Chapter Nine
The bedside phone suddenly rang and a still deep in thought Danny lazily reached over to answer it with his healthy, left arm.
"Hello?"
"What in God's name are you still doing at home?" Ed quietly demanded from the other end, "Get your ass back here immediately!"
"I've kind of run into a little problem, Ed." Danny explained, slowly sitting up again. "Mary's insistent on coming with us!" He shook his brown-haired head. "I've tried to tell her no, but she won't listen to reason."
"Yeah, I thought that might happen." Ed nodded, leaning back in his chair. "I guess that we're just going to have to take her with us, kid. But at least it'll give Nessa someone to talk to."
"Nessa?" a stunned Danny repeated, "Nessa's coming with us?"
"Yeah." Ed sighed heavily, still thinking about the wisdom of that decision. Of course, he had similar thoughts about everyone else that was supposed to go so far: Danny was too injured, Mike may be too inexperienced, and Keller…well, could he even be trusted? "Much like you, I know that she'd just attempt to do this on her own if we left her behind."
"Yeah, probably." Danny nodded, getting up from his bed.
"At any rate," Ed said, rubbing his forehead with his hand. "Get over here before I get really pissed off, all right?"
"Got it." Danny replied before hanging up the phone.
Just as Ed had hung up his own phone, the door to his office slid open and Sam Marquez walked a few steps inside. Keeping her eyes on her employer, the brown-haired casino hostess flipped a strand of her dark hair back over her shoulder.
"You wanted to see me?" she asked, clasping her hands together in front of her.
"Yeah, I did." Ed nodded in response. "I'm, uh, I'm going to need to borrow one of the corporate jets for a few days, and I just wanted to make sure that we don't have any big whales coming in that need them." "I don't think we do." an uncertain Sam said before quickly pulling her P.D.A. out of her pocket and checking it. "Nope, you're good to go."
"Good." a happy Ed smiled, glad something about this rescue operation was going right. "I'm going to need one of our smaller ones, and we're not going to be needing a pilot."
"…Because you don't want anyone unnecessary or untrustworthy going along on this mission." Sam assumed with a nod.
"What mission?" the gray-haired man retorted casually.
"You know that I'm smarter than that, Ed." Sam smiled, sitting down in front of the desk. "I know that you're planning on going and rescuing Jillian and Delinda from God knows where." A curious look appeared in her eyes. "So, who else is going?"
"Just Jack, Mike, Nessa, Danny and Mary." Ed replied, clasping his hands together and resting them on his desk.
"So, everyone but me." Sam nodded, looking away.
"Sam, this is a very dangerous mission." Ed said in a fatherly tone, realizing that, like everyone else, Sam wanted to go with him. "If you come along, sweetheart, I can't guarantee your safety or even that'll you come back alive."
"I understand that, Ed." Sam replied, looking into the older man's eyes. A smile suddenly appeared on her face. "But, the adventurous side of my personality just won't let me say no to this, and, besides, someone's got to make sure that Nessa and Mary don't screw things up."
"And just what is that supposed to mean?" Nessa asked as her and Mike re-entered the office, back from their mission to collect weaponry from Ed's private cache. The black woman of British descent put her hands on her hips, and stared at Marquez.
"The Hummer loaded up?" Ed inquired, looking at Mike. The gray-haired man knew it was best to keep the teasing banter that often popped up among his employees to a minimum. Otherwise, nothing would ever get accomplished.
"Got enough for a small army." Mike replied with a nod.
"Good." a pleased Ed replied, rolling up the map on his desk. He slowly rose from his seat. "Let's go meet Jack, Danny and Mary in the parking lot. We've already wasted enough time."
The other three people muttered their agreement and headed for the exit. After stepping out onto the surveillance room floor, Ed looked around at the remaining staff as a few of them had turned their heads to see what was going on.
"Mitch! Sarasvarti!" he called, putting his hand up in the air. Almost immediately, a wheelchair-bound, older man and a young, Asian woman came up to him. "Me and the others have got an errand to do out of town, so I'm leaving you two in charge until I get back."
"It's that urgent, huh?" Mitch inquired, looking into his boss's blue eyes.
"Yeah." Ed nodded in confirmation, "Listen, I'm going to be taking Danny, Mary, Mike, Nessa and Sam with me, so you will be a little short-handed."
"We can handle it, Mr. Deline." Sarasvarti assured with a smile, knowing that if Ed was taking those people, it had to be something big.
"Yeah, I'm sure you can." Ed smiled back before heading for the exit himself.
The yellow and black Camaro convertible sped into the Montecito employee parking lot, getting the attention of the group gathered around Ed's Hummer H2. A grinning Keller sat in the driver's seat, turning the car off, while a sick looking Mary sat in the front passenger, eventually dropping her hands from her face. An annoyed Danny carefully hopped out from the back.
"Damn it." he proclaimed, putting a hand to his forehead. "Why in the hell did I put myself through that again?"
"Because the medicine said not to drive after taking it." Keller smiled, roughly clapping Danny on the back. McCoy winced as the older man's rough hand collided with a few of the bruises he had earned from his mugging.
"About time you guys got here." Ed remarked, shutting the doors to the back of his Hummer, where the gray-haired man had been organizing the weapons that Mike and Nessa had retrieved from his collection. "Sam's already set us up with a private jet…"
"Yeah, but we don't have a pilot." Sam pointed out, "In your office, you told me that we didn't need one. Remember?" "We don't." Ed confirmed with a nod. "Both Jack and I have valid pilot's licenses, so we'll be flying the plane."
"You really expect us to get on that plane?" a skeptical, stunned Danny inquired before gesturing to Keller. "After seeing the way that he drives?"
"No one said that you had to come along, kid." Ed replied with a smile. Suddenly, his smile vanished and a firm look appeared in his blue eyes as he looked at the people around him. "Let's get to the air strip. Jack, why don't you come with me in my car? I think you've worn out your welcome on the Camaro."
"You mean, I can drive the Hummer?" a grinning Keller asked, knowing that Deline would rather die than let someone else behind the wheel of his beloved vehicle.
"You can in your dreams." Ed replied, returning Jack's smile.
"No way in hell." Mary commented upon seeing Danny getting behind the wheel of his yellow and black convertible. The smiling, red-haired woman walked over to the driver's side door. "You're not supposed to be driving under the influence, remember?" She motioned for the keys. "Give them here."
"So, you're actually speaking to me again?" a surprised Danny asked, getting out of the car and handing Mary the keys. He could have just slid over to the passenger seat, but he didn't think his injured body would like that very much.
"Hmm." Mary nodded as both sat down in their respective seats. "Just as long as no more of that chauvinistic crap about women not being able to do this comes out of your mouth."
"I didn't mean to be chauvinistic, Mary." Danny apologized with a weary sigh as the two vehicles exited the Montecito employee parking lot and emerged on the Las Vegas strip. He put his healthy, left hand to his forehead. "I just…I just don't want you to get hurt."
"And who said that I'm going to get hurt?" Mary asked, glancing quickly at her best friend.
"Well, nobody." Danny yawned in response, "But you can't guarantee that you won't."
"Sounds like those painkillers are making someone sleepy." Mary smiled.
"Yeah, I'll probably sleep on the plane." Danny nodded, readjusting in his seat. "After I find out what exactly the plan is after we arrive in Ecuador from Ed and Jack."
"You can close your eyes for a few moments now if you want to." Mary said, checking to make sure that the red Hummer H2 was still in front of them. "I'll wake you up when we get to the airport."
"Thanks, Mary." an appreciative Danny replied, curling up in his seat as best he could.
"All right, thanks." Keller said into his cell-phone before flipping the object shut. The dark-haired, former CIA agent turned to Ed, who was next to him in the driver's seat. "My contact said that the Professor was reportedly spotted earlier today with Jillian and Delinda in tow."
"Did he say how they are?" a curious Nessa inquired, leaning forward from the backseat.
"According to who he talked to," Keller said, keeping his eyes on the silent Ed. "they appeared to be drugged, but all right otherwise."
"Bastard doesn't want them to know where they are." Ed nodded, realizing that that would keep in line with how a typical kidnapper thought. Thinking of something, his blue eyes traveled over to Keller for a brief second. "How reliable is this contact of yours, Jack?"
"Pretty damn reliable." Keller assured with a smile, turning away from Ed and looking out the window.
"I just heard from the big boss." the man who had harassed Jillian earlier reported as he walked into a small, darkened room, holding his cell-phone up with one hand. The Professor sat with his back to the man, watching the Deline women on a black and white surveillance monitor. "Deline's apparently on his way to an airstrip in Vegas with every intention of coming here."
"I expected him to find us a whole lot faster." an amused Professor remarked with a smirk. "He must be losing his touch. Anything else to report?"
"The Big 5 appear to coming with him," the man continued, "even McCoy."
"You would think that Danny Boy would have learned his lesson by now." the Professor chuckled, "But it appears that he's a very slow learner." Without turning in his seat, he waved off his employee. "Why don't you go and ready our special guests? After all, I'm sure that our host will be very upset if we're late for the party."
"Right away." the man nodded, heading back down the hall towards the room where Jillian and Delinda were being kept.
To be continued...