Dangerous

Chapter One

"Miss Sommers, you're under arrest," Chief Investigator Gregory said harshly, his gun at the ready.

Jaime slammed the thick file of papers into his hands. "Tell me about it after you read this." She was still out of breath from the exertion of having forced the four-inch thick safe door open just seconds before the safe had self-destructed. They were standing in the hallway just outside the office where the explosion had just taken place, and Jaime was annoyed but not surprised that Gregory couldn't even wait until the dust and smoke had cleared before he made his move.

It had been the narrowest escape of her life. Jaime had been jailed, locked up in an NSB holding cell, after being framed for the theft of government equipment. A forty million dollar decoding device, designed by Doctor Ellis Hatch, was missing, and Jaime had been the courier. Against Oscar's stern advice, she'd broken out of the cell, determined to prove her innocence. She'd been forced into a safe at gunpoint by Doctor Hatch's assistant when she figured out that he and Hatch had been the ones who'd framed her, and were actually behind the theft of Hatch's forty million dollar decoder device themselves. Jaime had thought quickly and pulled Doctor Hatch into the safe with her. The five-minute countdown to the safe's self-destruction had begun and the only key that could stop the count - with its insertion into the box outside the safe - was in Hatch's pocket, inside the safe.

Jaime told Hatch the only way they'd be getting out alive was if he gave her the files that would incriminate him and his assistant in not only the theft, but also the murders of several accomplices. Jaime was basically going to clear her name or die trying. Once the files were finally in her hands, she forced open the huge door with less than ten seconds to spare, and Jaime, Oscar and Doctor Hatch had just cleared the office door when the safe exploded.

It gave Jaime great personal satisfaction to prevail over the NSB's Chief Investigator, since she'd always considered him to be far too full of himself. When he'd taken Jaime and locked her in the NSB's holding cell, she could've sworn she saw him smirking.

"An apology would be nice," Jaime told Gregory as he opened the file and began to read, "but I know you would never -"

"Just exactly what are you trying to pull?" Gregory growled.

"Excuse me?"

"Turn around, face the wall and put your hands behind your back," he ordered. "I won't tell you twice." Jaime merely stared at him in stunned disbelief, so Gregory grabbed her roughly, turned her around and shoved her, causing her head to hit the wall with a loud THUD.

"Oww!"

Oscar stepped forward and had to physically force himself not to throw a punch. "What the hell -?"

"See for yourself," Gregory said, handing Oscar the file.

Oscar opened it and began to read: The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog... "Oh no," he whispered. He turned back to Jaime and saw Gregory not only handcuffing her, but placing her in shackles and a belly-chain as well. "Look, we'll get this straightened out. I hardly think it's necessary to -"

"She kicked out the wall of our holding cell. I think that constitutes an escape risk. This time, she goes to The Hole. Oscar, it was my understanding that your superiors have ordered that you have nothing whatsoever to do with this case."

"There is no case!" Oscar stormed.

Gregory was already leading Jaime away, and she looked back over her shoulder at Oscar with pleading, tearful eyes, breaking the OSI Director's heart.

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Jaime huddled on the floor in a corner, her legs tucked beneath her and one cheek pressed against the rough concrete wall, weeping softly. She wished Gregory and his boss, Jack Hansen, had put her in jail or even prison - anything but this! She was locked in an inhumanly tiny NSB cell known as The Hole, used to confine only the most violent, dangerous prisoners.

"Six inches of concrete," Gregory told her with his trademark smirk, "then two inches of solid steel and a double brick wall after that. Try kicking your way out of here, Little Girl." Jaime could still hear his malicious laughter as he walked down the corridor and headed up and out of the old sub-basement, re-closing and locking the heavy metal door behind himself.

The air in her cell - in the entire sub-basement - was damp, frigid and smelled like mildew. The were no windows and the only light came from a single bulb at the other end of the corridor, in front of the locked door. Jaime stared at the narrow metal shelf that passed as both a chair and a so-called bed, with only one threadbare blanket and a pillow so thin that it offered no real cushioning. She'd wrapped the blanket around herself then huddled in the corner, thoroughly terrified and shivering in the cold, stale-aired cell.

Jaime no longer had any idea how long she'd been there when her ear picked up the sounds of a heated argument at the guards' desk on the other side of the door at the end of the hallway.

"I don't give a damn! You could be the Second Coming, and you're still not going in there without Jack Hansen's ok."

"Look, you're nothing more than a glorified doorman." This second voice was familiar, and Jaime listened more closely: Steve! "I am a Federal Agent," Steve told the unyielding guard. "I'm investigating this case for the OSI and will be assisting Miss Sommers' attorney." He began to bluff, very convincingly. "I don't think you want to be charged with obstructing a Federal investigation and interfering with this prisoner's legal defense. Either you open this door, immediately, or I'll have Oscar Goldman, the Secretary of State and the President himself down here faster than you can say 'I'm going to prison'!"

Jaime heard the lock click and the door slowly cr-re-eaked open. "Ring the buzzer when you're ready to leave," the guard said.

"Uh-uh, doorman; you aren't done. You're gonna let me in that cell."

"No way. I can't do that for anyone. I'll be -"

"Excuse me?"

"I - I'll have to lock you in there with her, and she's extremely dangerous."

"I'll take my chances. Now." Steve's heart cringed at the sight of his former fiancee - a woman he still loved more than life itself - huddled on the floor of a hole in the wall no bigger than six feet long and six feet wide. He remained stoic until the guard had returned to his station on the other side of the door down the hall.

"Oh, Jaime," he said sadly, kneeling down to put an arm around her shoulder. He felt her trembling body, saw her tear-stained face that was devoid of any hope, and wrapped both arms around her instead, pulling her close. Steve stood up slowly, easing Jaime up with him, to sit on the metal shelf. "Not even a mattress?"

"In the other cell, but not here," she answered in a quivering voice.

"You shouldn't be here," he said firmly. "I'm getting you out, right now." He turned and rapped his knuckles against the wall, checking for weak points.

"It's solid," Jaime replied, "and besides, that's how I got locked up down here in the first place."

"I know. But you didn't do this, and they're not gonna find you again until we prove that."

"No, Steve. I don't need to be in any more trouble, and I'm not gonna drag you down with me."

"Down? Sweetheart, you shouldn't be 'down' - here or anywhere else - in the first place," Steve insisted. "So how thick are these walls?"

"Steve -"

"I don't see any surveillance cameras. Are we bugged?"

"Steve...no! Please."

"Ok; I'll make the hole and I'll carry you out. You didn't escape - you were kidnapped."

"No."

"You know as well as I do that we're still the best team going. I can clear you by myself, but I could do it a lot faster with you helping me." Steve ran his fingertips down her face, wishing he could absorb the pain he saw there. "I'm gonna need your input, and I had to bluff my way in here this time -"

"I know."

"I doubt I'll be able to do that again, and I can't stand having you spend one more second in this place." Steve stood up, putting his hands on the bars. "Maybe these walls are too thick, but I'll bet I can break through out in the hallway."

"We're underground, Steve."

"Then you'd better come and help me dig." Resolutely, he pried the bars far enough apart to slip through and, after a test rap on the outer wall, kicked with all his strength, achieving a modest-sized hole as his foot hit dirt on the other side. He gave a couple more solid kicks, enlarging the hole, and then began to dig.

Jaime, still sitting in the cell, began worrying about the guard - or, God forbid, Hansen or Gregory - finding Steve in the process of committing a felony, and finally got up and helped him dig. Five minutes later, Jaime was breathing fresh, outside air once again, and the two of them were officially fugitives.

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