Licensed To Marry

Miss Walker clapped her hands. “Let’s do what the nice policeman said, class. Just like a fire drill at school. Follow me, and no talking.”

The teacher and her class headed toward the exit. Laura turned the opposite way to retrace their steps, hoping to find the stragglers quickly and shoo them out of the building behind their teacher.

No such luck.

She sprinted down corridor upon corridor in the warren of offices, moving against the tide of evacuees, but found no sign of the missing children. She had almost decided to abandon this portion of the capitol and move to another area when she heard a young boy’s shrill voice.

“I know you’re in there. You can’t fool me.”

She raced around the corner to find a little boy with shaggy brown hair standing with his hands on his hips in front of a door that read Women.

“Come out of there right now, Jennifer and Tiffany. Miss Walker’s gonna be mad.”

Giggles sounded behind the rest-room door. “You can’t come in here, Jeremy. This is for girls only.”

“Need some help?” Laura asked Jeremy.

He nodded solemnly. “Miss Walker’s gonna be mad, but they won’t come out.”

Laura walked to the rest-room door and pushed it wide. Two little girls with impish grins hovered just beyond the threshold. “You hear that noise?” Laura asked.

Their grins dissolved. Both nodded.

“That’s a fire alarm. It means we have to leave the building.”

“Told you,” Jeremy taunted his classmates behind her back.

“Miss Walker has already taken the rest of the class outside. Everyone else in the building has left. You’d better come with me.”

The girl with a halo of red hair and a rash of freckles folded her arms across her chest and shook her head. “No way. My mama says I can’t go anywhere with strangers.”

“You dumbheads!” Jeremy screamed. “C’mon. It’s a fire drill.”

“You have to go,” Laura said calmly. “The police have ordered everyone out of the building. Once we’re outside, we’ll find Miss Walker and the rest of your class.”

The second girl, her blond hair plaited in a long pigtail, looked at her companion dubiously. “Maybe we better do what she says, Tiffany.”

“Un-uh. Mama says bad people always make up stories to get you to come with them.”

Jennifer glanced up at Laura, then back to her friend. “But that is the fire alarm.”

“I won’t touch you,” Laura pleaded. Her heart pounded, remembering the apprehensive look on the policeman’s face. She hadn’t smelled smoke. Not yet. But something was wrong, and she had to get these children to safety. “Just follow me out of the building. When you see Miss Walker, you can run to her.”

“Well—”

She could tell Tiffany was wavering. “Come on, hurry now. We don’t have much time.”

Tiffany looked to Jennifer, who nodded her consent. In the hallway, Jeremy hopped from one boot to the other. “Hurry up, you dumb girls.”

Laura motioned the girls past her. Just as they crossed the threshold, the floor heaved beneath them, throwing them off their feet.

A concussive blast pierced Laura’s ears.

The world around her turned black.

“FOUR MINUTES to the capitol,” Frank announced over the chopper’s intercom. The suburbs of Helena were visible below them through the helicopter’s Plexiglas bubble.

Kyle sank back in his seat and willed his tensed muscles to relax. It looked as if he would have a shot at that bomb after all. He focused his concentration on the details the Helena bomb squad had provided about the device, keeping his mind on the intricacies of its construction, the sequence of contacts to disconnect, the possible permutations of design that could trap the unsuspecting.

With bombs, he was in his element, for the first time since coming to Montana. Not that he wasn’t an outdoorsman. He’d grown up on his parents’ farm in southern California, working the citrus groves that provided their livelihood. But when he’d arrived at the Lonesome Pony last month, he hadn’t known a damn thing about ranches or horses. Hadn’t known an Appaloosa from a lalapalooza. Had never settled his butt in a saddle, much less spent the day in one. He’d had to work hard to master enough knowledge to pull his share of the load, but Daniel and Court had been good teachers—

A strong current buffeted the chopper, interrupting his thoughts.

“What the hell was that?” Frank fought to maintain control of the whirlybird.

“God help us!” Court’s awe-filled prayer echoed through his headset, and he pointed straight ahead.

Kyle leaned forward between the two front seats for a better view, and his heart stuttered at the sight. A cloud of smoke and dust rose from Helena, precisely over the spot where the capitol building stood.

“Damn,” Kyle swore. “If we’d moved a few minutes faster, I might have prevented that.”

Court turned in his seat to face Kyle. “Or been blown up with the rest of the building.”

Kyle shuddered at that possibility and glanced back over at Daniel. “I’m sorry. We’re too late.”

The older man’s face had gone pale beneath its weathered tan, and he seemed to fight to regain his composure. “Not too late to help. Frank, put us down as close as you can. We have to make sure everyone’s out of there.”

Like the pro he was, Frank set the helicopter down smoothly on a swath of capitol parking lot that had evidently been cleared before the explosion. One side of the building was in ruins, office walls blown away, furniture hanging from the floors slanting at precarious angles. In stark contrast to the devastation, the other side of the building appeared unscathed. Police cars, fire trucks and ambulances, sirens wailing, were converging on the scene. In a far corner of the lot, paramedics were setting up a triage station.

Kyle was first off the chopper. The stench of cordite and burning electrical wires filled his nose, and plaster dust choked his lungs. Despite the clamor of emergency sirens, he could hear the shouts and screams of onlookers. A quick survey of the area revealed shock and disbelief on everyone’s faces.

Roger Jordan, head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms’ Helena office, strode across the debris-littered pavement toward Kyle.

“Everyone out?” Kyle asked.

Jordan shook his head. “We’ve got a hysterical teacher over there.” He wagged his head toward the capitol mall. “Claims she lost three kids inside. Some woman volunteered to look for them before the blast. They didn’t make it out.”

Daniel approached. “The governor?”

Jordan set his mouth in a grim line. “Haskel and his secretary are unaccounted for.”

Daniel turned to his agents. “Looks like our work’s cut out for us. Let’s find those folks.”

“We’ve got extra hard hats with headlamps at our command post.” Jordan jerked his thumb behind him. “You’re welcome to them.”

Kyle and his fellow agents followed the ATF leader and soon were fitted with headgear and additional flashlights.

“Tread carefully in there,” Daniel warned them. “What’s left of the building is unstable. I don’t want to lose any of you.”