Her shoulders relaxed. “Good decision.” She dropped her finger from the switch and gave him a sunny smile. “Now how do we blow up a snowmobile?”
18
* Joe *
Three guns. Two trained men. One amused captive. Eleven insane women.
And a house full of gunmen with an unknown objective.
They were doomed.
It grated against every nerve in Joe’s body to wait for help. He wanted to be proactive. He wanted to take the fight to the guys downstairs. Unfortunately, he couldn’t leave the women alone. Who knew what they would do?
The crazy half of the Donaldson twins sidled up to him. “I’m gutted I couldn’t make my prisoner talk. I don’t know enough about torture. I need training. Does Lake run a class?”
He stared down at Megan. “Yeah. Every Wednesday night. Torture 101.”
She studied him for a moment as if trying to decide if he was pulling her leg or not. It took her longer than he would have hoped. She narrowed her eyes at him. “Is now the best time for sarcasm?”
She had a point. The oldest women in the group, the ones who should have known better, were in the bathroom turning condoms into water balloons to throw at guys with guns. Kirsty was practically sitting on Caroline to stop her from taking over the intercom and lecturing the intruders. At least she hadn’t noticed that the women had found her condom supply. Jena was working her way through the wine and cookies as she distracted Abby, who looked worried and kept patting her belly as if to reassure it. Julia was hiding in the bathroom, and Magenta was watching everyone with a sarcastic smile on her face.
At least the captive was gagged. Joe really didn’t think he could stomach any more advice from the peanut gallery.
“What’s the plan?” Megan said.
Plan? Oh yeah, he was in charge. Fan-fucking-tastic. “The plan is to wait to be rescued.”
The blonde put her hands on her hips. “That sucks. Is that all you can come up with? I thought Marines were well trained. I thought you guys could deal with anything. Plus you’re American—shouldn’t you blast your way out of trouble?”
“How much TV do you watch, woman? These aren’t stuntmen. This isn’t a special effect. This is real life.”
Megan let out a frustrated sigh. “I didn’t think being under siege would be so boring.”
Joe blinked at her. The woman was beyond insane. She was in a whole new category. “I don’t have time to deal with your issues. We need to get this room properly secured. Get our guest off the bed. We need it for a barricade.”
“What will I tie him to?”
“Use your imagination.”
Her eyes actually gleamed before she walked away. Joe shuddered. Grunt had definitely lucked out in the twin department. His one was marginally sane.
“Listen up,” he called to the women, and was surprised when they gave him their attention. “We’re safe here for the moment, and I plan to keep it that way until Claire comes back with help. We need to reinforce the door barricade. The hinges are a weak point. We need to shore it up some more. No one can get through the walls; they’re two foot thick and solid stone. The chances of them scaling the exterior to get to us are slim.”
“What about coming down from the roof and in through the windows? There’s nothing above this room, is there?” Ryan asked.
Joe looked to Caroline. “Where’s the access to the roof above this room?”
“There’s a metal ladder fixed to the exterior of that wall.” She pointed to one of the walls without a window. “If you go out the landing window on the third floor, you have access to the ladder and it will take you up to the roof above this room. I know we call this a tower, but really it’s only an elevated corner room. Access is easy.”
Kirsty patted her hand as though to comfort her. “It looks like a tower to me, honey.”
Caroline gave her a grateful smile. Joe wondered what dimension he’d fallen into when they were under attack but the homeowner was more upset that she didn’t have a proper tower.
Joe brought her back to the problem. “Is there a chance they could get onto the roof, then come down and in through the windows?”
Caroline nodded. “The snow would make it more difficult, but with the right equipment it wouldn’t be a problem.”
“We need to barricade the windows,” Joe said.