Even as I came to that conclusion, Kyle bounded up in a blur of zombie speed, flung the door fully open with one hand and grabbed the back of Andrew’s suit jacket with the other. In a smooth, swift action, he shifted his grip, hauled Andrew up by collar and waistband and flung him like a sack of potatoes toward Philip.
Andrew let out a strangled cry of shock but managed to keep his limbs tucked in as he landed. He’d be bruised and banged up but not broken.
“Philip!” Kyle cried out. “Grab him and get to the car!”
“That’s Griffin!” a voice said from inside the warehouse.
Kyle yanked me fully upright and shoved me hard between the shoulder blades to propel me toward Philip and Andrew. “Go!” he ordered, then wheezed a sharp cough.
“What’s wrong?” I tried to turn and look at him, but he shoved me again as the door clanged shut behind us. Philip shook off the MegaPlague greyout enough to drunkenly grab Andrew and roll with him off the edge of the dock.
“Go,” Kyle gasped as he staggered into me and gave me a hard double-handed push that sent me careening over the edge.
I tumbled down and only avoided a faceplant because Naomi was right there and helped break my fall. She’d pulled the car closer to the dock, and I saw that Philip and Andrew were already in the back seat.
“Kyle! No!”
I jerked my head up at Naomi’s anguished cry. Kyle lay crumpled on his stomach, partially body-blocking the door like a meat doorstop. Two darts protruded from his shoulder and neck, and I realized he must’ve tried to go back to block the door when he realized he wouldn’t make it off the dock before collapsing.
He still had enough control to shift his head to look at us. “Go.” I couldn’t hear it, but I saw it on his lips.
“Kyle!” Naomi screamed and lurched toward him, but I grabbed her and wrapped my arms around her to drag her back.
“You can’t!” I yelled. Already the door opened and crashed into Kyle, and I knew the Saberton dudes would be happy to tranq the rest of us as well. A heartbeat later, Edwards squeezed out, tranq gun in hand. Naomi stopped fighting me, and I released my bearhug, though I kept a hand on her arm. “We’ll come back for Kyle,” I told her as I pulled her toward the car. “We have to go. Now!” A dart whined past my ear as if to punctuate my words, and I clamped down on a shriek.
She ran with me to the car, eyes full of anguished determination. “Get in!”
I didn’t need any more encouragement. I dove into the passenger seat and slammed the door as another dart whacked against it. A second later Naomi took the driver’s seat, shoved the car into reverse and squealed tires out of the dock area. I set my foot against the dash, bracing myself as she threw the car into drive and gunned it toward the exit.
“Sonofabitch!” Naomi yelled, and I looked up to see three cars blocking the exit. Her face twisted in a storm of rage. “Hang on!”
I clung to the seat as Naomi slammed on the brakes. Cold dread wrapped around me. “Now what do we do?”
“Everyone get seatbelts on, NOW,” Naomi snapped out as she yanked her own on. I hurried to obey and hoped Andrew was smart enough to do so as well.
Naomi shoved the car into reverse and hit the gas again, then did something with brakes and the wheel and who the hell knew what else, and suddenly we were going forward in the other direction, down into the garage.
“Did you just do a bootlegger turn?” I yelled in a weird mix of terror and excitement.
“Sure did,” she yelled right back, then did a sweet as hell high-speed drift around a corner before accelerating again.
“That’s too fucking cool!” Damn, this chick knew how to drive. I clung to my seatbelt as she took another tight turn at obscene speeds. From the back seat I heard manly cries of alarm. “Where the hell are we going?” I asked.
“To the bottom,” she told me, eyes narrowing in grim focus. “There’s a hatch with access to service tunnels. We should be able to get out that way.”
I didn’t see any vehicles in pursuit yet, but that was probably because a) Naomi was driving like a well-trained maniac, and b) Saberton likely figured they could take their time since they had the only exit blocked. Still, it wouldn’t take them long to determine we’d found a way out.
“I know the tunnels really well,” she said after another turn. She opened her mouth to say more but stopped. I had a feeling she’d been about to spill how she knew the tunnels then remembered Andrew was in the car.
A final screeching turn. This was the bottom floor of the garage, a dead end. “There’s the hatch.”
I peered ahead and saw a hinged metal hatch, a bit larger than a manhole cover, in the pavement a few feet from the far wall. “Stop the car right in front of it and leave the engine running,” I told her. “I have an idea.”
She didn’t question or ask for details and brought the car to a rubber-burning stop directly in front of the hatch. Philip threw the back door open and dragged Andrew not at all nicely out of the car. I jumped out on my side, and together Naomi and I managed to haul the heavy metal hatch lid up and open to land on the concrete with a heavy clang. I peered into the exposed shaft to see a ladder fixed to the wall, its bottom lost in shadow.
“No way to lock it from the inside, right?” I asked.
“Nope. C’mon, let’s get moving.”
“You go down first,” I said. “Andrew and Philip next. Then I’ll park the car over the hatch. I’m skinny and can squeeze under to the hole.”
“Jesus,” she breathed. “I think that’ll work. Slow them down enough for us to lose them.” She set her hands and feet on the outside of the ladder the way she’d done at Andrew’s apartment, and slid down into the gloom. A menacing growl from Philip got Andrew moving, though he climbed down in the more traditional manner, as did Philip.
I didn’t stick around to watch. A low rumble from above told me the Saberton team was on their way. As soon as Philip’s head was clear, I drove the car forward until it covered the hatch, killed the engine, set the emergency brake, then climbed out and locked the doors. Headlights washed the far wall as I shimmied my scrawny ass beneath the car, but instead of an easy crawl to the hatch, I found myself wedged between the undercarriage and the pavement. Stupid low clearance car!
Hot metal against the back of my lightweight jacket went from warm to painful in seconds. I thrashed, trapped, but the squeal of tires on the last curve fueled my determination. No way in hell would I let them capture me again. Not in a stupid way like this. I blew out my breath and managed to wriggle far enough to get my hand on the lip of the hole, then dragged myself forward. It took a few heart pounding seconds to make an awkward transition to the ladder, but I began to clamber down as a car slid to a stop a few yards away. With each movement, fiery pain like the worst sunburn ever flared across the back of my shoulders, and Hunger twisted inside me as my parasite sought resources to heal the damage.
At the bottom of the shaft, a dim bulb brightened pitch darkness to gloom, but it was enough light to see that we were in a grungy tunnel about eight feet wide. Pipes and conduits ran along the ceiling, and more bulbs dotted the tunnel every fifty yards or so.
I noted with grim satisfaction that Andrew’s hands were cuffed behind him. Philip looked unhappy, but I assumed it was simply the usual we’re-in-really-deep-shit until I saw Naomi sitting against the wall, face contorted in pain as she clutched her ankle.
“I landed wrong,” she blurted. “God, I’m so stupid! There’s a broken place on the ladder. Shit.”
I echoed her curse then turned to Philip. “Can you carry Naomi?” He nodded and moved toward her. I reached for Andrew’s arm then froze and inhaled deeply. The scent of his fresh human brain filled my senses, and I began to salivate like a dog at a barbecue. Shit. I didn’t know a lot about this spy business, but I was pretty sure eating a hostage wasn’t cool.