Mountain Investigation (18 page)

The way he said it made it seem as though al-Jihad had people throughout the local and federal arms of the investigation. Mariah knew Gray suspected there were insiders, but didn’t think he had any idea of the extent. If she could just get to him…

Who was she kidding? She didn’t want to see him to pass along information on al-Jihad’s resources and plans, or not really. She wanted to see
him,
to be with him. She wanted to talk to him, to convince him that they weren’t so different after all. They clicked. They fit. They made sense.

And she loved him. When she came right down to it, that was the truth in her soul, the emotion she’d been avoiding for too long.

She’d been thinking of herself as a fighter, but she hadn’t fought for what mattered most—her future.

Lee smacked her again, this time on the other cheek.
“Answer me, bitch! Tell me you spread your legs for some loser FBI agent whose own boss doesn’t even trust him not to screw up.” He got very close, practically screaming the words into her face. “Tell me!”

“Yes,” she said very clearly, speaking through a face gone numb and sore. “I was with Grayson. I love him.”

“And the feeling’s mutual,” Gray’s voice said, snapping Mariah’s attention to the bedroom doorway. He stood there, coldly furious, his attention fixed on Lee, though she knew he was as acutely aware of her as she was of him.

“Gray.” She sighed his name on a whisper of hope and a whole lot of fear, because she’d also seen the flash in Lee’s eyes. Not fear, but triumph. He’d planned for this, maybe even intended it.
Lee, don’t,
she wanted to say, but didn’t because she knew her pleas would only add to his pleasure.

“FBI. Hands up and get the hell away from her,” Gray growled, entering the room with his weapon drawn. Other men, including Fairfax, were crowded into the hallway behind him. “We’ve got the house surrounded.”

“Oh, I’ll raise my hands, all right.” Lee eased away from Mariah, then held up his hands to show the object he’d been fiddling with since Mariah awakened.

It was a small technical-looking box with a couple of buttons and a digital display. He held a yellow toggle with his thumb, and the digital countdown showed less than seven minutes remaining.

Mariah was no expert, but based on what she little she knew, and the way Gray and the others froze, she had to assume it was a detonator of some sort.

Lee’s tone was gloating when he said, “The basement of this place is loaded with explosives. You shoot me and I let go of this trigger, this place goes up immediately. You play along, and you’ve got three minutes and change to get your girlfriend out of here.”

“Define
play along,
” Gray said tightly.

“First off, get your agent friends out of here. This is between the two of us.”

“Clear the building and push the perimeter back,” Gray snapped without looking behind him. There was a mad scramble of bodies. All but one. “You too, Fax,” he growled. “Get out of here. For Chelsea’s sake, if nothing else.”

Fairfax hesitated, then turned and left.

When the three of them were alone, Gray said, “Now what? You know you’re not getting out of here alive. We’ve got the perimeter completely locked up.”

“Maybe I don’t want to get out.” Lee stood and backed across the room, toward the closet he’d used for his clothes and forbidden her from entering when they’d lived there. “Maybe there’s something I want to show you, instead.”

“Freeze!” Gray barked. “Stop moving right now, or—”

Lee tossed the detonator at him. The trigger snapped open, but instead of an explosion, it brought a gout of choking gray smoke spewing from the handheld unit. Under the cover of that smoke, Lee bolted for the closet, yanking open the door, then stooping to pull up a trapdoor that Mariah hadn’t ever seen before.

Shouting for the other agents to get their butts back
into the house, Gray fired several rounds into the smoke. Under that cover he lunged forward, grabbing for Lee. He made contact, getting Lee around the waist and throwing him to the ground, but lost hold of his weapon, which went skittering across the floor.

Choking and gagging on the smoke, her eyes watering profusely, Mariah could only lie helpless and watch as the men grappled and struggled. Gray landed two good punches, but then Lee drove his elbow into Gray’s temple.

Gray reeled back, dazed. Lee ripped away and leaped into the closet, disappearing down the dark opening revealed beneath the trapdoor.

“Get in here!” Gray bellowed. When Fax appeared at a dead run, Gray waved to the opening. “Down there. Careful, but make it fast. We’ve got a few minutes to get out of range, assuming the bastard didn’t lie about the explosives.”

“He didn’t,” Fax said quietly. “The outside team’s fiber optics located them in the basement. And you were right, this was a distraction, too. There’s been a riot at the Supermax. The warden’s dead, along with two cops. One was the IA detective, Romo Sampson.”

“Damn.” Gray shook his head. “We can’t help them now, though. Get moving.”

As Fax palmed his flashlight and dropped through the trapdoor, Gray grabbed his weapon, scooped up the smoke bomb and lobbed it out into the hallway. Then he crouched down beside Mariah and started yanking at her bonds.

Her tears welled up and spilled over. “He’s getting away.”

“Yes, he is.” But although Gray’s voice was matter-of-fact, it wasn’t the slightest bit cool. In fact, it trembled slightly.

“Go,” she urged. “Remember how you said—”

“I remember most of what I’ve said to you,” he interrupted, “and I’m not proud of all of it. Some of it was downright stupid, some of it dead wrong. But what I said just now? That’s the truth. It’s what matters.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “I love you. I’m sorry it took me so long to see that and to say it. You’re my priority, you’re what matters most. There’ll be another chance for us to get Mawadi and al-Jihad. If I leave you here, there won’t be another chance for me to save myself and take my life in a new direction.”

As he said that, her shackles came undone and she was free.

Sobbing, she threw her arms around his neck. “I love you. Oh, God. I was so afraid you wouldn’t come.”

“You won’t ever have to worry about that again, because I’ll always be right there beside you, from now on.” His words were muffled against her as he held her close and lifted her, and they turned for the door. Gray raised his voice. “Time to go, Fairfax.”

Fax’s voice floated up. “There’s a tunnel headed north. I’m going to—”

“You’re going to get your ass back up here or I’ll tell Chelsea on you,” Gray said calmly.

There was a brief pause, then Fairfax reappeared, pulling himself out of the hidden tunnel.

Without a word, the men ushered Mariah outside, to a car parked well beyond the blast zone. There was a
brief discussion about disarming the bomb, but it was deemed too late. Instead, the other members of the armed response agents hustled to clear the nearby buildings.

As the seconds ticked down, Mariah looked toward the house she’d entered with wonderful dreams and left in the grip of a nightmare.

Gray slipped an arm around her waist. “Let’s go.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I want to see it. Are we far enough back?”

“Yeah.”

They were standing there, partially sheltered behind one of the dark SUVs, when there was a
whump
of detonation, a shudder in the ground beneath their feet…and then her house seemed to sag and settle in on itself. The roof tilted, the walls bowed out and everything slid off to one side. Moments later, flames licked from one of the lower windows.

Mariah thought that, in an odd way, it was both anticlimactic and cathartic.

In the distance, a fire engine’s siren began to wail. Mariah, though, couldn’t find any tears. She couldn’t find any joy, either. She was, quite simply, numb. So much had happened so quickly that she couldn’t begin to process it.

“He said the hidden files had something to do with al-Jihad’s grand strategy, something he’d been planning since long before Lee and I met. I think…I think he meant that marrying me wasn’t just about the malls. He made it seem like there was more, that the bombs, and maybe even the jail time, was all part of something bigger, a plan they haven’t put into motion yet.”

“That plays,” Gray agrees. “We’ll have you give a full report, go over everything he said or did.” He tightened his arm and looked down at her. “I’ll be there, and I promise—no browbeating this time around.”

Incredibly, she felt a bubble of laughter lodge in her throat. “I think I’m tough enough to hold my own now. Bring on the rubber hoses, Mr. FBI guy.”

“Yeah, you’re strong enough to make it on your own now.” He leaned down and dropped a kiss on her lips. “But you’re not going to have to. And neither am I.”

And as she closed her eyes and opened herself up to his kiss, and the future that had begun to unreel in front of her, she knew he was absolutely right. Each of them was strong enough to cope with whatever came next, as Bear Claw City dealt with the fallout of the fatal prison riots. But the lovely thing was, she and Gray wouldn’t have to handle it alone, not anymore.

They’d deal with everything together.