Honor

by Janet Dailey

  Randy’s blue eyes stayed on hers. “Someone has to. Donna spoke very highly of you.”

  “You met her?”

  “Not exactly. She’s a friend of a friend. We Skyped before I flew out, not through a military server. I used a computer at a foreign aid place. Neutral non-combatants, medical support. She went off-base.”

  “Oh,” said Kenzie. “You were careful.”

  “Sometimes you have to be.”

  Kenzie nodded. She knew what Randy meant. Internet connectedness and social media were part of the army now, but soldiers didn’t always want the brass looking over their shoulders.

  “Some other medics have been seeing the same thing happen. Different places, other situations. Not that frequently. But often enough that it looks like a pattern.”

  “Is it the same brand each time?”

  Kenzie knew there was rarely just one supplier for any military need. Requirements changed constantly, and contract specs varied from supplier to supplier. Her boss had taught her something on the subject.

  “Yes and no,” Randy said. “The failed vests are the same brand, but they don’t always fail. Word is that a grunt who took a much worse hit than Frank survived. The fiber worked right and none of the armor plates cracked. Luck of the draw.”

  “And you don’t know why.”

  “No. And that guy wasn’t the only one who walked away. We can’t figure it out and we don’t want to start going up the chain of command until we have some facts.”

  “I understand.”

  “Just to clarify, the vests are army issue but not army-made. Frank’s gear was tagged X-Ultra,” she added.

  Kenzie thought. That didn’t ring a bell at all.

  “There’s a limit to what we can find out from over there,” Randy persisted.

  “I don’t doubt it,” Kenzie replied.

  “I’m heading back tonight. So I was hoping—well, you knew Frank.”

  Randy was obviously determined to play the cards she held.

  “Not that well.” Kenzie met her gaze. But he had said her name when he was dying. The medic was nice enough not to remind her of that.

  “Someone stateside is what we need,” Randy said calmly.

  Kenzie thought of Christine suddenly. It might be months before her friend knew about Frank’s death. But she would.

  “That’s true.” Kenzie faltered. “Although right now—is not a good time. I can’t really explain why.”

  Truthfully, she wouldn’t even know where to begin. But she understood the army creed that had driven the medic to find her. Her dad had lived by it; she’d always known it; Jim Biggers had it framed on his office wall. Since Christine’s accident, she truly understood what it meant.

  Never abandon a fallen comrade.

  Randy Holt wasn’t alone in her suspicions. She and the other medics didn’t have enough facts to make a stink. The young woman had risked a lot by contacting her.

  Kenzie, on the other hand, had nothing to lose. She pushed her coffee cup aside and looked straight at Randy. “I’ll do what I can.”

  The medic seemed surprised. Her mouth curved up in a crooked smile. “You sure?”

  Kenzie nodded.

  CHAPTER 7

  Linc looked at himself in the motel’s bathroom mirror. Scary. He had overslept and he desperately needed a shave.

  What a night. He hadn’t fallen asleep until after four A.M. He rubbed his eyes hard and opened them all the way.

  No female had ever given him a kiss like that. He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. About her. Kenzie had rocked him down to the soles of his shoes.

  Linc picked up the spray can of shaving cream and shook it vigorously, squirting a huge dollop into the palm of his hand. He slapped it on and looked around for his razor.

  Not where he had left it. Maybe it ran away with the toothbrush. He didn’t see that either. The housekeeper might have tidied up a little too much.

  Linc hitched up the boxers he’d slept in and conducted a search. For some reason known only to housekeepers, she had moved the razor and the toothbrush to the side of the TV, where his cell phone was.

  He picked up the razor just as his cell phone rang. Linc squinted at the number. Gary Baum. He answered the call.

  “Hey. Did you get anything?”

  “Yeah. Where are you?”

  The reporter laughed when Linc gave him the address and name of the motel. “What’s so funny?”

  “That place is hooker heaven.”

  Linc didn’t want to know. “Seems quiet to me.”

  Baum chuckled. “It used to be nice. But you know, new ownership,” he said vaguely. “We did an exposé on it last month. Knock, Knock, Who’s There?”

  “I missed it.”

  “Too bad. Cops, CEOs—you wouldn’t believe who we caught on tape. So when do you want to meet?”

  Linc looked at the digital clock provided by the motel, then picked up his watch. They didn’t sync. “In an hour.”

  “You got it.” Gary hung up.

  Linc had time to grab breakfast in a bag from somewhere after he got through the rest of his morning ritual. Good enough.

  He had finished eating and was scrolling through the news online when Gary’s loud knock resounded through the room. He left the page up when he went to the door.

  The reporter stood there with his hands in his pockets again, looking a little chilly. “Got any coffee?”

  “I didn’t drink mine. You can have it.” He indicated the capped takeout cup he’d left on the table.

  “Thanks.” Gary sauntered past Linc and looked at the counterman’s marks on the lid. “What have we here? Black, two sugars? How I like it. Great minds drink alike.”

  Linc managed a half-smile. He had to be nice to the guy. So far no money had changed hands.

  Gary sat down in the chair Linc had just left and tapped a key on the laptop, glancing idly at the headlines. “Big day, huh? Flamingo escapes from the zoo. That’s the kind of story I usually get.”

  He fiddled with the tab on the cap and took a slurp.

  Ugh. Linc looked elsewhere, then busied himself picking up clothes while Gary drank his coffee.

  “Thanks. I felt like I was in a frat house,” the reporter observed.

  “I wasn’t doing it for you,” Linc said. He tossed the balled-up clothes into a corner.

  “Whatever.” The reporter leaned forward and eased out of his jacket. He slipped a hand into an inside pocket and pulled out two silver discs. “Here’s the accident footage, hot out of the station computer.”

  Looking for a CD drive, Gary set down one of the discs and gave Linc’s machine a half turn with his fingertips. It bumped into Christine’s closed laptop. The reporter looked at it and smirked, fanning himself with the other CD.

  “Kittycats, huh? That yours?”

  “Shut up, Baum.”

  Linc picked up the CD on the table. He set Christine’s laptop aside and touched the button that opened the right drive on his.

  The reporter watched him insert the disc and tap the keyboard to get it started. Linc adjusted the screen for a better angle to where he was standing.

  “I can’t see,” the reporter said.

  “Tough,” Linc replied. The footage began with a herky-jerky pan around the accident scene. EMTs, highway patrol. Screaming sirens and shouted orders.

  The cameraman had tried to get in closer, immediately pushed back with curses not aired on family-slot news shows.

  Then Linc saw the part he remembered. The victim that he hadn’t known was Christine, being lifted up on a spine board with a head stabilizer.

  He could see how he’d mistaken her for Kenzie. The footage was blurred and her features weren’t clear. But the long dark hair and her small size had been enough to mislead him.

  It was amazing how different unedited footage looked. The station producers had to work fast with only seconds of lag time. He watched in silence.

  There was the license plate. KENZYZ.
The dark blue uniform of the angry officer who manhandled the cameraman away from the wreck filled the screen again.

  “I cut out the Suds-Up spot,” Gary said, yawning.

  Linc kept watching.

  The reporter and the cameraman had been forced back to the accident perimeter, where cars were slowing. A different officer made them move on. Linc hit Pause for each one, looking at the drivers and the passengers.

  Bored, Gary put in his two cents. “The usual. Housewife in curlers with dumb dog. Traveling salesman. Two goobers in a pickup. Teenagers—now, they should let them learn what a nasty accident looks like.”

  “Just let me watch.”

  Gary shut up again. Linc saw nothing that set off alarms in his mind, and no one out of the ordinary. The CD drive stopped with a faint whirr.

  “Ready for disc two?” the reporter asked.

  “Yes.”

  Gary smirked again. “It’ll cost ya.” He rose and tossed the empty coffee cup in the general direction of the wastebasket. It landed on the floor. “You can keep that one. Nothing on it that everyone and his cousin hasn’t seen.”

  “Listen, Baum—”

  The reporter was moving toward the door, opening up his folded jacket. Linc could just see the curved edge of the second disc in the inside pocket.

  The other man stopped as if he’d just thought of something. “Hey, you never did tell me why you’re so interested in that accident.”

  “I don’t have to.”

  “Is she your girlfriend or something?”

  “No.”

  Gary shrugged. “I looked you up online. Some mentions but nothing much. No full-face images of you. Just a couple of crappy distance shots from your brother RJ’s wedding and a ridiculous yearbook picture from Acne High. Nothing in between. Why is that?”

  Linc curbed his temper. “I don’t control what’s online.”

  “Wish I could.” The reporter put his jacket back on. “The accident didn’t get a lot of page views either.”

  “Why should it? Something like that happens every day.”

  Gary Baum looked at him shrewdly. “I was thinking maybe that lady was married or something, heading home after a hot night with you. Then—crasho. Husband found out and now he’s after you. Am I getting warm?”

  Linc scowled. “Not even remotely.”

  Gary Baum looked steadily at him. “Huh. You’re telling the truth. Too bad. I liked my version. Well, see you around.” He put a hand on the doorknob and turned it.

  “How much for disc two?”

  The reporter opened the door. “A thousand. There’s an ATM right around the corner. Want me to wait in the area by the front desk? I could make myself a waffle.”

  “You do that.”

  Deal done. Linc was lighter in the wallet but not broke. Gary was gone and he was reviewing the second CD.

  He’d taken the precaution of taking both laptops with him when he’d gone to the ATM. He’d also affixed a little gadget to the motel room door that would let him know if anyone went in while he was gone.

  The reporter seemed a little too interested in who Linc was. Sneaky as Baum was, he still wasn’t likely to find out why Linc barely existed online. The agency took care of stuff like that.

  He’d come back with the money and found Baum munching a waffle in the parking lot.

  Linc kept on pausing the CD on each car. He almost missed Baum’s capsule descriptions from the chair he was in. At the sound of the reporter’s voice, Linc sat up straight.

  Not in the room. Baum had recorded his own comment over the on-scene audio for the next frames.

  “Hey, Linc. How about him? Dresses like a fed, looks like a fed. Dark suit, forgettable face. You’re not supposed to notice those guys. That’s why he stands out.”

  Linc hit pause. Gary Baum was right. The cameraman had captured a neatly dressed man. Not old, not that young. Full head of tawny hair. Regular features. Sunglasses.

  Unfortunately the shot was from the side and slightly blurred.

  Linc let it run at normal speed. The man not only slowed his car, but pulled it over and got out.

  For less than two seconds. Triggering an explosion of wrath from the cop he’d disobeyed, who stood in front of him. The man got back in his car, black but otherwise as nondescript as he was, and drove on.

  Linc put the brief sequence on slo-mo and watched it again. And again.

  The Maryland license plate had fall leaves, dull gold and brown, covering nearly all of the number. Strategically glued or a gift from Mother Nature, Linc couldn’t tell. The car itself was medium-sized and boxy, the type purchased by the freighter load for government fleets. He could find out the exact model and other details when he dissected this image down to the pixels.

  Kenzie took the time to visit the hospital’s garden, dropping a coin in the donation box at the entrance and glancing at the sign. She followed a winding walk planted on both sides with fragrant flowers just past their prime.

  Fortunately many of the shrubs were evergreens, carefully clipped. The garden would have been too depressing otherwise, she thought, once autumn was over.

  The sign had mentioned that the garden was maintained by volunteers. One, an older woman in a canvas smock, looked up from her energetic digging as Kenzie passed, murmuring a hello.

  There were patients on benches, soaking up the sheltered garden’s sun. Some walked with relatives or nurses. In bathrobes and pajamas or wearing regular clothes, they had the same wan look from spending a long time indoors.

  She nodded at a frail, stooped man, guessing that he’d once been strong and tall. He lifted a hand to take the arm of the woman who walked beside him, the wedding band he wore catching a spark from the sun. They both smiled at her and she smiled back. His wife, providing discreet support, guided him to a bench.

  Kenzie found one for herself. In the shade. She figured no one else would want it and she could think.

  She had said yes to Randy Holt’s simple request, knowing full well that it was going to complicate her life, and without the slightest idea of how she could find out the information the medic wanted.

  She leaned back and looked up at the brown leaves rattling on the sycamores. Kenzie told herself to just start somewhere and do something.

  Besides, she had other things to do besides worry. Right now the Corellis were expecting her.

  The elevator was full of white coats. She moved to the back into a corner, listening to them talk shop, not understanding some of the medical jargon. A lot of people exited on the cafeteria floor. She looked out at the large, tiled room as she moved out of the corner, taking a few steps forward. Absently, she recollected not wanting to go into it with Linc the night of the accident.

  It didn’t scare her now.

  She was alone when the elevator stopped at the neurology floor, which had its own ICU. The complexity of brain trauma and disease made it necessary.

  Kenzie saw Alf Corelli at the end of the hall. She went toward him and walked beside him the rest of the way to Christine’s room.

  “We have a surprise for you,” he said in his rumbly voice.

  She looked at him, startled by his words. Mrs. Corelli hadn’t said anything about it. “You do?”

  He nodded, exchanging a word or two with the nurses and medical staff they passed in the corridor. Everyone responded, even when they were in a rush.

  “Looks like they all know you,” she observed.

  “Oh, I’m memorable,” he said with a wry smile. “Must be the beige windbreaker.”

  Kenzie gave him a pat on the back. “It’s a very nice windbreaker, but I don’t think that’s why.”

  She was sure that the older man’s devotion to his daughter had earned him the admiration of the ICU staff, along with his wife. Between the two of them, Christine had never been left alone. They spoke to her, because they knew she could hear, even if she couldn’t respond. And her mother sang to her every night as the late shift began, soft lullabies in her native
Italian that Christine had loved as a child.

  “How’s Christine today?” Kenzie asked. They were nearly at the door of the private room.

  “The last nurse I spoke to said she’s holding steady. I missed the neurologist this time around. But Minerva said she took notes.”

  Kenzie managed a faint smile. Christine had sometimes complained about her mother’s ability to keep track of everything. “That’s a good idea. It’s easy to forget what a doctor said.”

  “Minerva keeps them on their toes.”

  He pushed down on the lever that opened the door, moving ahead of her into the room. The shades were drawn and the overhead lights were switched off, with soft illumination provided by sconces. Kenzie took a deep breath and looked at Christine. Her head was nestled sideways into a comfortable pillow and her eyes were closed. If not for the medical gear connected to her, she could have been simply asleep.

  But she wasn’t. Kenzie moved carefully around tubes and wires, and pressed a kiss to Christine’s forehead. Her friend opened her eyes.

  Kenzie gasped.

  When she straightened, Alf Corelli was smiling at her. “Second time today.”

  She looked at him, speechless, and back into her friend’s hazel eyes and saw confusion and—she was sure of it—a flash of recognition.

  “Chrissie, it’s me. Kenzie.” She slipped her hand into Christine’s and had the odd sensation of the two of them being little girls again. Best friends forever. Maybe the forever was back.

  Christine’s eyelids drifted down. Kenzie let go right away. She could have sworn she felt a slight, very slight pressure against her palm. Christine was still here. Very much alive.

  “I’m so glad you got to see that,” Alf Corelli said quietly. “First time, her mother and I did. We almost didn’t believe it. It happened right when the neuro team was in the room. Big moment. No cheering allowed. We all wanted to.”

  Kenzie could only nod. Christine’s hand went limp and she gently withdrew her own.

  “Thank you for coming so often. It’s been very good for her. I’m sure she knows we’ve all been here, off and on.”