Her Undercover Defender

by Debra Webb

  When the service elevator stopped on the basement level, David stepped out into the corridor and turned toward the service area, hearing voices as he approached. The electrical crews were still assessing the damage and upgrading security protocols. He made a note of the contractors involved as he walked by. From the look of things, they wouldn’t be done anytime soon, a fact that he hoped meant a breather for Dr. Palmer’s project. If cutting the hospital’s power remained an essential element to Keller’s plan, he couldn’t repeat yesterday’s effort without a crowd of witnesses.

  As David climbed the stairs to the HR offices, he wondered again what Keller had learned from yesterday’s exercise. One thing was glaringly clear—Keller and his crew were more than willing to cause physical harm to anyone who got in their way.

  David wasn’t afraid of a fight, and with every passing hour he was more determined to make sure Joseph Keller had hurt his last innocent person.

  * * *

  AT PRECISELY FOUR O’CLOCK, Terri walked into Matt’s room, taking care of the last monitoring before she turned his care back to Regina for the night.

  “Forgive me, but I forgot your name.”

  “Terri,” she replied, not offended in the least.

  “You remind me of my wife, Terri.”

  She wasn’t sure how to respond. His eyes drifted to the window, and his smile was tinged with sadness.

  “She never forgot a face or a name and I relied on her for that.”

  Hearing him refer to her in the past tense, Terri wanted to offer some comfort. Matt didn’t seem old enough to carry this much pain. “How long were you together?”

  “Not long enough. Can I get up?”

  “Go right ahead. I’m done.” She watched him walk to the window, uncertain if she should stay or go.

  “She died on our honeymoon,” Matt blurted. “Franklin may not have told you.”

  “He didn’t. All I know about the project is what I’ve heard today.”

  “You probably think I’m an idiot for being the guinea pig.”

  “Not with Franklin as your doctor.”

  Matt acknowledged that with an arching eyebrow and a tight smile. “Good point. I volunteered,” he said.

  For several minutes they watched the afternoon sunlight glint off the dark water of the harbor. She couldn’t help remembering that lovely walk she and David had taken along the seawall—before the latest insanity with Trey had started. “Are you having second thoughts?” she asked, determined to focus on her patient.

  Matt shook his head. “Never. Whether it fails or succeeds—and everything points to success—it will be worth it.”

  “A good attitude is more than half the battle.”

  “You don’t know.”

  Once more she found herself waiting for an explanation.

  “I’m Franklin’s son-in-law. If being married for less than a week counts for anything.”

  “It counts,” she said quickly, her mind reeling with that announcement. Matt had married Franklin’s only daughter? She couldn’t recall ever seeing a single photo of the wedding in Franklin’s home.

  “We were honeymooning in Vancouver,” he said, his voice barely a whisper. “She’d never been to the area and we had a grand tour planned.”

  Terri waited, her breath stalled out in her lungs. The agony was stamped into every nuance of his face, and his shoulders were hunched against a persistent, invisible pain.

  “It was a trolley,” he rasped. He twisted around in an explosion of movement that sent his dinner tray table rolling into the opposite wall. “What kind of sick mind conspires to blow up a trolley?”

  The rhetorical question reverberated in the room as Matt’s chest heaved with his ragged respiration. She wanted to tell him to calm down, but she couldn’t say the words. She knew from experience that the anger wouldn’t stay bottled up, and he needed to give it an outlet.

  “The footage they show on television during a tragedy is nothing like being in it. The chaos. The noise.” He inhaled. “The silence is worse.” He looked up, but Terri knew he didn’t see her at all. “One minute we were holding hands with everything to live for. In the blink of an eye, she was dying in my arms on the street of a beautiful city.”

  Terri kept her thoughts to herself, though she was praying desperately for Matt, for any words that would help him.

  “She said she loved me. In that last moment, she said she loved me. She smiled.” He turned away, pressing his forehead to the window glass. “Some nut-job group spouting a message about equality killed my wife and ten others, including two children, and injured countless more that day. They planned and prepared and they got away.” He moved from the window to the edge of the bed. “What the hell is equal about that? They got away. The people who planted that bomb, who killed eleven people, lived,” he finished, his voice raw.

  Terri had known grief and pain, had felt robbed when her parents died so unexpectedly and far too early. She hadn’t known anything like this. Grief wasn’t a contest, but Matt’s anguish put her situation into perspective. Her world had been tossed on its ear four years ago, but the accident had been random. She couldn’t fathom the horror of knowing someone deliberately struck out, killing for the sake of harvesting fear and gaining a headline.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “They got away, but I volunteered. I wanted to be part of the solution.”

  The goal of Franklin’s new research became clearer to Terri. An embedded device that could transmit real-time observations and data would tip the scales in favor of the good guys. “You’re a hero.”

  Matt’s laughter was low and bitter. “You never met her, Franklin’s daughter, did you?”

  Terri shook her head. “I only met Franklin four years ago.” He must have been working on this project even then.

  “She was amazing. Smart like her father, but far more beautiful. A compassionate heart.”

  Terri smiled at his joke, pleased that he seemed to be calming down.

  “I could hardly believe my luck that she noticed me. Fell in love with me. That she said yes when I proposed.”

  “My dad used to say the same about my mom.” Terri had let herself forget what devotion and commitment, what a love so deep and true looked like.

  “I’ve had therapists tell me I’m exaggerating the emotion because of the grief, but she was my whole world.”

  “That’s beautiful,” Terri assured him. “It’s how love should be. Strong, intense and—”

  “Peaceful,” he finished for her. “Don’t get me wrong, we weren’t picture-perfect. Just perfect for each other.”

  “Exactly,” she agreed, moving to clean up the mess in the corner. He didn’t need the distraction of a janitor right now.

  “I’ll do that,” Matt said, kneeling beside her to gather up the pieces of broken dishes. “Sometimes I hate the normal stuff.”

  She sat back on her heels and smiled at him. “I understand. It gets under your skin and makes you itch until the tantrum hits and you have to do something.”

  He stared at her. “You do understand.”

  She nodded. “I broke more than my share of normal things after my parents died.”

  “Thanks for not judging.”

  “No problem.” With the mess squared away, she stood. “You’re a doing a remarkable and courageous thing here,” she said, picking up his chart on her way to the door.

  “You think I’m doing this for good and noble reasons.”

  She paused. “You’re subjecting your body to experimental devices, trying to make something good out of an inexplicable act of terror.”

  “You’re wrong. It sounds altruistic your way. Honestly, I’m not here to help others,” he said, returning to his chair. “I’m in it for revenge. Franklin has the funding and knowledge to make a difference and empower the good guys in a variety of ways. Me?” He rolled his shoulders. “I’m just a guy who had to sit back and deal with it. There wasn’t a place for me to get involved,
not a place that would have any impact on the group who tore my life apart. Until now. Franklin can implant anything,” he said in a voice so calm it scared Terri. “He can test on me all he wants if it means someone will have the tools to wipe out the team who killed my wife.”

  The statement left Terri speechless.

  “I tried,” he said, his eyes earnest. “I threw myself into the causes she believed in. It helped, but that feeling faded too quickly. I pitched in to build better communities, but I couldn’t shake the image of some other guy’s wife bleeding out after the next attack. What Franklin wants to do is drastic, but it matters. I loved her, Terri, and the men who stole her from me don’t deserve to keep walking away.”

  She mumbled something she hoped he interpreted as encouragement and returned to the nurses station.

  Intense didn’t come close to what she felt now. It would take some time for her to figure it out. As she left the ward for the day, she couldn’t decide which part troubled her most about what had to be the strangest shift of her career.

  Franklin had requested her because he knew her personally. He fought for her to stay despite her brother being viewed as a potential security risk. Franklin’s project, the full scope of it, swirled around in her brain.

  And Matt. What did it mean to love someone so much you’d subject your body to whatever was necessary to empower a fight you’d never see?

  She stepped off the elevator at the main lobby and checked her cell phone as she approached the security desk. She was about to ask for a cab when she saw the message that Suzette’s brother was taking care of immediate repairs to her car.

  * * *

  DAVID PAUSED JUST out of Terri’s line of sight, simply enjoying the view. With her gentle accent, her long, glossy hair and her wide, gracious smile, she epitomized the beauty and charm that set Southern women apart. It sounded ridiculous even in his head and he could practically hear his sisters cackling over the news that, as much as he traveled, he preferred Southern women.

  Veering sharply from that line of thought, he noticed the signs of fatigue on Terri’s face. He hadn’t heard of any trouble upstairs, but it looked as though her shift for Dr. Palmer had worn her out. He wanted to suggest she take time off or ask her about the project so she could share what must be a burden. Neither was a valid option. She couldn’t tell him anything about the research and he couldn’t tell her his real purpose here. In all probability he knew more than she did about the endgame of Dr. Palmer’s work.

  “Hey, Terri,” he said, striding up to the desk. “Do you need a ride home?”

  She turned and her lips curved into a smile, bringing a light into her soft green eyes. “No, I’m waiting on the repair truck.” She held up her phone. “Suzette sent her brother to deal with the tires and he’s working up an estimate on the body work. Then he’ll bring it to me here.”

  “Great. I’ll wait with you.”

  Her smile, while content, was a little tired at the edges. “You have better things to do than wait with me.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t think of a single one.”

  “Stop it,” she said, moving toward the seating area in the lobby. “I don’t want you to get into trouble.”

  “Let’s see. Human Resources is my job. You’re human and a valuable resource. Ergo, I’ll stay until your car arrives.”

  She arched one golden brown eyebrow. “Ergo?”

  “Are you a therefore girl?” The joke earned a chuckle out of her. “Seriously, how was your shift?”

  “Fine.”

  He bumped her shoulder with his. “Not so convincing.”

  “It was good. I mean it,” she added when he gave her another bump. “It was exhausting, though. I’d talk about it if I could.”

  He could see the truth of that in her eyes. “The project isn’t why I’m sitting here.” It was only a small fib. “You are.”

  “David,” she said on a soft sigh. “Thanks for that.”

  They sat for several minutes in the quiet, watching people come and go. “You look like you could use a hug.”

  “If you hug me right now, I’m likely to cry.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  She sighed. “More like that good.” She shifted in the seat, facing him and propping her elbow on the back of the chair. “You know Dr. Palmer and I go way back?”

  He nodded.

  “And you’ve been here long enough to know there are days that patients teach us more than any formal education.”

  “Right. Was today a school of hard knocks day?”

  “Emotionally,” she admitted. “Dr. Palmer has known this patient a long time.”

  David hung on every word, hoping like hell they didn’t have a security problem inside Dr. Palmer’s team.

  “He’s a great guy. A widower,” she added. “He told me about his wife today. How they met.” Terri sucked in a shaky breath. “How she died.”

  David reached out and swiped the tear from her cheek before she could.

  “I can’t get into a ton of detail, obviously, but his story moved me. The way he loved her. Loves her,” she corrected herself with a quick shake of her head. “That devotion.” She swallowed. “It’s intense. I...”

  “Go on,” he urged, wanting to hear what part of the story had made such an impact.

  “She was killed on their honeymoon.” She tipped her head to the ceiling. “Can you imagine having your soul mate torn away like that? Before you had any time at all?”

  He thought of his sisters, all happily married, and his parents, closing in on their fiftieth anniversary.

  “I just... After Mom and Dad died...” She cleared her throat and tried again. “I know it sounds silly, but I think I forgot what that kind of love looks like. My parents were close and affectionate and fun.”

  “So are mine.”

  “Then you know what I mean.” Her green eyes were hopeful despite the sheen of tears. “I must sound like a dork.”

  “No way.”

  Her lips curved into a wobbly grin. “It’s terribly sad and still so beautiful. The choices he’s made to honor his late wife. To defend her memory. Not his words,” she said, “but his intention. In my opinion.”

  Her opinion was suddenly the only one that mattered to David. He wanted to touch Terri’s hair, her skin, to give her that sense of connection she so obviously craved. He wanted to give her every good thing she deserved. Not to fulfill orders or for the advancement of the case, but for himself. The awareness startled him.

  “It’s been years since I let myself think about anything more than the next therapy session, the next shift or paycheck,” she went on.

  “You’ve had more than your fair share of stress recently.” And she’d have more to come if Trey was in as deep with Keller as it appeared.

  Her chin bobbed as she nodded. “Just when it started to ease up, Trey went missing.”

  “But he’s back now,” David soothed. “You can relax.” He couldn’t tell her he’d take the lead on managing her stress. “Let me take you out tonight. We’ll do something special.”

  “Thanks, but I’ll be okay.”

  “You’re already more than okay.” When she met his gaze, he gave her a wink. “A day like this calls for a night out.”

  “I don’t know.” Her phone caught her attention. “Oh. My car’s done.”

  “Good.” He wasn’t taking no for an answer. “You can unwind a bit and I’ll take care of everything. Come on, we’ll have fun, I promise.”

  “You don’t have other plans?”

  “No.” His only plans would’ve involved staking out her house. Better to spend that time with her rather than watching over her. He walked her out to her car when it arrived and held the driver’s door open for her. “I’ll pick you up by seven,” he said after she’d finished her business with Suzette’s brother. “We’ll get dressed up and celebrate.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Celebrate what?”

  “It’s Thursday and the weather’s cl
ear,” he said. “Those are good enough reasons for me.” Keeping a beautiful woman safe, checking for any dangers lurking in her home—that was just an opportunity to multitask.

  “It’s a generous offer, David, but I can’t keep relying on you to cheer me up when I’m down.”

  “Of course you can.”

  She tilted her head, studying him. “You aren’t going to drop this, are you?”

  He leaned in close, watched her eyes go wide and then kissed her. Softly and not too quickly. In front of the hospital where they both worked. They both knew what kind of statement he’d just made. “Not a chance.”

  She was still blinking owlishly when he closed the door for her. He figured most of the nursing staff would have heard about the kiss before he returned to his desk.

  Oddly enough, mission or not, he discovered the idea of rumors circulating about him and Terri didn’t bother him in the least.

  Now all he had to do was come up with a plan for a stellar evening. Confirming the clear skies and balmy weather would continue, he started making calls. He did a quick search of mansion tours, carriage rides and restaurant specials. While those options held some appeal, she’d been born and raised here and seen it all with holiday decorations and without.

  This had to be different. Something special just for her. He wanted to give her an experience she’d never had, one that would leave her with fond memories, in case his assignment destroyed their friendship.

  After everything she’d told him, the least he could do was show her what an amazing woman he saw when he looked at her. Pulling up the tide charts, he set to work out the details. He would give her an evening she couldn’t dismiss later as a tactic or trick, no matter how the case with her brother ended.

  Chapter Ten

  David arrived at Terri’s house just before seven o’clock and noticed Trey’s motorcycle was gone. He wasn’t sure if that should be a relief or cause for worry, based on Keller’s presence in the area.