The man takes one look at her and bolts for the elevator. Swearing, I go after him.
Inside the elevator, the man frantically stabs a button as he cries out, “Close! Close!”
The doors slide shut just as I reach them.
“Don’t let him leave the building!” Joel yells as the elevator starts down.
The stairs are located to the left of the elevator. I run to the fire door, wrench it open, and hurtle down the stairs, sliding the palm of my hand down the handrail so I don’t break a leg in my descent.
Above the sound of my pounding feet and ragged breathing, I hear Joel’s voice echoing urgently down the stairwell. “Don’t let him get away!”
I’m not going to waste precious oxygen answering him.
Reaching the foot of the stairs, I yank open the ground-floor fire door, hearing thepingof the elevator as it stops. The man runs out of the elevator, heading toward the empty reception area.
With a last burst of effort, my lungs burning, I sprint after him and tackle him a few feet from the building’s front door. Sprawled on his stomach, the man tries to get up, but I press my knee into his back.
He grunts in pain. “What do you want?”
“I want all experiments on animals to stop,” I reply, careful to keep out of his line of sight, “but since that’s not happening anytime soon, I’ll settle for rescuing as many as I can.”
“I don’t believe this. Are you one of those animal rights people?”
“Yeah, I belong to the alien species.”
“But the research we do here is—”
I jerk his arms behind him. “We’re not debating here today, buddy.”
Joel and Sue exit the elevator. Sue is clutching the cleaning trolley, her face blotchy with tears. “The place is supposed to be deserted! What do we do now?”
“Don’t say another word,” Joel orders. He looks at the figure stretched out on the floor. “What do you want to do with him?”
The man tries to lift his head. “You can let me go. I won’t say anything.”
I push his head down again. “You’re not part of this discussion.” I look around the reception area. “We’ll have to lock him up somewhere.”
“No gagging him,” Joel says firmly.
“Yeah, he might choke on his own importance.” I eye Joel. “You got a shirt under that overall?”
“Yeah.”
“Take it off.”
Joel shrugs off the top half of his overall and hands me his T-shirt.
I tug the shirt over the man’s head like a hood and haul him to his feet. “Just so you don’t catch a glimpse of our handsome mugs.”
“There’s a broom closet next to the staff area,” Joel says.
We locate the closet and shove him inside, tying him up as securely as we can. Turning the man around to face the wall, Joel reclaims his shirt and locks the door.
“Help! Someone help!” The man’s voice reverberates from inside the closet.
I bang a fist on the door. “Wait until we’ve left, you idiot.”
There’s silence. Moving away from the door, Joel says, “I figure we have an hour before he frees himself or someone comes looking for him.”
