AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That might be true, but Rafe didn’t like this set up. Bakerhill wasn’t exactly a den of criminal activity, but leaving a warehouse door unlocked at night wasn’t safe. Although he wanted to check the warehouse alone, Rafe couldn’t leave Kristi in the dark without protection.
Standing to the side of the threshold, Rafe pushed open the door and listened. Silence. If someone waited inside to ambush them, he didn’t want to turn on the lights, and make himself and Kristi easy targets. With a dim light coming from the left side of the building, Rafe stepped into the warehouse and led Kristi away from the doorway.
In silence, he nudged Kristi toward the wall. Large boxes and wooden crates were stacked in an orderly fashion throughout the warehouse, creating aisles as far as he could see which wasn’t far enough to satisfy him. Rafe’s gut urged him to take Kristi away from this building. Although Alan Stewart had sent his daughter a text to meet him here, the building felt deserted. “Where are the offices?” he whispered.
“To the left. If we follow the perimeter of the building, we’ll reach the hall where the offices are located.”
Rafe hugged the wall as he led Kristi around the perimeter of the cavernous warehouse. Near the corner, he peered around the row of boxes toward the area where the offices were located. Dim light streamed from the hall.
He glanced at Kristi. “Don’t call out to your father. This doesn’t feel right.” When she nodded, Rafe started toward the hallway.
At the entrance to the hall, he peered around the corner. The deserted hallway should have reassured him that all was well. It didn’t. Rafe stepped into the hall and tugged Kristi after him. Three closed doors.
When they reached the first office, Rafe tried the knob. Locked. With a hand signal for Kristi to remain in place, Rafe grabbed his lockpicks, crouched in front of the knob, and went to work. In less than 30 seconds, he stepped to the side of the doorway, twisted, and shoved the door open. Nothing. After peering into the empty office, he glanced at Kristi and shook his head.
The second door’s knob turned easily under his hand. Nudging Kristi’s back to the wall to make sure she wasn’t in the line of fire, Rafe pushed open the door. No shots, but also no greeting from Stewart. He peeked into the office. Empty except for a desk, two chairs, and a table with a small coffee maker and cups.
After another head shake, Rafe led Kristi toward the last office. He twisted the knob and pushed open the door. The office light was on, but Stewart didn’t call out. Not good. Rafe didn’t want Kristi to walk in on her father injured or dead. He signaled for her to wait, then looked into the office.
No Stewart. Standard office furniture. Sitting on top of the desk was a brick of C-4 with multiple wires, a detonator, a cell phone, and a digital clock counting down to detonation.
Adrenaline flooded Rafe’s veins. He didn’t have time to deactivate the bomb. He grabbed Kristi’s hand. “Run!” She sprinted down the hall with him without asking questions.
In his head, the clocked ticked down. They wouldn’t be able to escape before the bomb exploded. Rafe’s goal was to put as much space between them and the office as possible.
When the time clock in his head hit two seconds, he shoved Kristi to the floor in the corner and covered her body with his. He wrapped his arms around her head.
The bomb exploded, blowing out windows and tossing boxes everywhere with several of them catching fire. Something hard slammed against Rafe’s back. He grunted and shook off the weight.
As soon as the larger debris settled, Rafe tugged Kristi to her feet. Using the wall as a guide, Rafe resumed the journey to the door, coughing every few steps. Smoke billowed and filled the warehouse.
Kristi stumbled. Rafe caught her before she hit the floor and tucked her tight against his side. “Not much farther,” he shouted over the roar of the fire, and prayed he’d spoken the truth. He didn’t know what was in the crates, but they were going up in flames quickly.
“We have to go back for Dad.”
“Didn’t see him.”
By the time Rafe grabbed the knob and shoved open the door, he and Kristi coughed continuously. After they stumbled from the warehouse, Rafe hurried Kristi toward his SUV.
When they reached the vehicle, he opened the passenger door, scooped Kristi into his arms, and set her on the seat. Rafe rounded the hood, climbed behind the steering wheel, and drove farther from the warehouse.
“Are we leaving?” Kristi asked between bouts of coughing.
“I wish. Security cameras caught my license plate, and we were recorded entering the warehouse before the fire. The police will have questions.” He grabbed his phone and called 911, called Eli for backup, then Maddox.
“Yeah, Maddox.”
“It’s Rafe. I may need one of our lawyers soon.”
“Talk to me.”
Rafe summarized events quickly as the sirens from emergency vehicles grew louder. “My backup will arrive in five minutes.” He went through a round of coughing.
“I’ll alert one of the lawyers. Let the EMTs check you and Kristi. If they offer a trip to the hospital, take it.”
He grimaced. He hated hospitals with a white-hot passion. “Yes, sir.” Rafe ended the call and turned to Kristi as a police car followed the fire truck heading for the burning warehouse.
Abruptly, the police car skidded to a stop. Knowing what was coming next, Rafe leaned over and brushed his lips over Kristi’s. “Wolf Pack will be here soon. The police will have questions for us, and they might put us in handcuffs,” he said as he slid his weapons into a lockbox built into the floor of his SUV. Being unarmed made him uncomfortable, but he preferred to keep his weapons if possible. The police would be more suspicious if he was armed. “When the police ask questions, they might separate us. Tell them the truth. We don’t have anything to worry about.”
