-3 Page 48
