What am I thinking? He’s dealing with a sister who has cancer. I’m a single mom. I have enough on my plate. He has enough on his. Lord, help me to focus on the right things here.
“Why did you leave the military?” Regan asked.
“Sam.”
His eyes glistened as he turned away from her, and her throat thickened at his quick emotional response. Clinically, she knew a lot about Samantha Waterson. Age twenty-eight. Grade four glioblastoma—the worst kind of brain tumor, resistant to surgery and aggressive chemotherapy. These patients sought Regan out when conventional medicine failed to destroy the malicious cells that replaced healthy tissue with dysfunctional ones.
Interacting with Colby personalized his sister to her in a way that was sometimes hard as a doctor to cross over—seeing the person instead of just the brain MRI.
“Had you decided whether or not you were going to take Sam’s case?” he asked without taking his eyes off the road.
“I never set up a face-to-face meeting until I know the patient is a candidate. A strong candidate. I actually have her on the surgery schedule for tomorrow morning.”
That was true. Regan had developed the policy after meeting with too many patients who weren’t an appropriate fit for the study. She’d pray, relentlessly, for help in making the right decision. Was giving false hope better than dealing with death? Regan wasn’t strong enough to decline treatment when families sobbed in front of her. What human could? It was the part of medicine she hated—her inability to defeat death.
“Good.” Colby nodded and wiped away a quick tear, sniffing hard as if to urge the other potential droplets of his fear to stay in their place. “I guess my one and only job is to get you to the hospital safely. Get you all fixed up and then on to save Sam’s life.”
His statement was like a knife to her heart. There was so much expectation in those few words and she didn’t want to disappoint him.
Because, like Colby, she wasn’t sure she’d seen the last of those men. Could he be a man she could trust if they came back?
She glanced back at her SUV as they merged into traffic—the passenger side completely mashed up against the concrete and all of the windows shattered. Now that most of her adrenaline had dissipated, she was becoming cognizant of the mild aches and pains that would bloom into full-body soreness and immobility in the next few days, and she didn’t know if she’d feel safe operating on someone’s brain tomorrow.
Her cure couldn’t work if the patient died on the operating room table.
THREE
Olivia wasn’t answering her texts.
It was nearly midnight before Regan left the hospital. First the car accident. Could it be called that? Was potential vehicular homicide a more accurate term? Followed by stitches in the ER and then patient appointments the rest of the day. Above all else, she didn’t want her personal circumstances to affect the care of her patients. So many patients were desperate to participate in her research protocol, which showed true promise in curing the most aggressive type of brain tumor.
And she was using a polio virus to do it.
The cost of that decision was getting home way past Olivia’s bedtime, and the last thing she needed was to worry about her eleven-year-old daughter and the growing distance between them.
Sadly, medicine taught doctors to assume the worst-case scenario first and then settle on the more realistic diagnosis once the life-threatening possibilities were ruled out. Simply, an unanswered text first meant someone had died—plain and simple. Or they were stranded in a ditch and near death. No other possibility was acceptable until that one was ruled out.
Adding to this certainty was that her nanny, Polina, didn’t answer her texts or phone calls, either.
Lord, just let them be safe.
Regan fingered the front of her phone to call up the screen and smoothed her thumb over the picture of Olivia. Regan hadn’t thought eleven would be a hard age to deal with, but it was turning into exactly that. Her usually joyful and optimistic child had turned surly and ambivalent. Were the hormones changing more than her body? Or was it something more, something that Regan couldn’t change, like being away from home so much? The clinical trial consumed nearly every extra moment she could spare. Scraps of her attention. That was what Olivia got. She wanted to change this, but also needed to provide for Olivia—for all that she thought she deserved.
Why hadn’t Olivia called? Regan’s routine with Olivia when she was at the hospital was to talk every night if she didn’t make it home by dinner. If Regan couldn’t take the time to chat, she would send a quick text. But her call went to voice mail—her text with a multitude of heart and flower emojis unanswered, like silent witnesses to the distance between them.
Regan tapped her fingers on the front of her phone, trying to disperse the anxious tingling of her fingertips. She was breathing too fast. It was making her headache come back in full force.
Slow it down, Regan, slow it down. Stop thinking like this.
It wasn’t the first time an evening call went unanswered—but it was rare.
As the garage door rose, Polina’s battered navy blue Chevy Cavalier was where it should be. Regan parked her rental car, grabbed her purse and exited the vehicle, but froze when she saw the door that led into her kitchen. It stood open—all the way. The interior of the house was as dark and deep as a water well. The garage light flickered off and Regan’s heartbeat raced as blackness and fear enveloped her.
It was quiet—too quiet.
“Olivia? Polina?”
A stillness like no human presence remained. Regan pulled out her phone and activated the flashlight, approaching the wooden steps that led into the house with measured caution. Her heart galloped in her chest.
As the light traveled up the door frame, a smudge of blood jumped out in deep contrast to the white. When Regan crested the top step, heavy black marks and chipped paint gave the door a distressed look that had not been present before. As Regan entered the mudroom and eased the door closed behind her, she nearly tripped on bottles of laundry supplies that sat scattered on the marble tile. The box of laundry detergent had turned over and spilled. Soapy white crystals spread out like a blizzard had raced through the room. On the backside of the door, dusty footprints marred the white paint in several areas, almost as if someone had planted feet there to prevent the door from being opened. They were too large to be Olivia’s. The tread marks seemed characteristic of the athletic shoes Polina often wore.
Regan stepped farther into the house, throwing on every light switch as she briskly walked by, flooding the darkness to keep her evil thoughts at bay. The desk in her kitchen had been ransacked. Her papers, bills and notes were scattered all across the floor. A few more steps and she crossed broken glass from strewed dinner dishes. She wasn’t sure at first glance if the red liquid splashed against her refrigerator was spaghetti sauce or blood.
Rushing up the tan-carpeted stairs, Regan headed straight into Olivia’s room.
And there was the bed, perfectly made.
“Olivia!” she screamed, her sobs the only answer.
She rushed across to hall to Polina’s room and was met by another neatly made bed. Regan crossed to the center of the room, looking for any clue that would explain their disappearances, her briefcase still clutched in her hand, her breath strangled by invisible pythons wrapping and tightening themselves around her chest.
Regan’s phone pinged—an incoming text. Her vision blurred from the onslaught of tears. She brought her phone to her face.
Whatever you do—don’t call the police. Go downstairs. You’ll find what you’re looking for.
Regan’s hands shook and she tumbled to her knees. Whoever had Olivia was watching her. Had they followed her home? Were there cameras? Or were they merely watching her shadow travel through the windows to determine her position in the h
ouse? Did they sickly observe and relish the fact that her life was changing forever? Were they here? Inside her home? She didn’t want to go downstairs. Had she missed them? Were Olivia and Polina’s bodies lying somewhere downstairs and she had run past them, hoping to find them sleeping peacefully in their beds?
Terror crystallized every functioning cell in a wintry ice Regan didn’t believe she’d ever be free from. Should she call 9-1-1? Was the text instructing her not to because the assailants were waiting downstairs? Her heartbeat echoed in her ears like a scream in a canyon. Who could she reach out to? Her career caused isolation. Her parents believed her ex-husband’s stories that Regan’s study of medicine had caused the demise of her marriage, and so they didn’t stay in touch, not even for Olivia’s sake. Sadly, Regan didn’t know much about Polina’s family, or if they could help her grope through this shock to find help.
Regan took several deep breaths to abate the tremor stealing the strength from her legs. She stood, shaky, and took the stairs back down, leaning heavily against the banister to stay upright.
As her feet hit the landing, she almost dropped to her knees again—the terror quickly leaching the strength from her muscles. Retracing her steps, she entered the kitchen, seemingly Olivia and Polina’s last stand, and found a card lying on her granite island—the bawdy fluorescent green almost mocking.
It was Olivia’s handwriting on the back of the envelope. Mommy.
Regan crumpled against the counter, pulling the envelope toward her. She slid her blood-drained finger under the envelope’s flap, ripped through the paper and removed the card.
A ransom note.
We have your daughter. In order to get her back alive, we need you to do the following...
* * *
Colby stood on the sidewalk in front of Regan Lockhart’s home. A mix of emotions hazed his thoughts. One, he was angry she hadn’t showed up for Sam’s surgery this morning. Two, he was disappointed because he had been looking forward to seeing her again. But, overwhelmingly, he was worried. Did the events of yesterday have anything to do with today? Had they been a precursor to a bigger event? A crime even?
In hunting fugitives, starting at home base was often the first step. Then Colby would check friends and criminal cohorts. There was always a place to start.
Time to find out what the doctor was hiding.
It hadn’t taken long to find Regan’s house. It was not as he’d expected it to be...a smallish, refurbished Craftsman home, not five minutes from the hospital. Nothing looked out of the ordinary. Above all else, she had to open the door—even if it took a ruse to do it. He jogged up the steps and pounded three times on the black door.
“Dr. Lockhart!”
Colby quickly stepped back from the door. His plan was to put his foot in the crack as soon as she opened it, and if she didn’t quickly agree to return to the hospital, he was going to throw her over his shoulder and carry her there himself.
But as soon as the door opened and he began to advance, two metallic barbed instruments of torture hit Colby square in the chest and every muscle in his body contracted.
A Taser.
It felt like he’d just hit his funny bone, the feeling multiplying with lightning speed through every nerve in his body. He fell straight forward onto his face, his nose punching into the cement and blood popping from broken blood vessels. He inhaled the coppery-tasting fluid down the back of his throat as he struggled to open his mouth to breathe. Closing his eyes against the vertigo seemed like his only option.
“Mr. Waterson! What are you doing here?”
He felt Regan’s hands at his shoulder and waist as she pulled him over to his back, quickly plucking the darts from his chest. She was stronger than he’d imagined.
Did she really have to ask, considering the plight she had left Sam in? Colby tried to answer but the dizziness, even with his eyes closed, had him about to toss his breakfast onto Regan’s lap.
She laid a calming hand on his chest. “I’m sorry. It’s just that you scared me. Why didn’t you just tell me it was you?”
What could he say? I’m so mad about Sam’s surgery being canceled that I want you arrested and held until you can do said operation. I didn’t know if you’d even remember me. If you’d still trust me enough, considering what happened yesterday, to open the door.
“Can you sit up?”
Colby held up a hand to stop her, still afraid if he opened his mouth he couldn’t control what might happen next—both by his body or his language. Worsening his nausea was the blood he was swallowing. He looked up, focusing on the sky and the gray fall clouds brewing black with another threat of rain. Breathing slowly, he felt the dizziness abate and he placed his hands behind him and pushed up. Blood from his nose began to drip onto his shirt.
Regan reached forward and pinched his nostrils together. He winced from the pain, though it was markedly less than the full-body muscle soreness he now suffered, akin to lifting weights in the gym for twelve hours. It surprised him that she didn’t hold anything as a barrier from his blood when it was likely ingrained in her DNA to never do such a thing. That could mean she was willing to risk her life to do whatever needed to be done. Perhaps it was the same thing that made her a medical research maverick.
Never in his life had a woman surprised him like that. It was the last thing he’d expected from the lithe, uber-intellectual doctor. There was a definite fire within her.
After countless minutes, she released her fingers but kept a palm open underneath his nose to catch any stray droplets.
“Why are you here?” Colby asked, the words more angry than he intended. As he’d feared, she backed away from him, her trepidation filling the space. She was afraid of something. He softened his voice. “Why didn’t you come to the hospital for Sam’s surgery? Are you all right?”
Regan sat back on her heels and looked away from him, her hands clasped tightly in her lap.
What could he expect from her? Why should she trust him?
He folded shaky arms around his legs, not sure he could stand without falling. “Whatever it is, I want to help. Not just for Sam but...”
For you, too? Was that what he was going to say? Was it more than desperation for Sam tugging at his heartstrings?
Regan gripped her thighs, her hands white with blue fingertips from the frigid breeze that blew and pulled dead leaves from skeleton branches.
Colby took a deep breath and the sharp, crisp air set his lungs on fire.
Silent tears fell down her face. What would cause a woman, who seemingly had dedicated her life to healing, to abandon a patient and her clinical trial? He’d asked himself this question over and over again because only when he knew the answer could he save her.
And save Sam.
“I’m here to help you so that you can still help Sam. If something happens to you, no one else will be able to do the surgery—or have the cure.”
Regan’s lips trembled and she pressed the back of her pale hand against her lips. Her silence wasn’t defiance at his request...it was fear.
Colby eased up to his knees and reached for the hand hanging limp at her side. He held it and rubbed the back of it with his thumb, hoping the friction would ease the chill. “Please...I can and will help you. Whatever it is. I’ll do anything to save Sam’s life.”
Her gray-green eyes took him in, measuring him with an intensity that caused his heart to skip several beats. Few women caused such a rise.
“Someone has taken my daughter, Olivia. As ransom, they want the modified polio virus. Your sister’s cure.” She raised an eyebrow...almost as a challenge to his resolve.
He stood, using her porch railing for support, and reached a hand out to her. “I think we need to go inside and talk. What you don’t know about me is that I’m used to finding bad guys...and it seems like some bad guys hav
e your daughter.”
At first she wouldn’t do it—take his hand. He’d seen the look in women before who’d had less than ideal relationships with men, and he felt like he was asking the rabbit to trust the wolf. But then, ever so slowly, she reached out for him and took his hand. With his other hand, he clenched her elbow and pulled her up.
And in that moment, their eyes meeting, Colby wondered if he was trading his life for Sam’s.
FOUR
Regan trembled. It had been years since she’d had a man in her home. Colby’s inquisitive stare took in what remained of the home invasion that had snatched Olivia and Polina from what Regan considered a very safe house.
“When did you discover that they were missing?” Colby asked. He sat on her white couch, leaned forward and settled his elbows on his knees, his muscles still quivering from the effects of the Taser.
Hurting Colby added to the weight in her gut—so many misdeeds she needed to confess. What would he do when he found out what she’d done? Would he still help her?
“Last night when I got home. The house was a disaster—evidence of a struggle here on the lower level. When I was upstairs searching for Olivia and Polina, I got a text that told me to go back to the kitchen.”
“What did the text say?”
“It instructed me not to call law enforcement. To go back downstairs—which is where the ransom note was.”
“So they were watching you.”
Regan nodded. “I think so but from outside. I’ve searched the house pretty intently and didn’t find anything I would consider a camera or listening device.”
Colby glanced around. “Not exactly your area of expertise, either. Is the house unattended for long periods of time?”
Regan shook her head. “Polina is almost always here.”
“My guess is they had someone trailing you, but I couldn’t guarantee it was just that.”
The strength leached from her legs, and Regan sat next to Colby. Both stared straight ahead. Regan’s heart thundered in her chest. She needed to tell him before he made a commitment he wouldn’t back away from. At least, that was the kind of man she read Colby to be. Someone who wouldn’t walk away from a fight once he’d agreed to step into the ring.
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