Mantis (K19 Security Solutions 4)

Once he got his hands free and slit the throat of his so-called guard, he had to figure out how to get out of a hotel he had no memory of walking into.

Chapter 22

Mantis and Alegria

“You’re sure she’s at Spaulding?” Mantis asked Doc.

“Talked to her a little over an hour ago.”

That would’ve been the answer had Mantis asked when Doc had spoken to Alegria, but it wasn’t what he’d asked.

“She doesn’t have her phone.”

“What do you mean?”

“I had to call her hospital room.”

“Outstanding.” Mantis smiled. “What is it?”

“Third floor, room ten. She had no idea you were trying to reach her, or so she said.”

Mantis had spent the ten minutes before he called Doc, arguing with the woman at the information desk about whether they had a patient by the name of Manon Mondreau. She insisted they didn’t. Now he knew they did.

He punched the button for the elevator and waited impatiently. Maybe he should’ve taken the stairs. As he was about to leave to do so, it dinged and he hopped on.

When the door reopened on the third floor, Mantis stepped out and came face to face with Pierre Mondreau.

“Excuse me,” he said when Alegria’s father stepped in front of him.

“Manon does not wish to see you.”

“You’re under the assumption that I believe you,” he said, maneuvering around him.

Pierre grabbed his arm. “I forbid it.”

Mantis laughed. “Take your hand off of me, or you’ll experience the full force of how angry I am that you’ve kept her from getting in touch with me.”

Her father scowled at him while still gripping his arm. “It’s your fault she’s paralyzed. Does that mean nothing to you? Have you so little regard for her safety?”

Mantis hesitated for only a split second. “I don’t answer to you.” He shoved past him and stalked to the room number Doc had given him. When he stepped inside, he saw the bed was empty.

“Shit,” he muttered. Where the hell was she?

“Psst,” he heard someone say, and saw a nurse motioning at him from across the hall.

When he stepped forward, she held up her hands to stop him from coming closer. “She’s downstairs in radiology,” she whispered. “Go that way.” She pointed in the opposite direction from where he’d come. “First floor, turn right, and then left.”

Mantis mouthed his thanks, hurried down the hallway, and shoved open the door to the stairwell. If he’d come that way in the first place, he might’ve been able to avoid Manon’s father entirely.

He’d just rounded the second corner and walked through the double doors that led to the radiology department when he saw her.

“Mantis?” Her eyes fill with tears.

“Hey there, Flygirl.”

“You came.”

He knelt down next to the wheelchair. “I would’ve been here sooner had I known you fled the state.”