Page 97 of Final Exit

Bailey’s finger tensed on the frame of her gun as she waited for the doors to open.Swoosh.She crouched down and aimed her pistol into the opening. Empty. Jumping back out of the way, she waited while Kade used a special fireman’s key to lock the elevator and prevent it from returning to one of the lower floors.

He pressed the button to call the second elevator and they repeated the same procedure. Second elevator empty, locked. So far, everything was going exactly as planned.

Jace pressed a button on the earpiece that he was wearing. “Sitrep,” he whispered.

Bailey stood beside Kade, waiting for the update. Jace nodded and gave them a thumbs-up sign.

“Alarm’s disabled,” he whispered. “After we clear the second floor, we’ll signal them and they’ll open the doors for the rest of the team to begin the assault on the primary target.” He signaled the rest of the team, and the Enforcers with them led the way, running toward the stairwell. Jace, Kade, and Bailey took up the rear and soon they were all at the landing, ready to begin clearing the next floor.

Guns at the ready, they plastered themselves against the wall while, once again, Jace gently pulled the door open a crack to peer inside.

Bam! Bam!

Bullets blasted through the wall, slamming one of the Enforcers into the railing. Bailey lunged for him but he toppled over and was gone, his body thudding sickeningly on the concrete below.

Bam! Bam! Bam!

Jace and the others returned fire through the open door. Kade grabbed Bailey and yanked her out of the line of fire.

Jace made a winding motion with his hand. They ducked down while he laid cover fire, then Kade was out the door, leading the charge. Bailey and the others took up the rear.

Two bodies littered the carpet about twenty feet in, blood pooling beneath them. Bailey knelt down and checked both for a pulse, then shook her head.

“Mercenaries,” she told Kade, pointing to the tattoos on their arms.

He nodded, then yanked her back and laid fire toward a door that had just opened across from them. The gunman in the opening fell soundlessly to the floor without ever firing his weapon.

More gunfire sounded from farther down the hall where Jace and the two other men with him were engaging more of Faegan’s guys. One group was in a set of offices to the left, the other to the right. Even more gunfire sounded from downstairs. Lots of gunfire. Which meant their team outside the building had now joined the battle and was trying to break their way into the ground floor.

“Jace is pinned down,” Kade said. “We need to find a way to get behind the gunmen.”

Bailey looked around, getting her bearings, picturing the blueprints that she’d studied earlier today as part of the prep at Mason’s home. With three floors of layouts to remember, it was hard to separate them and get a clear idea of where they were.

“The conference rooms.” Kade pointed to the door directly across from them. “Didn’t Mason say there was a parallel hall across the back wall that connects all the meeting areas to the offices?”

She studied the door he’d pointed to, noted the room number hanging on the wall. The pictures in her head snapped together and she knew exactly where they were. She counted the doors down to where the gunmen had Jace and the others pinned.

“Through there,” she agreed.

They both looked up and down the hall, then ran for the other side. One of the gunmen spotted them and leaned out into the hallway. Kade jumped in front of Bailey and fired.

The gunman’s arm exploded in a hail of gunfire from both Kade’s and Jace’s directions. The man screamed in pain. Another shot rang out and he dropped to the floor, dead.

Kade threw the door open and Bailey ran inside with him. They rushed to the end of the conference room to the only other door. Kade held up his fingers, counting down... three, two, one. He pulled open the door and Bailey squatted down, then lunged into the opening, sweeping her Sig Sauer back and forth.

“Clear,” she whispered.

They headed into the back hallway, which was brightly lit from the rows of windows across the front of the building. The sound of gunfire continued to ring out both from down the hall and below stairs. But they didn’t risk running past any of the rooms without clearing them first. At the next office door to their left, Bailey was the one to count down. On one, she threw the door open and Kade swept his gun inside.

“Hold it,” he yelled. “Drop your weapon. Drop it!” He cursed and squeezed the trigger, the explosion of sound nearly deafening in the confined space.

He straightened and ran into the room, with Bailey following.

Kneeling down, he checked the gunman for a pulse, then shook his head.

“Damned idiot,” he said. “He didn’t have to die.”

Bailey put her hand on his shoulder. “You’re a good man. He obviously didn’t think twice about trying to kill you.”

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