by Dale Mayer
“Mom, you have to tell me. Who did this?” Zoe turned on the video feed to her phone, then placed it on the bedside table. This way she had a record of her mother’s words. Maybe she wouldn’t have to repeat the story several times to the police.
Her eyes flickered.
“You can’t keep letting this happen to you.”
“You don’t understand. If I say anything, he’ll come after you. Your father might not have shown you much love, but he didn’t really want to lose you when it came down to it.”
“What?” Zoe wanted to understand, to hear every little bit of what her mother had to say. “Mom, what are you talking about?”
“Two men came,” she whispered. “Military men. Your father knew them both. There were harsh words, some laughter, then harsher words. Things got ugly.”
Zoe sat straighter. “Mom, what about when Father pulled out a gun at dinner? I left soon afterward. Are you saying you didn’t shoot him? Neither did Alex?”
Her mother’s eyes opened. “Oh, no. I never shot him. I should’ve. Thirty years ago I should’ve, but I didn’t.” She gave a sad smile. “I was too weak to do that.”
“So, after dinner, where was the gun?”
Her mother tossed and turned her head, obviously distressed.
Zoe picked up her hand and held it close. “Mom, this is very important. If you didn’t shoot him, did he return to his office with his gun? Do you know if he put it away?”
“I don’t know. I was really scared and in so much pain after your father’s beating, I went to my room and stayed there. Then I heard the doorbell. I don’t know if your brother let the men in or if it was your father. Alex left after dinner, but I don’t know where he went. Your father’s office is underneath my bedroom, so I could hear the voices and shouting.” She fell silent.
“And?” Zoe urged. She was so close to getting some real information. Zoe needed her mother to stay strong. To stand up for something. “Mom, please.”
Her mother raised her gaze. “I went downstairs. I heard the gunshot. They were at the front door, and I saw one of the men. I screamed. The young man, in a military uniform, ran toward me. The other called out and said, ‘Leave her.’”
Her mother’s words were coated in such pain that Zoe had to close her eyes against it all. Against what her father had done to this beautiful woman—to break such a spirit of self-confidence to this ragtag female who nobody respected because she’d allowed herself to be beaten to nothing.
“Mom, you have to tell me what happened then.”
Her mother opened her eyes and stared at her daughter. She reached up to stroke her cheek. “Zoe…”
She leaned closer until she could press her mother’s palm against her cheek. “Come on. Tell me, Mom.”
“I was already hurting from your father’s beating earlier, but I couldn’t ignore the shouting. Your father was in trouble. I heard the shot, saw him fall. Then the younger man saw me. He raced over and hit me as if he hated me for who, or what, I was, or maybe he hated all women.” She shook her head. “I don’t know. He hit me in the face, tried to strangle me. He kicked me.” Tears poured from her mother’s eyes. “The older man finally hauled him away and both left. But there was so much anger in him.”
“Mom, this is really important. You need to tell me who these men were.”
But the answer was heartbreaking. “I don’t know. I never saw them before.”
“It’s okay. We’ll find out.”
Her mom shook her head, only to cry out in pain in the simple movement. “No. They told me to leave well enough alone, or they’d come back.” She gasped as she tried to talk. “More than that, they said I’d never live to see you again, and I believed them.”
“Mom, how old were these men?”
Her mom frowned, as if thinking back to her attack. “One was older, like your father’s age,” she said. “He might’ve been the one who shot him.” And she fell silent.
This was the part Zoe had to know, so she urged her mom. “Please, don’t fall asleep until you tell me. What about the other man? How old was he? If you saw him, would you recognize him again?”
“He looked like the first man. It had to be father and son.” And her mother shifted in the bed, quietly drifting off to sleep again.
Zoe heard a sound behind her. She jumped off the bed and whirled. A stranger stood in front of her, dressed in a white lab coat. There was a wary assessment in his eyes. She didn’t know who the hell he was, or what he was doing here, but he wasn’t medical, regardless of the coat, and he wasn’t part of Harrison’s team. If he was a security guard, he wasn’t dressed for the role.
“Who the hell are you, and what are you doing in my mother’s room?”
His gaze shifted to her mom and back to her, the tie around one wrist. The towel on the bed. But there was interest in his eyes. And something else, something dark.
“It’s really too bad she lived.” He took a half step forward.
Her lips turned into a grimace as she got ready to pounce if he took another.
“From the way I heard it, she was beaten so badly that she shouldn’t be alive right now.”
“She’s a fighter. Unlike the asshole who did this. He hates women and thinks they are nothing,” Zoe snapped. “He’s all fluff. He can’t take on a female who’s standing in front of him. He has to wait until she’s already broken, bleeding, and no real threat.” She waited a half breath, then added in a hard tone, “Like you.”
The man grimaced. “Unfortunately, you’re quite correct. He doesn’t fight fair in any way, shape, or form. Something you should remember. Not that you’ll ever get a chance. But you’re not my mission. She is. And I really hate to do this one because she’s a fighter. I don’t like this job. To have survived your father’s abuse and now this beating—she must have a strong will to live.”
“She does. She’s been protecting me all my life. Even from assholes like you.” From her peripheral vision she caught her mom’s hand as she pressed the button to call the nurse. “This is a horrible job for you. You should really pick better contracts. I don’t begrudge anybody a decent way to make a living, but there really should be some honor or standards.”
He studied her for a long moment and looked back at her mom. “You know something? You could be right. I didn’t like the sound of this one from the beginning. But the money was good.”
“You can still look in the mirror in the morning? Is there nothing you won’t do for a price? Who is your mother? Your sister? The one woman who you loved above all else? This woman has taken a massive beating. Where’s the sorry excuse of a soldier who wasn’t man enough to do his own dirty work?” Her muscles were locked down. But she had no illusions. Whoever this man was, he had skills.
He gave a half chuckle. “I can see you know who did this.”
“I believe I do.” She nodded. “A general and his son. The son did the beating. The general likely shot my father. But,” she admitted, “I don’t know for sure.”
“What about you? How do you stay safe?”
Instinctively, Harrison’s face popped into her mind. “I have people on my side. For once in my life, I’m not alone.”
He assessed the distance between them. “I could’ve killed you half a dozen ways already.”
She gave him a hard smile. “And I could’ve done the same. This is your one and only chance. Walk away, and don’t come back. Leave my mother and me alone.”
“What about your brother?”
“Did he have any part in this?” Her heart sank. Please, no.
A small smile faded from the corner of the stranger’s lips. “Don’t you know?”
She must answer carefully, her heart sinking with dread at his implication. She didn’t know this stranger. She didn’t trust him. But he had information she wanted. “My brother’s on an ugly path. I don’t know how far down it he’s gone. He likes to terrorize women. He loves to watch them go to pieces. He’s sick, twisted. But is he a killer
? Did he shoot my father? Did he have a hand in my mother’s abuse? I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I don’t know if he can be saved at this point.”
“That point is long past.”
“So he is involved,” she said, her gut knotting with pain.
“Maybe, maybe not,” he said. “You’re in trouble. You better have friends in pretty high places to keep you safe.”
Once again she smiled. This time her mind flashed with the names Levi and Ice, along with images of all the other men she’d met so far who had stood up to help her. She inclined her head gently and said, “I do.” Her tone was so positive, sure, and confident, there was no way he could have doubted her.
He took a step backward, nearer the doorway. She took one forward. “How did you get in?”
He stared at her in silence but with a knowing look in his eyes.
“Somebody here told you about that entrance and the security codes?”
He inclined his head. “All information can be bought.”
“Richard needs to go through his staff records to see who needs money. Time for a security change.”
“In his case, he needs to find two of them. Because two people here are weak links in the system.”
“And in my family, how many are there?”
By now he was at the doorway. He gave her an odd smile and said, “Everybody but the two of you apparently.”
He darted out the door.
She raced after him, passing a nurse coming to answer her mother’s summons. When she got to the end of the hallway, he was already gone. She wanted to chase him down. The best thing she could do right now was stay with Mom and commit to memory everything about him. Hopefully her phone caught most of what he said, but he was so far away from it…
Her father had been the bogeyman for her and her mom for a long time. And now she knew others just like him were after them. She pulled out her phone and sent a text to Harrison.
Contract killer was just here. Dressed all in black with doctor’s lab coat. Age is hard to say, but from the way he moved, he was in his prime, so mid-thirties maybe. He’s gone now. Richard has two on staff who were bought off.
Harrison’s reply was instant.
Stay there. On my way.
*
Of course he had just done a full sweep of the place, and the intruder had been with her. At least she and her mother were okay. He left the other men standing outside, hoping to get the guy before he completely got away.
He blasted into Trish’s hospital room to see Zoe sitting at her mom’s bedside. Both were fine. He stopped, took a shuddering breath and tried to hold in all his other emotions.
She glanced at him and smiled. “He was actually very nice.”
He glared at her. “How the hell can you say that?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. This whole business is making me crazy. What’s wrong is right. What’s right is wrong. I don’t know anybody anymore, including myself.”
“Did he have a weapon?”
“That guy didn’t need one. He could kill in many ways,” she said in a low voice. “He didn’t attack either of us. We talked.”
“Tell me what he said, all of it, right now.”
Still sitting in the same place, one hand covering her mother’s fingers, she clicked a button on her phone, and the stranger’s voice filled the room.
Harrison’s eyebrows rose, but he listened all the way through. He held out a hand so he could see any video she caught, but there wasn’t much to look at. The phone was directed at the ceiling most of the time. Still the hospital cameras would have an image of him somewhere. “Description.”
“Six feet, stocky, dark hair, T-shirt, tight black jeans, work boots—no, more like hiking.” She shook her head. “Hairy arms—if the backs of his hands are anything to go by. Lean face. His eyes…there was something about them. This job wasn’t one he liked. I think he was happy to find a reason to walk away.”
He snorted at that. “You really believe he’s walking away from the contract money?”
She shook her head. “I know it doesn’t make sense logically.” She stared at her mom. “But I do know he likes fighters. And as far as he was concerned, that was what my mom was doing. He didn’t want to add to her issues. He was willing to give her a chance to make her way through this.”
“No names mentioned though?”
She shook her head. “No, but a father and son. According to my mom.”
He walked closer and rested his hand on her shoulders—for his sake, not hers. He needed the physical contact to know she was okay. The last half hour could have ended so badly, yet it had gone extremely well. He didn’t want to appreciate the guy, just her. But he had to. Because that guy could’ve taken out both women easily. Professional assassins had half a dozen ways to kill and then get the hell out. He’d chosen one path by leaving without doing harm. Harrison knew the hospital’s cameras would pick him up. And that meant the guy didn’t give a shit who had a photo of him. Or knew where all the cameras were. Either way, it scared Harrison all the more. He squeezed her shoulder gently and stepped back, then had a thought. Considered it a moment.
As he was about to go, she reached up a hand and grabbed his. “He did say he’d been paid a lot of money for this.”
Harrison nodded. “They usually are.” He smiled for the first time since he had entered the room. “I have an idea.”
“About what?”
“I’m a bit of a hacker.”
At that her eyebrows rose.
“If I can get Levi and Ice to work some of their magic, I may be able to add some of my own.”
“Like what?”
He whispered, just to make sure Trish couldn’t hear, asleep or not. “If I can make the contract money disappear, nobody’s gonna do this hit.”
“You can do that?”
“I’ll sure try.”
She smiled, tears welling, mouthing, Thank you. It took her a moment, but she found her voice again. “He also implied that my brother was somehow involved. He didn’t come directly out and say it, but he basically said Alex was past saving. And how I wasn’t safe and better have friends in high places.”
“And we’ve stepped up the search for your brother,” Harrison snapped. “Somebody has to have a lot of money to be hiring assassins. The fact that someone thought your mom was so close to death—and yet still had to finish her off—points to the person who wanted her attacked to begin with.”
“My brother wouldn’t get his hands dirty. He never has before. But he has money. I’m starting to realize he wouldn’t have a problem paying big to make somebody else disappear.” She stared at Harrison, tears in the corner of her eyes. Who and what was her brother? She’d never considered Alex in this light. And she didn’t like it. “My own brother…it’s hard to believe. He hated me, and I don’t know why. He was disdainful of my mother, but I didn’t think he hated her, just that he had no use for her. She was female—like me.”
“We don’t know that for sure yet. Hold tight. We will get the answers. Especially now that we have some idea where to go.”
Richard leaned into the room then. He took one look at the three of them, and his shoulders sagged in relief. “Oh, my God. He was in here, wasn’t he?”
Zoe nodded. “Yes, he was. And he said he paid two of your employees to get the codes.”
Richard’s face went white.
Harrison told Richard, “Levi and Ice are already working on that.”
“Good. I want their names so I can report them. They won’t be working in the industry every again.” Richard snorted. “Very short term thinking on their part.
Zoe continued. “But he left, and I don’t think he’ll be back. He’s no longer after my mom.”
Richard closed his eyes in relief. “Thank God for that. I don’t know what I’d do if she was hurt while on my watch.”
“It still wouldn’t be your fault,” Harrison said. “This guy was a pro.” His tone hardened like
the snap of a whip. “Now who had the money to pay him?”
Chapter 10
“We need to talk to my brother,” Zoe said. She pulled out her phone, clicked on his number and pressed the Call button. The number rang and rang and rang. She frowned when it went to voicemail and said, “This is Zoe. Call me back.” She glared at her phone. “Where is he?”
“That’s something to consider.” Harrison leaned against the doorjamb. “Any chance the assassin has gone after him? Or went after him first?”
Her face twisted in a grimace. “Not a nice thought.”
Richard said, “His face should be on the security cameras. My guys are looking right now.” He pulled out his phone and called them. “Did you pick up an image of his face?” He listened for a moment, then turned to the others and said, his hand over the phone, “Nowhere in the hospital but in Trish’s room.”
He returned to his call and grinned. “Yes, send me a copy. … Please.” Richard hung up the phone and pointed to the camera in the far corner of Trish’s room at the top by the curtain. “He didn’t expect a camera in your mother’s room.”
Zoe stared at Richard in surprise. “Neither did I.”
“We’ll turn it off when she wakes up,” he said gently. “But, in her condition, I wanted to monitor her at all times.”
Zoe nodded, but inside she still didn’t like it. It felt very invasive. However, it was a good thing this time.
“I got it.” Richard held up his phone. “You can’t see it very clearly on the phone, so I’ll send it to my tablet.” Richard clicked on the tablet he carried in his lab coat pocket and brought up his email. He held it out for her to see. “Is this him?”
She studied the picture and nodded. “Yes, that’s him.”
They both looked at Harrison to see if he recognized him.
Harrison frowned at the image for a long time and said, “I think he’s ex-military-turned-mercenary. But maybe he’s taken a step to the left to become a private assassin.”
Richard nodded, busily tapping away on his tablet. “Already sent it off to Ice. We’ll also provide it to the police. They attacked here, and that makes it very personal. I want to make sure local law enforcement is included too. The staffing issue is already done.”