“Yet you didn’t fight for me when my father sent you away.” She swallowed hard. “You just…went.”
He didn’t bother to deny it. Nor did he bother to deny the rising heat between them, the tension that came from what had happened between them before, what was coming between them now. He nudged up her chin with his fingertip. “I’m here now. But I won’t mix personal and professional aspects ever again. So you choose. Partners or lovers?”
Before she could frame an answer, he bent and kissed her, swallowing her startled gasp and nudging his tongue between her lips.
Remember what we had before, he meant the kiss to say. Think of what we could have now. Then her flavor exploded on his tongue, rich and potent, and his mind went blank, save for one guilty thought.
He had promised. But sometimes, a man had to break a promise to keep a promise. He’d promised to stay away from her, but he’d also promised to keep her safe. What if he could only save her by becoming involved?
So he poured himself into the kiss. The sensations reminded him of the blessed time they’d shared in an airport hotel. His hands traced her body, telling her of the sleepless, lonely nights that separated them, the sleepless nights they could pass together.
A noise from outside the room was a vague intrusion, quickly lost in the feel of her neat, narrow hands gripping his shirt…and pushing him away.
“Damn it, Rathe.” She lifted a trembling hand to her flushed, swollen lips. Her chest heaved as though she’d run a mile, and her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “That’s not fair.”
Heartbeat pounding in his temples, he closed the distance between them, knowing he’d won, knowing she felt the same way she had seven years earlier. Knowing he could use it.
He brushed a strand of hair away from her cheek. “I’m not trying to play fair. I’m trying to make up for lost time. So tell me…” He imagined her beneath him, surrounding him. Safe. “Partners or lovers?”
She lifted her chin. Her lips drew a flat line across her face. “Partners.”
And she turned and walked away. The action startled him, disappointed him and brought back an echo of the pain he’d felt when the hotel door closed on her heels the day he’d sent her away for her own good.
In his mind Rathe heard the rev of a badly tuned jeep and a scattering of gunshots. But in the small room he heard Nia curse.
In that instant personal tension shifted to trepidation. “What is it?”
She swallowed, hand on the doorknob. “The door won’t open. We’re trapped.”
Chapter Six
Stupid, stupid, stupid. Nia stuffed down the fear and yanked on the storage room door. She’d been stupid to stop paying attention to the danger, and stupid to think, even for a moment, that Rathe’s kiss had been genuine.
He’d found another angle to work, that was all. Another way to ease her off the case. Partner or lover.
Worse, she’d been so caught up in the moment, in the memories, that she’d done the unthinkable—let down her guard and allowed Cadaver Man or one of his accomplices to trap them in a tiny room.
Stupid. She let the self-recrimination beat back the flutter of panic. Sweat prickled at her nape. She wasn’t sure which was worse, the thought of being trapped in here with Rathe or the thought of what might await them on the other side of the door.
“Here, let me.” When he nudged her aside, his touch scalded her flesh, but she shook it off and pressed her ear to the door. She swore she could hear a laundry cart rumbling past, down a corridor that was supposedly off-limits.
Rathe cursed and kicked the door, more from frustration than a plan, and turned away. “I don’t suppose HFH training includes lock picking these days?”
“It’s not the lock.” Nia twisted the knob freely and resisted the urge to beat against the thick metal and scream. She took a deep breath, willed her heart to slow. “I think someone wedged the door on the other side.”
“Great.” Rathe scowled. “Then what’s your plan, partner?”
Nia felt a prickle of surprise at the temper in his voice, the anger etched into the lines of his face. He was annoyed she’d rather be his partner than his lover. Of all the nerve!
Irritated, she glared at the door and saw that it was hung from the inside. Bingo. “I think I can get us out of here.” She pulled the small tool kit from her back pocket, unable to resist adding, “And for the record, there’s a big difference between Maria and me. I put the job first.”
Rathe muttered something uncomplimentary. For a man who railed about women being unprofessional, he seemed to be having a hard time with the concept himself. Professionals didn’t go around kissing each other.
Offering themselves as lovers.
Ignoring the flare of warmth that buzzed through her body, ignoring the taste of him on her lips and the imprint of his flesh on hers, Nia positioned a small screwdriver, tapped it with her collapsible hammer and neatly popped the door hinges. “Here,” she ordered, “you grab the door and I’ll keep watch.”
It wasn’t the first time her tool kit had come in handy and it likely wouldn’t be the last. She folded the worn leather neatly and passed a hand over her father’s initials. Thank you, Daddy.
He might not have understood why she wanted to join HFH, but in the end he’d tried to support her as best he could. Because she’d loved him, and because she believed Rathe had loved him, too, she could understand part of Rathe’s decision not to come home.
But not all of it.
“I don’t hear anything.” With one hand on the doorknob and the other on the upper hinge, Rathe eased the heavy metal slab aside. “Be careful.”
But the hallway was empty save for a strand of yellow police tape. No Cadaver Man armed with a scalpel and a penchant for eyes. No laundry cart filled with pilfered supplies. Nothing.
Adrenaline drained away, leaving Nia hollow.
“Well, hell.” Rathe toed the wooden chock that had held the door shut. “Someone wanted us out of the way.”
“Or they wanted us trapped until they were ready to deal with us.” Her voice quavered with the memory of bloody tear tracks, but she forced herself to stand away when Rathe moved up beside her. She squared her shoulders. “Let’s do our job. You’ve got my back, partner.”
“Nia…” His tone was low with warning, but she ignored it and him and set off down the hall, toward the room where they’d found the body.
Nerves sizzled to life on every exposed inch of her skin. Her eye twitched like quick butterfly wings when she neared the room. If Rathe hadn’t been right behind her, she might have turned and run for the elevator, but she forced herself to forge onward.
Her hand trembled as she reached for the doorknob. The police seal was broken, the door half-ajar. Someone had been inside.
Perhaps they still were.
Excitement thrummed through her body, thundered in her ears. Fear was an echo of nerves, held at bay by the man at her heels. Her partner.
She pushed the door open.
The room was empty. Only a dark, dried smear, a smudge of chalk and a dusting of powder marked where the body had been. But the tension grew worse.
She eased back and let the door swing closed. “Earlier, when we were…” Arguing. Talking about Maria. Kissing like seven years hadn’t passed. “…Occupied, I thought I heard something in the hall.”
“I heard a thump.” Rathe’s eyes were dark with a potent combination of anger and the same things she was remembering.
“No. After that.” Nia cast back over her scattered impressions, tried to blunt the memory of his kiss, of the way he had made her feel, as though she was all he’d ever wanted. All he would ever need.
She knew better than that. He would always pick the job over her, so she’d beaten him to it.
And it was on that thought that she heard the sound again. Rathe gripped her shoulder tightly and jerked his chin in the direction of the noise. “Do you hear it?”
She nodded and dropped her voice to the level o
f his, near a whisper. “A laundry cart.” She glanced at him. “Do you believe me now?”
“Come on. This time you can watch my back—partner.” And he was off, walking cat’s-paw quiet on his rubber-soled boots.
Heart beating an excited tattoo, Nia followed on tiptoes, careful not to let her low heels tap the echoing floor. The noise grew louder, then faded again, as though the cart had turned a corner. But there was no corner to turn. The short hallway dead-ended.
“Damn it.” Rathe thumped the wall in frustration, the noise echoing strangely in the closed-in space. “We’re missing something.”
She checked the doors on either side of the dead end. Empty storerooms. “Let’s work our way around to the next corridor over. Maybe the sounds are traveling from there.”
“Fine.” He scrubbed both hands through his silvery-blond hair, leaving the short strands sticking up on end. It made him look younger. The sight tightened a fist around her heart at the thought of what might have been.
“Focus,” she muttered to herself as she ducked beneath the police tape. “Do your damn job.”
“What was that?”
She glanced over her shoulder at Rathe. “Nothing.” But she could see in his eyes that he understood, perhaps too well. Something had changed between them the moment he’d told her about Maria. But if the confession had eased his soul, it had done the opposite for hers, because now she knew for sure.
He still loved Maria. Probably always would. It was in his eyes when he spoke of her—the anguish and the betrayal. The love.
It was how Nia had once imagined him looking at her.
Back in the main laundry area, the human noise was louder, the pace more frantic. She picked her way through a sea of canvas-sided carts, peering into each just in case. But instinct drew her onward, past the washing machines and giant steamers, past the rows and racks of pristine white lab coats and folded towels. Through a sea of workers, who carefully ignored the investigators, then whispered when they were past.
Rathe followed her, ghostlike, as she doubled back to the section of corridor she imagined was immediately opposite the dead end. It was guarded by a heavy metal door and a spray of caution signs.
She paused. “The incinerator?” Instantly her mind conjured images of fiery pits and screams. Focus. This wasn’t a B-grade action movie, it was Boston General Hospital.
Still, her shoulders were tense with anticipation when she eased open the door. Her left eyelid pulsed.
The walls were thick, and nearby doors opened to daylight. The incinerator was built into the outer wall of the hospital, separate, yet not, lest the fire run amok. Nia shivered at the thought of a hospital in flames.
“See anything?” Rathe crowded in behind her, making her feel simultaneously safe and unsafe.
She stepped farther into the narrow room and heat bloomed across her body. Her eyes locked on a canvas cart. “There’s a laundry cart. Think someone’s been burning clothes?”
The small space was empty, but for the cart in the corner. Nia’s eyes were drawn to a scrap of paper caught in the door of the idling incinerator. Rathe headed for the laundry cart while she bent to read the tiny letters.
Luer Lock Syr—
“Hey! I think I’ve got something.” When Rathe turned in inquiry, Nia spun the wheel on the incinerator door. It opened on a wash of hot fumes. The beast might be quiet at the moment, but its insides pulsed with radiant heat, and the air steamed when warmth rushed outward. A red light blinked on the console, warning Nia that the machine hadn’t yet cooled down to safe levels.
Yeah, like she couldn’t tell that from the blast of hot air.
Disregarding the danger and the foul fumes, Nia used her fingernails to tease the scrap of paper free. More of the label was visible now. Luer Lock Syringes 1 CC.
“The supplies!” She turned toward Rathe to share the discovery. “We’ve found the—look out!”
An apparition lunged up from the laundry cart and tackled Rathe. Trailing a white sheet, it could have been Jacob Marley’s ghost, but the solid smack of flesh on flesh was real. The laundry cart overbalanced with a crash. Taken by surprise, Rathe fell beneath the weight of his gray, ghostly attacker.
Nia screamed before she realized the heavy metal door would muffle the noise. There would be no help from the others in the laundry area.
Heart pounding, she leaped aside as the men rolled across the floor, grunting and trading punches like dirty street fighters. Cadaver Man kicked the tangling sheet aside, and Nia grabbed it.
“Get up, Rathe. Get up!”
Either he heard her cries, or realized he had no leverage on the floor. Rathe elbowed the taller man in the gut, scrambled to his feet and shot her a wild look. “Get out of here.”
“Like hell I will.” When Cadaver Man lurched to his feet and swung a meaty roundhouse at Rathe’s head, Nia stepped in and looped the sheet across the villain’s throat. She jumped on his back, pulled tight and did her best to strangle him.
Mistake. Cadaver Man roared, spun and slammed himself backward against the incinerator console. The blow drove the breath from Nia’s lungs in a whoosh that was masked by the scream of sirens and the roar of machinery as the incinerator flared to life.
A gout of heat and smoke belched from the open door, then the failsafes shut down the metal dragon. Still, the heat in the room skyrocketed, the metal glowed cherry red.
“Nia, let go!” Before her dazed muscles could obey Rathe’s shout, he hit Cadaver Man from the side, sending the three of them staggering toward the open door of the incinerator.
Instead of letting go, she tightened her fingers on the sheet and her knee grip on Cadaver Man’s ribs. She jerked her weight to the side, hoping he would overbalance.
He did. Right into the incinerator.
The lean gray man shot his hands out and touched hot metal. Steam rose. Flesh sizzled. And Cadaver Man screamed, a high, thin noise of agony.
He spun and shuddered, bucking Nia off his back. She felt the sheet skim through her fingers, felt her body lift through the air.
Furnace-hot air blasted around her.
Gravity slammed her toward the ground, toward the red-hot metal. She reached out her hands, twisted her body and fought the inevitable.
“Nia!” The shout was almost lost in the machine’s roar.
“Rathe!” She felt his fingers tangle in her shirt and yank. Buttons popped, cloth ripped. She grabbed for him, and their hands locked. They tumbled to the floor—
Outside the incinerator.
The cement was cool at Nia’s back, Rathe warm against her front. They lay chest to chest, tangled together like lovers.
Cadaver Man was gone.
Rathe lay still, his heart pounding in time with hers. Quick and frightened. Excited. After a moment he groaned and buried his face in her hair. “I can’t take this, Nia. You’re scaring the hell out of me with these stunts. You’re a bloody menace!”
But there was no censure in the words now. There was only weary acceptance. So she took a chance. “I’m also a bloody good investigator. Admit it.”
They had evidence now, and connections. Cadaver Man formed a link between the corpse and the missing supplies. But who did he work for? How did the transplant deaths fit in?
And why burn the pilfered equipment? Or had they just burned the packages? And if so, why?
“Damn it, Nia—”
The rest of his words were lost in the metal howl of the outer door, and the arrival of the ERT—the equipment response team. Summoned by the incinerator’s alarm, they were stunned to find a pair of doctors on the floor, surrounded by crumpled whites and an upended laundry cart.
As soon as she could, Nia slipped away from the chaos, out the back door, which opened onto the loading area. She tucked the scrap of paper in her pocket and wished that it had been something more concrete. More obvious. But she couldn’t think about it now; she was suddenly too tired. Achingly bone-weary, fuzzy-head tired. Too tired to even face
the drive to the apartment.
Call it delayed shock, call it lack of sleep or adrenaline letdown, her body was shutting down. She stumbled to the curb and belatedly realized she was alone—and Cadaver Man had escaped through the same door. He could be anywhere. He could be—
A hand gripped Nia’s upper arm. She squeaked before recognizing the flare of warmth.
“It’s me.” Rathe cupped her elbow in one warm hand. “I’m taking you home.” He flagged a passing cab.
“You don’t need to.”
“Maybe not, but I’m going to, anyway. Your daddy raised me right.” He slid into the cab beside her and gave the driver the address of the Boston General apartment building.
Though it seemed she should take offense to his high-handedness and that last comment, Nia couldn’t stir up a good dose of anger. Her body wanted to shake with the memory of plunging toward the incinerator’s gaping maw. Her eyes wanted to tear with frustration that they were still so far away from a solution. And her heart wanted to ache with what she’d seen in Rathe’s eyes when he’d held her pinned to the floor. After he’d saved her life.
“Rathe…” she began, not sure what she meant to say.
“Shh. We’ll talk about it later. Trust me.”
And strangely enough, she did.
RATHE GOT HER HOME, bullied her into bed and closed the bedroom door behind him. He didn’t sneak in later and watch her sleep, though part of him wanted to do just that. He didn’t kiss her good-night, either. It wouldn’t have been professional.
And a man could only take so much.
Instead he ordered a pizza, commandeered the neutral-toned living room couch and the sturdy coffee table and got to work. He snagged blank paper from Nia’s portable printer and used a pencil to chart their clues and conjectures. Connections and interconnections.
Covert M.D. Page 8