I should have left him inside the building that was now crumbling around me. But I knew what Sparrow wanted. She wanted him intact and whole. And I could do that. I could give that to her, but Christ. Sparrow.
My heart shattered into a million broken pieces as it hammered too hard, too fast, and I worried. Had she made it out? Was she safe?
Into my earpiece, I screamed, “Does anyone have eyes on Sparrow, damn it? Any eyes. Right the hell now.”
No response. It was just Truman Nix and me. Fucking hell.
A piece of my heart was in the building. And instead, I had to make sure that this idiot was okay. I resented that. I hated him. And I wanted to leave him right there and go back for her.
The ground rocked again.
And this time, cracks formed in the ceiling above me as I hauled ass down the stairs.
Fuck. Fuck.
On my shoulders, Truman groaned. “You’re girlfriend’s dead. And you’re going to have to deal with the fact that I killed her.”
“I swear to God if you don’t shut the fuck up, I will kill you myself. Never mind that I went above and beyond to save your ass. I will kill you.”
“You had better let me die. Because the moment I’m free, I’m coming back for her. Now that I know how strong she is, I know she’s the right woman for me. I don’t want to hurt her; I want to own her.”
Deliberately, when I jumped on the next step, I jostled him so that his rib hit my shoulder, and he howled in pain. The building shook again. I could hear crashing somewhere from upstairs and behind us. Fuck.
I offered up a silent prayer to the God that had taken my parents from me. Sparrow, please be okay. Please, please, please, please, please be okay.
Truman Nix continued to taunt me. “Do you think you can keep a woman like her interested? Keep her entertained? Keep her challenged? You don’t know what it takes.”
“You’re the one who doesn’t know Sparrow. She doesn’t need to be controlled. She’s perfect.”
“If you say so.”
I finally reached the exit, ran to the SUV, and shoved him in. He flopped and groaned, curling in on his side.
I reached into the front seat for the walkie talkie. “Who has eyes on Sparrow?”
There was muffled shouting, and then my brother’s voice was on the line. “Breck. You’re okay?”
“I’m fine. Where’s Sparrow?”
“She was trying to defuse a bomb, and then it went off. The building is collapsing in chunks. You need to get out of there.”
“I’m not leaving without her.”
“Breck. Breck.”
I shoved the walkie in my back pocket and ran back into the building and headed up the stairs. Jesus Christ. My family had never really been one for prayer. Sure, we made our state-required appearances, but it wasn’t like any of us worshiped really. Christmas, Easter, that sort of thing. The national holidays of course. But at that moment, I spoke to God, Buddha, Allah, anyone I thought would listen. Anyone I thought would hear my plea, my plight, my wish, my hope. I prayed.
I booked it up nineteen flights of flying debris, and I followed the map that I had on my phone to where she was supposed to have been defusing the bomb. But at the entrance of the hallway, there was nothing but crumbled debris from the original blast site.
The ground shook again.
Wilder yelled in my earpiece, “Breck, get the fuck out now. The building’s unstable.”
“No. She’s in here somewhere. I need to find her.”
In a solemn voice, my brother said, “I’m not getting anything on her monitor. No heartbeat, no nothing.”
All the breath left me then. In one long wheeze and exhale, I fell to my knees.
“Breck, are you there? Answer me.”
“What do you read?”
“I’ve got nothing to read. You need to come back. Get out of there.”
Oh God, she was gone. And a few days ago, I had left her because I couldn’t stand the thought of her being hurt. Maybe if I hadn’t walked away, we could have done this together, made a better plan with a better outcome.
“Breck, come on. This is not what Sparrow would have wanted. At the very least, get out so you can put Nix away for her.”
Wilder knew exactly what to say to me, exactly how to get me to comply, because it was true. If I couldn’t get to her, I could at least make the man who has caused her death pay. The man who had hurt her, the one who’d forced her into this predicament knowing full well that she would dive headfirst into doing the right thing.
I couldn’t leave her. “I’m not going.”
“Breck, listen to me. Sparrow’s a smart woman. If she was capable, she would transmit. Do not do this.”
“I have to be sure.”
I shoved aside some of the rubble, climbing over the rest to get to the door, and then I lay back and shoved the full weight of my foot against the door. When it gave way, the room was dark, smoky, charred. “Sparrow. Sparrow, please, God. Just say something. Move something.”
There was static in my ears. Static… and groaning.
I looked around. “Anyone else catching that?”
“One second. I might have eyes.” Wilder’s voice in my ear was warbled.
And then it was Niko’s voice. “I have a sighting. She made the jump. Breck, make the jump. She’s on the ground.”
The relief washed through me, making me nearly faint. “Jesus Christ. I’m on my way.”
The problem was that once I was in, finding a way out was tricky. There was debris everywhere. But Sparrow had made it out. God, I hoped to Christ she was okay. At the far end of the room, I found the window she’d used. I searched below, but there was too much smoke to see clearly. She might have landed in the water. Had she made it out? I checked my comm unit as I stripped off my clothes and activated my suit, and then I jumped.
The air washed over my body as the ground rose up to meet me. I extended my arms and legs like I knew to do, then the glide happened. I might have even enjoyed the ride if I hadn’t been so worried about Sparrow and trying to make my lungs fucking work properly. I’d inhaled too much smoke and soot. My lungs burned with every inhalation.
I glided to a landing at the opposite bank of the river, then I shed my suit and ran to the bridge to make it back across to the SUV. I stopped dead when I could see my way clear of the smoke.
Truman Nix. He’d been faking. He had his arm around Sparrow’s neck, and she was struggling. She was so weak. “Nix, let her go,” I commanded.
He shook his head. “No. I don’t think I will. I think I’ll keep this one. She’s so spunky. Don’t worry, I’m not going to kill her. But you will have to live with the knowledge that I took something from you. Just like she took something from me.”
“Nix.”
But he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking down at Sparrow. She was whispering something to him. With Nix’s attention diverted, I reached my hand to the small of my back where I’d stored the gun Nix had held on Sparrow earlier. How was my aim? Could I hit him? We’d all had hand-to-hand combat training. We’d all served in the military. Two years as was standard. I could do this. But, God, what if I hit her? He was leaning over her, and then I saw what she was doing. Even weak, with him choking her, she was still on mission. She reached into the little fold of her squirrel suit and pulled out the syringe. She said something that made Nix laugh.