Chapter 14
Dane forced a calm voice through his clenched jaw. “You set up a bomb?”
The man nodded. Everyone in the vicinity froze, then someone gasped. No one doubted that he was telling the truth, especially not Dane. Not even for one goddamn second.
“I never wanted to hurt Sassy.” He threw an arm in Sassy’s direction where she was being wheeled into the hospital. The medic pulled at Shana’s gurney to move her inside, but Shana clenched on Dane’s hand and spoke. “No, wait.”
The medic stopped. Shana pushed herself up and Dane watched Whitey’s face turn to her.
“No, I only wanted to hurt you, Shana.” He was back to the singsong voice again and Dane needed him to get back to the bomb, to tell him where it was. Pronto.
“The bomb, Whitey. Where is it?”
He laughed. “It doesn’t matter. You can’t defuse it in time without the code.
But I’ll tell you so you can watch the explosion.
What fun would it be if you couldn’t see the fruit of your destructive ways?
” He was still talking to Shana. Dane put a hand to her back, felt her shaking with the effort to hold herself up, to watch and hear this monster taunt them.
“Where?” Dane made his voice as matter-of-fact as he could. He didn’t do a half bad job considering the murderous rage that thundered inside him, the pounding of his heart, the white-hot loathing that seethed through him. The naked fear as he held Shana steady.
Whitey turned to him and spoke in his normal voice again. “I wanted to scare Shana first with the explosion of your house and then I wanted to scare her more by taking Sassy. I want to make her understand, make her apologize for what she did to me and then get rid of her evil.”
“The bomb, Whitey.” Dane’s effort was maxed out on keeping his voice even. This son of a bitch had one more chance, five more seconds or he’d beat the crap out of him to get the information and he didn’t care how many medics tried to stop him.
“I know she’s evil because she stays with you and you aren’t married. I don’t blame her because it’s too late for her now. But I blame you and you will both need to die.” He sighed and just as Dane was about to release his hand from Shana and go for the man’s throat, he spoke again.
“The bomb is at the Vineyard Haven Middle School.”
Without hesitating, Dane had his phone out to call Cap and filled him in.
“On it. I’m bringing the bomb squad. There’s a code?”
Whitey laughed. He was back to the singsong voice again. “I didn’t tell you the whole thing. The bomb has a code and I won’t tell you the code unless you call me from where the bomb is—a video call. Then I’ll tell you the code to diffuse it.”
“It’s a trap. Don’t believe him,” Shana said. Then she collapsed back down onto the gurney.
“I have to get her inside. She’s gone through this blood pack and needs more,” the doctor said.
Whitey spoke again, “It’s on a pressure plate. Can’t diffuse it without the code.”
Dane needed to make a decision. Should he fall for Whitey’s trap and try to diffuse the bomb, or should he stay with Shana?
“Damn it,” Dane snapped. He’d always prided himself on his cool under pressure, but he was unhinged now. He lunged for Whitey, intent on getting his hands around the man’s neck. Three pairs of hands grabbed at him, trying to stop him.
But Shana stopped him with one word. “No.”
With a hand on Dane’s arm, the doctor spoke in a quiet, calm voice, “I’ll take care of Shana. You can’t do anything for her right now.”
Squeezing his eyes shut in helpless misery, he fought to regain control, then he took her hand again, met her eyes. He saw the faint smile and would have leaned down to give her a kiss, but Whitey interrupted.
“Time’s wasting. There’s only fourteen minutes left.” Whitey looked at his watch.
Dane didn’t want to believe that Whitey was telling the truth but they all knew he was. His phone buzzed and he slipped it from his pocket and held it to his ear, knowing it was Cap.
“We’re at the Middle School and there’s a bomb. Our expert sent in a robot to look at it and says there’s a keypad for a code to diffuse it and otherwise it looks airtight. We’re going to try and get it into a container, but it looks like it might have a pressure mechanism.”
“Damn. Affirmative. Whitey said there was a pressure plate.”
Dane stopped the medic who was wheeling Whitey away.
Whitey said in a dead serious voice, “The bomb can’t be moved or it’ll go off. The only way to diffuse it is with the code and the only way you get the code is if I see you there.”
Dane looked at the man standing at Whitey’s gurney looking anxious. He recognized the doctor and spoke to him.
“You need to keep the guy awake and lucid until we get the bomb diffused. It’s in a populated area so we can’t take any chances.”
Cap confirmed on the other end of the line that they were evacuating people from the area, but he was still waiting for more of his men to arrive on the scene.
Whitey shook his head and said, “One more thing I didn’t mention. There’s a gas line under the bomb and it runs into the school.”
Shit. Dane dashed to Shana as her gurney rolled away. He kissed her pale face.
“I’m sorry, love. I have to go.”
“It’s okay,” she whispered, her cold hand over his. Fear bubbled up, but the doctor spoke in his calm rational voice.
“We need to take her now. I’ve got this, Dane. I’ll take care of her.”
“You do that, doc.” He didn’t mean for his voice to sound threatening, but he couldn’t change his stripes now.
The doctor with two orderlies wheeled her off and Dane turned to find a vehicle.
With no time to go far, he ran to the driver’s side of the ambulance he’d arrived in and yanked open the door.
Jumping into the ambulance, he shoved the driver over and cranked the ignition.
Then throwing on the alarm, he smashed the gas pedal to the floor and took off.
As he screeched past traffic faster than he ever could have in his old Jeep, he took out his phone and called Cap.
“Stay with the bomb and have your men evacuate the school. The bomb is on top of a gas line according to Whitey. We can’t take any chances that the sick bastard is bluffing.”
“Trying to, but I can’t get hold of anyone in the office—good news is school’s off. Bad news is there’s a lacrosse game going on out back and other extracurricular activity. My men are on their way to evacuate, but it’ll take at least ten minutes for them to get there.”
“I’ll be there in five.” This was too coincidental, too many factors figuring into it for it to be coincidence or bad luck.
Whitey planned for the school to be blown up along with everything else in the area.
He was a mad genius. Not a comforting thought as the steely cold survival instincts and no small amount of adrenaline rushed through him.
He was doing something, back in the driver’s seat with a role to play, not waiting helplessly as the doctors saved Shana.
He pushed her ruthlessly from his thoughts.
He needed to compartmentalize and not think of her, be satisfied that she was in good hands, that he would get back to her.
He hoped to hell he would get back to her.
He said to Cap, his voice even as he drove on the edge of recklessness, “I’ll get the code from Whitey to diffuse it. Be ready to film me on-site with my phone. Keep up the efforts for the evacuation.”
Dane signed off the call and looked at his unlucky passenger.
“What’s going on?” the man said.
“When I stop this ambulance, you jump out and run as fast as you can as far away as you can from the school. But be ready to come back if there’s an explosion. Got that?” He kept his voice firm but cool. The man nodded. They were almost there.
He wanted to call the doctor about Shana. She’d lost a lot of blood, the cut was deep, impossible to tell how deep or how much tissue damage had been done.
Dammit to hell he had to put that out of his mind. But how could he? How could he not? He couldn’t turn his back on the bomb and potential gas explosion at the school with who-knew-how many people in the area.
As he screeched the ambulance into the parking area of the school he heard and saw police cars coming in hot behind him.
He shoved out of the ambulance, taking the phone from his pocket and dialing Shana’s number.
“You son of a bitch, you better answer this damn phone.”
The picture flicked on and he saw Whitey and the doctor. They were inside and an IV was hitched to his arm.
“I’m here.” Dane maneuvered himself into the picture with the bomb, making note of the keypad and the pressure plate where the bomb stood with a glowing green digital readout ticking down relentlessly. There were under two minutes left until detonation.
It was so quiet he could have heard a mouse pee on cotton.
“Give me the damn code, you sick bastard.”
“I may be sick, but I’m not stupid. I want a deal.”
“There’s no time for a deal.”
“Give him whatever he wants,” Cap said. Dane saw the sweat trickling down the man’s right temple as he was poised with his shield less than three feet away.
“Fine. The state police captain has granted you asylum. You can leave the hospital unaccosted if you give us the code. Right. Now.”
Dane flashed his phone to include Cap in the picture. Seconds ticked by as Whitey considered it. He was surrounded by police and one lone doctor.
“Tell these men to back away from me. Order them to leave my room,” he said.
Cap barked out loud and clear, “You heard him, men. Leave the room. Now. That’s an order.”
The two officers looked at each other with disbelief, but they moved out of the picture.
“Now give me the damn code you fucking son of a bitch.” Dane gritted out the words.
“Temper, temper.”
The readout was below one minute and Dane’s hand hovered over the keypad where he’d need to type in a five-digit code.
He’d have to guess if it came to that. He remembered reading in Nash’s file the date of the last day of trial when Whitey got convicted.
It had been January 12th. He’d tap in the date and year if it got to two seconds.
All this strategy flashed through his head as he waited for Whitey Nash to make good. For once in his miserable life.
“The code.” Dane made his voice steely, leaving out the fear. Fear that he’d never see Shana again. Fear that Nash would finally get to her.
“A deal is a deal.” Nash laughed. “What was the date that will forever go down in infamy?”
“You bastard. Your trial—”
“No. Bzzzt. Try again.”
Dane searched his head, calling up visions of the information from the prison records. Then it dawned on him. It had to be the date that Shana arrested him. November first.
There were five seconds left.
He put his finger on the keypad to type in the date.
Cap yelled, “What are you doing?!”
“I’m typing in the damn code.” His fingers hit the numbers, got to the last one. He pressed his index finger on the number zero.
The green lights flashed twice and then, as he hovered there at ground zero waiting for the blast, the blinking stopped. The readout went black. The hum of the bomb’s electronics went silent.
He let out a long breath and backed away, slowly, still not trusting it.
“Jesus goddamn Christ. What the hell was that about?” Cap joined him as they both backed away, then turned and dashed back behind the line of shields set up around the bomb. “Send in the robot to dismantle this damn bomb,” Cap shouted.
As Dane’s heart thumped in his chest making him feel like a caged animal, all he could think of now was Shana. And that Whitey Nash was still alive. And free of his police guards.
“Get me back to the hospital.” He spoke to Cap in a low urgent voice as he tried to maintain calm. But adrenaline popped through him, tuning his tension to an unbearable pitch.
They ran to Cap’s official car and he put on the sirens as they peeled out. They drove past all the vehicles blocking the driveway and went over the grass to the street.