Hot Zone (Elite Force #2)(27)
Author: Catherine Mann

He patted the baby’s back awkwardly.

She crinkled her nose again, her eyes fluttering open. “Hugh? Do you smell smoke?”

Shit! He should have thought of that. He looked in front fast. The first rays of sunrise illuminated the smoke spiraling from the engine crumpled against the tree.

The scent grew thicker inside the van, mixing with the unmistakable stench of leaking gasoline. Hugh scooped the kid under one arm and yanked Amelia up with his other hand. He kicked the back doors of the van, exploding them open.

“Amelia, run!”

***

Liam was losing his shit fast.

He charged up the front steps of the stucco island school, now a temporary hospital and the last known location for Hugh Franco.

Where the hell was he?

Franco had raced off to check on the Bailey woman seven hours ago and still hadn’t returned. He wasn’t answering his phone or shortwave radio. Communication was sketchy with phones, but no comm through the radio?

Something was wrong. He could feel it deep in his churning gut. Franco has said he would be back in an hour—and that deadline had long passed.

They all had to log back in to work the next shift in three hours, which didn’t give Liam much time to search. He should be sleeping. Should be. But knew he wouldn’t even be able to close his eyes until he got rid of this sick feeling he’d had too many times during his prior days in the Army, times when he’d lost a fellow ranger.

Franco would probably come racing in at the last second and they would laugh their asses off at Liam for acting like a f**king mother hen. At least that’s what he told himself as he ran like a maniac up the steps into the hospital housed in the local school.

It wasn’t as if he could report the guy to the cops to investigate. The police had their hands full, as did every other individual here. Except Franco wasn’t answering his phone or pager, which of course could have been due to the jammed channels. Communication was still iffy and likely wouldn’t get better anytime soon.

For now, Liam had three hours to figure out what had happened to Franco before the next rescue shift.

He tugged open the heavy wooden door and stepped inside. The light was dim, mostly filtering through the window and from bulbs running on minimal power from generators. The air was thick with an antiseptic scent and pained groans. Hospital “staff” rushed down the halls, in and out of rooms, wearing scrubs and camo.

He eyed the harried personnel and chose the least frantic of the bunch, a reed-thin woman removing the lab coat from over her camos. “Excuse me, ma’am?”

She turned and he took in the army insignia on her uniform and her name tag. A nurse, a lieutenant. “Lieutenant Gable, a minute of your time?”

She turned impatiently, took in his uniform, and her face shifted into a smile. “What may I help you with, Major?”

“I’m looking for a patient here, toddler, about a year old, named Joshua, a local boy recently adopted.” He stepped closer as he sidestepped to make way for an NGO worker pushing a cart of MREs and a crate of bottled water. “He would have been brought in with his aunt from the U.S., Amelia Bailey.”

Her brow furrowed with deep thought, Lieutenant Gable stuffed her hands in her pockets for a moment before nodding, “Right, right… I remember them, sweet lady and kid. Very lucky to be alive. They’re not here any longer. They must have checked out while I was on a break.”

Damn. Not unexpected, but frustrating all the same. “Anything else?”

“She had a military friend who came by a couple of times. I assumed he arranged a place for them to stay.”

Something didn’t sound right. “In the middle of the night?”

“We are in such desperate need of beds, when somebody can leave, we’re glad to have the space. Surely you understand.”

“Of course. Sorry.” These weren’t normal times. “A military friend? Male?”

“Definitely male and close friends with the woman. That’s all I know, Major. We’ve been very busy here.” She swept back a straggly strand of gray-streaked hair with a shaky hand. “I really need to get back to work.”

He backed up a step. “Thanks for your help.”

As the lieutenant jogged away, shoes squeaking, he stood in the middle of the two-way traffic in the hall, wondering what the hell to do now. He always had a plan of action, marching orders. But now? He didn’t have a clue where to even start looking.

Where could they have gone from here? How was he supposed to even know which way to search? There weren’t any bread crumbs or red arrows pointing the way.

But there was a scent.

The world seemed to slow around him and take shape as an idea came to him, one that made him a little more pumped than he should be feeling, given the current state of hell on earth around them.

But what if Rachel and her search and rescue dog could work another miracle here?

He couldn’t pull them off an active search for someone trapped in the debris. Although if she could give him half an hour to just point him in the right direction…

Pivoting on his heel, he jogged back out the door, down the steps. Once outside, the sun just climbing on the horizon, he broke into a run. His military uniform would get him past any roadblocks or checkpoints. Even with the debris, he could make it to Rachel’s quarters in under ten minutes.

No one looked twice at him running through the street like a madman. Nothing seemed unusual here anymore—well, other than running out in the street half-naked, wearing nothing but towels.

Had that been only a few hours ago?

This couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t be losing a man on his team. Yes, he understood it happened. Hell, it had happened far too often during his combat days as an Army Ranger. But he was in charge now. He controlled the missions and they focused on rescue, not combat. He refused to lose another brother-in-arms. And yeah, that made him overreact sometimes.

Like now, chasing down a missing team member who was probably just off trying to impress a woman. Except Franco never, never dated women with children since his wife and daughter died. Which brought Liam to his real fear—that this latest rescue had pushed Hugh over the edge. A dark thought, sure, but then morbid conclusions had a way of chasing him.

People thought Liam was a lighthearted son of a bitch who did a helluva Chuck Norris impression. He was just covering up the fact that his insides were so scarred up from burying fallen comrades he’d become like that old Charlie Chaplin tune his mama liked to sing through her cancer treatments, “Smile, though your heart…”