Page 13 of Under Fire in Big Sky

“Why?”

“Just do it.” She snatched one of the notepads, pulled the cap off a sharpie, and wrote on the paper in big letters. HELP. TRAPPED INSIDE. “That’s not enough. Use another bottle. Saturate it.”

Gagging at the fumes, Olivia ran to the chained double doors. She slid the notepad underneath, in case firefighters came to the room. They might assume the locked door meant it wasn’t being used, and bypass it, moving on to more critical areas.

Coughing, she hurried back to Dempsey, fearing the notepad would simply catch on fire.

“Is this good?” He held up the jacket.

In the dim room, she had to feel it to be sure it was soaking wet. “Yeah.” She put a hand on his back. “Come on.”

Olivia led him to the far back corner of the room, as far as possible from the sources of fire and smoke. They hunkered down on the floor, shoulder to shoulder. She pressed the wet cloth over her mouth and nose, and had Dempsey do likewise with the other end. Smoke still racked her lungs and stung her eyes until they watered. The taste of gasoline coated her tongue. But the damp cloth eased her breathing somewhat.

A dense cloud of smoke already covered the ceiling and was quickly permeating the entire room with toxic fumes, clogging the air.

None of this felt like the New Dawn Revolution she’d researched. Its founder, George Maben, protested the use of violence, advocated nonlethal means of resistance, and even turned himself in to the authorities after the logger had been injured, serving eighteen months in jail. These current tactics were violent, aggressive, and highly advanced. Going so far as to pull a gun on her and then lock her and Dempsey in this room.

To die.

The pandas weren’t so toothless after all. They were prepared to kill.

She had questions for Dempsey and Whitney. Or better yet, for Lauren Hahn. Her boss tended to be aware of the clients’ dirtiest secrets, only sharing them with assigned agents on a need-to-know basis.

This qualified for full disclosure. Olivia was going to find out every ugly, sordid thing that had been concealed from her regarding the development of the Rising Rock Resort.

Provided she survived.

Pressing her hand to her stomach, she shut her eyes. All she saw was Eli. Thick, ebony hair. Dark blue eyes that were as kind as they were tragic. Olive complexion from his mixed heritage of Irish, Native American, German, and others. A heart-stopping smile that got her every time. He resembled the actor who played Superman in the old television show still on streaming, Superman and Lois. Not perfect like in the comics, but scruffy and rugged. She always thought of him as her personal man of steel. It was also why she chose Lane for her alias’s surname. It was the closest she would ever get to being his Lois. He’d suffered a lot of loss early in life and made it clear he never wanted to get attached to anyone again.

Tears streamed from her eyes. Olivia pushed Eli from her mind. Focusing on him would only send her into a spiral of panic.

Dempsey huddled closer to her, coughing and shivering. “Look.”

The wall at the other end of the ballroom began to glow. The fire was eating its way through to them.

The air was so hot and dense with smoke, the oxygen so thin. She was growing lightheaded. Her vision was getting blurry.

Olivia clung to her rage to keep the adrenaline flowing and her eyes open. If she had enough breath, she would’ve screamed.

All this over ferrets!

Whatever NDR’s grievances, she suspected this was a much bigger, deeper issue to those people. As she trembled, smoke curling in her lungs and squeezing out the air, she couldn’t wrap her head around how these environmentalists had been driven to this point. Where they were now willing to kill for their cause.

“Listen to me,” Eli said to the guards, who wouldn’t let him through. Mr. Whitney and the other investors were being escorted from the meeting room and out of the building. “New Dawn Revolution is responsible for this. They’ve set fires and have done something to the Aegis agent, Liv Lane. I’m her colleague and have to find her, but I need to speak with Mr. Whitney.”

“Wait a minute.” An older gentleman turned around. “I’m Chip Whitney. You’re with Aegis?”

“I’m with Liv Lane,” Eli said. “NDR knows she’s an Aegis operative and they’ve got her somewhere. Maybe with Dempsey. Do you have any idea where they could be? When did you last see them?”

“We were looking around the Grand Ballroom, discussing this very situation.” Whitney’s brow wrinkled. “They were headed to the last ballroom, Salon D, when I left them.”

“How do I get to the ballrooms?”

“They’re clear on the other side of the hotel,” Whitney said. “Over in the east wing.”

Where there was another fire.

Eli took off running down the corridor, backtracking the way he had already come. The smell of fire and ash permeated the air. His heart was pounding against his chest, blood thrumming in his ear with each panicked step he took.