Nurse Blood (The Organ Harvester Series Book 1)

by Rebecca Besser

  “Have you heard anything else?” she asked, pulling back and looking at Jan, whose eyes were red and puffy from crying. “What did the police say exactly? Tell me everything.”

  “Shh,” Jan whispered. “The kids are in the living room—I don’t want them to hear. I haven’t told them yet.”

  Sonya frowned and nodded, glancing off in the direction Jan had indicated to see three children watching TV and laughing.

  “We can talk in the kitchen,” Jan said, sniffing loudly and heading off in the direction opposite of the living room.

  “Aren’t they wondering why you’re crying?” Sonya asked, frowning and following Jan.

  Jan laughed. “Yeah, but I told them I just missed Dad and I’ve had a long day. They seemed content with that explanation. Besides, this is the worst it has been, since I just received the latest call from the police right before I called you.”

  “What did they say?” Sonya asked as they stepped through a swinging door into a large, brightly lit kitchen.

  “They said they would do their best to find him, but their expectations were low at this point—I got the impression they think he’s dead,” Jan said, and broke down into tears, throwing herself at Sonya, who hugged her again and patted her back.

  Sonya froze and stiffened. “I’m sorry…why would they think he’s dead?”

  Jan pulled away and wiped her nose, walking over to the stove to check on a couple of pots and a skillet with steam wafting above them. After a couple moments of stirring and flipping she’d calmed down enough to speak again.

  “Apparently whatever happened to Bill fits the same profile of people who’ve been going missing all over the United States. When they typed the details of the case into their data bank and did a search, they were instantly told to contact the FBI.”

  “Really?” Sonya asked. “How much do they know? Did they give you any other information?”

  “Not really,” Jan said, and blew her nose. “I’m supposed to go down to the station tomorrow and talk to the FBI agent handling the investigation. I just can’t believe it though. Why Bill?”

  Sonya shrugged. “Why anyone?”

  “I don’t know,” Jan said. “I just want to know what happened to Bill. If he’s dead…”

  Sobs racked Jan’s body and she leaned against the counter. She covered her mouth with her hand and looked at Sonya with tear-filled eyes.

  “It gets worse,” she said, moving her hand and swiping at the tears flowing freely down her cheeks. “We’re gonna lose the house. We’re gonna have to move.”

  “Why are you going to lose the house?” Sonya asked, frowning. “Don’t you have savings?”

  “We did,” Jan said, “but we put everything we had into the move and the business, and apparently, without Bill to write the software, they’ll lose the contract they were going to sign with a big corporation and will have to close. There’s no money. We’ve already received notices from the bank. We were depending on that deal to be able to keep the house—the advance from the contract was going to get us out of the hole.”

  “Oh, dear,” Sonya said, stepping forward and rubbing Jan’s back. “How long do you have before you have to move?”

  “Two weeks…I don’t know what to do!” Jan exclaimed in a near panic. “If I knew Bill was dead for sure I could collect his life insurance, but I can’t do that without a death certificate. I don’t know what to tell the kids. How am I going to take care of them? I don’t even have a job.”

  “You’ll figure something out,” Sonya said, drawing the woman back into her embrace. She really wanted to tell Jan she wouldn’t have to worry about anything because they’d all be dead soon, but she couldn’t.

  She spotted a clock on the wall and sighed.

  “I’m sorry, Jan, but I have to go—I have a meeting for work,” Sonya said.

  Jan stepped back and frowned. “At night?”

  Sonya laughed. “Hospitals never close. Call me if you find anything else out, okay?” She squeezed Jan one more time before stepping away from her and heading for the door.

  “I will,” Jan said, following her. “Thanks for stopping by. I needed someone to talk to, and a hug.” She smiled and more tears leaked from her eyes.

  Sonya gave Jan another quick hug as she stepped out the front door of the house.

  “Call me if you need anything,” she said, “and let me know what you find out tomorrow.”

  Jan nodded. “I will.” She smiled sadly, waved, and closed the door.

  ***

  “That fucking bastard!” Jennings screamed at his phone in a fit of rage.

  Roger sat in a chair with his arms crossed, watching the older man freak out. He raised his eyebrow quizzically, but knew better than to open his mouth and ask what was wrong.

  “Look at this!” Jennings ranted, turning his phone and holding it out to Roger so he could see the picture Lloyd had sent. “They fucking killed Jack!”

  Roger reached out and took the phone, looked at the picture, and fought the urge to smile.

  “What are we going to do about getting another guy?” he asked Jennings in a mild tone.

  “How should I know?” Jennings barked. “I should make them hire someone and pay him out of their cut.”

  “You’re not going to believe this!” Sonya exclaimed, coming through the door of the meeting room.

  “Oh, we already know!” Jennings screamed.

  She stopped in mid-step and blinked at Jennings.

  “You already know? How?” she asked, then shook her head. “Doesn’t matter…what are we going to do about it?”

  “What are we going to do about it? I think it’s you and Lloyd’s problem to handle. You can find a replacement for Jack—and fast.”

  “What? Did something happen to Jack?” she asked, confused.

  “Don’t act like you don’t know,” Jennings snapped.

  Sonya looked over at Roger, who smiled and handed her Jennings’ phone with the picture of Jack’s mutilated body still displayed.

  “Who did that?” she asked, glancing from Jennings to Roger, handing him back the phone.

  “Lloyd! As if you didn’t know,” Jennings said.

  “Actually, I didn’t,” she said, taking a seat and crossing her arms defensively. “When he left my house earlier, he was pretty pissed, but he didn’t say where he was going or what he’d be doing.”

  “Bullshit!” Jennings screamed, and his face turned red. “You helped him do it, just to spite me!”

  Sonya opened her mouth to retort, but snapped it closed and spun around as Lloyd entered the room and spoke.

  “She had nothing to do with what happened to Jack,” he said. “I did it on my own because he had it coming.” He sat down beside Sonya and casually draped his arm around her shoulders. She beamed a smile at him, knowing he’d forgiven her.

  Jennings looked at the two of them and frowned.

  “If that’s true, what were you talking about, Sonya?” he asked.

  “The FBI might be onto us,” she said, sitting forward slightly and frowning again. “They might have connected us to Bill’s disappearance.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “What do you mean they’ve connected us to Bill’s disappearance? How?” Roger asked.

  Sonya looked at him. “Apparently when the police typed the case information into their database, the damn thing told them to contact the FBI. I don’t know how they’ve figured things out…she’s—Jan’s—supposed to have a meeting with them tomorrow and she’s gonna call me and let me know how things went and what they know.”

  Jennings sighed, closed his eyes, and rubbed his forehead with the fingers of one hand. He stopped and opened his eyes, looking at Sonya.

  “This isn’t good. Planning to harvest an entire family all at once is complicated enough. Add in the FBI breathing down our necks and things are going to be worse.”

  “There’s more,” Sonya said, “and it might help us.”

  “What?” Roger
asked.

  “She said they were losing their house and will have to move—maybe we could strike then and it would be a smooth situation.”

  “What do you mean?” Lloyd asked, sitting slightly forward so he could see Sonya’s face.

  She turned to him and smiled. “I was thinking on the way over here that we could have Jack and Roger pose as movers and drug the family, stash them in the van or a moving truck, and take them all at once.”

  “That does sound like a good idea,” Jennings said with an edge in his voice, “but we no longer have Jack.”

  She looked at Jennings and frowned. “True…how hard would it be to find someone to take his place?”

  Jennings looked pointedly at Lloyd for a few moments before answering.

  “I don’t know. I really don’t want to alert anyone else to our presence here, or the operation, since the FBI might be getting involved.”

  Lloyd smiled and shrugged, staring Jennings straight in the eyes.

  Jennings opened his mouth to speak again, but Roger beat him to it.

  “What about Peter?”

  They all turned to look at Roger, blinking.

  “What about Peter?” Sonya asked, frowning slightly. “Do you think he’d come all this way to be part of one more job when there’s a possibility that we could all get pinched? He has a wife now.” She glanced at Lloyd to see what expression was on his face and what he was thinking. She didn’t know if having Peter back in the mix would mess up what they had planned.

  He shook his head so slightly that if she hadn’t been looking for a signal from him, she wouldn’t have noticed it.

  “What about me?” Lloyd asked. “Couldn’t I pose as the other guy?”

  Now everyone turned to look at him.

  Jennings sighed. “While I think that’s a good idea, and one that could make up for you killing Jack, I don’t want you in it that way. We’ve been extra-careful to keep you out of any public view, because even if one of us is compromised, you could still continue with the plans and move the parts. Isn’t that our agreement, after all?”

  Lloyd shrugged and sat back in his chair, casually caressing Sonya’s back.

  “I was just offering.”

  “Besides,” Jennings said, “I don’t think you’re muscular enough to look like a professional mover.” He turned to Roger. “Do you think you could do it yourself?”

  Roger shook his head. “I’d rather have back up, just in case something went wrong—two pairs of hands and eyes make things safer.”

  Jennings shook his head. “I suppose we could call Peter and ask.” He looked at Lloyd again. “I wish you would have controlled yourself better. You put us in a bind when you decided to slice and dice Jack.”

  Lloyd laughed. “The fucker shouldn’t have pissed me off.”

  “I’ll call Peter later and see what he has to say—he might say no,” Roger said with a shrug. “I don’t think it would hurt to put feelers out for someone just in case though.”

  “I might have someone who’d be interested,” Lloyd said, still trying to keep the retired team member out of harm’s way. “He’s got a few things under his belt already and he doesn’t want to get snatched by the feds any more than we do.”

  “Oh, really?” Jennings asked. “You know he’ll have to meet with my approval before I can allow him any part in our plans, right?”

  Lloyd smirked. “I don’t think he would mind an interview and he can be here tomorrow morning.”

  Jennings nodded and looked at Roger. “I’ll meet Lloyd’s guy first, and if he falls through, we’ll think about Peter—I don’t want to bother him unless we have to.”

  “What are we going to do about the FBI?” Sonya asked.

  “I guess we’ll wait and see what you find out from Jan tomorrow,” Jennings said. “At least we’ll have some inside information—I’m glad I had you make friends with the woman, otherwise this would have blindsided us. With us knowing they might be coming, we have a heads up to be careful. I was hoping this would be our last meeting until we planned for the family harvest, but now we’ll have to meet tomorrow night and make some plans. After we have the information we need, then we’ll lay low for a while.”

  “Sounds good,” Roger said, standing. “I guess that will be all for this evening then.”

  “I guess,” Jennings said. “I’ll call around and try to find a moving van or truck, to see if Sonya’s moving idea will work.”

  “Okay,” Sonya said, and she and Lloyd stood as well. “I’ll see what I can find out tomorrow.”

  Roger headed for the door and the couple followed him.

  “Are we still going to ask him?” Sonya whispered to Lloyd.

  “Sure,” he whispered back, and nodded.

  “Roger—wait up!” Sonya called, and rushed ahead into the shadows of the vast area of the building were he’d disappeared.

  ***

  Lloyd was about to increase his pace to catch up with Sonya when a hand clamped down on his shoulder.

  “Not so fast,” Jennings said from behind him. “I want to talk to you.”

  Lloyd clenched his fists at his sides, not wanting to deal with the old man and the bullshit he knew was coming. He turned to face Jennings.

  “What can I help you with?” he asked sarcastically, crossing his arms.

  Jennings stared at Lloyd for a few moments before he began.

  “I really don’t appreciate you killing my team member,” he said. “I thought we had an…understanding.”

  Lloyd shrugged. “He crossed too many lines and he was a stupid asshole. What did you expect me to do, just tolerate it?”

  “Yes,” Jennings all but screamed. “We have work to do and that work makes us all money.”

  “Yeah, and working with stupid people risks getting the rest of the team caught or killed,” Lloyd snarled back. “I blame his death on you, because you’re the one who hired his fucking ass.”

  “Now you listen here,” Jennings snapped, standing toe to toe with Lloyd. “I know what’s best for the team.”

  “Do you?” Lloyd asked, his eyes blazing with anger. “Do you really? Because I don’t think you do. If you did, you wouldn’t have had one of them spying on others, trying to cause trouble. I ended that trouble before it really began, while you were oblivious.”

  Jennings frowned and took a step back.

  “What are you talking about? Who was spying?”

  “That asshole was watching Sonya’s house and tried to follow me home,” Lloyd said. “I caught him in the act. How would things work out for the team if Sonya or I had been hurt by that bastard? What would you have done then? You wouldn’t have your bait or your mover then, would you?”

  “Fuck!” Jennings exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you come to me?”

  Lloyd laughed. “What would you have done about it? Give him a talking to? The bastard was planning something. Besides, I won’t let anyone hurt Sonya—ever!”

  “She can take care of herself,” Jennings said. “You should have come to me. I could have handled Jack.”

  “You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t believe that,” Lloyd snarled. “I have to go—you have a good night.” He turned to leave.

  “Wait!” Jennings called.

  Lloyd turned back. “What?”

  “This man—the one you want to replace Jack with—can he do the job?”

  “I wouldn’t have suggested him if he couldn’t,” Lloyd said. He turned and walked away into the shadows of the building.

  ***

  Roger paused and turned back when he heard Sonya call his name.

  “What?” he asked as she reached him.

  “I need to talk to you about something.”

  He smiled. “What do you need to talk to me about?”

  She laughed. “I can’t tell you here…right now. Can you come over tonight, or tomorrow morning before I go to work?”

  “I guess…” Roger said, confused. He knew better than to p
ush the issue, knowing if she didn’t want to talk about it at the factory it was something she didn’t want everyone to know. “Is everything okay?”

  “Yes,” she said, “everything’s fine.”

  Lloyd suddenly appeared from the shadows behind Sonya, and he looked angry.

  She turned to him with a puzzled expression.

  “What was that about?” she asked.

  “I’ll tell you later,” he said before shifting his attention to Roger. “So, Roger, what do you think?”

  Roger frowned. “Uh…about what?”

  Lloyd glanced at Sonya; she shrugged.

  “I didn’t want to talk about it here.”

  “Now you two have me curious,” Roger said, and laughed. “I’ll be at your house in an hour.” He nodded at Sonya and left the building.

  As soon as Roger was out of earshot, Lloyd glanced behind him to make sure they were still alone. He turned back to her and spoke in a hushed tone.

  “You go ahead and explain things to Roger,” he said. “I’m going to tail Jennings.”

  She pressed her chest against his, wrapping her arms around his neck.

  “Why didn’t you let me come with you to handle Jack?” she asked playfully, biting her bottom lip and tilting her head to the side.

  “Because you were a bad girl,” he teased, and slapped her ass.

  She squealed with delight before becoming serious.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered with tears in her eyes.

  He sighed. “I know.” He leaned forward and kissed her gently.

  Sonya jumped when her cell phone rang. With a frown, she stepped back from Lloyd to answer it.

  “It’s Miles,” she said, glancing up at Lloyd.

  He grinned, but his eyes were hard and deadly. “You know I’m going to kill that bastard, right?”

  She smiled broadly and nodded, answering her phone as she turned and left the building.

  Lloyd followed, gritting his teeth and clenching his fists as he heard the woman he loved flirting with another man…one she’d fucked hours before.

  Chapter Twenty-Three