No!
Emmett skipped the remaining three steps without any concern for his own safety. Janie had just screamed and was shouting for help.
Someone was with her. They werehurtingher. And whoever it was would soon be dead.
“Boss, wait!” Gwen’s hurried steps let him know she was covering his six.
He didn’t wait.
He shoved open the door in front of him, determined to get to her as soon as he possibly could. But when Emmett stepped into the hallway, it split off into two different corridors.
Left or right?
Sparing seconds Janie may not have, he listened intently for something to tell him which way to go. When the sound of an angry man’s voice traveled to them from the left, he didn’t so much as hesitate to sprint that way.
He rounded another corner, and that’s when he saw her.
She’s alive!
Two men he recognized instantly were also there. Christopher Campbell and Howard Daley.
His gun remained out in front of him as he and his teammates made their way closer to where the men had forced Janie to stop. One side of her face appeared swollen, and there was a trail of blood dripping down her chin. More blood ran from a long cut one of the bastards had made along her left forearm.
The grip on his Glock grew tighter with a fierce, murderous rage.
“Let her go!” he ordered Daley.
Rather than obey, the asshole pressed his forearm against the base of her throat. The gun in his hand was at her right temple, and the man’s finger was dangerously close to the trigger.
“Emmett?” she choked out his name.
Hearing Janie call for him sent a flood of fury coursing through his every cell. “Drop your fucking weapons and let her go!”
“Tell your men to drop their weapons, or she’s dead!” The command came from the White House Press Secretary.”
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
“Not going to happen, Daley,” Emmett informed the man calmly. “Let her go, and I just might decide to let you and your buddy live.”
Liar.
Christopher Campbell took a few steps in Emmett’s direction, putting himself between Emmett’s team andthe woman they’d come to save. “You’re not the one in charge, Shaw.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong.”
The narcissistic prick couldn’t let that one slide. “If you don’t drop your weapons and walk away, I’m going to put a bullet in your girlfriend’s pretty head.”
At the same time, a tiny red dot appeared on guy’s right temple. A clean shot through the small window to Campbell’s right struck with perfect precision.
Janie screamed as Campbell’s blood and brain matter sprayed into the air. A beat later, the man’s lifeless body fell to the floor, hitting it with a hard thud.
Gwen looked down at his corpse with a smile. “You were saying?”
Emmett’s focus was on the man who was still very much alive. Daley was scared, now. His frightened gaze skittered between the broken window, Campbell’s body, and Emmett and his team.
“Last chance, Daley,” he warned the frantic man. “It’s over. Let the woman go.”
Janie remained quiet, the look in her eyes fearful but trusting. His heart swelled knowing she had faith in him to get her out of this alive.
