In His Keeping (Slow Burn #2)(103)

As they approached the wall of the prison cells, the pitched roof in the middle of the facility simply collapsed and flames roared upward, licking toward the sky. Smoke billowed in black clouds and the fire began to race across the rest of the roof.

Ash, cinder and burning debris blew hard over them, pelting down like a hailstorm.

“Your girl is wreaking some serious havoc,” Zack said, awe in his voice. “I think I might be in love.”

Beau merely stared, more worried than ever, as they closed the remaining distance, picking up speed until they were at full sprint.

They ducked inside the gaping hole in the wall and streamed one by one into the hallway. Dane and Capshaw took the others’ sixes by turning so they walked backward, guns up, scanning the hallway behind.

When they got to the doorway that opened into a large circular room with a glassed-in dome, they paused only long enough to ensure Ari’s position hadn’t changed and that they weren’t in for any unexpected surprises.

The mostly vacant area of the complex they were standing in was likely at one time either a nurses’ station or a reception area with each of the corridors branching off housing different wings of the so-called hospital. Obviously the more serious threats to society were housed in the filthy, vermin-infested barred cells, and Beau was sickened that anyone would be treated with so little humanity. Even if the criminals were the worst sort of human beings.

Here they were reduced to the furthest thing from humanity one could get. Most animal shelters and, hell, modern prisons, for that matter, offered better accommodations.

But then the bastards who’d put their hands on Ari, who’d stuffed her parents into a tiny cell with deplorable conditions, deserved far worse, so Beau would reserve his judgment in the future before offering blanket sympathy to anyone.

“We got a problem,” Zack said grimly. He turned halfway so he stared at the hallway to the far lower right. “Got movement in the northern wing. Headed this way.”

Dane tensed, immediately shifted so his hands held a weapon in each. Then he nodded at Cap and Isaac.

To Beau and Zack he said, “Go and retrieve Ari. We’ll provide cover here and make sure they don’t get past us. Let us know when you’re coming in, though, so neither of you gets your balls shot off.”

“Thanks,” Zack said dryly. “I’d rather not part ways with my dick.”

Restless, Beau started down the hallway. Toward Ari. Toward his life, leaving Zack to catch up. Or not. He wasn’t waiting another goddamn minute. He trusted Dane and the others to do their job and keep the men creeping toward them at bay long enough for them to tag Ari and get her the hell out.

No sooner had they taken two steps down the corridor than the floors buckled and rolled like ocean waves beneath their feet. The walls shook, knocking already askew paintings down to clatter on the tile below. The ceiling and rafters creaked and groaned in protest, swaying until it felt as though the entire building was in motion. The sound was ominous, the signal of impending collapse.

Relying on Zack’s techno recon, Beau ran toward the end. Toward the one closed door that Ari was behind, paying no heed to the barren rooms that lined either side of the hallway. Zack was hot on his heels, guns in both hands, arms up, his piercing gaze missing nothing. Beau knew he was being reckless, but he counted on his partner to cover his stupid ass. Zack had never failed him yet in their rather short acquaintance.

Beau slowed only enough to let Zack catch up so they could kick the door in. But before they made any motion to do so, the door splintered apart, breaking free from its hinges and sailing down the hallway in pieces.

Both men ducked, barely in time to prevent their heads from being taken off.

“Down!” Zack yelled, shoving at Beau as he started to get to his feet once more.

A man went flying down the hallway after the door, crashing into the far wall. He punched a hole straight through the Sheetrock, forming a cavernous opening.

“Holy shit,” Beau said, his face a mask of shock. “She’s kicking some serious ass!”

“Uh, yeah. What was your first clue? Three dozen heat signatures suddenly vanishing? Oh wait, make that one more in the ‘ticked off the list’ column. Ari thirty-eight. Bad guys ten. Or maybe it was the huge-ass hole in the roof with an inferno blazing and erupting like a f*cking volcano. Or perhaps—”

“I get it,” Beau muttered. “Smart-ass.”

Zack snickered but cautiously rose, humor disappearing from his features when he stared inside the now-open doorway.

“Beau,” Zack murmured. “You need to get in there. Now.”

THIRTY-SIX

EVEN Goon A’s smirk was now gone. Where before he’d been smugly assured that Ari didn’t have the guts to actually kill someone, uncertainty now marked his features and fear was stark in her eyes.

Good.

Because she meant goddamn business. Gone was any squeamishness whatsoever over causing the deaths of the *s who’d killed her parents and dragged their bodies off like discarded trash.

Fury sizzled and boiled, hissing through her veins until a warm throb reverberated through her entire body.

“What did you do with them?” she demanded, her tone so frigid that she could discern an actual temperature change in the room.

A puzzled look furrowed his brow and then pain rapidly took its place when she applied pressure to his throat, momentarily cutting off his airway. He was solidly plastered to the ceiling, incapable of moving. He was completely paralyzed and capable of doing her no harm whatsoever.