Not So Innocent (Shattered Glass #2)

Chapter Thirty

Kelly used a specialized key to lock the elevator doors open. Once finished, she stepped out to wait beside Riley until the building was cleared. An instrumental version of a pop song trickled out into the lobby.

In front of them, eight heavily armed and armored SWAT members formed a line next to the thick wooden door to the main stairwell. A tall rectangular window inset above the door handle allowed a clear view of the first flight of stairs. If anyone came down, they’d be spotted as soon as they stepped foot onto the landing at the top.

Four of the SWAT team broke formation to head down to the basement. Riley turned to watch them, but loud voices ripped his attention back to the stairwell.

“On your knees! On your knees!”

A figure bent over the guardrail on the second-floor landing and dropped a small object. A slant of light framed the man’s eyes, and Riley instantly recognized him as the masked gunman from Cai’s drawing. He reached for his gun, but someone screamed, “Grenade!” He tackled Kelly into the elevator as a blast deafened him and a bevy of sharp objects punctured his lower back and legs. If he made a sound from his pain, he couldn’t hear it, couldn’t hear anything. He felt Kelly’s coughs wrack against his chest and neck. She seemed okay. He twisted slightly to look out at the lobby. Across from the elevator, two SWAT members pulled an injured teammate toward the entrance doors. A fourth ran over to help them.

Kelly tried to scoot sideways, frantically slapping and pushing at Riley’s shoulder. He obeyed, rolling onto his uninjured hip. She staggered to her feet like a drunk boxer while drawing her gun from its holster and then fell into a crouch under the control panel.

The elevator jolted and rumbled beneath him, and a plume of dust and debris blasted into his face. Kelly stumbled forward and barely stopped herself from going headfirst into the back wall. Riley twisted to look at the lobby. The three SWAT members had thrown themselves on the injured one as a chunk of ceiling crashed down. Cords, cables, and broken blocks of cinder rained from the ceiling. Tremors from a mix of fear and adrenaline ripped through Riley. He spat ash out of his mouth and blinked it out of his eyes. He stared at the devastation, realizing all those men were buried under rubble and he soon would be too.

In less than ten seconds, two explosions had decimated the lobby.

Kelly lurched to the control panel and pressed two. The elevator doors closed on Riley’s foot. He dragged it in, and the lobby disappeared.

Agony in his hips, spine, and thigh swamped him all at once. He lay motionless, trying not to exacerbate his wounds.

Kelly’s hand dropped away from the control panel. She looked at him, her face ghosted by ash. Her mouth moved, but he couldn’t hear over the ringing in his ears. Wetness soaked his pants and he honest to God couldn’t tell if it was blood or if he’d pissed himself. The air was coated in ash and burnt…something— God, please don’t let that smell be me . He poked around his hip area, where the pain was the most intense. His fingers brushed a half inch piece of wire sticking out of the skin and down to the bone. If that didn’t come out, movement would be like stabbing himself with a knife every step. He gripped it with his shaky fingers and then yanked it out. “Fuck. Fuck.” Vomit rolled up from his stomach and settled in his throat. The thing sticking into the back of his thigh would stay there. It hurt, but not unbearably, and it was too deep to reach with fingers.

Riley was pretty sure Kelly said, “God dammit!” as she slammed the emergency stop button. The alarm blared loud enough to cut through the ringing in Riley’s ears.

“We gotta go,” he said. “They’ll blow the elevator shaft.”

She nodded, said something else, and then bent down to lift his jacket. He made out “Shit” because she said it loudly right next to him, but the rest of her sentence sounded like someone speaking underwater.

“I can’t hear you,” he told her.

She raised her brows in question while miming walking with her fingers.

“I can walk.” He grimaced. “Not far.”

She held up two fingers and then all five tightly together, palm out. Level two, hold.

Riley tried to get to his feet but gave up after several attempts. He scooted slowly to the wall, hoping to use it for leverage to stand.

Kelly took a step toward him and leaned in, mouth near his ear. “Can you hear me?” He made a ‘sort of ’ gesture. She shook her head and pointed at the door. “e—ca —tay—here.” We can’t stay here.

“If you can walk, go up to seven,” he said, “I’ll stay on two.” He’d be a liability walking, but he’d try to take the elevator up. Not that he’d tell her that.

She pursed her lips and thought about it, then leaning in close she said, “Move now”, gave him a thumbs up and that questioning brow raise again. He nodded.

Kelly helped him struggle to his feet and then he fell back into the wall. The thing in his thigh burrowed deeper, and he felt every bit of shrapnel riddled into his skin. He’d break a tooth at this rate from clenching his jaw. With one hand, he unsnapped his holster and pulled his gun out, Kelly mimed, ready’.

He flashed his thumb up and then raised the gun to his shoulder.

The doors opened.

Breath held, he checked her side, then signed ‘all clear’. Kelly did the same. Then they both scanned the whole floor to get a layout before they moved.

The stairwell was three feet down a hallway on the left. Kelly indicated to make a go for the stairs on her count of three. Before the count started, she screamed, “Back!” and fired down the hall. She scuttled into the corner while stabbing ‘five’ repeatedly on the panel. The doors slid shut just as a shadow moved toward them.

The ringing in Riley’s ears subsided, but now his heartbeat threatened to deafen him. “I can hear,” he said.

“Can you walk?” she asked.

“Yeah, slowly.” He tried to calm himself so his hands would stop shaking. Fuck . The one thing they tell you in every training class is never get on the elevator. He was putting her at risk. They had to get out of here. “I’ll need help.” He braced against wall, numbness spreading in his right leg where something pressed the nerve.

Riley tried to focus on something else than the myriad of wounds littering his body. “I need to say something to you, Kelly.”

“We went this long without sentimental garbage. Let’s not ruin a perfectly good friendship.”

“I really have to say this.”

“Fine. Be quick. And poetic.”

“Remember when I said we should breach and that they weren’t going to negotiate?”

She looked at him, dropping her gun to her thigh and staring in astonishment. “Are you I-told-you-so’ing me seconds before I probably die in a hail of bullets? Is that what you’re doing?”

“I’m just pointing out that I did, in fact, tell you so.”

Kelly flattened herself against the wall facing the back of the elevator and raised her gun again. “In all the craziness, sir, one of my bullets must have bounced off the elevator walls and hit Cordova in the ass.”

“Hey, now.”

“Don’t worry, it’ll just be one cheek. Your sex life won’t be affected for long.”

The elevator jerked to a stop. So did Riley’s lighter mood.

The chime announced they’d arrived at the fifth floor. “Get ready,” Kelly said.

They held their breaths again as the doors opened.

Distant footsteps echoed in the wall behind Riley, approximately a flight below them. “He’s coming fast.”

Kelly looked him over and then pushed the button for the next floor. She assessed it right. Running would be impossible.

The numbness had worked all the way to Riley’s toes. He wiggled them but felt no response. Paralysis? Panic cracked the thin layer of calm he’d salvaged from bantering with Kelly. When he leaned across to reach the panel, it felt like a sharp spike shot through his foot. He’d never been so grateful for pain. He pushed the emergency button near Kelly’s hip. The elevator stopped and his breath escaped in a relieved, shaky whoosh. “He should have been above us already. What’s he doing?”

“I was wondering the same thing,” she said. “Did you see more explosives?”

“I only saw the grenades. The second explosion was closer to C-4, though.”

“He could have dropped some of that in the shaft at any time. Unless he has other plans for it and that’s why he’s been so slow to catch up. Whatever he’s doing, it’s not going to keep him busy for very long.”

“I can’t run,” Riley said. “You get out at the next floor, wait for me to bait him to the elevator, then go up the stairs behind him.”

Her jaw went tight and then she shook her head. “Last stand, OCD.” She pulled out the emergency stop and spoke rapidly. “Seventh and eighth floors are single suite office spaces. Layout is like this.” She drew a small map in the dust on the door. “Northeast corner is a hall with an exit to the stairwell and an office or storage room. South of that is a bathroom, then a large conference room. Rest is open, unless there’s some cubicles or something. I’ll cover, you haul ass to the stairwell. It’s only three feet. Then I’ll move, you cover. If we’re lucky, the baddies are in the southwest. We stay in cover until the cavalry arrives. If they’re north, we’ll run right into them as the elevator door opens. Same deal, I cover first, you try to make it to the hall or stairwell. Most important is to get out of—” A ding sounded over their heads.

They split off facing each other in their corners again. The elevator doors opened for the last time.