He paused in the empty dining room of the property, a room at the back of the house where no one would see him from the windows that faced the street. His phone slowly blossomed back to life as he gained signal strength, up above ground once more: a number of notifications chimed one after the other, appearing on the screen.
A lot of missed calls from work. Paul swore under his breath. He should have checked earlier. If they needed him and he was just sitting down there waiting, he was letting everyone down.
There was a voicemail: he listened to it briefly, hearing the voice of his supervisor coming over the line.
“Paul, I don’t know where you are today, but please come straight to the hospital when you get this. We’ve got an emergency situation, all hands on-deck. Big accident downtown. And please stop turning your phone off when you’re on call. We need you here as soon as possible.”
Paul ended the call as the voicemail’s electronic voice chimed in, telling him which buttons to press if he wanted to save the message. He swore under his breath again, glancing around. He hadn’t left any sign of himself behind, other than the woman in the basement. He’d been careful about that. If someone came in while he was out, they wouldn’t be able to pin this on him.
Not unless she was still alive, of course. She’d recognized him. He’d seen it in her eyes as he approached with the needle. Seeing him in connection with medical items must have triggered her memory.
But, damnit, he was needed. He did take his job very seriously, and there were plenty of people who needed help or could be saved before their hearts stopped. People who weren’t supposed to die today. Those people, he could save. Should save. He could get back here before the timer went off and the platform dropped, just to make sure it was all as fast as he wanted it to be.
He turned to leave the house through the back door, emerging into the cold but bright sunshine, taking the slightly longer route back to his car to avoid being seen – but walking fast.
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
Laura sat in the small office reserved for the managers of the hospital’s ambulance service, tapping her walkie talkie against her knee anxiously. She hated waiting like this. Not being able to do anything.
But she’d done everything she could, at least. All she had left was waiting. Waiting for Paul Payne to arrive for the fake emergency call-out she’d organized with his supervisor.
“Anything yet?” she said, speaking into the walkie. She could see the main ambulance parking area through the windows of the office, but that was all. She couldn’t see the road, or the employee parking lot. The idea was to wait here, out of sight, until Paul came inside to receive his assignment. He wouldn’t be expecting an ambush. If anything, he’d probably be ready to eat humble pie at this stage and apologize for how late he was.
She hoped.
She was beginning to wonder if he was running so late because he’d figured out it was a trap and wasn’t coming at all.
The radio crackled to life in her hands. “Nothing yet,” came the response. One of the security guards at the employee parking lot entrance, who’d been fully briefed on the situation.
Laura had called Nate and filled him in already, and he was supposedly on the way with a small group of detectives from the precinct to make sure they would have enough manpower to take him down. She supposed she should be happy that Paul hadn’t showed up yet, that she wasn’t having to tackle him alone.
But she wasn’t. She was wired instead. Wishing he would get here so that she could do her job and take him down.
Her cell phone buzzed in her pocket, and Laura checked it to see a message from Nate: ETA five minutes. The supervisor, who was still sitting at her desk and having to actually run the ambulances while also sharing the same nerves Laura felt, glanced at her in alarm. Laura just shook her head, and the woman, an older Hispanic EMT with short-cropped white hair who had done her time on the service already, dropped her tense shoulders by a single notch.
The radio crackled into life, making those shoulders shoot back up – and Laura’s too. “Okay, I can see his car approaching now.”
“Great. Let him into the parking lot as normal,” Laura said. “Remember, don’t let on that anything is different than normal.”
There was no response from the radio – which, she hoped, meant that the security guard was staying quiet and doing what he was told as Paul pulled up to the barrier and showed his staff pass. Laura drummed her fingers on the seat, staying as still as she could otherwise. The inclination was to move forward, to go right and stand in the window and watch for his arrival. But she needed to stay out of sight now. She was right by the door, and as soon as he’d gotten himself inside the office fully, she would be able to move between him and the only exit and ensure he wasn’t going to go anywhere.
She glanced at the supervisor. The woman seemed to be shaking slightly, her hand wavering as she reached for her mug of coffee and took a sip, perhaps to try a
nd steady her nerves.
Laura tensed more as each moment passed, trying to imagine his progress. He would be pulling through the barriers, moving into the parking lot. Parking his car. Getting out. Would he spend a moment inside first, or would he race towards the office, thinking he was needed?
“Hey, Paul!” the voice was muffled by the door, but it made Laura stiffen, her spine going dead straight and her hand moving automatically to rest on her gun in its holster.
“Oh, hey, man. I just got called in.”
“Really? Why?”
“What do you mean? For the big accident downtown.”
“Big accident?” There was a short laugh. “First I’m hearing of it, if so. We’ve still got three ambulances in the bay waiting for call-outs.”
“What?”