Black Is Back (Quentin Black Mystery #4) (35 page)

I don’t know any of what I said to whoever picked up, but at some point, Lisbeth was on the line. She told me the car Black had tailing me was still with us at Stow Lake, that the two agents inside had already alerted technicians from Black’s medical branch and told them at which hospital to meet us. From what Lisbeth said, those doctors were on the payroll and already knew some of the “unusual aspects” to Black’s physical history.

I used my psychic ability to read her at that point and realized she didn’t know the truth about Black’s race, only that Black had some genetic anomalies. That appeared to be the company story more generally, and even that wasn’t widely known.

Lisbeth definitely seemed to know that I knew, however.

We’d been talking a few minutes when Lisbeth told me the ambulance had just arrived, and that Angel was on the other line with Kiko and that EMTs were coming our way.

Everything after that happened in a blur.

I have a memory of Nick pulling me to my feet, probably to give the EMTs space to work. I remember standing there while Nick held me, watching the EMTs crouch over Black where he lay on the ground under that cherry tree. I don’t know how long they were doing that before they hoisted him onto a portable stretcher, but it couldn’t have been long.

I read them and knew their priority was to move him, fast.

His eyes never opened. Not once, during that whole time.

For some reason, that’s where I focused, willing them to open, to flicker at least, but they never did.

He looked ghost-like to me now. Leached of so much pigment he looked the color of chalk, his skin now matched the white paint used to write the Bible verses on the asphalt.

When they lifted him up off the grass, I saw the opening in his back and groaned aloud, lunging towards him. Nick held me back, gripping me in a half-hug in his arms, even as he kept me behind the cover of the trees. I’d seen that kind of thing before, of course––again, mostly while I’d been in heavy fire zones while serving in the military.

In front, where the bullet entered, there was barely anything. Some blood, a hole. It was like a clean, metal spike got punched through the left side of his chest.

The wound on his back, on the other hand, came last––after the bullet had rolled over and over inside him, expanding its hollow point outward once it hit his flesh and bone and organs, smashing through and breaking and running into things and tumbling until it exploded out his back, leaving a hole closer to the size of a softball.

I watched them lift him onto the gurney and I didn’t see him move and some part of me broke inside, even as I yanked on Nick to let me go after them.

Nick held my hand by then.
 

When I followed the EMTs that time, he didn’t hold me back. He came with me.

He helped load me into the back of the ambulance, telling the EMTs to let me ride along and flashing his badge. He said something to me––something about security waiting for us at the hospital, something about him and Angel following shortly––then Nick just stood there, watching my face as the double doors closed between us.

I couldn’t think about them looking for the person who did this on that island.

I couldn’t think about Nick standing there with the bloody arms, or the look on his face as he’d watched the ambulance pull away from the curb, its siren blaring.

For the first few seconds, all I could do was stare down at Black’s face from the corner of that ambulance and will him to open his eyes.
 

Then my mind clicked back into focus. Marginally, at least.

I pulled out my phone a second time. I only took my eyes off Black’s face long enough to find the number I’d been given. I’d programmed it into my phone only a few weeks earlier, while Black and I were still in the Paris airport, waiting for our plane home.

Someone picked up the phone on the other side in less than two rings.

I talked to that person while the EMTs worked over Black in a blur, fitting him with oxygen, checking and stabilizing his vitals while they talked to someone else over a radio. I knew they wanted whoever waited for us on the other end to have everything they could give them before we arrived. I wanted the same.

At the same time, I could feel their puzzlement already.

Puzzlement about Black, about things they’d noticed about his physiology, even in those few minutes. If nothing else, that told me I was right in making the call.

No matter what Black had in place, we needed seers there. Trained seers.

“You’ll have someone there?” I clarified over the phone.

“It is happening as we speak.” My uncle Charles sighed, clicking gently. “My
ilya
... my darling girl. Trust me. I will take care of this. I will take care of this for you...”

I could only nod, numb, my eyes on the gurney in the back of the ambulance.

In all of that, Black never moved.

He lay there like a ghost, and I couldn’t feel him at all.

Fourteen

NEXT OF KIN

I RAN INTO Nick and Angel pretty much the instant a nurse escorted me out of the surgery staging area and into the waiting room. I stood there as long as they would let me, but they stopped me outside the last set of swinging doors and a soft-spoken nurse who might have been Chinese took my arm and gently guided me out of those back rooms, promising they would come talk to me as soon as they knew anything about his condition.

Blinking into the brighter light of the waiting area, I stood there for a few seconds, unmoving, before I realized the place was full, and that most of the people I could see standing there were cops.

Angel and Nick walked over to me right away, as I said, which confused me as much as anything, especially at first.

Truthfully, I hadn’t expected to see them here so soon.

I hadn’t thought either of them would leave the lake while the SWAT team was doing its sweep, especially Nick. But I saw Nick seconds after I saw Angel, both of them standing with the same cluster of plainclothes cops. As I watched, a third person standing with them turned, staring at me with sharp, sky blue eyes.
 

His expression altered visibly as soon as he saw me.

“Where’s Hawking?” I said, feeling my jaw harden. “Where is he, Mozar? Where’s your fucking partner?”

Mozar’s eyes flinched, then widened in surprise.

He glanced around us, then back at me.

Sympathy filled his shockingly blue eyes as I watched, along with an understanding I’d never seen there up until now. His voice bordered on gentle.

“Ms. Fox. I’m horribly sorry about what happened. My partner is down at the lake. Coordinating the SWAT team. It’s more his area of expertise than mine... and Detective Tanaka wanted to come here. We’ll debrief you as soon as you’re ready. Right now we’re in the preliminary stages of discussing next steps and setting up protection for––”

“Where was he when Black got shot?” I said, cutting him off. “Hawking. Where the fuck
was
he, Mozar? Do you know?”

I was close to shouting that time.

Nick got between us, holding up his hands as if to shield me from Mozar and the rest of the uniforms now staring in our direction.

Or maybe he was trying to shield Mozar from me.

Among the faces I could see as I stared around the room, I couldn’t help noticing two men who stood taller than the others. Both of them were model-handsome, with dark eyes that I strongly suspected to be tinted by contact lenses.

My uncle’s people.

I’d already run into two others in the surgery area. They’d been suiting up with the human surgeons. Luckily, no one else seemed to noticed them but me. That, or they’d somehow managed to push their minds into thinking they belonged there.

I bit my lip, facing Nick.

Anger washed through me at first, most of it still about Hawking, and why Nick was protecting him. Then I looked at Nick, really looked at him––and my throat closed. Gratitude washed through me––so much I couldn’t speak at first. Remembering Nick down by Stow Lake, what he’d done for Black and how he’d snapped me out of the shock I’d been tunneling into, I met his eyes, fighting to speak.
 

Before I knew it, I clutched his shoulders in my hands.

Then I looked down, and saw that he was still covered in blood.

Angel got between us as I stared, taking hold of Nick’s arm on the other side.

“Hey. Naoko. You should go clean up,” she murmured to him.

Nick looked down, like he had no idea what she was talking about. Then he held up his hands, frowning. Nodding, he gave me a brief apologetic look then turned, walking swiftly down a hall and probably looking for a bathroom.

Mozar continued to stand there, a few yards away, staring at me.

He looked like he wanted to say more to me, but didn’t know what to say.

I bit my lip from saying what I wanted to say. I would wait until I could talk to Nick and Angel about Hawking. Preferably alone.

“Take a walk, Mozar,” Angel said, her voice cold.

Mozar looked about to speak again, then just nodded. Motioning with his face and jaw towards the doors, he muttered something about coffee to Estevez and Glen, who I only then realized were standing there too, staring at me with the same blank expressions on their faces.

When the three of them wandered off, Angel caught hold of me, holding both of my shoulders and rubbing them, as if trying to get the circulation going again.

“Has anyone checked you, doc?” she said. “You don’t look so good.”

I shook my head. I felt drained from whatever it was I’d been doing to Black, so I knew what she was seeing, but I couldn’t let them focus on that right now.

“I’m fine,” I said. “What’s Nick doing about security? Here, I mean.”

“Black’s going to be in surgery for at least a few hours, doc...” She hesitated. Shaking her head, she swallowed, as if stopping herself from saying more. “Don’t worry about any of that right now, doc. We’ve got a lot of people here... it’s covered.”

I nodded, biting my tongue.

I hadn’t meant to read her that time, but I felt a glimmer of her thoughts anyway. They weren’t really focused on protection for Black, not yet. Nick told them it was a bullseye shot. The Templar got him right in the heart. They wouldn’t need to worry about keeping Black alive if the Templar had already killed him.

They were more worried about me.

“Why are we here?” I said, clenching my jaw. “If you all think he’s going to fucking die, then why are we here? Why not have this little get-together at the station?”

I saw her wince, and went on before she could say anything.

“Why
are
you here?” I said again, clenching my jaw. “Why is Mozar here? Didn’t he like Black for the Templar like five minutes ago?”

She rubbed my arm. “Mozar and his people didn’t realize how serious it was until they got here, doc. They were hoping to talk to Black. We were getting ready to go, actually.” She continued to rub my arm, softening her voice. “Mozar wants to debrief. So does the Captain. We were going to head down to the station, but everyone agrees you should sit in if you can. Not leave the hospital,” she added, gripping me tighter when she felt me stiffen. “We’re not asking you to leave here, Miri. But Black’s going to be in surgery for awhile. We’re hooking up a virtual station for you so you can sit in from here. Mozar’s already got you a room. Here, I mean... in the hospital.”