“Jake? What is it? Is there anything else my Dad needs to know before he leaves?”
“Yes.” He turned his eyes to Kate. Do you remember the last words I said to you before you fell asleep?”
Kate tried to pry memories from her brain but couldn’t manage it. “No.”
Jake ran a hand through his hair twice, eyeing Kate with a look of trepidation.
“What is it? You’re scaring me, Jake.”
Her dad piped up, “Kate? What the hell is it?”
Without breaking eye contact with Jake, she held her hand up to her father to stop him from saying another thing until Jake spoke.
Jake blew out his breath and spilled the beans about Carlos.
Kate could feel all the color drain out of her face as she nearly choked. “He’s involved in Jake’s situation?”
“Yes, Kate. I told you while you were out of your body and even took you to the prison to prove it to you. You just can’t remember at the moment.”
Kate turned her face away from Jake and looked straight ahead, solemnly. She tried to process it all and found herself lost. Too many emotions consuming her at once.
Her father’s voice rose in panic. “What’s he saying?”
“It’s Carlos.” Her voice came out sounding like a zombie, even though she could feel tears building.
“What the fuck?” Rob moved fast to squeeze both of Kate’s arms, hard, and was shaking her. “Tell me, Kate! Tell me about Carlos!”
At her father’s firm grip, Kate started to cry. Her head moved as he shook her. She could hear Jake growl beside her as he got off the bed and flew around to Robert, trying to pry his hands free from Kate’s arms.
“Carlos is on the island with Jake! He’s been assigned to look after him.” Kate shook, wailing loudly; partly from knowing her relationship with Carlos was a sham and partly from a side of her father he hadn’t shown her before. It was like the mention of the name Carlos had triggered a beast within him.
Rob let go of Kate and stared down at her, realizing she was distraught and he was partly to blame. “Katie Bear! I’m so sorry! Oh God! Please forgive me!” He lowered himself to her and lifted her sagging body to his chest so he could wrap both arms around her, clasping her tightly.
Kate sobbed as she relaxed into her father’s embrace. It wasn’t how she’d envisioned their first hug but it still felt good. She could feel his heart pumping as he squeezed her harder, her head nestled into his shoulder. He let her cry until there were no tears left.
“I just can’t believe Carlos is involved. I just can’t get my head around it. I can’t believe he would do something like that!”
“I know, sweetie. We’ve been doing research on the guy and it appears he does indeed work for The Organization. He’s been lying to you from the get go. I can’t tell you how sorry I am for that. After Jake left—” He stopped mid-sentence, looking around as if remembering Jake was in the room.
“You can tell him yourself, you know.” Kate sniffed, looking up at her father.
Rob pulled his arms away from Kate and lay her gently back down on the bed, eyeing her speculatively.
She nodded to him in encouragement. “Go on. He’s right here.”
Jake spoke up next. “Tell him that I want to hear what he has to say.”
“Dad. He’s interested in what you have to say to him.”
Rob glared at the empty space beside Kate, blinking heavily before starting. “Son. I sincerely apologize for what happened to you. Gary’s started a search and we’ll do everything in our power to make sure you return home safely. I never wanted it to end this way, Jake. You have to believe me. I think of you like my own kid…” He couldn’t continue and Kate reached out to squeeze his arm, realizing the extent of her father’s feelings for Jake and how choked up he was.
Jake held an emotion that Kate had seen all too often as he walked over to her father and placed a hand on his shoulder. Rob flinched.
“It’s okay, Dad. It’s Jake! He’s got his hand on your shoulder.”
Robert swung around, looking down at his shoulder, having no option but to trust his daughter.
Rob’s eyes were huge. He patted his own shoulder. Kate watched his hand go through Jake’s. “It was you all along.”
“Yes. It was me, Rob. I’m glad you finally realize that now. What took you so long?”
Kate actually managed a giggle in between some more sniffles.
“What did he say?”
“He said that you are as slow as a wet week and asked what took you so long to figure it out?”
Her dad and Jake laughed as Kate’s mom poked her head back in to find out what was taking so long.
“What’s going on in here? Come on, already!”
“Okay. Okay. I’m coming, woman! Sheesh. Can’t a man have a little one on one time with his daughter?” He blew a kiss to Kate and winked at her.
As he turned to walk out of the door, Kate added, “Dad?”
“Yes, Katie-Bear?”
“Jake loves you, too.”
Both parents faltered and then her dad grinned from ear to ear, dragging her mom out the door.
All Kate could hear was, “What does she mean, Rob?”
And with that they were both gone, leaving a crazy, wonderful, emotional silence in the room as Jake approached Kate.
“Scoot over, baby.”
She did and Jake climbed onto the bed and lay down beside her, taking her in his arms watching the smirk form on her face.
“I suppose you think you’re pretty good, huh?”
“Yep. Sure do. I’ve just witnessed something amazing.”
“You’re amazing.”
Kate’s hand came up to Jake’s face as she murmured, “You know what I’m having trouble with?”
“Carlos?”
“Yes. I’m pissed off at that and feel betrayed. But the thing that I’m having the most trouble grasping is the fact that I actually think that I’ll be okay.”
“You will?”
“Yes. Don’t ask me why but I really feel I will be.” She had Jake to thank for that. It had always been Jake.
As he brought his head towards her, Kate felt him fade and pull away somewhat. She followed his form, that was blurring at the edges and swirling.
“Jake!”
“Baby, I’m being pulled back into my body. I can’t stay. It happened to you too, you just can’t remember.”
“No! Don’t go. Don’t leave me! Stay!” She was practically yelling, holding her arm out as Jake backed away. He was fading fast, his legs totally disappearing, just his torso floating near the doorway.
Kate was beside herself. “Jake, you can’t go back there! You can’t!”
“Baby, I love you. Get a message to your dad to hurry!” His eyes burned into hers before he disintegrated into thin air.
Kate screamed out, feeling completely lost. “Jake! Jake! Come back!”
Nurse Darla came running into the room. “What’s wrong, precious?”
The overhead lights had been turned off earlier with only the small glow of a lamp connected to the headboard.
“Jake’s gone! He’s gone!”
“Who’s Jake? Was it your dad?”
“No! He’s my—”She was about to say boyfriend but that wasn’t really the truth. She didn’t know what he was now, only that he had vanished and she needed him. “He’s a friend. Please, I need to call my father! Can you bring me a telephone?”
Kate was out of breath as she begged the nurse. Darla tried to subdue her. “Just calm down, my lovely. I’ll get you a phone in a moment. You’re about to pull out your drip.”
“No! You don’t understand. You need to get me a phone now!”
Darla ignored Kate’s pleas and walked around the bed to untangle the fluid line, noticing the bag was empty. “I’m just going to dash out and get you some more fluids okay? I’ll see if I can grab you a phone from somewhere.”
Kate relaxed. “Thank you.”
; She didn’t know when she would see Jake again or if she would. The sense of loss she felt was crushing. She could do nothing stuck in the hospital. It was all up to her father, whom she hoped could gather together all his resources to get Jake the hell out of that place before it was too late.
It was all too much to think about. The danger Jake was in. The danger her father was about to walk into. How had things spiraled out of control? All she wanted was to go back to her boring, routine life in Vernazza.
She didn’t like chaos. She liked normalcy and control over her life. It was so above and beyond that at the moment. She forced deep breaths into her lungs to try and settle her anxiety, wondering what was taking Darla so long.
She’d need to ask where her cell was. When she spoke to her dad, she’d ask if he could get her one.
Kate fidgeted. She squeezed the blankets on the bed and tossed and turned, unable to get comfortable, mentally counting down each minute that she had to wait.
After a nail biting twenty minutes, Darla finally strolled back in carrying a full fluid bag and a cell phone.
“Sorry, honey! The phones were all being used so I grabbed my cell. You can use it. First, let me hook up this new bag of fluid and then I’ll leave you to make your call.”
Kate was taken aback at the nurse’s kindness of offering her own cell. “Thank you. I mean that.”
“You’re very welcome. I wouldn’t do it for just anyone.” Darla winked at Kate and then proceeded to unhook the old fluid bag and replace it with the new one, checking to make sure fluid started flowing through the catheter before handing Kate the phone. “When you’re done, just place it on the chair and I’ll get it soon. Do you need a bedpan when I return?”
“Uhh, sure. Yeah, that would be great.” Kate realized she did need to use the bathroom.
Darla nodded and left, enabling Kate to hurriedly key in her Dad’s number and wait for him to answer.
“Hello?” Rob wouldn’t recognize the number.
“Dad, it’s me.”
“Katie-Bear? What’s wrong?” His voice went from confused to panicked in one second.
“I’m fine, Dad. Nurse Darla let me borrow her phone. I called to tell you Jake’s gone.”
“Gone? Gone where?”
“He started fading out and said he had to return to his body. Dad, you have to find him. He may be waking up and I don’t know what will happen when he comes face to face with Carlos.” Kate likened her voice to a squealing pig.
“God dammit!” Rob hissed into the phone. “How long ago?”
“Nearly half an hour ago now. I had to wait until the nurse returned with a phone. Dad, I’m scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen to him or if I’ll see him again.”
“Okay, darling. Settle down. I’m glad you called me. Gary’s out with the chopper, searching as we speak. I’ll call him and tell him that if he finds the island or one that looks like it, he needs to land, find Jake, and get him out of there, fast.”
“Dad, I can’t lose him again. I just can’t!”
“I know, Katie. We’ll do our best. I promise.”
“I need to get a cell phone, Dad. I can’t keep asking the nurse for hers.”
“I’ll bring my spare one to you in the morning. I need you to get some sleep now, honey. Don’t worry about anything. I’ll take care of it.”
“You know I won’t sleep until I know Jake is okay.”
“Yeah, I figured as much but at least close your eyes and rest.”
“I will. I’ll see you tomorrow. Love you, Dad.”
“Love you too, Katie-Bear.”
Kate knew it would be a restless night. Even with the hospital noises outside her room and nurses talking she felt lonely. This was the first time she’d been on her own since the accident. Even though she’d slept a lot while her family and Jake had been present she’d still felt the comfort of them nearby. Now it really did feel like she was in a foreign place with strangers all around her. She grabbed Pig and held him close, not willing to turn the bed light off to plunge into darkness where the demons lurked.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Gary was onboard the military chopper with The Gladiator and the two medics that had helped rescue Kate from the ledge. They had the spotlights outside the helicopter on high beam as they flew as low as they could along the coast of Italy parallel to the Cinque Terre region. The Gladiator had his laptop booted up, quickly trying to Google abandoned prison locations. It felt like they’d been flying around in circles.
Rob had called a second time, relaying to Gary what Kate had told him, so he was pushing the helicopter to its limit.
So far they’d flown over the islands of Montecristo, Elba, Pianosa, Giglio, Capraia, and the most southerly of the islands in the archipelago, Giannutri. They had turned around and were heading to the island of Gorgona, which The Gladiator had researched to find there was an agricultural penal colony on it which still housed 50 inmates. He sat up front with Gary while the medics talked amongst themselves in the back.
“I don’t know about this one. Rob said the prison Jake was being held in was abandoned. I can’t imagine The Organization choosing somewhere with other prisoners, not to mention guards.” Gary’s lack of enthusiasm was due to being out at a crazy hour because of a far-fetched whim.
“Should we do a flyover anyway? That means we’ve covered all the islands in the archipelago region.”
Gary sighed, looking at this watch. It was now 2 a.m. and he was feeling the lack of sleep. “Yeah. We’ll do a flyover just to make sure we’ve covered all the islands, meanwhile I want you to start looking outside that region.”
“Yes, sir.” The dark man’s fingers were already skimming over the computer keys, searching outside their current region. He brought up a map on the screen with detailed locations of Italian islands.
It was a slow process but kept him busy until they approached the island of Gorgona.
From what they could see, it didn’t look so much like a prison but more like a half-crumbled building on the edge of the island. The last time he’d spoken to Rob, his friend had mentioned a horseshoe shaped structure and the one he was looking at certainly wasn’t that.
“No. This isn’t it, I’m sure of it. What else have you got?” Gary asked as he banked the chopper and headed back out to sea. They’d used half their fuel so they couldn’t afford to fly too far away from the coast without having to turn around and refuel.
“I’ve expanded the search, sir. Just checking now.” It was dark inside the chopper, the light coming off the laptop the only thing illuminating the soldier’s face.
The helicopter was loaded with weapons, leaving nothing to chance. With a change in the mission came a rise in danger, so Gary had brought every type of military weapon he could lay his hands on as well as a stretcher and medical equipment for their subject. If they couldn’t get their man out with what they had on board, no one could.
The plan was for the two medics to stay inside the chopper ready for a quick getaway and Gary and The Gladiator would take care of any obstacles in their way once they landed. The less people involved, the better. Two innocent medics didn’t need to be put in danger any more than they already were. Plus with such short notice, it had been impossible to amass more men.
“Head southwest, sir. There is one other island Google has brought up with a prison on it. I’m pretty sure this is horseshoe shaped.” He turned his laptop towards Gary, who looked at the screen and mentally cursed. Glaring back at him was a three-story ancient structure that had been built in a perfect horseshoe shape and was on a high island with no noticeable clusters of houses. The building dominated the whole island. The perfect place to keep a body.
Gary looked up at The Gladiator with a determined expression on his face. “E.T.A?”
“Taking into account the wind speed, I’d say about ten minutes, sir.”
“Hmmm. Well, if our man is there, we better be prepared for a gunfight.”
Chapter T
hirty-Three
Gary brought the chopper down on the outside perimeter of the jail. He’d spotted a helicopter already parked in the center courtyard and didn’t want to draw unnecessary attention, even though he’d guessed that the occupants inside would know of their arrival by now.
“Grab all the weaponry you can carry,” he barked to The Gladiator as he turned off the rotor and lights.
He turned to the medics. “Lock the helicopter from the inside and keep it locked until you see either myself or The Gladiator approach. Under no circumstances are you to unlock the doors for anyone else. The glass is bullet-proof so you’ll be as safe as you can possibly be.”
Gary ran around from the front door to the side door, taking a rifle, handgun, and army knife from The Gladiator and stashing as much as he could on his body out of sight. The military rifle was slung over his shoulder. He didn’t know what to expect inside the prison but he’d learned to always expect the worst. It wouldn’t just be a case of going in, taking Jake out, and leaving. Of that he was sure.
Once they were out of the chopper and were sure it was locked with the medics safely inside, Gary nodded forward to The Gladiator to run towards the cover of the jail and to get inside via any entry door they could find. The Gladiator responded, taking off at a full sprint but hadn’t yet made it to the wall of the crumbling structure when shots rang out.
The bullet landed about a foot from him on the stony ground. Lucky whoever was shooting was a poor shot. Then again, it was harder to hit a moving target. Gary hadn’t made it to the side of the prison yet and heard another crack and then a stinging sensation in his left arm. He didn’t stop to see what it was but kept running, letting off a round from the semi-automatic handgun in the direction the previous shots had sounded. He couldn’t see shit with the new moon and cloud cover. It was the perfect night for an ambush. He flew into the stone wall next to The Gladiator, flattening his body and trying to scour the darkness for any sign of the enemy. Fuck! They could be anywhere within the confines of the three-story structure and not necessarily firing from outside.
“Sir, you’ve been shot.”
Instinctual 2 Page 14
