‘Mikhail,lock the door!’Vale yells so loud it’s almost a scream.
‘It won’t lock, they shot it,’ Lachlan lies.‘Get inside the safe room right now!’He then raises his gun at the Delacroix twins when they move towards the panic room Jules is in.‘Notthis one.’
‘Alistair, tell him to move!We need our own space, we—’
Lachlan hits Prescott Delacroix right in the mouth with the butt of the semi-automatic, breaks a tooth.Madeline screams.Whitlock and Vale are already inside the panic room on the other side, the empty one.
Alistair stares at Lachlan with glittering calm, unreadable.‘Go in the other,’ he tells the twins after a beat.‘Now.’
The medical staff try to get inside the other safe room, but there’s a struggle because Whitlock forces them out, telling them there isn’t enough room.
The twins glare at Lachlan with pure loathing but they do as Alistair said.
‘Tanner,’ Sorrenko barks from above.‘Get inside with the boys!’
Lachlan ignores him, looks to Alistair.‘Where’s Savannah?’
Alistair gestures to the pale blue room.‘Resting.’
‘Let me get her,’ Lachlan says instead of the dozen other things he wants badly to ask, chief among them,what did you do to her?
‘Of course.’
Without bodies in the way, Lachlan sees two beds in the third room of the bunker.Savannah is on one, her gaze moving between Lachlan and Alistair with fretful fear.Groggy though she is, she’s more awake than before.
Ariadne is on the other bed, fully unconscious.
‘Wake her,’ Lachlan says to Alistair.
‘We can’t.’
‘Wake her or leave her.’
‘Her bed has wheels.’
Lachlan’s resolve hardens.
‘Fine.’He doesn’t care about Ariadne.‘Ana, we’re under attack, sweetheart.I’m going to put you with Jules and Roman.You’ll be safe with them.’
‘She needs to keep the IV on,’ Alistair tells Lachlan.‘I’ll bring Ariadne.’
The bed Ariadne lies upon is portable, reinforced frame, sealed casters, onboard power integrated beneath the chassis.Lines feed from its spine into her arms, throat and chest while compact monitors built into the rail quietly track pressure, oxygen and neural activity.
Lachlan’s never seen a bed like it.
Savannah stays quiet when Lachlan lifts her into his arms.
The backs of his eyes sting as if he’s staring at direct sunlight first thing in the morning.That weird taste thickens in his mouth.The wrong feeling thrashes like somethingwrigglingto get out.
Lachlan moves inside the panic room, brings the attached IV stand with him.Roman’s eyes widen when he sees her.‘Ana.’
Penhalyx wheels the body of Savannah’s unconscious mother in, pushing the bed into the far corner of the room.
Jules is waking now, softly calls out, ‘Bodyguard,’ all croaky and weak.
Lachlan takes a breath that hurts to hold.‘Ro, did you fill—?’
‘Everything I could,’ he tells Lachlan, checking Savannah over.‘You don’t seem right,’ he says, lightly touching her face.‘Did they take too much?’
