by Dale Mayer
He glanced up and shook his head. “No, they told me that it was a car accident. I was just coming out of another surgery. My recovery was pretty rough. At the time I couldn’t reconcile my grief, and healing was not something my body wanted to do when I was ready to yell at the world for stealing from me the one precious thing I had left.” He smiled weakly. “But this is a pretty morbid conversation. I have a couple photos I would like to show you. How about we take this away from Elizabeth? Let’s go to the cafeteria for half an hour.”
She smiled. “I’m game. Let me just grab my bag.” Instinctively she repacked all her stuff, including her laptop, and collected her coffee cup, which she tossed in the garbage. With her space clean again, she walked over to Elizabeth, bent down and kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll be back.” And she turned and strode out, Cade at her side.
Cade wasn’t exactly sure why he’d told her the details of what they suspected. He wasn’t normally a talker. And it wasn’t that he trusted her or didn’t trust her. He didn’t know her. And that was what made this all very unusual. Still, as he walked at her side, he didn’t see anything not to like. She had brunette hair cut into a bob with a bit of a curl to it. He kind of liked it short and sassy. Must be easy to care for. Considering the type of job she had, it would make her life easier, he was sure.
He wondered about a woman who made it as a commercial pilot. He loved it. She had pushed for what she wanted and had achieved it.
As they entered the cafeteria, he motioned toward the same table they’d been at before by the window. “How about over there?” He nudged her toward the table. “I’ll grab coffee.”
She smiled at him and headed to claim their place. He walked down the line and poured two cups of coffee, paid for them, snagged a couple muffins as an afterthought, dropping more money in the cashier’s hand, then turned and left. He threaded his way through the tables and sat down beside Faith.
She reached out for the coffee and eyed the muffins. “You bought two?”
He nodded. “One for you and one for me,” he confirmed and realized he made the right decision when she snatched one off the plate and quickly unwrapped it.
“I’m not sure if it’s because I’m sitting here doing nothing, but I’m hungrier now than I seem to remember being in weeks.”
“It’s better than not eating,” he said. “Grief can have very debilitating effects on the psyche. Food helps to nourish the body and to heal the emotions.”
“I don’t know if that’s true or not,” she said, her mouth full of muffin, “but it sounds right.”
He laughed and reached for the other muffin, cut it in half and buttered it.
She stopped midbite, looking at the butter. “I didn’t even see the butter.”
He opened up the second pat of butter, reached for the part of the muffin still on the table in front of her and buttered it for her.
She grinned at him. “You’re definitely a keeper.”
The phrase startled him. He knew that term from Mason’s group. But there was no way she would know it. And there was no way he would tell her about it. It had been a running joke among the SEALs for a long time. The trouble was, there were still enough people who tried to get close to Mason, just in case some of that romantic fairy dust ended up on them. Mason’s unit was well known to have been struck by Cupid. Every one of them had found an incredible partner and were still together, even after all this time. And sure, it wasn’t all that long, but, in the military, sometimes a weekend was a long relationship.
“I don’t know about that,” he said lightly. “But you’re easy to please.”
She chuckled. “When I’m hungry, all you have to do is feed me.”
“I’ll remember that.”
He smiled at her, loving the way her chocolate-brown eyes lit up with a warm glow. There was just something nice about her. And there weren’t a whole lot of nice girls in his life. There were a lot of women he liked, but Faith was the type of girl he would call all-American. She was full of life, strong, walking with a purpose and a surety that he really appreciated. Self-confidence was so sexy. All these women so busy getting Botox injections and their hair just perfect and needed to wear layers of makeup, failing to understand that sexiness came from within.
Although he suspected Faith wouldn’t understand what he had to say about this. She might not see herself the way he saw her. Right now, as her bangs drooped slightly to the side, he could see the lines on her face from the lack of sleep having taken its toll, along with the worry and the grief. All of it affecting the shoulder slump and the lack of color in her cheeks.
“You should go for a walk outside every chance you get,” he said. “The fresh air would do you some good.”
She nodded. “I’d love to, but every time I leave Elizabeth, I feel guilty.”
He nodded. “And, if something happens while you’re not there, you’ll feel terrible. But what she wouldn’t want is for you to waste away at her bedside because you didn’t look after yourself when she was incapable of helping you.”
“No, she wouldn’t be happy with that.” Muffin gone, Faith bundled up the wrapper, tossed it on the tray and pulled the coffee cup closer.
He loved the protective way she snuggled up to the coffee, as if she desperately needed it. When she leaned closer and took a deep sniff of the aroma drifting up from the cup, he chuckled. “A coffeeholic by any chance?”
“Absolutely. I think it’s a basic requirement for being a pilot too.”
“Understood. In the military we had to go sometimes twenty-four to forty-eight hours without any rest.” He was remembering some of the worst missions of his life. “It seemed like, if we couldn’t inject coffee, we’d never get through another hour.”
She nodded. “I’ve done flights from San Francisco to Singapore, Vancouver to London. I’ve been on routes to Dubai and summers up to Iceland. The longer flights are just deadly. Even though we’re supposed to sleep in between, it doesn’t mean you can. Just because you have four hours of downtime doesn’t mean your body can shut off like that.”
He chuckled. “Same for us. If you’re on watch, there is no way you can close your eyes, not even when your watch is over and you have two hours to grab. Often it would take fifteen to thirty minutes to just unwind enough to go out. Some of our unit learned to shut it all off and could drop to sleep, as if they had been unplugged. I was never one of those guys. I was always restless, could never quite manage that complete-silence thing. Mouse, now he couldn’t sleep at all. He would need dead silence. And I have to admit, we often bugged him about it. Just when he was starting to fall asleep, we’d make a loud sound that would wake him back up, and he had to start the relaxation process all over again.”
He chuckled at the memory. “But he was a good kid. He was younger than all of us, but he was a real brain. A wizard with electronics. Picked up anything electrical real fast. But he wasn’t quite the same at sharpshooting and strategy. The military is hard on people who have weaknesses. We used to tease him a lot. Of course, then we teased everybody.”
“I’m sure he realized you loved him anyway,” she said reassuringly. “No matter what kinds of things you guys were put through, I understand the brotherhood of being in a unit like that. It would be very special.”
He nodded. “Even now, after the accident, after all the many surgeries, we’re still in this together.” His voice hardened. “And speaking of which, I brought the photos.” He pulled them out of his pocket and laid them on the table in front of her. “These are the same guy but with different looks. Could you take a good look and see if you recognize him?” He unfolded the papers and stretched them out flat in front of her.
Chapter 8
Faith stared at the photos, feeling the same horrible fear that had clenched her throat when she’d seen the man the first time. She reached a hand to cover the top portion of his face like a hat and nodded mutely. “It’s definitely him.” She raised her gaze and stared at Cade. “Who is he?�
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“According to the paperwork, he’s John Smith.”
She stared at him and frowned. “Seriously?”
His tone dried as he nodded and said, “According to the paperwork.”
She sat back. “And do we believe the paperwork?”
“Hell no.” He tapped the photo. “If you look at the other pictures, you’ll see him without the beard and the thick eyebrows and a different haircut.”
She quickly leaned forward again and shuffled through the pages on the table. He really had a chameleon appearance and managed to look different in each one. “Wow, I didn’t think disguises worked quite like they say in the movies.”
“They don’t. But every once in a while you get someone who does well with them.” He tapped the one she’d seen first. “And considering that he was seen here in this disguise, and you saw him in a variation of this back in Santa Fe, he probably no longer looks like this at all.”
“Is it just makeup and hairstyles, or is there plastic surgery involved?” She glanced up at Cade to see him shrug.
“I don’t know yet. It’s possible he has a skill for disguise. It’s also possible he was military trained for undercover work. We all have a certain amount of training in hiding our appearance. You just work with the basics and keep switching it up and switching it down.”
“So now that you have a photo of him, any chance of catching him?”
He gave her a grim smile. “We hope so. But there’s no way to know yet.” He stacked the papers together and folded them back up. “We have scanned these and sent them off to various people we know who can help. With any luck, he’ll be spotted somewhere.”
She frowned. “Somewhere, as in Santa Fe somewhere?” She had to guess.
“It’s possible he’s still there. But I’m not sure about that.”
She glanced around the cafeteria. “I thought I would be off work this weekend, but I have a couple flights scheduled. The doctors told me this morning that Elizabeth could be like this for weeks.”
“That’s tough. And you have to carry on with your life.”
She nodded. “I don’t want to leave her though.”
“Leave her and then come back. That’s the only answer. Maybe by then there’ll be a change. Unfortunately some people are in a coma for a long time. We’re talking years.”
She winced. “I know. I just can’t imagine that as a future for Elizabeth. She was always so vibrant.”
“Keep that in mind. Let the doctors do their thing and trust in the system. Trust in your friend to fight with what she can fight with, and let go when it’s time to let go.”
“I know, but it’s hard.”
“You haven’t been here very long yet. Are you staying a few more days?”
“Just a couple I think. When the doctor told me this morning that it could be weeks, I realized I wouldn’t be able to stay the whole time. I still have to work for a living,” she confessed. “The best thing I can do is spend some time with her now and get more time off to come back.”
“That’s a good idea.” He stood. “Do you want to go back to her room or go back to your hotel now?”
She sighed. “Now that they don’t expect her to die in the next twelve hours, it feels like a gamble to leave. The doctor did sound so much more positive, as if she had stabilized but still has a lot of healing to do and needs to pull out of the coma. But because of the drug inducement, they won’t give her that chance for quite a few more days.”
“And maybe that’s a good thing too.” He gave her a smile and said, “I’ll speak with you later.” And he walked away.
Faith walked back to Elizabeth’s room and sat down again. She could see Elizabeth had found some sort of a new level. Her face was calm, smooth, as if she had slept easily. She still didn’t move or shift in any way. But then how much did one move when in a coma?
The nurse walked in then and smiled. “Just to let you know, the doctors have reduced the drug dosage. We’ll see if there’s any change in her condition. We should know more in the next day or so.”
Faith smiled and nodded. At the same time she was terrified. Was this good or bad?
The door opened again, and she looked up in surprise to see Mary walk in. But it was an angry Mary. Instinctively Faith’s back stiffened as she prepared for a fight that she hadn’t expected to have.
“Why are you still here?” Mary asked quietly.
Faith raised her eyebrows. “Elizabeth is my friend. I wanted to stay and see how her condition would develop.”
“She should have passed already.” Moodily Mary walked to the foot of her sister’s bed and stared down. “I don’t know why she hasn’t.”
“Because she has improved,” Faith said impulsively. “The nurse just said they’re reducing the drugs to see if she comes out of the coma.”
Mary shot her a look. “You’ve been talking to them?”
Unsettled Faith sat back and nodded. “Whenever they come in and talk to me,” she said. “Obviously I don’t go speaking to the doctors beyond any kind of concern as a friend.” She wasn’t sure Mary believed her though. There was a sharp assessment in her gaze. “Don’t be so quick to rush Elizabeth to the grave. The doctors seem to think she has a much better chance now. They did say she could stay in a coma for several days to weeks, and there was no way to know when she’d pull out, but they were hopeful she would pull out.”
Mary turned her gaze back to her sister and shook her head. “If she’s in a coma that long, it’s not good. She won’t recover afterward either. Better for her not to recover.”
“How can you say that?” Faith jumped to her feet, her voice loud.
“I can say that because I’m her sister, and I know what she’d want. And she wouldn’t want to be this frozen vegetable in a bed for the rest of her life.”
Faith bit back the words hovering on her lips. She didn’t know if this was just Mary being negative, as she knew Mary could be, or if she really believed that. “I don’t think it’s fair to decide that that’s what Elizabeth will be or what her future will be. The doctors are hopeful. That makes me hopeful.”
“Hope doesn’t put food on the table or bring satisfaction in the morning after a good night’s sleep. Hope is nebulous. Hope is something you can’t measure, you can’t count on. It’s just a cover-up for the reality of what we have to live with.” Mary bit her tongue. “I called you so you’d have a chance to say goodbye. I wasn’t expecting you to move in.” She turned on her heels. Before she walked out the door, she said, “I want to talk to the doctor myself.” And she was gone.
Hurt, and not sure what to do about it, Faith sat down on Elizabeth’s bed and stroked her friend’s fingers. “Oh, Elizabeth. What do we do about family? I really need you to wake up and show some signs of improvement so we can get your sister to feel a little more positive about your condition. I would hate to think there was anything going on here that would hurt you. And I can’t stay here the whole time and fight for your cause. But I want to.”
She bowed her head for a long moment, feeling the pain, the regrets for time not spent together, phone calls not made. She knew Elizabeth understood. She’d been busy too. But, at this moment, it just seemed so hard to face a future without her best friend.
She continued to stroke her fingers and then realized Mary was likely to cause a fair bit of trouble for her too. She didn’t know if they could kick her out as she was only a friend, not a family member. And she didn’t know why Mary would do something like that, unless it was because she was afraid Elizabeth’s condition was being affected negatively by having Faith there. So far, it had only been a positive change.
But sure enough, when the door opened a few moments later, the Norwegian behind Mary had a sharper tone to his voice. Faith turned to look at Mary standing triumphantly in the doorway. The doctor spoke rapidly. And he motioned to the door. Then he turned around and left.
She stared after him, struggling to understand, when one of the nurses came around
the corner and said, “You’ve been asked to leave.” Her gaze flicked to Mary and then back again.
“And it’s something I have to do? You know I’ve only been sitting here, keeping Elizabeth company.”
The nurse nodded. “I know that. But the hospital has rules. And family members do have control in this situation.”
“Even if it’s not in the patient’s best interests?”
The nurse nodded. “I’m sorry.”
Heartsick and devastated, Faith stood, leaned over and kissed Elizabeth’s cheek gently. She turned, picked up the rest of her belongings, packing them in her bag, and stepped outside. She didn’t bother looking at Mary. It was obvious Mary didn’t want anything to do with Faith.
Changing her mind, she turned. “So if your sister dies, who gains from her death?”
Mary stiffened in anger.
“If I were you, you shouldn’t make it look like anything you did hastened Elizabeth’s death,” Faith said, her own anger reaching through her voice, even against her best efforts to stop it. “Elizabeth deserves a chance at life.”
“I’m her sister. I know what’s best for her,” Mary snapped. “You’re not welcome here.”
“You don’t want me here, but Elizabeth does. The fact that you’ve already written her off and probably made funeral arrangements, waiting for her to kick the bucket so you can take her house and her car, is an entirely different issue. But if she dies because of this, I’ll be looking into legal action against you.”
With that last parting shot, Faith turned and walked out of the hospital. She could hear Mary sputtering behind her, but, at times like this, it was often hard to know what to say. And truth was, Faith was a little ashamed of her own actions. But she was hurting from Mary forcing her out of the hospital, away from Elizabeth’s side.
Distraught, she headed back to her hotel room.
When she got there, she remembered Laszlo. She sent Cade a text. Can Laszlo find out if I’ll be allowed back into the hospital?