Authors: Vicki Hinze
Sara felt her face heat. If only with herself, she had to admit she had felt far more during the hug than she could classify as professional. “As for hugging, it holds specific therapeutic value, especially to PTSD patients. They tend to detach from everyone and everything around them. The key to helping them begins with getting them to attach. To do that, you have to understand their pain and do what you can to relieve it. Hugs release endogenous opioids. Do you know the term?”
“I’ve forgotten.” William’s gaze turned speculative. He was listening. Whether or not he was hearing was anyone’s guess.
“Endogenous opioids are the body’s natural pain killer,” Sara said. “Now do you understand why I hugged him?”
“Yes, Major.” William looked away.
“Good.” Sara walked back to the second-floor station with Shank.
Rolling the cart beside her, Shank checked to make sure they were out of William’s earshot, and then slid Sara a sidelong look. “Nice save, Dr. West.”
“Yeah, right.” Sara bent down and picked up a scrap of paper on the hallway carpet. “Every word was true, but Fontaine will know each detail before I can walk to Fred’s room.”
“Flat out.” Shank paused by the second-floor station desk. “Tell me something.” Her eyes twinkled. “Did that hug feel as good as I’m imagining it did?”
Sara grunted. “It felt a hell of a lot better than him choking me half to death.”
“Uh-huh. I’ll just bet it did.” Shank emptied some files from her cart onto the lid of the desk.
Sara withheld a retort. Beth was sitting at the computer listening avidly and pretending to be stone-deaf.
Stretching toward Beth, Shank passed over two files. “Orders in these two need to be entered right away.”
“Yes, Captain,” Beth said, retrieving the files without glancing at Shank.
Sara jotted a couple more notes in Jarrod’s file. She started to write down that he had revealed his name, but afraid Foster would go paranoid and deem Joe unsalvageable, she kept that information to herself. And it hit her that maybe Fontaine’s notes had been ambiguous for the same reason. Maybe he had substituted the peacock-blue ones for the original notes because he too had been protecting the patients.
The man had won a Purple Heart, the Bronze Star, and a medal for meritorious service. Congress was stingy with those things, so there had to be some good in the man. It could be possible
. . .
Oh, hell, if that was the case, then she’d misjudged him. The protective scenario fit. It was possible. And, if true, then he would resent her being here and changing orders. He would be terrified of her doing anything that could upset the status quo and have Foster terminating the patients.
She’d have to weigh this carefully. As impossible as it seemed on the surface, Fabulous Fontaine could be one of the good guys.
She checked her watch. Three-fifty. She’d have to sift through it all later. She had a date with her phantom patient at four. “Fred’s in his room, right?”
“Not anymore.” Shank rolled the cart behind the desk.
“Damn it, Shank. I specifically ordered—”
“Hold on a second, Doc.” Shank left the cart near the medicine room and returned to the desk. “During the night, Fred kept thumping at his chest, so this morning while you were with Joe, I had them run an EKG on him.” Shank dipped her chin. “You ordered it, by the way.”
“
I
ordered it?” Sara fought not to shout. “I’d prefer you not do that.”
Shank shrugged. “You were busy. It needed doing. I did it. I wouldn’t give meds or anything like that, but this seemed harmless enough.”
Sara supposed the woman was right. She didn’t like it, wouldn’t tolerate a steady diet of it, but under the circumstances
. . .
“So what did the EKG show?”
“Tape’s in the file. Bad stuff. Flat out.” Shank left the cart and walked back to the desk. “Fontaine happened by, saw the report, and shipped Fred out.”
Surprised, Sara frowned. “To a regular hospital?”
Shank dropped her voice so Beth wouldn’t hear. “To one of ours.”
From the corner of her eye, Sara saw Beth watching their every move. “When will he be back?”
“No idea.” Shank cut her eyes toward Beth. “I’ll keep you posted.”
Someone didn’t want Sara to see Fred. Why, Sara didn’t know. She looked at the computer terminal. But she damn well knew how to find out—if she could ever get just a few minutes of privacy.
Sara walked away from the station. Passing Fred’s room, she saw a yellow piece of paper taped to his door. Staph infection. She couldn’t enter. No one could enter without proper gear, and no cart holding that anti-infection gear had been stationed outside his door.
She turned and walked back to the desk. “Shank?”
She looked up from the paperwork she was charting. “Yeah, Dr. West?”
“Why is there a staph warning on Fred’s door?”
“The room’s been reassigned to another patient. He has a staph infection.”
“There’s no cart,” Sara said, tension coiling in her stomach. Shank had been her only ally. She’d lied, albeit reluctantly, but now she was stonewalling Sara.
“We’re waiting for it to come up from downstairs. Should be here in a matter of minutes.”
“Who’s the patient?” Sara persisted.
“ADR-40.”
Sara stuffed her hands into her lab coat pocket. “Is he PTSD?”
“No. Bless his heart, he’s too far gone for anyone but God to help. I thought poor Lou was about as bad as a body can get, but ADR-40 is even worse.”
There was a message in that remark. Sara saw it in Shank’s eyes. What it was niggled at the corner of her mind. She tugged, but it remained just out of reach.
Turning back down the hallway, she slowed her steps at Fred’s door. Inside, Dr. Fontaine talked softly. The patient, ADR-40, mewled. At first, Sara couldn’t make out what he was saying. But when she did, it stopped her dead in her tracks.
“I wept.”
Sara pored through her patient files.
It was hot in her office. Since it had warmed up again, the air conditioner was needed. Instead, the heater was on and under the influence of a master control that maintenance couldn’t seem to alter. But she was determined to sweat it out, literally, and find the common denominator between her patients and Fontaine’s new one, ADR-40. He hadn’t been admitted under the guise of PTSD, but his mewling “I wept” warned her that there was a connection.
She began a list, working backward by their patient numbers.
ADR-40: more damaged than ADR-39, Lou
ADR-39: more damaged than ADR-36, Ray
ADR-36: more damaged than ADR-30, Joe
ADR-30: more damaged than ADR-17, Michael
ADR-22: Fred. According to Shank, a vegetable damaged somewhere between Lou and ADR-40.
ADR-17: Michael. Least damaged of all.
Three of them cited betrayal. Two, “I wept.” And—
Sara blinked, stared at the listing, and then blinked again. Her heart beat hard and fast. Except for Fred, the higher the patient number, the more damaged the patient.
If these cases were connected—and her gut instincts and her intuition screamed that they were—then whatever had been done to the men had started out mild with Michael, had gotten severe with Fred, had eased up with Joe, and then had progressively gone downhill from severe to catastrophic.
One thing was clear. These incidents hadn’t been accidents or coincidences any more than they were cases of PTSD. Someone, somewhere, was causing this. And due to the pattern of damage, she had a sick feeling in her stomach that it had been intentional.
But who would do this? Why would
anyone
do this? And why didn’t Foster know who and why? He spied on spies, for God’s sake.
Or did he know?
Is that why he had brought her here? To prove or disprove his suspicions?
Sara leaned back in her chair, dabbed the sweat from above her upper lip, from her forehead. In recruiting her, Foster had gone outside proper channels. So if his intention had been to prove or disprove suspicions, then it stood to reason that once those suspicions had been proved or disproved he intended to bury them and the proof. That meant he also intended to bury her.
Will I be canceled?
The moment you become a risk. Yes, you will.
Sweat trickled down between her breasts. She’d become a risk the moment he had mentioned Braxton.
Her stomach muscles clenched. The taste in her mouth turned bitter. Could he really do that? Bury her?
She sifted back, through five years of memories and confrontations with him. Panic surged up from deeper and deeper inside her. Not only could Foster bury her, he would.
Unless you stop him, Sara. You choose. Fight to stop him, or let him do it.
Shaking, she stacked the files and grabbed her purse. Her every instinct was to run to Joe, to wrap herself in one of his hugs and shut out the world. But she couldn’t do that. This problem wasn’t going to go away. She had to face it. And to solve it.
She had to face Foster. To talk to him, anyway. The sooner, the better.
His name was Jarrod.
He lay flat on his back on the padded floor and tucked his folded arms behind his head. Jarrod. Amazing how much pressure it relieved just to know his name.
The Celtic music beat a soothing tattoo inside his mind. He hated to admit it, but Sara had been right about it. About the music, and the rage. About a lot of things.
Now that there was color, his whole room felt
. . .
calmer. Having experienced the rage, he appreciated calm.
He knew his name. That he’d been a major. That he’d been a Shadow Watcher. That he was halfway in love with his doctor—a woman he had known of before coming here. A woman he nearly had murdered, who had cried for him. For
. . .
him.
Images came to mind. Images of the familiar man. Images of, he suspected, his mother. And images of a woman he sensed belonged to him. She was beautiful, with long black hair and brilliant blue eyes. But they were cold. She was cold.
Feeling her chill, he rubbed at his arms. No, not cold. Betrayed. She had betrayed him. How, he didn’t know. He had known, but he’d forgotten again. That was okay. When he was ready, the memory would come back.
He closed his eyes, watched the spots from the bright lights overhead dance on his eyelids, and thought of Sara. He didn’t want to care about her any more than she wanted to care about him. But he did.
God help him, he did.
Sara monitored the grounds.
No dogs, but guards patrolled the facility’s perimeter every half hour, and one person remained in the guard shack at the entrance gate at all times. The entire perimeter fence was electric, topped with razor wire, and enclosed even the grass airstrip. One exit in and out, blocked by an armed guard. That damned fence. How was she supposed to get out of here?
There had to be a way, and she had to find it. She had to talk to Foster. And to Lisa. Sara checked her watch. Eight forty. To hell with subterfuge.
She pulled out her car keys, slung her purse over her shoulder, and hustled to her car. Okay, so she’d get out fine. The problem would be getting back in. If worse came to worst, she could sit in her car parked outside the gate until morning.
She braked to a stop on the road near the shack, and a guard stepped out. In his late twenties, he had three stripes on his sleeve and a grim expression on his face. She hit the window button, and with a little squeak, the glass lowered.
“Dr. West?” He tilted his head to keep from blocking the light.
She didn’t remember having seen him before, but evidently she had at some time. She scanned his name tag, sewn just above the pocket on his uniform shirt. Ah, the uncommunicative guard who had escorted her to Fontaine’s office when she’d first arrived here. “Hi, Reaston.”
He checked his watch. “It’s not long until lock-down.”
“I have to risk it.” She pretended an embarrassment she didn’t feel. “I have to run to the store.”
“You can get everything you need here, ma’am.”
“No, I can’t. The facility exchange store is out of, er, what I need.”
Think fast, Sara. He’s young and brash. He’s going to ask what you need.
“Maybe I can rustle it up for you.” Reaston checked his watch again. “You’ll be hard-pressed to make it to the store and back before lock-down.”
“I’m going to have to risk it.”