Working Stiff

steps, please.”

He did it, surprise derailing anything else, and in three steps they were in an alcove safely hidden from the other security people. “Condition Diamond, do you hear me?” Bryn asked, and saw his eyes widen. An eerie relaxation came over his body. “Okay, I need you to take this radio, get on the air, and broadcast an alert that you received a threatening phone call. There’s a bomb in the building. The building must be evacuated. Do you understand me? I need you to say it and believe it. I’m depending on you to save all these people. Tell me you understand.”

“Condition Diamond acknowledged,” he said. “Broadcast radio alert that there is a bomb in the building, and evacuation must proceed. Protocol priorities state that executives must evacuate first.”

“Perfect,” Bryn said. “After you’ve broadcast the alert, call Irene Harte’s people and tell her that her car is waiting at the front door. Questions?”

His eyes focused on hers, perfectly untroubled, but she knew that deep inside he’d be screaming. She’d felt this. She knew how … unclean it was. “Where’s the bomb?”

“Basement,” she said. That would take the maximum amount of time; typically, it was a maze of machinery and locked rooms. “Start now.”

She stepped back and took the gun away from his chin. If the protocol was going to fail, it would do it now, in spectacular Technicolor; he could have been faking it, waiting for his chance.

Instead, he just looked at her and said, “I need my radio, ma’am.”

She handed it over.

“This is Ledbetter at the entrance. I have a Level One bomb threat. Device is located in the basement. Initiate immediate evac of executive personnel.” He met Bryn’s eyes as he said, “Ms. Harte has a private car at the front—get her out here now.”

He clicked off. Bryn nodded and holstered her weapon. “Mr. Ledbetter, I want you to join the others now and lead them in a search for the bomb. Do you understand?”

“Yes. In the basement.” He hesitated. “Is this related to the two men we have pinned down?”

Bryn felt her whole body flush with adrenaline. “Pinned down where?”

“The hallway on the left,” he said. “Ballroom.”

“Go!”

Ledbetter raced off, looking as committed as if he really believed in the bomb … which she supposed he did, in a certain sense that was beyond his control. Bryn shuddered. The protocols might create kamikaze bombers and suicidal terrorists, but they weren’t likely to produce any brilliant military strategists.

Ledbetter’s radio message had poked a stick into the hornet’s nest, and people boiled out of the building. Bryn stopped another security man and commandeered his radio as he raced toward the basement, and waited next to the glass doors. Executives arrived in neat tailored suits and expensive shoes, surrounded by assistants and armed escorts; she recognized one as the first man she’d seen converted to Pharmadene’s new corporate loyalty program.

He recognized her, too, and his eyes widened. “You,” he said, and broke free of his guards to come toward her. “You were there. Across the hall.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help you,” Bryn said. She meant it. But the man just smiled.

“No need to be sorry. Best thing that ever happened to me, or to the company. First time in years we’re all in agreement on what needs to be done around here.” He glanced down at her badge, then back up at her face, a frown grooving his brow. “You’re not Irene Harte.”

“Ms. Harte gave me her badge to get me into security,” she said. “I’m her driver.”

He wasn’t buying it, and as an executive, he would have knowledge and power to invoke Diamond protocol. He could bury her in bodies in seconds.

The radio suddenly rattled with static in her hand, and Ledbetter’s voice came over it to say, “This is a Level One alert. All executives need to be out of the building now! We have a credible bomb threat!”

The man’s security team grabbed her problem executive by the arms and hustled him out. She heard him saying, “But I don’t think she’s got the right badge….” They weren’t listening.

Diamond Condition. She was starting to love it.

Except that in the next five minutes, she saw dozens of executives flee the building, and not one of them was Irene Harte.

She used the radio. “I need a twenty on Ms. Harte. I repeat, there is no sign of Ms. Harte in the evacuation. Where is she?”

A female voice answered, calm and brisk. “Who is this?”

“Her driver.”

The voice turned cold. “I’m her driver.”

“Ma’am, I’ve been assigned to drive both of you out of here as an emergency measure,” Bryn improvised. She was probably talking to Harte’s assistant, she realized. “There’s a bomb in the building.”

“No, there’s not. We swept it for devices hours ago.”

“Ma’am, as a precaution …”

“Harte doesn’t move from her current position until the gunmen already in the building are eliminated.”

There was a final click, and Bryn knew she’d lost the bet. No time to lose now, not if she wanted to actually end this; she abandoned the doors and ran, looking for someone, anyone, in a security blazer. She found one heading for the basement. “Harte!” she yelled at him. “Where is she? I’m her evac driver!”

“Downstairs private meeting room,” he said, and kept running in the opposite direction, where she could hear the muffled booms of gunfire. Two gunmen. Pinned down. That was McCallister and Fideli.

But she couldn’t help them yet.

Bryn raced down the silent hallway, the empty one, all the way to the end, and banged open the door to the stairs. Her heart was hammering now, her palms wet, and she knew there would be someone waiting for her at the bottom. Probably a lot of someones, all intent on stopping any intruders.

She could take some pain, and some injury, but it still frightened her.

This has to be done. And you’re the only one left.

There were security men stationed at the bottom of the stairs, inside the door. Both had guns out and trained on her as she rounded the last turn of the staircase, and they didn’t challenge or wait.

They just fired.

The bullets took Bryn in the chest and left arm, and she staggered against the wall under the assault. The pain rose and then receded, too fast for it to be a nanite thing; shock, she guessed. She felt woozy and strange, but calm enough as she lifted her gun with her right hand and fired clean head shots.

They went down. So did she, falling the last few steps, but she staggered up, pressed her wounded left arm to her side, and kicked their handguns out of the way into the shadows. They weren’t permanently down, but it would take time.

And time was what she needed.

The shots had drawn more security out from their positions in front of the meeting room the security guard had told her about, and Bryn didn’t wait this time; she began shooting, fast and accurately. She took four of them out and wounded a fifth, but then something hit her from behind with staggering force. Not a bullet, though.

A chair.

Bryn twisted around and caught the wooden chair as it descended again, using her wounded left arm; it didn’t stop it entirely but it reduced the force of the blow. She kicked out, and her assailant fell back, dropping the chair in the process.

Mareen, Harte’s executive assistant. She held up her hands in surrender as Bryn aimed at her. “I’m not revived!” she gasped. “I didn’t get the shot yet; you can’t!”

“No, I really can,” Bryn said, but she shifted her aim and took out Mareen’s knee instead. The woman went down screaming. Somewhere deep inside, the nicer, kinder Bryn winced and complained, but this wasn’t the time for mercy or kindness. It was time to get it done.

The meeting room doors were closed and locked. Bryn kicked, bracing herself, and it took three tries before