Breaking the Rules

CHAPTER

TWENTY-EIGHT



Izzy and Dan knew where they were.

Jenn held on to that thought as the man named Nathan held her tightly by the arm as he half pushed, half dragged her with him into what looked like a warehouse.

There was a sign—a small one—on the side of the building: A&B STORAGE AND DISCREET PEST CONTROL.

There were windows in the structure, but they were up along the roofline. They were more like air vents that opened to keep the building, with its nearly flat metal roof, from getting too hot in the daytime.

Although, that was an impossibility. When the sun was out, this place would literally cook. It was crazy. The construction looked new. Who would build something like this, out in the middle of the desert, and expect to be able to store anything here at all?

Although there were large garage-bay-type doors all along the side of the building—large enough to accommodate a small plane or a fleet of trucks.

The place had what looked to be a relatively low-tech security system. There were two cameras—at least that Jenn could see—each mounted at a corner of the building, but they were fixed in place. They were seemingly consistent with the type of security at a storage facility—enough to lower the insurance, but not enough to break the bank. But, incongruous with a typical storage facility’s security system, there was also a very large guard out front, carrying a very large assault rifle.

“You need to get the bag with the insulin and the needles,” Eden was saying again, but then she screamed, and Jenn turned quickly back to look at her.

Jake had her arm twisted up behind her back as he told her, “What you need to do is to shut the f*ck up.”

She didn’t. “Ow! He could die without it! Ow!”

“Keep it moving.” Nathan gave Jenn a nudge that nearly knocked her over.

“Do I look like I give a shit?” Jake asked.

“You should,” Eden gasped. “Because Danny’s going to ask for proof of life.”

“And you’re going to tell him that you’re all hunky-dory,” Jake said.

“He’s not an idiot,” Eden argued. “He’s going to ask to talk to Ben.”

Jenn was pushed again, past all the bay doors, past that very large guard, who spoke into a cell phone. “They’re here.”

There was a large metal door down at the end of the building, and it opened before they reached it, before Nathan knocked.

The man who opened the door could have been Nathan’s twin, they looked so much alike, with those same blue-gray eyes and lean faces. This new man greeted them without any words, and barely even a glance. He just stepped back to let them in.

Nathan gave Jenn another nudge, so she stepped inside.

And yes, it was a warehouse, and absolutely, it was extremely hot in here.

A large thermometer on the wall advertised the fact that it was 120 degrees Fahrenheit. Despite that, a series of fans up in the high metal rafters moved only very slowly, and only a few of the window vents were open.

And yes, there was a fleet of trucks inside—if you could call one truck and two vans a fleet. They, too, bore the name A&B Storage on their sides. No doubt the discreet-pest-control part of the business was so discreet that it wasn’t advertised on the trucks.

It was weird in the warehouse, though. Most of the big dimly lit room was empty, but there were huge wooden crates, wrapped in plastic and perched on pallets, distributed haphazardly throughout the vast, shadowy space.

One would think they would’ve been stacked neatly, in one corner, but they weren’t.

It made the place look spooky.

“Bedbug remediation,” Nathan told her as he saw her confusion. “It’s a growing business. Heat over a hundred and seventeen degrees kills ’em dead.”

“Bedbugs,” she repeated. She knew they were a problem, particularly in urban areas … Still, it was mind-bending. An organization that ran a child prostitution ring and dealt in the purchase and sale of human beings also managed a bedbug remediation service …?

Although it gave them a reason to be here—to have trucks and a warehouse in the middle of the desert.

Or maybe the people who owned A&B Storage were similar to Jenn and Eden and Ben. Maybe they’d also gotten involved in a bad situation purely by accident.

Eden was still pushing Jake about Ben. “We want to see him. And there’s a device in the bag? That you didn’t bring in from the van? It’ll test Ben’s blood sugar levels so I’ll know how much insulin to give him.”

Jake pushed Eden, hard, at Nathan’s brother. “Get them photographed and secured in the back. And someone call Todd. Tell him to get back inside that apartment—find out why the sailor hasn’t called us yet.”

By sailor, he meant Dan.

Oh God.

Jenn met Eden’s gaze. The younger woman was terrified, too—Jenn could see it in her eyes. But she was fighting it—and she was going to keep on fighting it. Jenn could see that, too.

“He’s probably not calling because he was drunk before I hit him,” Eden lied. “You better let him sleep it off, or he’s going to be useless.”

“Todd just called to check in,” Nathan’s brother volunteered. “He says the sailor didn’t leave, so he couldn’t follow him to find the girl. He says nothing’s moving, no lights have gone off or on, nobody’s come near the place.”

Jenn raised her hand. “Excuse me,” she said, trying, like Eden, to distract. But she couldn’t keep her voice from shaking. “I’m so sorry, but I need to use the bathroom.”

Jake had had enough. “Forget the photos, just take them to the back,” he ordered Nathan and his brother and two other men who’d come from somewhere to join them. “And call Todd, and tell him to get the hell over there and wake that a*shole up. We are running the f*ck out of time.” He looked at Eden and Jenn. “We’re not going to give him proof of life. If he doesn’t tell us what we want to know, we’ll give him proof of death. Flip a coin, girls. One of you, or the kid, is going to die.”


They’d gone as far they could risk going in via car, but they still had about a half a mile of ground to cover before they had to slow their pace and move covertly.

Normally, a half-mile run would’ve been a piece of cake. But Dan hadn’t done more than very short spurts of fast movement for quite a few weeks. Running half of a mile seemed as daunting a task as running a full marathon immediately after eating a huge Thanksgiving dinner.

Izzy was on the phone again with Jenk as Dan hauled Izzy’s bag out of the backseat of the car that they’d driven off the dirt road and down into a gully, where it wouldn’t be seen by any casual passersby.

The sun was going to come up soon, and the sky to the east was already giving off the start of a predawn glow.

It was actually a good time to approach a guarded facility. If the guards had NVs—night-vision glasses—they’d have to take them off. Even just that little glow from the sky would prove to be too bright and would distort their vision. But without the NVs, the desert would seem otherworldly. Heat would stir and shimmy. And darkness and shadows would prevail.

Now, if the guards had infrared glasses, able to pick up the heat signal from a human being … Then they were completely screwed.

Because Izzy and Dan had, between them, a series of kitchen knives, each blade duller than the last.

Dan would have preferred an M16 or a grenade launcher.

Izzy snapped his phone shut as they headed briskly south. “You know Tess Bailey? She works at Troubleshooters with Lindsey? She’s their comspesh. She’s got mad hacking skills.”

“I’ve met her,” Dan said. “Yeah.”

“Jenk says Tess is using her home setup to try to access those satellite images, give us a better read on how many tangos we’re up against.”

“She can just hack into a high-clearance FBI—”

“I’m not asking questions,” Izzy cut him off. “When people want to help, I say thank you. If you want to be a Boy Scout—”

“No,” Dan said, working hard to keep up. “I’m just impressed. I didn’t think anyone besides WildCard could do that.” Navy SEAL Chief Ken Karmody, nicknamed WildCard for obvious reasons, was currently OCONUS, with most of Team Sixteen. So Tess Bailey would have to do.

“Jenk’ll send a text when she gets through. Dude. Gimme that.” Izzy took the bag from him. “You should’ve reminded me.”

“I’m okay,” Dan said. “But if you’ve got the bag? I’m good to run.”

Izzy looked at him hard, but then nodded. “Your pace,” he said. “Save something for when we get there.” But then he softened the implied I’m reminding you because we both know you’re an idiot of his words by adding, in his best Groucho Marx, “And save a little something else for even later, to throw to Jennilyn.”

“Zanella, you’re an a*shole.” Dan started to run, slowly at first and then faster. Jesus, his leg hurt. And after all those weeks of sitting on his ass, his wind was for shit.

“What?” Izzy said as he easily kept up, bag and all. “I’m just saying. I got myself a post-mission plan …”

“TMI,” Dan gasped.

Izzy ran closer and put his free arm around Dan’s waist. “Arm around my shoulder, bro.”

And with much of Dan’s weight transferred to Izzy, they could both punch up the pace.

Izzy, of course, started to sing, because he clearly had wind to spare. “The road is long, with many a winding turn …”

The song was “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother.” Through the years that they’d worked together, Dan had heard Izzy singing it plenty of times, along with a whole playlist of similarly themed tunes. He’d always thought Izzy’d done it to purposely annoy and just generally be an a*shole.

But it was entirely possible that Dan had been wrong—and that Izzy sang the sappy lyrics because he meant them.

“Actually,” he gasped now, cutting Izzy off mid-brother. “I’d prefer ‘Lean on Me.’ ”

Izzy laughed his surprise. “I was trying to piss you off,” he admitted. “Get a little stamina-building rage burning.”

“I got plenty of rage,” Dan told him. “Those a*sholes have my family.” He corrected himself. “Our family.”

“Not for long,” Izzy said. And he started to sing. “Sometimes in our lives, we all have pain, we all have sorrow …”

He really did have a nice voice.


The entire back section of the warehouse was air-conditioned.

It was separated from the main area by a heavily insulated wall with a single door in the middle that opened into a significantly cooler but still-warm hallway.

The hallway was windowless and ran the entire length of the back of the building, with one of those white acoustical-tile drop ceilings overhead and cheap linoleum tile in an industrial shade of speckled tan underfoot.

Eden’s heart was pounding as the two men who were escorting her and Jenn led her to the left, past two, then three, then four doorways, all of which opened into dark rooms. She didn’t get more than a peek inside. Two had typical cheap office setups, with desks and chairs and file cabinets—she couldn’t see if there were phones on the desks—and one was simply empty.

“I really need to use the bathroom,” Jenn said again.

“I’ll get a bucket,” the man holding Jenn told her as he pushed her toward the very last room at the end of the hall. The door was shut and locked with a big thumb bolt on the outside, and he opened it and shoved Jenn in.

“Oh, my God, and towels, too,” Jenn said. “And that bag, from the van!”

Something was wrong—Eden could tell by the tone of Jenn’s voice, and as she, too, was pushed forward, into the open doorway, she saw … “Ben!”

Her little brother was lying on the floor, on his stomach, with Jenn beside him, checking for his pulse.

“What did you do to him?” Eden cried as she scrambled down next to him. He was naked—his jeans and briefs draped almost modestly over his bottom by whoever had left him there—and she imagined the worst. “No, oh, no, Boo-Boo …”

“He’s alive,” Jenn told Eden, her hands in Ben’s hair. “I’m not feeling any lumps or bumps. I don’t think he’s got a head injury.”

But he’d definitely thrown up, and he’d absolutely been hit. Repeatedly. His lip was bleeding and his face was scraped and swollen. He had a bruise already forming on his rib cage, too, as if he’d fallen and then been kicked.

Jenn leaned close as if whispering to him, murmuring something that Eden didn’t hear—as if beseeching him to be all right—as she started to cry.

Eden reached for his pants, dreading what she’d find beneath them, but to her surprise, Jenn reached out and caught her wrist, stopping her.

“Come over here,” Jenn said. “You need to …”

“I thought you said he didn’t have a head injury,” Eden said as Jenn physically moved her closer to Ben’s head.

But then she gasped, because his eyes opened.

Ben looked directly at her, and it wasn’t the unfocused, hazy look of a diabetic going into shock. His eyes were clear and filled with apology and understanding.

And as Eden turned her gasp into noisy pretend crying, as she shifted slightly to make absolutely sure that the guards couldn’t see Ben’s face, she understood why Jenn had been whispering and murmuring. She’d been talking to Ben, who was faking his unconsciousness.

“I’m okay,” he told her silently.

Was he, really? She had to ask. “Did they …?” She couldn’t say it.

He knew what she was asking, and he shook his head, furtively, barely moving at all. Still, he was definite. “I’m okay. I made myself throw up. Did you bring insulin?” But then he closed his eyes again, because the second guard was coming back into the room with a bucket and a sorry-looking pile of rags.

“There’s a bag,” Eden told the man—it was Nathan—as she wiped her nose on the sleeve of her shirt, “outside in the van. It’s got insulin and needles in it. I need it in here, or my brother’s going to die.”

“One of you’s gonna die anyway,” Nathan told her.

“Yeah, well, it’s not going to be him,” Eden said fiercely. “You get us that bag, or neither one of us”—she looked at Jenn—“will talk to Dan. Without proof of life, he’ll never give you Neesha. Never.”

Jenn nodded her solidarity as she used the rags to wipe Ben’s face, as well as the arm that he’d convincingly let fall into his own vomit.

“We’ll see about that.” Both guards left them then, pulling the door closed behind them and locking it with a thunk.

Ben sat up, talking softly but quickly, as he pulled on his shorts and his jeans. “This is all my fault. I couldn’t sleep, so I went out. They grabbed me in the courtyard. Eden, God, I’m so sorry—”

“They were planning to kick in the apartment door,” Eden told him. “If they hadn’t bumped into you the way that they did? Izzy would be dead right now. They would have killed him. So no blame.” She hugged him, hard, then pulled back to look him in the eye. “They really didn’t …?”

“No,” he said. “I’m okay. They took pictures of me. That was it.”

“Pictures of you naked?” Unlike Eden, Jenn still hadn’t figured it out.

“They’re going to auction me off,” Ben told her.

“Oh, my God,” Jenn said.

Jake had originally said that Eden and Jenn were to be photographed, too. Until he’d decided he was going to kill one of them.

Ben looked at Eden. “Are Danny and Izzy—”

“Coming,” Eden said. “They’re going to get you out.”

“Us,” Jenn said sharply. “All of us.”

Eden didn’t look at her. “I’ve already decided. If it comes down to it? It’s going to be me.”

Ben looked from Eden to Jenn and back. “What—” he started.

“We’re all getting out of here,” Jenn said again. She turned to Ben. “Ben—”

“Don’t scare him!” Eden said hotly.

“He’s not a child,” Jenn countered. “Not with that mother. So don’t treat him like one.” She turned to Ben. “Jake—the skinhead—said that if Danny didn’t tell him where Neesha was? One of us was going to die.”

Ben turned to look at Eden, his mouth open, as he realized what her words had meant.

“None of us are tied up,” Jenn continued, “so I say, if it comes to that, we …” She took a deep breath. “We go for it. We jump them. We try to get their guns. In fact, why wait? The next person who opens that door—”

“Unless he’s got Eden’s bag from the van,” Ben interrupted her. He turned back to Eden. “Did you bring only the insulin, or the glucagon, too?”

“I brought everything,” Eden told him. “The meter, too. We didn’t know what you’d need.”

“I don’t need anything,” Ben reassured her as Jenn looked up at the ceiling, which was too high for them to reach, even if Eden stood on Ben’s shoulders. “I was thinking we could try to use the glucagon on the guard.”

“That’s the drug that raises your blood sugar?” Jenn asked, turning her attention to the air conditioner that was set into the wall.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Unlike the insulin I use, it’s super fast-acting.”

“What’ll it do to him?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Ben said, “but I’m pretty sure it’ll mess him up. When I take it? When I need it? It knocks me to my knees. Total puke-city.”

Eden said, “At which point, we grab his gun.”

Jenn smiled at her. “That’s a much better plan. Not that I didn’t appreciate your selfless sacrifice, but … You’re not expendable.”

“Still,” Eden said. “If it comes to it …”

“It won’t,” Jenn insisted, back to gazing at that air conditioner.

Ben nodded up at it. “It’s in there solidly. Believe me. I’ve been in here for a while—the only way out? Is through that door.”


Neesha had to pee.

She’d been crouched there, back behind the sofa for such a long time. And even though she hadn’t had anything to drink or to eat, nature called.

She considered relieving herself right there, but it seemed ungrateful and impolite.

So she took the gun and the cell phone that Dan had given her, and she went into the bathroom. She left the door open and the gun on her lap. It was cold against her knees, so she pulled her pants up a little bit farther than she normally would and kept the fabric between the metal and her skin.

She didn’t hear it over the sound of her water. That was what her mother had called it—making water.

And because she was making water, she didn’t hear the sound of the key in the lock. She didn’t hear the sound of footsteps in the entryway, or even down the hall.

He just suddenly appeared, standing right outside the bathroom doorway, with a gun of his own in his hand, aimed directly at her, and she froze.

Todd.

He smiled when he saw her.

Neesha couldn’t keep her terror from her face, from her eyes, and his smile grew into a grin and then a genuine laugh of amusement. “Well, isn’t this a lovely surprise,” he said.

And instead of sending a bullet into her head and killing her right then, right there, he slipped his gun into a holster that he wore beneath his left arm, and he locked it into place. At first she didn’t understand, but then he reached for the buckle of his belt, because he thought he had the power, because he hadn’t seen her weapon. “I don’t have to call the boss right away,” he said.

And she didn’t wait a second longer.

Neesha picked up the gun from her lap with her right hand, bracing it with her left the way Danny had demonstrated.

And now Todd’s were the eyes that were widened in fear, as she didn’t hesitate. She aimed for the center of his body, and she pulled the trigger and pulled the trigger and pulled the trigger and pulled the trigger as he fell back against the closed bedroom door, leaving a smear of blood behind him.

The noise was incredible and someone was screaming—not Todd, though. He’d screamed his last. When he’d fallen, one of her bullets had connected with his head, and she had no doubt that he was dead.

It was Neesha, herself, who’d made that noise like a wild animal, high-pitched and rough in the back of her throat as the trigger clicked and clicked and clicked—her gun long emptied.

So she put the weapon down on the counter and finished her business, carefully washing her hands in the sink.

She took the gun with her as she went back into the living room, stopping first to lock the door, and even push the refrigerator in front of it again. She could already hear police sirens—one of Eden’s neighbors had no doubt reported the ungodly noise.

Neesha took a can of soda from the fridge, and went back to the couch. No need to crouch behind it anymore. She set the gun on the cushion beside her and took one of the full clips that Dan had left on the end table, and replaced the one she’d just emptied.

And then she took out the cell phone that Dan had given her, and called him, reporting what had happened in a clear, even voice.

Dan kept saying, “Are you all right? Are you sure you’re all right?”

And she kept saying yes.

He told her that some friends of his were on their way—friends who worked for the FBI, friends that she could trust, friends who would take her someplace safe. But she asked him if it was okay if she stayed right there and just waited for him and Izzy and Eden and Jenni and Ben to get home.

And he said yes.

It was only after she hung up, only after she opened her soda and took a sip, that she started to shake and she started to cry. And she remembered the fear that had bloomed in Todd’s eyes—fear and a dark despair as he realized that he was doomed—the same fear and despair that she’d felt every day for eight years, three months, and thirteen days.

And she couldn’t imagine ever getting pleasure from making another human being feel that way.

Although with Todd? When she’d given him her absolute and final no in the form of those bullets barreling out of that gun?

She’d come pretty close.


Ben barely made it down onto the floor before the guard unlocked the door and pushed it open.

Jenn and Eden quickly snapped to it, dropping to their knees beside him as if they’d just finished dressing him, and were tying his sneakers, looking up at the door as if surprised that it was opening.

“Oh, thank God,” Eden said, and Ben heard the crinkling sound of a plastic grocery bag before the door thunked shut again, and the bolt slid home.

Jenni poked him. “Door’s shut. We’re good.”

“We’re more than good,” Eden said, taking out both of his glucagon kits, and tossing one to Ben. “We’re ready to get out of here. Or at the very least improve the odds for Izzy and Danny. I counted seven of them—including the ones called Jake and Nathan.”

“I got six,” Jenn said. “Five inside plus the one out front.”

“No,” Eden said, “I saw two outside, plus those same five …”

“Wow,” Ben said, mixing the powder with the liquid in the vial as Eden did the same with the second kit. “I have no idea how many bad guys there are.”

“Your eyes were closed.” Jenn gave him a good excuse.

“So it’s Danny and Izzy against seven men with guns,” Ben repeated.

“At least,” Eden confirmed. “But maybe we can lower that by one.” She moved back behind the door, where she’d be hidden from the guard’s view when it opened. “If I’m standing here, and you’re there, with Ben on the floor …”

“He’s not going to come in if he can’t see you,” Jenn pointed out. “Maybe you should just stand more in the middle of the room, like, Ben’s choking and you’re distressed.”

“I can do distressed,” Eden said.

“If I’m the one who’s choking,” Ben said to Jenn as he got into position, “you should have the second syringe.” He handed it to her.

“And we hit him with both,” Eden said, “right at the same time.”

“While I go for his gun,” Ben said.

Jenn and Eden looked at each other over the top of Ben’s head.

“Come on,” Ben said. “If we’re doing this, we have to do it. All of us, together.”

“If you get yourself shot,” Eden told him, “I will kick your ass.”

She hugged him hard, hugged Jenn, too, and Ben knew what his sister was thinking. It was do-or-die time.

And they were probably going to die.


“We have maybe five minutes,” Izzy said as Dan ended his call with Neesha, “before you need to call Jake.”

“We’re not ready for me to call Jake.” Dan was shocked—Izzy could see it in his eyes, on his face. Neither one of them had expected Todd to come back into the apartment, although now that he had, it made perfect sense.

Whoever was down there in that big white warehouse that seemed to glow in the predawn darkness had gotten tired of waiting for Dan to call, and had sent Todd in to wake him up.

But instead of moving forward, Danny was still struggling to compartmentalize the idea that the sweet little girl they’d left behind had needed to defend herself with deadly force. Instead of giving himself a pat on the back for successfully teaching her to fire the weapon that had killed her attacker, he was mired in the horror of it all.

They’d reached the point in their approach where they had to move in more slowly, more cautiously, and if Izzy had more than five minutes to spare, he would have sat there for at least thirty, just watching the place and observing the patterns and check-in procedures of the various guards. He also would have traversed the building’s perimeter before making that phone call to Jake. He glanced at his watch. Or maybe not. Once that sun came up, they’d lose their advantage. So maybe this was fate plus common sense giving them a friendly nudge.

While Dan had been on the phone with Neesha, Izzy’d spoken briefly to Jules Cassidy, who was probably going to get his ass fired for helping them this way. But that was another thing that Izzy couldn’t worry about right now.

“The witness your AIC is looking for just killed a man in self-defense,” Izzy had reported, giving Jules the address of Eden’s apartment. “You might want to get someone over there, pronto, because the police are on their way, and it could get ugly if they try to kick down the door. She’s inside with the body, and she’s armed and understandably tightly wound. She’s also got a cell phone.” He rattled off Greg’s number so the FBI could at least contact her.

“Bless you,” Jules said. “I’ll make sure she stays safe.”

“Roger that, sir,” Izzy said. “I’m betting you grok how the fact that their man being dead makes him unable to communicate with the mothership via cell phone, which shortens the time line for our”—he cleared his throat—“surveillance. I need a little help, ASAP, from our friendly eye in the sky.”

“I’m on it,” Jules had said, and cut the call.

Izzy now got a text from the FBI agent: 4 out, 11 in, believe 3 of those 11 are Hs in sm rm NE. It was followed, immediately by a text from Troubleshooter Tess Bailey, verifying those numbers.

Yes. “Fifteen life-forms—twelve tangos, three H’s,” Izzy told Dan. “Cassidy just told me they believe the three hostages are being held in a small room in the northeast part of the building.”

That information brought Danny back. Or maybe he’d just got his second wind. Because he nodded and took out Eden’s cell phone as he said, “I have to call Jake. We have to give him a reason for why Todd’s not answering his phone or calling to check in.”

“Wow, what a good idea,” Izzy said. “But hold up there, Skippy, I already got it all figured out. Here’s what you’re going to say.”