Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 112001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
So it wasn’t an attack. Or at least… not one that had reached the interior of the house yet.
In the foyer, the front door was open and four guards were standing in it, with guns drawn. As he came up to them, he expected an argument when went outside, but they just let him pass—and the lack of attention they paid to him was a loud-and-clear that he was too slow and infirm to be a concern. If they needed him out of the way, they’d move him. If they wanted him to stop, they’d hook his arm. If he got hurt? He was dying anyway.
Now he knew what being an eighty-year-old was like.
Heading under the overhang, he worked his way around the SUV and—
Lydia and a guard were closing in at a fast pace, and they were sharing a load: A body was strung between their arms.
Gus.
But why were they rushing? Dead bodies had no timeline to worry about—
“Excuse me,” someone said as they brushed him aside.
He barely caught his balance before he was hit by another person hurrying by him. This time, it was a nurse in scrubs—Georgina, the redhead from upstairs.
“In the house,” he heard someone order. “Right on the floor.”
All he could do was get out of the way, and he met Lydia’s eyes as she shot by him, the medical types hovering around, molecules circling a gravely damaged nucleus. As he watched helplessly, he had a thought that the guard was clearly strong enough to carry the load on his own, but Lydia wasn’t letting go of Gus’s shoulders—and she stayed with him as they followed orders, putting him out flat on the black-and-white marble tile.
Hitching up his strength, Daniel doubled back into the house, but he had to pause on the threshold to catch his breath.
It seemed fitting that he watched the assessment happen from the periphery, and as a stethoscope was pressed around the bloody chest, Daniel did his own review of the injuries. Gus had been beaten in the face and head, and there were two-pronged burn marks on the side of his neck, across his abdomen, and along his thighs.
“He’s coding—I’m using the defibrillator.”
The statement was calm, the doctor who was in charge moving quickly but with deliberation as he pulled over a small red box logo’d with a white heart and an electrical charge symbol.
More duffle bags were brought to the resuscitation as the chest was cleaned quickly by C.P. Phalen’s nurse, and pads were stuck to the skin up high by the collarbone and down under the pec. Oddly, the discarded, bloodstained gauze bundles were what came into sharpest focus. They were like blooms fallen from some demonic bouquet, and depending on what square of marble they landed on, they were either offset by a loud white background or consumed by a black one.
“Clear,” the doctor said firmly.
All hands were raised, including Lydia’s, and there was a little whine as the charge was gathered—then the torso jumped as the electric shock was delivered.
Daniel looked at Lydia. She had been forced to the sidelines, too, but she wasn’t going far. Sitting on her knees, her bloodstained hands were palms- up on her thighs, as if in prayer, and her mouth was parted as she breathed hard. In her pose, she reminded him of the saints in the Catholic tradition, suffering in their piety, sending up an entreaty for aid in their crisis—
“You in or out?”
As the question was presented, Daniel glanced to his left. The guard who’d come up to him was his own height, but had seventy-five pounds of muscle on him, easy. With a square jaw and confrontational stare, it was like he’d been ordered out of the Military Stud handbook.
“I used to be you,” Daniel said numbly.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Enjoy your health while you have it.” Daniel moved himself forward. “And I’ll be going in, thanks.”
As the door was shut behind him, he noted the whirring sound of the lock being engaged, and then the clapping sound of footfalls on the stairs made him look up. C.P. was racing her descent, her face as white as her sculptures, Gus’s fleece like a part of her as opposed to a piece of clothing as she clutched it to her silk dressing gown—
Later, Daniel would wonder what made him do what he did. Maybe it was the impotence that was riding him, the urge of a former operative to come out of involuntary retirement and insert himself as a way to be relevant—but he liked to believe his actions were because he wanted to do good, and for sure that was part of it.
Moving faster than he should have been able to, he rushed over and snagged the woman’s arm at the base of the steps, forcing her to stop.