by Dale Mayer
“Yep,” Troy said. “Doesn’t matter now though because, when it comes home like this one has, you’ll do whatever you need to do to make sure you’re clear and Kate stays safe,” he said.
“We need to put a military guard on George too. Or a civilian one if we can’t confirm the guards are clean.”
“I wonder if anybody has considered that. You know it won’t be well-received if we tell the commander he needs to consider a second attack.”
“God, no, it sure won’t,” Colton said, “but we need to find out and deal with it.”
Just then they looked up to see Petty Officer Parsons walking toward the cafeteria area, probably looking for a coffee. They hailed him over to the little office they were in, and he approached with a smile on his face.
“What are you two up to?”
“Just trying to figure out who might have been involved in this,” Troy said.
“Right. Like the rest of us, you’re trying to figure out if a crime actually occurred,” he said with a laugh.
That gave Colton an idea just how much their word was doubted. “Well, there is a downed plane,” he said quietly. “If nothing else, that should be cause for concern.”
“To the number-crunchers and the supply guys, yes,” Parsons said, “and obviously you guys. Plus, whoever’s delivery was dumped in the ocean.”
Colton hadn’t really considered that angle. Somebody wanted that load shipped. Had crashing it benefited somebody else on a budgetary level? He hated to even think along that line, but, now that he had, it was one more thing to look into. When shit happened, it wasn’t always easy to sort out who did the shitting. Again, there were no immediate answers. He faced the petty officer and asked, “Does George have base and civilian security on him?”
“I don’t know, but I believe his condition is such that you could visit him at the hospital.”
“Now that would be good,” Colton said. “I know Kate really wants to check in on him.”
“Let me know, and I’ll arrange it.” Then he headed over to get the coffee he’d come for.
“Something about him seems so nonchalant, as if he doesn’t care,” Troy said.
“I imagine a lot of them don’t,” Colton said. “When you think about it, the only ones who really care are those directly affected by it. To these guys, planes go down all the time, and, in this case, it was just a cargo plane with no loss of life. So it’s an equipment headache. I was working my way through that angle in my mind, but I’m not really getting much of a hit on it being viable.”
“Maybe it didn’t have as much to do with killing George and/or Kate,” Troy said thoughtfully. “Maybe it was as much to make it look like George was a shitty-ass pilot who shouldn’t be flying or something. More to discredit him than anything else.”
“But it’s not like his preflight check would have shown up with something wrong in the engine or anything, not unless the computer revealed something.”
“I suggest we talk to George,” Troy said, “because you know that he’s the one who would have the most answers.”
“He also did the preflight before Kate was even there,” Colton said thoughtfully.
“Are we thinking suicide?”
“That’s a rough way to go,” he said.
“It is, but we’ve seen it before.”
“Well, I haven’t,” Colton said. “Wouldn’t want to either. It’s one thing if you take your own life but another thing to take others down with you. Besides, why would he want to do that when he has a wife and kids?”
“We don’t know that everything’s okay in the marriage,” Troy said. “What if they were on the verge of a divorce or something?”
“Right, and a pilot may want to go down with his flight, but would he want to take Kate too? Some people probably wouldn’t want to fly with him because of the deal with turning in his coworkers.”
“Although,” Troy said, “since he’d gone that far into it and had taken all the heat he likely has, you’d think he’d want to stick around to see it through. Unless somehow he has left evidence behind and just doesn’t want to be part of the zoo.”
“Again, more thoughts I don’t really want to consider,” Colton said with a wry smile, “because it will be a zoo, going up against his own coworkers like that. And who knows what kind of crap George’s been through because of it already.”
“Exactly. That won’t be fun for anybody. Including his wife and kids potentially. Maybe he thought this would be an easy answer.”
“Well, it’s time for me to find Kate. Then take a trip to the hospital and find out for sure.”
Chapter 9
When Kate stepped into the waiting room, she saw Colton walking in to greet her. She smiled up at him. “You don’t have to follow me around, you know?” she said gently. “You saved my life, but—”
“And you saved mine. We’ve already been over that old ground,” he said. “I came to tell you that we can see George, if that’s something you want to do.”
“Absolutely it is,” she said with excitement. “He’s that much better?”
“Apparently,” Colton said. “We just have to tell the petty officer, and he’ll arrange for us to get to the hospital.”
“Can we go now?” she asked hopefully. He looked at her strangely. She frowned. “What?”
“Are you okay after all that? Do you need to rest or eat or something?”
“No,” she said. “No more sitting around. I’d like to do something active. And definitely no more talking about my health or mental state, please!” she said.
“As long as all the talking needed has been done, and you’re good to go,” he said with a smile.
As they went to leave, the receptionist called back, “The doctor wants to see you in a couple days.”
Kate froze, then looked at her and said, “I should be going home in a couple days.”
“There’s a good chance all flights will be canceled due to weather,” the woman said. “In that case, she wants to see you again.”
Resigned, Kate nodded and waited while the appointment was booked and thanked her. Then, with a smile, she walked out of the office.
“You don’t sound so impressed. Was it terrible?”
“No, not at all,” she said.
“Did she want you to relive the accident?”
“No, not really. I think she is just wondering how stable I am, mentally, in terms of returning to work. And, of course, any suggestion of me not being stable or not capable to return to work amplifies my own fears in that regard. That’s just not something I want to deal with right now, thank you very much.” She caught the surprised look on his face, and she nodded. “Of course I’m worried. It was a hell of a crash. I haven’t been up since, and I wanted to go up right away, but apparently that isn’t allowed.”
“I think that’s probably standard,” he said. “You’ll go back up when scheduled, the same as you always have, and you’ll carry on just like the professional you are.”
Her tone was lighter as she said, “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“No problem. I’d fly with you anytime.”
“You might be the only one,” she said. “A certain aura attaches to pilots after you crash.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Meaning people don’t want to fly with you?”
“Well, a crash doesn’t exactly garner confidence, does it?” she said with a chuckle.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You survived. That should boost everybody’s confidence.”
“It doesn’t work that way. But it’s fine. I’ll deal with it.”
“Was this your first crash?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Everybody has one bad experience,” he said cheerfully.
At that, she burst out laughing. “Often you only get one.”
“Point taken, but we made it out, so it’s all good.”
She loved his blasé, not quite careless, but almost, attitude. And really, the It happe
ned. It’s over. Let’s move on way of thinking was not a bad way to go. Colton really was a good guy.
With great joy that they hooked up with Petty Officer Parsons, who arranged a ride for them and access into the hospital. It took a good twenty minutes to go from the base to where they needed to go, but very quickly they were inside the hospital and directed toward George’s bed. He was sleeping. Kate hesitated, not wanting to wake him up. She looked at Colton to see his frown. “What’s the matter?
“He was supposed to be awake,” he said by way of explanation, but it wasn’t enough.
“He’s been through a lot,” she said. “I’d be asleep too, if I could be.”
At that, he nodded. “Right. Good point. And he was way worse off than you.”
“Exactly,” she said. “We can go get a coffee or something and come back.”
“That sounds like a plan.” Colton looked around and noted where the cafeteria was. “Come on. Let’s go. We can always return and sit outside his room and hope he wakes up again.”
She didn’t like the way he said that. “You don’t mean he might die, right?” she said, as soon as they were moving toward the cafeteria.
He looked at her in surprise. “No! No, that’s not what I meant at all, but I have to admit to being disturbed at the fact there’s no security on him.”
“That’s because nobody really believes it was sabotage. Accidents happen, fuel lines break, sometimes engines fail, and things overheat.”
“Did you have any problems with the plane before that?”
“You asked that once before,” she said. “I told you then it was a no.”
“Were you awake the whole time?”
“No,” she said, “I wasn’t. I took a few minutes of shut-eye, and so did he. But nothing was unusual about that either.”
“I know. Relax. I’m just looking into every angle I can,” he said. “What is George’s mental state like normally?”
She frowned. “Since the whole drug case, he’s been a little morose, like he’s almost sorry for what he started. He got involved and knew it was the right thing to do, but I don’t think it’s been easy. Not for him or his family.”
Colton took a deep slow breath, and she watched curiously, realizing he was about to drop a verbal bomb on her. “Go ahead. Just tell me what’s going on. Trust me. It’ll be much better than not knowing what’s going through your head because, honestly, you’re kind of freaking me out.”
“Okay, sorry. So you know we have to look at every angle, right? So one of the questions we have to consider is whether this could have been a suicide attempt.”
Kate stared at him. “Oh, my God,” she said. “Are you kidding? That is definitely not something I want to consider. I don’t want to consider that at all.”
“Maybe not but you know everybody else has to consider it. George got himself into a spot, and I’m sure his life hasn’t been easy lately. Do you know if he and his wife were doing okay?”
“No, I don’t know,” she said, speaking slowly. “I know they had a temporary separation not all that long ago, but I can’t imagine he would choose something like this. He loves those boys.”
“What if he was sorry for dragging them into this mess? What if he regretted his actions and didn’t see any way out?”
“But why would there be no way out?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I guess that’s something we have to look into.” They walked into the cafeteria, and Kate picked up muffins and coffee. At least she thought they were muffins; they were a very unique-looking treat anyway. Colton paid for them, and they returned to George’s room.
“Listen, Colton. I really don’t like that suggestion. I don’t like it at all.”
“I know, but we’ve got to keep digging until we find something, somewhere,” he said, as if trying to toss the idea back under the rock where he’d dragged it from.
“Do you have a way to check his email?” she asked slowly.
“Why?” Colton asked. At his sharp look, she clarified her question.
“I’ve spent quite a bit of time with George, and the only way he would do something like that was if his family was in danger. Like if he was being blackmailed into it.”
“Oh, that’s an interesting angle. I hadn’t considered that.” Colton pulled out the phone Petty Officer Parsons had turned up with at the request of the commander and contacted Mason. She could hear the conversation and heard Colton say, “I know it’s a long shot, but—”
At that moment, she glanced at George, who didn’t look very well. His face was turning red. She raced to his side and then hit the panic button. Alarms rang out; Colton jumped to her side. Almost immediately medical staff came running. Kate and Colton were ushered out of the room as medical staff worked on George.
Kate paced up and down the hallway. Colton looked at her and asked, “What happened?”
“He didn’t look good,” she whispered. From the doorway he joined her to look over her shoulder, trying to see. “I wondered if he was dying. I don’t know. I just reacted.”
“Yeah, especially if somebody was trying to help him along.”
“I would go along with the murder and/or blackmail line,” she said, “and both would be shitty options.”
“True, but at least it would be him, not you and him,” he murmured, his breath drifting across her cheek. Instinctively she leaned back into him, his arms coming around to hold her close.
They watched the medical staff fighting to save George’s life.
He said against her ear, “I’ll be right back. Stay here.” And, with that, he dropped his arms from around her and headed off down the hallway at a rapid clip.
She called after him, “Where are you going?”
“To check the video cameras.”
She stared after him in surprise and then realized how right he was. She didn’t know what kind of credentials he needed to see them, but she was pretty sure he could pull whatever strings he needed to get the job done. With nothing else to do, she sat down and waited. With relief, she heard the atmosphere and the mood change inside George’s room. She stepped up to take a look, and one of the nurses gave her a thumbs-up sign, a big smile on her face.
She crossed her hands against her chest and beamed. George had been saved. She didn’t know what the hell was going on, but wow. “That was real shitty, whatever it was,” she whispered quietly to herself. Two doctors walked out past her, and she asked the nurse, “Is he okay now?”
“For the moment,” the nurse said.
“Do you know what happened?”
She shrugged. “His heart stopped. But he’s back again.”
Kate nodded and said, “Can I go in and see him?”
The nurse shook her head. “No, no visitors right now.”
Kate looked at her and asked, “But what about monitoring him?”
“We’ve got him on the monitor at the nurses’ station, and somebody will check on him every fifteen minutes.”
Kate didn’t like that one bit. “I’ll just sit here for a bit.” She sat down, picking up one of the coffees. She slowly sipped it, wondering how long Colton would be. Sure enough, the nurse came back, checked on George and gave her another thumbs-up as she left. That meant it had already been fifteen minutes. She waited and waited, and finally ate one muffin.
Still hungry, she ate the second one. She also drank Colton’s coffee. By the time she saw him walking toward her, the nurse had come and gone once more. She bolted to her feet and ran toward him and threw herself against him. His arms closed around her, and he held her close. “It’s okay,” he said. “It’s all right.”
“It doesn’t feel all right,” she whispered against his chest. “Did you find anything?”
“It’s what we didn’t find. It took us a few minutes to get clearance, but then, when they checked the security footage, they saw the system for this entire hallway was down for the twenty minutes we were in the cafeteria.”
Kate stared up at him.
He nodded. “I know. Very suspicious.”
“No,” she said, “deadly suspicious.”
“Exactly.” He wrapped his arms around her and held her close.
*
It had taken a fair bit to get anybody to let him access the security cameras, but, when they realized what they had seen, orders were barked all over the place, and people had jumped in to try and figure out what was going on. Colton had stayed while they searched other hallways, looking for anybody who might have had anything to do with it, but, not finding anything, he decided it was time to go back. He sent Mason an update and then headed toward Kate.
The fact that there had potentially been an attack on George would hopefully bring the case up to a higher priority on base now that people had confirmation George was in danger. And that meant Kate was in danger too, only he’d left her alone. His footsteps rapidly increased until he almost ran down the hall. When he caught sight of her waiting for him, his heart slammed against his chest in relief. He shouldn’t have left her alone. He never gave it a thought because she was surrounded by hospital staff.
When she’d seen him, she had raced toward him. It was natural for him to open his arms, and he was grateful she had jumped into them. He didn’t know why the hell he hadn’t tried to call her in all these years. He should have. Part of it may have been out of fear. That one night had been so good, and maybe it wouldn’t be so good again. Foolish, he knew, but it was like one of those high spots in his life, and he didn’t want to ruin it. And now his mind was completely overwhelmed with the fact somebody had managed to get into the hospital and to attack George—and could have attacked her too.
That meant it wasn’t safe to leave him here. Colton hoped somebody was working on setting up proper security for George. Colton had passed on his own request, hoping it wasn’t needed and that people were already working on it. But it was hard to know. His phone vibrated. Reaching for it, he looked down and frowned, then said, “Hello, Commander.”
“Where are you?” the commander asked, his tone brisk.
“Standing outside George’s hospital room.”
“Good. Stay there,” the commander ordered. “I have two men coming to stand guard.”
