“Have you told anyone else about this?”
“No.”
He handed her the phone back. “I sent a screenshot to my phone, so you have my number in your text app. Call me if he texts you again.”
“Okay.”
“Will she be okay if I take her out of here now?”
The nurse hesitated. “Does the doctor know what she was given?”
“He thinks it’s some sort of sedative.”
She nodded slowly. “I can give her something to counteract it. She should be okay to leave, but you’ll have to keep a close eye on her for a few hours.”
Calder wasn’t sure he wanted this nurse to inject Quinn with anything, but he felt as though he had no other choice. He let her go, gesturing for her to go get whatever it was she wanted to give her.
Calder returned to the room with Quinn. She was still unconscious, sleeping deeply in a way that was obviously different from how she’d been before he left her alone. He should never have left her alone.
What the hell had happened while he was gone? Why didn’t Doug see anyone enter the house?
The nurse returned with a vial that she held up for him to see. “You can look it up on the Internet. It’s just a mild stimulant.”
He gestured for her to continue. She filled the syringe and injected the same port she’d prepared before. Almost immediately, Quinn moaned, but she still didn’t open her eyes.
“She’ll come around in a few minutes.”
“I don’t have time to wait. Take out her IV.”
The nurse did as instructed. Calder gathered Quinn in his arms, and the nurse draped her blanket over her again, leading the way out into the corridor. She directed him to a back entrance that opened onto a narrow alley not far from where he’d left his truck. He walked around to the front and was gone before anyone inside noticed Quinn was missing.
He couldn’t take her home. He didn’t want to take her to a Mastiff safe house because he didn’t want her to wake with strange men sitting around her. The only place he could think of to take her was probably the last place he should have taken her.
His house.
Quinn was moaning as they drove across town, coming to just as he pulled into the driveway. She sat up a little, clearly confused.
“Where are we?”
“What’s the last thing you remember, Quinn?” he demanded, turning to her on the narrow truck bench, taking her face between his hands. “Do you remember me leaving?”
She was quiet, the confusion clouding her eyes. “I remember you finding me downtown. I remember arguing.” Her eyes cleared and filled with something like pleasure. “I remember what happened after.”
“Do you remember when I left?”
She nodded, reaching up to touch his face. “I remember.”
He kissed her gently, then pulled back to search her eyes. “Do you remember anything after that?”
She hesitated. Then, slowly, she began to nod. “I remember laying back down on the bed, thinking I’d just lie there and wait for you to come back. But then I got hungry and thought I should probably eat something before you came back. I went downstairs and . . .” She stopped, fear and anger bursting in her eyes.
“What?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s jumbled.”
“What is?”
She shook her head again, pulling away from him as she struggled to work out her memories. “I don’t know. I think maybe somebody was downstairs, but I don’t . . . there was a shadow in the rose garden the night before. It seems like it came into the house.”
“A shadow?”
“I saw it. On the wall.”
“In the living room?”
She nodded. “As I came down the stairs. But . . . that’s all I can remember. She hit herself on the forehead like the movement would jar her memory. “I know there’s more!”
He tugged her hands into his and pulled her close, kissing her forehead lightly. “It’s okay, babe. We’ll figure it out.”
“I was drugged again?”
“Yeah. But I got them to test your blood.”
“Who?”
“The hospital.”
“My hospital?” She shook her head emphatically. “They won’t find anything. They didn’t the last time.”
“It’s okay.” He kissed her again. “I think I have a lead. I need to go check it out.”
“You’re leaving?”
He nodded. “But I’m leaving you in safe hands. My mom, she’ll take really good care of you.”
She looked at the front of the house with renewed interest. “This is your house?”
“It’s not much, but it’s comfortable.”
She leaned forward a little, really staring at the front of the humble home. “It’s nice. Better than my place.”
“I doubt that.”
“It looks lived in, even from the outside. Mine looks like a model home meant to entice people to buy.”
He couldn’t argue with that. But he never would have imagined she’d say it with such joy.
He kissed her again, then slipped out of the truck, going around to help her down. He pulled the blanket back up around her shoulders and slipped his arm around her. The front door opened as they approached, his mother apparently watching from the kitchen window. She studied Quinn with open curiosity.
“Mom,” he said cautiously, “this is Quinn. She needs a place to stay for a few hours.”
His mother nodded. He wasn’t sure if it was her name or if she just recognized her from the many pictures that had appeared in the papers over the years, but he knew the instant she realized who Quinn was. She backed up, her arms wrapping around her chest, her whole body closing itself off.
Calder led Quinn inside and settled her on the couch, brushing her hair back behind her ear before he stood. Addie came running into the room, clearly escaping nap time.
“Daddy!” she cried, jumping into his arms. He lifted her, swinging her around.
“Hey, angel,” he said softly against her ear, kissing her soft neck. “How was school this morning?”
“Good!”
Addie caught sight of Quinn and turned to look at her, openly staring. “Who are you?” she demanded.
“This is a friend of Daddy’s, Addison,” he explained. “She’s going to be staying here for a little while.”
“How come?”
“Because she needs a safe place to be while Daddy goes to work.”
Addie nodded as if that made complete sense. She scrambled down out of his arms and went to sit beside Quinn.
“I’m three,” she told her.
“Is that right?”
“How old you?”
Quinn laughed. “I’m really old.”
“Yeah?” Addie looked her over. “You don’t look like it.”
“Thank you.”
Addie glanced at her father. “You like my dad?”
Quinn glanced at him, too, a big smile spreading over her lips. “I do.”
“He has long hair. You know why?”
Quinn shook her head. “Why?”
Addie grinned really big. “Because he’s like Sampson. His strength is in his hair.”
Addie started to laugh, but Quinn studied Calder, her eyes moving over the long ponytail that fell down his back. “I think you’re right,” she said softly.
Calder winked at her before turning to his mother who’d spent the entire exchange glaring at him from the front door.
“What the hell are you doing with that woman?” she demanded.
“She’s a client of my firm.”
“She’s the daughter of the man who destroyed our family!”
“I thought you said yesterday that father made his own choices? That he was the one who destroyed our family.”
His mother looked uncertain for a moment. “I said he made his choices, but that doesn’t mean that woman’s father didn’t let that monster out of jail! That he didn’t set things in motion!”
“But she grew up in that mansion, under that man’s thumb! How could you even begin to have sympathy for her? I thought you hated every member of that family.”
“I did. And then I realized that she was just as much a victim of that sadistic pig as anyone else. Maybe more so.”
His mother frowned. “What does that mean?”
“It just means that we don’t know everything that goes on behind closed doors. I know you understand that as well, if not better than, most people.”
She hesitated, her eyes flicking to the living room, and the people sitting close together on the couch.
“You trust her enough to allow her to spend time with your daughter?”
“I do.”
She still hesitated, but then she slowly nodded. “Okay. She can stay, but I don’t have to like it.”
“No, you don’t.” Calder pulled her into a tight hug, then backed up. “She’s had a hard day. She needs rest and lots of hydration, okay? And no one can know she’s here. Understand? Not even the ladies from church.”
His mother nodded. “How long will you be gone?”
“If everything goes well, only a few hours.”
“Okay.”
Calder kissed her forehead, then extracted himself and went over to the couch. “I have to go, ladies. Addie, take good care of Quinn, okay?”
“Okay, Daddy.”
Calder leaned over and touched his lips, encouraging the child to give him a kiss. Then he turned to Quinn.
“Take it easy. We still don’t know what they gave you.”
“I will.”
“If anything happens, anything at all, call me. If you remember something, if you get a weird phone call, anything.”
“I will. I promise.”
He brushed her hair behind her ear again, then kissed her softly. Addie began to giggle, reaching over to push him away from Quinn.
“Daddy! We don’t kiss friends!”
“Why not?”
“Because we don’t!”
It seemed like a simple enough answer, but it was one of those complicated things about parenthood that he wasn’t looking forward to addressing. He leaned over and kissed the tip of her nose.
“I love you. I’ll be back in a few hours, okay?”
Addie nodded. Calder’s eyes landed on Quinn’s face, and for a second, he could almost imagine what it would be like to just as casually say the same words to her. There was a spark in her eye that suggested the same thought was taking root in her mind. He kissed her once more despite Addie’s reaction, then forced himself to leave. But he left with a smile.
Chapter 17
Springfield, Illinois
Mastiff Security Headquarters
Calder sat on the edge of a stool and watched the tech type quickly against his keyboard. The image on the monitor shifted and changed continuously. But then it began to focus in on a spot in the car beside Quinn.
“There,” Calder said, pointing to the screen.
The tech continued typing, and the image sharpened. After a moment, they could clearly see the shape of an arm and a gun extending out from the hand.
“There’s someone in the floorboards there,” the tech said, gesturing to the passenger side of the car.
“Can you blow this up and print it for me?”
“Definitely.”
Calder jumped up and headed out the door, already pulling his phone out of his pocket. “Tell me you have something on that number.”
The guy on the other end sighed. “It’s a throwaway. All I can do is tell you what cell tower it last bounced off.”
“Can you put a trace on it? Let me know when he uses it again?”
“I can try, but no guarantees.”
“What cell tower?”
“Downtown. Five blocks from the medical center.”
Calder cursed under his breath. The guy was right there under their noses.
He disconnected the call and walked into human resources. Gracie was at her desk, looking absolutely disgusted as she stared at her computer screen.
“Bad day?”
“Bad life.”
He settled down on the chair beside her. “I have a question.”
“Shoot.”
“You told me once that you worked as a receptionist at a hospital, right?”
“I did.”
“Could you tell me how someone would go about accessing personnel files?”
She shrugged. “You go to the human resources office and ask.”
“What if I don’t want anyone to know I’ve accessed them?”
She looked sideways at him, catching onto what he wanted. “Calder, that’s not exactly legal.”
“That’s why I came to you instead of the guys in tech.”
She studied him for a long second. “This for a case?”
“It is.”
She sat up a little, looking around the quiet office. No one else was there this late in the day, just her supervisor, but she was locked behind her office door.
“All right,” she said softly. “But you can’t tell anyone that I did this.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
Gracie was a jane-of-all-trades; the one person in the company that all the operatives knew they could come to if they needed help with anything. Nine times out of ten, she knew exactly what to do and how to go about it. Like right now, she accessed the Lincoln Medical Center’s records with just a few keystrokes.
“Who are we looking for?”
“Dr. Petrov and Dr. Morgan.”
Gracie typed quickly and a series of files suddenly appeared on the screen. She clicked on one, and it opened to a picture of a young man of European descent. She pressed several more keys and information flooded the screen. Dr. Dimitri Petrov was from Moscow. His family immigrated to the United States when he was fifteen. He attended Yale and Stanford, coming to Springfield for reasons Calder couldn’t fathom based on his Ivy League education. He was a fellow under Quinn in the pediatric surgery department, a star in his field according to the reports she’d filled out about him.
“Looks like they respect one another,” Calder commented.
“This is exceptional,” Gracie agreed. “When I was a receptionist at that hospital, I rarely saw peer reports like this one.”
She closed the file and opened the one on Dr. Morgan. A woman about the same age as Quinn appeared on the screen, a scowl on her unattractive face. The reports that appeared in her file were less impressive than Petrov’s. And there were several complaints made against her by patients and their families.
“Here’s something,” Gracie said. She gestured to a new document she’d pulled up. It took Calder a second to see what she meant, but then it was glaringly obvious.
Quinn was a witness in a complaint against Dr. Morgan, claiming that she’d seen Dr. Morgan yell at and hit a child recovering from surgery on her floor.
“Dr. Morgan was angry with the child for not cooperating when it came time to take her medication. She called the child a spoiled brat and slapped her hand even though the child was not reaching for her or otherwise threatening her in any way.”
“That’s a fireable offense,” Gracie said. “Especially since it’s not the first complaint against this particular doctor.”
“They can fire a doctor.”
“Sure. They just don’t do it often because the benefit of the doubt always falls with the doctor. But this . . .” She shook her head. “I’m surprised she still works there.”
“That’s a hell of a motive,” Calder said, a little disappointed. “But this scheme is a little involved for a doctor.”
“Desperation can cause people to do very odd things.”
Calder sat back. “I was hoping the evidence would point to someone connected to her father.”
“Her father?”
“Quinn is the daughter of Senator Roan Naylor.”
“Oh.” Gracie glanced at the computer screen before looking back at Calder. “Sorry.”
He shrugged. “The man’s an ass and not above this sort of behavior. But if it’s not him, it’s not him.” He stood slowly. “Thanks, Gracie.”
“I’m glad to help.”
He rested a hand on her shoulder. “How was Durango?”
She sighed. “He’s Durango. His own worst enemy.”
“And he always will be.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
All Calder could do was pat her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Gracie. I wish there was something I could do.”
“Me, too.”
Chapter 18
Springfield, Illinois
Calder Obre’s Home
Quinn enjoyed talking with Addie. She talked a mile a minute and was incredibly intelligent, her vocabulary far advanced for a child her age. And she had such a joy for life that it was infectious. Maybe it was just that Quinn was used to being around children with illnesses that included chronic pain and immobility, but it was such a contrast being around Addie.
She fell in love with her in the first few minutes.
Calder’s mother, on the other hand, was another story. She avoided speaking directly to Quinn, choosing instead to speak to her through the child. But then Addie had to go to bed, and it was just the two of them stuck alone downstairs because Calder had yet to come home.
“May I help?” Quinn asked, joining Calder’s mother in the kitchen as she prepared to do the dishes.
The woman glanced at her, but she didn’t say anything either way. Quinn picked up a rag and began to wash the pot that was in the soapy water, not waiting for permission.
“I’m sorry if my presence here has upset you.”
She shrugged as she bent to put a plate in the dishwasher.
“I didn’t know Calder would bring me here until we were already sitting in the driveway.”
“Calder has a mind of his own.”
“He does. He’s a good man.”
His mother smiled, pride flowing from every pore. “He is.”
Mastiff Security: The Complete 5 Books Series Page 35