Flashbyte (Byte Series - Ellie Conway Book 4)

by Cat Connor

  Within my mind terror lurked. My name didn’t make sense, yet Chicky did. I needed to see. But my eyes would not open.

  “I can’t open my eyes.”

  “Get some sleep. You’ll feel better when you wake up.”

  “I’ll try.”

  I had no idea how much time passed. A drugged daze clouded everything, including the passage of time with a happy coating of ‘who-gives-a-fuck’. Everything that felt so confusing became unimportant. Then it all made sense. I’d been flashy-thinged, Men in Black style. Because that was the only logical explanation for why I couldn’t remember things. Kay or Jay had flashy-thinged me. Any minute I expected to see Kay talking to a pug dog and a man rip off his skin to reveal a giant cockroach. The Men in Black theme song filled my head.

  There was no way of knowing if I slept or if I was in a zombie-like state of unconsciousness. At some stage the song stopped. The voices in my head were soft, deep, and male. Not intrusive yet but I knew they were there. There was a certain comfort in hearing the voices. No words, just the intonation of men talking. Somewhere deep in the dark a woman’s voice called out. Mom? No, it couldn’t be Mom, she was dead. That I knew for sure.

  The voice called again. “Rylee?” A name that didn’t fit me. I ignored it. It came back again. Closer, more insistent. Someone yelled out.

  “Rylee!”

  A lot of noise followed, more people rushed into the room. Someone rubbed my sternum. The back of the bed dropped flat.

  “She’s coding.” Two words and I felt Kurt’s stress level sky-rocket.

  Too much was happening near me and I couldn’t stop or process any of it. Then the dark came. The welcome sleep.

  No noise.

  Soothing.

  Dark.

  Twenty-Two

  Stairway To Heaven

  My eyes wanted to open but I couldn’t control them. I knew I should talk but nothing happened. A mask was over my mouth and nose. I felt air rush into me. My eyes pinged open and rolled back in my head. Surely that’s not good?

  Stunned, I watched from the ceiling as Kurt and two nurses worked on me. Me. It was beyond bizarre. I wanted to yell at them, to tell them I could see and I was right here. No matter what I said, my body lay there, unresponsive. I watched Kurt charge the defibrillator and shock me twice. One nurse forced air into my lungs via an Ambu Bag, the other did compressions. That was going to hurt later.

  A nurse spoke, “Could be the Demerol causing this.”

  Kurt called for Narcan. I watched him inject it into a vein on my arm. “Let’s hope it’s not too late, if it is.”

  I couldn’t see Lee or Tim. Then the coolest thing happened.

  I poked my head out through the wall and found them both. Lee was leaning on the wall outside my room. He looked upset; he held his phone in his hands, just staring at the blank screen. Tim was pacing back and forth. As he moved away I saw a Sig Sauer on his right hip and noticed another in the waistband of his jeans. From the holster placement I could tell he was comfortable firing with either hand.

  Back in the room they were still working on my lifeless body.

  I turned my head and saw Mac next to me. He slung his arm around my shoulders and kissed me. “You can’t be here, babe. It’s not your time. Go back.” He had something in his hand. He showed me.

  A candy bar. Not just any candy bar. It was a 3 Musketeers candy bar. My chocolate snack of choice.

  “I want to be with you.” It’s all I’ve ever wanted and now I am. I’m not going anywhere.

  Kurt said, “Clear.” Sweat beaded in the worry lines on his forehead. His voice had an edge I’d never heard before. “Come on, you’re not trying.”

  I watched as he shocked my rag-doll body again. Mac threw the candy at Kurt. It hit his boot and bounced off. His eyes flicked to the floor and his reaction was immediate. Kurt ordered glucagon and injected it straight into a vein on my right arm.

  “Go back, Carla needs you.” Mac pushed me gently.

  Carla? Who?

  “I want to stay.”

  He kissed me. “It’s time to go. They need you back now.”

  Kurt looked up at the clock on the wall. “We’re running out of time.” He looked down at me. I just lay there staring as the nurse continued compressions and the other nurse kept forcing air into my lungs. He dipped his face close to my ear and whispered, “Come on, Conway, you can do this.”

  Something tugged at me.

  “Hey, that was cool, Mac. Kurt whispered in my ear and I heard it way up here.” My incorporeal hand brushed my ear. “I felt it too.”

  A force I couldn’t see dragged on my legs. Weight. That’s what I felt. Weights making me sink. It took great concentration to stay with Mac. When I looked at my body, my eyes were shut. Maybe Kurt shut them.

  Mac took my hand and pulled me down to my body. He pushed me on top of myself. There was no way to stop it. I melted in. With one last kiss he faded away.

  A beep came from the machine next to me. Then another. Then another. Within seconds the beeping was regular and strong. My chest hurt as I breathed in. I wanted to cough but figured that’d be an adventure in pain.

  I opened my eyes. Kurt was standing right by me. He pulled a new gown over the one he’d cut off me. He had to unplug the tubing in my left arm from the IV pump to get the gown on my arm. He reconnected the tube, reset the pump, and fastened the gown behind my neck.

  “Thank you,” I said. My voice was croaky, my throat dry. He lifted the back of the bed up about forty-five degrees, and gave me a sip of water. Then indicated I should lean forward a little, he fastened the rest of the ties and helped me sit back.

  “Can’t have you exposed, with Lee and Tim about to come in.”

  “Not for that, for bringing me back.”

  “That’s my job.”

  “You seemed pretty determined to bring me back.”

  “Can you imagine having to face Caine, Sam, and Lee, if I couldn’t bring you back?”

  “The candy bar was cool.”

  He looked at me. “Candy bar?”

  “Mac threw a candy bar, it hit your foot … then you asked for glucagon?”

  Kurt looked under the bed, then bent down and picked up a candy bar. “It did hit my foot. I thought it fell from the bed. How did you know?”

  “I was with Mac and saw him throw it.”

  “You’re spooky.”

  “All for one and one for all.”

  Kurt turned the bar over in his hand revealing the shiny red and blue logo; he held it up so I could see it too. “3 Musketeers.”

  Then I remembered. Caine, our SAC, Sam, and Lee, worked with me. I am SSA Ellie Conway, and it still sounded like a ship. There was a moment of pure relief as my name settled and felt right. Until then I’d envisaged my life being like Fifty First Dates and I didn’t want to be Lucy, living the same day over and over again. Never being able to move forward or remember anything of that day.

  “I’m FBI.”

  He smiled. “You are. But while you are here, you are Rylee Henderson.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know for sure. You were sleeping, and then you crashed. It could have been a reaction to the drug I gave you for the pain, but I doubt it. You’ve had Demerol for migraines in the past. It’s not something you’ve ever had a problem with. But I gave you Narcan in case it was the Demerol. It did nothing, so it wasn’t Demerol that caused the crash in your vitals. The only other sensible cause was extremely low blood sugar, and that was evident by the way you came back after the glucagon. Low blood sugar is new for you.”

  “I remember bits and pieces. Someone was in here before; it wasn’t you, Lee or Tim. Who was it?”

  “A nurse came in and did routine obs. Temp, etc.”

  “What time is it now?”

  “Two fifty-five in the morning.” The penny dropped or the candy bar did. “Fuck.” Kurt unplugged the pump. “We almost lost you,” he said as he removed the needle from my arm an
d applied pressure to the tiny hole left behind.

  “What?”

  “I think someone administered insulin,” Kurt said.

  I was a victim of the hospital killer.

  “The nurse.”

  “That’s how the killer is killing. No wonder there wasn't an obvious cause of death.”

  Kurt yelled for Lee.

  Lee burst through the door followed by Tim.

  “Someone tried to kill her. That nurse who came in just before she crashed ... either of you get a good look at her? I’ll recognize her again.”

  Tim nodded. “I did.”

  “Find her.” He leveled a hard stare at both of them. “Lock this place down. I think she administered insulin while she was in here. You’re looking for a small syringe – it takes two mils to kill a normal adult, more for a diabetic.”

  “We’re looking for a two-mil syringe?” Lee asked. “Have to ask – Chicky is anything but normal.”

  “Thanks,” I grumbled.

  “I mean that in a good way,” Lee said.

  “In this case she’s normal,” Kurt said.

  Lee and Tim left.

  “Was I that much of a pain in the ass in the ER?”

  “Not really, you get nasty though.” He rubbed his jaw. “You have a decent left hook by the way. You didn’t like me applying an icepack to your left hand.”

  That explained why my fingers felt stiff; I smacked Kurt. I am such a charming woman.

  “What does my chart say?”

  “I don’t know. I only have the med chart in here.”

  “If Mac hadn’t been here, I’d be dead,” I said. It was the truth as I saw it, not a reflection on Kurt’s ability.

  “I would’ve figured it out.”

  “Okay, I’d be a vegetable that breathes.”

  “I would’ve figured it out. Low blood sugar was next on my list.”

  “I’d hate to be trapped in a vegetative stasis.” I’d sooner die than not live.

  “Chicky Babe, I would’ve figured it out.”

  A smile reached across my lips. First ever Chicky Babe from Kurt. He would’ve figured it out.

  “It’s easier to talk to dead people when you are dead people.”

  “I’m glad you came back. Don’t know if I could handle being haunted by you.”

  “Doc, do I have clothes?” I tried sitting forward but it hurt like hell. Bruised ribs at the very least.

  “Yes.” He walked across the room and picked a bag up from a chair then put it back down. “First though, I think you should eat. I don’t want a repeat of that whole flatline shit you pulled.”

  “Vending machine, I don’t want to eat anything prepared here. Someone might not be happy I’m alive.”

  Sooner or later people need to stop trying to kill me. Maybe I need to stop pissing them off.

  He nodded. “I’ll help you get dressed soon. I cannot leave you, okay?”

  “I figured as much.”

  “How do you feel?” Kurt appeared curious but not in a medical way. “You sound okay, in fact better than I would expect from most people who’d been through what you just survived.”

  “I’m not most people.”

  “Don’t I know it,” Kurt said with a smile.

  “I don’t feel any worse than after a migraine. Tired, a little disjointed mentally – things aren’t as clear as maybe they should be.”

  “You should be under observation for at least twelve hours in a hospital.”

  I choose to ignore that comment.

  “Who admitted me?”

  “Grant signed the forms.”

  “I have records here ... do you have them? If someone accessed them they’ll know who I am.”

  “Chicky, I have your records. Before we left DC I had a duplicate set made.” From the table behind him he picked up a thick file and placed it in my hands. “It’s all here, your exciting list of head and brain traumas, the migraines, everything.”

  “The reconstruction to my shoulder? The dates?”

  “No one but Grant has seen this file. No one.”

  I closed my eyes and welcomed sleep, but it resisted. Thoughts of hospital records would not leave my consciousness. My eyes opened again. Kurt was watching me.

  “Welcome back.”

  Had I slept?

  “What’s the time?”

  “Almost four.”

  My thoughts about records became vocal.

  “My records, the ones that are kept in this hospital. I used to live here. They have records.”

  “There are none. When you were admitted with a fractured skull and broken arm after being drugged by Charles Boyd, all records were removed from this facility. Caine insisted. That’s how I had them in Richmond when I took over your care.”

  “There is nothing here?”

  “Nothing in the records department. There may be records on the computer system but they won’t marry up to anything official in the records room.”

  Kurt showed me the thick file in his hands.

  I looked at the name. Rylee Gabrielle Henderson.

  “When did you come up with that?”

  My eyes closed again before I heard his reply.

  The door flew open, jolting me from sleep. Lee pushed a woman into the room.

  “This is her,” he growled at Kurt.

  “Yeah.” He looked at the woman who glared back at him. “You’re not a nurse.” I had no clue how he could tell, everyone wore the same color scrubs. Pale green. She looked like a nurse. Small, pretty, with her blonde hair pulled back into a pony tail. Stethoscope around her neck. A photo identity tag hung from a pocket.

  “Kurt Henderson,” she said, her voice devoid of emotion.

  “Do I know you?” Kurt said.

  “Once.”

  Kurt shook his head, he couldn’t remember the woman.

  “What is it you want with me, Doctor Henderson?”

  “You can start by explaining the insulin you injected into the port on my wife’s drip.”

  She almost scoffed, but thought better of it and tried for a more appalled reaction. “I’m a doctor. By definition I can do no harm. And you accuse me of attempted murder?”

  Above everyone floating on the ceiling, Mac attracted my attention. He waved and pointed at the woman. Then held up two fingers.

  “Why is the number six so important?” I said.

  She turned her head and focused on me. “Excuse me?”

  Tim barreled in and closed the door. He threw a banana at me. “Eat.”

  “Thanks.” I guess.

  “Now.”

  I didn’t know him well enough to know quite how to read him but I sensed trouble, so I ate the banana. He stood by the door, hands behind his back. He reminded me a bit of Lee, as he stood at parade rest.

  Lee didn’t react at all. He was focused on the female doctor. That meant he trusted Tim. Good to know. I had a feeling I was supposed to know who Tim was. Another elusive memory wiped by the flashy thing.

  “Six,” I said once I’d finished the banana. “Why six?”

  She didn’t answer. Lee kicked her foot.

  “Answer the question.”

  Kurt had his laptop open, running searches on hospital files and records.

  “I have patients who need me,” she said.

  Lee reached over and removed her hospital identity card. “Doctor, you are not leaving this room until you answer the questions.”

  “Why did you pose as a nurse?” Kurt asked. “When you came in, you did the nurses’ duties and wore your top out over your pants.”

  Oh, that’s how he knew; some kind of doctor/nurse code that meant doctors tucked in their scrubs and nurses didn’t.

  “Where is the syringe?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know what you are talking about. I did not come into this room. I’ve been up on the ICU all night. A patient of mine coded earlier this evening.”

  Really? So did I.

  Kurt looked at Lee as if to say,
where did you find her? He replied, “She was sitting outside the ICU having a coffee.”

  Lee passed the credentials to Kurt. “Run them. If she used the elevator or opened any doors it’ll show on the record for her swipe card.”

  Kurt did. The record showed she hadn’t left the ICU floor.

  “Search her,” he said.

  Lee found nothing in her pockets and Kurt looked at Tim.

  “Tim, go back to where you found her and search trash receptacles. She may have ditched another identity card.” Tim hurried away after whispering something to Lee first. I saw Lee nod and move back to Tim’s position by the door. He handed over guard duty. He must know something.

  Kurt perched himself next to me on the bed and checked all records from all the doors that had swipe-card entry. Doctor Sandy Richards swiped out of the ICU, seconds before a nurse accessed the elevator from emergency and exited at the ICU floor. Five minutes later the same nurse went back down and then swiped into the ER, from the staff entrance.

  “We need to find a nurse who works in the ER. Her name is Annabelle Richards.”

  The doctor stiffened.

  “Your sister?” Kurt asked.

  “No,” she replied. “I don’t have a sister.”

  “A happy coincidence that you have the same surname and look very similar?”

  “I’m not one for coincidences,” I said, watching the laptop screen with Kurt. My head was starting to hurt again. It wasn’t bad but I could tell the Demerol was wearing off. “Kurt,” I whispered. “I need more …”

  “Okay,” he whispered back. “Hang in there.”

  “Even Tylenol will help. I need to stop it before it gets real bad again.”

  Kurt stood up, leaving the laptop on the bed with me. He walked over to Lee and spoke quietly. Lee nodded and stepped out the door.

  “What’s wrong?” Richards asked me.

  “Nothing,” I said.

  “If you need help, tell me, I’m a doctor.”

  I pressed my fingers to my right temple.

  “One who tried to kill me.”

  “I. Did. Not. Try. To. Kill. You.”