had to fight a desperate urge to hit the streets and find her friend.
“Have you called Gillian?” Dylan asked, his voice terse. No one else could track like Gillian, not even Creed.
“Yes, and the Jungle Boy is with her at Alazne’s,” Hawkins said.
“How far out are you?” Dylan asked.
“Five minutes.”
“Call me when you get here,” Dylan said. “We need to be ready to deploy the instant we get word on Jane.”
Hawkins no sooner signed off than the hairs along the back of Skeeter’s neck suddenly rose straight up.
She whirled toward the window at her back and saw a pale flash of something slip off to the side. Geezus. A bolt of lightning crashed in the night sky, and for an instant, she wondered if that’s what she’d seen, a precursor of the lightning strike.
Bull, she decided. She’d never been afraid of lightning in her life, and no matter how bad the night had become, she wasn’t a girl who jumped at shadows.
Striding over to the window, she drew her Glock .45 out of her shoulder holster.
“Do we have a problem, Skeeter?” Zach asked, drawing his own semiautomatic pistol.
“I’ve got a bad feeling, that’s all.” And she knew that was enough for him. It was enough for everybody at Steele Street.
At the window, she threw open the sash and started to look out, but Zach stepped in front of her.
“Let me do this,” he said, then carefully checked out the edges of the opening before venturing a bit farther out to see all around.
Skeeter held her tongue, knowing nothing was going to keep these boys from trying to rein her in.
Quinn had taken up a position on the east wall, where he could see out his side.
A loud roll of thunder bellowed and rumbled above the city, and when Zach ducked his head back inside, he was wiping rain off his face.
“I’m heading upstairs, going to check things out.”
“Did you see anything?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean you didn’t. Is Kid on his way up here?”
“Should arrive any minute,” she said, checking the time on her computer screen.
“Good. When he gets here, we’ll—”
The sound of breaking glass and a scuffling thump came from the floor above them, and the three were off like shots, weapons drawn, heading for the stairs. They cleared the single flight in seconds and came out onto Steele Street’s state-of-the-art shooting range, a large open area that took up half the eighth floor. The other half housed the armory workshops and weapons rooms.
Quickly, one by one, they cleared the range and the rooms, working their way back to the workshop directly above the office, only to find it empty save for the wet footprints leading out of it and the broken glass on the floor below the window.
Skeeter reached the glass and bent down to pick up a blood-smeared piece. When she brought it to her nose, every “Spidey” sense she had red-lined with the smell and weight of the intruder. Sweet geezus. Dread coursed through her veins. Then came the cry, a muffled sound of panic and fear coming from the floor above them.
Jane. She knew it down to her bones.
“Get back to the comm. Call Creed and get him here,” Zach said, running for the stairs that led to the ninth floor. Quinn was already hitting the first step.
Skeeter dropped the bloody shard and ran back through the firing range, heading toward the stairs leading down to the office. She didn’t question Zach’s orders—and she didn’t see MNK-1 drop out of the rafters and land silently in a crouch behind her, ready to spring.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
“I’m scared, Jack.”
Yeah, so was he.
“Are you going to order a steak?”
It wasn’t at the top of his list anymore, not after talking to Con.
What he wanted to do was get over to the Kashmir Club. He had a feeling that’s where Con had gone—but that meant leaving Scout alone at the Armstrong, and that was not going to happen, and he sure as hell was not going to take her anyplace he might run into trouble, like the Kashmir Club.
Con had tied his hands, and the boss damn well knew it.
“Yeah,” he said. “I think it’s a good idea to get some food. If you can, Scout, it would be good for you to eat something, too.”
“Sure, I guess I—” She stopped abruptly when the phone in her pocket rang.
It could be only one person, Red Dog, and he quickly reached out and took her hand before