Chapter
Twenty-Two
March 11th
7:03 A.M.
The sounds of screams had him abruptly heading for the door.
Thunder knew the sounds were masculine, it hadn't been Maya who was shouting out in pain, but he was pretty sure he knew who it was.
There were eight dead guards littering the property, which meant the only people left alive were the six of them, Maya, and Dr. Gardner. The man screaming had to be the scientist. But unless the man had hurt himself, it had been Maya who inflicted the damage.
Which meant she was close enough to the man they both loathed with every fiber of their being to touch him.
That meant she wasn't safe.
“Left Maya inside the cage they put me in,” he whispered before he used his enhanced speed to get to his girl as quickly as possible. There was no need to speak loudly since Blade was there and would hear the softly spoken words. “There couldbe another key, but I thought leaving her there was the better option than bringing her out into a firefight.”
Now he was second-guessing that decision.
He wouldn’t have been able to move as quickly, kill both of those men, get his hands on a weapon, and reunite with his team if he’d had Maya with him. Carrying protecting, and keeping her shielded would have been his priorities. Instead, he had left her alone and vulnerable. Now she might lose her life because of that decision.
As he rushed through the kitchen and back into the hall, he saw her.
Maya.
Coming to an abrupt stop at the top of the stairs as Dr. Gardner grabbed hold of her, one of the scientist’s eyes a bloody mess.
He skidded to a stop only because the two were balanced somewhat precariously above the very top step, and he was worried that him ascending the stairs in a blur would startle them enough that they’d lose their footing. Falling down the stairs wasn't likely to kill either of them, but he wanted Maya to walk away from this in one piece, and Dr. Gardner not walking away from it at all. For now, it seemed the wisest move was to stay down there, he could always reassess the situation as it unfolded.
“Thunder,” Maya cried out when she saw him, and the relief in her tone about undid him.
She believed he would get her out of this mess. She trusted that he wouldn't let her down. Given what she’d lived through and the rocky start to their relationship, there was nothing better she could have offered him.
“Right here, babydoll,” he soothed, and as he felt the shift in the air that signaled the presence of his teammates, he added, “And I brought reinforcements.”
“You're here,” Dr. Gardner gushed, giving what could only be described as a borderline hysterical giggle. The man who had imprisoned them for three years was nothing like the one now standing at the top of the stairs holding Maya close against his body. “I knew you'd come. I knew I'd get you all back. You're mine, you know. I created you, and that means I own you. You're going to be punished, of course, for leaving me, but I know after that you’ll be good for me. Obedient, compliant, my perfect little killing machines.”
Insane as it sounded, Dr. Gardner seemed to genuinely think he was going to punish them, and then things were going to go back to the way he wanted them, the way they’d been in the three years he’d kept them captive. Did he believe he could just throw six grown men with enhanced ability and knowledge of a hundred ways to kill someone with their bare hands, over his knees and whip them into submission like he’d tried to do with Maya?
Whatever sanity the scientist had possessed at one time appeared to be quickly crumbling. The man was devolving, and that made him dangerous. Thunder wouldn't put it past Dr. Gardner to throw himself down the stairs, taking Maya down with him when he realized this wasn't going to go the way he wanted. Despite Maya’s earlier attempts to throw herself out a window, he knew she had moved past that place. She was emotionally and psychologically stronger than she’d been in over a decade.
“We should go,” Dr. Gardner continued as though any of them had agreed with his assessment. “I don’t have a place set up for you, but I'm sure you’ll be patient with me. As you can imagine, your little … tantrum games … have put quite a dent in my operation. You’ve pretty much ruined it, but everything will be better now. Everything will go back to the way it was. The way it was supposed to be. Maybe we can go back to my island,collect my sister, and my best scientist on the way. My other experiment, too, I’ll definitely need her.”
How the doctor thought that any of that was going to happen, Thunder couldn’t fathom, and he didn't care. It was clear that Dr. Gardner’s delusions of grandeur and obsession with playing at being a god had devolved into plain old delusion, and he didn't have the patience to listen to this rambling.
It was time to spill this man’s blood once and for all.
This time, Dr. Gardner wouldn't escape.
He was trying to figure out the best way to get up the stairs without causing his girl to fall, while the scientist continued his unhinged rant, when he heard Maya call his name.
Their gazes met, and the trust in hers almost brought him to his knees. He knew what she was going to do even before she said the words.
“I know you’ll catch me,” she whispered, before letting her body fall forward.
Caught off-guard by the sudden movement, Dr. Gardner didn't have time to react. Maya’s momentum took him down with her, and then the two were falling.