Page 113 of The Librarians

Jonathan forces his thoughts out of their dark spiral. It will be fine. Maryam and Detective Jones are both seasoned cops. They will handle it. It will be over in the blink of an eye and then they can all go home.

How long has the intruder been in the library? Ninety seconds? Two minutes?

He imagines the intruder listening outside the storage room and then slowly pushing open the door. He would see someone in a hooded jacket with their back to him, and a genuine yearbook from a quarter century ago on their lap.

“Give me that if you don’t want to die.”

Jonathan’s teeth clench. Finally.

“Drop your weapon and put your hands behind your head. You’re under arrest,” comes Maryam’s cool voice.

Silence.

“Don’t look so surprised,” she continues. “Hunters can become prey, too.”

Her breezy confidence is reassuring. Still, Jonathan’s heart revs at a dangerous rpm. Adrenaline floods him; he digs the toes of his boots into the top of the porch to hold still.

“Fine, so I walked into it, I’ll give you this,” answers a man’s voice. He speaks fluent English and sounds British, but with an undertone of elsewhere.

That’s a capitulation, right? Is it all over except for the handcuffing and eventual fingerprinting?

“But I didn’t come unprepared,” continues the man. “Your flak jacket and tactical masks are all well and good, but the carfentanil in this tranquilizer gun doesn’t require hitting the heart or even any major arteries. Look at your colleague’s big, strong, undefended thighs. If my finger slips, he’ll be dead by the time you finish talking to an emergency dispatcher.”

Jonathan’s ears ring.

“Now, both of you,” says the man, a trace of smugness in his voice, “put down your weapons, hands behind your heads.”

By the lack of a subsequent scuffle, Jonathan has to assume that the detectives have complied.

Shit. This is what he was afraid of. But at least Hagerty and Gonzalez are close by. They will come to their colleagues’ aid, right?

“Now walk,” says the man. “You, lady, two steps ahead of me.”

“There’s a vehicle moving in the apartment complex,” Conrad speaks in Jonathan’s ear, his voice low and tense. “Might be our guy’s partner in the getaway car.”

Why didn’t Hagerty and Gonzalez stop the driver of the getaway car? What are they doing?

Hagerty’s voice booms in his ear. “Individual in the gray Honda CRV, Texas license plate BVF 7725, is highly armed.” He sounds panicky. “I repeat, individual in the gray Honda CRV is highly armed.”

Fuck. The guy in the library will most likely use one of the detectives as hostage and human shield until he makes a successful escape—and the highly armed individual in the SUV has practically guaranteed that escape. The thought of an unconscious Maryam being kicked to the side of some desolate stretch of I-10 is bad enough, but what if they don’t let her live?

“Tell your guys outside not to be stupid,” says the man.

“My partner and I came alone,” answers Maryam. She might be quaking in her boots, but her voice is even, if flat. “There’s nobody else here from the force.”

The man snorts in derision. “And where is Hazel Lee?”

“At home. We drove her Miata here.”

The CRV nears the exit of the apartment complex and disappears behind some utility buildings.

Conrad comes around the side of the library at that exact moment—thank goodness they disabled the alarm on the emergency exits in case anyone had to leave during the wait. He sprints to Hazel’s Miata, and crouches down.

The CRV covers the scant hundred feet of road distance between the driveway of the apartment and the entrance into the library’s parking lot, banking two sharp left turns in succession.

The sliding doors underneath Jonathan hiss again, opening. His heart migrates to his throat, each beat a hard thump against the base of his skull. Being atop the porch gives him a certain amount of surprise factor, but he can’t see anyone until they emerge from under the structure—and if he crawls too far forward, he might be seen by the driver of the getaway car.

Maryam is the first to become visible, her hands behind her head. She looks toward the CRV, then back at her partner, careful not to glance up toward Jonathan.