Dark Abyss by Kaitlyn O'Connor (classic novels for teens .txt) 📕

I didn’t see enough to tell which, but that might be the best place to start,” Ian said.

Anna rolled out of the tub as the uneasiness congealed into a terrifying conclusion. “Simon, wait!” she gasped, crawling frantically toward the door.

She discovered when she reached the bedroom that he and the other men were shoving their makeshift barricade away from the door. “Wait! Wait!” she gasped, pushing herself to her feet and rushing the door when she saw Simon ease the door open and take a quick look outside. “He blew up my house, Simon! He had a bomb in it!”

Simon sent her an impatient look. “I know. We were there.”

“But …he blew it up to make sure there was no evidence, Simon!”

All three men stared at her blankly for a moment as that settled in their minds.

“Get her out of here! Now! ” Simon barked at the others. “I’m going to see if I can grab anything useful!”

The relief that had flickered through her vanished. She lunged at Simon and grabbed him. “Come with us! Please! You can come back!” she begged him.

He studied her for a long moment, his expression stony, and then abruptly jerked her upward and covered her mouth with his. As long as she’d hoped desperately that he would kiss her, she was too anguished and in too much shock to really register anything until he’d let her go. The heat and pleasure of his touch swept over her then in a backlash that rocked her to her core and abandoned her just as swiftly. “I’m sorry, Anna,” he whispered harshly when he put her away from him.

Someone grabbed her arm, hauling her toward the window Ian had come in through. “Simon! Please!” she called after him.

“I’ll go after him,” Caleb growled, surging toward the door.

“Don’t!” Anna covered her mouth with her hand as Ian swept her up into his arms, but she saw it was too late. Caleb had darted down the hall behind Simon.

“Hold on, baby,” Ian said grimly, “this is going to be a jolt.”

Anna twined her arms around his neck instinctively as she felt him leap. Having braced herself to fall, the sensation of rising up instead sent a disorienting jolt through her. She discovered Ian had leapt up onto the ornamental railing just as he leapt off of it.

It was amazing enough that he landed solidly on two feet, but he almost instantly launched himself forward at a run. “Joshua!”

“Here!”

“Take her and get her over the wall! Anna thinks there might be explosives in the house!”

He had to pry her loose. She knew the moment he spoke that he was heading back inside.

“Any sign of Cavendish?”

“Not yet!”

Anna made a grab for Ian again the minute he peeled her loose.

“Go with Joshua!” he said harshly.

Before she could think of anything to say, Joshua hauled her across one shoulder and took off at a run. The jolting of his shoulder against her belly knocked the breath from her, but that was nothing beside the jolt she got when he sprang upward, paused briefly on the top of the wall surrounding the compound and then leapt down. Pain seared through her. She didn’t have time to recover either. He hit the dirt running.

She thought she was going to pass out, but she never quite achieved blackout.

They hadn’t reached the end of the wall before a horrendous explosion erupted so close it deafened Anna. She wasn’t certain if Joshua threw her to the ground or if the concussion of the blast knocked him off his feet, but he rolled on top of her, shielding her face with his hands and his own head.

Debris rained down around them. Between the pain and her deafness from the explosion, Anna wasn’t even aware of it until a burning board landed across Joshua’s back. He rolled with her. When he stopped, she was beneath him again, still deaf, but she could smell burned hair and fabric even above the other smells of burning things.

Despair filled her. She felt it all the way to her soul just before she lost consciousness.

* * * *

Simon didn’t have to search for the hidden door. It was standing ajar when he reached the office. Rushing toward it, he discovered the ‘room’ was no more than a couple of feet deep, no more than a small closet. Shelves lined the walls, though, and at the back was a steel door.

Scanning the shelves swiftly, he grabbed up a case of the sort used to store data chips and shoved it into his pocket. When he saw nothing else beyond stacks of money in a dozen different denominations, he tried the door. Without surprise, he found that it was locked. Stepping back, he flicked a glance over it, saw that the hinges weren’t visible, which meant it opened in to whatever was on the other side, and began kicking at the edge of the door near the handle.

Caleb arrived just as he fell back to catch his breath and try again. Spying the door, he pushed Simon aside and began battering at it with his shoulder. Simon was having another go at it when Ian arrived.

“Is there enough room for three?”

“We can give it a try,” Simon responded after glancing at the door speculatively.

Lining up belly to back, the three of them launched themselves from the door of the office in a concerted lunge. The door, already weakened from the battering Simon and Caleb had done, flew open the moment the three of them slammed into it.

There wasn’t a hall or a room on