“There.” Marc nudged Aidan with his elbow and pointed to a corridor off to the right.
Footsteps emanated from the hallway. A couple of security guys walked out, carrying Styrofoam cups of coffee. They talked as they drew near, probably headed for their break—and a whole-house blackout they didn’t even know existed.
Marc and Aidan each took one of them, dispatching them the way they had their colleague.
The guards crumpled to the hard concrete floor.
“Their replacements will be on their way,” Aidan said. “They’ll find their friend at the top of the stairs and blast down here.”
“There’s another set of basement stairs at the opposite end of that corridor,” Marc replied. “I remember them from the map. We’ll take those up once we have Emma. Come on.”
The corridor was short, with a bunch of storage closets and only one room. The unyielding handle told them that it was locked from the inside.
Aidan planted one foot on the ground and used his other foot to deliver a front kick near where the door latch was. The door fell open on its hinges. Aidan and Marc then burst inside.
The room was devoid of furniture but for a four-poster bed, a few chairs and side tables, and more wall sconces.
On the bed lay Emma.
Marc and Aidan were greeted by her haunted, terrified gaze. She’d been stripped naked, bound, and gagged, each of her limbs tied to a bedframe post. There was dried blood and bruising on her body, but there wasn’t time to evaluate the extent of her injuries now.
Slava was kneeling beside her, unzipping his fly, several knives sitting on the bedside table, and an evil sneer on his face.
He whipped around at the commotion, his smile fading, and he leapt to his feet, groping for the gun that was still clipped to his belt.
He didn’t stand a chance.
Before his fingers had closed around the weapon, Marc squeezed the trigger of his raised SIG Sauer and delivered one lethal head shot right between Slava’s eyes.
The impact sent Slava crashing backward, blood oozing from his forehead. His body shattered the side table, then rolled onto the floor in a lifeless heap.
Stepping over him, Marc grabbed a blanket from the foot of the bed and wrapped it around Emma as Aidan sliced the ropes binding her.
“It’s Marc,” he said as he removed her gag, aware of the fact that she couldn’t see him or make out his identity through his scuba gear. “Aidan’s with me. We’re getting you out of here. Hold on.”
Emma’s teeth immediately began chattering, and she whimpered, the expression in her eyes almost painful to see.
“Easy,” Marc murmured, as, very gently, he lifted her blanketed body into his arms. “We’re almost home free.”
Aidan was already in the shattered doorway, scanning the corridor. “We’re clear,” he announced. “You lead. You know where the staircase is.”
They took off.
As they rounded the bend at the opposite end of the corridor, they could hear racing footsteps approaching the now-empty room.
They ascended the steps two at a time, and Marc kicked open the door at the landing hard enough to knock over the guard on the other side.
Waiting to hear his grunt of pain as he fell over, Marc shoved open the door, and he and Aidan bolted for the study.
Even carrying Emma, Marc shot through the window in one smooth motion, with Aidan right behind him. They squatted down, using their powerful quadriceps to hustle them across the grounds.
“I’ve got you,” Marc murmured to Emma, who was shaking violently and making agonized sobbing sounds. “You’re safe.”
Aidan was texting Ryan as he moved.
As they neared the lake, the red beam pierced the sky like the Bat signal.
The powerboat reached shore, and Marc waded out, placing Emma on the boat. Then, he climbed in, Aidan alongside. Ryan turned the boat and sped away from shore.
Behind them, they could make out a convoy of trucks pulling up to the Lubinov mansion and a blur of figures swarming inside.
“Looks like SWAT,” Aidan noted.
Marc turned around to see. “Yeah, I’m guessing it’s Albany SWAT. Hutch must have made this happen. Good. They’ll finish up where we left off. So much for Lubinov. I hope he rots in hell.”
Ryan glanced over, seeing that Marc was still cradling Emma, rocking her like a baby in distress.
“How is she?” he asked.
“Not good,” was Marc’s blunt reply. He reached over to grab the bottled water that Ryan had just uncapped and was handing him, along with the couple of extra blankets they’d brought on board. “Time to rehydrate,” Marc told Emma.
“Okay…but Marc.” She stopped him with a painfully devastated expression. “I tried not to say anything or to answer Lubinov’s questions. I tried. But those instruments he let Slava use…they hurt. I was scared. After a while…I told them I worked for Forensic Instincts. Not about Lisa’s identity switch, but about FI. I’m sorry.”
“Stop it.” Marc put down the water long enough to wrap the extra blankets tightly around Emma, easing both her internal and external chill. “You were a trooper. Now sip slowly.” He held the bottle up to her lips.
She complied, coughing at first but then gradually swallowing small amounts of fluid.
“Damn straight you were a trooper,” Ryan said. “We’re so proud of you. Besides, it doesn’t matter anymore. The FBI has Lubinov by now, along with all the psychos working for him, and those poor athletes who won’t even understand why they’re being taken in.”
“They won’t be charged. But they’ll make ideal witnesses. They’ll help put the scumbags away.” While he was speaking, Marc was studying Emma’s bruised and swollen face. He remembered the rivulets of blood on her body, along with additional bruising around her ribs. “We’ve got to get you to a hospital.”
“No.” Emma blanched. “I just want to go home.” Tears were spilling from her eyes. “He didn’t rape me, Marc, not yet. You stopped him. My cuts sting, but they’re not that bad. Please. Just get me home.”
Marc’s jaw tightened. She needed medical care, and she needed it now.
“Listen to me, Emma,” Marc said, soothing her as best he could. “You can’t travel all the way home in the condition you’re in. You have to go to a local hospital, just to get checked out and receive whatever treatment is necessary. You’ll be released in no time.” After the police and the FBI grill the hell out of you, he thought grimly.
“Ryan,” he said, recalling his teammate’s attention.
Still steering the boat, Ryan peered over his shoulder, brows raised in question.
“We have to figure out a way to work this.”
“I hear you.”
“From here on in, it’ll just be the two of us,” Marc continued. “Aidan’s going home.”
Aidan frowned, visibly bothered by leaving Emma in her condition and by off-loading all the responsibility onto Marc and Ryan.
“Marc…” he began.
“No.” Marc sliced the air with his palm, effectively cutting his brother off. “That was great teamwork, Black Hawk. Now it’s time to grab your SUV from the warehouse and head back to the city and to Abby. We got it from here.”
Knowing where he belonged, Aidan nodded.
“I don’t give a shit about discovery,” Ryan said. “I’ll carry Emma into the hospital myself.”
“That’s not an option.” Part of Marc was totally on board with what Ryan was saying. He hated having to let Emma handle any part of this on her own. But he also knew the ramifications of them admitting her. They’d have to provide their identities, their explanations—everything that would ultimately expose them and FI to criminal charges.
“The University of Vermont Medical Center isn’t far from her
e,” Marc said. “We’ll pick up our van at the warehouse, and you’ll drive us to the ER entrance. I’ll carry Emma inside and make sure she’s in a wheelchair or on a gurney before I—”
“No.” This time it was Emma who interrupted. Her voice was weak, but her resolve was strong—as if she were reading Marc’s mind and understood what had to be done. “You’ll be noticed. You can’t help but be. Just leave me near the outside ER door. I’ll cry out for a doctor the minute you drive away.”
“And how are you going to explain why you’re alone on their doorstep, naked and injured?” Ryan demanded.
“I’ll say I was attacked near the hospital grounds and that I got away.”
“That’s all she needs to say,” Marc agreed. “The staff will be concentrating on treating her, not interrogating her. That part will come later. And, by then, we’ll be there to run the show.”
He tucked a lock of disheveled hair behind Emma’s ear. “Listen to me,” he said. “Ryan and I will be watching the ER door to make sure someone helps you in. Don’t try to be stoic like you usually do. Be an emotional wreck. Beg them to call Ryan. They’ll do it ASAP. That call will be our cue.”
“Cue for what?” Emma asked.
“To start counting.” Marc knew that Emma was far more panicky than she was letting on. “We won’t have left the hospital grounds. We’ll wait two hours—enough time for us to have flown from Manhattan to Burlington—and then rush in. I need you to hold it together for that long, okay?”
Emma gave a tentative nod. “What about the cops? How do I answer their questions?”
“Act too freaked out to talk. Let them wait. Get hysterical if you need to. Just let the doctors fix you up. We’ll handle law enforcement when we get there.”
“I can do that.” Emma was talking as much to herself as she was to Marc.
“I know you can. Meanwhile, I’ll call Casey. She’ll want to fly up here. The whole team will.”
“And call Lisa,” Emma whispered. “Tell her that she, Miles, and Shannon are safe. It’s finally over.”
EPILOGUE
Offices of Forensic Instincts
Two weeks later
The whole FI team—plus Hutch, Aidan, and Madeline—was gathered around the main conference room table.
Casey carried in the cake, which was chocolate frosted, decorated with yellow buttercream flowers signifying friendship, and bearing the scripted words: Welcome Home, Emma.
Not welcome back. Welcome home.
Casey placed the cake in the center of the table, which was decorated with a bright yellow tablecloth, napkins, plates, hot cups, and plastic silverware, along with an enormous urn of freshly brewed coffee and a large cake slicer.
“This one’s all yours, Emma,” Casey told her. “You can share or eat the whole thing yourself. We’re so happy to have you back we’ll all forfeit our pieces, right, guys?”
There was a chorus of enthusiastic agreements.
Emma stared from the cake to her teammates, and tears filled her eyes—eyes that were no longer swollen or haunted but had yet to boast that Emma sparkle. “Thank you,” she murmured. “Of course I’ll share. What all of you have done for me—it means more than I can say.”
“You mean more than we can say,” Claire replied, gently squeezing Emma’s hand.
“Yeah, we missed your mouthy quips,” Ryan informed her. “It was way too dull around here.”
“I’ll remind you of that when I’m myself,” Emma responded, her lips curving into a smile that hadn’t come for two weeks.
The welts on her face had gone down, the cuts on her body were rapidly disappearing, and her bruised ribs were healing. She was sore and shaky but physically on the mend. Emotionally, she was, and would be, going for counseling for months, dealing with the deep-seated scars of her trauma.
Still, little by little, Emma was starting to be Emma again.
Over the past two weeks, the team had taken turns sitting with her at her apartment, helping her through her recuperation period—a period that had been ordered by Emma’s doctor and by Casey. Madeleine had visited, too, both as a friend and as a nurse, checking out Emma’s wounds and refreshing her bandages as needed.
The FBI, of course, had come to interview her, both at the University of Vermont Medical Center and here in New York. With the help of Marc’s coaching, she’d told them everything—except the identities of her rescuers. To that question, all she said was that the two men who saved her were dressed totally in black with night goggles and hoods, and that they hadn’t spoken to her, only brought her to the hospital and vanished. She assumed they were heroic FBI agents.
No one at the Bureau had countered that.
“Are you up to cake slicing?” Casey asked now, gazing uncomfortably at the knife. “Or do you want me to do the honors?”
For a moment, Emma eyed the slicer. Then, she said, “I’ll do it.” With a determined look, she stepped forward and cut generous helpings for everyone, her hands steadier than expected. “Go for it, gang,” she urged.
They all complied, beaming as they watched Emma scarf down her piece of cake and cut a second. Finally, her appetite was returning.
“This is the absolute last thing I’m eating until the wedding,” she declared. “It’s only a few days away. I have to fit into my dress.”
“Why does every woman say that?” Patrick asked, shaking his head in bewilderment. “I’ve heard Adele utter those same words a thousand times over the past thirty-five years. And she’s never had a problem fitting into anything.”
Casey laughed. “It’s a female thing.”
“Yeah, Marc,” Ryan said cheerfully as he polished off another forkful of cake. “Get used to it. You’re about to enlist for life.”
Marc put down his plate and wrapped his arm around Maddy’s waist. “I’m a willing recruit.”
“Even if you have to give up lap dances?” Maddy’s eyes danced, as she reminded Marc of the unexpected and unappreciated part of his bachelor party—a part that he’d been bitching about all week.
“No comment.” Marc glared from Aidan to Ryan to Hutch.
“Kudos to us, Aidan,” Ryan said. “He’s still pissed off. “Yeah, the arrangements did have their benefits. Which reminds me…” Aidan dug around in his shirt pocket and produced a slip of paper. “The lovely Yvonne—lap dancer number one—asked me to give you this.” He offered the paper to Marc. “It’s her cell phone number. She said that anytime you get bored, give her a call, and she’ll give you more than a lap dance.”
Maddy reached over and snatched the scrap of paper, tearing it into a dozen pieces and tossing it into the trash. “Problem solved.”
Everyone burst out laughing.
“Pardon me, Casey.” Yoda’s voice echoed through the room. “My data scanner has just alerted me to a national press conference that’s about to air on all major networks. It’s being held by the FBI and pertains to Maxim Lubinov. Shall I display it for you?”
“By all means.” Casey’s brows rose in interest. “Put it up on all screens.”
“Of course.”
An instant later, a visual appeared on the enormous, centrally located conference room TV, as well as the panorama of screens surrounding it, providing a perfect view from every angle.
Breaking News flashed in red at the bottom, along with the caption: FBI and local authorities break up national drug trafficking operation.
Three official-looking law enforcement representatives in suits stood there—a stocky gray-haired man and a slim blonde woman positioned on either side of the dais, and a broad-shouldered African-American man, who was up at the podium. On the front panel of the podium was the customary imposing seal that read: Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The authoritative spokesman at the podium stepped clos
er to the microphone and addressed the TV audience.
“Good afternoon. I’m Special Agent in Charge Rodney Bloom of the FBI Albany Division. With me today is United States Assistant District Attorney Roberta Elden and Captain of the Chicago Police Department William Regis. We are here to announce the results of an extensive, ongoing multi-law enforcement operation that has led to the indictment of Dr. Maxim Lubinov, a renowned Russian-born microbiologist, who is formally being charged with drug trafficking, manufacturing and distribution of illegal PEDs, kidnapping, murder, and attempted murder.
“In addition, the Department of Justice, along with the Albany division of the FBI and the Chicago Police Department, has evidence tying the above crimes to the murder investigation of a young woman, Julie Forman, who was allegedly killed as a result of uncovering incriminating information on Lubinov’s drug ring. On Lubinov’s property was found the body of James Robbins, an employee of Lubinov’s, who’d been missing from his Chicago home for over four weeks.”
The SAC went on to detail the part that Russian Organized Crime played in the cartel, and then went on to name names, including all of Lubinov’s employees.
The list was endless.
No mention of Emma, Lisa, Miles, Shannon, or any outside investigative source was made.
Casey glanced around the table and raised her coffee cup. “Good news all around. The FBI and DOJ get the credit, we get to stay clean, and we have the pleasure of making yet another ADA’s career skyrocket.”
“That should be easy with Lubinov representing himself in court, the arrogant bastard.” Marc rolled his eyes in disgust.
“An ugly combination of narcissistic personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder.” Hutch reiterated his earlier evaluation. “Good thing he’ll be locked up for good.”
“That scene he made prior to his Grand Jury hearing was a media circus, with Lubinov raving on the front steps of the courthouse about his research and about how one day the world would recognize his genius.” Marc gave a humorless laugh. “He really believes the courts will value his scientific advances over his crimes, and that he’ll be exonerated. And that’s even knowing that his assistant, Dmitry Gorev, is cooperating with the authorities. It seems the kid finally grew a conscience.”