“You want to try that again?”
“I’m not interested in a relationship. I have responsibilities. There is no time for a man in my life, and if there were, it wouldn’t be you.” Her eyes skated away from his. He decided to try something.
“Are you attracted to me?” He snapped out the question.
“I – I…”
“Answer the question,” he fired out.
“Yes,” was her knee jerk response. He smiled. Her eyes widened, the whites showing around the rich brown, making her look like an anime character.
“How?” she asked softly.
“I don’t know, baby. I was mimicking you. It must have rubbed off.” He turned towards the area where the passengers would be coming out. Nate was easy to spot. He pointed. She didn’t look up, instead she continued to stare at him.
“Kota, I don’t understand.”
“It’s simple, you’re attracted to me.” He was careful not to sound smug.
“If you were found, I could understand how you did that.”
“Baby, you know it isn’t just the found who have gifts. You know that. Now there’s Maricel, go say hello. She needs you.” He gently guided her forward with his hand at the base of her back.
He watched the beautiful woman as she moved forward to hug Maricel. Nate nodded, as he kept his arm around Sarah. They looked good together. It was nice to see after all this time they’d gotten their shit ironed out.
The four of them walked back to Kota as he scanned the crowd. He got them hustled out to the parking lot in record time.
“Are we going to see my mama now?”
“Yes, we’re going to her apartment,” Gabriella smiled. Kota grimaced. The hellhole Gabriella was referring to as an apartment was not something he really wanted Maricel to see, but her mother wasn’t working at the moment. They headed over to Mission, and went to the absolute worst part of town. The talking going on between the three women had quickly subsided the closer they got to Maricel’s mom’s home.
“Damn,” Nate said under his breath.
“It only gets worse,” Kota breathed back. He pulled in front of a two story building that was baby puke yellow with broken windows and screens falling out. There were four cars in the potholed parking lot, two of them up on blocks.
“Let me go get her,” Kota commanded.
“You know it won’t work,” Gabriella protested. “She doesn’t believe us. You’ll have to take Maricel to the door, and if she is going, I am going.” Kota rubbed his hand through his hair.
“Fine.” He glared at Nate when he made a move.
“You’re right, Sarah and I’ll stay in the car.” Kota and Gabriella had already been there once before, they knew the lay of the land. He felt confident he wouldn’t need Nate the little distance they’d be away from the car, especially since he was armed. He motioned towards the center console in the SUV for Nate who tilted his chin in acknowledgement. Now both of them would be able to protect the women.
As he led the ladies up the stairs to Mrs. Lopez he wished, once again, he wasn’t taking Maricel to such an ugly place to meet her mother. He noted how Maricel gripped Gabriella’s hand tighter with each step they took up the dilapidated staircase.
Kota had the two women stand behind him as he knocked on the door. After some shuffling easily heard through the paper thin door, it opened a crack. The security chain hung uselessly above the small woman’s head.
“Si?”
“Mama!” There was no stopping Maricel, she pushed past him and Gabriella, and Mrs. Lopez opened the door with a scream. They hugged each other until they both melted onto the floor. Kota easily helped them up and guided them to the couch was covered with a sheet. Even though he was raised speaking Spanish, trying to decipher what these two women were saying between the sobs was impossible. He looked at Ellie who shrugged.
He finally crouched down and said in Spanish. “We need to leave. Maricel, you need to explain to your mom it isn’t safe here, and we need her to come with us.”
Again he listened in to a torrent of Spanish damn near impossible for him to keep up with, but finally Mrs. Lopez got up and tried to engulf him in a hug, which was impossible. He bent low and patted her back.
“Thank you for caring for my daughter and rescuing her and my granddaughter.” The older woman said with quiet dignity.
“They are both very special to us Mrs. Lopez.”
“Call me Alma, please.”
“Alma. I think Maricel has explained how she and her daughter have been in danger and we now worry for your safety as well. We want to take care of you. You must come with us at once.”
Then came the torrent of Spanish again, and Kota had no chance of winning this argument. Even though there was no blood relation between Maricel and her adopted mother, they certainly had the same level of stubborn. Once again he found himself looking at Gabriella for support.
“Alma, the sooner we get you to California, the sooner Maricel will be safe.”
“No, I must give notice, and say good bye to my friends. But most important, I have my duties at the senior center that must be divided out to other volunteers.” Here was a woman who was having trouble walking, doing menial labor who had also taken on volunteer duties? Kota was amazed. He also had enough.
“Dona Alma, I’m sure they’ll figure it out when you say you’re leaving town to stay with your daughter. They’ll understand.” He was beginning to feel like nothing was in his control.
“I said no. This will take a week to be properly done. Some of the older residents do not take change easily.”
“But…”
“Dakota, you heard the woman.” What Kota heard and saw was three against one. He wished he hadn’t made Nate stay in the car.
****
Kota and Maricel stayed behind with Maricel’s mom. Maricel was sure she could convince her mom to come to California sooner if she stayed behind. Sarah, Nate and Gabriella headed to Nevada to question Kathy Simms. Nate tried to talk Sarah out of going, he really didn’t want her to have to confront the bitch again. She’d suffered enough at her hands. But Sarah was right, they needed her to decipher the medical speak.
“You’ve got a half hour before Simms needs to meet with her lawyer,” Cyrus said before he left them in the prison yard.
“I told them I wasn’t going to talk to you without my lawyer present, is he stupid?”
“I see your bedside manner hasn’t improved since you started dressing in orange,” Sarah said calmly.
“You think you’re so much better than everybody else, when you’re nothing more than a sideshow freak.” Nate could smell the anger and desperation emanating from the woman.
“Lady, if you want to avoid solitary confinement, you better watch your tongue,” Nate said as he leaned across the table.
“Nate…”
“Enough,” Gabriella cut in. “You vicious bitch, will answer my questions.”
“I will do nothing.”
“Alma, what kinds of tests did you run on her?” Gabriella shot out the question.
Nate watched as she shook her head, flyaway blonde strands of hair escaped her ponytail, her green eyes looking at him for an explanation.
“You look at me,” Gabriella commanded. “What kinds of tests did you run on the baby?” Gabriella enunciated each word slowly.
“Too many. We needed to find out why her core body temperature ran so hot.”
“Bah! I don’t care about that. I want to know what kind of tests you ran on her after you found out she could harm people.” Simms gripped the edge of the plastic picnic table until her knuckles turned white. Sarah leaned forward, all of her concentration on the woman. Nate realized that she was likely combining her energy with Gabriella. Simms didn’t stand a chance.
“We tried everything. We did blood tests, we did CAT scans, and MRI’s, we, we,” she bit her lip so hard blood seeped out and dripped down her chin.
“Say it,” Gabriella’s voice was steel.
Sarah reached out and gripped Nate’s hand. God it was going to be bad.
“I wasn’t there. I was in Nevada and they took her to Atlanta. I only read the results of the tests they ran. I wasn’t there. I would never have been part of what they did, you’ve got to believe me.” Sarah didn’t believe her. She remembered all too well what she suffered at her hands.
“What did they do,” Gabriella demanded.
“They needed to measure her brain activity when she was hurting someone, something.” Simms’ voice dropped so low Nate couldn’t hear her.
“Louder,” Gabriella was relentless.
“They gave her a lab rat to hold, but it kept getting away,” Nate knew where this was going. Sarah clutched his upper arm. Simms stopped talking again.
“You will finish, you will tell us everything. You feel me in your head, don’t you?” Simms nodded. “Say it.”
“I can’t, please don’t make me.”
“I can turn your brain to mush. You will tell me everything.”
“Stovers arranged for them to give her a kitten to hold while they strapped her into an MRI machine. They measured her brain activity. From a purely scientific standpoint it was incredible. The results showed three times more brain activity as the kitten got weaker. When Alma realized she was hurting the cat she would struggle so much to stop touching the cat she would end up passing out. It was then the kitten would revive.”
“My God, you tried to have her kill a cat?”
“Not me, I wasn’t there. This was all Stovers idea. He had some crazed psychotic bastard working for him in Sandy Springs. He had me look over the data while I was working Nevada. I couldn’t believe it he was doing that to a baby.”
“Oh my God.” Sarah gagged.
“The experiment went on for hours, with Alma passing out each time, and the kitten reviving, until finally Alma went into a catatonic state. It took weeks for her to come out of it.”
“Were you able to isolate what she did? Are you able to in any way mimic her abilities?” Gabriella’s questions came out rapid fire, which amazed Nate because he felt the need to throw up.
“No, they never could. I want to make this clear. I was not part of what went on in Atlanta.”
“But they sent you the reports to analyze, didn’t they Ms. Simms?” Gabriella asked in a pleasant tone.
Sarah, Gabriella and Nate stared at the woman. She looked at them with an almost defiant expression on her face that soon turned to defeat.
“Yes, yes they did.”
“Tell us what else they did in Atlanta.” Just the way Gabriella asked the question made it clear she didn’t buy into Simms bullshit that her hands were clean.
“Stovers was finally convinced we had to use hypnosis or brainwashing to get Alma under their control. But it didn’t go well. They finally put her back in the MRI machine. Apparently when they tried to use the different techniques, some of those parts of her brain that should have been at rest would activate. They seemed to create a defense against both the brainwashing and the hypnosis. It went a lot slower than it would with a normal person. Stovers was furious.” Sarah’s nails that had been biting into his biceps, relaxed.
“What did he do next,” Gabriella asked.
“He figured if he started at an earlier age we, I mean they, could get the techniques to work. That’s why he worked even harder to find more candidates for the breeding program.”
“What do you mean an earlier age? Earlier than a year old?” Sarah asked incredulously.
Simms took a long pause. It was clear she didn’t want to answer, but knew she didn’t have a choice. “He was thinking to start when the fetus was invitro,” she whispered.
“Jesus,” Nate breathed.
“But first he needed to get Maricel or another healer pregnant,” she continued. “He was thinking you would be more powerful than Maricel.” She tipped her chin in Sarah’s direction. “He was fixated on you, he was sure you would produce a more powerful baby than Alma.”
“One more question. If it wasn’t working, why did they continue to keep her in the Atlanta facility?” Gabriella asked.
“Stovers said until they had a breeder, they would continue to experiment on Alma, try to perfect hypnosis and brainwashing techniques on her. At the same time, they could continue to see what her level of power was.” Gabriella was just as sickened as Sarah, she was just hiding it better. He hoped this tale of horror was almost at and end.
“So they continued to run experiments on her?” Gabriella asked, as Sarah clutched his arm so tight he thought she might cut off the circulation.
“I’m not sure, they stopped sending me reports. I recommended that due to lack of progress Alma be returned to the Nevada facility. At that point Stovers stopped sending me reports and I was told to focus on the fertility and memory loss drug therapies.”
“Do you know anything more that is of use to us?” Gabriella asked in a tired voice.
“I honestly don’t know.”
“We’re done here.” Gabriella stood and marched across the yard to the gate in the chain link fence. Sarah was trembling, and Nate helped her up off the bench.
“This was all off the record you know,” Kathy Simms yelled after them.
Nate spun around and rested his big fists on the table staring the woman in the eye. “But your e-mails, your files and all of your correspondence with the Atlanta facility has been confiscated. That’s on the record, now isn’t it?” His smile was all teeth. “Please don’t take a plea, I’m begging you lady. I want to see you go to trial. I want to be there. Unless of course one of Stovers minions gets to you first. That would be fine with me too.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Sarah, you can’t leave again,” Sierra grabbed her arm and practically dragged her into the nursery where Alma was staying. Sarah never saw Sierra so distraught. As soon as she saw Alma, she understood. Somehow the child pulled up the mattress of her crib and burrowed beneath it.
“Since you’ve been gone, she won’t let me feed her or change her diaper.” Sierra’s voice dropped down to a low whisper. “She’s stinky, I know she needs to be changed.” Sarah looked into the compassionate green eyes of her friend. Beneath Sierra’s gruff Navy exterior was a woman who didn’t want a baby to hear she smelled.
“When I try to use force to take her out of the crib she screams so desperately I just can’t bring myself to do it. I don’t know if it’s my red hair, my bad breath or the fucking lead lined gloves you forced me to wear. Before you left, I watched you take care of her, and it wasn’t the same. I mean, she would go absolutely stiff when you touched her, but she would still let you touch her…” Sierra’s words trailed off. They both looked at the tiny lump under the mattress.
“You did the right thing. I understand so much better now I talked to that…” Sarah stopped herself from using a word she never used in her life. “Come out in the hallway with me and I’ll explain.”
When she was done, Sierra used the word Sarah wanted to use to refer to Kathy Simms. “I can’t believe Nate didn’t climb over the table and kill her.”
“I think he plans to take the law into his own hands when it comes to Stovers,” Sarah whispered.
“Good. If he doesn’t, there are at least three of us who will.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.” Sarah looked into the redhead’s green eyes and saw she absolutely was serious.
Sierra peaked back into the nursery. “Can you help Alma? I’m going to go talk to the Chief.”
“I can get her fed and make her comfortable. As for helping her, it’s going to take time and thought.” Sarah watched as Sierra left the apartment. She went into the nursery and raised the mattress. Alma was on her tummy with her little butt up in the air. She turned her head and looked up at Sarah.
“Yep, it’s me. It’s time to get you cleaned up and fed.” Alma shook her head.
Sarah reached into the crib and Alma scooched into the farthest corner away from
her.
“Honey, I’m going to pick you up no matter what. You know I am. So let’s make this easy on ourselves. If you rest easy in my arms, there will be less touching, okay?” Alma stared at her. Sarah tried again. “I’m like you, you won’t hurt me, I promise. I promise honey, you won’t hurt me. I won’t let you hurt me.” Sarah repeated the words until Alma finally nodded.
She swooped in and picked up the child and put her onto the changing table. She definitely felt Alma’s energy, but she was easily able to counteract it with her own now she knew what to expect. It would have been a cold day in hell before Sarah would have worn the gloves to save herself a little bit of discomfort.
“There, not too bad, now was it?” There was no response. Sarah went about the process of changing the diaper. She soon had Alma changed and fed. She adjusted the mattress and put her back into the crib. She dropped a kiss on Alma’s forehead and saw her look of surprise.
“Get used to it kiddo.”
****
“Tell me we’re going to kill the fucker!” Sierra shouted as the door slammed against the wall. Nate, Cyrus and Brice looked up from the conference room table to see Sierra storming across the room towards them. Even though she was much smaller, Nate had an urge to take a step backwards.
“Easy Lovely, we still need Nate in one piece, wait until the op is over before you kill him.” Sierra rounded on Brice.
“This isn’t funny, Scotty. Do you know what that sick fuck did to Alma?”
“Aye,” Brice nodded.
Nate saw the shimmer of tears in Sierra’s eyes.
“Then he needs to die.”
“Aye, he does. First we have to find him and we have a lead.” Nate watched as the big Scot pulled Sierra into the chair next to him. “Now, we were needing you anyway Lass. You know your way around the computer much better than I do.”
“Well yeah.”
“I think we found something,” Brice said.
“Not we,” Nate interrupted. “This was all your wiley Scot. I don’t know how his twisted mind works, but I like it.”
Healed (The Found Book 3) Page 21