And there you have it. Tate couldn’t explain the world because he didn’t understand it, either. Hence, he stayed clear of most people, but Dr. Keegan had definitely gone up a notch in his playbook. “Thanks for taking good care of Winslow, but what about her cancer?”
Keegan’s smooth forehead shifted into rows of wrinkles as he leaned forward, damned near into Tate’s face. “What fucking cancer?”
“Doc,” he bit out. “She’s dying of cancer. That’s why we think her mother’s been poisoning her, to kill her so she doesn’t have to take care of her anymore. That’s why Winslow’s lost her hair. Couldn’t you guys—?”
“Sorry, Tate. I might have interrupted you when you were checking her in,” Isaiah said. “Dr. Keegan might not have heard what you were telling him.”
“What kind of cancer?” Keegan barked. It was easy to see by the twitch under his left eye that he was riled all over again.
“She never said what kind,” Tate admitted. “Her mother didn’t say, either.” Or wouldn’t. “All Winslow told me was it didn’t matter, that she’d be dead soon anyway.”
Keegan exploded off his chair. In a passionate display of emotion, he slapped his hand to his forehead before he faced Tate. “You guys are the FBI, aren’t you? Right? Isn’t that what you told me when you brought her in?”
Tate nodded.
“Then do something! Arrest her damned mother! Do it today! Tell me what you need to press charges on her, and I’ll do everything I can to make sure she doesn’t hurt another person like she’s hurt her daughter. To knowingly inflict a cancer patient with multiple poisons like this is unconscionable.”
Precisely what Tate needed to hear. “We can’t find her at the moment, but trust me. We’ll get her.”
Keegan sat back down. “Good. See that you do. In the meantime, I’ll order more blood work, but to answer your question, no. I didn’t detect any obvious signs of cancer during my preliminary exam. Let me get back to you on that.”
Tate had to know. “Can I see her now?”
Keegan shook his head. “I’d rather you didn’t. Like I said, what we’re putting her through right now isn’t fun, and once she feels better, she’ll be in dialysis. A day would be best, but at least give her until late morning if you don’t mind.”
I mind, but… “Okay,” Tate answered. This guy he could respect, but he wouldn’t leave Winslow here alone by herself. Not after all she’d been through.
Keegan settled down. “Besides, you look like you could use some sleep yourself.”
Tate let him think that. Sleep was one of those things he’d learned to live without.
“You’re coming home with us,” Eden spoke up.
Tate shook his head. “No, I’m good.”
“Ha,” she shot back at him. “If I had a nickel for every time Ky told me that, I’d be on my way to Jamaica with a Pina Colada in my hand by now. You men. You’re all the same.”
Of course, Tucker had to put his two cents worth into the mix. “It’s either Eden and Ky’s place or mine, Agent Higgins. You decide.”
Oh, no, the dreaded Agent Higgins card. Scary. Not. Tate darn near smiled at his boss’s sorry attempt to pull rank. He’d worked for Alex Stewart, remember? He’d been intimidated by the best. It didn’t work then, either.
“I’ve got my Jeep,” he said because he had to say something. “Thanks, but I’ll be fine.”
This time when Tate stuck his hand out, Keegan latched onto his wrist as if they’d served and fought together. “Twenty-Sixth Infantry, Second Brigade Combat Team. Iraq,” he said.
Tate answered with an automatic, “First Battalion, Sixth Marines, Twenty Fourth MEU. Afghanistan.”
And a new friendship was sealed.
“I’ll be looking for you in the morning,” Keegan declared to Tate with an edge in his voice. “Bright and early.”
“I’ll be here,” Tate vowed. Because I’m not leaving tonight.
That earned him another hard glint from Keegan’s sharp eyes, but he didn’t challenge what he probably knew was a lie. “Goodnight then.”
When the good doctor closed the door behind him, Tucker arched his back and stretched his hands over his head. “Guys, it’s been a long day. Beat it. Isaiah, have your friends secured the Parrish home or do I need to go back there?”
“I’m headed back now, but yes. A couple agents are still on site.”
“Good. First thing in the morning then.”
Ky and Eden trailed behind Tucker. Isaiah stayed long enough to toss his Starbucks’ empties in the trash before he headed out. Tate left with Isaiah because he needed to know where his Jeep was parked. Besides. He had something in there for Winslow.
“You’re parked over there,” Isaiah chin nodded to the row at his left, tossing Tate’s Jeep keys to him.
“Thanks,” Tate said as he caught the key fob in the air.
Isaiah stopped where he stood. “Hang in there, brother. We are going to get Joyce or Hattie or whatever she’s calling herself now.”
That brought Tate up short. “You think she’s already changed her name? Her appearance?” Of course.
“Count on it.”
“But do you know for sure? Can you get into her head?” Like you get into mine?
Isaiah shook his head, his eyes gone black. “That’s why I needed you on the team, Tate. I can’t get into Hattie’s head. She’s blocking me, just like you do.”
“I block you?” Seriously? It works? Tate walked back to Isaiah, thrilled for the confirmation of a skill he hadn’t been certain of until now. “It was you who wanted me on this team, not Eden?”
“Eden advocated for you, but I pushed Tucker into it, not like it was hard to do. You have an innate psychic power unlike the rest of us. Don’t ask me how it works, but you decide who you let into your head, and when. I’ve got to tell you, it’s darn frustrating. I can read Tucker easy, Ky and Eden, too, but you? No can do.”
Didn’t that lift a weight off Tate’s shoulders? All along he’d felt like the odd man out. “So what can you do about it? Reading Joyce, I mean?” Not me.
“Nothing. It’s simply the way it is. Some people’s minds are easy to decipher; some aren’t. I can’t get much of a read from Tucker’s wife, Melissa, either. Her brain must be wired like yours.”
“But…” Tate grasped for something to say. Anything. “How can I help?”
“For starters, you can let me run a couple tests on you first thing in the morning. Let me do a couple mental exercises with you when you’re fresh.”
“What kind?” Not all the psychological profiling bullshit again. No more EEGs. Hell no.
A grin split Isaiah’s cheeks. “Relax. I’m not going to torture you. What I have in mind we can do sitting at a table in the hospital cafeteria. No big deal.”
Tate stared Isaiah down. The man was guileless; hardly what he’d expected in the son of a mad scientist. “Okay,” Tate said, agreeing to be a test rat for the first time in his life.
Isaiah nodded his goodbye, and with that, Tate strolled to his Jeep, flashed on the headlights, and waved as Tucker drove past with the rest of the Deuces Wild team rammed in his Challenger. Once they were out of sight, Tate locked up his Jeep and headed back to the ER admitting desk for her room number.
Guess Dr. Keegan must’ve spread the word about Winslow’s protective FBI custody order. All Tate had to do was flash his badge and Nurse Haley was eager to help. Tate caught the nearest elevator and Operation Guard Winslow began in earnest.
On the third floor, he cleared the elevator and turned left, needing to see how she was doing with his own eyes. At the open door to her room, he cocked his ear, not wanting to disturb what might be happening on the other side of the curtain.
Silence.
Stealthily, he cleared the curtain, and slosh went his heart to the floor. Winslow was as pale as a ghost, her skin nearly translucent. Flat on her back, her arms had been folded over her chest, her hands clasped together. All she needed was a
lily and she’d be ready for a casket.
He went to her and lifted her hand to his lips. His heart swelled with tenderness for this woman. Her fingers were warm, but so tiny. He’d never noticed before how delicate they were. How clean and pure. “Hey,” he said quietly, just in case she needed a friend.
Winslow peeled her eyes open as Tate tipped his forehead to hers, his simmering brown eyes soft with unshed tears. “Where am I?”
“At a real hospital,” he whispered. “With real doctors and nurses. You need dialysis, Winslow. Do you know that that is?”
She nodded. God, do I have kidney cancer? That was supposed to be a painful, quick death, but please, not now when she’d finally met a man who seemed to see her. A whimper got away from lips. “Why?” she cried, blinking hard. “Has the cancer… has it gone to my kidneys?”
He traced her quivering bottom lip with the pad of his thumb, his fingers gently squeezing her chin. “No, Winslow. You tested positive for arsenic poisoning, along with a few other prescription meds and barbiturates that had no business being in your system.”
“Me?” she squeaked, her voice pathetically timid. “There were drugs in me? Illicit drugs? And arsenic?”
He nodded, his eyes incredibly tender.
“B-but…” She couldn’t imagine how those things got inside of her, unless... No. Mom wouldn’t do that to me. “Who gave that stuff to me?” she asked, hating that fear had reduced her voice to a thin whine.
Tate lifted her hand to his lips, his eyes black with foreboding. “I think you and I both know who’s behind this. Didn’t you say your mother made you drink a smoothie every morning?”
“Yes, rice water and some healthy stuff. Bananas!” She latched onto that healthy fruit to prove her mother’s innocence. “But Mom wouldn’t drug or poison me. I know she wouldn’t. She’s… she’s…”
“She’s crazy is what she is.” Tate turned Winslow’s hand over and placed a gentle kiss to her knuckles, not taking his gaze from her. “The FBI lab tested what was left in your smoothie glass and a hypo they found in your mother’s bedroom. There were traces of arsenic in your drink, and the results aren’t back on the hypo.”
“That can’t be true. My mom’s a gardener, Tate. That’s it. That’s why she keeps arsenic around. I think it’s in the fertilizer she uses. Maybe she just didn’t wash her hands when she fixed my drink. She came in from working in her flowerbeds, and she was in a hurry and she must’ve forgot. She wouldn’t hurt me. I know she wouldn’t.”
Tate didn’t argue, just kissed her knuckles one by one, his mouth soft and sweet on her skin. His tongue trailed a line to the back of Winslow’s hand where he ended with a kiss.
She couldn’t think under that sensual assault. How could he suspect her mother of such a terrible thing? The need to protect her mother lifted proud and fierce and—false. Winslow took a deep breath as the truth she’d suspected for some time settled into place like the last fallen domino in a long line. Mom tried to kill me. Tate—I can’t believe I’m saying this—was right, and she knew it. Winslow gulped down the bile creeping up her throat at that bitter acknowledgement. This was hard. Yes, her mom was a prima donna and prone to dramatics, and she could be a little bit mean. Well, make that a lot mean, but…
Wow-wow-wow-wow-wow-wow-wow. All those days of feeling crappy and throwing up until Winslow thought her head would explode. All. Those. Years.
“My mom tried to kill me,” she murmured more to herself than to Tate, her heart shredded at the worst betrayal any child should have to endure. He kept hold of her fingers even as a sob choked out of her. “She… she….” And the dam broke. “Where’s my dog? I want my dog. I want Pepe.”
Tate smoothed a big, manly hand down her bicep. “Don’t worry. I found him and he’s having a sleepover at a friend’s house, so take it easy. Go back to sleep. Everything’s going to be okay.”
But it wasn’t, was it? Tate didn’t know the worst part yet. “She… she wanted to take me on a road trip.” She was going to kill me.
His nostrils flared as his brows narrowed to one fierce V.
“To Oregon, I think.” That was the only state Winslow could recall. “Assisted suicide’s legal there.”
“What?” snapped out of Tate like a lightning strike.
It broke Winslow’s heart to confess what she now knew to be true. Her mother wasn’t just mean. She was evil. “I thought it was a good idea at first, you know, to save everyone the trouble of taking care of me, watching me waste away, and…” She choked on that word—die.
“You’re no trouble,” he growled. “No trouble at all. Stay with me. I’ll take care of you, damn it. You’ll be surprised how easy it is.”
Tears brimmed, blurring his handsome face. She needed to hear that. “Thanks, but—”
He nipped the knuckle he’d just kissed. “No buts. You don’t tell someone you love ’em in one breath, then hurt them the next. People—mothers—just don’t do that.”
Winslow clutched his hand to her chest as an exquisite pain sliced her heart. Did he just tell her he loved her? “B-but then I started to feel better. I think there was something good in the IV Dr. Bly gave me, and I decided, umm…” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “I decided… bullshit.” Saying that word out loud heated her cheeks. Winslow fastened her gaze to the blanket, so Tate wouldn’t see it embarrassed her to cuss.
“Bullshit, huh?” he whispered back at her, his lips on her knuckles again. “Say it again.”
She cleared her throat, but couldn’t meet his eyes. “Bullshit?” she said a little louder only it came out like a question.
“You can do better.” He pressed his index finger to the bottom of her chin and made her look up. So much tenderness rained down on her, it was impossible to look away. “I like that word on your tongue, Winslow. Say it again, only this time like you mean it.”
“Bull—shit,” she declared with a shoulder shrug and a titch of attitude. His word gave her a sense of resolve, as if she hadn’t been sick and defeated most of her life. As if she could fight back. “I decided I wasn’t going to die, Tate. What my mom wanted me to do was… it was bullshit.”
The first genuine smile she’d seen on his rugged face blew her away. Even his eyes sparkled. “That’s my girl. Did you use that word on your mom?”
Best. Day. Ever. He couldn’t have said anything sweeter. “I wanted to, but…” She shook her head, still sorting through what was real and what seemed like a dream. “I’m not sure I got the chance. But you like it?”
He winked and that sweet light in his eyes turned Tate into the handsomest man she’d ever met. “Yeah, I do, especially the way you say it. It’s over, Winslow. You need to take care of yourself from now on and let me worry about her.”
“No, I can’t. Not now, I—”
“Yes, you can,” he breathed, the tip of his nose touching hers. “I have something to mark this brand-new day. Consider it a birthday present.”
An olive drab beanie with bright gold USMC stitched on one side dangled off the fingertips of his other hand. He shook it out and tugged it over her head and made certain it was snug, pinching the edges of it around her face until it covered her ears. “I figured your head might get cold. Hope you don’t mind. It’s mine, but it looks a better on you.”
She couldn’t help ducking her shoulders as the warmth from that cap shifted down her bare neck. Winslow touched her fingers to the gift, her silly eyes glimmering at the kindness from a man who’d recently been a total stranger. The beanie wasn’t fancy, but he’d remembered. He knew how she felt about people seeing her bare head, and that counted.
“Thank you,” she squeaked, blinking hard and trying not to act like a sap.
“Listen to your doctor and get better. You’re safe now.”
She nodded, but lifted her right hand and circled the nape of his neck to pull him in closer. “Kiss me again?”
“Oh, yes, ma’am.” He obliged, his lips soft and warm and that delicious windbl
own scent of pine the best thing ever. She closed her eyes and risked licking his lips, needing the minty taste of him back in her mouth, which tasted oddly like Listerine now that she thought about it.
When he cupped her head, his big hands holding her with care, the tenderness in his kiss broke her heart wide open. Winslow tugged his face into the crook of her neck so he couldn’t see her cry. Like she stood a chance of hiding her puffy eyes and runny nose.
He scooped his arms around her and hunched over her, rocking her like a little girl while she clung to him. “Hey. Don’t cry. I’m not leaving you. I promise.”
She sniffed. “I’m not worried about you leaving, but I can tell, Tate. No one’s loved you in a very long time, have they?”
A sardonic something tweaked one corner of his mouth even as a shadow filtered over his face, kind of like the shadow an airplane makes when it’s flying high above a field of golden wheat, bright one moment, dark the next, then bright once more. “Don’t tell me you’re psychic too.”
He said that so seriously, she nearly laughed. “I don’t think so. Are you?”
“I most definitely am not.”
What an odd conversation. The tension eased out of Winslow’s body like air hissing from a deflating balloon. Over all, this hospital room was a nice change from her mother’s house where the temperature was always set to sixty. Her toes were warm, her fingers too. For the first time in ages, her stomach felt relatively calm, and she could take deep breaths that filled her belly without making her choke or cough. She almost felt—good.
But there was something Tate wasn’t telling her. She could read it in his eyes. “Where’s Mom?”
“To be honest, I don’t know. She was screaming plenty when I got you out of Dr. Bly’s clinic, but where she went from there is anyone’s guess.”
“You didn’t arrest her?” Winslow shivered at that alarming news. Mommy Dearest always seemed to get away and she always got even.
“Not yet, but don’t worry. We will. Did you know Bly lost his medical license for prescription fraud two years ago?”
Joker Joker (The Deuces Wild Series Book 2) Page 19
