She looked to Madeline. “I’m good.” She glanced up at the big dormitory where her boys shared a room. “Let’s get in there.” When she took a step, Madeline stopped her with a hand on her arm.
“This way.” The woman took off across the yard where kids played football and volleyball, to the campus’s new weight and fitness center.
Rose ran to her side. “How do you know where they’re at?”
She cut a glance at Rose as if insulted by her questioning her skills. “There is a chopper en route. They should land any minute. When they do, Rose, you get back and stay out of our way.”
She shook her head. “No way. I’m in this. I’m here for my sons and I’m not taking orders from you.”
“We’ll see about that. But for now, I need your help. We’re going to scope the perimeter of the building first and try to see inside. We need a head count of hostages.”
Rose’s heart gave a massive, painful jerk in her chest. It never crossed her mind that other people’s children could be in danger. She thought only of her boys. But now she realized her job just intensified.
The afternoon rays of sun were fading to a spectrum of beautiful sunset colors, lighting up the sky. But inside, Rose felt nothing but darkness. If anything happened to Nick and Alex…
She cut off that thought and took off at a run. Madeline kept pace beside her, spewing instructions without so much as a hitch in her breath. The woman was in damn good fighting shape, and Rose felt marginally better about having Madeline at her side.
“Lobo won’t be alone in there. He never travels without at least a guard of six men.”
Rose’s blood ran cold. Lobo. She’d heard that name before. Dozens of crimes had been pinned on the evil motherfucker, and that was just what hadn’t been covered up.
Six men and Lobo. Against her and Madeline, the odds didn’t look good. But they had young people to save, and two of them were Rose’s entire world.
She gulped back any fears that rose into her throat. The building was nestled near the woods on one side. Tall windows on the front faced the lawn. And the side they reached had a row of bushes planted to conceal the air conditioner unit and other mechanical systems. It was the obvious place for them to hide to see inside the building—but also where Lobo’s men would lurk.
Madeline held out a hand and directed her to be silent. She gestured that she would go first and Rose was to follow.
Heart thumping, reality slammed her. This entire situation had gotten out of control. Getting kidnapped herself was one thing, but touch her boys and she wouldn’t hesitate to kill in cold blood, just as she’d told Madeline.
Rose fell into a crouching position as they slipped between hedges. Madeline scanned the area and pointed to the air conditioner unit. “Get down there and stay hidden while I check the area.”
Rose opened her mouth, but Madeline gave her a look that squelched her opposition. She slid into the space between the brick wall and the metal unit. The noise would conceal any footsteps approaching, and Rose didn’t like that one bit. But she didn’t have much choice in the matter. She hunkered down and watched Madeline take off around the side of the building on the fleetest of feet.
Throwing a look up at the thick brick windowsill, she worked up the gumption to peek through the glass. If one of Lobo’s men happened to be looking at the window at that moment, she would be seen. No doubt existed in her mind that she’d be shot.
Why the hell hadn’t SWAT shown up? Saying screw it to her fear, she popped her head up—and saw exactly why authorities hadn’t arrived.
She and Madeline had gotten here so quick, they’d shown up before Lobo himself. But as she looked on, a man walked through the front door, waving an automatic rifle.
Screams and shrieks sounded. Rose stood and whirled, thinking to take off for the front door. But Madeline stood in her way.
“We were ahead of them! We could have walked through the front door and gotten those kids out before he even showed up,” Rose cried.
“I was afraid of that, but there’s nothing we can do now.”
“Except go in.” Rose’s gritty tone didn’t belong to her. At least she had never heard that type of determined edge to her voice before.
She spun back to the window as chaos broke out in the building—and her boys were in there.
She jerked into motion, sprinting around the building to the back entrance without waiting for Madeline’s instruction. In the back, a short sidewalk led to an emergency exit, and she yanked on the door, praying it opened for her.
When it swung outward, relief washed through her, coupled with another burst of adrenaline. My boys are close, and I’m getting them out safe.
Madeline slipped in ahead of her, but Rose wouldn’t hide behind the bodyguard. The woman might be trained for this, but Rose’s love would fuel her and see them all safe.
“Everyone, gather here in the middle of the room and you won’t be hurt.” Lobo barked the order.
A few feet away, a row of stationary bikes stood, and behind it, she could see a flash of red hair. Rose’s heartrate sped wildly. If that redheaded girl peeked out, her hair would be a flaming beacon to Lobo. Rose couldn’t let her be hurt.
“Hey,” she whispered. “Here!”
The girl’s eye appeared between the cycle frame and seat. Keeping her stare on what she could see from her vantage point of Lobo and his men fanned out in the middle of the fitness center, Rose ensured they weren’t looking this way, and then she beckoned for the girl to come to her.
At first, she didn’t move, then she glanced behind Rose, saw the exit, and ran for it in a crouch. Rose grabbed her around the waist and rushed her to the door, shoving her out to safety. “Go to the woods and hide until we come for you!”
She didn’t stop to watch the girl sprint to the safety of the trees, because she had more people inside to save.
Huge mirrors hung all over the place inside, and she used the advantage to look around the space. Madeline was nowhere to be seen. Neither were her boys. But they didn’t stand among those who’d obeyed Lobo and were now on their knees with their hands behind their heads.
Bile shot up Rose’s throat, but she swallowed down her terror and the urge to scream like some of the others.
Her gaze snagged on a reflection in one mirror. If not for that reflection, she would have missed the boy completely. A young kid, no more than fifteen, in athletic shorts and a T-shirt bearing the school logo. He made himself into such a tight ball behind the weight equipment that he might escape—if not for that mirror.
Rose looked wildly around the room for her boys again, but they weren’t in her line of vision. She slowly moved to the right and spotted yet another kid in hiding.
If Lobo continued to train his attention on the group, then she might have a chance of getting these two kids to safety.
She flicked a hand, hoping the boy would see her. To her relief, he did. His brows shot up on his terrified face, and she wiggled a finger to the right, indicating he should slowly move to the next piece of equipment and hide his way over to the cycles.
With her blood rushing in her ears, she held her breath as the young kid slowly—bravely—made his way to the cycles. She grabbed hold of his wrist, feeling the thumping pulse there, and pressed him toward the back door.