Spies and Prejudice (26 page)

“He’s here.”

“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Drew’s voice echoes.

“Fine.” I drop the paper and follow Tanner out of the small office and back to the iron rungs. Tanner goes first. The noise sounds even louder now that I know that Drew is in here with us.

Tanner stops to wait for me on the bottom, and then we run down a corridor, turning left and hiding behind a row of cartons that ends at the wall. There’s nowhere else to go from here.

The room vibrates with the sound of an engine turning over and the smell of diesel fuel fills the air.

“What’s he doing?” I ask.

“There was a forklift near the entrance.”

“Why is he driving a forklift?” The sound gets closer and we hear the smack of it hitting something solid. A stack behind us starts to totter and sway. We look at each other and both turn to run the way we came, but it’s too late. Gravity sends the stack tumbling forward.

Tanner pushes me back, shoving me off balance and throwing himself across me. We land hard on the concrete. It’s a few seconds before I can breathe.

Tanner lies across me. “You okay?”

I nod. Considering I was almost buried alive under a pile of boxes, I feel pretty good. Tanner grins at me and for a second I think he might stay right where he is, and I might even want him to. My heart beats faster while the rest of the world slows down.

“What is going on down there?” It’s Mary Chris, right there in our ears. Tanner leaps up and puts a hand out to me, just as the beep, beep, beep of the forklift backing up chimes.

“We don’t have much time.” Tanner looks around, but the corridor is blocked where the boxes fell, and we have more stacks on either side of us. There’s a wall at the end of the corridor that’s finished with drywall.

“We’ll have to go up.” I run over to the wall, and rummage through my messenger bag for my climbing picks. I start strapping them on my feet. “I’ll go first, then I’ll drop them down to you.”

Tanner shakes his head. “Where did you get those things?”

“Have you never heard of the Internet?” I grasp the picks and climb up far enough to reach the top of a stack of boxes. I kick the stack with my foot and it doesn’t move. A good sign. The beeping of the forklift has stopped and there’s a sharp scratching sound as Drew tries to get the thing in gear. The good news is I have a little time, the bad news is that he’s aiming at the stack right behind Tanner.

I have to kick myself off the wall and try to land on the middle of the stack. I just hope it holds. I take out one toehold and aim my heel against the wall to get a good push off. As I kick the wall, I pull out my hand picks, sending myself flying backward into what I hope is the middle of the stack. I land hard on my back. The stack shakes a little but doesn’t give way.

I unstrap my climbing gear and throw it down to Tanner just as the forklift lurches forward.

“Drew! Stop!” I wave my hands to get his attention.

Drew stops moving forward and waves at me. He angles the forklift at the stack to my right.

Tanner has the climbing gear on and works his way up the wall. The drywall starts to give under his weight about halfway up.

“Keep climbing! You can’t stop or it won’t hold you.”

Tanner looks up at me. “What?” But it’s too late, the drywall gives under his weight and he falls to the ground. He rolls to his side, holding his shoulder.

“Don’t tell me you brought your boyfriend?” Drew moves the forklift forward again toward the stack directly in front of Tanner.

The forklift charges the stack.

“Do that thing from laser tag!”

“What?” Tanner asks again.

“Laser tag!” I yell, making a twisting movement with my hands to try to get my message across.

Tanner nods and jumps to the side, diving into the fallen boxes and rolling against the wall just before the tractor hits. I leap into the air, throwing my body at the stack to my left. The stack wobbles and sways under my weight as the cartons I was just standing on tumble to the ground.

“Keep going!” Tanner is against the wall, pinned in by the fallen boxes. “Get back to the van.”

The beep, beep, beep of the forklift chirps out a warning. There are crushed stacks to either side of me, but a straight line of boxes up ahead. I look at Tanner one more time, reluctant to leave him trapped there. Then the beeping stops, and I’ve run out of options.

“What are you doing?” I yell at Drew, just before I run and leap for the next stack of boxes.

“I’m stopping them!” Drew hollers over the sound of the forklift. He points to a fallen stack of boxes on the floor. “See for yourself.”

One of the cartons is open and green plastic bottles roll along the floor.

“The door is at the end of your row,” Ryan says in my ear. “The water pipe next to the frame should hold your weight.” The forklift rails against the stack behind me, and I run faster. The sound of the engine behind me gets louder as I run. The wall is just up ahead, and the pipe is there. I lunge at it, just as the forklift hits the stack beneath me. I wrap my legs around the pipe, sliding to the ground.
I run through the door as a pile of boxes crashes behind me. I look back, but all I see are boxes blocking the doorway. There’s no sign of Tanner.

“Keep going.” Ryan’s voice is eerily calm. “He’ll kill me if I don’t get you out.”

I
can’t leave Tanner in there. “Drew has seriously lost it,” I speak into the comm watch. “I’m going back in.”

“No,” Ryan says. “Mary Chris is nearly into the hard drive. We’ll be there in a few minutes. Wait for us.”

The forklift engine cuts. Someone shouts.

“Forget that.” I slip back inside the basement, pushing aside crushed boxes and stepping through plastic bottles. It takes a while to clear a path through the wreckage. Drew has knocked over nearly every stack of boxes in the room. I hear a scuffle and several grunts and groans, but they echo across the large room, so I can’t get a sense of direction.

Finally, I see the forklift tucked under a mountain of boxes.

Drew’s voice carries through the air. “You think you’ve got her fooled? By the time the night is over she’ll know which one of us is really on her side.” Drew has a warped sense of loyalty if he thinks we’re on the same side of anything. Whatever his intentions with the formula, the fact remains that he’s here to steal it.

I pull the knife from its sheath beneath my shirt, moving along a wall toward the spot where I last saw Tanner.

A flash of Drew’s hair peeks from behind a pile of boxes. I move closer, staying against the wall until my path is blocked by more boxes. I pick my way behind the pile until I can see Drew, pacing back and forth in front of something on the ground. At first I can’t tell what it is. I stifle a gasp when I realize it’s Tanner. He’s on his stomach with his feet duct-taped to his wrists. A line of tape circles his head around his mouth. A second section of tape covers his eyes. Adrenaline surges through me, and I have to hold myself back from leaping at Drew from behind. I can’t get a good angle from here, and I won’t be able to help Tanner if I’m a victim too. Logic battles with something deeper, an instinct that won’t allow Tanner to be hurt.

Drew’s hands are clenched into fists the size of large rocks. He stops pacing and hits Tanner in the ear, knocking Tanner’s head back. “Not so tough now, are you? Don’t worry, it will get a whole lot worse before it gets better.” He raises a fist again.

“Stop!” I blow any cover I had by yelling, but I can’t bear to watch him hit Tanner again. “You made your point.”

Drew whips his head around, but I duck out of sight before we make eye contact. “Berry! I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away. The truth is more important to you than safety. That’s the part dimwit here never understood. He doesn’t get you. Never has.”

I crouch behind a pile of boxes, clutching the knife with both hands. I need to get Drew away from Tanner before he hits him again.

“We’re on our way,” Ryan says in my ear. “Don’t do anything stupid.” He’s right. I should wait a few more minutes. But I can’t. I have to do something.

Drew’s footsteps are soft, but getting closer. I press my back against the debris pile, not daring to look around it. At least I’ve gotten him away from Tanner.

Drew walks right past the pile, but he doesn’t look behind it. I hold my breath, waiting for him to get another few yards away. I run to where Tanner still lays on the ground. I slash at the tape that binds Tanner’s feet and wrists.

“Berry!” Mary Chris yells in my ear. “What are you doing?”

I manage to cut through the thick layer of tape binding Tanner’s legs when Drew runs up behind me. Tanner rolls to his side and gets up to his knees, but he still can’t see, and his arms are taped behind his back.

Drew grabs me by the shoulder and lifts me off my feet in one painful movement that sends a sharp shock down my arm. I hang onto the knife, but just barely.

“He’s not your friend, Berry.”

“Neither are you.”

Drew puts an arm around my waist, keeping my feet off the ground so I can’t get a good stance. I bring the knife down hard on his forearm.

“Ahhh!” He drops me.

I fall to the ground hard, barely keeping the blade away from my own skin. I roll toward Tanner and cut the tape at his wrists. He immediately pulls at the tape around his eyes.

Drew comes at both of us, his fists swinging. I jump to my feet and slash the knife in the air. “Stay back!”

He lunges at me, with no regard for the knife between us. He grabs my wrist so hard, I let go of the knife. It lands on the ground with a clang. Drew drags me to him, pulling me off my feet in a bear hug that cuts off my breath. The blood from his arm is still warm as it soaks into my shirt.

“Let go of me.” I kick at his legs, but don’t make contact.

“I’m trying to help you!” He yells in my ear. “Calm down and listen. Those bottles that are all over the floor, what do you think they are?”

I can’t breathe. Everything’s fuzzy. There’s movement behind us. I wrench my neck to look back. Tanner has the tape off his eyes and he crawls toward the knife. I need to distract Drew a little longer. My elbows are pinned, and I can’t get leverage to kick him. The room seems to get narrower as I struggle to breathe.

Drew kicks one of the bottles. “It’s the energy drink, Berry. The same one your mother tried to stop. Repackaged and rebranded. It’s set to go out to market in a month.”

Drew doesn’t see Tanner reach the knife. I barely see it. Everything’s going black. By the time Drew catches the movement, it’s too late, Tanner is on his feet and throwing the knife at Drew’s shoulder.

Drew lets go of me all at once. I fall to the ground with a thud, sucking in air. Drew slumps on top of me.

“This is not helping!” I push at Drew, but he doesn’t budge.

“What’s happening?” Mary Chris asks. “Are you okay?”

“We’re fine,” I say, even though I’m not at all sure it’s true.

Tanner pulls Drew to the side enough for me to scoot out from underneath him.

Drew yells out a curse. He tries to lift his arm, but he can’t.

Tanner removes the last bit of tape from his mouth. Finally free, he glares down at me. “I said no knives.”

I
reach for one of the green plastic bottles on the floor next to me. It says “FRANTIC” in big yellow letters with a lightning bolt for the letter “I.” “Did you know about this?”

“No.” Tanner holds his watch to his mouth. “Send for an ambulance.”

Drew groans from the floor as Tanner pulls the knife from his shoulder. Tanner rips off a big hunk of his shirt and presses it to the wound on Drew’s shoulder. He grabs a roll of duct tape from the ground and uses it to secure the makeshift bandage.

“Is he okay?”

“I got the muscle. And if the way he was fighting is any indication, you just broke the skin. It will just hurt like crazy for a while.” Tanner looks at the blood covering my shirt. “Did you get cut?”

“The blood’s not mine.”

I’m relatively unscathed, which is more than I can say about Tanner. His cheek is red and already turning purple. There’s a cut at the corner of his lip. I touch it with the pad of my finger. “Does it hurt?”

“Not even close.” He takes my finger in his hand and brings it to his lips, kissing it lightly.

“Oh.”

“Just shoot me now,” Drew mumbles.

“The ambulance is on the way.” Mary Chris is in our ears. “We’re almost there.”

Tanner pulls his watch off and lobs it over a stack of fallen boxes. He looks at me expectantly. He takes the button-cam off his shirt and does the same.

“What was that?” Ryan’s voice gets louder. “Tanner? Do not go offline. Tanner …”

Tanner tries to smile, but winces instead.

I pull the earpiece out of my ear and toss it after Tanner’s, along with my watch and button-cam. Tanner takes my hand, leading me around some fallen boxes to a corner that’s relatively closed off from where Drew still lies.

“We only have a few minutes before they get here.” He pauses anyway, searching for words.

“It’s okay. I already know that you’re not allowed to let me see the file. I get it.” I can’t ask Tanner to put me ahead of his family, but I want to anyway. I stare down at the ground. At the bottles of Frantic strewn around the floor. Problem is, I don’t understand anything. Is Moss really planning to release the same dangerous product my mom stopped eight years ago? What if Drew was telling the truth? I kick a bottle. “Did you really not know about Frantic?”

Tanner picks a bottle off the floor and turns it around in his hand. “This isn’t about a stupid energy drink.”

“Of course it is. That’s all anyone cares about, isn’t it? You aren’t here to help me find out what happened to my mom. You’re here to protect the formula.” The truth tastes sour on my tongue. “No one was there to protect my mom. She was killed for what?” I glance around at the mess of boxes and bottles. “For this?”

“No.” He looks stricken. “It’s not what you think.”

My heart freezes. Tanner knows. He knows what happened to my mother. He knows everything. I hold my breath, terrified that he is going to tell me. More terrified that he won’t. The seconds stretch as we stand there. Not touching. Not moving.