Page 15

Chapter Ten

“ K enna!” Jax rushed over to grasp her hand.

She pulled it out of the TV screen, barely able to feel the cuts from the shattered glass screen.

“That’s bad. We need a bandage.” He led her to the couch. “Sit down. I’ll look for a cloth or some kind of first aid kit. Don’t get up.”

“I’m not going to.” She didn’t even know why she’d done that.

“Here.” Jax raced back over with a dish towel. “Not the cleanest thing, but better than nothing.”

“I’m fine.” She straightened her fingers, then contracted them. Blood seeped from multiple cuts on the back of her hand.

“Sure. Looks real fine.” He sat on the coffee table, wrapping the towel around her hand. “What did the TV say before you took your frustration out on it?”

She pressed her lips together.

“Kenna.”

“There’s no cure for what you are.”

A tendon in his jaw flexed. “And what does that mean for this operation?”

“They know who we are and why we’re here, and they drew us down here.”

“I think it was a test. To see what you would do.”

Which meant he thought he might be a loose end these older men didn’t need.

Assuming they were directing this, watching, and not back in the main hall having lunch with Bruce.

“I don’t care. This thing has gone from interesting to mildly curious to over .

” She tipped her head back. “You hear me? It’s over. ”

Nothing happened.

“We’re trapped in here unless they decide to let us out.” He tucked the end of the towel under the part he’d wrapped around her hand.

Kenna’s blood was already seeping through the towel.

She slumped back on the couch. “Who cares? Bruce will come looking. What do they think Ramon is gonna do when he finds out we’re missing?

He’s on his way, right? And all our other friends.

I didn’t even get to the FBI realizing you didn’t show up for work tomorrow and sending a tactical search party in full gear to kick all the doors in. ”

Jax said, “That’s the spirit.”

She let out a breath that puffed out her lips. “Do they have any snacks?”

“Nothing you’ll want to eat.”

“Darn.”

Jax got up. “I’ll see if there’s a way out.”

If this really was some Cold War–era bunker, it probably had bathroom facilities and a bedroom. There could be other storage rooms or a huge pantry with months of food supplies. “Maybe this is some kind of Wizard of Oz thing.”

“Or a puzzle we need to solve to move on to the next stage.”

“No thanks. That always sounds like a good idea, but in reality, they’re frustrating, and I don’t want to.”

Jax said, “That’s fine because I haven’t found anything like that.”

A telephone rang. An old-timey ringtone. Kenna pushed up on the couch and looked around, still seated but not in such a reclining position. “Where is it?”

“Here.” He pulled open a closet. The inside looked like a phone booth. He grabbed the receiver. “Hello?”

His body stiffened. He turned to her. Held the phone out. “It’s for you.”

Kenna yelled, “I’m not playing games!”

A panel in the wall slid away at the far side of the room. Jax dropped the phone. “Come on.”

“How do I know I even want to go in there?”

“It could be better than in here. Smells like dried cheese in this place.”

“Mothballs and old wood.”

He went through the panel first.

“At least if there’s anyone in there, you can just shoot them.”

The panel slid shut behind her, plunging them both into darkness.

“Well, this is fun.” Jax flipped on his camera flashlight. “Long hallway.”

She peered around his shoulders, her hands on his hips. “Lead the way since you wanted to go first, and we can’t go back now.”

She should be able to feel the cuts on her hand, but all she could feel was the dampness of the bandage around her injury. If someone was at the end of this ridiculous maze, she was going to ask them why her hand didn’t hurt. Had there been something in the glass of the TV?

Or in her?

Everything went back to the doctor. A man who was supposed to have also altered these people the way he had altered her. There’s no cure for what you are. Maybe they had enough experience with what’d been done to them to know there was no fighting it and no way to reverse it.

She prayed, not liking the way she was feeling right now.

Maybe she would always struggle with control—maybe everyone did.

It seemed like she should have a handle on things.

That she should be able to work the outcome in her favor.

But if that was true, then it would remove any faith from the equation.

If she didn’t need to trust and have faith, then what good was that belief? She wouldn’t need God, in that case, because she would be the lord of her own life.

The door ahead of them clicked open.

Jax went through it, gun first. She had her hand close to hers.

Ready to pull it, just in case. But the trust she had in her husband was a great example.

Jax would take care of whatever they faced, and he would give it all to protect her.

She wanted to do the same for him. That’s why she was backing him up with every step.

Light flickered on in the room that was larger than any they’d been in so far.

This one was a long hallway, wide enough it might have been some kind of garage or storage room.

Now, it had a fake fireplace halfway down the left wall and huge portrait paintings on the other side, hanging up on the double-height wall so the images towered over them.

Men in World War II–era uniforms.

Two or maybe three chandeliers hung over a long table set for dinner.

“Come in. Have a seat. After all, you’ve made it this far.” He had a strong voice, but the man himself was barely five-foot-two. “I’m One.”

Three other men stood.

One said, “This is Three, Four, and Five.”

No Two.

Kenna glanced at each man. They looked to be about mid-fifties, which was impossible if they’d first been experimented on in the nineteen fifties. That was over seventy years ago.

They all wore jeans and buttoned shirts, some plain and others stripy.

Different color hair and skin tones. Three and Five had tanned complexions that told her they didn’t live down here all the time.

One was the broadest and moved like the alpha.

His shiny bald head resembled the doctor’s.

Four had stark white hair and a ring on his right pinkie finger.

One waved them over and took a seat on the far side. “There is good food, and we have much to discuss.”

Jax put a hand on the small of her back. Not ushering her over to the table but supporting her and allowing her to make the decision.

The four men were on one side of the table, all in a row. Two place settings had been laid on the other side.

As if they’d been expected.

“We know who you are.” Not that she knew all that was going on. But finally, she had a chance to get answers. “Maybe you could tell us why all of this was necessary when we just came here to talk to you.”

“So let’s talk.” Five grabbed a hunk of bread from a basket at the center of the table. He pulled off a small piece and tossed it into his mouth. “Before the food gets cold.”

She sat, putting both her hands on the table.

All four men stared at her hand that was wrapped in a towel.

“Where’s Two?” she asked.

One lifted his chin, motioning to the towel. “What’s that?”

Beside her, Jax didn’t reach for any food or his utensils. He slid out his phone under the table and unlocked it, keeping his attention on the men across the table.

“I punched the TV,” Kenna said. “One, Three, Four, and Five. So where’s Two?”

“It doesn’t matter.” One lifted his silverware and cut a bite of what looked like chicken.

“Potatoes?” Four held up the dish.

She stared at him.

“I thought you liked them.” He handed the dish to Five.

One was definitely in charge. The others deferred to him.

Seemed like Three didn’t say much at all.

She turned and looked at the paintings hanging behind her, history looming over the present as if to say, You should be as impressive as I am .

And yet, the images were of the same men sitting across the table from her.

“You like those?” Four had a smile in his voice.

She shrugged, turning back to face them. “They look like you guys, but it can’t be you.”

Four gave her a toothy smile. “I had them commissioned. One didn’t seem to find them as funny as I did, and I nearly threw them out, but they were up there the next morning. Hanging on the wall.”

“So, you all live down here?”

Five looked at his friends. “Does she not know what a Batcave is?”

Kenna said, “I know what the Batcave is.” She grabbed a roll and tried to tear it in half. With a towel around her hand, it was difficult.

Jax took the roll and tore it for her.

She buttered it with jerky movements, irritated she couldn’t tear it herself. Her forearms felt better than they had in years. But the trade-off might be far too costly.

“He fixed you, didn’t he?” One motioned with his fork. “The tendons in your forearms. Maybe you’ve been ignoring it, but there’s not nearly as much pain. You can lift far heavier things. Right?”

He was right about part of it. Since the other day. She’d had a lot more strength and less pain. “Can I?”

Jax turned to her. “Is that true? Your arms are better?”

She lifted her hands and stretched them out in front of her, rotating her wrists. “How am I supposed to know what he did when I was unconscious? I wake up, and I feel different. I have no answers and no clue what is happening.”

“So you came to find us.” One took a bite and chewed thoughtfully.

“What did he do to me?”

“Time will tell, I suppose.” One shrugged. “That’s how it was for the rest of us.”

Five looked at him.

Three and Four, on his other side, just ate their lunch. Jax served himself some chicken and potatoes and dug in. She finished her roll, still irritated at the whole thing. Was this really better than being pregnant? Not that she’d have been able to enjoy it with their enemy looming.

She blew out a breath and rolled her eyes, eating some chicken and potatoes while One asked Jax how he liked being the boss at the Phoenix FBI office. They made their way through some small talk, including comments about Jolene. Seemed that Five liked cats.

After she’d scarfed down most of the meal, she said, “Enough chitchat.”

Four smiled at her.

“Do you know Doctor Nicola Santorini?”

One wiped his hands on a cloth napkin and tossed it onto his plate. “Not the doctor I thought you were going to ask me about.”

“We’ll get to him. Answer the question.”

“Very well.” One sipped his water, then said, “Nicola is our doctor also. The very things that led you to her, paying her under the table in cash and keeping everything off the record, meant that she was ideal for us also.” He nodded.

“Your instincts were right. She would have done right by you if your friend hadn’t confronted that lady. ”

“You mean if he hadn’t protected those two kids?” She figured they knew Bruce was upstairs. “Do I need to be worried about my friend?”

Who knew what the people in the main hall were doing to him. He could be carved to pieces in the empty pool by now.

One waved away her concern.

“I’m not going to stop worrying until I see him.”

One shrugged. “Guess you’ll have to trust me in the meantime.”

Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen. “Did you take Nicola? She’s missing.” Even though Kenna figured they knew, she still wanted to see their reaction. None of them let go of any tell. Even the small mannerisms she’d been getting were gone now.

Four said, “Nicola is missing?”

Now that was interesting. A personal reaction. Concern for the young woman.

Jax set his silverware down. “Since last night. Along with the woman who hurt those kids. She’s gone, too.”

They both waited to see these guys’ reactions to the news.

Four sipped his water, a blank expression on his face. Five didn’t move. Three was busy picking chicken from his teeth, and One simply stared at her and Jax.

“Where are they both?” Kenna asked. “Tell us, and we’ll be on our way.”

“But that’s not why you came, is it?”

“We came here looking for you.” She wasn’t going to hide that fact.

“Because you want answers as to what was done to you.” One stared at her, unmoving.

No one else moved either.

“I want to know where to find Marcus Buzard.”

One lifted his chin. “So you can kill him?”

Four looked a little uncomfortable at that.

“My business with him is just that,” Kenna said. “My business.”

One shook his head. “That doesn’t work for us.”

“Because you need him alive?” Maybe the doctor supplied them with meds or continued treatments they would be forced to live without if the doctor was suddenly out of their lives. Or unobtainable. “How do you contact him?”

“Perhaps you should focus on your case. Leave the doctor to us.”

“Protecting him won’t help.”

One chuckled. There was no humor in the sound and none on his face. “I wouldn’t recommend going up against us. It won’t end well for you.”

Jax leaned forward slightly. “I wouldn’t recommend going up against my family. It won’t end well for you.”

One almost looked impressed. “Let me guess. The city suddenly decides the retirement home above us needs a full inspection, and a federal investigation is opened into our finances. At least to start with.”

Jax said nothing.

“You want to protect the doctor,” Kenna said, “that’s your prerogative. But I want answers, and I want to know where that woman and Doctor Santorini are.”

“ That woman ,” One said. “I’ll give you the address where you can find her. We can’t allow evidence of what we are to be out in the general public’s knowledge. You took a risk. Anyone could have been filming on their phone and caught what you did.”

“Is she alive?” Kenna asked.

One pushed back his chair and stood. “This conversation is over.”