Truth Be Told

66

Choose?

Jake could feel his face go white. His fingers clenched around the handle of the Glock, and with all his heart he longed to blast this guy into the stone age. But if he did, he’d never know what happened to Jane. He couldn’t risk that.

Choose?

And this jerk Sandoval. Smirking. Enjoying it. The ridiculous clanking and hissing of that damn machine upstairs, he should have unplugged it, the steam now heating up the entire place. This was hell.

“Last chance,” Sandoval hissed out the words. “You want me to let your partner go? Or you want to know where Jane is? You get to choose one.”

The sound of the gun behind him.

Sandoval, with one crazed expression of bewilderment, seemed to rise, pause mid-air, then crash to the floor, his gun skittering away. Not another motion. Except for the rapidly growing pool of red on the hardwood floor.

Sherrey rolled, three times, hit the wall, struggled to his feet. Kicked the gun down the hall.

Jake whirled, saw the open doorway. Saw who stood there.

Jane.

And Paul DeLuca, holding his own Glock.

“Darn,” Jane said. “I wanted to hear who you’d choose.”