Midnight Hero - By Diana Duncan Page 0,19
windows. “Go!”
She sprinted past CD Palace. Past Quality Leather Goods. Her breathing loud and raspy in the tomb-quiet mall, she hunkered outside Death by Chocolate. She’d worked at River View five years and this was the first time it had seemed threatening. Running from criminals past windows full of fudge lent an aura of unreality. The smell of chocolate lingered in the air, the rich scent incongruous in the frightening dark void. Her stomach grumbled.
Con’s arm slid around her waist. “Hungry?”
She leaned against him, taking comfort in his unshakable warmth. “I don’t feel hungry.” Terror tended to squelch her appetite. “I guess my stomach is complaining because I didn’t eat breakfast or lunch.” She’d been too upset to manage either.
“After this is over, I’ll take you wherever you want. Deal?”
A line from every B movie she’d ever seen popped into her head. “How can you think of food at a time like this? I just want out of here. Intact.”
He gave her a hug. “Almost there. Next stop, One Hour Photo.”
The fifteen-foot-square booth perched in the middle of no-man’s-land, between them and the main doors. Con scanned the walkway in all directions, and again commanded her to run.
Gasping, she clung to the orange cabana, and rested her forehead on the cool vinyl. The main doors reflected muted interior lights. Outside, black storm clouds and pounding sleet crowded the glass, thick and impenetrable. Freedom. Safety. A few hundred yards away.
“There’s Syrone,” Con whispered in her ear.
The big, uniformed, African-American man had his back to them, staring into the storm. “I wonder why he’s still here?”
“Probably waiting for you. You know Syrone. He won’t leave until every last person is accounted for.”
Guilt assailed her. If she hadn’t spent all that time agonizing over her decision about Con, she’d be long gone. Home. Safe. And so would Con and Syrone. But what about Nan, Letty and Mike? “Con? I’d thought you’d gone home. Why did you come back?”
He hesitated. “The roads are icing up. I planned to follow you at a distance to ensure you got home okay. I hung out in my truck for a while, and finally came to find out what was taking so long.” His smooth, deep voice was low, intimate. “I wasn’t going to let you see me, because you needed time alone. Until our friendly neighborhood bank robbers threw a monkey wrench into the works.”
Another phrase from his evaluation popped into her head. Sometimes, a photographic memory was a pain. Sometimes, a comfort. Quickly adapts when an unexpected event throws the plan into disarray. Thank goodness. Otherwise, she’d be cowering in the bank with her friends. With a gun pointed at her head. And nobody would know they were being held hostage. Maybe until it was too late.
Con’s nudge derailed that awful train of thought. “Looks clear. Tell Syrone what happened. Call 9-1-1. You have your cell?”
“No, it’s in my purse, in the bookstore.”
“Syrone has a radio, but just in case, take my phone. Cell phones don’t work in this blasted mall anyway.” For some reason, maybe the tall, cylindrical structure, or the steel girders supporting the sky bridge, cell reception wasn’t clear inside the mall. The remodeling was supposed to correct the problem, but hadn’t. He passed the phone over her shoulder. “Here.”
Like his camera, the cell phone was an up-to-the-minute, complicated technological marvel. The man did love his gadgets. 007 had nothing on him. “If I can figure out how to work it.”
He chuckled. “When you and Syrone get out, dial 9-1-1 and press Send. Have dispatch call up Alpha Squad. Tell ’em I’m inside with a confirmed visual on three hostages and three suspects, with a probability of a crew of six or more. I’ll signal from the third floor east windows when they arrive.”
As she slid the phone into her pants pocket, his words hit home. Shock collided with disbelief. She spun to face him. “You’re not coming with me?”
“I need to gather intel and scope out the inner perimeter.”
“Are you insane? Those guys have Uzis, all you have is a handgun!”
His impassive gaze flicked away from hers. Not fast enough.
The memory of him withdrawing his hand from his jacket in the bookstore rose like a specter in her mind. His empty hand. “Where’s your gun?”
“Don’t worry about me, I can take care of myself.”
“Where. Is. Your. Gun.”
“At the armorer’s,” he admitted. “Needed an adjustment.”
Sick fear roiled in her stomach. “There is no way I’m abandoning you to those maniacs alone and unarmed!”
“Baby,