Chapter Seventeen
Beck’s pulse kicked hard as he drew his gun, the sound of Grace doing the same sharp in the silence. The blackness swallowed the hall, thick and absolute, no hint of light to give them an edge. Every breath sounded too loud.
From reception came a muffled sound, strained and distant, like someone trying to speak with a hand clamped over their mouth. Beck froze, straining to separate noise from silence. Then a thud cracked through the stillness, heavy enough that he knew someone had hit the floor.
The young guy at reception?
Or someone else?
He couldn’t see a damn thing.
A soft creak reached his ears next, the distinct whine of hinges. Beck’s instincts screamed. That was the hall door. Someone had just opened it.
He felt Grace shift, her shoulder brushing his as they pressed back to back. Their breaths synced, quiet and controlled. He swept his aim toward the end of the hall, heart hammering while he listened for the faintest stir from the patient rooms.
One wrong step, one noise, and they’d be flanked.
Beck caught it again—a soft, dragging shuffle coming from the hall door. Every instinct urged him to call out, to demand whoever it was show themselves, but he kept his mouth shut. Silence was their best shield.
His hand twitched toward his pocket where his phone rested, the temptation to flip on the flashlight gnawing at him.
But no. The second that beam cut through the dark, it would paint a target right on his chest, and on Grace.
If the killer was here, waiting for them, Beck wasn’t about to make their job easy.
His jaw tightened, ears straining to track the sound.
It was deliberate, measured, almost taunting.
Whoever was moving knew they were here, knew they were listening.
He swept his gun toward the end of the hall and thought of the suspects one by one.
Jonah. Silas. Denny. Elena. Each had the motive. Each had the chance.
But which one of them was hunting tonight?
Beck leaned close enough to whisper, his lips barely moving. “Crouch down.”
Grace didn’t question it. She eased down with him, their backs pressed together, covering both directions.
His eyes were adjusting, pulling in faint shapes from the dark, but it still wasn’t enough to make out more than vague shadows. Every sound carried sharper, each one setting his nerves on edge.
There it was again. A faint scrape, the subtle drag of a shoe, coming from the far end near the nurses’ station. His gaze locked there, on the counter with its swinging half-door. Someone could be hiding behind it.
His pulse hammered. Evelyn Hart. The nurse who had called them. Was she in there? Or had someone silenced her and taken her place? Beck swallowed against the tension coiling in his gut. For all he knew, she could be tied up, restrained, maybe already dead.
And if she wasn’t, then maybe she was part of this.
Beck stilled, every muscle tight as the sound reached them. A woman’s voice, faint at first, then clearer as it carried down the hall.
“Help me. Please… somebody help.”
Elena.
Grace’s sharp inhale told him she heard it, too.
Beck’s pulse spiked. Elena was alive. Which meant she hadn’t been in that truck.
Relief tried to edge in, but suspicion crushed it back down.
A voice didn’t mean flesh and blood. It could be a recording, a lure.
And if it wasn’t, if it really was her, then she was in one of those front rooms and in bad shape.
“I’m tied up,” Elena called again, her voice breaking. “I’m bleeding. Please help me.”
Beck clenched his jaw. Every instinct told him to move, to breach the door and pull her out. But instinct could get them both killed. Whoever set this up was counting on that very reaction.
“Hold up,” he whispered to Grace.
His mind raced. If he sent a text to Noah or Isla now, their phones lighting up in the silence could give away their exact position.
Even a vibration would be enough. Yet backup mattered.
Cal could already be on his way, though Beck figured the man would find the ER door locked.
That wouldn’t slow Cal down. If Cal was close, he’d be inside soon.
Beck stayed crouched low, the weight of choice pressing on him. Move forward and risk the trap, or stay put and let Elena bleed if she was truly in there.
Grace shifted slightly, whispering just loud enough for him to catch, “What do we do?”
His answer caught in his throat. He didn’t know yet.
Elena’s voice cut sharper through the dark this time. “Who’s there?” she shouted, the pitch rising, threaded with either pain or desperation.
Maybe both.
Beck froze, his hand tightening on his weapon. Every syllable echoed off the sterile walls, bouncing through the pitch black hall. His gut twisted. It could be real, or it could be a trick meant to push them into the open.
Then another voice broke through, this one higher, pleading. “Help me, please!”
The nurse. Evelyn. He recognized her voice from the phone call she’d made to them about Jonah.
Beck’s heart slammed against his ribs. Both women sounding terrified. Both women maybe in grave danger.
Maybe.
He tried to picture the layout. Those first rooms near the front of the hall, the ones closest to the door. They had to be in one of them.
Two captives, same room. But nothing about this sat right. If Evelyn had called them here to begin with, she would have known the danger. Why hadn’t she warned them then? And why wait until now, in the dead silence of the blackout, to cry out for help?
The air felt thicker with every second, the darkness pressing in. Beck swallowed hard, scanning the shadows, listening for the shuffle of a footstep, the rattle of a door handle, anything that didn’t fit.
If this was a trap, it was closing in.
The gunshot cracked through the dark like lightning, sharp and close. Beck’s pulse spiked, every instinct screaming to move. Then came the shrill cry of pain, followed by the frantic sounds of a struggle.
“Please!” The nurse’s voice. High, desperate.
Another crash inside the room, then another gunshot, and Beck’s gut twisted tight. He didn’t want to move them into a kill box, but waiting meant someone could already be bleeding out.
He gave Grace a sharp nod. They rose from their crouch in perfect sync, pressing their shoulders to the wall. The hall felt endless, every step forward measured and tense, the linoleum cold beneath his boots.
A second scream ripped out, louder this time, raw enough to curl his gut. He was almost certain it belonged to Evelyn.
No time left.
They reached the first door. Beck slid left, his back pressed to the wall, his Glock raised and steady. Grace mirrored him on the right, silent but ready, the faint glint of her weapon steady in the dark.
One breath. Two. Then, Beck pivoted and drove his boot hard into the door. Wood splintered and the crash echoed like thunder through the hall as the door swung open.
The door slammed against the wall, and Beck swept his gaze across the space.
It wasn’t a patient room but a small exam room.
Harsh chemical smell clung to the air, and a steel tray sat overturned on the counter, instruments scattered across the floor.
The fluorescent lights were off, but a faint glow from the hall stretched just far enough to reveal a thin trail of blood smeared across the linoleum.
His pulse kicked harder when he saw another door at the back, slightly ajar. A sliver of shadow leaked through the gap, and every nerve in his body warned that someone could be standing just beyond it, waiting for him to make the wrong move.
He kept his gun trained high, sweeping corners, but nothing stirred. No figure lunged. No sound of breath or movement gave him a target. Just the copper tang of blood hanging heavy in the air.
Then his eyes cut to the far corner. Elena. She was on the floor, her wrists bound in front of her with what looked like medical tape. Her face was pale, hair tangled, and there were streaks of blood across her blouse.
“Help me,” she rasped, her voice raw and shaking.
Beck’s jaw tightened, the unease growing in his gut. She looked trapped, beaten down. But in this mess, looks could lie.
Grace edged closer, careful but steady, her weapon angled low as she crouched beside Elena.
Beck stayed back, his stance rigid, keeping his sights sweeping between the half-open door at the rear and the one they had come through.
His eyes had adjusted more to the gloom, but shadows stretched into every corner, hiding too much.
Elena’s voice cut through the silence, high and urgent. “They kidnapped me. Drugged me. Brought me here.” Her words tumbled out in a rush, her wide eyes darting between Grace and Beck.
“Who?” Grace asked, her tone sharp and distrustful.
“I don’t know,” Elena said, shaking her head so hard her hair whipped her face. “I swear, I don’t know who it was.”
Beck’s gut twisted. He didn’t buy it, not fully.
Elena could be telling the truth, or she could be weaving another lie to drag them deeper into a setup.
Grace must have sensed the same because while she bent to help Elena to her feet, she didn’t bother freeing her hands.
The tape stayed in place, binding her wrists tight.
“Move,” Grace told her, keeping her voice calm but firm.
Beck shifted his focus, gun trained toward the rear door again, every muscle coiled. The silence around them pressed heavy, too heavy. Whoever had set this up could be standing in those shadows right now, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
Elena’s voice rose sharp and demanding. “Untie me. Give me a gun. I need to defend myself.”
Beck snapped his attention toward her, ready to shut it down with a flat no, but movement flickered at the back door. His instincts screamed. He swung his weapon up, bracing, finger tightening on the trigger.
The door crashed open.
A woman stumbled through, gagged, wrists bound tight with zip ties. A nurse’s scrubs clung to her frame, stained and wrinkled, her hair matted dark with blood. Evelyn, almost certainly.
Beck’s breath caught in his chest as she lurched forward. He grabbed for her, steadying her, just as her knees gave out and she collapsed against him.
And then the figure appeared in the gap of the open door, half-shrouded in shadow. Muzzle flash split the dark.
Gunfire tore through the room.
Beck yanked the nurse down with him, dropping hard behind the metal leg of the exam table, and shouted, “Cover!” Grace jerked Elena toward the corner, both of them ducking as more shots ripped past.
The acrid scent of gunpowder filled the room. Splinters of wood flew from the doorframe where the bullets struck. Whoever was out there wasn’t just firing at random.
He was aiming to kill.