Page 397 of A Matter of Time

I could not, would not, let Aja’s sister, Candace, pay for my mistake of not seeing that Caleb wanted to hurt me. And I was ninety-five percent certain that if I could talk to him, I could get the gun away and let him live. Not that I was the Second Coming or anything, I just felt like I knew him well. But then, maybe I didn’t know him at all.

I hit the door for the stairs, went through, and ran up two flights. It crashed open seconds later, and however many men had been chasing me went down. I followed them at a safe distance and slipped from the stairwell through the door on the third floor. I walked to the opposite end and took the tiny elevator with ten other people stuffed into it down to the emergency room. I stepped out into a demilitarized zone—loud, chaotic, and filled with people. The place was packed, and I moved through the bedlam unseen. I was definitely getting good at running. I didn’t even have to think anymore.

On the street, I flipped up my collar and got a cab as soon as I moved to the curb. I had already missed five calls from Sam, three from Dane, and three from a number I didn’t know. I turned the phone off and gave the driver directions to the building.

I panicked a little when I saw the barricade, but I had sort of a plan by the time I got there. It all hinged on how believable I could be. What was helpful was that I had keys, because even though the police weren’t letting anyone in or out of the parking structure, they were letting people into the building itself. So once I got to the elevator that went to Dane’s apartment, I took the private one at the opposite end of the hall to where he parked his car. When the doors whooshed open, there were the guys in their Darth Vader masks and body armor.

“What are you doing here?”

I was hoping that Agent Calhoun hadn’t talked to every guy on the SWAT team already. “I was told to report to the negotiator. I’m supposed to try and talk to Caleb Reid until his mother gets here.”

It must have made sense. What crazy person reports to a hostage situation?

I was grabbed roughly, jerked from the elevator, and walked through a maze of men in black until we reached a barricade of parked cars. There were lights all pointing toward the opposite end of the parking level, where I could see a car with both the front and back tires flat and a broken-out driver’s side window. The front end was smashed into a bearing pole.

“Lieutenant.”

There was another man dressed up like Darth Vader’s stunt double, two men in black suits, and two more in jeans—one in a turtleneck sweater, the other in a shirt and tie.

“Who’re you?” the one in the sweater barked at me.

“I was told by Special Agent Calhoun to come talk to Caleb Reid.”

“Bullshit,” he said flatly. “Agent Calhoun called us, Mr. Harcourt.” He looked over my shoulder at one of the SWAT guys. “Take him back out to the street and put him in a car until this is over.”

But I’d gotten farther than I’d thought I would. When I turned to go, I did the swivel move I’d perfected during freeze tag when I was eight. Go right, spin back left, and bolt. It worked like it always did, and I made it to the side of the car before I was grabbed hard from behind, my coat firmly in someone’s grasp. Not that it mattered, as I had loosened it on the way down the elevator. It slid easily off my shoulders as I flew out ten feet from behind the parked car into the glare of the spotlights.

“Mr. Harcourt, get your ass back here!”

“Dane!” I heard Caleb scream.

“No,” I yelled back, hands up as I walked toward the crash. “It’s me.”

“Jory?” The voice had gone instantly from crazed to calm. He sounded like he normally did.

I nodded, but realized quickly that he couldn’t see it. “Yeah! You wanna let Candace go, and I’ll come sit with you?”

After a moment, sounding as normal as could be, he said “Okay” like I had asked him if he wanted a hamburger or something. Just a nothing decision, not the life-and-death one that it was. I put down my hands and ran toward where the car was as Candace’s head popped up.

I waved her to me as I ran. “C’mon, run!”

All the women in the Greene family were phenomenal. She did exactly what I said without any Hollywood theatrics. She just moved.

“Run to the cars at the other end,” I shouted at her as she started to slow the closer she got to me. “Don’t stop, just run!”

She flew by me, and I sprinted toward Caleb, who was crouching behind the car. He had the barrel of his gun pointed at me in seconds.

“Sit down,” he ordered, grabbing my wrist and yanking me down beside him.

I sat there, shoulder to shoulder, my back against the side of an SUV, the cold concrete floor instantly chilling me through my jeans, the muzzle of the gun shoved into my ribs.

“I’m cold,” I mumbled, shivering, leaning next to him.

“Jesus.”

I turned to look at his profile. “What?”

He shook his head. “You know and you’re still not scared. What the hell, Jory?”