“Tell her to search admissions,” says Honesti.
The panic in the nurse’s eyes tell me she still thinks I’m nuts.
I step toward her. “The girl is the missing girl on the news, Aimee De Lucca. I’m Reizo Rush. Stewart and a kid kidnaped us because we found something that will probably put them out of the drug business.”
“You don’t have long,” says Honesti.
“I know. Will you chill?”
“Let the boy think,” says Bouncer.
“Sorry,” says Honesti.
I shout, “Please shut up!”
The nurse jumps and peers at me with her eyes wide.
I lower my voice, focus on the nurse, and talk slower. “Please. Search the patient log.”
The nurse taps on the computer keyboard.
I pick up a phone on the nurse desk and dial information. Who do I call? I could call my Mom, but she’d freak. Maybe JT, but Steve has access to a van and occasionally drops patients off here. No one will suspect he’d be helping me.
“What number please?” A voice on the phone asks.
“Connect me to Franklinville Medical Hospital, please.”
“Thank you,” the voice says.
I point to the nurse. “This is a matter of life or death. Aimee has a heart problem. Zeke is probably going to kill her.”
“Zeke Sarov?” the nurse asks. “That slime bucket is involved? Why didn’t you say so? He’s trouble. I know that for sure.” She glances down at Dr. Stewart, who is now on his back, passed out. “I never liked Stewart either.”
“Yeah, he’s working with Zeke. I’m pretty sure Zeke runs a drug operation from Willowgate. I just don’t know where.”
The suspicious glint in the nurse’s eyes suddenly changes. “Why didn’t you tell me that earlier? I’ve suspected something was up with Dr. Stewart for a while now. I see him talking to Zeke almost every day.”
“Franklinville Medical Hospital,” says a new voice over the phone. “May I help you?”
“Steve Baxter, please.”
“Thank you.”
A few seconds later, Steve answers the phone. “Hello?”
“Steve, this is Reizo.”
“Reizo Rush? I thought—”
I interrupt. “Look, I can’t explain. I need you to drive over here to Willowgate. Park around back, I’ll be coming out the rear entrance. You know where, right? The rear entrance where they bring in the new patients.”
“Is everything okay?” Steve asks.
“No, Zeke kidnaped us. He shaved my head and committed me. Aimee too, I think. I just broke out. By the time you arrive, I hope to have Aimee. We’ll meet you around back. Got it?”
“But I’m—”
“Steve, please dude. This is an emergency. Life or death. Can you help us?”
“Yeah, yeah, fine. I’ll be right over.”
Just as I hang up, the nurse says, “Well, I’ll be. You were right. A girl was brought in two days ago. She was put in room 131—but—huh? That’s weird. She was to be moved back to Little Rock early this morning, but instead of a transfer authorization, there’s a note that says “See Dr. Stewart.”
“Oh no. I'm too late,” I mutter.
“Maybe not,” says Honesti. “Find Zeke’s drug operation.”
“She could be dead already,” says Bouncer.
“Don't say that!” says Honesti.
I peer at the nurse. “If Zeke ran an operation at Willowgate, what part of the hospital would he use?”
“What now?” the nurse asks, clearly confused.
“Is there any part of the hospital that’s off-limits?”
The nurse frowns. “Um, the basement. Dr. Stewart made it clear that the basement is closed off. It’s the only restricted area in the entire hospital. He told everyone it is off limits, supposed to be filled up with cement or some such thing to reinforce the old foundation.”
“Check the basement for Aimee,” says Honesti.
“Be careful or you’ll die, brother man,” says Bouncer.
“Stop it,” says Honesti. “The basement, Reizo.”
I ignore Bouncer, but Honesti has a point. A large basement would be the perfect place for a drug operation. There’s no way an operation would be in any open part of the hospital or everyone would know about it.
“Do you believe me now? Zeke wants the two of us dead. Stewart has to be involved.”
The nurse glances down at Dr. Stewart passed out on the floor. She turns to me and asks, “What can I do to help?”
“My friend, Steve, will be around back in a few minutes. He’ll be in a van. In the meantime, call Pete Murdock’s number at the ranch outside of town. Tell him what’s going on. Do you know the ranch I’m talking about?”
“Sure, sure. Everyone knows Murdock’s ranch.”
Reizo continues. “Don’t call the police. Zeke has most of them paid off. Tell Mr. Murdock to call Aimee’s mom. We’ll meet her at Murdock’s. Got it?”
“No wonder they don’t let us down there,” mumbles the nurse.
“Can I borrow your badge to use the elevator?”
The nurse points to Stewart, who’s still on the floor. “Use Dr. Stewart’s. His badge will work, but you'll need a special access key for the basement level.”
I pull off Stewart’s white jacket with his badge still attached to it. I notice a long chain dangling from around his neck.
“That’s it,” says Honesti.
I yank the chain and take the key.
“You aren’t thinking about walking around in socks, are you?” asks Honesti.
“Good point.”
Stewart’s shoes look about my size. I pull them off his feet and put them on—they’re a little big, but better than running around in socks. I put on Stewart’s white coat over my Willowgate issued pajamas and then place the pepper spray and Taser into the jacket’s large pockets.
The nurse shakes her head as I lead the way to the elevator. “I never did like that man,” she mutters. “Stewart has always given me the creeps.”
“Try having him for a doctor. Come on. We need to hurry.”
“I’ll take the stairs and unlock the back entrance and wait for you at the elevator on the ground floor,” says the nurse. “You’ll need me to show you through the maze of hallways to the back entrance.”
“Cool. Thanks.”
The nurse disappears down the stairway.
chapter forty-five
I hear distant whispers and footsteps on the other side of the locked door.
Chemical smells, mildew, and dust.
I want to throw-up, collapse and cry, but I don't. Instead, I search the darkness for anything I can use as a weapon.
Part of the wall feels like rusty iron with large bolts. Other parts feel like rough mortared brick.
As my eyes adjust to the small amount of light, I can tell the room is nearly triple the size of a closet and completely empty, except for a small cot against one wall.
The only thing I find is a rolled-up iron chain under the cot. It's about three-feet long.
The chain isn’t much, but it’s something. I keep two feet of chain loose with the rest wrapped around my hand, and return to the cot. I practice swinging it back and forth.
It will do damage, but no way is it going to stop a big guy. The only thing I have going for me is the element of surprise.
Now I wait.
chapter forty-six
Pressing the down button over and over isn’t helping the elevator arrive any faster, but it feels productive.
“Be empty.”
“Be empty,” says Bouncer.
“Be empty.”
“Be empty,” says Honesti.
“Be empty.”
After a few seconds, the elevator bell chimes and the doors open.
The elevator is empty.
Awesome.
“Damn you’re lucky,” says Bouncer.
“Luck is a good thing,” says Honesti.
I q
uickly get inside the elevator and insert Stewart’s ID card into a slot on the button panel near the floor selection buttons. I notice a slot for a key on the lower part of the panel, next to a metal button marked with a B, presumably for basement.
I push in the key.
It fits and turns.
When I press the B button, a tiny green light illuminates and the doors close.
The elevator rattles downward.
I pace inside the small space like a trapped tiger. “Come on.”
“Relax Reizo,” says Honesti. “You got this.”
“Take ’er easy big guy,” says Bouncer. “Or die.”
I stop and grab my head. “Remember the rules! Chill with the play-by-play. Okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” says Bouncer. “Dying ain’t in the plan, right?”
“Right. We’re finding Ames, then getting the hell out of this place.”
“Now you’re talking,” says Honesti.
I button up the long white jacket and get ready for the elevator to stop.
With both hands in the large pockets of the white doctor jacket, I grip the pepper spray in one hand and Stewart’s Taser in the other. I should feel like a badass, gripping two weapons, but when I look down and see pajama bottoms from the knee down, crazy ass is a better description.
The elevator doors finally open.
I peer past an empty desk into a massive rectangular space the size of the floor I came from. It’s filled with a hundred people wearing surgical masks, working at long tables extending the length of the building. Some people are taping up boxes, others stacking, and a few carry boxes up cement stairs on opposite sides of the basement. Both stairways apparently lead up and out of Willowgate.
“It’s a drug operation, all right. A big one,” I mutter.
“The side entrance must be how Zeke moves workers in-and-out of Willowgate without staff noticing,” says Honesti.
“Get your ass in gear,” says Bouncer. “What the hell you waiting for?”
No one notices me. It’s probably thanks to the white doctor’s jacket I’m wearing with the badge attached. I relax my grip and breathe out slow.
“You have about five minutes tops,” says Honesti.
“Right.” I make a mental note. “What? Why five minutes?”
“Just move, Reiz,” says Honesti.
“You better act like you should be here,” says Bouncer.
I walk out of the elevator with confidence and continue along one side of the building. A few people glance up as I near them, but they quickly go back to work. I don't see Zeke anywhere.
At the far end, I notice a group of old rusty iron doors running along one wall. Rooms maybe?
“Check the iron doors,” says Bouncer.
“Yep. I see them.” I pick up the pace and hope like hell she's inside one.
“If Zeke has Aimee locked up down here, that’s probably where he’d keep her locked up,” says Honesti.
“Better hurry,” says Bouncer.
When I reach the first large iron door, I knock on it. “Ames?”
“Really?” asks Bouncer. “You expect her to hear you whisper through an iron door? Speak up, man.”
When I knock on the next door, I raise my voice. “Aimee.”
After four doors with no sign of Aimee, I knock on the last iron door and lean my ear against it. I hear movement.
“Ames? You in there?”
A faint voice replies, “Reizo?”
chapter forty-seven
The room is still dark as night, but I suddenly feel a familiar energy and a racing heartbeat.
Reizo?
I tighten my grip on the chain just in case I'm wrong and jump to one side of the door.
The big iron door squeaks open and I prepare to swing.
“Ames?” asks Reizo.
I drop the chain and wrap my arms around Reizo. “Thank God you found me!”
His soft lips find mine and my world fades away as I melt into him. Warmth. Safety. Love.
I want the moment to last forever.
Reizo wipes the tears from my face gently and peers into my eyes. “I'd thought I lost you. Are you okay?”
“I think so. I'm just groggy.”
Talking outside the open door causes us both to flinch.
“Zeke will be back any minute.” I squeeze his arm. “We need to get out of here.”
Reizo touches my hand and looks out the door. Waves of determination and intensity radiate from him. It gives me hope. He points to a staff identification card clipped to the doctor coat he's wearing.
“Just pretend I’m part of the Willowgate staff taking you out of here to the elevator.”
I notice all his beautiful hair has been buzzed. I run my fingers across his head and feel energized. “Nice hair.”
He forces a grin. “Yeah, thanks. Yours too by the way.” His energy shifts.
Reizo glances at the door opening. “We need to get out of here. Steve is going to drive us to your uncle’s ranch. I told him to tell your Mom to meet us there.”
“Steve?”
“The security guard from the real hospital, ” he says. “Remember?”
I remember the big guy from the hospital. “Can we trust him?”
“Yeah, I trust him.” Reizo grabs my bicep. “Show time.”
chapter forty-eight
I escort Aimee quickly down Willowgate's hallway.
I’m tempted to use one of the side stairways that lead outside the building, but I told Steve to meet us at the rear entrance of the hospital. He'll have a van waiting for us.
I stick with the plan and walk to the elevator.
“How’d you find me?” Aimee whispers as we walk.
“I’ll tell you later, right now keep your head down and shuffle your feet like your drugged up.”
Through the corner of my eye, I see stacks of large clear plastic bags full of white powder.
“This is a processing factory all right,” says Honesti.
Stacks of wrapped green stuff are spread across tables. Steam rolls off of a large silver canister with copper pipes against the wall across the room. The entire basement is full of just about every kind of illegal drug that Zeke could possibly sell.
“Probably a million bucks worth of drugs,” says Bouncer.
I noticed something else that makes me walk faster. Guns. Crates full of different types: long rifles, handguns, and automatic weapons.
Suddenly someone behind us screams in Russian.
Aimee and I jump at the same time, but we keep walking.
I tighten my grip on her arm. “Don’t look back.”
“Move it, Reiz,” says Honesti. “You don't have much time.”
Near the elevator, a tall, gaunt-faced man with a shaved head in a white coat sits down at a desk.
Crap. We keep walking toward the elevator.
The man at the desk shouts back in Russian, then quickly gets up and sprints past us down the hall. He yells at three men working near a silver canister.
When Aimee and I finally reach the empty desk, I notice an open binder. It looks like some sort of log.
“Take it, brother man,” says Bouncer.
“It could be records,” adds Honesti. “You'll need proof to put Zeke away.”
I discretely pick it up and see names, dates, cities, and street addresses written in it. Honesti is right. It looks like an inventory logbook.
I hand it to Aimee. “Hang onto this. It might come in handy.”
“Hurry up, Reizo,” says Honesti.
I push on the elevator button, willing it to open. “I’m trying.”
“What?” Aimee asks.
“Nothing. Lower your eyes and hang your head. We’re almost out of here.”
I let go of her arm and put both hands in the jacket pockets, gripping the pepper spray and the Taser. I’m ready to start zapping people coming out of the elevator.
When the doors open, two men in white lab coats w
alk out of the elevator, struggling to carry heavy boxes. They’re talking in Russian and ignore us.
“Made it,” says Honesti.
“I’m shocked,” says Bouncer. “I was sure he'd screw this up.”
We step into the elevator. I fumble with Stewart’s identification card, slide it into the slot, and then push the ground floor button.
“You better hope the nurse is still waiting for your dumb ass,” says Bouncer.
“No shit,” I mutter.
I shake my head at Aimee when she gives me a confused look.
“That’s enough you two,” says Honesti. “Stay focused. Reiz.”
Before the doors start to close, Zeke walks into the hallway from one of the side stairway entrances and spots me. “Stop them!”
“Damn.” I hold the elevator door open and turn to Aimee. “I need to create a diversion. A nurse will be waiting for you.” I hand her the key and Stewart's ID card. “Give her these. She’ll take you to the back entrance where Steve will be waiting. Give the binder to your Mom. Got it?”
“No. You have to come too.” Aimee’s eyes flood with tears.
“Sorry. There’s no time. Zeke will stop us for sure. I’ll meet you at the ranch, I promise.”
Zeke and another man are getting closer.
I give Aimee a quick kiss, jump out of the elevator, and run, letting the doors close behind me.
Sprinting toward Zeke catches him off guard. He hesitates, allowing me to change direction. I jump up on the tables in the middle of the room and run faster, dodging workers, stacks of drugs, and boxes.
Near one of the cement stairways, I leap off the table at the opposite side of the basement.
“Stop him!” Zeke screams. “I want him alive!”
chapter forty-nine
My head is foggy, but my eyes are clear.
The nurse Reizo had mentioned stands outside the elevator on the ground floor as the doors open.
I hand her the key dangling from a chain and the ID card. “Reizo told me to give these to you.”
“Right,” the nurse replies. “Thank you.”
She leads me through two locked doors to a van that’s waiting and helps me into the passenger’s seat.
Steve fastens a seatbelt around my waist.
“Thanks for—” I start to say with a raspy voice.
Steve stares at me and interrupts. “Where’s Reizo?”
“He’s creating a distraction,” I say. “He wants us to get out of here.”
The nurse pats the van’s hood. “Go!” She steps back. “Move it!”
Steve hits the gas, throwing me backwards in my seat.
“Are you okay?” Steve asks, fishtailing the van away from Willowgate.
“Yeah,” I manage to say, hanging on to the dashboard. “I’ll be okay.”