Matt glanced over at Nathan. He was standing at the bars, his hands gripping the metal, watching Matt. “I’ll figure it out.” Though he was tense, he smiled at the kid to reassure him, then turned back to the device.
He wished Michael was here. It appeared to be a simple bomb, but simple bombs were often the most volatile. Michael would know exactly what to do.
But it was just him now, and he had to make a decision. He stared at the bomb, willing a solution to come to him. Sweat poured off his brow, from the heat and from the threat in front of him.
Matt was beginning to truly hate Garrett Reid’s partner. It was an odd feeling for him—he didn’t hate criminals. He’dfaced many violent predators and desperate criminals, and while he didn’t like most of them, he pitied some and had no feelings for others. He pursued them, investigated them, arrested them, testified against them. This distinct feeling of hatred made him uneasy, as if he wasn’t in control of his own emotions.
This woman had put him and Kara in a damn warehouse full of dangers. That, he could have dealt with. He was a cop, he was trained. But she also kidnapped a child and his mother and terrified them. Locked a kid in a cage and threatened to kill him, kill his father.
Matt didn’t use the wordevillightly. He couldn’t remember a time when he thought one of the criminals he pursued wasevil. Some came close. But this woman seemed to take pleasure in setting up these deadly games—for the newlywed couples, for him and Kara, for Lily and her son. He could still hear her gleeful voice coming out of the tinny speakers at the warehouse.
A game. That’s exactly what this was to her. And if someone got hurt or died, they’d lose and she’d move on to another game.
This damn basement was a trap—a cage for the child, cameras to keep the mother in line, a cloned phone to prevent her from seeking help.
He breathed in, breathed out. Focused his attention on the task in front of him. Worried that no matter what he did, it would be game over for all of them.
The wires went from the phone to the safety cap, which wasn’t completely attached. Between the base of the cap, where it could be securely attached over the valve, and the valve itself, was a chunk of white putty the size of a golf ball. The wires went into the putty.
Carefully, Matt reached out and with his pinky pressed gently on the putty. It had the clay-like consistency of C-4.
Where thefuckdid this woman get C-4?
Then Matt remembered what Kara had told him about the elevator—that she’d heard a bang and spark when she pushedon the door and the elevator fell. It could have been rigged with C-4, and the electricity in the lighting plus Kara pushing on the door could have set it off.
It almost didn’t matter what type of gas was in the canister—something as benign as oxygen could create a fireball that would kill or severely injure whoever was in the basement. But Matt didn’t think this lone device could take down the house.
Unless there were more like it that Lily hadn’t found.
“Matt?” Nathan said, cautious.
Did he ask Lily for permission to pull the wires? He was 99percent certain that once the wires were removed, the bomb would be inert.
Lily wouldn’t do it, Matt was certain. Even a tiny risk to her son was too great. But if Garrett’s partner decided at this moment to look at her camera, she would see that Matt was here. She might set it off, killing him and Nathan.
“Nathan, I need you to trust me,” Matt said. He forced himself to remain calm, even as his heart raced.
“Okay.”
Matt walked over to the mattress and leaned it up against the cage, a weak buffer between Nathan and the bomb. “Sit down in the far corner, behind the mattress. I can disable it.”
“The gas?”
“It’s not the gas you have to worry about. It’s a bomb. Even if the gas ignites, it’ll be short-lived. I don’t know what type of gas, so the fumes might be dangerous, but it’s the fireball that is our main concern. If it goes off, this should protect you.” Matt hoped.
“Okay,” he said. He didn’t ask for his mom, or for her permission. Maybe he knew, like Matt, that Lily would never agree to this.
“What happened?” Matt asked as he adjusted the mattress to better protect Nathan should something go wrong. “How did the woman get you here?”
“She came to the house. Said her car broke down, asked if she could wait on our porch until the tow truck came. My mom invited her in. And then she took out a gun.”
“You saw her?”
“She had on this big floppy hat and sunglasses, at least when she was talking to my mom.”
“But?”
“I saw her put them on, before she came to the door.”
