Page 111 of Edge of Darkness (Night Prowler 4)
Then the phone he’d tucked into the front pocket of his shirt rang.
With an audible sigh of frustration, Caesar pulled away, stood and paced to the windows. “Armond, talk to me,” he growled into the phone. “What’s happening up there?”
Whatever was said on the other end of the line caused Caesar to spin around and stare at her in sudden, crackling fury. That look made Ember’s heart began to stutter in dread; her mouth went dry.
“Well, hello, friend! I’ve been so hoping we could meet,” Caesar hissed. An ugly smile spread over his handsome face.
Ember realized who was on the other end of the line, and that’s when her heart stopped beating altogether.
Christian mistakenly slammed the SUV into drive instead of reverse, shouted a curse, and wished, for not the first time in his life, but definitely the most fiercely, that he’d learned to drive.
The powerful engine propelled the car forward with a lurch, and he crashed into the SUV parked in front of him.
He’d been able to sneak undetected to the car from his hiding place behind the pines because there was still a gun battle raging at the bunker compound. Though the shooters led by Jahad—he recognized the big albino, but didn’t have a clear shot as the man bounded for the main entrance with Kamikaze determination and disappeared inside—had killed the Ikati left behind at the sedan they’d been chasing, dozens more had erupted from hidden holes in the ground all around the area like rats from a sinking ship.
Armed, angry rats.
Conveniently, Jahad’s men had even left the car running for him. Which was lucky, because Christian wasn’t entirely sure he’d be able to locate the key, find the ignition and turn the engine over, on top of figuring out which direction to pull the shifter on the steering wheel column to make the car move forward and back.
Before this moment, he’d thought driving a car was a matter of simple common sense.
Too bad he hadn’t tested that theory under better circumstances.
He slammed the shifter in the other direction and stomped his foot on the gas pedal. The car surged backward with surprising force, throwing him into the steering wheel, and tearing off the rear bumper of the other SUV. Quickly righting himself, Christian eased his foot off the pedal, gripped the steering wheel, and executed a squealing 180-degree turn that miraculously managed to point him in the right direction down the hill. The demolished metal bumper went flying off into the darkness beyond the headlights.
This time when he punched the accelerator, he knew what to expect.
He didn’t look behind to see if he was followed. He didn’t look behind to get a better look at what sounded like a small munitions explosion, possibly one of the buried land mines. He did look behind just as he reached the bottom of the hill—a quick glance in the rearview mirror before he made the turn onto the main road—when a much larger explosion rocked the night, lighting it brilliant orange and crimson and blue like a tropical sunset.
Bodies flying in slow motion. A giant fireball of flame and debris. A spectacular flare of color against the sky, then everything fell dark and silent except for a few piles of flaming rubble and the squalling of a half dozen car alarms, oddly alien among the trees and grass and sky.
“Jesus,” muttered Christian, flooded with relief that Ember hadn’t been in that compound; apparently Caesar had the whole thing wired. With the amount of explosives it must have taken to induce that kind of light show, he doubted if anything identifiable would be left.
Then he smiled in dark satisfaction. So long, Jahad. I bet the goats in hell have much sharper teeth than all the ones you killed up here, you miserable bastard.
He pulled the sat phone from his zippered pocket, set it on the seat beside him, and did his best to stay on the
right side of the yellow line as he flew down the two-lane highway and into the outskirts of the city.
It took too long. His heart felt like it was eating its way out of his chest. The air had become too thin to breathe.
Narrowly missing oncoming traffic, he blew through three stoplights before he finally had to stop at a busy intersection near the marina. Seconds ticked by like hours as he waited for the light to turn, and as soon as it did, he was flying like a madman over the pavement once again.
Ember was with Caesar. He knew it. He felt it, deep in his bones.
Just as he knew he was going to tear that son of a bitch’s head right off his body.
He abandoned the SUV near the aquarium building in the marina parking lot and set off at a dead run with the rifle slung over his back and the phone in his hand, following the direction of the little red dot. The boat slips were at the opposite end of the parking lot with the smaller vessels nearest the lot and the larger yachts at the end of the wood slip decks. Barcelona was loaded with mega-yachts and their rich owners, so the marina was forested with sleek, gleaming ships, but he had the phone, and he knew exactly where he was going.
When finally he stood panting at the end of the dock eight boats removed from a sleek number ironically named God of Vengeance, Christian knew without looking at the mobile that Ember was inside.
He smelled her. He was so attuned to her scent now he could find her blindfolded in the middle of a huge crowd.
He expected to smell fear, but strangely she was angry. Angry and repulsed—Christian didn’t want to know what Caesar might be doing to her to make her feel that way.
He dialed a stored number. Caesar picked up on the second ring.
“Armond, talk to me. What’s happening up there?”
