A Chip and a Chair (Seven of Spades, #5)(97)

“Can you run fast enough to get out of here if you have to carry him?” she asked, handing Dominic the keys to the cop car.

“Yes.”

“No,” Levi slurred.

Natasha retrieved the unconscious guard’s gun, checked the mag, and smacked it back in.

“You really think you can pull this off by yourself?” Dominic could help asking.

Natasha’s only response was a cruel smirk. Dominic fought the urge to recoil at the sadistic anticipation on her face.

“Take care of him,” she said with a nod to Levi.

“No.” Levi struggled weakly, his limbs as floppy as an infant’s. “Don’t . . .”

Dominic slung Levi over his shoulders in the fireman’s carry he’d used with wounded buddies in Afghanistan, one arm wrapped around Levi’s thigh and the other around Levi’s arm. Levi tried to kick him, but only managed a useless jerk of his leg.

“What are you guys doing?” Carmen asked, though the anxiety in her voice made it clear she’d figured it out on her own.

“With me,” Dominic said to Rebel, who huffed acknowledgment.

Standing next to the door, Dominic and Natasha looked at each other. She arched an eyebrow, and he inclined his head.

Natasha threw the door open. Dominic and Rebel bolted back toward the fire exit while Natasha raced in the opposite direction.

His heartbeat thundering in his ears, Dominic flew out the door, startling a pair of Utopia soldiers posted there. They took a few wild shots, but he kept sprinting, never looking back, running the fastest he ever had in his life.

Over his earpiece, he heard the screams and gunfire of Natasha tearing through the building without mercy. When the men behind him stopped shooting, he knew they’d prioritized her assault over his escape.

By the time he reached the car-unscathed, but wheezing with every breath and seriously cramping-Levi was beginning to regain motor control. That was bad news for Dominic, because even injured and recovering from electrocution, Levi was a challenge to subdue. And Levi’s fear and rage would only increase his strength.

Dominic tossed Levi into the back of the cop car and slammed the door shut.

Levi kicked the window impotently. “Dominic!”

Ignoring him, Dominic opened the front door so Rebel could leap inside, then hopped into the driver’s seat. He sucked a gasping breath into his burning lungs and shook black spots out of his vision as he started the car.

“Dominic, you motherfucker-”

With the screech of burning rubber, Dominic peeled out of the parking lot and gunned the accelerator, blasting past several cars speeding toward the building.

A louder, higher-pitched scream came through his earpiece-definitely Natasha.

“What happened?” Carmen demanded.

“Got shot,” Natasha said tightly. “I’m fine.”

“Dominic, stop!” Levi banged his fist against the divider between the front and back seats. “We can’t just leave her there. We have to go back. Dominic!”

When Dominic refused to respond, Levi shifted backward and drove both feet into the grating with a powerful kick. Then he did it again, and again.

Dominic flinched as the divider creaked and groaned, and Rebel growled anxiously. There was more than one reason criminals were handcuffed before being put in the car.

All he could do was keep driving, heading away from both the campus and the known locations of the bombs, listening to Natasha’s progress with horrified fascination.

“What the-” said a new male voice.

There was a gunshot, a scream, and the slam of a door. Levi went still in the back seat.

“Stay there or I’ll shoot the other knee,” Natasha snapped. She was breathing hard, her voice strained. “Carmen, I found the device that controls the bombs.”

“Tell me what you’re looking at.”

“It’s like a laptop inside a metal briefcase. A small keyboard and a screen with a bunch of stuff I don’t understand.”

A stab of pain throbbed through Dominic’s head; his vision swam, and the car swerved onto the shoulder before he righted it. Yeah, he really should not be driving.

“Is there a field for a disarm code?” Carmen asked.

“Uh . . .” Natasha paused. “Yes.”

“That’s good. All you have to do is input the right code to stop the timer. Then the bombs won’t go off unless the code to arm them is entered again.”

Levi’s feet slammed into the grate again, but the kick was weaker this time. Dominic could hear him trying to catch his breath.

“Tell me the code,” Natasha said.

“Fuck you, b-” The triggerman’s voice cut off in a wail of pain.

Crisply enunciating every word, she said, “Tell me the code, or I’m going to start slicing body parts off one by one and making you eat them.”

“Christ-all right, fuck!”

The man rattled off a sequence of numbers and letters. Moments later, there was a soft beep, and Natasha’s satisfied grunt echoed down the line. “Got it. Bombs are disarmed.”

Dominic exhaled, his shoulders relaxing. But his relief was short lived, because the next thing he heard were multiple loud shouts and a door banging-then a gunshot.

There was a strange note in Natasha’s voice when she spoke again. “Carmen, take me to a different channel, please.”