A_Father's Sacrifice

by Mallory Kane

  “He’ll need you when he wakes up,” he’d told her.

  “He’ll need you more,” she retorted. “He trusts you.”

  Mintz had met her gaze solemnly. “But he loves you.”

  Now she paced the short length of the emergency room cubicle with Mintz’s words echoing in her ears as she waited for Dylan to wake up. Stopping at the head of the bed, she pushed a damp strand of hair off his forehead and picked up the cool, wet towel the nurse had given her. She patted his face.

  He groaned, but didn’t open his eyes.

  She traced his honed jaw, his cheekbone, his brow. His pallor and weakness brought tears to her eyes. He was so determined, so focused. He was going to hate being injured.

  She looked at the bandage covering his shoulder and part of his neck. An awful realization hit her.

  Oh, dear God! His shoulder. He couldn’t operate on Ben.

  “No, please,” she prayed. “Don’t let Ben lose his chance to walk.” What had the doctor told her? That they’d know within twelve hours if he’d have to have surgery to repair ligaments. Without surgery it would take him at least two weeks to be able to use his arm. With surgery it would be more like six weeks.

  Ben didn’t have six weeks. He didn’t even have two.

  Natasha compressed her lips, trying not to cry. What would Dylan do? He’d said Ben probably only had about another week before he lost too much viable muscle and nerve tissue.

  She remembered him saying there were only two other surgeons in the world that could do the delicate procedure that would give Ben the ability to walk.

  She took out her cell phone and called Mitch Decker.

  “Mitch, it’s Natasha.”

  “Hey. Storm told me what happened. Are you okay?”

  “Sure, I’m fine. Dylan’s in the hospital and Storm and Alfred and several agents are looking for Ben. Mitch, that’s not why I called.” She took a deep breath. “Do you have any idea who Mohan Patel is? He’s at the University of Mumbai. Or Frederick Werner at Johns Hopkins?”

  “No, why?”

  “Dylan’s been shot in the shoulder. He can’t operate on his son. He told me those two were the only other surgeons in the world who could do this operation. I need to get in touch with one of them.”

  There was a pause on the other end of the line, then she heard paper rustling.

  “I know the Chief of Medicine at Johns Hopkins. Let me give him a call.”

  “Really? You’d do that?”

  “Tell me the name again.”

  “Frederick Werner. Neurosurgeon. Dylan studied under him.”

  “Give me a few minutes.”

  “Mitch—thanks.”

  She disconnected and stared at the cell phone display. No calls. Why hadn’t Alfred called? She was so worried about Ben.

  Dylan’s thick black eyelashes fluttered and he groaned again. “Ben?” he said hoarsely.

  She set her phone on the bedside table, pasted on a smile and leaned over the side rail. “Hi, there,” she said, caressing his hair, working to put a light tone in her voice.

  He frowned drowsily at her. “What’s going on?” He went to push himself up and discovered that his arm was immobilized. “What the hell?”

  “Tom shot you, remember?”

  He let his head fall back against the pillows. “Tom shot me. When—?” He broke off.

  Natasha saw his eyes sharpen as adrenaline overcame the effects of the morphine they’d given him.

  “Where’s Ben?”

  “Dylan—”

  “Damn it, Tasha.” He glared at her. “Where is he? Where’s Alfred?”

  She put a hand on his chest. “They’re looking for him. We should hear something soon.”

  “What are you doing here? Why aren’t you out there helping them? Ben’s going to—he’ll be scared.”

  “Alfred made me promise to stay here with you.”

  He frowned at her, obviously assessing whether to believe her. “Are you telling me the truth? Or are you here because—because Ben—”

  “No! No, Dylan. They’ve traced Tom’s last call. Alfred and Storm and several other agents are on their way to the location now.”

  He closed his eyes and wiped his face with his good hand. “Swear to me you’re telling the truth.” He turned his searing gaze on her.

  “I swear. I wouldn’t lie to you.”

  “Again, you mean.”

  She compressed her lips. “I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you about Tom earlier. I know if I had, Ben might not have been abducted.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  “I’ve been going over everything, trying to figure out what went wrong. How someone inside the house could know where Ben was being hidden—” She stopped and met Dylan’s gaze.

  His eyes widened.

  “Charlene,” they said in unison.

  “Oh my gosh, of course. It makes perfect sense.” She pressed the heel of her hand against her temple. “How did I miss that? It’s so obvious. Tom suckered her in, used her. Just like he used everybody—the young insurgents who did his dirty work for him, the homeless kids who believed that he would take care of them. I’m sure she thought he loved her. I’ve seen him in action. He had an incredible charisma when he wanted to turn it on. It’s like he hypnotized his followers.”

  “Charlene. She wouldn’t kill Ben, would she? I believe she truly cares for him.”

  “I’m sure she wouldn’t.” She pulled out her cell phone. “I need to make sure Mintz knows.”

  Dylan sank back against the pillows, obviously weak. It hurt her to see him injured.

  She dialed Mintz’s cell phone and quickly told him their revelation.

  Dylan lay back on the pillows and tried not to think about what would happen to Ben if Charlene had been brainwashed by Tom. He concentrated on Natasha’s voice as she talked with Mintz.

  As soon as she hung up, he tried to sit up. The pain in his shoulder warned him about moving it too much. “What did he say?”

  “They’re at the hotel, just about to make contact. He said he’d come to the same conclusion—that Charlene was in on it.”

  “Do you think he’s all right?”

  She laid her hand on his wrist, just below the tape that held the IV line in place. “Yes, I do.”

  Slowly, he shook his head. “What if they don’t find him? I need to be there when Alfred finds him. He won’t understand why I’m not there,” he said brokenly. “I can’t—I can’t—” He put his good hand over his face.

  She stood and pushed his hair back off his forehead, then kissed his brow. “I know,” she whispered, pressing her cheek against his.

  Dylan breathed in her soft familiar scent. It reminded him of Ben’s fresh bubble bath smell and his chest tightened with an aching loss.

  He nudged her out of his way and struggled to sit up. “I’ve got to get up.”

  “Dylan, where do you think you’re going? You can’t get up. You’re on a morphine drip, which you can control by pushing that button to give yourself a higher dose if you want. You have to lie still for twelve hours and you have to use the morphine. If you can stay still, they’re hoping they won’t have to do surgery to repair the ligaments.”

  Dylan glared down at the bandage and the tape that bound his arm to his ribs. The shoulder ached with a dull, persistent pain that made him feel queasy. He swallowed and licked his dry lips.

  Natasha held a cup of water for him. He reached for it with his right hand, but the bandages and the IV line restrained him.

  A shadow flickered in her green eyes as she held the straw for him to drink.

  He stared down at his bandaged shoulder. “I can’t do this. I can’t lie here for twelve hours. I have to be ready to operate on Ben. Where’s the interface?”

  “Campbell has it. He looked at it and said it’s fine.” She sent him a questioning look. “Why’d you throw it at Tom? You could have broken it.”

  He gave her a sad smile. “I didn’t care. At th
at moment nothing was more important than finding Ben. I’d have given my own life if I could trust Tom to set Ben free.” He took a deep breath and blew it out. “I can build another interface. Ben is my only son.”

  Natasha sat beside his bed, her fingers making little pleats in the edge of the sheet that covered him. She’d showered and changed into a surgical scrub shirt and pants. Her hair was damp and tied up into a ponytail.

  His gaze ran down her cheek to her jaw and on over her long graceful neck. Her skin glowed and her slender body looked sexy in the scrubs.

  A tear slid down her cheek. She cared about Ben, too. Was worried about him.

  Something happened inside him—something sweet and painful, comforting and frightening. He realized that as much as he loved Ben, his heart obviously had the capacity to love Natasha, too. Because he couldn’t imagine living his life without her. He wanted to reach out and stop the tear but he couldn’t—not with his right arm.

  “Tasha, what’s wrong?”

  She shook her head without looking up.

  Dylan saw her bowed shoulders, her pale face, and everything she’d told him sank in.

  He’d been shot in the shoulder. He might have to have surgery.

  “I can’t operate on Ben.” He heard his voice break.

  She looked up, her fingers still playing with the sheet. The look in her eyes told him what he didn’t want to know.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I tried—”

  He leaned back and closed his eyes and covered them with his good arm.

  Natasha’s cell phone rang.

  “Mitch?” Her voice sounded anxious.

  Dylan lay there, half listening. Her boss was probably talking to her about her next assignment.

  “Really?” she said, her voice rising. “When can he be here?”

  Dylan lowered his arm and opened his eyes.

  “Tomorrow? That’s great. Oh, Mitch, I can’t tell you—” She paused. “Right. Thank you, sir.”

  She closed her phone and smiled at him.

  “What was that?”

  Her eyes sparkled with tears as she put her hand over his. “My boss, Mitch Decker, just talked to the Chief of Medicine at Johns Hopkins, who assured him that Dr. Frederick Werner can be here tomorrow to make arrangements to operate on Ben.” By the time she’d finished, tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  Dylan stared at her. “How? Why?”

  “You told me he was one of only two other men who could do the operation.”

  He nodded, but terror gnawed at his gut.

  “He’ll be here. He can do the operation. You can—consult, or whatever it is you’d do.” Natasha frowned. “What’s the matter?”

  “You think you’ve fixed everything? You got some strings pulled and you think that’s going to solve all the problems? Sure, Werner can do the operation. Everything’s rosy now.”

  “What’s wrong with you? I thought you’d be happy. Ben will be able to walk.”

  Dylan wiped his face. “That’s great, except for one thing. We don’t know if Ben is alive or dead.”

  DADDY! DADDY! Look at me. I’m in a big hotel with Charlene. We saw helicopters and cars and trains. Daddy, why’s Charlene holding that gun? Daddy? Daddy!

  “Ben?” Dylan mumbled, rubbing his eyes. He’d been asleep.

  “Daddy!”

  He rubbed his hand down his face, trying to wake up.

  Then he heard a familiar giggle and a whisper. “He’s asleep. Daddy, wake up!”

  Dylan opened his eyes. Was he dreaming?

  “Daddy!” Ben ran toward the bed. Alfred was right behind. He caught him and lifted him up onto the bed.

  Dylan couldn’t stop grinning. Not even when tears slipped over his eyelids and down his cheeks. “Hey, sport,” he croaked.

  “Daddy! Charlene was real sad when Alfred came. But I was glad. Did you hurt your arm? Is it making you cry?”

  “I’m crying because I love you and I’m glad to see you.”

  “I love you, too, Daddy.” Ben laid his head on Dylan’s good shoulder. “I got really tired at Charlene’s. But I saw helicopters…and planes…and…” He yawned and stopped talking.

  Dylan met Natasha’s gaze.

  She smiled, but her eyes were rimmed with red. “He’s here,” she whispered.

  He smiled. “Thank you, and thanks for getting Werner down here. If the damn doctors will let me, I can scrub in with him when he operates on Ben.” He looked at his shoulder. “At least I can scrub one hand.”

  He looked around. Alfred stood next to Natasha. Storm was standing behind her. Then he looked back at his son and touched his baby-fine hair. “He’s asleep.”

  Alfred moved to take Ben but Dylan shook his head. “No way, Alfred. You’ll have to wait your turn.”

  Alfred scowled, but his eyes sparkled.

  “Oh, Dylan, I’m so glad,” Natasha said.

  Storm put his hands on her shoulders and whispered something to her. She acknowledged him by angling her head and smiling.

  “Dr. Stryker,” Storm said, “we’re very happy to be able to bring your son back to you, safe and sound.”

  Dylan nodded, disturbed by the pang of jealousy that had streaked through him when Storm had laid his hands on Natasha. “So it was Charlene, wasn’t it?”

  Alfred nodded. “I should have known,” he said.

  Dylan shook his head. “In a way, it should have been obvious, but we didn’t figure it out, either, until just—” He raised his eyebrows at Natasha.

  “A couple of hours ago. You slept quite a while.”

  “What’s going to happen to her?”

  “That’s up to the courts,” Alfred responded. “On the one hand, she’s spilling her guts about Tom and his little group. On the other, she smuggled explosives into your compound and set them so that they could be detonated remotely. She didn’t actually set them off, but she was an accessory. And in the helicopter crash, one of the CSIs found a portable GPS device. She’d obviously planted it to guide the helicopter to the target, which was Ben’s play area. It’s blind luck no one was killed.”

  “And Tom’s dead,” Natasha said. She stepped to one side and Storm dropped his hands from her shoulders with a little smile.

  “Do we know who the group was that Tom was involved with?” Dylan asked, doing his best not to glare at Storm.

  “Homeland Security will take over that case. They’re being picked up now. I’m certain they’ll be prosecuted.”

  Dylan shifted Ben against his side and looked down at him. His little mouth was open and his soft breaths warmed Dylan’s bare skin between the strips of adhesive tape that circled his abdomen and ribs.

  Then he looked at Natasha. Her eyes were on Ben and the smile on her face was positively angelic. She blinked and a crystal sparkling tear slid down her cheek.

  Storm shifted his weight to his other foot. “Well, I’d better get back to the local FBI office. Charlene will be arraigned tomorrow. After that Gambrini and I will head back to D.C.”

  Natasha turned to him and kissed him on the cheek. “I’ll see you back at the office. Tell Agent Gambrini thank you for me.” She pointed her finger at him. “And behave!”

  Storm flicked her nose, then shook Dylan’s hand and Alfred’s. “It was a pleasure to work with you both,” he said.

  Dylan nodded, and Alfred walked out with the FBI agent.

  Dylan looked at Natasha.

  “What’s the matter?” she asked tentatively. “Everything’s all right now, isn’t it?”

  He shook his head. “Not everything.”

  Natasha frowned at him. He was still pale, still weak, but the blue fire was back in his eyes. He denied it, but she knew he was upset about something, and that something had a lot to do with her.

  “Sit down.” It was a command, not a request.

  She sat. “Yes, sir.”

  “Is there something between you and Agent Storm?”

  “Something…” She paused, confused
, then grinned. “Oh. Well, yeah, if you count a constant battle to keep Storm’s mind on the job and off of flirting.”

  “So you’re not—”

  Her grin faded and she frowned at him for a second before understanding dawned. “No, we’re not. He’s a talker and a flirt, but in reality he’s like the big brother I never had. Why?”

  “Big brother.”

  Her smile came back. “Yeah. He flirts with everybody. It’s his way of keeping his distance—a cover for his inability to commit.”

  Dylan looked dumbfounded. “What?”

  “Never mind.” She waved a hand. “What’s with all the questions?” She’d like to think he was asking because he wanted her himself, but she knew his entire focus was on Ben right now. And that was the way it should be.

  He had his son back. There was no room in his life for anything else. Not now. Maybe never.

  As if he knew what she was thinking, he looked down at Ben and shifted his weight a bit.

  “Do you want me to take him? You look tired.”

  “No.” He leveled a gaze at her. “I want to ask you something.”

  “Okay.” She steeled herself.

  “Are you all right?”

  Her heart sank. She’d known that was what he was going to say. She had no idea why she was so disappointed? “Sure. I’m fine. You’re the one you should be worried about.”

  He nodded and looked down at Ben again. “I am. I’m worried about me and Ben and Alfred.”

  Ben stirred. “Daddy?” He lifted his head. “What’s for supper?”

  Natasha smiled, blinking back tears. She was going to miss him—and his father. The hollow empty place in her heart that Dylan and his son had filled began to ache. Soon it would be empty again.

  “Tasha!” Ben sat up, digging his elbow into Dylan’s side.

  He winced. “Whoa, sport. Move slowly. Daddy’s got a boo-boo.”

  Ben giggled. “Grown-ups don’t get boo-boos, do they, Tasha?”

  She smiled. “Oh, sometimes they do. Sometimes grown-ups’ boo-boos aren’t on the outside.”

  Ben cocked his head and frowned, as if trying to understand what she’d said.