Chapter Nineteen

 

 

River shivered as cool air hit her skin. It had been warm outside, but they’d moved into something completely unnatural. The air was stale, but Jax had gotten it moving. The lighting was far too bright.

Everywhere she looked was white. Pure white. So white it was an absence of color, of anything at all, really.

“Is this what your lab was like?”

Jax had gone silent, moving through the outer spaces carefully. He insisted on going first always. Every door he managed to get open, he would step into and then give her the go-ahead to follow him.

Some had been seemingly innocuous, nothing more than rows of microscopes and refrigeration units. Almost all of them had computers that had been left behind. They’d found what looked like a pharmacy complete with a sign left behind saying it would open again at eight a.m.

One had been terrible. They’d left the animals behind. Now they were nothing but bones in cages, but her heart had ached at what those creatures had suffered. Darkness and hunger with no way to save themselves.

Like Jax.

“Yes, it was a lot like this,” Jax said, his voice steady as he managed to open another door. “I bet she modeled her other labs on this one. It looks like we hit the break room. It’s good to know the fuckers got their cappuccinos.”

The break room was pristinely kept and luxurious in a way most offices couldn’t be. The bistro tables were straight out of a fine dining establishment and the coffee machines would make any barista proud. There was a chalkboard that proclaimed today’s breakfast would be eggs benedict or steel cut oats with a choice of toppings.

It was good to know the evil doctors knew how to live well.

“I don’t suppose you got cappuccinos.” There wasn’t any dust. It was odd. It looked like the place was ready for use, waiting for someone to come in and sit down and enjoy some coffee.

“Caffeine wasn’t good for us. That’s what Mother said. We were on very strict diets. No dairy. No sugar. Very few carbs. You think I’m ripped now, you should have seen me then. We weren’t allowed to go over two percent body fat.”

She hated the fact that his voice had lost any animation. He was back in hell and it was up to her to remind him he didn’t have to stay here this time. She moved into his space, putting her hands on his waist. “I think you’re sexy just the way you are. In fact, I could fatten you up a little bit. I’ll make you all kinds of sweet stuff and then you won’t be so fast when you try to run away from me.”

A smile slid across his face. “I would never run from you.”

He kissed her swiftly and moved on again, but at least the terrible bleakness had been wiped from his eyes.

She followed behind him. “I think we might have come in the back entrance.”

They’d passed a bunch of storage rooms and she’d noticed a row of clipboards with lists of supplies on them, waiting to be checked in. They’d moved through the building, past what looked to be living quarters. She’d gone through some of them, but couldn’t find one that had anything to do with the woman who’d tortured Jax. He’d explained that it was possible she wasn’t in the facility when they evacuated. All they’d found was some rooms with left behind makeup or clothes. No random notes that might tip them off as to who had stayed here.

“I think so, too,” he replied, moving to the opposite side of the break room. “If she truly did base her European lab on this place, the real treasure trove should be through the doors and to the left.”

She followed him out, hating how eerie the place was. Their footsteps echoed over the concrete floors. She couldn’t help but wonder how many men like Jax had been through this place, had their lives ripped away in the name of science and security.

They found the first of the larger labs and Jax took a deep breath. “This is it. Not this one probably, but this is the first of ten separate labs. Five on the left and five on the right. She would have used one of these if she had a base here. We’ll have to search every one.”

He connected his laptop to the high-tech looking keypads and the doors suddenly swung open.

Damn but he was one sexy computer nerd.

Twenty minutes and five of ten rooms later and he was a frustrated computer nerd. He stared at the screen in front of him. Whoever had worked here had left behind a large mainframe computer Jax had been able to connect to.

It hadn’t given him what he wanted.

“It looks like they were working with something cellular here. I don’t understand all the medical stuff, but they were definitely interested in manipulating the human genome,” he muttered.

The dark aspects of the place had been made incredibly clear. Jax had taken one look at lab two and backed out, closing the door as quickly as he could. She’d gotten a glimpse of bio hazard suits and shuddered.

She didn’t like to think about what these scientists could do to DNA.

Jax unhooked his computer and glanced down at his watch. “We have to leave soon.”

He stood and strode to the hallway.

“We’re fine. We can stay the night here if we have to.” She couldn’t let him leave without trying everything they could.

“They’ll be here soon. I want to avoid whoever comes out here to fix that camera. It could be anyone. They’ve likely got someone embedded. Probably one of the rangers. The nearest station is an hour away. I gave us forty minutes when we started and our time is almost up.”

“Then we should each take a room and search it.”

He stopped, his hand on the next door. “No. You stay with me.”

He was so frustrating. “We can cover more ground apart.”

“Or we can stay together and…that’s all I’ve got. We’re staying together.”

“Look, I’ll leave the door open and everything will be fine. I’ll call out if I find something.” She wasn’t taking no for an answer. She knew damn straight why he was insisting on leaving early. It was to protect her. If he were here alone, he would likely still be searching hours from now. “There’s more at stake than just me. Let me help. I can’t be the reason Robert and Tucker never find out who they are. Dante and Sasha deserve to know why they were taken, who’s waiting for them.”

His jaw hardened, but he nodded. “Leave the door open and you yell if you find anything that vaguely looks like it could have something to do with us. You’ve got five minutes in that room and then we meet back out here. Is that understood?”

He could go all military on her when he wanted to. “Sir, yes, sir.”

“That means something else in my world,” he said with a shake of his head. “Go.”

She was in the lab in a shot, propping the door open with a stool from the tall rectangular desk she found at the front of every lab. She hooked her thumbs under the straps of her pack. She’d wanted to leave hers at the entrance, but Jax insisted they carry them.

Her shoulders were starting to ache.

This was the largest laboratory she’d been in yet. The others had been one room with several desks, a shared workspace. The test animals had been held in another part of the facility. This one was different. It seemed to have several rooms in it. She walked into the large space at the front. Two hallways branched off. This space had two desks, a large refrigeration unit, and a wall of what looked like different microscopes. There were stools in front of each.

She moved to the hall to the left and found another refrigerator, though this one looked more like something one would find in a home. A note was stuck to the front.

Don’t take my fucking yogurt.

Good to know. Across from the fridge was a set of glass doors and what looked like a surgery. A medical bed was in the center of the room, a massive surgical lamp above it. A chill went through her when she saw the bed was equipped with restraints.

Was that dark stain blood?

She turned away and forced herself to walk down that hall. She stopped when she came to the cells.

There was no other word for it. Those three glass rooms with cots and toilets were cells. The doors were closed and that could only mean they were on a different grid from the rest of the facility.

She walked up, putting her hands on the glass and looking inside. The bed was unmade, blanket thrown back and pillow dented. There was a robe draped across the end of the bed and slippers that looked like they could fit Jax’s massive feet. Had he been trapped in here? Had this been the first home he could remember?

Her heart ached at the thought that he’d potentially been “born” here.

It was very much like he’d described the lab in Europe he’d been rescued from.

“Jax.” She shouted out his name. “I think this is it.”

She turned and realized how far back she’d gone. He probably couldn’t hear her. The hallway seemed to make a loop around the back of the lab. She followed it around. There was another room. This one looked like it was equipped for training. There were weights and mats on the floor.

She walked through the hall, calling for him again.

And then she noticed the door to her right.

It was the only room that wasn’t bright white. Set against the rest of the lab, it looked almost like a hole she could fall into. She stepped to the edge of the room. It was dark inside. She felt around and found a light switch, illuminating a cozy-looking office with an antique desk and chair. They were ornate, completely out of synch with the rest of the place. There was nothing modern about this space.

River walked in, her hands going to the bookshelves. They contained row after row of medical tomes. Books about neurology and memory seemed to be the doctor’s favorites, though she had several journals detailing the latest surgical techniques. On the ornate desk sat a framed picture. A blonde woman stood in her black cap and gown, a doctoral hood around her shoulders. She stared out at the camera, a smile on her face that didn’t quite reach her eyes. She was flanked by a pretty woman with laughing eyes and a large man River recognized from his many appearances on news shows. Senator Hank McDonald.

This was the place. This was where she’d plotted and planned to change the lives of the men she called her “boys.”

She felt sick, but there was a sense of urgency running through her body that kept the anxiety tamped down.

She pulled the small USB drive that was connected to the laptop on the desk, shoving it in her pocket. She opened the desk drawer and found a leather-bound journal with notes written in a precise feminine hand.

Harvey has proven to process the first round of drugs far too quickly. His brain reforms connections after a few days without his dosage. He remembered yesterday. I might have to terminate him. I can’t have Daddy getting upset with me.

Harvey. That had been Jax’s name. God, he’d been here. He’d been in that damn cage and she’d been mere miles away going on with her life. She’d been marrying that idiot and getting her heart broken while the love of her life had been treated like an animal in here. How many times had she hiked these woods and never known this was here?

She flipped the page again.

I might have to leave The Ranch. Something’s happening with the group funding. The CIA might have good facilities, but they can’t compete with the company I work for. Kronberg Pharma is very interested in my research. They sent me a new surgeon to work with. Dr. Reasor is young, but ambitious. He’s got a genius-level IQ and absolutely no morals whatsoever. My kind of guy. We’ll see what happens. If he proves unsuitable I wouldn’t mind making him a subject. It would be fun to see if I can break that brilliant mind of his. If I get a whiff that he’s planning on stabbing me in the back, I’ll show him how my drugs work firsthand. Until then, I’ll let him do my dirty work. He looks rather cute with bloody hands.

Every word she read made her ill. She picked up the journal, reaching around to tuck it into her pack.

There was a drawer of file folders along the back wall. She opened one. Thick files of medical charts were neatly organized in alphabetical order. She pulled the first one. It was labeled Albert.

River slapped the file folder on the desk and opened it.

“Albert” had been a twenty-eight-year-old homeless veteran McDonald had found on the streets of Denver. The doctor had researched the man. His legal name had been documented as Stephen Wells, a former private first class who’d been honorably discharged due to his PTSD.

The bitch had the gall to write a note to her partner in crime.

Dr. Reasor, take a look at this one. He’ll thank us for helping him forget.

It was there written on a perky pink sticky note.

The file contained an autopsy report detailing how Stephen Wells had died. He’d had an allergic reaction to the drug, causing his heart to stop.

Owen, she’d been told, had a bad reaction, too. His skin still bore the scars, but he’d lived.

Jax could have died. It would have been so easy for him to die here.

She needed to find the Harvey file.

She turned back to the file cabinet and there it was. Harvey. She couldn’t read it. Not now. Now that she had it in her hand, all that mattered was checking for the others and getting the hell out before someone showed up.

“Jax! I found it.” He should be the first one to look through that file. Not her. He needed to read it and decide what he wanted the others to know.

He would read it by their fire tonight. They would hike as far as they could and then hunker down until morning. He would read his file and she would be there to support him no matter what it said.

She flipped through but there was no Sasha. No Robert or Tucker or Dante. Were those the right names? Or had they been like Jax? Had they chosen new names?

She had to find Jax. She started through the door and stopped because she wasn’t alone.

Solo stood in the middle of the lab, a gun in her hand.

 

* * * *

 

Jax didn’t like that River was across the hall, but she was correct about the fact that they could get more done.

Something didn’t feel right though. Something felt off.

He looked back and the door to the lab across from him was open. He watched as River moved around inside.

She stopped in the middle of the room, staring at the bank of microscopes.

A cold chill crept along his spine and suddenly he couldn’t breathe. He stepped back into the hall. He couldn’t get stuck. This place brought back so many terrible memories.

His short life had been full of them. But now he would focus on the good ones. When he left, he would concentrate on remembering everything about River.

He turned and forced himself to walk into the other lab.

He knew immediately this wasn’t the one he was looking for. There were white boards covered in equations. He didn’t understand the math at all.

But he lifted his phone to take a picture of each of them. Dante was some kind of mathematical genius. Perhaps he could decipher what was happening in this small lab.

Despite what he’d told Ezra, he’d never intended to not document what he could about The Ranch. The information could be invaluable. He’d already copied what he could from the mainframe. They would have the names of the scientists who came through this facility and they could watch them. They could be the check the Agency needed. They could find the factions inside the CIA who were working for the greater good and feed them information.

Allies. If they had allies on the inside, he might be able to find some kind of a life. They might all have a chance at something vaguely normal. For him that meant a chance with River.

He moved to the next lab and found it empty. Nothing but clean white space.

Two more to check and then they would be out of here. He would have to hope that they could use the information they’d found as leverage because it appeared the whole op was a bust on the personal front. He’d seen no evidence that Dr. McDonald had ever been here, though he knew she had. She must have pulled out before the shutdown. Or been smart enough to see it coming.

He couldn’t help but think back to those cages. All those dead animals, used and abused and left behind because they didn’t matter.

He could have met the same fate. He could have been nothing but bones, having suffered starvation and dehydration. He could have died knowing no one cared, that he didn’t matter.

He was probably going to have a lot of dogs. River should know he might end up being that dude who brought home all the strays because he knew what it meant to not have a home.

“Jax.”

He stopped inside the lab at the far end of the hall. The door had closed behind him and he could barely hear his name being called.

He rushed to the door, throwing it open and then shrinking back because he saw something he hadn’t expected to see. Someone was moving down the hall, a shadow turning from the break room to the hallway. She came into view, a Ruger in her hand, moving with the surety of a well-trained operative.

Son of a bitch. He should have listened to Ezra and not his own stupid instincts. He backed away, closing the door silently behind him. He had to get ready. He eased the heavy pack from his back, gently putting it on the ground. He would move far better without it.

Now that he thought about it, he had a lot of information on his system. She would want that. The least he could do was make it hard for her to get it. They’d already discovered the bench seating in the labs had storage underneath.

Solo would need to move quickly, too. She wouldn’t want to be caught by whoever came from the security force the Agency had hired or her faction would be outed. She would likely take his pack and run. Not that he intended for her to leave this place alive.

She was threatening River and he couldn’t abide that.

As quickly as he could, he shoved his laptop into the storage space, grabbed the other item he would need, and zipped his pack closed, hoping beyond hope that she didn’t inventory it before she ran.

He had a little time. She would need to check the labs they’d come through before. She seemed like a cautious agent. He would wait until she went into one and then find River. He would stash her someplace safe and face the agent alone.

But before that he had to get a message out.

He glanced out his door as unobtrusively as possible. Sure enough, Solo was slipping into the first lab at the end of the hall. It was one of the larger labs. It would take her a minute or two to sweep it.

That gave him time.

He pushed the button on the satellite phone that should connect him to base. If everything worked according to plan.

“Jax? Is that you?”

The dulcet tones of Charlotte Taggart’s voice gave him great comfort. She was a woman any man could count on. “We’ve been compromised. Tell Ezra Solo is here and I’m going to try to take her out.”

He heard Big Tag curse in the background.

“Message received,” Charlotte replied. “Look, something’s going on. We’re sending a chopper your way. The Agency is on the move. Hunker down if you can and wait for Ezra.”

“What do you mean you’re sending a chopper? How do you know where I am?” It didn’t make sense.

“Jax!”

Fuck. “Charlotte, I have to get back to you.”

There was no way Solo hadn’t heard that. He could hear it through a closed door and Solo was far closer to River than he was.

He let the phone drop even as he could hear Charlotte asking for more information.

He gripped his semi and moved across the floor to the door. Opening it slightly, he could see Solo was already walking through the door.

His heart had started to race. What the hell was Solo going to do with River? She wasn’t the one Solo wanted. The best-case scenario was that Solo would take River hostage and exchange her for himself. He would do it. He would make the trade and then fight like hell when he knew River was out of danger.

And if they found the doctor’s formulary and decided he was the best test subject around because they already knew he wasn’t allergic to it? Well, then he would do anything he could to remember her, to hold on to any tiny piece of her.

Theo Taggart had done it.

In that moment, he realized he hadn’t loved anyone before. The barest memory of Erin had survived because Theo had loved her so fucking much. He knew it wasn’t scientific. It wasn’t logical, but somehow Theo’s love for Erin had survived.

And he would do the same. He’d always thought that if the needle was coming for him again, he would find a way to permanently end himself.

He wouldn’t because now he had something to live for.

Jax took a deep breath and moved as quietly as he could across the concrete floor. He had to get in behind Solo.

“Jax, I found it!”

He could hear the light in her voice, the triumph of discovery.

They’d gotten so close. They’d almost had it.

He couldn’t let River be taken.

“River, don’t panic,” Solo was saying. She sounded the slightest bit breathless. “Where’s Jax? I need to talk to him.”

“How the hell did you find us?” River asked, her voice shaking.

He moved through the doorway. They weren’t in the main room of the lab, but he could easily hear their conversation now.

“I wasn’t following you,” Solo replied. “I was following someone else. Come on. We need to move. We need to find Jax and get out of here now.”

“I don’t think I should go anywhere with you,” River said, but she was obviously moving because he could hear her more clearly now.

They were coming toward him. He moved to the hall on the opposite of where they were coming from.

God, he couldn’t breathe in here. This was it. He knew it instinctively. River had found the place where he’d been born.

For a second his vision flashed white and he couldn’t see a thing, couldn’t feel anything but cold. The drug always felt like ice in his veins.

He moved until he was sure he was out of sight. He would come up on them from behind. That would give him the best chance at taking out Solo and saving River. The minute Solo went down, he would pick up everything they had and run because he didn’t doubt for a second she would have backup.

“You have to come with me.” Solo stepped out and then stopped as a sound pinged through the air. Her white T-shirt bloomed with red and she got the strangest look on her face. “Motherfucker.”

Andy stepped into the room, a gun with a suppressor in his hand. “Sorry, Solo. Guess you aren’t as good as you used to be. And River, you will definitely be coming with me.”