Page 27 of Resuscitation

Chapter Twenty-Five

Waving away the dissipating smoke, Brick assessed the situation. Harper was nowhere to be seen, but the hostages were all present, including the new one, the old man. No way this geezer was the intruder who’d beat the shit out of Harper.

He looked down at the smoldering, charred corpse in the wheelchair. Leon—he recognized the gold chains. Smoke still curled from the ruined body, a sight that turned his stomach and ignited a fire in his chest. Leon. Brick had been sure that mo’fucker was indestructible.

A knot of rage threatened to throttle him. Leon’s death wasn’t on that intruder or any of the others. No, this fell squarely on Mercer.

He whirled on Mercer, grabbed him by the shoulder, and hauled him to the hallway outside the waiting room. The sprinklers weren’t going out here. The smoke was thin, although the stench was still pungent, at least he could breathe.

He leaned forward to shout over the alarms, “We need to go. Grab the rubies and let’s go. Now.”

If Mercer had focused on their goal—the jewels—none of this would’ve happened.

They wouldn’t be holed up in this shithole of a clinic, waiting for the inevitable swarm of cops to descend.

What was the escape plan exactly? Brick was no Einstein, but he could see a shitshow when it flung crap at his face like some nasty pie fight.

Mercer stood his ground, shrugging Brick’s hands off him. He raised his pistol between them, could’ve blown Brick’s face off if he pulled the trigger.

Brick stepped back. Mercer lowered his weapon.

“Not. Without. My. Brother.” Mercer gritted the words out. Then he spun on his heel and strode down the hall to the room where Connor was busy dying. If he wasn’t dead already.

Brick glanced back into the waiting room. The hostages had clumped together as far away from the smoldering wheelchair as possible, crying and coughing and freaking out. Except the old man, who was on the floor against the wall beside the door where Mercer had thrown him.

Brick wouldn’t hesitate to kill them all in an instant if it meant getting those rubies for himself and getting outta here. But right now, that would achieve zero.

Only Mercer knew where the rubies were.

Mercer.

His fists clenched at his sides as he took one last look at Leon’s charred remains. The rubies were supposed to be their ticket out, but they’d become a curse, just like that Watts guy had said.

He turned and moved down the corridor, pulling a hunting knife from his belt just as the distant sound of sirens whispered on the wind.

* * *

Mercer stormed into the operating room, eyes blazing with such fury that Sara turned to place herself between him and her patient.

“Hey! Where’d the nurses go? You let them go?” He moved toward her menacingly.

She stood her ground, meeting his gaze with a steady calm she didn’t feel. “You promised to let them leave once Connor stabilized. He’s awake and talking.”

Mercer stuttered to a stop, his gaze raking over the gurney with its clean sheet, blood free. Sara held her breath as he approached Connor, taking the seat she’d vacated.

Connor turned his head toward his brother. “Andrew, listen. You gotta get out of here, before it’s too late. Just go—live your life. This all isn’t worth dying for.”

Mercer gripped the edge of the gurney and smiled at his brother, ignoring his words. “Hey, Connor. How you doing? Listen, we’re both getting outta here, okay? Nothing’s changed. We’re in this together, remember?”

“Not anymore.” Connor’s voice was barely above a whisper. “It’s over, Andrew. Let it go. I’m not gonna make it.”

For a moment, Sara thought she saw a flicker of doubt in Mercer’s eyes, a softening of his resolve.

Then he leaned over Connor, their faces close together. “I’m sorry I let you down, bro. I fucked up, big time.”

Connor stared at Mercer for a long moment. “It’s okay. I love you, Andrew. Forget the rubies, go live your life. For me.”

Mercer embraced his brother. Sara was finally able to take a full breath again. It was over. Connor had gotten through to him, thank god. Mercer would take his men and leave her people alive.

“Mercer!” Brick appeared in the doorway, knife in hand, face in shadow, eyes blazing with hate.

* * *

Blake, clutching his arm in his blood-soaked jacket, hid behind a triage desk, watching Brick stalk away. He had not seen that coming. And still no sign of the other gunman, Harper.

Blake rushed to Thomas first. The old man smiled up at him weakly. “Did we get them?”

“Yeah, Thomas. We whupped them good. Ready to blow this pizza joint?”

Thomas nodded.

Blake helped him up, turned to the other hostages. A few were already freeing each other from their restraints.

“Follow me,” he told them, handing his knife to the man who’d come in with the lady with the broken arm. “I work here, I know the way out. We should hurry, I don’t know when they’ll be back.”

The patients moved slowly, unsure. Everyone was holding someone else as if unwilling to venture out alone. And none of them would meet Blake’s eyes. Did they think he was one of the bad guys?

Thomas waved for their attention. “This is Blake, he’s a medic. Saved my life more times than I can count. Come with us if you want to live.”

The kid in the hockey jersey gave a nervous laugh at Thomas’s horrible Terminator impression.

His mom grabbed his hand, strode over to Blake.

“Let’s go, people.” Her voice was that of a woman used to corralling young boys.

Command presence, they called it in the Army.

“Everyone got their hands free? Okay, no one alone, get a partner and follow us.” She lasered her gaze at the ward clerk, Angie.

“You’re in charge of making sure no one gets left behind. ”

With that, she nodded to Blake, and he draped an arm around Thomas, leading them out to freedom.

When they turned into the dark corridor leading to where Alyssa was, a few protested, but Hockey Mom kept them herded in the right direction, no stragglers.

Blake wouldn’t have minded having a few of her with him on patrol back in the shitstorm.

He was glad for the lack of lighting hiding Psycho’s blood spattered over the walls and pooled on the floor.

It was too cold to have them wait outside into a blizzard, so he sent the kid and his mom to gather chairs so they could sit in the more defensible corridor that connected to the office wing. Just in case.

“The police might come in the rear doors.” He pointed down Alyssa’s hallway to the exit. “Just keep still, hold your hands up, and stay quiet. Follow their commands.”

With the hostages taken care of, he led Thomas into Alyssa’s room where he could check him out properly. Poor guy was going to have a black eye and his nose looked broken, but his sugar was doing okay.

“Potassium’s higher,” he told Alyssa. She’d taken one look at Thomas and waved Blake away from her to evaluate the old man first.

“Needs dialysis,” she told Blake. “Soon.”

Her color was worse, he noted.

“I’m fine,” Thomas protested. “Blake, take care of Alyssa. She needs you more than I do.”

He reached for the stethoscope, but Alyssa batted him away.

“Hemo-pneumo,” she gasped. Shit. “Nothing. You. Can. Do.”

Except pray the cops got here fast and brought ALS medics with them. Unless…Sara. She’d be able to help.

He’d saved everyone else. Except the one person he’d come here to save.

As usual, Alyssa followed his thoughts. “Sara,” she said. “Get. Sara.”

“On it, boss.”