Page 69 of Duplicity

Simon scanned the blueprint drawing. “Looks like an elevator at the end of the hall beside a linen closet.” Bigger than any cupboard for towels he’d ever seen. “The northeast corner.”

“Copy that.”

Gunfire echoed through the earpiece. The point where they’d start saying things like, “Encountering resistance” and giving each other locations so they could back one another up. Another shot rang out, followed by two more.

It sounded different.

Cat flinched in her seat and turned to look at the side of the van. “That was outside.”

Simon flushed cold. “The Vanguard operative out there protecting us?”

“Did someone just kill him?” She drew her pistol and checked it, confirming there was a round in the chamber and flicking the safety on and then off again. The shift in her toreadywas visible in the way she became steady, her lips pressed together.

The woman who cared about people enough to stop and ensure they had what they needed—even if it was only a soda and a comfy chair in the dark—disappeared, and the cop overtook everything.

Instinct. Training.

He’d seen it enough in Peter to know what was happening with Cat.

She would guard him with her life.

Someone tugged on the handle of the back door. Simon stiffened. “What are we?—”

“We don’t know how many are out there.” She scrambled between the seats and turned the key, so the engine came to life. “Whoa. More than one, that’s for sure.” She shoved the van into gear, then lifted her gun and pointed it at the passenger’s window.

She hit the gas.

The van jerked forward.

Simon nearly slid off the stool. Calls of “Found one” and “They’re here” over his earpiece indicated the team in the spa had discovered the girls. Some, or all of them. Gunshots echoed over the comms channel.

A bullet splintered the van’s back window but didn’t shatter it thanks to the wire crisscrossed in the glass.

“Hang on! I’m getting us out of here.”

Simon gripped the edge of the desk so he could hang on, literally. Was the man who’d been covering them outside dead? He had to be, given the way someone was still shooting at the back of the van.

Rounds pinged off the back doors and the sides as Cat gunned it away from the spot where they’d parked. “How many are there?”

“More than three, less than ten.”

He’d have said a handful. Simon slid out his phone and sent an update to Peter. No need for anything to go awry in the spa just because they were worried about him and Cat. As long as they stayed ahead of their pursuers, they’d be okay.

“Where are you taking us?”

She gripped the wheel, the gun in her other hand. “To the spa. Safety in numbers.”

“Copy that.” The gunbattle over comms might actually be worse than the situation he and Cat were in. “Any idea who they are?”

No one had thought these people would go down easily. But they should be attacking the invading men with guns, not the van.

A shiver went through him, and for a second, he was back on that cold concrete floor, seventeen and all alone. At the mercy of what they wanted. And their threats.

“No idea.” She didn’t sound irritated, just focused. “Hold on.” Cat yanked the wheel to the side, and he held on while they careened around a corner. The tires bumped up onto asphalt, and the ride got a whole lot smoother.

Lord.What should he say?

Peter hadn’t replied yet.

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