Smokescreen (33 page)

D
arcy hit the brakes hard, swerved to a stop, grabbed her satellite phone from the seat beside her, and ripped into it. She’d repaired it before and, by God, she would again.

She pulled the schematic from memory, compared it to what she was looking at on the phone, and spotted a loose connection. She fumbled with her purse, snagged a penny, and used it to tighten the loose connection, then snapped the casing back into place.

She got a tone.

Grateful, she dialed Home Base, and when Maggie answered, her words came out in a rush. “They’ve got Ben. I need a locator put on his phone.” She reeled off the number. “And I need it now. Kunz has him. GRID, Santana and Kunz—they’re all together and they have Ben.”

“Okay, Darcy, we’re on it. Give me a minute. It’s seeking,” Maggie said. “How did GRID get Ben?”

“I don’t know. Wexler—someone—tampered with the stem valve on my tire. I got a flat out in the damn middle of nowhere. The shipment had gone through by the time I got to Los Casas.”

“How do you know that?”

“Wexler had already left. One of the other guys, Mick, said Ben went home sick. I figure he followed the shipment and they snagged him.”

For fear of taking off in the wrong direction and putting more distance between her and Ben, Darcy stayed put, waiting for the locator to work its magic and tell her where to find him. “His phone is active,” she said, more to reassure herself than Maggie. “There was fighting and party horns in the distance, and music.”

“Sounds like a party.”

Darcy gasped. “Not a party, a festival. He’s in town, Maggie. They didn’t take the fireworks to Broken Branch. They took them somewhere in Devil’s Pass. I heard music. There’s an opera rehearsal at the open-air theater tonight. He has to be somewhere around there.” She hit the gas, made a sharp turn for town, and then stomped the accelerator.

“Definitely in Devil’s Pass, Darcy.” Maggie confirmed it. “Downtown, but off Main Street. We’re getting a specific address on it now.”

“I know Colonel Drake wanted to wait and monitor all three shipments, but I’ve been working on the code and I think at least one is already here.”

“Intel confirmed that about ten minutes ago.”

“We can’t wait, Maggie. They could already have the third, or go without it. We need immediate FBI intervention or we risk losing Thomas Kunz again.” They’d lost him before, thought they’d killed him twice and put him in Leavenworth once only to discover they’d never had him, only his body doubles.

“Colonel’s briefing General Shaw and Secretary Reynolds now.”

Darcy came to the edge of town. People stood crowded in the streets, dancing, laughing, drinking. It was a huge block party—only it went on forever. Frustration and fear stacked and spread in Darcy. She’d never find him.

“Warehouse, Darcy. Third and Main.”

“I know it.” She steered around a group of teens, sitting in the street, their heavy metal screeching, setting Darcy’s teeth on edge and fraying what was left of her nerves. And then she felt the snap. The tight chest, the scattered thoughts she couldn’t seem to grasp, and those telltale spots that blurred her eyes. Having no choice, she whipped into a parking place and slammed on the brakes.

Not now.
She bent forward, leaned her head against the steering wheel.
Not now, please. Please, not now.

Her thoughts ignored her, sped ahead to what could be happening to Ben. The rest of her tried to keep up but she just couldn’t do it. She was functioning a few beats behind, and clammy with sweat.

You can do this, Darcy. For five years, you’ve done damn near everything a few beats behind. You can do this that way, too. You have experience at it, lots and lots of experience at it. Just do what you have to do, Darcy. Just do it!

She snapped her phone to her black slacks, concentrated hard and checked her weapon—ready to fire—then got out of the car.
Okay. Okay, where are you?

Slowly, she turned around and spotted the flag and wide stone steps.
The courthouse. You’re at the courthouse. Three blocks to the warehouse.

She started out on foot, winding between the throngs of people, humming to minimize their input into her
senses. She held her nose to block out smell, kept humming and moved quickly—too quickly to grasp impressions. Ah, move quickly!

Run, Darcy. Run!

She focused hard to get her feet to work in rhythm with her brain, sideswiped people and just kept running, shouting, “Sorry. So sorry. Sorry.” She ran two blocks—and took in nearly nothing on impressions. Then she ran headlong into Mick and a petite brunette, dancing in the grass above the sidewalk. “Sor— Mick?” She’d left him at Los Casas, working. How had he gotten here so quickly?

“James Grady came in to help out Bobby Meyers.”

Odd. Ben had said James had the flu.

“I’m keeping Elizabeth company. Elizabeth Wexler, meet Darcy Clark.”

Lucas’s wife. A pretty brunette with doe eyes and full lips. Darcy nodded. “Have fun,” she said, because it was easier than explaining anything, then she rushed on.

The crowd thickened. The tightness in Darcy’s chest felt like a vise, and someone wrenched it a half hitch. The crush of people squeezed and her feet lifted off the ground. Her back and neck muscles twitched, locked for seconds in little spasms, warning of bigger ones to come. She could barely breathe. The hyperstimulation was strengthening….

You can’t fail. Not again. Not Merry and Ben. You can’t do it, Darcy. Die if you have to, but don’t fail.

“Ben, please be alive,” she muttered to herself. “Please be near your phone. I need you!” She snaked toward the building, pushing and shoving, bit by bit making her way out of the crush. A man grabbed her shoulder, spun her around and kissed her. She pushed
away, looked him in the face. He was drunk. Harmless and drunk.

“Come on, hon. Let’s go party. I’ll bet you’re one hot mama under those tight pants.”

Darcy didn’t have time for this, and she damn sure didn’t have the patience for it. When he grabbed for her again, she popped him with a right cross that knocked him back off his staggering feet. To the laughter of the men, and gasps and cheers from the women right around them, Darcy took an exaggerated bow and then walked on.

She didn’t have time for this, but the last thing she could afford while others watched her was to appear panicked. She looked back and saw Mick looking her way. He shot her a big grin and a thumbs-up.

Why was he watching her? Why was he with Elizabeth Wexler?

Regardless, it was time for Darcy to disappear. She wound through the crowd and around the back of the warehouse. Finally, she touched the building’s cool metal. Its windows were dusty, the door padlocked. For all intents and purposes, it appeared empty.

She double-checked with Maggie on the phone. “Are you getting the same location on my phone as Ben’s?”

“You’re right on top of each other.”

“Get me some help, Maggie. Now.”

“On the way. It’ll be a few minutes. They were staked out at Broken Branch.”

“That’ll be ten minutes, at least.” Ben could be dead in ten minutes. So could she.

“At least.”

It was too little, too late.

Handle it.

He was here. No. No, his phone was here.

Darcy lifted her leg and pain shot through her spine up to her nape. Her knees collapsed and she crumpled to the ground.

Her muscles were in lockdown.

You can do this, Darcy.

I can’t move! I can’t defend myself, much less fight to defend Ben. How can I do this? I can’t freaking move!

You can. You can, Darcy. Breathe deeply. Relax. You can do this. I swear, you can.

She heard Ben’s voice, heard Dr. Vargus, Colonel Drake. They all believed in her.

Merry. You can’t fail again like with Merry. Get on your damn feet!

Drenched in cold sweat, Darcy slid up the building to her feet. She took her gun from her purse, folded her fingers around the grip. She wasn’t steady. Hell, she wasn’t even sure she could aim much less shoot. She stumbled along the perimeter of the building to the side door. It wasn’t padlocked. Did she dare to just walk in?

Ten minutes.
Did she have a choice?

She slid inside, into a darkened doorway. She heard muffled noises from across the warehouse. In her vicinity, nothing stirred. Deliberately, she brought Ben’s voice to mind, focused on his soothing tranquility, his gentleness, his tenderness.

With a shake and a giant shudder, she regained some of her control. Swiping her slacks at her thighs, she dried her soaked palms, gripped her gun tightly and then stalked the warehouse, looking for Ben.

Darcy moved with stealth through the dark warehouse toward the bald yellow light shining in its center. Wooden crates stacked ten or more feet high formed
barricades. They were marked as canned goods, but her heightened senses disagreed. Darcy sniffed a crate and smelled a trace of gunpowder.

The bombs? Probably, but they should smell stronger. Maybe her senses weren’t as attuned as usual because her focus was slivered.
Something
was off.

She scraped her back against the rough wood, checked for signals that she’d been spotted, but she perceived none. Silently, she peeked around the corner of the crates—and saw Ben in the center of a circle of wooden boxes stacked far above his head so that no one outside could see what was going on inside the building.

He hung suspended from metal rods, tied a foot off the floor with heavy ropes, his arms stretched wide, his legs pulled apart. Sweat-soaked, pain had his face haggard, and his head lolled forward, chin to his chest.

Her heart nearly ruptured.
Don’t do it, Darcy. Not now. You can handle this.

“Why were you following us, Ben? Who told you to follow us?”

Needle.
Darcy recognized his voice before he turned and she saw his face. He picked up a syringe. He’d drugged Amanda. She’d lost three months of her life! Darcy’s stomach twisted and churned.

No answer. Ben didn’t so much as grunt.

“We have the means to make you tell us everything,” Needle warned him.

They did. Oh, God, but they did.

“Spare yourself the pain and just tell us, Ben.”

Darcy swallowed hard, looked around. Needle couldn’t be here alone, yet she saw—

Thomas Kunz walked into the light, paced a short
path before Ben, looking up at him. But when he spoke, it was to Needle. “Anything?”

“Not yet.”

Kunz turned his attention to Ben. “Agent Kelly, I admire your loyalty, but it’s severely misplaced. You will tell me what I want to know. The only question is how much pain you’ll endure between now and then, and that is totally up to you.”

“Go to hell, you sadistic son of a bitch.” Ben spit at Kunz. The strain on the ropes had his wrists bleeding.

“Soon enough.” Kunz stepped back. “You’ll of course join me there.” He turned back to Needle. “The authorities are too late to affect the mission. The S.A.S.S. blew this one. Unfortunately, pressing matters call and I don’t have time to play with our friend, Agent Kelly,” Kunz said. “Kill him.”

Shaking, her muscles spastic, Darcy gritted her teeth. She couldn’t follow orders and watch Ben suffer. She wouldn’t watch him die.
Not him, too!
She lifted the gun, struggled to hold it up and aim at Thomas Kunz’s broad back. He was the most valuable target in GRID. Without him, the terrorist network wouldn’t collapse, but it would be disorganized and give the S.A.S.S. time to run down its components. Her grip slipped.

She caught the gun in midair, now shaking like a leaf.

You can do this, Darcy. Damn it, you will do it—now!

The barrel of the gun lifted. She took aim and fired, dropped and rolled to the next line of crates.

Grabbing his shoulder, Kunz dove into the darkness. Santana, whom she’d not seen, stepped out and aimed at the crates where she’d been standing. “Come out. We’ve got you.”

The hell they did. He wasn’t shooting. He
knew
what
was in this warehouse and he wasn’t going to blow himself up. But she couldn’t get a clean shot at him.

Needle cut Ben down.

Santana snatched Ben from Needle and disappeared into a hallway near two rows of low-ceilinged offices. She had a clear shot at Needle and took it.

He dropped to the floor.

Certain Kunz had departed—he never hung around for the fight—she started toward the offices, to where Santana had disappeared with Ben. Her legs didn’t want to work. Her mind was already there.
Damn it! Can’t I get just one break here? Just one?

Her left arm went numb.

She couldn’t move it.

Acknowledge and accept the pain, Darcy.
Dr. Vargus’s voice.
I promise you, if you acknowledge the pain, you can overcome it.

You’d damn well better be right, Doc.
She gripped the gun in her right hand tighter, entered the narrow hallway, knowing she’d be wiser to avoid it. Odds were high Santana would ambush her here, and she had no cover. But blood smeared on the wall insisted she go on. Ben’s blood.

He was brushing the walls deliberately, leaving her a trail.

Behind her, something crackled. Seconds later, she smelled sulfur then heard the hiss of fire.

Fire.

She turned and saw the flames sweeping across the warehouse. Kunz, the bastard, had set a charge to burn it before running out—and Needle no longer lay on the floor. He’d been winged, not mortally wounded.

It’s just like Merry. It’s your fault Ben’s here. Your fault he’s going to die. Darcy, it’s all your fault.

Her entire body in full revolt, Darcy fought hard. Fought the guilt, the fury, the fire she most feared. None of Dr. Vargus’s techniques worked. None of her own techniques worked.
Her damn feet wouldn’t move.

Ben. I’m sorry.
Tears stung her eyes, fell down her face.
I’m sorry…

“Darcy!” Ben’s shout. “Darcy!”