The Defender (The Carrier Series Book 2)
Read The Defender (The Carrier Series Book 2) Online
Authors: Diana Ryan
The
Defender
Text Copyright © 2016 Diana Riechers
Cover Image Copyright © 2016 Hannah
Christian Hess
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in
any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage
and retrieval systems, without written permission of the publisher or author.
The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living
or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
To my dearest
Maddox and Macy,
who hold my very
heart in their hands.
A tiny blue service light at the top of the elevator shaft penetrated
the complete darkness. My heart beat rapidly as a fat bead of sweat slowly
dripped from my hairline. I took a sharp breath.
“This is it,” I whispered to myself.
“Just breathe, Nolan.” Agent Drew Smith detected my anxiety, and
whispered to me from my left. “Ten minutes, buddy, and this is all over.”
He was right. I consciously reminded myself to breathe in and out.
Heartbeats sounded loud in my ears as I crouched down against the cold elevator
ceiling, holding my Glock in the ready position. Several other FBI agents held
their offensive positions around me, silently waiting for the signal.
“Outlier, report,” my earpiece called.
“The tactical team is in the ready position.” I came off
confidently, but secretly wanted to vomit on the elevator top. I took a deep
breath and the nausea subsided momentarily.
“The task force has almost defused the bomb system within
headquarters. Infiltrate on my signal.”
“Copy that. Myers is in his office,” the voice continued. “You
must apprehend him before he suspects the intrusion.”
“Affirmative.” Seconds passed and the silence of the moment rang
out through my ears. Then I heard the signal from Ground Ops.
“Now!” I yelled to my team. Agent Smith cracked open the hatch in
the top of the elevator and four agents jumped in. We pried open the elevator
door, and Agent Smith rolled in the tear gas canister. Screaming sounds
contrasted a calm, but serious voice on the intercom. “System breech. Execute
Plan B.”
I ran through the open door and shouted, “Get on your knees! Hands
in the air!” More tactical teams entered the office from different entry points
and fired shots to create confusion. It was Ethan Myers we wanted, not these
unsuspecting agents. All the computers had turned blood red, a protection
protocol I learned about when I worked here only a few months ago.
I headed toward Myers’s office, but stopped dead in my tracks as I
passed my old desk. It was a bit too familiar. I ran my fingers over the
desktop as memories flooded my brain. Not too long ago I sat right there,
hopeful and excited to serve my country faithfully. Familiar faces hid behind
their desks around the room, some being dragged away in handcuffs. Pandemonium
continued around me, but my eyes moved everything in slow motion. These people
had no idea they were not working for the American government. They had been
duped, just as I had, most of them probably for more years than the four I was
fooled into. I wanted to bring them into a huddle and impart the truth about
everything, but the desk agents began to fight back—following their defense
protocol and believing they were being attacked by criminals.
Complete chaos ensued—CBB employees sprinted for the exits,
furniture was overturned, computers smashed, and sparking wires hung from the
ceiling. There were many agents involved in combat, and shots whizzed by my
head, but I was still stuck in a trance.
Drew shook me by the shoulders. “Nolan! Myers! We have to get
Myers…now!”
He was right. I quickly followed Drew, darting through a maze of
desks to where Myers’s office was in the back. He kicked down the door and we
entered, guns drawn. We circled the perimeter of the office, but Myers wasn’t
there.
A vent door swung in the ceiling.
“You go up after him,” Drew suggested. “I’ll have Ground Ops
figure out where it leads and meet you there.”
“Got it.” I jumped up on the desk and hoisted myself into the
ceiling. The air duct was just a bit larger than the size of my body, and I
wondered how Myers had fit through, being the overweight creep that he was. The
metal pathway made a spooky creaking sound in response to my weight as I
carefully army-crawled through the duct. Myers couldn’t have gotten too far
yet—surely his body couldn’t snake through as fast as mine could.
What was I going to say when I came face to face with Ethan Myers
again? I was filled with nothing but rage for the man. He had forced me to stab
my girlfriend six weeks ago, and for four years he deluded me into believing I
was working for a legitimate government function when in all reality I was
inadvertently assisting him to advance in the world of criminal activity.
What I wanted to do to Myers if I came face to face with him was
against FBI code. I’d have a hard time restraining myself.
Just ahead of me I saw a pair of feet crawling as the duct took a
bend to the right. They disappeared as I sped forward.
Myers!
I crawled faster through a bend, and as the duct straightened out
I spotted the feet again. I activated my earpiece: “Ground Ops, Outlier.”
A steady male voice responded. “Go ahead, Outlier.”
“I have visual on Myers thirty feet ahead of me. We’re in the
ductwork.”
“Affirm. We’ll inform Agent Smith.”
“Myers!” I called. He stopped for a moment and turned his head
toward me. Evil, bright eyes looked straight at me through the tunnel.
“You.” The right side of his mouth turned up the tiniest bit. “You
will pay for this, Hill. Mark my words.” Then he turned forward and took off
quicker than before. Some type of special scooter was tied to his stomach.
So he was rolling through the ducts.
Myers was putting distance between us—I couldn’t keep up with the
wheels of his scooter. I panicked and pulled the gun from my waistband. Before
I thought about the repercussions, I fired two shots into the darkness. The
first bullet ricocheted wildly off the sides of the metal tube and whizzed by my
left ear, taking a tiny bit of the top off with it. I stopped moving and
instinctively pressed a hand to my wound.
“My leg!” Myers grunted in front of me. “You incompetent—Ah! Go
back to rookie training, Hill!” He started up again. I heard the wheels speed
ahead.
“Go to hell, Myers!” I screamed, but he was already too far ahead.
I crawled as fast as I could, my knees filling up with bruises and blisters. I
pushed through the pain and soon came to a fork in the ductwork.
Right or left? Right or left?
My gut said right. I rushed down the right path, but not too far
in I heard a metallic clang, and felt the duct come unattached to the ceiling.
I started to fall to the ground but held tight to the edge of the
duct. One side of the metal tube was swinging while the other side was still
bolted in. My feet dangled below me as I tried to pull myself up, but it was no
use—I couldn’t get a good grip.
Dammit!
Myers is getting away!
My fingers slowly slipped down the metal slide as huge beads of
sweat dripped down the side of my face. There was no way to get back into the
ductwork, so I checked the floor underneath me, looking for a good landing pad.
I was hanging above a tall, oversized room with high ceilings
easily two stories from the ground below. I had never seen this part of the CBB
the entire time I worked here. Across from me, on the ceiling, hung vast,
industrial looking spotlights shining down on what must be an operating room.
All sorts of fancy machines, shiny metal sinks, and stark white cabinets housing
medical supplies lined the perimeter walls. In the middle of the room sat two
operating beds. If I swung the right way, and let go of my grip at the right
time, I could probably land safely between all the equipment, and on one of the
beds. I used my abs to get my feet in motion and after a few swings I let go.
Just like a cat, I landed safely on the left bed. I spotted the exit off to my
right and quickly headed to it, but as I approached, I found the door locked
from the outside.
“No!” I grunted furiously as I tugged uselessly at the door
handles. I had blown my chance to get Myers! How was I going to get out of
here? I slammed my fist into the locked doors. Anger built quickly as my
breathing felt heavy and fast. Unsure of what else to do, I flipped a medical
table holding supplies to the floor with a loud clang.
Damn, that felt good.
I pressed the little button on my earpiece. “Ground Ops, this is
Outlier. I lost visual on Myers when the duct broke.” I looked out a window to
the street below. “I’m locked in some sort of medical room, probably on the
fifteenth floor.”
“Requesting extrapolation. Hold position, Outlier.”
I paced through the room while I waited. On the south wall there
was a whiteboard with several notes written on it. Along the top, the numbers
one through eight were written in red marker and circled boldly. Names were
sketched under three of the numbers and pictures had been attached under the
names. Lynette Mitchell, Jody Isaacs, and…Ava Gardner.
I felt my heart drop into my stomach.
Ava Gardner?
I tried
to control my anger but it was difficult. I thought Myers’s business with Ava
was done. Why was she plastered on this wall with these two other women?
Each person was female and looked very similar to Ava—brown hair
and brown eyes and seemed to be about the same age. Under each name there was a
series of written notes. I ran my eyes over the phrases on Ava. There were
details about where she lived and that she had a blue meteor in her house for
several years, but it also indicated she was of Cornish descent and that she
was right-handed.
What could this mean?
In the lower right-hand corner of the board were three words
written in all capitals and circled in black: cure, revenge, vanquishment.
Below it stood a date and time—sunrise, November 1st.
My earpiece buzzed. “Outlier, be advised the door will open
momentarily.”
“Copy that.”
I took a picture of the wall with my phone and erased the
whiteboard. Then for good measure I trashed the room. Whatever crazy
experiments Myers planned on doing to the woman of my dreams would never happen
on my watch.
Seconds later the door magically clicked open. “Thanks, Ground
Ops. I’m outta here.”
A grey hallway welcomed me. I jogged down it toward the stairs
while I waited for Op Tech to pull up the blueprints of the office.
Dammit! How could I have been outplayed by Myers again?
I slowed down near the middle of the hallway when an oversized map
on the wall caught my attention. It took only a few seconds to realize what was
represented, and then an angry fire deep within my body flared up again.
The map of the United States was covered with about thirty little
red stars indicating all the CBB offices scattered all over the continent. I
was naive enough to believe Myers headed up a small operation central to the
Midwest, but I was sorely wrong. Just when I thought taking down this office
would render Myers useless, I was flooded with deep and overwhelming defeat.
“Outlier, take the stairs on the north side of the hallway down
two floors. Agent Smith is waiting for you there.”
“Copy that, Ground Ops.” I pulled down the map in anger and ran
the rest of the hallway until I reached the door leading to the stairwell. I
was about to push the door open when I heard a gun cock right behind my head.
“Don’t move, Hill.” I recognized the voice as Agent Harper’s
immediately. Harper quickly grabbed the gun from my belt and tossed it to the
floor, sending it sliding away from us down the hallway. I put my hands up and
slowly turned around.
“So we meet again.” His cropped blond hair and chiseled face
looked aged and full of stress. Myers must really be putting the pressure on
him. “You know, Nolan, I can’t let you out of here alive. Myers wouldn’t
approve of your attempts at single-handedly destroying our operations.”
I knew Ground Ops could hear what was happening, and I prayed my
backup would arrive quickly.
“I don’t know, Harper,” I said, buying some time. “Won’t Myers
want me alive so he can conduct some kind of inhumane torture methods on me?
You better not shoot.” I knew I had to make my move quickly. Harper had shot me
once before, and I was sure he wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
I had been trained to appear calm, even though furious rage was
still burning deep within me. “You know, I have been wondering. Why didn’t you
kill me last summer when you had the chance?”
Harper’s eyes filled with anger. He knew exactly what I was doing
and was ready to fight back where it hurt me the most. “She will never be safe,
Hill. Myers needs Ava, and some feeble little half-agent wannabe like yourself
could never protect her from his ultimate terminus.”
Before he could go on for a second more, I kicked the gun out of
his hand and sent a powerful punch across his jawline. He doubled over in pain
and tried to pick up the gun, but I was right there seconds before him. I
swiftly pulled Harper’s right arm tightly behind his back, pushing him up
against the wall. With my other arm I held the gun to his head.
It took all that was inside me not to shoot him in the side of the
skull right then and there. Through clenched teeth and with rage behind my
voice, I loudly whispered into his ear, “You will
never
hurt Ava. She
has done nothing wrong and deserves a perfect life.”