Explosive Attraction (4 page)

The doctor taking care of Darby pressed a last piece of tape into place on her leg and hurried to Rafe.

“Sit him down over here. He should have been brought in on a gurney. What happened?”

“Gurneys are for sissies.” Rafe’s words were slurred. As soon as he sat on the examining table the doctor pointed
to, he fell backward with a groan.

* * *

D
ARBY
YAWNED
AND
STRETCHED
, her muscles aching from being scrunched into the uncomfortable chair in Rafe’s hospital room where she’d fallen asleep. The clock on the wall facing his bed showed it was twenty minutes until midnight.

His face was relaxed in sleep. He looked far less intimidating and more approachable now that he wasn’t wearing
his usual frown. She wished he would wake up. The doctors had said he’d fully recover, but she needed to look him in the eyes and hear his impatient voice for herself. The man might be infuriating most of the time, but he’d risked everything for her. She needed to thank him for saving her life.

A light knock sounded on the door. Before Darby could fully rise from her chair, Captain Buresh
walked into the room, waving her back down.

“Don’t get up.” His voice was pitched low, barely above a whisper. “What are you doing in here? You aren’t supposed to be roaming the halls.”

“Since my room is next door, I don’t think you can accuse me of roaming the halls. There’d be no point anyway, since there’s no one else to talk to. What did you do, clear out an entire hospital wing
just for the two of us?”

“Moving the other patients to another floor was a security measure.”

“For Rafe and me, or for the other patients?”

He shrugged. “I’d feel better for everyone if you stayed in your room, under guard.”

“I
am
under guard. I’m sure you noticed Officer Daniels outside.”

He sighed as if he was too tired to argue, and stepped closer to the bed. “Has he
woken up yet?”

Darby pushed her aching body out of the chair and stood across from him, on the other side of the bed. In addition to the hospital gown she was wearing, she had a second one she was using as a robe. She self-consciously pulled it tighter around her. “He hasn’t been awake since I came in here. The doctor said he has a slight concussion, that he can go home tomorrow if all goes
well.”

Buresh nodded, reminding Darby that he probably already knew the details about Rafe’s condition. He was, after all, his boss. She glanced at the wall clock again. “Why are you here so late?”

“I...ah...wanted to check on you and Detective Morgan before I went home. It’s been a long day, and I needed to put my mind at ease before trying to get some sleep.”

Did the hesitation
in his voice mean there was more to what he was saying—or rather, what he
wasn’t
saying?

“Have you caught him yet?” Rafe’s raspy voice called out from the bed. His eyes were open now. He pressed the buttons on the railing, raising himself into a sitting position.

Darby handed him the cup of water on the rolling tray, figuring he was probably as thirsty as she’d been earlier, in spite
of the IV. She hadn’t given much thought to the heat when she’d been fighting for her life in the marsh, but afterward, she’d felt like a wilted flower, dry as dust.

He gave her a grateful nod and took a long sip before handing the cup back to her. “Are you all right?”

“The doctor wants me to stay overnight to make sure I don’t develop an infection from getting all that nasty swamp mud
in my cuts, but overall, no worse for wear.” She studied him closely. “How do
you
feel?”

“Fine for someone who can’t remember how he got knocked out. What happened? The doctor had no clue.”

Buresh exchanged a startled glance with Darby.

“You don’t remember?” Buresh asked.

“I remember the boat, the alligator and some old man holding a rifle on me. Everything else is a big blank
until I was in the ambulance.”

“Retrograde amnesia,” Darby said.

Rafe narrowed his eyes at her. “I don’t have amnesia. I remember what happened...most of it.” His scowl was as fierce as Darby had ever seen it, which was saying quite a bit.

“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” she said. “It’s normal with head trauma. You forget what happened before the event that caused the injury.
I’ve seen my share of clients in therapy with similar problems. Since you remember most of what happened before you got knocked out, you’ve got an excellent chance of regaining all of your memory.”

He didn’t look as though he appreciated her analysis. He was a big guy, more than capable of taking care of himself and those around him—normally. It had to be a blow to his ego to think he’d been
knocked out and unable to help her, especially given his past, when he’d been knocked unconscious, unable to protect his wife in a home invasion. That reminder had Darby groaning inside. Great. She should have just kept her mouth shut.

“It doesn’t matter,” Buresh said, filling the awkward silence. “The few minutes you lost wouldn’t have added anything to the investigation. Dr. Steele gave
a statement and a description of the bomber. She was an excellent eyewitness.”

Rafe winced and pressed a hand against his temple.

The corners of Buresh’s eyes crinkled with concern. “You need me to get the doctor?”

“I’m fine,” Rafe gritted out. “You never answered my question. Have you caught the bomber?”

“Not yet.” Buresh gave Rafe a brief summary of what had happened after
Rafe was knocked unconscious, and the progress of the ongoing search. Buresh glanced uneasily at Darby, hesitating. “The envelope the bomber left at the warehouse had another timer and a photograph inside.”

“Who was in the picture?” Rafe asked.

Buresh looked at Darby.

A shiver of fear sliced through her.
This
was what Buresh had been hiding earlier, why he’d hesitated when he’d
first come into the room. “It was a picture of me, wasn’t it?”

He sighed in surrender. “Yes.”

She rubbed her hands up and down her suddenly chilled arms.

“And the timer?” Rafe asked.

“The timer runs out at midnight.” Buresh’s voice was awkward, low.

Rafe and Darby both looked at the clock on the far wall. Ten minutes until midnight. Darby swallowed hard.

“We’ve searched
half the marsh,” Buresh continued. “But at this point, I don’t hold out much hope of finding him there. We’ve been performing door-to-door searches to rule out that he entered someone’s house or took hostages. So far, nothing.”

“Loan me your gun while I’m in here,” Rafe said. “I don’t feel right without one.”

Buresh was shaking his head even before Rafe finished. “I’m not leaving a gun
with a man with a concussion. Who would keep an eye on it when you’re sleeping? And I’m certain the nurses wouldn’t appreciate finding it under your pillow when they change the sheets.”

Rafe didn’t look happy with his captain’s refusal.

Darby tapped the bed rail. “You’re sure the bomber’s not...in the hospital, right?” She let out an uneasy laugh.

Buresh gave her a reassuring smile.
“You’re completely safe here, Dr. Steele. I’ve got an officer posted in the emergency room. That’s the only access to the hospital this time of night. And Officer Daniels will stand guard until morning, when another officer takes his place.”

Her doubt must have shown on her face, because he gave her an admonishing look, as if he was disappointed that she didn’t trust him. “Half the police
force is looking for the man who abducted you. He’s on the run. He wouldn’t have a chance to follow through on his ‘midnight’ threat, even if he knew where you were—which he doesn’t.”

“It can’t be difficult to figure out where I am, Captain,” she said. “There’s only one hospital in the area, and he knew I was hurt.”

The captain’s face reddened. “Not true, Dr. Steele. We could have taken
you into Jacksonville. Baptist Medical Center South is just a short drive up the interstate.”

Darby regretted her reply. She hadn’t meant to sound sarcastic, but obviously Buresh had taken it that way.

“Regardless,” he said, “you’re safe here. What I’m worried about is what happens after you leave the hospital. Until we catch this man, we have to assume you’re still a target.” He glanced
at Rafe. “You’ll need to be on light duty for a few days, so I have the perfect assignment for you. I want you to watch over Dr. Steele until we have the bomber in custody.”

Rafe shook his head. “I’m not a babysitter, and you can’t afford to have your best detective on the sidelines right now.”

Darby tapped her nails on the railing again to get Rafe’s attention. “I don’t need a babysitter.
But I
would
appreciate having an experienced police officer nearby. It would make me feel much safer. And I promise I won’t get in your way.”

“This isn’t a debate,” Buresh said. “When you’re both discharged tomorrow, you’re going into hiding, together. End of discussion.”

Darby wrinkled her brow. “Into hiding? Wait a minute. I thought I’d have police protection, but that I’d be able
to go back to work. My clients book appointments months in advance. I can’t just cancel without notice.”

Rafe frowned at her. “If you go back to your office, you’ll put your clients—and Mindy—at risk. Buresh is right about one thing. You do need protection.” He turned back to Buresh. “But I’m not the one who’ll be protecting her.”

“We’ll talk more about this in the morning,” Buresh said.
“I suggest you both get some sleep. Dr. Steele, would you like me to walk you back to your room?”

“No, thank you. I’d like to talk to Detective Morgan before I go.”

“All right. Good night, then.” He turned and left.

“It’s not personal, you know,” Rafe said.

Darby tightened her fingers around the bed railing. “You sure about that?”

“I wouldn’t want to pull guard duty for
anyone,
regardless of my opinion about what they did for a living. I have more important things to do, like finding the man who killed the A.D.A., the man who almost killed you.”

Her stomach tightened at the reminder that someone she knew had actually been murdered today, and how close both she and Rafe had come to being the bomber’s next victims. “I know you aren’t exactly a fan of mine.
I can live with that. But I still wanted to thank you. You saved my life. You were almost killed.” She swallowed hard. “No one has ever...” She was about to say
cared,
but that wasn’t the right word.

She cleared her throat and tried again. “No one has ever
fought
for me like that. And you shouldn’t have had to. If I’d followed your instructions, stayed at my office, none of this would have
happened. You wouldn’t be lying in this bed right now.”

Without stopping to think about what she was doing, she reached out and put her hand on his. His face mirrored his surprise, but when she would have snatched her hand back, he entwined his fingers with hers. Maybe it was exhaustion, maybe it was just that she was tired of fighting and was tired of feeling so alone, but when his hand
wrapped around hers, she held on tight.

“If you’d followed my instructions, you’d be dead,” he said.

She blinked in surprise. “What? What do you mean?”

“If you’d stayed in your office, the bomber could have abducted you out the back door. We only had one policeman watching your building, from the front, because none of us really thought the bomber would strike again so soon. I thought
one cop was enough of a deterrent, but I don’t believe that now. Not after everything that happened. The only reason you’re here right now, alive, is because you were too stubborn to ‘stay put.’ So, no apologies necessary. I’m glad you didn’t do what I told you to do.”

She drew a deep breath to hold off the unexpected rush of moisture in her eyes. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. But, for
the record, if I tell you to do something again, I expect you to do it.”

Now, this was what she’d expected. She tugged her hand out of his grasp. “For the record, since you’re refusing to be my ‘babysitter,’ I don’t guess it matters what orders you give me, does it?”

The corner of his mouth quirked up. “No, I guess it doesn’t.”

She twisted her hands together, feeling the loss of
his warmth far more than the air-conditioned room warranted. “Well, thank you again, for everything.” She glanced up at the clock and grinned. “It’s midnight and nothing happened. I guess your boss was right.” She covered a yawn. All the stress of the day was catching up to her, and she was looking forward to a good night’s sleep. She gave him a wave and headed toward the door.

The lights
flickered, followed by a dull boom in the distance. Darby froze and whirled around to look at Rafe.

He was already sliding out of bed when the lights went out.

Chapter Four

The emergency lights popped on, casting a dim yellow glow through Rafe’s hospital room. He ripped the tape off his arm and pulled out the IV needle that anchored him to the pole beside the bed.

Darby rushed to his side. “What are you doing? You’re bleeding.” She grabbed some tissues from a box by the bed and pressed them against his arm.

He grabbed her hands
and tugged her to the bathroom doorway beside the bed. “Wait in here,” he whispered.

“It’s just a power outage, right?” She sounded as if she was trying to convince herself. Her teeth bit into her bottom lip while her eyes practically begged him to agree with her.

He wished he could. He wished he could erase the fear in her eyes. But he already knew the worst had happened.

The bomber
had found them.

“Hide in the bathroom, Darby.
Please.
”

She looked as though she was about to protest, but instead, she ran into the bathroom.

Rafe moved to the main door as quietly as he could. He started to bend down to look under the door when a wave of dizziness forced him to brace his hands against the wall. He closed his eyes and willed the room to stop spinning.

“It’s
the concussion.”

His eyes flew open. Darby was standing beside him in her cleverly constructed outfit of two lime-green hospital gowns, one tied in the front, one in the back. He hadn’t even given a thought to the flimsy gown covering him. Darby had probably gotten a generous view of his backside when he’d jumped out of bed. He’d laugh if he wasn’t so worried right now, and if it wouldn’t
make his head hurt worse.

“I told you to stay—”

“In the bathroom, I know,” she whispered. “But then I thought about your concussion.” She glanced at the closed door, her face pale. “Do you want me to open it?”

“No.” He winced at how loud his voice sounded in the quiet room. “No,” he repeated, in a quieter voice. “I need to know what’s on the other side of that door
without
opening
it, just in case...”

She visibly swallowed, and nodded, letting him know she understood.

“Unfortunately,” he continued, “since I don’t have a mirror, I’m going to have to bend down and—”

“Wait.” She put her hand on his, stopping him when he started to lower himself to the floor to look under the door. “Give me a second.” She hurried to the rolling tray by the bed, the one that held
the water pitcher and plastic cup she’d given him to drink out of earlier. She pressed something on the sides, and the tray rolled back to reveal a compartment. She reached inside, tugged on something he couldn’t see, then snapped out a rectangular mirror attached to a piece of plastic the same color as the tray.

She held up her prize and hurried back to him. “Voilà.”

He squeezed her
hand in thanks and took the mirror. “Remind me to arrest you later for destruction of hospital property.”

The answering grin on her face faded when he crouched and placed the mirror flat on the floor, sliding it just under the edge of the door. The dim emergency lights in the hallway showed no one was standing outside. What he could see of the hallway was deserted.

It shouldn’t have
been.

Officer Daniels should have been outside.

A nurse should have been sitting at the nurses’ station.

The phone by the bed rang. Darby let out a startled yelp. Her eyes widened in dismay and she clapped her hands over her mouth.

Rafe pulled her to the bathroom again, pushing her inside. He grabbed the phone before it could ring again. “Detective Morgan.”

“It’s Buresh.
Dr. Steele, is she—”

“She’s fine. Daniels isn’t here, though, and the power’s out. What’s going on?” He stretched out the phone cord so he could stand closer to the door and watch for any movement reflected in the mirror.

“Something happened to the power transformer. I’m downstairs with Daniels, in the emergency room. He came down to check on the noise. Keep Dr. Steele with you until
we get this figured out, okay? SOP, you got that?”

Rafe’s fingers tightened around the phone. “Got it. SOP. Call me back once you have more information.”

“Will do.”

He pressed the button to end the call. Then he dialed 9-1-1. He gave his name, location, and told the operator that an officer needed assistance. Without waiting for a reply, he pitched the phone on the bed, grabbed
Darby’s hand and pulled her toward the door at a near run.

“What are you doing?” she gasped as he tugged her into the hallway. “What’s going on?”

“Be quiet.” He squeezed her hand to soften his words. The neon green emergency-exit sign glowed at the end of the hall, drawing him forward like a beacon. All he had to do was get through that door and down the stairs. From there he could get
Darby out of the hospital and take her somewhere safe.

A muted noise sounded behind them. Footsteps, coming toward the double doors that blocked off this wing. The exit was still thirty feet away.

Too far.

Rafe shoved the nearest door open and pulled Darby inside the room with him. A brief glance at her face had him wincing. Her complexion was ghostly white, her eyes wide and searching.
With good reason.

They were in a world of trouble here.

Easing the door shut, he dropped her hand and did a quick survey of the room. It was another patient’s room, thankfully empty because—as the doctor had told Rafe earlier—Captain Buresh had cleared out the floor to keep Darby safe.

Not that his plan had worked.

Footsteps sounded down the hallway again, quiet—as if someone
was trying not to make any noise—and stopping and starting, like someone was searching each room, one by one.

Rafe had to do something, fast. He ran to the window and looked out. A three- or four-story drop to the parking lot. No balcony. And there weren’t any other exits from this room. He did what he’d been trained to do long ago at the police academy—look up—because most people don’t.
When he spotted the acoustic tiles in the ceiling above him, he realized exactly what he had to do.

“Rafe,” Darby whispered, “what’s going on? Wasn’t that Buresh on the phone? What did he say?”

He let out a quick breath. “A transformer blew. The captain said he and Daniels were in the E.R. He said we should stay in my room and wait for him to call back.”

“Then why did we leave your
room?” Her voice was panicked, high-pitched.

He held a finger to her lips, reminding her to whisper. “Because Buresh said Daniels was with him.”

“I don’t understand.” She remembered to whisper this time, but her voice shook with each word. “What does that have to do with—”

He waved her to silence again and crossed to the door. He put his ear against the wood, listening. Nothing,
then...another shuffle, a shoe scraping across tile. Whoever was searching the rooms was maybe halfway down the hall. How many doors had he and Darby passed on their sprint from his room? Ten on each side, eleven? Twenty-two rooms to search. Not a lot when there was practically nowhere to hide in each room, other than under the bed or in the bathroom, maybe in the small closet behind each door.

They were running out of time.

He rushed back to her and tried to explain. “Daniels was assigned to guard you,” he whispered. “When the lights went out, he should have immediately gone into my room to check on you. That’s SOP, standard operating procedure.” He looked up again, mentally measuring the height of the ceiling. He could easily lift Darby up there. But how would he follow her
up? He didn’t want to prop any furniture beneath the hole where they climbed up. That would be like a sign telling the bomber exactly where they were.

“Should we call Buresh back?” Darby asked. “Maybe he forgot about this SOP thing.”

“He didn’t forget, and there’s no point in calling him back,” he answered, only half paying attention to the conversation. There, the bathroom door. If
he pulled it closed, and braced his foot on the handle, then used the top of the doorframe for leverage, he might be able to pull himself up into the ceiling.

“Why not?” Darby’s voice broke on the last word.

Rafe forced himself to focus on what she was asking. “Buresh can’t help us, neither can Daniels.”

“Why not? Why can’t they help us?”

“Because, by now, they’re both dead.”

* * *

D
ARBY
STARED
AT
R
AFE
in horror. He’d just told her two police officers were dead, and now he was calmly holding out his hand, telling her to climb on his shoulders so he could lift her into the ceiling?

The man was insane. And he was asking her to do the impossible.

Climb into that black hole where he’d removed the ceiling tile.

The thought of going into that dark
space, being cramped between the roof and the flimsy network of railings holding the tiles in place, had her stomach churning with nausea.

“Darby, we have to go now.”

She shook her head and backed up a step. She drew in a choppy breath, then another, and risked a quick glance up. No, she wouldn’t do it.

She couldn’t.

Rafe frowned and dropped his hand. “What’s wrong?”

“I just...can’t...I can’t go up there. I can’t.” She ran to the door.

Rafe grabbed her before she could open it. “We can’t go out in the hall,” he whispered furiously, his blue eyes blazing at her. “He’s armed. I’m not. It’s too risky. Our only chance is to go through the ceiling, but only if we do it
now.
”

“We can call Buresh. Maybe you’re wrong about him.”

“Buresh told me to follow
SOP. That was his way of warning me he was under duress. If he could help us, don’t you think he’d be here by now?”

He didn’t wait for her answer. He pulled her toward the end of the room beneath the opening in the ceiling. “We could wait here for help, but I’m not going to bet my life, or yours, that help will arrive in time.”

As Darby stared at the small dark hole in the ceiling, her
world began to spin. Black dots swirled in front of her eyes and she had to sit on the floor to catch her breath.

Rafe crouched beside her, a look of surprised understanding on his face. “You’re afraid of the dark, aren’t you?” His voice sounded incredulous. “Who would have thought a psychologist would be afraid of the dark?”

She stared at the floor, deeply embarrassed. “It’s not just
the dark. I’m not...comfortable...in tight spaces.” She didn’t dare look at him again. She knew what she’d see—the same condemnation she’d seen in his eyes the last time they’d crossed proverbial swords in a courtroom.

“Okay, we’ll do it your way.”

She looked up, certain she couldn’t have heard him right.

“I may not understand your fear, but I can see it’s real. We’ll figure out
another way.” His brows drew down. “If we have to go through the door, we’ll go through the door. We’ll have to work our way down the hall, one room at a time, until we get to the exit. But our timing will have to be perfect. We’ll have to run into the hall each time the gunman goes into a room, so he doesn’t see us. And we can’t make any noise.”

Darby remembered the way her own hospital
room door had squeaked when she’d opened it to go to Rafe’s room. What if one, or more, of the doors they had to go through squeaked, too? The gunman would hear it. They’d be trapped.

She watched in silence as Rafe crossed to the tray that had been beside the bed before he’d moved the bed to block the door. He snapped off the mirror, just like she’d done in the other room. He hurried to the
door and got down on his hands and knees, wincing but not slowing down even though his head was obviously hurting. He slid the mirror under the edge of the door.

The man had almost been killed protecting her. And yet, here he was, willing to put himself at risk again even though he felt there was a safer option.

All because of her stupid fear of dark, tight spaces.

Fisting her hands
beside her, she forced herself to look up at the ceiling. That dark opening wasn’t a hole. She couldn’t think of it that way. No, it was an escape hatch. And the tiles surrounding the hole were just, what? Some kind of foam board? Rafe had already explained they were just going to crawl across the beams that supported the ceiling, not across the grid holding up the tiles. The grid wasn’t strong
enough to support them. If she panicked, and had to get out, all she had to do was drop through one of the tiles. It wasn’t as if she’d really be trapped.

There weren’t any musty, cold stone walls up there.

Or water dripping all around her.

Or the scurrying of rats as they brushed against her in the dark.

She shivered and clenched her teeth together.

This wasn’t a well.

She wasn’t a scared little girl again, trapped, waiting, crying for help. She wouldn’t have to pull herself up the wet, slimy walls, inch by inch, grasping for holds on rocks that cut her fingers until they bled.

She glanced down at the tiny white lines on her fingers, lines that would never let her forget. She fisted her hands together.

This wasn’t a well.

Muted footsteps sounded
in the hallway, louder, closer.

Darby’s gaze flew to Rafe.

He was motionless by the door, staring into the mirror. He stiffened and jerked back, noiselessly pulling the mirror back inside the room. When he turned toward her, and she saw the grim look on his face, she knew what she had to do.

She had to climb into that hole.

* * *

W
HAT
R
AFE
HAD
SEEN
in the hallway was the
dark silhouette of the gunman, holding the gun with practiced ease in front of him, far closer to their room than Rafe had expected.

He cursed Buresh beneath his breath for not leaving him a weapon.

Using some oxygen tubing he’d pilfered from a drawer beside the bed, he finished securing his hospital gown tightly against his waist. It made more sense to completely strip the gowns off
both him and Darby, so the cloth wouldn’t hang down and get in their way when they climbed through the ceiling. But Darby had been so horrified when he’d suggested it that he’d settled for tying their gowns using oxygen tubing and the telephone cord.