Rx Missing (Decorah Security Series, Book #10): A Paranormal Romantic Suspense Novel

by York, Rebecca

  “By ‘all’—do you mean the mystery of the Mirador Hotel? Or our . . . relationship?”

  “Everything,” she said in a small voice.

  “Okay.” Pulling the covers aside, he stepped out of bed and began picking his clothing off the floor. He was dressed in his jeans and tee shirt in under a minute.

  “I can meet you downstairs in a while,” he said.

  She felt instantly guilty for effectively kicking him out—and feeling relieved that he was willing to give her some space.

  “Yes. Good,” she answered, hoping she sounded more casual than uptight. “Probably we don’t want to come down together and give everyone something to talk about.”

  Before he left, he looked toward the window. “Does it ever get dark here?” he suddenly asked.

  “What?”

  “Does it get dark here?” he repeated.

  The question took her by surprise, but she managed to answer, “How would I know?”

  He shrugged. “Just trying to figure the place out.”

  Did she even know the answer? She’d thought she would only be here a few hours and that she would keep her interactions to a minimum. That plan hadn’t worked out quite the way she’d assumed, and now every second in the hotel had started to weigh too heavily on her.

  She waited with her heart pounding as Mack walked down the hall to the living room, then exited the suite. She sat up, counting to a hundred to make sure he wasn’t going to come back. Finally she climbed out of bed and pulled on her panties, bra and blouse. There was really no point in getting dressed, but she didn’t want someone—Mack—to find she’d gone with half her clothing still here. As she pulled on her slacks, she wondered what he was going to think when he found out she wasn’t in the hotel.

  Standing beside the bed, she clenched her hands into fists, feeling trapped and wishing she’d planned this whole thing better. When Mack figured out she’d vanished, he’d be angry. And hurt. Could she come back and explain who she was and why she’d come here? Or would it already be too late?

  She looked toward the living room. She’d like to lock the damn door, but she’d already found out that wouldn’t do her any good. And if she dragged a chair in front of the door, that was going to come across as majorly suspicious.

  With her heart pounding, she went back to the place where she’d been headed when Mack had first come in—the closet, with the secret piece of equipment that wasn’t in any of the other bedrooms.

  oOo

  In the woods, Danny Preston wanted to scream in frustration. After Bradley and Wardman had escaped from his show in the woods, he’d scratched around for a plan B.

  Probably they’d warned everyone to stay away from the other side of the wall, so luring someone else out here was a long shot, which meant that his only option was getting in there.

  With his lips set in a grim line, he conjured up an army of little men and lined them up, ready to assault the wall that separated him from the hotel grounds. He sent them alone and in groups rushing toward the wall. But each time they vanished as they hit the barrier.

  “Fuck,” he growled and slammed his fist against the trunk of the tree that he’d made his main base of operation. The bark dug into his hand, and he cursed again. The sensation was real enough, and he pressed his hand against his side, willing the pain to subside. He supposed that if the bark had been sharp, it would have cut his flesh. Unfortunately he was as vulnerable as any of the hotel guests. This place could hurt him, probably kill him if he did something stupid. Or maybe taking this assignment was as far as he could go into the realm of stupidity.

  He clenched his teeth. He wasn’t here because he’d decided to invade someone’s private playground. He’d been hired to do a job, and he hadn’t had much choice about taking it. He’d come this far, but partial success wasn’t good enough. Which meant he’d better think of some trick to get in there, identify his target and finish the job. Or was there another way to get an entrée? Pulling out his cell phone again, he made a call to one of the people who was standing by to help him.

  The phone was answered on the first ring.

  “Not going so well?” his associate asked. It wasn’t the guy who’d hired him but someone he could theoretically trust.

  “You could say that. I’m going to need a little help.” Quickly he began to outline what he had in mind.

  “You want me to what?” the other man asked.

  “Just do it. You know I’ll make it worth your while.”

  “What if I get caught?”

  “I’d advise against it,” he answered and clicked off. It was satisfying to put someone else on the spot—but would it do him any good in the long run?

  oOo

  Mack looked up and down the hall, glad that he was alone as he turned back and listened at Lily’s door. When he didn’t hear anything, he got out the keycard again and shoved it into the lock. Once again, it opened the door, and he couldn’t repress a little smile of satisfaction. Maybe the locks didn’t work to keep anyone from locking himself in his room and going quietly nuts—like that first guy, Jay Douglas, had done not so quietly.

  Once again, Mack hurried down the interior hall. Lily wasn’t in the bedroom. She wasn’t in the bathroom, but she’d been going into the closet when he’d come here earlier. Now he threw the door open and stared inside. Lily wasn’t there, but he saw some kind of interior door, closing off an area about the size of an old-fashioned telephone booth.

  There was a knob and a keypad. He pushed some numbers at random without expecting any results. This wasn’t going to be like the keycards.

  Too bad he didn’t know her birthday or anything else that might give him a clue.

  Christ, now what? As far as he could tell, he’d found a secret room that you got to through the closet. Was it a door into the real world? Or could she be somewhere else in her room? Grimly, he searched the suite, looking behind furniture and under the bed, but she was gone—vanished like that guy Jay Douglas.

  A shiver traveled over Mack’s skin.

  Had Lily been a figment of his imagination? That couldn’t be true, could it? For a moment, he contemplated that idea. Jesus, since the breakup of his marriage, she was the first woman he’d wanted more from than good sex. What if he’d made her up because he needed her—or someone like her?

  That thought made his chest tighten, until he fought back to rationality. He wasn’t the only one who had seen her. The others in the bar had interacted with her. Unless he was making that up, too. Which would involve a whole new level of insanity on his part.

  To reassure himself, he strode to the bed and lifted the top sheet, pressing it to his face. The scent of lovemaking was indisputable. He and Lily had been here together not long ago. If she was an illusion, she was the most realistic illusion he’d ever heard of. But then, where the hell had she gone?

  Chapter Fourteen

  Lily lay for a moment in the specially designed bed. She could hardly believe she was back in the real world, not after everything that had happened.

  Hamilton had told her the stage set called the Mirador Hotel would seem absolutely authentic. She hadn’t quite believed him. She’d expected some kind of barrier between herself and the altered reality. Instead, she had been there, right in the middle of everything with all the other hotel guests, like it was the only world that existed. That had never changed during the whole experience, but the rules of the place had shifted in ways she hadn’t expected. Things had started happening that were impossible. Or should be impossible, at least according to the laws of physics.

  She gave herself a few moments to adjust to being back in her physical body, then reached up and pulled off the cap that held the electrodes to her head, trying to focus on the task rather than the out-of-kilter experience—or the appealing man she’d been with a few minutes before.

  Lord, what a mess. She hadn’t planned on being so attracted to Mack Bradley. For years she’d focused on her work and not her social life. No
w she’d finally met a man who made her yearn for all the things she’d denied herself, and she couldn’t have him.

  She closed her eyes and clenched her hands and teeth, trying not to think about that.

  She’d lied to Mack about a lot of things. She wasn’t a nurse. She was a doctor, a neurocyberneticist, who had taken what had seemed like an exciting job—to give men and women in a coma a chance for a life in a virtual reality by connecting their brain functions to a highly sophisticated computer program. It might not be in this world, but Hamilton had told her they wouldn’t know the difference

  Unfortunately, a lot of things weren’t working out the way Dr. Hamilton had told her they would, starting with Jay Douglas’s psychotic break that had caused him to attack her in the hotel lobby.

  Okay, she supposed some failures were inevitable when you were dealing with damaged brains, a delicate interface and highly specialized equipment. Apparently Douglas hadn’t been able to take the stress of waking up in a totally unfamiliar environment. Had Hamilton not anticipated something like that—or didn’t he care?

  But the screwup with Douglas didn’t explain the other stuff—like the sky changing with impossible speed and the fantasy creatures attacking her and Mack in the woods. Hamilton hadn’t prepared her for any of that. Had he known, or was he going to be as shocked as she was to find out their virtual reality was . . . what? Under attack? Out of control? But how? And why?

  When she’d disconnected herself from the machinery that had made it possible for her to enter the virtual environment, she felt a strange sense of loss. She should be glad to be back in the twenty-first century US of A. Glad that she could get back here. Yet now reality had a hollow feel.

  With one hand on the bed rail, she sat up cautiously. She’d only been in there for a few hours, and the bed had kept her from lying in one position for too long, but she’d better take it slow while she adjusted to her normal body functions.

  Where was Hamilton? And what about Mack?

  She turned her head, and her insides clenched as she surveyed the rows of beds, each with a sleeping patient. She knew which was Mack. She’d been drawn back to him again and again.

  Now she turned away, unable to deal with the difference in the pale, still Mack Bradley who was here and the Mack Bradley who had made love with her.

  She had to put that aside—and put aside her own mistake of getting involved with Mack. Right now, she had to find Hamilton and demand to know what he wasn’t telling her.

  oOo

  Mack was still searching the bedroom when a noise in the suite’s other room made him whirl. Against all odds was she back? Or had someone else come in?

  Reaching the area set up like a living-dining room, he stopped short. A cute little girl was sitting at the table, dipping a spoon into a bowl and carrying the contents to her mouth. Her blond hair was caught up in two medium-length ponytails at the sides of her head, and she was wearing a tee shirt with a kitten on the front, jeans and tennis shoes.

  She looked up when she saw him and smiled.

  “Hi,” she said.

  When he was still scrabbling for words, she went on, “This is really good.”

  He managed to ask, “What is it?”

  “Ice cream. I haven’t had anything this good in . . .” She stopped and took her bottom lip between her teeth. “In a long time,” she finally said in a low voice. “Maybe I could get you some.”

  “No thanks,” he answered, wondering where it had come from and where she was going to get more. And at the same time, he was remembering that he hadn’t been particularly hungry since he’d woken up here.

  She tipped his head to the side, studying him. “If you’re looking for Lily, you won’t find her.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s back in the world.”

  He felt a shiver travel over his skin as she confirmed his worst fear. “What does that mean?” he demanded.

  “I’m not supposed to say.”

  It was a struggle to keep from shouting. “She told you not to say?”

  “No. The Preston told me. He says he made. . . special arrangements to bring me here, but I’ll have to leave if I say too much. . .” Her voice trailed off.

  Anger and frustration made him want to stride across the room, take her by the shoulders, and shake her. But the look of confusion in her eyes stopped him. She wasn’t being coy. He was pretty sure she didn’t know much more than he did.

  He cleared his throat and asked the question that had been circling around in his mind like a top whizzing around on a wooden floor.

  “Are you Lily’s sister—Shelly?”

  She tipped her head to the side, studying him. “Yes. How did you know? I mean, we never met did we?” The last part sounded doubtful, as though she wasn’t entirely sure.

  “She talked about you.”

  “Like what did she say?”

  “She told me you were in an accident.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Did you come here to talk to Lily?”

  “Uh huh. The Preston said I should, you know. But I guess I was too late.”

  He crossed the room, pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. “The Preston—what is that?

  She shrugged. “A guy—I guess. He needs to get out of the woods, but he’s stuck.”

  Mack had met a man in the woods—along with a bunch of little warriors and some dangerous animals.

  “What does he look like?”

  “Ugly.”

  “Like how?”

  “His head was bald, and he had . . . pictures on his arms. She clasped her hands together. One was a nasty snake. And one was a skull.”

  “What else?”

  “Big, heavy, black boots. Dirty jeans.”

  She was describing the guy Mack had seen standing on the tree branch. The Preston? Maybe that was his name.

  “How do you know him?”

  “I don’t. He just came and talked to me. I think he’s not very nice.” She stopped, then went on quickly, “But he was nice to bring me here.”

  “Why did he do that?”

  She squirmed in her chair. “I guess he thinks Lily will do something, if I ask her to.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she feels bad about my . . . accident.”

  Maybe she was telling the truth. Or maybe not. Or maybe she was giving him a child’s interpretation of events. He was sure she didn’t like being questioned.

  Dipping her head, she scraped at the ice cream bowl and ate a few more bites.

  Was she human? Or was she just a fantasy projection like the creatures in the woods? Only in the form of a little girl instead of monsters.

  And for that matter, was Mack Bradley human? Or was he just a figment of someone else’s imagination?

  The question made the breath freeze in his chest, and he struggled not to gasp for air.

  Could he trust anything in this place that was as reliable as a fun-house mirror?

  His vision had turned inward, and he didn’t realize the girl was halfway out of her chair until she bolted for the door of the hotel suite. She’d taken Mack by surprise, and he was steps behind her as she leaped into the hall like a forest animal desperate to escape a hunter. He stopped short when he got to the doorway. She wasn’t anywhere in sight. Could she have run fast enough to round a corner? Not unless she’d sprouted jets on her tennis shoes. Of course that could have happened in this place where the rules of physics seemed to have no meaning. Or she could simply have vanished. Again, a tribute to this fantasy-land outpost where it was impossible to know what to expect.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The address of Hamilton Labs was on a narrow road in an isolated area of Montgomery County out past Gaithersburg. As Grant drove slowly by, he took a good look at the three-story building constructed of cement slabs with few windows. He also noted the chain-link fence topped by razor wire and the security cameras at various locations around the exterior of the building. Clearly, whoever
ran this place didn’t want surprise visitors.

  He turned around in a small woods about a mile past the building and drove by again, noting the location of the exits and the distance of the fence to the building. There were only five cars in the lot, which probably meant there weren’t many people inside at this hour.

  After the recon, he stopped by a nearby home improvement warehouse that was still open. Using more of the cash he’d taken from the dead man at the Roosevelt Memorial, he bought a wire cutter and some other equipment before heading back to the lab.

  Glad that it was fully dark, he used the wire cutters to snip through a section of fence, then ducked inside and waited for several minutes. When no floodlights came on and no siren sounded, followed by armed men charging in his direction, he bent low as he ran to the closest car. Again he waited before sprinting to another vehicle that was closer to the building. This time, to make sure he hadn’t tripped a silent alarm, he waited for ten minutes with the vehicle blocking him from view while he got some of his supplies out of his knapsack.

  He’d taken the thugs at the Roosevelt Memorial by surprise with his ploy of arriving early. He was betting his life he could throw them off-balance again.

  Five minutes later, the car was on fire, sending smoke and flames into the air. He hurried away into the darkness, pretty sure that guys who shot one of their own men weren’t going to call in the local fire department for an auto fire on their own turf.

  As he’d anticipated, a squad of men came running out with fire extinguishers, some from the main entrance and some from a door at the side of the building.

  “Christ, how did that happen?” someone shouted.

  “Looks like a diversion,” a hard voice answered. The man speaking was Jack Wilson, who had ordered one of his own operatives cut down.

  “A diversion from whom?”

  “I’m betting on the brother.”

  “How would he find this place?”

  “I don’t know. But we’re not taking any chances. Greg and Martin, check the parking lot. Tim and Brad, check the building interior.”