Cut and Run 4 - Divide and Conquer

sheet. He was
    hooked up to three different IVs, and his head was wrapped in enough
    gauze to make a turban.
    Ty gave a sniff and looked up into Zane‟s face again. “Fine,
    copycat. Don‟t talk to me, then. I‟m not leaving,” he said stubbornly as
    he dragged the heavy chair over from the corner of the bay and sat next
    to the bed. He crossed his arms over his chest and resolved to sit there
    until Zane woke, McCoy‟s orders be damned.
    He was still sitting there when two orderlies arrived almost an
    hour later to take Zane to the CT scan.
    Ty stood to the side and watched them prepare Zane to be moved.
    He knew they wouldn‟t let him go along, even if he flashed his badge
    around. He smelled of smoke, and his suit was damp and dirty and
    probably ruined. His entire body ached from head to toe, and he
    couldn‟t decipher which injuries had come from his run-in with Tank
    100 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

    on the softball field and which ones had come from his foolhardy
    headlong search through the bomb debris.
    He also noticed as he glanced at his reflection in the stainless
    steel paper towel dispenser that his face was smudged with smoke and
    dirt.
    McCoy had been right: he looked like hell. It would do Zane no
    good if he woke up to find Ty sitting there looking like this.
    He cleared his throat and touched one of the orderlies on the arm
    to get his attention. “If he wakes up, will you tell him his partner will
    be back?” he requested in a hoarse voice.
    The orderly glanced at him, looked him up and down, and then
    smiled. “Sure thing.”
    “Thank you,” Ty murmured as he gave Zane one more glance and
    then went to call himself a cab.

    “IT WAS him!” Pierce shouted, eyes bright with excitement.
    Graham raised an eyebrow, more and more convinced that his
    buddy was losing his mind.
    “Who was him?”
    “That asshole FBI agent from the aquarium! He made me drive
    him to the hospital!”
    “What‟d he do, hold a gun to your head?” Ross asked drily.
    “No,” Pierce answered, sounding more excited than angry. “He
    just pointed at me and told me I was going to do it, and I had like this
    physical response where I had to do what he told me to! It was
    awesome!”
    Graham frowned. “That doesn‟t sound awesome.”
    Hannah rolled her eyes at them all. She was beginning to grow
    tired of the game; Graham could tell from the constant sighs she
    emitted lately. Soon she‟d be back under a football player from school.
    Divide & Conquer | 101

    “The FBI guy from TV was hot. He could tell me to do
    anything,” she told them as she counted out stacks of money from their
    last robbery.
    “So why is this exciting?” Graham asked, ignoring her comment.
    Pierce grinned manically and dug out a pair of keys from his
    pocket, holding them up and letting them dangle. “Because he left his
    keys with me.”
    “That was kind of stupid of him, but I still don‟t get it.”
    “He‟s a fucking monster—he‟s got to be like six and half feet tall
    and eats nothing but steroids and babies.”
    “Dude.”
    “He‟s like Moby Dick and I‟m Captain Ahab,” Pierce continued
    with relish.
    “Third-year AP English,” Hannah grumbled.
    Graham frowned. “Did you finish that book?”
    “No, why?” Pierce answered distractedly.
    “No reason.”
    Pierce nodded, looking smug. “I‟m gonna kill him,” Pierce said
    as his eyes lost focus.
    “Wait, what?” Hannah exclaimed, sounding just as alarmed as
    Graham was.
    “Come on. We‟ve got work to do,” Pierce said to Ross, and the
    two of them left together, strutting out of Graham‟s kitchen.
    Graham and Hannah shared a look. Graham wasn‟t sure when it
    happened, but somewhere along the line, the bombings had become
    more important to Pierce than the robberies. And now he wanted to kill
    someone?
    Graham frowned as Hannah bit her lip and looked away. Neither
    of them had the nerve to buck Pierce, and they both knew it.

    102 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

    WHEN Ty returned less than an hour later, just after the lunch rush, he
    proceeded immediately up to the fifth floor, punched in the code he‟d
    seen the doctor enter to get access to the secure area, and walked
    straight to Zane‟s bay, hoping he‟d be back from the scan. The last time
    Ty had suffered holding still for one of the damn things, it had only
    been about ten minutes, all told.
    When Ty arrived, there were two doctors—neither Dr. Jameson—
    and a nurse already in