Her Best Friend's Keeper (Finley Creek Book 1)

by Calle J. Brookes

  Brynna pulled in a shuddering breath, then winced. Her hand went to her side. Chance cursed and put his hands on her shoulders. She leaned back against him for a moment then he guided her back against the pillow. “Damn it, Brynna, don’t hurt yourself.”

  “The number one reason we didn’t want you to have a laptop, goof. We didn’t want you sitting up for too long,” Mel said, pulling a pillow from the closet and putting it beneath the laptop to get it at a better angle.

  “I have to sit up sometime. I can’t lay down forever. I need to get home and back to work. Back to my life.”

  “Brynna, what was on the video?” Gabby asked.

  Brynna looked at the laptop for a moment, like she was seeing something that wasn’t there. “There was layering that shouldn’t have been in there in one of the frames. So I ran it through Carrie’s system. Hers is better than ours, Gab. A lot better. And then I split the video and looked closer.”

  “What did you find?”

  “Someone had been erased from the video. Meticulously. Frame by frame. It must have taken days of work to do. And access to the TSP files a long time ago.”

  “Who?” Elliot asked.

  “I don’t know. I tried to find a shadow, but couldn’t. But…whoever did it has some serious skill. If I wasn’t working on Carrie’s 70-inch monitor I wouldn’t have noticed the first frame. I think someone erased a fifth man. But all I could figure out was that he was taller than Slade, and heavier.”

  “That was enough to get you ran off the road?” Mel asked. “If there was nothing identifiable, why would it matter?”

  “I don’t know. I also don’t know how they knew. Unless Gabby’s laptop had a spyware on it that we didn’t find. And that’s stretching it. Someone had to have serious access to even get it on one of our laptops. Plus to get it past Carrie’s? That takes skill. And resources. Lots of them.” Brynna pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders. Chance’s hands were there to help, but Elliot didn’t miss the way his idiot brother glared down at her.

  When Brynna looked up at him, there was a hesitation in her face. And love. So much love. Why didn’t his brother see it?

  Or did he? Was that what had his brother so damned scared? Did she even realize that she still leaned into his brother, that Chance had shifted enough that he was behind her on the bed, holding her up? That her head was resting on his brother’s shoulder?

  Damn the bastards who’d hurt them all—because of them, Chance was about to throw away probably the best thing to ever happen to him.

  Elliot’s gut tightened when he looked down at Gabby. Decision made.

  He wasn’t going to be making the same damned mistake. When they left the hospital, he was taking her somewhere and telling her, showing her, exactly how he felt about her.

  Taking the time they had together and making the most of every moment. Together.

  “Maybe it wasn’t just what was found on her laptop,” Chance said. “Maybe they were just not wanting someone looking at the files at all.”

  “But by harming her, that was bound to draw attention to what she was working on,” Elliot said. “And it was Gabby’s laptop. How do we know they didn’t somehow track the laptop to find you?”

  “Is that even possible?” Mel asked. “I mean, that quickly?”

  “I don’t think it would have been necessary.” Brynna said, shifting uncomfortably. “They probably traced my phone.”

  “But why did they focus on you? Instead of Gabby?”

  “Because I had Gabby’s laptop and had signed out a zip drive that had the videos from that night on it. My name was right there in the evidence log. Anyone at the TSP could have seen it. Could have known I was in St. Louis, and could have found me with my phone. Gabby and I use cell phones to track suspects all the time.”

  Gabby nodded. “So you think it wasn’t because it was my laptop.”

  “It was the zip drive. With copies of the exact originals turned in from your old laptop ten years ago. It was still in the original envelope, sealed, with the original date. I made a copy of it at the evidence desk using one of the TSP issued drives. I signed for it, like we do everything, and told people where I was going. It was blocked off of the CF schedule three weeks ago. I even told Daniel McKellen that I was going to be up there. And when I expected to get there. I texted him when I got there, too.”

  “Why the hell for?” Chance asked.

  “Because he’s a friend and he was worried.” She finally looked up at his brother. “He wants to be a whole lot more.”

  Chance’s face got even darker, if possible. Elliot was surprised. Brynna had definitely baited the bear with that one. Did she realize that? “If he’s not the son of a bitch who hurt you.”

  “He isn’t. He’s just a nice man who wants to get to know me better. He gave me flowers the day I left, you know. Those pink balloons right there are from him, too. He knows I like pink.”

  “Ok, back to what we’re dealing with here…” Mel said in the awkward moment that followed. “So we know that anyone could have found Brynna easily. But not everyone could have altered that video.”

  “Not everyone who had access to it, anyway.” Gabby shifted closer to Brynna.

  “You’re missing the obvious. Handley Barratt could have paid someone to alter that video and paid someone to switch it out.” Chance grabbed the bottle of water on the table behind him and put it in Brynna’s hand. “Drink. You can’t afford dehydration.”

  She complied, but only after sending him a pointed look that Elliot had no difficulty interpreting. It stated clearly she was just humoring him. Brynna Beck was fully capable of handling his brother, wasn’t she? For all her obvious vulnerabilities, she wasn’t a pushover.

  Elliot would never have thought it would be possible, but Brynna could hold her own with Chance somehow. A naïve, twenty-four-year-old woman with autism could wrangle his hard-as-nails brother with just a single look.

  Probably all she had to do was look at his brother with love in those eyes of hers and Chance would be putty, just like Elliot was with his Gabby.

  His Gabby. Just like Brynna was his brother’s. Damn it, he was gone.

  It was time he accepted it.

  He wrapped his fingers in her hair as she spoke with Brynna in more detail about what would have had to be done to alter the video that sophisticatedly. Half of what they said didn’t make a lick of sense to him, and he could tell the same was true for his brother. Mel was capable of keeping up though, and she explained a few things in laymen’s terms for them.

  The sun was setting before Kevin Beck and his son-in-law returned to the hospital to take over guard duty from Mel.

  Elliot called a nearby restaurant to make a quick reservation for the four of them—they were going to continue their discussion over dinner—and they headed to the parking lot.

  Gabby was quiet, her exhaustion easy to see on her pretty face. Elliot pulled her closer to him in the elevator and brushed a kiss over her forehead. “We’ll eat, then head home. I can tell you’re exhausted.”

  She leaned her head on his shoulder for a moment. “I am.”

  “We’ll figure this out, Gabs.” Mel touched her shoulder briefly. Elliot looked at her—Mel’s exhaustion was almost as visible as Gabby’s. He got the impression she was holding herself together through strength of will alone. This whole thing—it had to end soon, didn’t it?

  They’d parked the SUV in the closest parking lot and Elliot scanned the area immediately after the exit quickly.

  Mel made her way down the curb carefully, Chance staying close by. Mel snarked at Chance occasionally, but Elliot got the impression it was because of how protective she was of her younger sister. Family loyalty was strong in the Becks, for certain.

  Elliot held Gabby’s hand as they started across the parking lot. He wanted to keep her as close as he possibly could. Both to protect her, and because that was where he wanted her to begin with.

  His body tightened in anticipatio
n of just how he would be showing her how he felt about her in a few hours.

  After she rested a bit first, that was.

  Life was too short for him to screw around with his future anymore.

  This little blonde bundle of contradictions was all he wanted in his life. Her.

  He got a quick kick out of imagining his sister watching out for him up above—he could just hear her wild giggles at the idea of her brother and her best friend. He had no doubt she would have been thrilled with the idea.

  Some of the torment he’d felt since her death lessened in that moment and he knew it.

  He looked around at the parking lot again as the hair on the back of his arm stood up. As he felt eyes watching them.

  There was a shadow on the hill three hundred feet away that should not have been there. And as he looked closer, a glint that he shouldn’t have seen.

  Shots came flying across the parking lot, just as Elliot crowded Gabby behind the concrete pillar of the portico.

  Mel cried out behind them somewhere.

  Fire burned through Elliot’s shoulder. A fire he’d felt before.

  Then he was falling; his weight taking her to the ground with him.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO.

  ***

  CHANCE saw his brother go down and he didn’t think. He acted. Brynna’s sister was right there beside him. Right in the line of fire.

  He dove toward Mel and took her to the ground, covering her with his own body. They were more exposed than Elliot and Gabby now. He had to get Mel back inside, before the shooter tried again.

  He risked a look over his shoulder at his brother. Elliot was moving, but there was no denying the blood.

  Little Gabby, instead of curling up in a ball cowering like Chance would have expected, was tugging his brother closer to the hospital entrance, a look of determination on her face. She wasn’t stopping until she got Elliot inside.

  Elliot was on his feet, so some of Chance’s worry lifted.

  Ten steps more and Gabby would have Elliot safe inside.

  Chance needed to get the woman beneath him there, too.

  She hadn’t been hit—there was no blood. But the woman was missing half a damned lung and could barely walk. Getting knocked to the ground could have done just as much damage as a bullet.

  They were forty feet from the entrance, but twenty feet from the columns that provided some cover. “Can you run at all?” He knew the answer to that already.

  He looked down at her, not missing the panic in the eyes so much like Brynna’s. The sudden fear. Hell, even the gap between the front teeth was the same as her sister’s. “Can’t breathe…wind knocked…you’re on top of me…”

  “Sorry about that.” Only choices he had were to either wait it out or scoop her up and run for cover. Neither was all that appealing. “I’m going to carry you inside. Keep your head down and hold on, ok?”

  The panic was still there and that’s when he remembered. Brynna’s sister had been shot outside a hospital just like this. Ambushed just like this. That she wasn’t a screaming pile of hysterics right beneath him told him a lot about her.

  He stood quickly and reached down for her, expecting a bullet to slam into him before he got her inside. He kept his body between her and the shooter. She was not getting hit like that again. Not if he could prevent it.

  She didn’t weigh much, and he ran with her inside, not stopping until he could put her down on a gurney. He looked at the doctor on duty—the same one he’d handed Brynna over to before. “I knocked her down pretty hard. She’s having trouble breathing. She’s been shot before, and I think she’s missing a lung.”

  “We’ll get her taken care of, Mr. Marshall.” The doctor was already pulling his stethoscope up, as the orderlies rolled her down to an exam room. “Police have been called and we’re now in full lock-down.”

  Gabby waited outside it, and Chance knew his brother was in a room nearby. She looked at Chance and stepped toward him—covered in his brother’s blood. “How is he?”

  “They kicked me out while they do the exam. Mel…is Mel hurt? Did she get shot?”

  “I don’t know. I landed on her pretty hard. She was having trouble breathing. There wasn’t any blood, Gabby. I don’t think she was hit.” She was alive. They all four were. “I’m going to get up to Brynna’s room. Check on her and fill Beck in on what happened. Let him know his other daughter is down here.”

  “I’ll stay with Elliot.” She bit her lip after she said it and he understood. She was hurting for his brother, wasn’t she?

  Had she been the target? Or had it been his brother? Either one—if someone knew they were here at the hospital, chances were good they knew she’d been staying at Elliot’s place.

  Knew right where to find them if they went looking.

  Easy damned targets.

  “Gabby—you keep your head down. Stay right here until I get back. We’re going to find another way out of this hospital, then I’m getting you and Elliot out of town for the night.”

  He didn’t want to leave the hospital, but like it or not, Brynna was safer there guarded than Elliot and Gabby would be tonight.

  But he had to check on her one more time. Just to make sure.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE.

  ***

  GABBY prowled around the room, waiting. She wasn’t very good at waiting, not when it was for something that mattered. Chance came back, looking all big, bad, and brooding. Gabby didn’t know how to deal with him right them. She kept pacing.

  “Sit down.” Chance ordered, after he’d dealt with the TSP who’d arrived. “They’ve agreed to move Bryn to an interior room.”

  “I’m sorry.” Gabby sat. After about two minutes, she was back on her feet.

  He had looked so pale, so broken.

  Blood…

  She bolted for the closest trash can, making it barely in time. When she finished, she fished a tissue out of her purse and a breath mint. It didn’t help.

  Chance was staring at her. “You ok?”

  Ok? Heck no. “Not really.”

  “He’s tough, you know. This isn’t the first time he’s been injured.”

  “Well, it’s the first time I’ve seen it, thank you very much. I don’t think it’s a sight I want to repeat.’’ And like what she’d seen ten years ago, this was something she would never forget.

  Had he not pushed her out of the way, she would have been there bleeding right next to him. She shivered.

  And once she started, she couldn’t stop. She stayed there, tremors wracking her body, until strong hands wrapped around her and lifted her out of the chair.

  Chance’s eyes were just as green as Elliot’s. Somehow that made this just a little bit worse. “He’s going to be ok, Gabby. You can deal.”

  He hugged her tight, and she got the impression it was definitely something he wasn’t comfortable with. But he was trying—that should matter, right?

  She sucked it up and dealt. What other choice did she really have?

  ***

  ELLIOT pushed himself up off the exam bed. “I’m finished.”

  “Sir…Chief Marshall, you shouldn’t rush things. You need to give your body time to heal.” The young blonde doctor tried to block his path to the door bodily. He admired her guts, but…he had things to do.

  “I’ve been shot a time or two before.” But never while the woman he cared for was watching. While she was threatened.

  It didn’t matter that he knew his brother was with Gabby, that Chance wasn’t about to let anything happen to her, what mattered was that Elliot wasn’t right there next to her, keeping her as safe as possible.

  “I have things to do, Dr. McGareth. Sign me out. AMA, if necessary.”

  “I don’t recommend that. Please reconsider.”

  “I won’t be alone. And I’ve been hit worse than this before. A lot worse.” It was his arm, damn it. Not like he’d taken another in the chest. “I have things I need to see to.”

  “I’m sure
you do.” The doctor stepped in his path again. He had no choice—if he kept going he would be forced to knock her out of the way. “Look, the Becks are friends of mine, too. I want to go see how Mel is doing, myself. Work with me here. Let me finish. Then I’ll bring Gabby back and she can deal with you. How does that sound?”

  Like the only option he was going to get—unless he wanted to make one hell of a scene in the middle of the ER. How would that help anyone? “Deal.”

  He sat back on the exam table and the doctor returned to her task.

  ***

  GABBY snuck in to Mel’s exam room. She’d heard Elliot talking with the doctor and she’d peeked inside to see him without his shirt, getting stitched up easily. Lacy looked up and nodded, then waved her away.

  He would be ok. And she wouldn’t be a stupid wimp and bawl all over him, like she was wanting to.

  Mel was being treated when Gabby slid in. The nurse stopped and glared at her. “Who are you?”

  “Um…next of kin.” She looked wide-eyed at Mel. Her friend was pale and shaken—and struggling to breathe.

  “Can she stay?” The nurse asked Mel.

  Mel nodded but didn’t speak. She held a hand out toward Gabby. Gabby took it. “Your dad is on his way down from Brynna’s room. He’s taking care of insurance information first.”

  Finally, after a while Mel was able to speak again. Faintly, but… “How’s Elliot?”

  “I think he’s ok. Lacy’s sewing him up now. Chance went back upstairs to sit with Brynna. I’m sure your dad will be here soon.”

  “They’re keeping me here, Gab. They want to do tests after some swelling goes down.”

  “Swelling?”

  “Around the lungs. Chance’s shoulder hit me hard. He weighs a damned ton. Broken rib, they think…too close to the left lung. Can’t risk puncturing it.”

  Gabby’s eyes widened. Mel was missing half of her left lung anyway because of the damage from the bullet. “But you’re going to be ok?”