Vigilante Mine

by Cera Daniels

  "Great news." He pointed straight up when she shot him a look. "Ducts."

  "Right." Buildings in this part of town had plenty of old, wide ventilation winding through the ceilings and walls, but Amanda had trouble believing someone would design a security hole that large for the "secure" file room. She moved to study the near wall. "Help me find this leak and stop wasting your time."

  "There is no time," he said, then flashed a huge grin. "My cavalry has blueprints."

  Smoke rolled faster, darker, and there was no rescue team. The crumbled shelf rack McLelas chose for a ladder teetered precariously.

  Amanda reached over to stabilize the metal. "I can admit when I'm wrong."

  A sound-proofing panel crashed to the floor, followed moments later by the vent cover.

  "Ah, but can you admit I was right?" he asked.

  One strong hand helped her into the ventilation shaft. Thickening darkness pushed from every side. McLelas took the lead like he'd been poring over the precinct's blueprints himself and she crawled, one-handed, after him. She had no doubt he had directions from "Zach". If the bodyguard on the other end of his earpiece got them out of the crushing air of this tunnel alive, he was worth whatever McLelas scribbled on his paycheck.

  Her eyes burned and she coughed, squeezing her eyelids shut as her lungs rebelled.

  "Grab my ankle." Had he turned a corner? "Our out's just ahead."

  Her fingers encountered a men's dress shoe worth more than her entire wardrobe. She took a shallow breath and put her trust in the man leading her to safety.

  "Whatever you say, McLelas." Amanda slid her hand around a warm, toned calf and the muscles bunched under her fingers.

  He slid backward and one of his arms wrapped around her shoulders, waist, then hips, hauling her up his side until the damp cloth over his nose met the arch of her neck. A thrill of pleasure danced down her spine.

  He took a slow, measured breath by her ear. "Is 'Ryan' really that hard to pronounce?"

  Reason fled as his brain worked overtime, replaying a single, explosive kiss that had burned hot as the fire around them. He forced himself to keep moving, undone by the detective's too-trusting grip on his pants leg. For Amanda, he'd entered a lust-fueled purgatory.

  Would redemption be enough?

  "Turn left when you hit the wall. It's tight, but it'll take you straight out the side of the building." Zach's voice pinched in concern. "Move it, bro. The place is still burning."

  Old ductwork. Wide enough, but he was sure it wouldn't hold long. The heat and fire-resistant sheeting warmed under his palms. His fingertips discovered the turnoff. He slid a hand along the arch of Amanda's spine, urging her in front of him, down the tube to the left, as fast as she could crawl.

  Halfway through . . .

  Hot metal crunched under his knee and his heart punched into his ribs. Ryan seized Amanda's ankle. Thick, oily smoke hit his tongue. "Zach?"

  "It'll hold. Just keep going." Confidence had returned to his brother's words. "Jay's commandeering oxygen."

  He pushed Amanda's leg forward. If Zach's danger sense said they'd get out, they'd get out.

  A loud crash behind him rattled their escape route. Heat swept through the air in waves and the crackle of burning timber roared in his ears. No time to filter. Red-orange flickered off the metal surrounding them, highlighting edges of black and gray puffs of smoke. The deadly blaze beneath the shaft reflected around them as it licked its way into the air vent. Fire would soon overtake their escape route. If the metal didn't collapse, it would melt.

  On the other end of the line, Zach covered up a chuckle by clearing his throat. "Well, maybe that piece won't hold."

  "How is that funny, jackass?"

  "Ever try telling a hungry German shepherd you've killed his master?"

  Sadistic little . . . "Zach!"

  "Yeah, yeah. 'Jackass.' I know."

  A second reassurance never came. Ryan felt the woman in front of him falter, heard her cough.

  "Go, Amanda!" he shouted against the whoosh of flame.

  The floor of the shaft groaned under their hurried movements, a string of metallic curses. Precious seconds later, horizontal bars of white light pierced the shaft. A round outlet vent set in the exterior wall. One of Amanda's fists pounded the fixture. Punching was futile. The metal was too thick; they'd get more leverage by kicking it loose. Ryan reached for her forearm and missed, but she caught the motion and squinted in his direction. He pointed at her feet.

  Then he desperately fought to breathe as she squirmed against him to get into position in the tight space.

  Teamwork took care of the vent cover faster than he'd expected, and the last barrier to their freedom plunged three stories to the asphalt. Fresh, frigid winter air warred with humid smoke.

  Ryan pushed his just-for-show glasses higher on his nose but before he could locate a way down, he heard stirrings of chaos below. Reporters, sirens, confusion, and shouted attempts to restore order beat into his temples like a hangman's drum. If he didn't control the additional volume now, he'd overload. Mid-jump from a burning building wasn't an optimal time to pass out. Concentrating, he closed his eyes and strained his filters.

  Something went wrong. Outside stimulus dimmed in his ears, but instead of focus, he couldn't lift his eyelids. Dread coiled tight in his stomach.

  "Spiritwalker."

  The back of his head hit the warm vent. Romeo? Why do you keep calling me that?

  "Move, Spiritwalker."

  "Ryan." A dry whisper. Amanda's hands shook his shoulders, pulled at his body. "Don't quit now."

  His detective's voice roused something fierce in him that went beyond lust. Re-energized, Ryan's eyes cracked to narrow slits. She had pushed the strip of fabric against his face with one hand, pointing past his nose with the other. Urgency creased her soot-streaked forehead. He strained to see through the smoke. A fire escape lined the building to their right. Jay was there, leaning over the rail, his fingers twitching in rapid sign language as he mouthed simultaneously, "Any day now!"

  Zach had done it.

  By the time they reached the ground, the fire was out. Both he and Amanda were fussed over by harried EMTs. She sat huddled on the bumper of an ambulance not far from him, wrapped in an orange blanket and clasping an oxygen mask to her face. Heat had given her gold and brown hair an adorable, frazzled texture and with that weary look, she could have climbed out of a bed instead of a burning building. An image of one feisty detective—wrapped in silk and lace and sliding under those sheets with him—sparked in his brain. A fresh lance of need torqued through his blood.

  His body didn't get a vote. As it was, getting close wouldn't be easy. She didn't care about his money. She cared about integrity, and he'd already folded that hand.

  Jay's hard grip locked onto Ryan's shoulder. Anger tightened his youngest brother's gaze but his fingers twitched anxiously and his cheeks were pale. "This is your idea of a lunch break?"

  Ryan cracked the mask off his jaw to respond and Jay pinned him with a glare that could melt glass. With their abilities, who knew—maybe it could.

  "Less talking, more breathing," Jay said.

  Ryan lifted his hands in surrender and slumped against the ambulance door. The inevitable grilling he'd receive that evening would be long overdue and well-deserved. Considering the regularity he had to lecture Jay and Zach, he let his little brothers take victories where they could.

  "Better." Jay's voice dropped to a sliver of a whisper. "Fiscal adventures aren't enough for you during the day? You have to liberate files, too?"

  So much for a reprieve on questions. Ryan frowned. He was certain no mention of the file had gone over his earpiece. So how did his brothers know what he'd paid for with his implied bribe? Had they bugged Lieutenant Dale's office? Both of them had been heavy-handed with the tiny sound-triggered mics lately.

  Jay didn't keep him guessing long. "I saw the folder when you crawled out of the air duct." He rubbed the back of his neck wi
th a quiet sigh. "Ryan, if word got out where you were . . . "

  Ryan rubbed his hand over his scorched jacket and shook his head. Officially, he and Amanda had to have climbed out a window. No one could know he'd been in the secure file room. McLelas credibility was on the line. Even wealthy civilians couldn't explain away a rummage through the precinct's sealed and cold cases, and a cover-up would mean piling new sins of bribery on top of the original one.

  Lesson learned: Responsibility was fucking complicated.

  "Soon as he's good, I'll take him home. Don't let him up," Jay said to an EMT who promptly retrieved a blood pressure cuff. Both men exchanged a conspiratorial smirk and Ryan groaned.

  At least Amanda had been released from the clutches of her caretakers. Her oxygen mask was off and Ryan watched her shrug out from under the blanket; the bright, coarse fabric balling in her hands. Impatience tugged at him. If he could disentangle himself from his brother and the EMT now prodding his arm, he could catch her before she left. To what end, he wasn't sure. Asking her out to dinner would get him laughed out of the parking lot. Sentiment was a waste of breath and she wouldn't know any more than he about the explosion until investigators sifted through the precinct. For the second time since he'd met her in that dark alley, Ryan had no idea what to say.

  Lieutenant Dale stomped into his peripheral vision and toward Amanda with a scowl, dragging a paramedic and two officers behind him. "Detective, take that off and you get strapped to a table. I'm not above sending you to the hospital overnight."

  Ryan grinned. So, he wasn't the only one being bullied back to health.

  Lieutenant Dale did an about-face and Ryan jerked to attention. It was obvious he'd be the next target and with the man's forehead furrowed so deeply, he didn't expect a pleasant conversation. Jay and Ryan's EMT disappeared, leaving him to the lieutenant's whim. Ryan started to slide from back of the ambulance.

  "Don't. You're as bad as she is." The lieutenant let out an exasperated sigh as he propped a foot on the bumper. "Sit."

  Ryan leaned back on his elbows.

  "She's like a daughter to me, McLelas." Lieutenant Dale cut himself off. He gave him a long look, unblinking. "If you hadn't found a way out—"

  Ryan waved off the implied gratitude and slid the mask down his nose. "Lucky we were in that room when the explosion happened."

  A muscle ticked in the other man's jaw. "Should have been the safest place in the building."

  Something in his tone caught Ryan's ears. Knowing. Before he could dig, they both spotted News 9's lead anchor picking her way around uniformed officers. Lieutenant Dale sighed and Ryan shoved the mask over his face, hoping to deter her from an impromptu interview. He'd have preferred not to be noticed on the scene, but such was the price of fame.

  She brazenly shoved her microphone in their direction and gestured over her shoulder for the camerawoman at her back to start filming. "Can we get a statement, Lieutenant?"

  "No comment." The lieutenant put his hand over the lens of the camera and lowered the device off the camerawoman's shoulder. "Sorry, ladies. Your viewers will have to wait with the rest of the city. I'm sure the other department heads will give you the same story: Press conference. Seven o'clock tonight. The investigators haven't gone through the door. If we know something before then, we'll let you know . . . at seven."

  Both women glared at him, but the lieutenant was unmoved. Ryan suppressed a sigh and reached for his oxygen mask. His turn. But to his surprise, the microphone yanked away. They stomped off, toothpick heels steady on the uneven blacktop, leaving him staring after them with his mouth open.

  No interview? Ryan rubbed at his ears in agitation. The press couldn't always follow him around—gas at twenty a gallon was too expensive for most of the outlets—but his favorite restaurant was regularly staked out by photographers snapping shots of his date for the evening. Magazine articles, radio speculations, near-daily TV footage of his charming public face and playboy tendencies had been the norm since before he'd signed on as McLelas Financial's president. Being ignored was surreal in a way that made his blood go numb.

  "Not everything is about you."

  "Huh?" He looked up to find Lieutenant Dale studying him, his expression bland.

  "I can call her back if you like." The corner of the man's mouth twitched. "But you look like you've been dragged behind a semi, dunked in a vat of tar, and left to repel stray cats."

  Ryan blinked at him, then down at the ashen knees of his suit pants. He grimaced. For the press not to recognize him, the lieutenant couldn't be far from the truth.

  Lieutenant Dale's hearty laugh broke free. "Money can't buy everything." His eyes swung toward the reporter, watching her find another officer to harass. "She'll have an exclusive. The other networks won't waste the gas for a . . . simple fire."

  Ryan raised an eyebrow. "Lieutenant, the floor moved. Twice. There's no way—"

  "Blown gas pipes, maybe." He dragged a hand through thick, graying hair. "As you saw, the heat's been acting up."

  Was the lieutenant downplaying the potential dangers for a civilian or was there more to his hedging? Ryan frowned, studying the precinct as he weighed his next words. The north corner had darkened with soot and some windows were broken. From the outside it appeared stable. Slightly more rundown than the rest of the area, but still standing. The solution to one of his problems formulated in his head. In the face of even minor disaster, funding was far easier to pry from wealthy, philanthropic pockets.

  "This press conference," Ryan said.

  The corners of the lieutenant's eyes had pinched with concern, and now his gaze turned wary. "What about it?"

  Ryan smiled. "I'm thinking that McLelas Financial's fundraiser couldn't come at a better time. Your building was in bad shape before—look at it now. When's good for you? A couple of days? End of the week?"

  Lieutenant Dale eyed the front of Ryan's jacket, where the smuggled documents created a slight bulge. "Would hosting it sooner be an apology?"

  "I don't make excuses." Nor would he return the file. His father hadn't been able to find answers. Ryan would. "Hosting it now turns your disaster to an advantage. Your choice."

  The other man studied him for a long moment and finally gave a slow nod. "You'll do your father's memory proud yet."

  His chest ached with the reminder but Ryan forced a shrug. He snapped his oxygen mask over his cheekbones, focusing instead on the sting of elastic. War, distraction by detective, and a tongue that functions ahead of my brain, yes, those are the hallmarks of a good legacy, Lieutenant.

  "I don't recommend tacking it on to tonight's media circus, though. Give me a day or two to sort this mess."

  Ryan nodded. At least this way, he could leverage the case file deal to a greater advantage, both for the company and for the reputations at stake.

  The cellular phone hooked on one of Lieutenant Dale's belt loops buzzed and he flipped it to his ear. After a final nod at Ryan the lieutenant strode off. He disappeared around the side of Amanda's ambulance to take the call as if the shield of a vehicle between him and the swarm of people in the parking lot could garner a private conversation. Amanda looked up as he passed. When he didn't glance her way, her mask fogged with an aggravated huff. Ryan empathized—his EMT buddy had returned to poking. He occupied himself with burying memories as he watched the detective's fingers twitch in an uneven pattern over her biceps.

  A furious, muffled "Where is she?" came from the other side of Amanda's ambulance. Ryan stripped off his oxygen mask. He tuned in to the lieutenant's phone call, ignoring the EMT's attempt to strap the device back to his face.

  "No praise for my demonstration?" asked an auto-tuned voice on the other end of the line. "Disappointing, Lieutenant."

  "You had your fun. Tell me where she is."

  Ryan hopped off the bumper and moved toward Amanda, purposefully keeping his steps slow and calm. Her lieutenant's hedging hid guilt. He had known there would be an attack. Had spoken with the person behi
nd it before the explosions, and now he was doing so again. A grim smile found its way to Ryan's lips. "Might take some time to find," indeed. Lieutenant Dale had purposely maneuvered his favorite detective into the safest place in the building.

  "Smooth," Ryan murmured. McLelas Financial made the right call to support the 16th.

  The lieutenant snapped his fingers and Ryan guessed the man had covered the receiver. "Get my team."

  Amanda frowned as one of the officers guarding her took off at a sprint across the parking lot. She hopped down and scooted around the corner. "Lieutenant?"

  "Where?" he asked again.

  "She's here. Home, safe and sound. But I'm not calling about your lovely wife." The caller's tone modulated wildly between pitches, clearly irritated. "I'm calling to deliver a promise."

  "And what would that be?"

  Ryan braced himself against the ambulance door as a rising tide of murmured concern pushed over the caller's response. He leaned around the corner to see several detectives huddled around their commanding officer. Amanda's shoulders were straight and her weariness had dropped away.

  "Who is that?"

  "Everything okay?"

  "Sir . . . "

  The lieutenant snapped his fingers, this time for quiet, and the pressure of extra voices in Ryan's ears eased. He homed in on the caller's so-called promise, his ability rummaging through the tones in the modulated voice. The caller's voice was a knot of sound. If he could focus long enough, he could find the right string, pull it, pull it again, until the whole thing unraveled.

  "Elected leaders in our dying city's government must vacate their offices within the week."

  That was an ultimatum, not a promise. Ryan aborted an intense step forward. He wasn't supposed to hear both sides of the conversation.

  Lieutenant Dale uncovered the receiver, his stance rigid with fury. "Or?"

  "One week, Lieutenant. One week until I take matters into my own hands. Relek City will be cleansed." The line clicked.