by Dana Marton
Maybe it was for the better.
He deleted the message as he headed upstairs to his own room.
She needed time to process everything he’d told her yesterday. He would contact her later. Her e-mail address was up on her animal sanctuary’s website. That’d work.
Cole had lunch at the cafeteria, then drove to the airport through sheets of rain. He dropped his rental and checked in. By the time he made it to gate twenty-seven, the sign was up that his flight had been delayed due to the weather.
He went to grab coffee. He had his friend Derek’s thriller in his suitcase. Maybe he’d finally get to finish the book.
He didn’t. As rain slammed into the terminal windows and the sky darkened, another announcement flashed onto the display screen next to the boarding gate, updating to a longer delay. Cole was fine one second, then knocked sideways the next by the sudden flashback of him running up an Afghan hillside with Matt across his shoulders.
We walked three hundred miles, because the nearest US Army base was in Bagram.
Cole blinked hard, reaching out to steady himself on the armrest of his chair. Who said that?
Then the voice continued. Officially, there are no special ops stationed there, but it’s an unofficial staging base for black-ops missions.
He blinked. Shook his head. Who would know that?
He did. He had said those words. When? He had no memory of the conversation.
He pushed up from the gray plastic chair, strode to the window, and stared into the roiling clouds of the approaching hurricane. A military plane might take off in weather like that, but no way a civilian aircraft was going to. Nobody was flying out of Philly tonight.
Looked like Hurricane Rupert has just made landfall at Chesapeake Bay, coming fast this way.
He paced along the window. The flashbacks wouldn’t leave his head. When had he talked about Bagram? He didn’t discuss Bagram with anyone, ever.
He ran his hand over his shaved head. Why would he say something like that? To whom? He couldn’t untangle the jumble in his mind.
Had he said those words at all, or was it some kind of false memory? Was he now, in addition to flashbacks, hallucinating too?
He almost regretted ever coming to Hope Hill, ever letting the shrinks stir up the past in his head. Almost, because he couldn’t regret meeting Annie.
How many SEALs were at Bagram the last time you were there?
OK, he had not said that. He closed his eyes and could see someone’s lips move, forming the question.
Cole could clearly envision a man’s mouth. But he couldn’t see the face that went with it.
The walls of the terminal closed in on him. He grabbed his phone to call Annie, then swore. He needed her new number, dammit. She was the only person he 100 percent trusted at Hope Hill.
Cole leaned his forehead against the cool window, not hearing the rain outside, but feeling the vibrations as the heavy drops hit the glass. When and where had he been questioned? He wanted to pin down the sudden flashbacks. He needed to recover the memory of the face that went with the lips that asked him questions nobody should have asked him.
The last time he’d been questioned like that . . .
A flashback from one of the endless torture sessions of his captivity slammed into him. Cole broke into pacing again. He needed to work off the excess energy that sought a violent outlet, exhaust some of his murderous rage. He needed a clear head.
When was the last time you were at Bagram? How many troops were there at the time?
Had he answered that? He couldn’t remember. Frustration pumped through him.
Who was the senior brass at the base?
Cole knew the answer. But had he told?
You were shot down in a chopper. Black Hawk? How many of them did the base have?
He stopped as lightning crackled through the darkening sky, the floor shaking the next second. He could actually hear the thunder, but only as if from a great distance, or as if he were deep underwater.
The thought that speared through his mind hit him as hard as if he’d been struck by that lightning bolt. He didn’t remember where or when those questions had been asked, but he clearly remembered lip-reading them.
His hearing hadn’t been injured until they were escaping. The damage had happened in a drag-out, to-the-death fight with one of the guards. So the questioning Cole was remembering so suddenly couldn’t have happened during the six months he’d been a POW.
The memory had to be more recent. When and where?
Hope Hill. His subconscious mind kicked up the answer. Hope Hill had a traitor who dealt in information.
Cole’s mind buzzed like a whole flock of incoming choppers as he thought about all the pills he’d taken while he’d been at Hope Hill. Any number of people around him could have switched out a sleeping pill for something else. What had he been given?
Scopolamine came to mind, used in the twenties by police departments to interrogate suspects. Not only did it loosen people’s tongues, but they couldn’t remember the interrogation afterward. It was banned for police use now. Any evidence gained with the help of scopolamine was inadmissible in court, but the drug was still around, used in small doses to prevent severe motion sickness.
A traitor slash spy could certainly gain access to a couple of pills easily enough. Except that the traitor at Hope Hill was Trevor.
Or was he?
Trevor had had a scar on his lower lip, part of the injury that had put titanium pins in the kid’s neck. But the mouth in Cole’s newly recovered memories, the mouth that had asked him those revealing questions, had been unblemished.
So not Trevor, then.
Cole let that thought settle in for a few seconds.
If Trevor wasn’t the bad guy here, could he have been a victim?
What if Trev too had been drugged and used? What if he too remembered answering traitorous questions? Cole stifled a groan at the implications of his trail of thoughts. What if Trev hadn’t committed suicide? What if the traitor had killed Trev?
Trev had been planning that barn . . .
Cole sent his CO a text. Think we got the wrong guy. It’s not Trevor. Then he added, I’m at the airport. Heading back to Hope Hill.
His CO would get in touch with him as soon as he got the messages. He could be anywhere. He could be over in Yemen with a team right now, rounding up the recipients of the coded Hope Hill information. Cole was on his own.
He grabbed his bag and walked out of the terminal, straight to car rental.
He reached the desk just in time. The parking lot was flooding. He got the last car they signed out before piling the rest on trailers to move to higher ground.
He drove through Philly in driving rain, going at half the speed he could have if the road wasn’t slick, visibility crap, and his mobility limited by his injured shoulder. The trip to Hope Hill took twice as long as it should have, and he found himself grinding his teeth at the delay.
He was soaked to the skin by the time he ran from the parking lot into the building.
He checked Annie’s room first. Still not there. She’d probably decided to stay at her house to make sure her animals were OK during the storm. He wanted to text her, dammit, wanted to make sure she was safe. Instead, he grabbed his phone and started typing messages to his CO. He began with the flashbacks and listed the questions he remembered having been asked.
He was typing out the fifth question, focused on the mouth forming the words, when the full face flashed into his mind at last.
Son of a bitch.
Cole hurried down the hallway as he sent the last message.
Dan Ambrose. It’s the staff psychiatrist.
The door to the hallway with the staff offices hadn’t been locked yet for the night, so Cole simply walked through. Ambrose’s office stood empty.
Right. The guy would have no reason to be here at eight o’clock at night.
Murphy Dolan’s office was empty too. Cole couldn’t see any other
staff. Only two offices had the lights on, but nobody sat behind the desks.
Cole ran to the staff break room down the hall. Since the facility was inpatient, they had staff on duty around the clock. Somebody had to be here who could tell him where to find Ambrose.
Cole burst into the break room. The three women sitting at the round table in the corner looked up from chatting over coffee: Libby the reflexologist, Kate the touch therapist, and Margie from the cleaning crew.
“Does anyone know where Ambrose lives? It’s an emergency.”
“Everything OK?” Libby came to her feet.
Kate, too, immediately moved toward Cole. “What can we help with?”
“I need Ambrose’s address. I need to talk to him.”
Kate stopped. “I’m sorry, but we can’t disclose personal information to a patient. I’m sure that whatever is wrong, we can help.”
As the floor vibrated behind him with footsteps, Cole turned in time to see Murphy Dolan stride up to him.
“Where’s Ambrose?” Cole grabbed Dolan by the arm and turned him so when he responded, Cole would be able to read his lips.
“He didn’t show for your session either?” Dolan glanced down at the hand, then over at the women who looked uncertain, clearly worried about Cole’s brusque manner and demands. “Dan didn’t show for any of his afternoon patients. I left him two messages earlier, but he never called me back.”
Dolan ushered Cole out of the break room. The guy sensed a threat, and his first move was to protect the women. Cole could respect that. He meant no harm. Not to them.
He closed the door behind him.
“I came to Hope Hill undercover,” he told Dolan. Cole needed his cooperation to find the psychiatrist. “I think Ambrose has been drugging patients. He’s been getting confidential military information out of them, then passing it on to a connection in the Middle East.”
As Dolan’s eyes narrowed, the phone vibrated in Cole’s pocket.
His CO with a text. Organizing Backup. Cole clicked to call, and when the display showed that the other end picked up, he said, “I’m going to give the phone to Murphy Dolan. You need to tell him I check out. You need to tell him to give us assistance.”
He handed the phone over.
As Dolan listened, the man’s jaw went from tense to tenser. Within five seconds, his eyes glinted with murder.
Then things went from bad to worse.
Cole remembered another question Ambrose had asked.
What’s your relationship with Annie Murray?
Why was Ambrose interested in Annie?
Cole thought of her stalker, her intruder, the hit-and-run that almost pushed her into the reservoir. And so far the police couldn’t pin any of that on her ex. Last Cole had heard, they were still pushing for a confession from Joey and Big Jim.
Cole held his hand out for the phone. “Find and detain Ambrose,” he told Dolan. “The police can help. I need to find Annie.”
Then Cole was running.
Chapter Twenty-Six
THE MAN WALKED down into his basement, holding an empty jar in one hand, a sippy cup in the other.
“Hello, Mother.”
The woman who had abandoned him in his childhood lay on the bed in a short, sleeveless nightgown. He kept the basement warm so she wouldn’t catch a chill.
“Do you know who I am?” he asked, setting the sippy cup on the bedside table.
She shook her head, her blue eyes widening with fear.
“Don’t worry. I’ll help you remember.”
He picked the leeches off her one by one as she shuddered with revulsion, tears leaking out of her eyes.
“Are you feeling better?”
She nodded. He’d trained her to do that, but sometimes she forgot. The curse of Alzheimer’s.
He set aside the jar of leeches, then treated the wounds on her thighs. He’d thought if he re-created the pain of childbirth, maybe she’d remember giving birth to him. She hadn’t. He’d have to try something else in a few weeks, when she fully healed.
Her wounds taken care of, he helped her sit and lifted the sippy cup—a strawberry-flavored protein shake—to her lips. He smiled as she drank.
“Aren’t you glad I found you in that home? It’s so much nicer for family to live together, isn’t it?”
Her straight, patrician nose—which he’d inherited from her—ran. He wiped it.
“I was going to bring someone home to meet you.” He sighed. “But she disappointed me. I’m afraid she won’t be able to join our family after all. Isn’t that a shame?”
Teary-eyed, his mother nodded.
Annie huddled in the garage with her animals while Rupert pounded on the roof. She didn’t want to leave them alone in the storm. Her garage was pretty sturdy, and she felt safe. Right now, the house was more vulnerable since the wind could tear the plywood patch off the back, leaving the inside open to the elements.
The storm raged outside, but Annie was too numb to care. Her heart had been broken into a million pieces that had fallen away like dead leaves from a tree. There was nothing inside her. She was empty.
She was so empty it hurt, with a sharp, pulsating pain.
She moved between the separate animal enclosures in her garage. She petted the llamas, scratched the pig behind the ears, gave the donkey a treat. She thought about opening the gates and bedding down with them, but Dorothy, the pig, had no respect for personal space. And if Dorothy was too aggressive, pushing her snout into the skunks, one might spray.
The garage had a metal roof, and the rain was insanely loud as the fat drops hit. The wind bent the locust tree next to the garage, the branches scraping over the siding. The noise was so bad, she almost didn’t hear when someone knocked on the door.
She could barely make out the dark shape of a man through the glass. Only one person ever came with her to take care of her animals. She hurried to let him in. “Cole.”
But the man who pushed inside wasn’t the man she’d expected.
“Dan?” She shut the door quickly before more wind and cold rain could rush through the gap. “What are you doing here?”
“You have to come with me.”
“Did your car break down?” Did he slide into a ditch and need a push? Pushing wouldn’t work in all this mud. “Stay here until the weather blows over.”
He grabbed her. His eyes usually conveyed care and concern. Right now, as he held on to her arm, Annie thought he looked determined and almost angry.
“Things could have been different,” he said, and his words had a bite to them.
“What are you talking about?”
“I chose you.”
For a second, she didn’t understand. Then . . . this was about refusing to go out with him? She blinked. He was still angry about that? “You know we can’t—”
As if her words flipped a switch, Dan’s hand jumped from her arm to her neck in an instant, and he held tight. She was so startled she froze.
“Stop your fucking lies. You’re fucking a patient. You’ve disgraced your license. I wanted to mentor you! You could have been worthy of me, if you only tried. You, among all the others.” He spit the words into her face, his hard, ruthless gaze making it clear that he meant to hurt her.
She fought to catch her breath as she desperately tried to make sense of him.
They were coworkers. Friends. Bitter betrayal flooded through her again, for the second time in as many days. Was nobody what they seemed? Was everybody lying to her?
Dan shook her, his voice filled with a level of hate impossible to comprehend. “Your whoring days are over.”
Cold fear spread through Annie. This was a Dan she didn’t know—utterly unstable. A madman.
She didn’t understand much, but she understood that she was in serious danger.
“Let me go. Please.” She struggled, her fighting instinct kicking in at last, but his grip on her neck only tightened.
And then she caught a flash of plastic in his hand. He slam
med it into her arm. She felt a pinch. Her brain came to a screeching halt. What’s happening?
The world went black.
Annie’s loaner Toyota stood in her driveway. The house was empty. So was the garage. No sign of struggle in either place, although her animals were agitated, the donkey doing her best to kick her way out of her enclosure.
Cole texted Murphy Dolan: You got Ambrose?
Not at home, Dolan responded. Neighbors haven’t seen him. Got APB out on him.
Good, then the cops were looking for both Ambrose and his car. He wouldn’t get far in this weather. Few people were out on the roads. The police would have no trouble spotting Ambrose if he was driving.
Cole texted his CO next. Backup?
The response was less than encouraging. Chopper grounded due to weather. Make do with local cops?
Cole was about to text Murphy Dolan for Annie’s new phone number when a text popped up on his screen. From Ambrose. Deer blind. Come alone.
A picture came next: Annie, soaked through and lifeless, lying on wet boards somewhere.
You touch her, you die. Cole sent the text, then jumped into his car, cursing Hurricane Rupert.
Water covered the road. He had to be careful if he didn’t want to go hydroplaning. The wind grew so strong that it blew the car sideways at times. Cole navigated the hazards with care, one-handed, while his mind went to the deer blind.
He’d only been there once. The blind wasn’t far from the walking path, but where exactly did he have to go off the path? Damn drugs. A year ago, he wouldn’t have had any trouble remembering. He was a freaking Navy SEAL. He owned his environment.
He drove to Hope Hill and ran across campus to the woods. He ran down the muddy footpath, most of it underwater. He couldn’t see footprints, dammit.
Fear and fury drummed in his head, pounding in his brain.
How bad was Annie hurt?
Was she even really here, or was this a trap?
Annie came to slowly, her head buzzing, her limbs heavy. Several seconds passed before she figured out where she was: in the deer blind, in the woods, in the middle of a hurricane. A squall pounded on the roof, making her head hurt. She couldn’t remember how she got here.