Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

January 29 th

8:55 P.M.

The whole place was going to fall down around her.

Cassie had accepted that.

Once she finally remembered what had happened, she tried to escape, to see if there was a way out of the lab, but she couldn't.

While her memories were still hazy and she didn't have all the details, it was obvious that she must have known seconds before the blast that the place was going to explode because she was under what appeared to be a table.

She must have taken cover there and it was likely the only thing that had saved her life.

Well, saved her from the explosion.

But it wasn't going to save her in the long run.

Because now she was trapped.

Debris had fallen, filling the room, including blocking her exits from under the table.

She really had been buried alive.

There was no way out.

Unless she was found soon then she would die there.

And how could anyone find her?

Walking through the building while it was this unstable was like willingly walking toward your own death. It was a suicide mission if ever there was one.

All she could hope for was that whoever was watching her tonight—and she was positive there was someone on her because they all knew about the threat to her and her teammates—had already called for help.

Maybe if it got there fast enough there was a chance for her.

Maybe .

But she wasn't holding out much hope.

The terror that had pulsed through her earlier, stealing her ability to breathe was still there, only now it was sending out tentacles of ice through her veins. She was shaking. Badly. More than the building.

It didn't matter that she tried to stop it, even her teeth were chattering.

Knowing it was shock didn't help in the least.

How could it?

A lifetime of studying didn't give her the practical experience needed to do anything about it. She wasn't a field agent, she was a scientist who worked in a lab. She was supposed to be safe in the lab.

Cassie knew she wasn't strong like Scarlett and Lucy. Scarlett had grown up with military parents and grandparents who had drilled her in survival skills, it was no wonder she'd been able to survive being abducted and tortured. And Lucy was so practical, nothing seemed to faze her, having lived with epilepsy that refused to be controlled by medication all her life, she had a perspective on death that most people could never understand.

They were both so strong and brave, they were survivors.

But not her.

She was just a smart girl.

That was it.

Her entire identity.

It was all she had ever been allowed to be.

It was all she knew how to be.

But being smart didn't help her now.

Not in the least.

It didn't erase the hunks of concrete blocking her path and keeping her trapped under the table. It didn't undo the explosion, it didn't do anything at all.

A sob caught in her throat, and the next thing she knew, she was screaming like she'd lost her mind. There was no one to hear her pleas for help but that didn't seem to register with her voice box.

It just yelled and screamed until she was hoarse.

"Help! Please! Is anyone out there? I need help. I'm trapped. I can't get out. Please, help! Help me! Help me! Please, someone help me!"

Of course, her pleas went unanswered.

There was no one there.

Lucy was recovering from her injuries and spending time with Zander, Scarlett was with Tate, and Ella had gone to rehearsal tonight, needing to destress. She was the only one there. Whoever her babysitters were had been outside the building. They were safe, at least she hoped they were. There was a chance they'd been injured in the explosion, too. She had no idea how big the blast had been and no way to find out, trapped as she was in there.

"Cassie."

She froze.

Someone had called her name.

Ears straining, she listened for any hint of a sound, anything to prove that she wasn't alone, that someone was indeed coming for her.

But she didn't hear anything.

The pounding of her heart and her harsh breathing drowned out everything else.

Ready to give up and accept that she had merely allowed her overactive imagination to trick her into thinking help was coming, she sank down against the dusty floor. "It's not coming," she told herself aloud, hoping that might make her accept the words if she heard them outside her own mind. "Stop being stupid. No one is coming. No one would be crazy enough to walk inside a building that just exploded. You're going to die here. Accept it. Don't be a baby."

"Cassie."

Her name.

Again.

Was someone really out there?

"H-hello?" she called out, hardly daring to hope for an answer.

"Cassie, it's Luis. I'm coming for you, okay? Do you know where you are? The room is a mess, and this would go a lot faster if I knew where to look for you."

Luis?

She remembered him. Luis Aguilar, one of the men on Tate's team. She hadn't met him many times, but in the handful that she had, she was sure she had somehow embarrassed herself. It was the norm for her, especially when she was nervous, which she almost always was when she was around strangers. Her solitary life hadn't taught her many social skills and she never knew what to say.

Throw in a deliciously handsome man and she barely remembered how to think, much less how to talk, much less how to engage in a meaningful conversation.

"Cassie? You still with me?" Luis called out.

"I-I'm here. Under th-the table," she called back. Best as she tried to stop it from happening hope flared to life inside her. Maybe she wasn't going to die.

"All right, Cass, just hang on. I'm making my way over to the table now," Luis said. "You did good getting under there, it probably saved your life."

His praise sent a burst of heat flushing through her veins, chasing away the chills of shock. "I d-don't remember everything. I th-think I h-hit my h-head." It was the only way to explain her sluggish thinking and inability to correctly recall the events leading up to the explosion.

"Do you have any other injuries, Cassie?" Luis asked, sounding closer this time.

"Umm …" Did she? Honestly, it hadn't occurred to her to check to see. Adrenalin could mask pain, and so far, she wasn't feeling any so she had to assume it was doing its job. If she'd made it under the table before the explosion went off, and the debris trapping her said that she had, then she didn't think she could have gotten any other injuries. She likely hit her head as she dived under there, striking it on the floor or maybe one of the table legs.

"Cassie? You hurt?" Luis asked again, now sounding like he was right on the other side of the piles of concrete.

"I don't think s-so. Just my h-head."

"All right, then just hold on and I'll have you out as quickly as I can."

"Are y-you okay? Did you g-get hurt?"

"I'm fine," he assured her.

For the next few minutes, neither of them spoke. She could hear his grunts as he presumably lifted heavy pieces of debris and threw them to the side to make an opening big enough for her to climb through.

The seconds felt so long.

More like hours.

And for some reason, she remembered how she used to count them in her head to drown out the sounds of the woman who was supposed to be her nanny, watching over her at college since she was not even quite ten years old, having sex with some guy she hooked up with on campus in some bathroom or closet or empty room.

It always embarrassed her.

Sex was for grown-ups and she was just a little girl. It always served to remind her how badly she didn't fit in. College was supposed to be for adults, and she was supposed to be in the fifth grade. Yet there she was. Surrounded by thousands of people and yet completely alone.

Even at nine, she resented her parents for bringing her into the world and treating her like she was some performing doll instead of a real child with feelings and emotions.

Never once had they cared about her needs, much less her wants.

But it seemed childish to complain about it. Her brain was smarter than most people's and it had allowed her to get a job at sixteen with one of the most revered and respected companies in the world. She did good work there, helped make the world a safer place, and made a difference.

Really, she had nothing to complain about.

Other than the whole being buried alive thing.

Suddenly, a rush of hot air swirled around her, and a hand reached inside.

"Almost there, Cass, hold on for me a few minutes longer," Luis said, his voice much louder now, and she watched, rapt, as his hands dismantled more of the wall blocking her escape.

Finally, his head stuck through the hole, and he shot her a grin. His face was streaked with dirt and sweat, his cheeks stained red from heat and exertion, but even dirty as he was, he was still the single most handsome man she'd ever seen.

When he reached out a hand, she didn't hesitate to take it and let him help her squiggle through the hole. As soon as she was free, she flung her arms around his neck and hugged him hard.

He'd just saved her life and the words she had to utter didn't seem like nearly enough.

"Thank you, you saved me."

"Not yet, princess," he said as he glanced around them.

It was only then, as she took in the full extent of the damage, that Cassie realized how much he'd risked coming in to look for her, and everything they would both risk as they tried to find a way out.

January 29 th

9:18 P.M.

Damn, holding this woman in his arms felt … good.

Too good.

The kind of good that led to doing something stupid. Something he had vowed a long time ago to never do again.

Luis was always careful about who he allowed into his life. Not physically, but emotionally. He had his younger brother, the men on his team who he would die for without a second thought, his foster parents and their extended family.

But that was it.

No women.

The last thing he wanted was to be responsible for someone in that way. The last time he'd been responsible for someone he'd almost gotten them killed.

Focus on the op .

The reminder was exactly what he needed. He didn't have to be there for Cassie emotionally, all he had to do was get her out alive and in one piece.

Sure.

Easy.

The crumbling building and flames were nothing to worry about.

Standing, he brought Cassie up with him then set her on her feet at arm's length, close enough that he could reach out and cover her body with his own if he needed to protect her, but not so close that he would do something stupid like pull her back into an embrace.

Instead, he schooled his features and gave her a visual once over. Just because she'd said she didn't think she had any injuries other than the head wound didn't make it true. She'd sounded uncertain, and he knew firsthand how shock and the adrenalin dump of being in a life-and-death situation could mess with your pain receptors. He'd once carried a teammate on his shoulders almost four miles through the desert to safety before he realized that he'd been shot, too.

Cassie's black jeans and tight-fitting, bright pink T-shirt were streaked with dust, but the only blood he spotted was oozing from a wound on her left temple. The blood had trailed down her cheek and stood out in stark contrast to her otherwise pale skin. The eyes that looked up at him were slightly glazed, but she seemed with it enough that he was sure if she had a concussion it was a minor one.

"We've got to move," he said, already shifting around her so he could lead her back out the way he'd come in. Staying had been crazy, he knew he was putting his life on the line, but then again, that was what he did. It was who he was. Or at least who he had become after a rocky start to life and starting down the wrong path.

Leaving had seemed even crazier than staying.

The second he heard her weak, shaky voice, filled with raw, untamed terror Luis had known he wasn't going anywhere until he got Cassie out.

"Okay," Cassie said, trustingly following after him. She stayed close, not just close enough to see him through the red shadows, but close enough to touch him. Which she did. Slipping her hand into his.

For a moment he faltered.

He was not the kind of man who held hands with anyone. A couple of the guys on his team were married and a few had kids. He'd hung out with the kids before, tossed them into the pool to make them laugh, or jumped out from behind a door to boo them, or snuck them an extra cupcake when their parents had already said no more junk food. He liked kids, was comfortable enough around them, but he never did this. Never held their hand.

And women were for having fun with. He was careful to never get involved with one who was after more than sexy times between the sheets. Relationships weren't on his radar, so he never walked around holding hands with a girl he was seeing.

Yet he made no move to pull his hand out of Cassie's.

He just kept moving forward, tugging her along with him.

"I can't believe you came through all of this just to look for me when you didn't even know if I had survived," she whispered, clearly in awe as they maneuvered their way around a huge pile of concrete.

"It's my job, princess," he shot back, keeping his tone light, refusing to acknowledge, even to himself, that her praise stirred up feelings he'd much rather not be having.

"I know, but still, thank you." Her voice was so soft, so melodic, so beautiful, like an angel's and he absolutely hated that he responded to it in any way other than sexually.

Sex.

That's all he wanted from women.

He was happy to wine and dine them first. Always made sure they had a good time. Enjoyed laughing and talking with them. But it was still just about sex. Dressing it up so it didn't look like a somewhat crude one and done, getting them into bed then kicking them right back out again, didn't mean it went any deeper than that.

Playboy.

That's what his teammates referred to him as and he'd always embraced it.

It was true and it was safe.

There was no chance of catching feelings if you never allowed yourself the time it would take for that to happen. The longest relationship he'd ever been in lasted three months and that was only because she was a model and out of the country for more than half of that time.

Usually, they hung around a couple of weeks. They'd go out a few times, spend hours making out in his hot tub, in his bed, anywhere in his house he could take them, then he'd cut things off and move on to the next woman.

His younger brother Miguel had once asked him if he ever got lonely, although Miguel was every bit the playboy he was. One look at the scar on his brother's neck was enough to have him shake his head and answer that he wasn't lonely in the least, he was perfectly happy with how he lived his life.

That was still true, and yet this pampered, genius princess, gripping his hand like he was her lifeline, had him wondering what his life would have been like if his foster parents were his biological parents and he and Miguel had been with them since birth.

None of that mattered.

Especially not now.

When they reached a section of wall they would have to crawl over to get down the other side, he released his grip on Cassie's hand.

"We need to go over this, then we take a right, another right, and we're almost to the door," he told her. Just because she knew this building better than he did, didn't mean it wasn't easy to get confused when it was mostly destroyed, dark, and spookily red with the light of the flames.

Cassie nodded, her eyes still wide with fear.

Together they climbed over the pile of debris. They were right at the top of it when he got that feeling in his gut that said something bad was about to happen.

The building seemed to groan.

Then it began to shudder.

Next thing he knew, they were both tumbling down the side.

Luis barely noticed the pain as his body bounced off jagged hunks of concrete. He reached for Cassie, snagged a hold of her T-shirt, and hauled her up against him, doing his best to protect her as they rolled down to the ground.

As soon as they hit the floor he rolled and came up on his feet, Cassie still in his arms.

"Is it going to collapse?" she asked in a scared whisper.

"Oh, yeah, princess, any second now."

Since he'd move quicker carrying her than with her walking, Luis took off at a sprint toward the door. This building was coming down, no doubt about it. The foundations were ruined, and it was only by some miracle that it had stayed upright for as long as it had.

Now, though, if they didn't get out it was going to become their tomb.

Not happening.

Only as he rounded the final corner and approached the door, he saw that flames were dancing around it now, blocking their exit.

"We're trapped," Cassie squeaked.

There was no time to search for another way out.

No time to wait for help to arrive, the building would likely be down by then.

Setting Cassie on her feet, he stripped off his T-shirt then grabbed the hem of hers and yanked it up and over her head before she could even utter a protest.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, lifting her arms to cover her chest, even though her pretty pink bra covered all the good stuff.

"Getting us out of here," he replied.

"Why do I have to be half-naked to do that?"

"Because we're going to use the T-shirts to protect our faces as we run through that," he replied, waving a hand to indicate the dancing flames.

"You're not … we can't … that's crazy," she stammered.

"Crazy or not, princess, you want out of this building before it collapses and kills us then that's the only way."

Because there was no time to argue, he covered her head with her T-shirt, did the same with his own, then snatched her up into his arms, said a quick prayer, and ran straight toward the flames.