THIRTY-FOUR
It was dark when Chase arrived in the Garrett Resources Citation at the Colorado Springs Municipal Airport. He had two car rentals waiting. Jason Maddox took the Jeep Cherokee and headed for the Broadmoor Hotel to provide protection for Jessie. Chase and a private military attorney named Russell Addison got into a rented silver Lincoln sedan and drove straight to the base.
The gate guard checked their IDs. In his long-ago military days, Chase had been an army MP. As a military attorney, Addison also had the appropriate credentials.
Unfortunately, once they reached the detention facility, no amount of persuasion could entice the operations officer at the front desk to allow them in to see a detainee named Brandon Garrett.
“I’m afraid visiting hours are long over,” said a female staff sergeant named Holmsby. “You’ll have to call in the morning and make arrangements to speak to him.”
Chase fought a surge of frustration. “Would you at least relay the message that his brother Chase is here. Tell him I’ll be back in the morning, accompanied by his attorney.”
She cocked an iron gray eyebrow. Holmsby was a stocky, no-nonsense sort of woman suited perfectly for the job. “I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try.”
“Thank you.” He shouldn’t have been disappointed. He knew how the system worked. Rules werenotmade to be broken.
They left the base and drove to the Broadmoor. He wished he had better news. He had no idea what sort of relationship Jessie and his brother had, but he had heard the possessive note in Bran’s voice whenever he talked about her.
And Jessie certainly seemed to care about him.
“Beautiful hotel,” Addison remarked as Chase turned into the long, stately drive leading to the impressive front entrance. “I’ve stayed here before.”
“My brother’s tastes have definitely improved since he left the army.”
Addison smiled. “From what I read in his file, he deserves a little luxury.”
Chase thought of the rugged conditions in Afghanistan and other abysmal spots Brandon had been deployed, as well as their recent adventure in the Colombian rain forest. “That’s for sure.”
He pulled up in front of the Broadmoor, a grandiose cluster of pink stucco buildings over a century old. With Maddox there, Jessie should be safe.
But worrying about Bran’s safety until morning was going to make it a long night for everyone.
Bran lay on the top bunk in his cell on the ground floor of the detention facility. He was alone, which he saw as good news. If someone entered the cell to attack him during the night, he would have more room to maneuver.
His stomach growled, reminding him of his decision to skip the day’s meals. Colonel Kegan’s lunch had been tampered with. Whatever had been in it had made him sick and ultimately gotten him killed.
No way was he taking that chance.
It was quiet along the row of cells. Lights out, the occasional sound of someone shuffling around in the darkness, but nobody talking. He wondered if he’d have a visitor in the night, and if so, which guard had been paid off and how much money it was worth to unlock the door and look the other way. Or maybe there was a way to remotely unlock the cell doors.
The hours slipped past. He dozed with an ear cocked to the slightest disturbance, an art he had perfected. It was a little past three in the morning when he heard it. The soft snick of the lock, the glide of the heavy door sliding open.
His muscles tensed in anticipation as two shadows moved into the cell. One broad and tall, the other leaner, with long bones in his arms and legs. He caught the flash of a blade in the lean man’s hand, but he was ready. He jerked his pillow up as the knife slashed down, felt a sharp sting that was meant to be lethal but dodged the main thrust of the blade. He kicked out at the man’s head, connecting hard enough to send the knife flying and the wiry body crashing into the wall on the opposite side of the cell.
The second man was on him, big and strong, a Janos Petrov look-alike with a shaved head and prison tats on his arms and the back of his hands. Bran came off the top bunk feetfirst, kicking the guy in the face so hard his front teeth jammed all the way into the back of his throat.
The big guy clutched his neck, made a gurgling sound, and lurched forward. Bran elbowed him in the face, smashing his nose, sending a spray of blood into the air.
The wiry man was up, swinging a blow Bran ducked. He took the guy out with a chop to the esophagus, then linked his hands and brought both fists down on the top of his attacker’s head, driving him into the floor face-first. He lay there unconscious.
The big guy swung a punch, but he was disoriented and badly injured, his broken nose affecting his vision. Bran punched him in the face, elbowed him, kneed him, and he went down. He didn’t get up.
Stepping over both men, he walked out of the cell, making his way to the guard station. He was bleeding a little, not too badly. In the guardroom, two men sat behind the glass, watching a pair of screens. Another guard, a woman, stood at the far end of the room. With any luck, they weren’t all being paid to look the other way while someone killed him.
The guards raced toward the glass door as he approached.
“I need to speak to Colonel William Larkin, head of Criminal Investigations. You’ve got two inmates down in my cell. They need medical attention. They were paid to kill me, so I think you had better make that call.”
His instincts said Larkin was a straight shooter. A little too by the book, but a man who believed in the law.
