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TWELVE

Why was she so cold?

Where was Grizz?

Dani grasped around her, trying to find anything that could identify her location. But her arms were useless, tied up behind her back with zip ties while rope secured her to a wooden chair. The last thing she remembered was meeting with Rio. And someone else. Jamie?

They’d been discussing the senator’s involvement in the terrorist organization.

Her mind opened a floodgate, and the deluge of memories assaulted her.

Grizz.

The mystery compound.

Senator Deville.

Assassin bugs.

She tried to move, but her stomach threatened to empty its contents all over the floor. She tried to feel around in her pockets, but her knife was gone.

No, no, no. Not good.

The man Dani had thought she’d ruined with her story happened to be exactly as she’d portrayed him. Evil.

How much time had she wasted feeling sorry for him—for herself? She’d been right all along, but that did little to comfort her when she was tied to a chair in an unknown location with a lunatic abductor. That man was as unstable as the fires Grizz and his team fought.

Fire! The compound was ablaze.

These militia guys were cleaning up. Which meant she was out of time.

Dani would be collateral damage. The senator wouldn’t keep her alive for long.

She squinted to examine her prison cell.

To her left, she spotted a rectangular window caked in dirt, but it gave her just enough light to make out some shapes in the shadows.

She could see the outline of a door in front of her along with a few objects covered in sheets.

In the corner, boxes were stacked against the wall.

Storage? Maybe she was in a basement, based on the damp smell and dusty air.

“Hello?” A frail voice startled her.

“Who’s here?” she said.

Something scuffed against the concrete floor. “I was going to ask the same of you. I’m Rodrigo Cortez.”

“Cortez? I know your daughter, but she goes by Sanchez, not Cortez. She’s been looking for you.” She didn’t want to say that the compound was currently burning to the ground. The man had been through a lot and didn’t need to know his daughter was in danger.

He sucked in a breath. “My Maria has been looking for me? No. Please make her stop.”

“What do you mean, Doctor Cortez?”

“Please, I don’t want Maria involved. These men are very bad. They’ll use her just like they’re using me. She needs to stay far away.”

Dani shivered, and not from the cold room. “What did they make you do?”

Another scraping sound. The man shuffled in what sounded like a chair scraping across concrete floor. She squinted in the dark and saw the silhouette of a rail-thin man with shaggy hair. He hopped the chair a few more spaces toward hers.

“They forced me to develop a bioweapon. They threatened my family. I had no choice.”

Dani didn’t want to voice the next question, but her reporter instincts were working overtime. “What kind of bioweapon?”

He sighed. “It’s a toxin that attacks the nervous system—derived from nightshade. They plan to detonate the canisters over American farms in the Midwest, spraying the toxin and poisoning the crops and soil. America’s breadbasket would be wiped out, leaving us to import the majority of our food.”

Dani’s heart thumped in her ears. Visions of bare grocery store aisles coupled with the skyrocketing price of staple goods filled her mind. Not to mention the United States’ total dependence on other countries for basic needs.

Reporter mode pushed the fear out of Dani’s mind. The more she discovered about this whole situation, the better their odds of stopping this terrorist attack from occurring.

Assuming she walked out of this alive to tell about it.

“How can we stop them?” Her throat tickled. What she wouldn’t give for some water. “If you know everything about the devices, can you tell me if there’s a way to deactivate them? We have to be able to stop this.”

He inched even closer, keeping his eyes glued to the one door in the windowless room. Definitely a basement. But where?

In a whisper, he said, “I put a kill switch in the coding that renders the whole system inert when the code is entered. The canister and the delivery system will fall to the ground without exploding and can then be safely retrieved. You just need to?—”

A noise silenced them both. Light flooded the room from the open door.

“Oh no you don’t, Dani.” The senator stood in a doorway. “Don’t think for even a second that you have a chance to save the day. I hadn’t expected you to wake up so soon.”

Had the senator overheard Doctor Cortez’s confession about a kill switch in the canisters?

There had to be a way for her to get this information to the good guys in time.

“I was just a pawn in your political game, Deville. I can’t believe you let me take the fall for you.” She could believe it but needed to keep the man talking. If he was as narcissistic as she suspected, maybe he’d reveal his endgame.

He scoffed. “That was all you. Every story you put out just garnered more sympathy for me. I should thank you. But instead, I’m going to kill you and pin this whole compound in the woods on you.

Maybe your FBI friends will find the special account you used to purchase a massive amount of chemicals.

I can’t help it if you’re obsessed with me and want to ruin my life by making me look like the bad guy.

But they’ll be too busy looking for your body to come after me. ”

The man was seriously unhinged. Did he really think he could sidestep a conviction by making her take the fall for it? But based on the dark look in his eyes, he would kill her.

The senator kept one eye on his Rolex watch. “It’s about time to leave.”

A noise scuffed from upstairs. It sounded like footsteps. A man came into Dani’s view, behind the senator.

“Finally. What took you so long?” The senator glared at the newcomer, a short man with dark hair. The guy clutched two silver suitcases and passed one to the senator, keeping a tight grip on the other.

Dani’s mind spun to put the pieces together. The canisters. Could they be the bioweapons Cortez had talked about?

The senator nodded to the man. “We’ll split up. You take Cortez.” Then Deville nodded at Dani. “I’m taking her.”

The man cut the zip ties around Cortez’s hands and feet and pulled him up by the arm. Cortez wobbled. The new guy gripped Cortez’s upper arm and half pulled, half dragged him to the open door that led to a stairway.

Deville cut the rope to free Dani from the chair and yanked her up by the arm. Pain radiated from her shoulder to her fingers, but she refused to cry out.

She wouldn’t show this man an ounce of fear.

He didn’t cut the zip ties around her hands but shoved her forward. She worked hard not to trip.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“Always the reporter. Asking way too many questions.” With her hands behind her back, maintaining her balance was a challenge. Not to mention the lingering effects of chloroform.

Deville dragged her up some dimly lit stairs, through an opulent house, and into a kitchen. Her entire apartment in DC would fit in this kitchen.

He shoved her into a dining-room chair at a table built for serving fifteen people. “Sit and don’t say anything.”

She twisted her hands to see if she could get out of the zip ties but wound up rubbing her skin raw. She checked out the kitchen island to see if there were any knives. If the senator turned his back, maybe she could grab something from the counter to cut the binds.

The picture window on the far wall of the kitchen overlooked the expansive backyard. A thrumming sound grew louder. Was that—a helicopter?

She watched out the window as the helicopter approached. It landed in a big white circle at the end of the lawn.

No. Dani wasn’t getting on a helicopter with this man. Who knew where she’d wind up?

A scuffle in the hallway by the kitchen caught Dani’s attention. Deville’s lackey arrived and shoved Cortez into the chair across from Dani.

Deville moved to the table. “Our rides are here.”

Rides as in plural? Dani’s mind whirred at the implications. The men were going to separate so the cases wouldn’t be together.

Which meant she and Cortez would probably be separated. But was she going to be leaving by helicopter?

The senator grabbed Dani from behind and jammed the familiar white cloth over her mouth and nose. She struggled, but it was no use.

She was going to die, disappear without a trace, and no one would know she had her story.

And Grizz would never know that she’d loved him.

* * *

“Just breathe.”

Rio’s voice brought Grizz back to reality. His mind spun out of control. He’d hitched a ride on the helicopter and now sat in Mike’s office.

But his thoughts could only focus on one thing.

Dani.

Grizz stood and paced the six-by-ten office. “Where is she? We will find her.”

Rio leaned on the doorframe with his arms folded.

“Senator Deville is our top suspect, and he has that mansion on the other side of the mountain. Jamie uncovered the property in his second wife’s name.

She also pieced together the money trail that will be the final nail in his coffin when we arrest him.

If Dani isn’t there, he might have left something behind that could tell us where she is.

I’m getting a SWAT team in place to raid the house. ”

“Not good enough. I have to be there for her. I can’t let it end this way.” Still in uniform, Grizz could smell the smoke that clung to his shirt. But he wasn’t going to clean up. He wasn’t going anywhere until there was a plan in place to rescue Dani.

The woman Grizz loved. “Rio, you have to let me go. What if the team doesn’t get there in time?”