“Honey—”
“Alone, Mom. Please.”
His mother looked up to meet his father’s gaze. His dad nodded.
“I went looking for Allie’s family,” his mother said.
He froze. “She doesn’t have any. You know that.”
“Well, I thought there must be someone.”
As the chief of police, she’d have the resources to find someone if they existed. “And?”
“No one. And no record of Allison Radcliffe before her sophomore year of high school.”
“What? That can’t be. I know her. I know everything about her and . . .” No, apparently he didn’t, because his mother had never lied to him, so if what she said was true . . . He pressed fingers to his eyes and tried to think past the throbbing in his skull—and realized that every time he’d brought up Allie’s past, she’d skillfully avoided talking about it—or told him just enough to satisfy him. “I need some time.”
“Don’t cut yourself off from us like you did before,” his mother pleaded. “You need us.”
Before. When he’d been betrayed by the woman he’d loved—and thought loved him. But she’d just been playing him, pretending to fall for him so she could gather information to use to further her own criminal career.
Cops weren’t the only ones who could go undercover.
The only thing that had made being played for a fool bearable was the fact that he’d been the one to set up the sting that had finally taken Regina and her gang down. She now sat in prison for the next twenty years, and Linc felt like he’d somehow managed to redeem himself.
And then he’d been partnered with Allie last year—and started to fall for her. Only now he’d never get the chance to tell her.
No, not Allie. Please, God, not Allie.
He wanted to rail, to shake his fist at God, but numbness had set in and all he could do was stare at the wall.
“Linc?” his mother said.
He let his gaze meet his mother’s pained and fearful one—and his heart softened. “I’ll call you,” he said. “I promise. Just let me deal with this the way I deal.” Alone. “Please.”
“Sure. Okay, then.” She leaned over to kiss his forehead like she used to do when she tucked him into bed at night. The action brought a lump to his throat.
The rest of his family filed out one by one. Each stopped to hug him or offer a sympathetic “I’m sorry.” They’d liked Allie too.
Linc let them go without comment and soon found himself in the empty room. Alone. With the lump in his throat growing to unmanageable proportions.
The sob ripped from him and he closed his eyes as his brain processed what his heart wanted to deny.
Allie was gone.
Allie groaned at the sound of . . . what? She cracked her eyes open, then frowned as she let her gaze scan her surroundings. A hospital? Oh, right. She’d awakened once before and thought she’d been dreaming.
Shadows, created by the lights on the monitors, danced on the wall, causing a creepy sensation to shiver up her spine. Silly. Gently, she turned her head to one side, expecting to feel a rush of pain. Surprised at the lack of discomfort, she turned her head to the other side. Henry sat in the chair next to her, eyes closed, face drawn, looking like he hadn’t slept in a while. He was spinning his keys. Spin, clink. Spin, clink.
She lifted a hand to her head and felt the bandage just below her shoulder blade pull. The IV in her arm itched, a minor annoyance she ignored as she processed where she was.
“Allie?”
“Henry. What happened?”
At her voice, he sat forward and tossed the keys onto the table beside him. “Someone blew up the boat. Don’t you remember?”
“The drone.”
“Yeah.”
“Linc!” She sat up. This time lightning bolts of agony shafted through her head. She lay back, pressed her palms to her eyes, and fought the wave of nausea. Finally, she looked up.
Henry’s face made her forget the pain and everything else.
“What is it?”
“You can’t talk to him just yet, Allie. We need to think this through.”
“But he’s alive?”
“Yes.”
“Then I need to talk to him.” She ran her tongue over her dry lips. “Please. Bring me a phone.”
“You can’t.”
“Why not?” Another wave of nausea swept through her and she drew in a sharp breath. “He’s dead and you’re not telling me. Is that it?”
“No, Allie—”
“I don’t believe you.” Tears ran down her temples. The pain in her head was no match to the torment shredding her heart. “No,” she whispered. “No.”
“Give her something to sleep,” Henry said to an unidentified person. “She needs to heal more before dealing with this.”
A woman stepped from the corner of the shadowy room and inserted a needle into the IV port. A rush of coolness hit her vein. Sleep approached. But she needed to stay awake. “Linc,” she whispered just before the darkness closed in.
Allie wasn’t sure how much time passed before awareness returned but was grateful the pounding in her head had eased. However, her mind went immediately to Henry’s words.
Linc! Grief clawed at her and she moaned. A hand clasped hers. She gasped and opened her eyes. “Henry.”
He held a straw to her lips and she drank. When she finished, he set the cup within reaching distance and sat in the chair next to the bed. “How are you feeling?”
“Okay. I think. But Linc . . . ?”
“He’s alive. I promise.”
“How did he survive?” she asked.
“I don’t know. It’s a crazy miracle. The drone hit the stern where he was. We were on the opposite end. You—we—almost didn’t survive, but all three of us did.”
The fact that she was alive should thrill her, but all she could think about was that she wanted to see Linc and then possibly return to the dark, pain-free abyss of unconsciousness. No, she needed to stay awake. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Four days.”
“Four days!”
“We had to keep you sedated. PT has been in to work with you, and you got excellent nutrition through the feeding tube.”
She touched her nose. “What?”
“Dr. Forsythe took it out when he decided it was time for you to wake up.”
It was all too much to process. She needed Linc.
Allie reached for the phone that all hospital rooms had and found the table empty. “Where’s the phone? I need to call him. I need to—”
A knock on the door interrupted her. She swallowed the sobs that threatened to erupt and pressed a hand to her lips. “Come in,” she finally said.
The man who stepped into the room took everything in with a single, sweeping glance of his dark eyes. “Glad to see you’re awake and coherent.”
“Who are you?” she asked.
“This is Dr. Nathan Forsythe,” Henry said. “He’s the doctor who’s been tending to you for the past four days.”
“How’s the head this morning?” Dr. Forsythe asked. In his midforties, he was tall with a smooth olive complexion.
“Fine.” She needed to get out of there so she could find Linc and make sure Henry wasn’t lying to her.
A smile tilted one side of his lips and a dimple flashed briefly. “Why do I think that’s not a completely accurate description?”
She grimaced. “Because you’re probably pretty good at what you do.” A sigh slipped from her. “It hurts, but not terribly.”
“Fortunately, the hit on your head wasn’t that bad. Not even a concussion. You’ve got four stitches in your back, thanks to a piece of the debris, but that shouldn’t give you too much trouble other than some itching while it heals.”
“Okay, when can I get out of here?” The doctor and Henry exchanged a glance. “What?” she asked.
“Well,” Dr. Forsythe said. “You really need at least a few more days.”
�
��No way. I need to get out of here and find Nevsky.”
“Listen to him, Allie,” Henry said. “If you go after Nevsky half healed, you might not live to finish the job. You’re still weak.” He rubbed a hand down his face. “Besides, Nevsky’s not going anywhere. He’ll be there when you’re ready.”
She sighed, loath to admit he was right. She was weak. And so very tired. “Where’s my phone?”
“It was lost in the explosion.”
“I need you to get me a new one then and I need to talk to Linc.” She nodded to the hospital end table. “Why isn’t there a phone in here?”
“We took it out,” the doctor said, “to keep you from being disturbed.”
She gave a light snort. “There’s no one to disturb me.” At least no family to care if she was alive. A few fellow agents would want to know how she was doing, but Henry had no doubt informed them.
Weariness tugged at her. Her back ached and she vaguely remembered getting hit with a piece of the boat. Stitches, the doc had said. Wonderful. Her eyes drooped. “Henry?”
“Yeah?”
“How’d he know we were there? The guy with the drone. How’d he know?” Allie forced her lids up.
Henry rubbed his chin. “I don’t know. I’ve wondered that myself.”
Of course he had. “You promise he’s okay?”
“I promise.”
“I don’t believe you. Why won’t you let me talk to him?”
“Later, when you’re better, we have a lot to discuss. And it involves protecting Linc.”
“Protecting him?” Her words slurred and her lids drooped. “He’s dead. I know you’re lying to me.”
The last word came out on a squeak and Henry moved to sit on the bed next to her. “Allie . . .”
But the sobs took over and he held her, promising her that Linc was alive. However, she’d traveled this road before and they wouldn’t trick her again. Doctors, even her mother, had told her that everyone was alive, and once she’d healed, they’d finally told her the truth. Her father and her sister. Dead. They were dead.
Just like Linc was now.
Sleep crept in as the sobs faded and she fought it. She needed to stay awake and go after the man who’d killed yet one more person she loved.
5
Linc sat on the boat and stared at the water where he’d last seen Allie. His brother Brady had gone down fifteen minutes ago. “Anything?” He wore the earpiece that would allow him to communicate with Brady while he searched.
“No, sorry, man. You know I’ll tell you if I find anything.”
He was five days post-release from the hospital. It hadn’t taken too much pleading to convince Brady to journey back to Charleston and go to the bottom of the river to search for anything that might lead him to the people who’d bombed the boat and killed Allie.
Thirty minutes later, Brady surfaced. Linc helped him into the boat and Brady pulled the mask off. “That’s it, Linc. I’m sorry. All the evidence has already been collected. There’s nothing down there and I need to get back to work.”
Guilt swamped Linc for dragging Brady out there, but . . . “You weren’t on the team. They might have missed something.”
“I really don’t think they did. We’ve gone in a full circle. Everything’s gone. All traces of the boat have been swept up and are most likely being processed.”
“And yet, so far no one’s figured out where the drone came from, who built it, or who was flying it.”
“No. At least not yet. The good thing is, I think they got every last piece of it that was around to get.”
“It’s connected to Nevsky. Somehow he knew about the surveillance.”
“Maybe so,” Brady said, “but you’re not going to find the evidence down there—and neither am I.”
A heavy sigh escaped Linc. “Fine.” He paused, thinking, while Brady stripped out of the wet suit and pulled on his street clothes. “I know who has some evidence,” Linc said, “I just don’t know how to go about getting it.”
“Who?”
“Daria Nevsky.”
“The daughter?”
“Yeah.”
Brady frowned. “Then bring her in and talk to her.”
“It’s not that easy. We don’t know where she is.”
“Thought you had eyes on her.”
“We did.”
“Did?”
Linc groaned. “They lost her.”
“How?”
“No idea.” He shook his head. “One minute she was there, the next she was gone.”
“He knew you were watching her,” Brady said.
“Apparently. And staged a way to make her disappear. She hasn’t been in school since the attack on the boat.”
“You think she’s still alive?”
“I don’t know, but I think I owe it to her to find out.” He paused. “Allie had formed a special bond with the girl. She’d want me to look out for her.” Grief pierced him as it did every time he mentioned Allie’s name or thought about her. Which was almost every minute of every day.
“How are you going to do that?” Brady asked as he raked his fingers through his hair several times, trying to tame it into some semblance of order.
Linc allowed the familiar action to distract him from the grief and refocus. “I’ve been searching for everything I can find on Nevsky and I keep coming back to something,” he said.
“What? You found something some of the best in the business—including Annie—couldn’t find?”
“Maybe, but only because I had some insider information no one else was privy to.”
“Like what?”
“Something Daria said when I was listening in on her and Allie the day her cover was blown. At least I tried to listen in. Allie had the blender going while she was talking to Daria, but she also had her head close to the girl’s lips, so I was able to pick up most of the conversation.”
“What’d she say?” Brady settled into the seat next to the captain’s and pulled on his shoes.
“Something about a foolish man building his house on the sand and when the floodwaters rise, the house would crash down.”
“Sounds like a song we sang in Vacation Bible School,” his brother said.
“And I think that’s why Daria used it. I think she was trying to send a message. She said that she could only talk in riddles around her house in order to stay out of trouble. I’m sure it’s because Nevsky was listening in on everything.”
“So, what was the message in that cryptic piece of dialogue?”
“I did a little research this morning while I was waiting on you to come pick me up. Nevsky has an office building. Kind of like a small warehouse with space for offices. He’s got it under a shell corporation name, but it’s definitely his. I located it with Annie’s help. It’s a new build and was just finished last week.”
“Okay. How does that help?”
“The construction company’s name is Sands and Sons Construction.”
Brady stilled. “Sounds like a bit of a long shot, but I’m listening.”
“What if Daria was telling Allie she needed to look into it?”
“Guess it won’t hurt to check it out.”
“You and me and a couple of others for backup just in case. I don’t want to spook the guy.” Linc rubbed a hand across his eyes, thinking. “I can’t believe that, as involved as he is in everything that goes on in the operation, we can’t get him on something. I want this guy to go away for life. I want his organization wiped off the face of the earth. And I want him alive.” He blew out a low breath. “Death’s too good for him. He needs to live every day locked up with nothing but his memories of what it was like to be free.”
“Then let’s head back to the office and figure out a way to make that happen.”
Two days later, Henry still hadn’t brought her a phone and she was getting mighty irritated—and Henry had to know that. Which was probably why he’d escaped her room for a while. He’d been there every time she wok
e up and every time she closed her eyes. He’d convinced her that she needed to stay in the bed to recuperate while cooperating with the physical therapist who’d come in the room to work with her.
Frankly, Henry had been like a mother hen, and Allie had to admit, she’d vaguely enjoyed the attention and having someone else take care of her. However, that had worn off quickly and now she was smothering, anxious to get back to work and, this time, put together a fail-proof plan that would enable her to find and arrest Nevsky—and anyone who worked for him.
They’d started her on a pill regimen. She had probably needed the stronger drugs but hated them because they made her feel so woozy and light-headed. Yesterday after Henry had left, she pulled out the IV to make them transition her to pills. The way Henry had been fussing over her, if he thought she wasn’t getting pain meds, he’d harangue her to death. This way, she could prove she was fit to be released. Today.
Allie slipped out of the bed, wincing at the tug on her back where the stitches were still healing and the general aches and pains that came with almost getting blown up. She’d yet to leave the room per the doctor’s and Henry’s orders, but she was done with lying in a hospital bed.
Her floor exercises and trips to the bathroom weren’t enough, and now, with the drugs out of her system, she didn’t get weak-kneed and nauseated when she got out of bed. She needed to move.
And to grieve without an audience, because Henry had not been able to convince her that Linc was still alive.
That meant quitting her job and getting away from Henry. Because how would she be able to continue working with a man who lied to her?
If Linc was still alive, he would have called or come to see her by now. So the only conclusion she could draw from his absence was that he was dead and Henry had lied.
So she was done.
In the closet, she found several outfits in her size hanging neatly. Enough for at least a week. Upon closer inspection, she found a bag containing toiletries and everything she might need for an extended stay away from home.
“What in the world, Henry?” she whispered. She dressed as quickly as her wounds would let her, then opened the door and stepped into the hallway.
And gaped.
Luxury greeted her, from the dark hardwoods covered in Oriental rugs to the greenery-filled atrium to her left. Allie wasn’t in the likes of any hospital she’d ever seen before.
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