Chapter 8 - TWELVE MINUTES
“Don’t touch it!” Eli shouted.
My fingers stopped an inch from Tessa’s collar.
The timer kept moving.
11:42.
11:41.
Tessa was crying without making a sound.
“I can’t feel my hands.”
“Look at me,” I said. “Only me.”
Agent Pike leaned into the van and examined the device.
“Pressure switch. Maybe motion-sensitive.”
“Maybe?” I snapped.
“I’m not a bomb tech.”
Eli crouched beside us.
He looked once and swore.
“I know this design.”
“Of course you do,” I said.
“It’s not meant to blow up Tessa.”
Tessa stared at him.
“That is the least comforting sentence anyone has ever said to me.”
Eli pointed to a thin wire running under her coat.
“It’s a transmitter. The timer is synced to another device.”
“Where?” Pike asked.
Eli looked at the time.
Then at me.
“The temple.”
My chest tightened.
“Why?”
“Today is the memorial ceremony for the south window donors.”
I remembered the banners outside.
Hundreds of people were supposed to gather at noon.
The timer showed 10:59.
Pike grabbed her radio.
“Evacuate the temple plaza now.”
Static.
She tried again.
Nothing.
Sloane’s men had jammed the police channel.
Eli stood.
“We need to get there.”
“And Tessa?”
He looked at the device.
“She comes with us.”
Tessa laughed wildly.
“Fantastic. I always wanted to be luggage.”
We took the van.
Pike drove. Eli sat behind Tessa, holding the device steady. I held Tessa’s hands.
“Talk to me,” she whispered.
“About what?”
“Anything.”
I swallowed.
“Remember when you stole my car in college?”
“I borrowed it.”
“You drove it to Arizona.”
“I brought it back.”
“With a cactus in the back seat.”
“You loved that cactus.”
“I hated that cactus.”
“You named him Kevin.”
Tessa laughed, then sobbed.
The timer showed 7:21.
Pike ran a red light.
We reached the temple plaza with five minutes left.
People were everywhere.
Music played.
Children carried paper lanterns.
Nobody knew.
I climbed onto the van roof and screamed, “GET OUT! EVERYBODY MOVE!”
Most people stared.
Then a shot hit the van beside my foot.
That got their attention.
Panic exploded.
Eli pointed to the bell tower.
“There!”
A man in a gray jacket disappeared through a side door.
Pike chased him.
I helped Tessa toward the temple steps.
“Why are we going closer?” she yelled.
“Because Eli says the receiver is inside!”
“That man has terrible ideas!”
“I know!”
3:12.
Inside the temple, smoke drifted from the prayer hall.
Eli followed a wire taped under a bench and tore up a floor grate.
The wire went down.
“Basement,” he said.
The basement door was chained.
2:31.
He fired at the lock.
Nothing.
“Move.”
I grabbed a fire extinguisher and smashed the old wood beside the chain.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
The frame cracked.
Eli kicked through.
We ran downstairs.
1:42.
A metal case sat under the memorial stage controls.
Eli opened it.
His face changed.
“No.”
“What?”
“This isn’t the bomb.”
The timer on Tessa’s collar hit 1:00.
I stared at him.
“Then where is it?”
A deep bell rang above us.
Not from the tower.
From below.
The basement floor vibrated.
Eli whispered, “Under the foundation.”
Then every exit door slammed shut at once.
And the timer reached thirty seconds.
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