by Fiona Quinn
“Goodwill at three a.m. is going to be hard to come by. What exactly do you need? I put your guys in the fridge and that’s about it. Autopsies in the morning.”
“I’m interested in the Lily Winters case. Is her autopsy scheduled too?”
“She’ll be number three in line. Her body’s not in good shape. I’m not sure what you expect to get from seeing her.”
“Did she come in with personal effects?” the special agent pressed.
Dr. Tooker moved toward the refrigeration unit, and pulled open a drawer with a black body bag. “I found her purse beside the tracks. She must have dropped it as she fell in. The straps were cut off by the subway, and it’s filthy from getting dragged, but the bag itself is intact.”
“I need to see her phone,” Prescott said with a chummy smile.
Dr. Tooker rolled her eyes at him, then unzipped the body bag. Gage looked down at Lily’s corpse and didn’t recognize her. He barely recognized her as having human form. He wondered if she had committed suicide like the news reporter had suggested. It was a pretty gruesome way to go. He shook his head.
His mom died in a car accident when he was fourteen. That’s what the police called it, an accident. She was driving too fast while intoxicated and hit a tree without wearing a seat belt. She died on impact. Gage imagined that much like Lily’s body, his mom’s would have been equally gruesome.
Of course, what the officers didn’t know was it hadn’t been an accident at all. When he had come home from school, he had found two notes side by side. One was a note from his dad saying he’d found his true love and had left them. “Left her” is what it actually said. But the “them” was implied. The other note was his mom saying how she couldn’t live without his dad, so she’d decided to end it. Gage never told the officers about the notes. He’d ripped them up and flushed them down the toilet. With no family to call on, Gage was shipped off to a home for boys where he lived until he went to college.
Gage was glad that Lily--whether this was suicide, a terrible accident, or something darker--didn’t have children left to wonder if their mother had known they’d loved her. Or the even bigger question—why she had decided to leave them. Gage knew why his dad left; he was an asshole. To be honest, Gage had been happy when he read his note saying he was gone. But his mom? That one haunted him.
The medical examiner turned and handed out nitrile gloves, which they pulled on, then she moved the purse to a stainless-steel tray. The phone was nestled in the inside zippered pocket. Dead.
“No battery,” Dr. Tooker said and raised her brow.
“iPhone. You don’t happen to have a charger, do you, Mandy?”
Dr. Tooker moved toward her desk and unplugged her phone. “Yes, if it’ll get you out of here sooner, and I can get some sleep.”
Gage’s gaze scanned over to where an unmade cot stood in the corner. Obviously there for the medical examiners who were on night duty.
As soon as the phone blinked to life, Gage unlocked it and moved quickly to Lily’s list of recent calls. As he scrolled through the screen, Prescott and Gage each took photos with their own phones.
“Hey, who is this guy with you?” Dr. Tooker asked.
Prescott didn’t look up from their task. “Some random homeless dude I found on the sidewalk. I told him if he could wait a few minutes, I’d buy him some breakfast. You know I have a heart of gold and can’t stand to see my fellow man suffering.”
Dr. Tooker snorted. Her phone buzzed, and she moved to answer it. Gage scrolled back through the last month of numbers before he moved to messages and did the same. Either Lily deleted her texts on a regular basis or she just didn’t like to text, she didn’t have much there for him to record. Most of the names looked like family members.
“Okay, Damion, that was a call about a traffic fatality. I need to head out, so we need to zip Lily Winters and her things back up.” She moved over to them and took the phone away, pulling her cord from the bottom. “It’s time for you all to leave. If you need anything more, you can show up during regular hours.” Dr. Tooker put the purse back with Lily’s remains.
Prescott leaned in to Gage. “You get what you need?”
“Not sure.”
“It’ll have to do.” Prescott put his hand on Dr. Tooker’s back as she pushed the drawer in place. “Mandy, thank you as always. I owe you a drink. A stiff one.” He added with a wink.
Dr. Tooker snorted. “Funny.” Then she grabbed her keys and pushed the two men through the door.
Dr. Tooker turned right. They tuned left to move back to the elevator, and out the front door. As they reached the street, Prescott broke the silence. “You still have time before five. Let’s grab a quick cup of joe. You must be dragging ass.”
He was tired, but Gage had been trained to fight for days and nights on end, through pain and exhaustion. He had to admit, this was a different kind of tired. It wasn’t physical as much as emotional. This whole experience was eye-opening. He hadn’t realized how much Zoe meant to him. How invested he felt in her well-being. Even though he didn’t seem to have even a basic grasp on who she was, right now he’d move mountains to keep her safe. Gage looked up the street toward an all-night diner and nodded his head in that direction. With their hands pushed deep into their pockets and their heads tucked into their collars, the two men moved through the early morning chill.
Inside, Gage ordered a tall coffee to go. Black. Prescott lifted a brow, and then ordered the same. “Anxious to get back?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’re worried about her safety. And you should be. Until we can get a better feel for what’s going on, the FBI considers Zoe to be in imminent danger. I’m working on arrangements for a safe house for her. I need you to call me as soon as she’s getting ready for discharge.”
Gage accepted the thick paper cup from the waitress and reached for his wallet.
Prescott put his hand on Gage’s arm to indicate that he’d get the bill. “Zoe’s wearing a wedding ring, and you’re one of two people on her hospital list. To some eyes, it might look like you’re married.” Prescott pulled a ten-dollar bill from his wallet and exchanged it with the server for his to-go cup. “Who’s she really married to?”
“She’s not. Guys think that an attractive woman on her own is an opportunity. Zoe hates it when strangers talk to her. She wears the ring as a deterrent. If they bug her anyway, she tells them her husband’s a Marine Raider. That usually does the trick.”
Prescott put his loose change in the tip jar and put the bills in his wallet. Nodding at the door, they made their way back out to the street. “Does that bother you? Zoe insinuating that you’re married?”
“I don’t think she’s ever insinuated anything about me personally, I think my job gave her a title that sounded like muscle would be applied if anyone bothered her. And I can promise you, it would be.”
Prescott tipped his cup for a sip. “I can see that.” He stopped under a street light. “Did you find what you thought you would?”
“Yes, sir.” Gage put his coffee cup on the ground near his feet. He pulled out his phone and picked the image that had three calls to a single number unidentified by name or icon just hours before her death. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a business card with “private cell” scrawled in blue ink.
Prescott’s gaze slid between the two. “Whose number is this?”
Gage flipped the card over to show the name Senator Charles Matthew Billings on the front. “I overheard a conversation, but I didn’t have a lot of context. You need to take this as a step above pure speculation.”
“All right.” Prescott leaned his shoulder against the street lamp post.
Gage picked up his coffee. “A couple of hours ago, Senator Billings told a friend of his that he was having an affair and that the woman died last night. She was his lead researcher for the Montrim Industries trial being held by the Senate oversight committee.”
“You said Lily and Zoe were friends and th
at this could have something to do with Zoe?”
Gage took a sip from his cup. “I’m not sure. I don’t want to run you in the wrong direction, because that might endanger Zoe.”
“Spit it out. We’ll use an abundance of caution with all our decision making.”
“Lily died not two hours after I neutralized the men in Zoe’s apartment.”
“Seems a hell of a coincidence. But I’m not sure—”
“Up until a few weeks ago, Lily was living with Zoe while she got her feet back under her following a divorce.”
“Lily lived with Zoe. Two thugs break in to that apartment. Lily dies shortly after. Crap. They might have been going after Lily, and Zoe happened to be there.”
“It’s a possibility. Or the two things might have nothing to do with each other.”
Prescott’s phone buzzed. He slid it from his belt holster and stepped away from Gage. “Prescott here…I don’t care. We need this in place…well, jump over his head to someone who will authorize.” Prescott threw an exasperated arm in the air and let it land on his head. Pulling the phone back to his ear, he growled, “Do it.” He hung up, strode down the sidewalk then turned and stalked back to Gage. “The safe house wasn’t authorized. I’ll keep working on it. It shouldn’t take me long. Sometime later today probably. Can I depend on you to keep Zoe in your sights until then? Let me know if anyone else tries to contact her, or goes to see her?”
“Roger that.” Gage looked down at the time, zero four thirty five hours. “Shit. I’ve got to go.” With a backward wave, Gage jogged toward his car. He had to get back to Zoe. Now.
Chapter Seven
GAGE
No sooner had Gage found his place in the corner of Zoe’s hospital room than the door pushed open. Gage was immediately moving to get between whoever this new player was and Zoe.
“CIA, son. Relax.” The guy moved farther into the room. “The name’s Parker.” He yanked out his wallet-badge and flicked it open for Gage to see. Parker nodded toward Zoe’s sleeping form. “She looks like she’s getting some rest. Good. Good.” He pulled a chair from one end of the room all the way over to place it directly beside the chair Gage had occupied seconds before. He patted Gage’s chair. “Let’s chat.”
Gage crossed his arms over his chest to make his biceps bulge in an obvious display of physical capacity. He leaned his shoulder into the wall to let the agent know he wasn’t going to be compliant. Something about this guy set off his warning signals. Could be, Gage acknowledged to himself, that he was primed to be combative from his night of adrenaline and confusion. He’d see how things progressed before he kicked the guy out on his ear. Right now, curiosity had the edge. He wanted to know why the CIA would be visiting Zoe before sunup.
“Hell of a shock, what happened tonight.” Parker crossed his ankle over his knee and adjusted his trousers. “She’s been working around the clock on her project. But you already know that, eh?”
Gage didn’t answer.
“I understand from the DCPD, she’s been diagnosed with exhaustion.” There was a pause, and Gage could feel Parker gathering carefully selected words. “Sleep deprivation does terrible things to the brain. Makes people paranoid, creative about reality, overly emotional, poor girl.”
Gage said nothing.
Parker cleared his throat. “Ironically, being exhausted also makes sleep come harder—nightmares and sleep talking are common. It’s good that she’s getting the meds she needs to get some rest.” Parker crossed his arms casually. “You sleep over at her place much? Ever know her to have problems like that? Talking in her sleep?” He quirked a brow. “If so, we should let the doctor know so he can adjust her protocol.”
Something in the studied ease in Parker’s body made Gage shake his head. “Not that I know of. We don’t really have that kind of a relationship.”
“No? I thought you were the boyfriend.” Parker canted his head, the look on his face saying he didn’t believe Gage for a second.
“We see each other. I don’t think I fall into the boyfriend category. She’s pretty busy, and our schedules don’t always mesh. I’m jumping between Lejeune and Quantico. She’s up here in Alexandria.”
“What do you know about her job? She must have told you something,” Parker asked.
What did Gage know about her job? Well, he didn’t know she was a damned Ph.D., that’s for sure. She’d told him she worked in a lab. A “lab tech,” she had called herself. But lab techs don’t have doctorates, and they sure as hell don’t have top secret clearance or the CIA and FBI buzzing around.
“She does something with robotics, I think. We really don’t talk about our jobs,” Gage replied.
Parker stood and gazed down at Zoe. “I bet you don’t do a lot of talking about anything at all, eh?” He sent Gage an I’ve-got-your-number grin, and Gage wanted to slam his fist into the guy’s jaw.
Parker moved back to his seat to answer a text, and Gage looked down at Zoe’s drugged state.
Gage had lied to the CIA operatives. He was definitely Zoe’s boyfriend. His mind jumped back to one of the last conversations he’d had with Zoe. He’d asked her a question about something random. She had been staring at the wall and pulled out of her trance to ask, “Do we have to talk?”
“No. Not if you don’t want to.” He’d chuckled at her candor.
“Good, thanks,” she’d said as she opened her computer.
“You know, my friends think I’m the luckiest guy in the world.”
She’d turned and raised her brow. “I don’t know your friends.” She didn’t say it like a bitch. There was nothing bitchy about Zoe. Her voice had been pleasant and matter of fact. She saw the world though Zoe-colored glasses. Pragmatic. Non-judgmental. Clear about parameters. Hoping everyone would respect hers in return.
“They’ve seen your picture.”
“All they could get from that is what I look like, right? That’s kind of a shallow way to decide if you’re lucky or not.” She tipped her head and looked at him with curiosity. “Why were you showing them my picture?”
Gage smiled over at her. “Putting a face with a name. You know, their girlfriends want to talk to them constantly. Ask them how they feel about stuff.”
Zoe’s eyes turned thoughtful. “Communication is important to maintaining a healthy relationship.”
Gage’s smile turned into a grin. “That kind of sucks, since my girlfriend hates to talk.”
“Girlfriend, huh?”
“Okay?”
She turned back to her computer. “I guess. Now can you leave me alone?”
That was Zoe in a nutshell. He got that Zoe spent a good part of her time in her head. He was sort of medium on the introversion continuum and liked the time he spent rattling around in his own brain.
At the time, he had been happy about his good fortune in finding a woman who put out zero in the way of couple-vibes or demands. There was no honey-do list or expectations. It was all just…fun. He enjoyed Zoe.
He had flopped back on the couch, thinking he really was a lucky guy. He found Zoe to be an odd mix of edgy and sweet, and it intrigued him. Now that Gage knew she was involved in something damned serious—possibly life threatening—he wished he’d asked more questions instead of just heading back to base when she’d had trouble sleeping. What had she been wrestling with? Did she know she was in trouble? He had thought that their relationship was comfortable and fun. But that had changed seven hours ago when he crushed some guy’s windpipe to save her.
The doorknob turned, and Gage took advantage of the distraction to step back into the shadows. A head peeked around the doorframe.
“Grossman, good. What’ve you got?” Parker waved the guy in.
“Besides acid indigestion? I’ve got a deadline in my rearview mirror.” He strode over to the bed. “How’s she doing?” he asked Parker.
Parker raised his wrist to check the time. “She has another few hours before they let her wake up.”
Grossman reach
ed over to Zoe’s IV and read the prescription label on the bag. “Good.” He nodded. “This’ll wear off quick and won’t give her a hangover. She’ll be functioning again in no time. So she was hysterical? Where are the bodies?”
“The medical examiner took custody of them. The DCPD and FBI are working on identification.”
“Shit.”
Parker turned and gestured toward Gage. “And this is the hero of the night.” The tone he used seemed to pass information from Parker to his colleague. “Gage Harrison, meet Jim Grossman, also CIA.”
When Gage took a step forward and extended his hand for a shake, he made sure his face wore the impassive mask he’d used to become his unit’s poker champ.
“You’re the guy who took down the kidnappers? Hell of a feat, soldier. You did Uncle Sam proud tonight, and did your nation a huge favor.”
Gage detected the ember of a lie in the way Grossman squeezed his hand a little too hard and a little too long, and stared into his eyes with a flint-edged gaze. Gage didn’t trust this guy any more than he trusted Parker. “I’m a Marine, not a soldier. Just glad I got there when I did.”
“Are you standing post?” Grossman asked.
“I’m going to stay with Dr. Kealoha until she’s released.”
Grossman pursed his lips then focused on Parker. “I’ve got a fire to put out. We need to know when Dr. Kealoha wakes up so we can have a chat.” He pointed at Gage. “You don’t have clearance to be in here for that.”
“Sir, I’ll wait and ask Zoe what she wants.”
Grossman and Parker exchanged another silent look before Grossman turned and left.
Gage had relied on his ability to read body language to stay alive during his three deployments to the Middle East. He couldn’t always pick out the words when people spoke in their particular dialects, but he always knew when to dive and cover. And Gage knew that Parker and Grossman had their fingers on their triggers. They were dangerous as hell.
A nurse popped the door open. “Gentlemen, I need to hang a new IV bag and check vitals.”
