Panel 118
Triumph
As Glennon began her final desperate run to the arcade, Triumph’s motorcycle came screaming down the street toward the main entrance of Elysium.
Two men stood at the entrance, drew their weapons, and fired at him.
Had he not been wearing his leather jacket, the graze that tore his sleeve would likely have ripped open his arm.
Making a split-second decision, he dumped his bike, making sure to keep himself behind it.
Wes and his fellow ranger, Dax, were right behind him in their vehicle, with TJ Rockwell hanging out the back passenger-side window, his rifle up to his shoulder.
Two rounds roared from the weapon, taking out both men where they stood.
The car wasn’t even at a standstill before Wes was out his door and racing toward Triumph. “You okay?”
Triumph gave him a thumbs-up, then tore his helmet from his head and chucked it to the ground next to the bike. Quickly, he began thumbing buttons on his phone. “Fuck! I need to get to the arcade!”
He held up his phone to the man. Dax and TJ ran up to look over his shoulder at what was showing there. He had pulled up the video cameras from inside the club just in time to see Glennon running into the Hall of Mirrors.
“What the hell?” Dax uttered.
“I don’t have time to explain, but she’s given herself the best chance she has of shaking them. If I can get to her, I know the patterns of their movement.”
“Cruz is on his way with the cavalry. Dax will stay with the bodies. I’ll check the back entrance. Take TJ with you.”
Quickly, he scanned his new cuff against the panel, then punched in his code. The door opened. Inside, he took three seconds to code the door so it would remain unlocked. They would need law enforcement to be able to get inside.
He glanced at his phone again, and his heart sank. Guillermo and Cesar had caught up with her in the maze.
“Fuck! They found her.”
TJ slapped his shoulder. “Keep it cool. I’ve got you, and I’ve got her, but I need higher ground.”
With effort, he reset himself. “Go to the lobby. Fire exit on the right, one flight up. That landing goes to all the mechanics. The entire space is catwalks. You can see the whole club from up there.”
With a clap to Triumph’s shoulder, he raced back to the lobby.
Triumph took another look at his phone, his eyes widening in fear. Cesar and Guillermo had Glennon pinned to one of the mirrored walls and were in the process of binding her hands.
Their next action of beginning to undress her made his blood boil with rage.
Moving faster than he’d ever thought possible, he took off, dashing left and right unerringly through the maze to get to the arcade.
Once there, he didn’t hesitate to approach the Hall of Mirrors.
However, as soon as he did, he heard the grinding of the walls against the floor and watched the panels shift.
Panic coursed through him as he took another look at his phone.
Glennon had managed, by sheer luck, to have been pressed up against a wall that spun one hundred and eighty degrees during the last shift, allowing her to fall behind it when the men weren’t prepared for the change.
The problem was that the same wall was about to shift another one hundred and eighty degrees in about five seconds, leaving her open to the men pursuing her.
Unless she’d gotten up and run immediately, and given the state of undress she’d been in, she was about to be caught again, since the men hadn’t moved.
One glance at his phone showed him that she hadn’t had time to escape, and now she was literally boxed in for the next sixty seconds before the panel at the far end of the “closet” she was now stuck in would open.
She had no way out. Even once that doorway opened, Guillermo and Cesar were still between her and the next possible exit option.
They’d be on her before that happened, and by then, the damage would already be done.
While his heart was screaming at him to get moving, to save her, he wasn’t so far gone that he didn’t recognize the need to be smart about getting to her.
If he didn’t pause to gain control and remember the paths and patterns, he’d get lost himself.
While he knew she was tough, the best way to help her was to make sure he actually got to her.
They caught her again. They would attack her again.
But she was strong. She’d survive being assaulted.
She would not survive a direct shot to the head.
He closed his eyes, took a deep breath to center himself, and imagined the view of the Hall of Mirrors from the control booth. Then his brain segmented—one part imagining the current paths, the other part running at rapid speed through the panel movements.
Panel 118. He had never checked it the other night because Glennon had distracted him.
His eyes shot open wide, and he took off toward the southwest corner of the room.
They were in the northeast corner, but right now, the tunnel directly to his right was a straight shot around the outside of the space, with no distracting alleyways, and it stayed that way for approximately fifteen more seconds.
It would get him into the alleyway next to where she was trapped, as long as he beat the shifting panels.
If he didn’t make it before the next change, he’d be cut off from her, with no way to go but back the way he came. Then he’d definitely be too late.
Huffing out huge breaths and dragging in even larger ones as he ran, he felt his adrenaline pumping through him at a dangerous pace. As the fifteen-second mark hit, the wall behind him swung shut. He’d barely made it.
Over the noise of the heavy-metal music, he could just barely hear male voices, dark and angry, along with scuffling, grunts, and swearing in Spanish. He got down on his knees and slid his hands along the bottom of the panels, pricking his skin on the sharp edge. Panel 118!
He’d never been so happy to have a piece of technology refuse to be fixed by him.
Slicing the hell out of his fingertips, he worked to pry the bottom of the panel toward him.
With a gargantuan final heave, the panel made a god-awful screech.
In the space he created, he managed to get an arm through the gap and grab Glennon’s ankle, where she was once again positioned tight against the wall.
TJ’s voice bellowed from the rafters. “Triumph! Go right!”
Without thinking, Triumph yanked hard on Glennon’s leg, not stopping to worry about hurting her or what she was enduring in that moment. He pulled with everything in him, and as he did, a single shot rang out.
Then a second.
Time seemed to stop. The lights seemed to freeze, and the music cut off.
Then everything suddenly started back up, like a music box being wound.
Glennon collapsed at the foot of the mirrors, and with a thud, both men hit the floor.
Cesar’s gun skittered across the floor and came to a stop when it hit the mirror next to him.
“Glennon!” he yelled over the music.
She wasn’t moving, and from this angle, he couldn’t see if she was breathing.
“Glennon!” he yelled again.
He let go of her just long enough to grab hold of Panel 118 again and pulled with all his might until it broke off its track. Pain screamed through his hands and arms, up into his shoulders, but he didn’t stop pulling and yanking until he was able to slide his torso through the space he’d made.
“Glennon! Little spy, you gotta answer me! You gotta tell me you’re still with me. Jesus, no. Don’t you dare give up on me.”
A hand grabbed his, and through a tangle of hair, two brown eyes looked at him. “Never gonna give you up,” she whispered.
Surprise lit up his face, and he couldn’t help the mad laughter that poured out of him that she could Rickroll him at a moment like this.
Using the last of his strength, he reached for her and pulled her half-clothed body through the space between the panels to his side of the wall, paying absolutely no attention to the two bodies bleeding out behind her on the floor, reflecting back on themselves.
Gears grinded, and the panels made their next movement, but suddenly, he watched her eyes go wide at something behind him.
He’d heard that in moments of importance, things could move in slow motion. He’d never experienced it.
Today was the day.
Glennon’s eyes, saucer-wide. Her arm reaching across his lap. She rolled onto her back. She emptied the weapon. Guillermo weaved, almost drunkenly, where he stood, then fell to the floor.
He lay there on the floor with her, staring at the man who’d done so much damage. He’d never get up again. He’d never hurt anyone again.
The chime sounded, the grinding noise came, and the panel in front of them swung closed, boxing the two cartel men off and removing the bodies from view as if to protect her from what had occurred.
Absolute quiet. Someone had reached the control booth and shut off the club’s sounds.
The lights changed from club atmosphere to the stark halogen ones used for repairs and upkeep during off hours.
Carefully, Triumph reached out, unpeeled her fingers from the gun, and set it on the floor, giving it a gentle push away from them.
He gathered Glennon close, hugging her as tightly to him as he could.
In return, her arms clutched at him. Sobs tore from her body with such viciousness, he worried she’d hurt herself.
All he could do was hug her tighter, burying his face in her hair.
He doubted she could hear anything he was saying to her over her cries, but he told her everything anyway.
What he didn’t say? He didn’t tell her it would be okay. He knew he couldn’t promise that.
But he did know some things to be true.
He was so proud of her.
She was such a badass.
He loved her.
He would always be there.
He’d never leave her.
He was hers.
She was his.
Voices came from the shadows and through the walls, one of which was Cosmos barking orders on how to get through the mirrors.
Triumph’s brain was telling him to cover her up, to keep everyone from seeing her this way, but she was still gripping him in a stranglehold, and he didn’t think she’d be willing or able to let go.
Moments later, a shadow moved over them, and something was laid over Glennon’s body. It looked like a picnic tablecloth, probably from one of the eating areas out by the food trucks. He looked up to see Wes crouched over them, a hand on Glennon’s head, smoothing her hair.
“She’s alive, and that’s all that matters,” he said gruffly.
Triumph nodded, dropping a kiss to the top of her head, continuing to rock her through her tears. It was going to be a long road to recovery, he was sure. But he’d be there every step of the way.