by Fiona Quinn
“That doesn’t seem to be too far from the truth.”
Fourteen
“Morning, beautiful.”
Striker’s words popped my eyes open in surprise. I was waiting for the morning church bells to signal me that Grandma Oatmeal was delivering my morning mush. Maryland, not Honduras, I reminded myself.
Andy moved to Striker’s side. “Time to get you up and out of bed.” The men lifted me up and over to the side of the bed, where I sat and dangled my feet until my head cleared. Andy went into my bathroom to set things up.
“Did you sleep okay?” Striker asked. He pulled a chair up next to me, keeping a steadying hand on my shoulder while I acclimated.
“My drugs are amazing, but they make me feel a little bit like my head is stuffed with cotton. I’m glad you came in when you did, though. I was having a miserable dream.”
“What about?”
“I saw the queen from Snow White, standing in front of her reflection. ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall, whose the most clever of them all?’ Then I was running through the haunted woods, and I feel like I’ve been running for a very long time.”
“Yup. Meds will do that to you.” Striker knelt down beside me and rubbed life back into my toes.
Andy brought my walker to the side of the bed. I felt absolutely stupid shuffling along behind the darned thing; but I also felt grateful for the stability it gave me. The men positioned themselves on either side of me, supporting some of my weight as I pulled to a standing position and lumbered toward the bathroom.
“What’s on the agenda today?” I asked as we made our way forward.
Striker flashed me a grin. “You are scheduled for healing and recuperation. Laura is going to be here in forty-five minutes to start your torture session.”
“What about the case?” I raised one eyebrow.
“We’ll have a meeting tonight if you’re up to it.”
“I’m up to it.” I set my teeth for the last five feet of my hike to the bathroom.
Striker bent to kiss my cheek. “I have to go. Work hard. I’ll have a special treat for you tonight.”
I looked up to catch his eyes. “Hint?”
“Nope.” Striker threw his head back and laughed when he saw me pout. It was a wonderful, full-throated laugh. I’d missed that.
***
Andy and I emerged from the bathroom. He had wrapped a towel around my wet head, and I was now dressed in black yoga pants and a T-shirt. I sat in the straight-backed chair while Andy combed the tangles out of my hair, and braided the damp strands into a rope down my back, out of the way. I ran my hand over the lumps. God bless him for trying, anyway.
My gaze wandered around the room. The walls glowed with a gentle, soft buttery yellow. Artistically distressed white French farmhouse furniture stood counterpoint to my modern hospital bed - safety wings, wheels and all. On one side was my nightstand, on the other my monitoring equipment.
Shelves to the left of the French doors displayed dozens of conch shells in various sizes, easily visible from my bed. The fabrics in the room duplicated the shells’ warm shades of pinks and peaches in soft cotton.Being in here felt like inspiration for my recovery — fresh and clean and healthy. The exact opposite of my cell.
Above my bed hung a painting of a village scene with darker hues, browns and shadows. The doors of the houses were painted verdigris, which contrasted beautifully with the fabric palate in my room and kept it from becoming cloying. The only subject in the painting was a small, lithe girl, maybe five- or six-years-old. Her hair fell thick, like a black velvet curtain, to her waist. She stood with her back to the viewer, under a tree heavy with pink cherry blossoms. The canvas was both winsome and sad at the same time. I knew immediately that Striker must have painted it from the delicate brush strokes. I’d have to ask him the story behind this – it seemed like something poignant was happening.
On the right hand side of the French doors was my table with two straight-backed chairs and a vase of wild flowers that Striker brought in when he set the table for last night’s soup. This morning, he’d set out a soft-boiled egg, a peanut butter protein shake, and toast.
“Have you had breakfast already, Andy?” I asked.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Honestly, I can’t stand how you stare at me while I’m eating.”
“Orders, ma’am. Laura wants me to report on how well you swallow different textures. You see, you have a thick fluid, something soft here, and something chewy there. If you do well with this you get chicken at lunch.”
As if on cue, someone tapped at the door; it pushed open just enough that I could see Laura’s broad smile through the door. “Was that my name I heard?”
Laura didn’t let me sit for long. I walked along a corridor of plain white walls. She laced a belt around my waist and held onto it from behind me in case I lost my balance and tried to do a face plant on the floor. I felt like a dog on a lead. Up and down the corridor. Up and down. My knees wobbled and my head spun. I was glad I could lean like an old lady on my walker, pushing it forward on its little fluorescent green tennis ball feet. I walked for forty-five minutes—well, shuffled for forty-five minutes. Then I lay on a mat on the floor where Laura stretched and massaged me, attached an e-stim unit to my skin and let the electricity contract and relax what was left of my muscles. I wouldn’t have thought it would be exhausting to lie there and let a machine do the exercising for me, but after about twenty minutes, I was panting.
I must have been a successful swallower, because the lunch that Andy brought me was chicken parmesan with angel hair spaghetti, a peanut butter smoothie, and peaches. Okay, not a combination that Nona Sophia would have put together, but at least the cook gave a nod to the flavor of the day.
If I’d been sick at Nona Sophia’s apartment, she would place a heating pad on my feet and an ice pack on my head. Nona thought that if you confused your body, the white cells would know to rally and fight. It was a pretty good theory; it seemed to work for headaches. But I’m not sure that it would apply to a broken sternum and a swollen vertebral column.
After lunch, I swallowed a handful of meds and took a nap. Laura sat in a cozy chair at the far side of my room, reading a book on her Kindle, waiting for me to get up so we could start all over again. She was hardcore. I appreciated that. But mostly, I appreciated my soft pillow and sleep.
Fifteen
Striker wasn’t around for dinner. It was Chris, Andy and I. Laura went home at five, thank god. Tonight we ate ribollita, an ancient Italian soup full of veggies and beans. Nona Sophia claimed that back in the Middle Ages, the nobility would eat their meals off plates made from large slices of dried bread called trenchers. After the meal, the peasants would gather the trenchers, full of the meal’s juices and leftover tidbits, and took them home to boil them for their own dinners. That was the origins of ribollita. I always thought it sounded gross, but this ribollita tasted pretty darned good, not at all like boiled leftover trenchers.
The three of us ate in silence. I was bushed.
Andy cleared off the table, helped me into my pajamas, and hooked me up to the equipment to do a systems check. When Striker came in, he nodded at Andy, who walked out the door, closing it softly behind him.
“You look zonked,” he said, sounding tired himself.
“Laura is dedicated to her job.”
Striker smiled. “Good.” He sat on my bed, leaned over, and gave me a kiss. His eyes held mine. “You look better. I’m starting to recognize you again.”
“I have to say, it was a good call not giving me a mirror on day one. If this is an improvement, I must have been horrific.”
Striker didn’t answer, but I could see emotions straining toward the surface. He dammed them back. The muscle in my thigh twitched at a steady pace. The top of my leg moved like a metronome.
“Are you doing that on purpose?” Striker asked.
“Could you do that on purpose?” I rubbed my palm up and down my leg.
“That’s weird. Does it hurt?”
“It’s distracting and irritating, but no, not painful.”
“Does it happen all the time?”
“Different muscles at different times. The doctor said it will stop eventually — maybe. Are you the only one here?”
“No. The team is in the west wing. We had a case come up that needs our attention. We have to pay the light bills while we try to figure you out.”
“Absolutely. Do you have anything for me? Was Axel able to get more information?” I asked.
“He sent a tape of Hector’s DA interview, but it’s visual only. They didn’t record audio. You still might get something from it, since you’re so good with body language, but I couldn’t get anything. Axel said the timeline went like this: T-Bone was in prison for two weeks prior to Hector’s arrest. His charges were assault with a deadly and resisting arrest. T-Bone had a cellmate, another Hellhound member, who was moved to solitary – consequences of a cafeteria fight over pudding.”
“Ah yes, well, pudding often has that kind of deleterious effect.” I shook my head in mock consternation.
“Chocolate pudding,” Striker added.
“Chocolate pudding? Even worse. The staff should have known that would end badly.”
Amusement brought out Striker’s dimples. “Are you done?”
“Are there any more food fights in this story?”
“Nope. We’re back to somber facts. Axel and Randy captured Hector on Tuesday afternoon. He was drunk when they arrested him, but not so drunk that he was incoherent. He was booked into the prison and put in a cell with T-Bone. Wednesday morning, Hector met with the DA and returned to his cell with T-Bone. My guess is that there was a time lag to do some rearranging of bunk assignments. Ninety minutes later, Hector moved to his own cell in the minimum-security wing where he would have more privileges and no gang members. An hour after that, T-Bone’s neck was broken.”
“Where?” I asked.
“The exercise yard. Wednesday afternoon, Axel interrogated Hector. Then Hector went to dinner; he had time in the community room, watching television, and went to the showers. A commotion called the guards’ attention to one end of the showers. When they turned around, Hector was on the floor dead — no obvious reason for the death. They handcuffed him and took him to the hospital wing, where the doctors discovered a plug of soap shoved deep in his throat. A security tape showed Jesus Manchuro, Hellhound member with a life sentence, standing over Hector. No one knows how a gangbanger with his record ended up housed in that wing of the prison — some kind of administrative glitch. I have the security tape for you, too.”
“Good. Thanks,” I said. No, not good. Not good at all.
“I have another tape. Command got an interesting visit today from our friend, Frith.”
That was odd. “Why would Frith risk more contact now that I’m dead?”
Striker pushed a button on my bed to elevate my head and pulled the hospital table over my lap. “Exactly. Frith doesn’t think you’re dead.” Striker reached down for his laptop, played with the keys, then turned the screen around for me to watch.
I recognized the image on the video as the conference room at Headquarters. This was the executive wing where the carpet was plush, the ceilings high and coffered, and the wood paneling richly polished. The receptionist, former Miss Arizona what’s-her-name, in her uniform of tight black pencil skirt and her fifteen-hundred dollar Christian Louboutin python-skin stilettoes, led a man to the Queen Anne table in the conference room. He was fifty-something, with a full head of gray hair and a well-fed physique.
“I’m guessing this is Frith?” I pointed at the screen.
“Yup.”
“You do a background on him? Are you sure he’s really Frith from the FBI?”
“You’ve never seen him before?” Striker raised a questioning brow.
“No. When I puzzled his case, I was under Spyder’s wing, and Spyder allowed no contact between the clients and me. I only know him on paper.”
“Command knew him already; I’ve met him before. He was our contact on three cases.”
“Can you tell me what they were?” I asked, pausing the video.
“The first was a case we shared with FBI and ATF. We were monitoring a separatist group, Patriots United, in West Virginia. The second one was the case that you puzzled over, the million-dollar drugs-for-gold bust, the one where you saved his ass. Spyder was Lead on that one. I guess he had good feelings towards us when he not only survived but received a promotion, and bonus check to boot. He’s the one who hired Iniquus to help investigate the torture and murder of an FBI senior administrator’s daughter.”
“Frith hired you for the Travis Wilson case?”
“FBI was our first client on the case, then CIA. As each agency took their own hit, each one added their name to the contract. Frith was our contact at FBI.”
“Wow. Small world. Now I have to thank him for his help protecting me from Omega and for his good judgment in bringing you guys onto the Wilson case. I don’t think I would have survived Travis Wilson if the team hadn’t found me, pulled me out of the hospital after Wilson’s first attack, and put me in the safe house.”
“You did a pretty good job of staying alive on your own. We weren’t around when you shot him.”
“Yeah. You know, sometimes I wish Wilson was in custody instead so I could ask him what was going on. I still have so many questions.”
“What do you want to know?” Striker asked.
“Why did he send the death threats as poems? Was that just to make us victims feel terrorized? Or was there more to it? What was his MO all about? I don’t get the naked, unmolested, razor-sliced vinegar scenario. It must have a backstory.”
“I have a few questions of my own. Where did he get his training? His surveillance equipment? They were professional grade. And why bludgeon the others to death?”
“It would have made more sense to strangle us or slit our throats. I’m lucky that’s not what he did, or I wouldn’t be sitting here feeling puzzled by him. It’s not easy to kill with a single blow.”
“Unless you’re trained how to do it,” Striker said.
“There is that. And he was able to accomplish his murders six times out of seven.” I tapped my pen on the tabletop in a distracted tattoo.
Striker leaned forward, planting his elbows on his thighs. “Seven’s your lucky number, Chica. It must be hard not having the answers you need to get closure. But some good did come out of this. Iniquus found out that Spyder had you as his private puzzler hiding up his sleeve. We got to hire you on. That’s a good thing. As far as thanking Frith goes, he did hire us in for the FBI connected murder, but he had no knowledge that Wilson was a serial killer until it hit the papers after the fact. The agencies weren’t talking to each other about it. Frith wouldn’t have heard your name. He only knows you from the drug bust.”
I turned back to the screen and pressed play. Mr. Spencer walked into the conference room with a harried quickstep. He sat down across from Frith. “What have you got for us?”
Frith slid his coffee cup to the side. “I’m worried about Sobado.”
“She’s dead.” Spencer’s voice was flat.
“I don’t think so, and more importantly, Omega doesn’t think so.”
“Why?” Spencer leaned in, his eyes lighting up. “Does Omega have information? If she’s alive, we need to get to her quickly to protect her. Is she hurt?”
“I don’t know. Omega’s antennae are up. They know you’re making inquiries at the prisons down in Nelson and Bellington – Maria and Julio Rodriguez. Since they’re the ones who took Sobado before Omega could move, Omega thinks you’re pumping them for more information, trying to find out where Sobado is shelved or could be hiding.”
The muscles in Spencer’s shoulders slacked as his energy level dropped. He looked resigned and maybe a little sad. “We have an ongoing interest in Maria and Julio. Maria kidnapped our operative and used her a
s a counter to exchange for her husband. We plan to make sure that neither one breathes a single breath of free air in this lifetime. Maria Rodriguez has been charged with murder one now that our operative is dead,” Spencer added.
“You’d better be damned sure, Mr. Spencer. Omega has their nose to the ground. Until they test DNA, the team won’t give up. Omega men are like pit bulls. They have their teeth into this thing, and they won’t let go until it’s resolved.”
Spencer stood up. “Why?”
Frith tilted his head toward Spencer. “They don’t like to lose, not even by death of the target, and they especially don’t want to lose to Iniquus.”
“I’d say it was Iniquus’ loss.” Spencer widened his stance; he leaned his weight into his knuckles on the table. He had a ferocity on his face that I had never seen there before. Aww, he did care about me.
“Maybe. Maybe not,” Frith said.
Spencer went still. After a full minute, he said, “Excuse me while I make a phone call,” and stalked out of the room.
Frith fidgeted around in his chair, pushing it back a little so he could cross his ankle over his knee. He drummed his fingers on the high gloss of the table, reached to pull his coffee cup back over, but pushed it back again when he heard the door open behind him.
Spencer strode into the room and back to his place at the head of the table. “I talked to the search and rescue leader. Lackland has pulled the recovery search. They don’t believe the plane ever made it to US soil. They’re sure it went down over the Gulf. The Coast Guard informed Mexico and Belize that we’re looking for plane parts. Our search team returned to Headquarters, and their Lead reassigned them to other cases.”
“So the embed is sniffing down the wrong trail. The person hospitalized at Lackland is not who they think it is?”
Spencer walked around the table to stand next to Frith, who stood up so they were eye to eye. “I wish to god it was. Frith, Iniquus. . . I. . .I am very grateful that you tried to intervene on her behalf. She was a truly an amazing woman. Surprising. Smart. Funny. We really lost something when we lost her. If you’re ever in need of something, and it’s in our power, please let me know personally. I’ll see it gets done.”