“We can take the tunnels,” she said. “They’ll be faster and we’ll be less likely to run into anyone.”
He’d just reached for her hand when the door swung open and he found himself staring at four men, all of them holding high-powered rifles aimed at his heart.
Chapter Seventeen
Emily saw four men with guns, each muzzle trained on Zack. She could feel high-octane adrenaline pumping through her entire body.
“Move and I’ll put a bullet in his heart,” one of the men said. “Get your hands up. Now!”
She stared at the men, unable to believe this was happening. They’d been so close to getting away. One of the men strode toward her.
“I said get your hands up!” he shouted.
“Emily,” Zack said. “Do it.”
Snapping out of her shock-induced stupor, she raised her hands.
“Put your hands on the desk and spread your legs,” one of the men said to Zack.
She watched as Zack complied, wondering how he could be so calm about this. The men roughly patted down Zack, then seized the folded papers from his waistband.
“You, too,” one of them said to Emily.
Emily didn’t want them touching her but didn’t think she had a choice.
“Do what they say,” Zack warned.
Before she could obey, a sandy-haired man with cold blue eyes shoved her against the desk. “Put your hands on the desk.” He kicked her legs apart, then quickly and impersonally searched her.
“She’s clean.”
“We’ve got Devlin and Monroe,” one of the men barked into his radio.
Zack shot a hard look at Emily. “You set me up, you bitch,” he said loudly.
It took her a moment to realize the crude words were an act so the corrections officers would think he’d kidnapped her.
Doing her best to play along, she straightened and turned to face the officer who’d patted her down. “I didn’t think you’d ever get here.”
“Put your hands back on the desktop,” the officer snapped. “Now!”
Heart pounding, Emily obeyed. Dear God, they didn’t believe her.
“I forced her to bring me here,” Zack said.
“All of us have seen the security-camera videos, Devlin.” The sandy-haired man grinned in Emily’s direction. “Don’t tell me you haven’t had a piece of her.” He sneered at Emily. “Must have been pretty damn good to give up the rest of your life for a convict.”
Emily glanced over at Zack to find his eyes already on her, urging her to stay calm. She wanted desperately to believe they were going to get out of this, but she didn’t see how.
Movement at the door drew her attention. Everything inside her froze when Marcus Underwood strode into the room. His eyes sought Emily and he shook his head as if he were supremely disappointed.
“Why couldn’t you just do your job and stay the hell away from this?” he asked.
She stared at Underwood, her heart thumping like a drum against her ribs. She thought of the screams she’d heard in the infirmary and a fierce hatred for him surged up. “You’re a murderer,” she spat.
“Emily, that’s enough.”
She heard the warning in Zack’s voice, but her emotions were out of control. There was no way she could heed him. Not when the man she’d respected her entire professional life was responsible for untold misery and murder. “We know about the RZ-902,” she said. “We know you’re using the inmates as guinea pigs. We know the people at Lockdown, Inc. are about to sell it on the black market.”
A chill passed through her when Underwood smiled. “How astute of you.”
“You won’t get away with it.” She tried to make her voice strong, but it was trembling all the same. “We’ve already sent some of your files via e-mail.”
Underwood snapped his fingers at one of the men. “Contact our IT people and have the server taken down. Now.”
One of the men nodded, then fled the room.
Underwood’s eyes flicked to Emily. “What else do you think you know?”
“I know you’re not going to get away with this. I know there are people who are on to your sick research project.”
Zack moved toward her, set his hand on her shoulder. “Emily, don’t—”
Suddenly the officer nearest Zack swung his rifle like a baseball bat. The butt slammed against Zack’s solar plexus. Air whooshed from his lungs. Zack doubled over, choking back nausea as his knees hit the floor.
“Zack!” Forgetting about the men holding guns on them, she rushed to him and dropped to her knees at his side.
“Don’t say anything else,” he said through gritted teeth.
His entire body shook with the effort of trying to get oxygen into his lungs. She looked up at Underwood. “What do you want?”
“I want you to disappear,” he said. “Both of you. Permanently.”
He was going to kill both of them. Oh, dear Lord, how were they going to get out of this?