“Do you think that the nosebleeds might stop if my abilities continue to strengthen?” I pressed.
She appeared deep in thought at length before finally shaking her head.
“Honestly, I have no idea,” she admitted. “These are all cutting-edge experiences now. You’re likely the first person who’s advanced this far into their abilities before, though I’d have to search Nuclegene’s entire database to know for certain.”
I nodded. Then I looked down at her with appreciation.
“I can’t thank you enough for helping me, Maria,” I offered.
Her resulting smile was a movie-star-worthy level of spectacular. Her eyes darted to her watch and she quickly rose from the chair.
“I have to return home. My neighbor, Claire, was kind enough to watch the kids for me, but I really need to get back to them now,” she explained. “I’ll start making more of the liquefied supplement for you as soon as possible.”
I bent over and gently pressed a quick kiss to her cheek.
“Thank you for everything,” I offered. “I’ll keep you posted.”
She nodded and then we both went our separate ways.
I continued to the fifth floor and located Burroughs’ room by the sight of his daughters sitting nearby in an oversized family waiting area that served as a central lobby for the patient’s rooms in that wing of the building. I looked at the nurse’s station to see both Sally Burroughs and Agent Sanders meeting with a doctor.
“Are you here to help Aunt Meg find the person who shot my daddy?” asked one of the girls.
Aunt Meg?
Then I remembered Agent Sanders’ business card.
Megan Sanders
.
I stared at the innocent face of one of the blonde-haired, blue-eyed girls who couldn’t have been more than five or six years old. Burroughs might be an asshole, but his daughters seemed like little angels.
I squatted down to see her eye-to-eye and adopted a reassuring expression.
“I’m certainly going to try,” I said with as much resoluteness as I could muster.
An unusual bond had been formed by circumstance; Burroughs and his family, and me and my family.
A nurse peeked out from Burroughs’ room. “Is there a Logan Bringer out here?”
“I’m Logan Bringer,” I said.
“Mr. Burroughs is asking for you,” she said. “But he’s very weak following his surgery, so I’d appreciate if you’d keep your visit brief.”
“Is that you, Bringer? I heard your voice,” Burroughs’ strained weak, but still gruff, voice demanded. “Get in here.”
Both the girls crowded in around me to stare into their father’s room.
“Daddy’s going to have a chat with the nice man and then you can both come give me a big hug,” Burroughs whispered in an unusually friendly-sounding tone.
The girls both replied in unison, “Okay, Daddy.”
Well, I’ll be damned; the jerk actually had a heart.
Okay, maybe I was being the asshole just then.
I closed the door and looked at the formerly robust FBI agent, who now looked more like someone who’d only narrowly cheated death. I’d seen that look before on the battlefield more times than I could count. Frankly, I was impressed that the guy was even conscious after all that he’d just been through.
“Sit your ass down, Bringer,” he demanded in a weak, groggy voice. He paused to take in a few breaths before adding, “Tell me what the hell…is going on.”
It sounded like he was maintaining consciousness by sheer willpower alone.
I recounted what I’d told his partner earlier and briefly described what had taken place at my house, including our little “bullet experience.”
Believe it or not, the guy actually seemed to be listening for a change. Or maybe he was just fighting unconsciousness.
He moved his head back into his pillow and stared at the ceiling for what seemed like an eternity.
“Damn. I’ve never even heard of anything like that,” he half-whispered. “Whatever this is, you’re in deep, Bringer. And this better mean that you’re planning to cooperate fully with us now.”
“Just so long as I’m able to get to the bottom of who set fire to my sister’s house and nearly killed my family.”
Burroughs remained silent for a time.
“Fine. You can start by telling me why some heavy was ransacking your house when I arrived there.”
“
Ransacking
?” I asked.
Burroughs took a series of shallow breaths before speaking again.
“Yeah, I heard him rifling through things. I think I surprised him, but he was a much quicker draw than me.”
Burroughs closed his eyes for a few moments, and I almost got up to leave before he finally added, “My pistol barely cleared leather before I had two rounds in my chest.”
I mulled that over for a moment. I wondered if the stranger fired two rounds as a matter of habit.
Something about the technique triggered in my mind.
“This guy sounds like a pro. Maybe ex-special forces or sniper,” I ventured aloud.
That realization should’ve made me cringe, but instead all that I felt was steely resolve.
“The man’s formidable,” Burroughs conceded.
“Doesn’t matter,” I added. “Soon, he’ll be the one who needs to start looking over his shoulder.”
Burroughs grunted.
“Well-well, I’d say that soldier boy finally woke up again,” he whispered.
There were a few moments of shallow breaths before he spoke again.
“Honestly, when I first saw you, I thought you were just another washed-up, former army loser. What do you think about that, ground-pounder?”
I frowned.
“I think I’ll let my future actions do the talking,” I replied.
He squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them to stare at the ceiling above.
“Good enough for me, Army. Just don’t get Sanders killed in the process, or so help me, I’ll hunt you down if it’s the last thing I do.”
The guy was barely conscious and had numerous tubes stuck in his arms, yet he sounded like he meant every word.
“I stopped two bullets for her earlier tonight,” I said. “What makes you think I won’t stop more for her, if needed?”
The resulting surprised expression on his face was truly priceless.
A knock sounded behind me and the door opened to reveal both Agent Sanders and Burroughs’ wife.
“Are we interrupting anything important?” Sanders asked with a suspicious expression.
“Nah,” Burroughs insisted in a voice that sounded a little weaker than a few minutes ago. “Just asking Bringer some questions.”
“My God, Ted, you just got out of a critical surgery. I think you need to concentrate on healing for the time being,” Sally Burroughs chastised. “However, you have two daughters who’d like to visit their father before you get some sleep.”
Burroughs grunted.
I rubbed at my mouth with one hand to hide my look of amusement. It appeared that Agent Burroughs wasn’t the only assertive person in their household.
“All right, honey,” Burroughs muttered. “Come on in, girls.”
His two daughters carefully squeezed past me and slowly approached their father’s bedside. Agent Sanders gently led me from the room and toward the nearest elevators.
“Why in God’s name were you pestering Agent Burroughs?” she asked in an accusatory tone.
“I couldn’t resist the temptation,” I replied dryly.
She shook her head but didn’t press the subject.
“How’s your family?” she asked as we entered the empty elevator car together.
“They’re okay, thanks for asking. I suggested they should visit my parents out of town for a few days,” I replied.
“Not a bad idea, but the police will want to visit with them first, myself included,” she said.
I nodded.
“Where to now?” I asked.
Sanders pressed the button for the bottom floor.
“Back to our offices,” she said. “We need to go over some more details and try to put together as many of the pieces to this puzzle as possible.”
“We?”
She tentatively looked over at me.
“Mr. Bringer, it seems that you’re at the center of everything on this case. Who better than you to help me work through things?”
“Fair enough, but there’s something else that you need to do for me first,” I stipulated.
She appeared surprised and her eyes narrowed. “And what exactly is that?”
I grinned despite myself.
“I’d consider it a courtesy if you’d start calling me Logan.”
“I’ll consider it, Mr. Bringer,” she replied as we exited the elevator.
Chapter 7
Events had transpired so quickly and chaotically that I’d barely glanced at my watch since jogging earlier that evening. By the time I finally slouched into a cheap cushioned chair before Agent Sanders’ desk at the FBI offices, it was nearly midnight. Remarkably, aside from being a little hungry, I felt surprisingly awake and alert.
The office still buzzed with four other agents who were busy either talking on the phone or working at computer terminals.
A female agent with long blonde hair suspiciously peered at me while she was on the phone. I politely looked away, and noticed Sanders staring at me, as well.
“Hungry?” she asked.
“Well, now that you mention it, yeah,” I replied.
A few minutes later, a fellow wearing dark slacks and a blazer walked by and slipped two wrapped deli sandwiches and cans of Coca-Cola onto Sanders’ desk.
“Thank you, sir,” she said while smiling back at me.
“You earned it tonight,” he replied as he strode across the room and into a small office.
I shook my head. “Now you’re a mind reader?”
“Logical deduction,” she replied.
“Your boss?” I asked, reaching for one of the sandwiches.
“Chuck Denton. He’s our field office supervisor,” she replied as she popped the tab on her soda can.
For more than an hour, we went back over everything that I could recall, beginning with my jogging and leading through the fire at my sister’s, and then of course, the shooting at my house.
As Sanders left her desk to visit with her boss, I yawned and was thinking that I needed my abilities to get a hell of a lot stronger if I was going to be of any use in defending my family.
Following that, I must’ve dozed off.
I thought that I was dreaming, but then, everything seemed so real and vivid. I sat in a crowded bus terminal, but it seemed too quiet given all of the people milling around me. When I scanned people’s faces, they all silently stared back at me, and I recognized each of them. They were people who I’d seen that evening: firemen, police, hospital workers, and the agents in the field office, including Sanders.
Gradually, I heard some people talking in hushed tones. I looked around but only saw lips moving for the people representing the agents who were in the field office.
“Kind of a cute guy in the chair over there,” the blonde-haired agent muttered.
“…help but wonder what his story is,” another agent muttered.
“Do I dare tell Chuck about the bullets floating in midair?” Agent Sanders asked.
“Mayhem means nothing but endless overtime,” another agent muttered sitting close by.
“I’ll probably have to call in for additional agents on this case,” Chuck Denton noted with aggravation from a bench seat across from me.
I woke up with a start and nearly fell out of my chair. Three agents arrayed around the room stared at me with a look of surprise.
I rubbed at my forehead and felt cool sweat on my palm.
“What the—?”
W
hat’s his problem?
…
kind of an odd situation. I wonder what his story is.
There were voices in my head!
I looked over at the blonde-haired agent a few feet away and she stared back at me suspiciously.
I wonder if he’s single?
“What?” I asked her.
She frowned. “I didn’t say anything.”
What’s happening out there
, said Sanders’ voice in my head.
“What’s wrong?” Sanders asked as she strode over to me.
“Whaddya’ mean?” I asked, completely focused on her face.
What just happened
, I could hear Sanders ask, except that her lips never moved!
“Everything’s just fine,” I insisted. “Just a weird dream. Must’ve nodded off.”
She regarded me dubiously. Suddenly, I couldn’t hear her thoughts anymore.
“Listen, it’s been a long day for all of us. Let’s call it a night and we’ll pick up first thing in the morning,” she suggested.
I nodded. “Sounds fine to me.”
Sanders was kind enough to drop me back by my sister’s home to retrieve my car. I noticed that there was a police car parked in the street, as well as someone from the fire department poking around with a flashlight. Crime tape was strewn about like a spider’s web.