Page 61 of Nuclear Option (Owens Protective Services)

“What is it?”

“They’re breaching the building from the roof, and they came prepared.”

I spun around and made my way to the roof access, followed by Red and Kavanaugh. The door opened just as I was rounding the corner and several grenades were tossed down. I spun back around the corner, jumping out of the way just as they went off. Kavanaugh and Red yanked me toward them, tossing me to the ground and covering my body just as I would do for them. The explosion rang in my ears, making it nearly impossible to get my bearings as we all stumbled to our feet and looked around for anyone caught in the blast.

I vaguely heard Red yelling at me and pointing to his ear. “IRIS!” he was shouting.

I pressed my hand to the button, “IRIS, come in.”

“I got this,” he yelled.

“Fucking IRIS,” I muttered, turning back to the roof access. Men were starting to climb down. I motioned for Red and Kavanaugh to take up positions around the roof access. I fired at the first man coming through, but he dropped a smoke grenade, making it impossible for us to see as a thick cloud filled the area.

“Fall back!” I shouted.

The thick smoke surrounding us made it difficult to breathe, let alone see who we were firing at.

“Uh…guys? You might want to get the fuck out of there,” IRIS said.

“What?”

“Yeah, I’d say you have thirty seconds.”

I glanced at Red, but he didn’t know what was going on. “IRIS, what the fuck are you talking about?”

“I may have set up a diversion that’s about to go very wrong.”

“In what way?”

“Do you want to chat about it, or do you want to feel it burning around you in twenty fucking seconds?”

“Fuck,” I swore. “Haul ass before IRIS blows us all to hell.”

We ran through the building, finding the escape hatch. One by one, we dropped down inside. When everyone was through, I closed the lid and tightened it behind me. I ran down the hallway to the outside gate, getting there just in time to see the entire OPS building explode into a fiery ball of flames. I flinched back as the heat reached us in just seconds.

“What the fuck was that?”

IRIS shrugged. “Experiment gone wrong.”

“Fuck, I put Mark in the panic room.”

“He’ll be fine,” Kavanaugh reassured me. “Maybe a little toasty, but fine.”

“Cash is going to kill you,” I said to IRIS.

“Why don’t we look on the bright side,” he argued. “All the bad guys are burning up in there, and we’re still alive out here.”

“Somehow, I don’t think Cash is going to see it that way.” Sighing, I pulled out my phone and video-dialed my boss. I wasn’t looking forward to this conversation.

“Yeah?”

“Boss, we’ve got a problem.”

“Are those flames behind you?”

“Um…” I turned around and cocked my head at the torched building. “Yeah.”

“What happened?” he said, his tone brooking no arguments.

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