Covert M.D. (24 page)

She willed her legs strong, latched on to an image of Rathe outside waiting for her, straightened and crossed the room. Talbot groaned when she passed, but she paid him little heed. She didn’t have time to flip the gurney over and tie him to it, though the bastard deserved that and more.

He’d killed innocent people—mothers, fathers, husbands and wives—for money to pay off his debts. What was worse?

Fury spiked inside her and she glared down. “Bastard.” Then she turned her back on him, crossed to the door and cracked it so she could look out into the waiting area. It was deserted, but black-clad men moved beyond the windows, gathering around a long, sleek,
stretch SUV. A hydraulic lift descended from the side of the vehicle, carrying a wheelchair. In it sat a silver-haired man, maybe sixty, collapsed in on himself as though he’d lost substance from within.

Nia remembered that look. Incredibly, she felt a spurt of pity, quickly quashed by the knowledge that Mr. Bronte, whoever he was, had purchased her kidney—whether or not she could spare it.

She had to get out of the clinic.

Footsteps overhead reminded her of the two speakers who’d gone to look for Talbot. They would return soon. Rathe hadn’t come to rescue her, so she would have to rescue herself.

But his absence beat at her, reminding her of Talbot’s threat and Cadaver Man’s absence. What if Rathe had been hurt? What if he’d been—no, she wouldn’t think of that. Not now. Not ever. Rathe was fine. He had to be.

But even through that declaration, grief beat in her chest. Grief that she loved him without reservation, guilt that she’d asked more of him than she’d been willing to give in return.

In the end neither of them had tried hard enough. She wanted another chance, needed another chance to tell him how much he meant to her. How hard she was willing to try to make it work between them.

“Come on, Nia. Time to get moving.” Her lips barely shaped the words, but it was enough to propel her across the waiting room. Her heart beat jerkily, so loud she was sure Bronte’s private army would hear the cadence and know she had escaped.

But no, they were focused on the old man and on the woods near the house. Half a dozen black-clad men fanned out into the trees, automatic weapons held at the ready. Four remained behind, surrounding the wheelchair. All had their backs to the house, apparently judging it secure.

Now!
Nia eased open the door and slipped out onto the wide patio. Speed and quiet were equally important, but her reflexes were off and she blundered across the open space, tensed for the shout at her discovery, the shot that was sure to follow.

“Don’t let her get away!” Talbot’s voice rang out from the clinic door. He reeled out onto the patio and pointed at her. “The bitch nearly broke my head!”

Pandemonium erupted. The four guards near the SUV closed ranks around the wheelchair, lifted their weapons and aimed at her. “Freeze, lady! Don’t move or we’ll shoot!”

Nia dove behind the shelter of an ornate cement planter and hunched down amidst a hail of gunfire. Small, stinging chips deflected from her meager shelter, and from the stone wall behind her.

“Aim for her head!” Talbot shouted, sounding panicked. “Don’t hit the kidney!” He waved his hands. “We need her, we need—” A fist-size rock buzzed through the air and hit him on the jaw, dropping him. Shouts and gunfire erupted in the woods behind the house, and a silver-blond-haired warrior ducked down behind a line of shrubbery.

Rathe!
He was alive. The knowledge speared through
Nia like a starburst and she cried out when the guards fired blindly into the landscaping. Rhododendrons and azaleas exploded in a hail of bullets, but when the fusillade ended, there was no sign of a body.

“Sorry I’m late.” His voice spoke at her shoulder and she whirled, disbelief hammering in her mind, hope blasting through her soul.

“Rathe!”

He caught her in a crushing embrace, and Nia curled into him, needing the contact, the reassurance that he was still alive, that she was, too.

“They’re over here! This way!”

The shout broke them apart, but Rathe kept hold of her hand as though he never intended to let go. His energy buzzed through the contact, strengthening her, warming her. He cocked an eyebrow. “Ready, partner?”

She was conscious of the excitement swirling in her stomach, of the black-suited men fanning out along one side of her hiding place, and of the absolute, utter confidence in Rathe’s eyes. She nodded. “Ready.”

He jerked his chin toward the tree line, where the gunfire had dwindled to sporadic chatter. “Work your way behind the house and back toward the road. Peters has a car there.”

“Where will you be?” She lifted her chin, expecting him to put her in her place, to tell her to hide behind the lines, where the women belong.

He surprised her by smiling. “Right behind you.” He kissed her quickly. “I love you. Now go!”

Heart thundering from a mix of nerves and joyous excitement at his declaration, she bolted from behind the planter, keeping low beside the stone wall. She heard excited shouts and the stitch of gunfire moving away from her.

She dove behind a long-dry fountain and looked back. “Damn it,
I believed you!
”

Which was her own stupid fault. Of course Rathe had drawn their fire. He was a bloody hero.

Instead of right behind her, he was on the opposite side of the patio, pinned down by two of the guards while the other two hustled to load Bronte back into the stretch SUV. Worse, Talbot was on the move. Hidden by the same planter Nia had crouched behind, the doctor was advancing on Rathe with a wickedly pointed surgical instrument—a trocar—in his hand.

The long, thin, metal blade was designed to create an incision for thin tubing. It could easily pierce a man’s heart with a trained jab.

“Rathe, behind you!”

But her shout was lost in a loudspeaker’s crackle as Peters’s voice called, “Put down your weapons. We have the others in custody and you are surrounded. Put down your weapons, now!”

The guards nearly tossed the wheelchair into the huge vehicle. Two jumped in, fired the engine and sped away, leaving the other two behind to fight a rear-guard action. One sent a spray of bullets towards Peters’s voice, the other scowled and aimed at Rathe.

“No!” Nia broke cover and charged across the patio,
hoping to draw the fire, to protect him from Talbot’s approach, to warn him at the very least.

Rathe spun. His lips shaped a cry she didn’t hear as it was lost amidst a quick volley of gunfire. The two guards were cut down in a spray of bullets. Nia misjudged her footing and went down, crashing into Talbot on the way. They fell together in a tangle, squirming and grappling for the upper hand.

Talbot loomed above her. “You were my ticket out of here, bitch!” A searing pain, cool blue and hot red, cut into Nia’s side, and she screamed when Talbot raised the bloody trocar and aimed it at her eye.

“Bastard!” Rathe lifted Talbot bodily off her. The older doctor reeled and swung at Rathe, who danced back and flashed a kick that broke Talbot’s kneecap. “She’s mine!” He followed the anguished shout with a trained one-two-three combination that would have ended in a killing blow.

But he ended on “two” and stood over his fallen enemy, breathing hard, as uniformed officers in Kevlar vests poured onto the scene.

Nia struggled to her feet and hunched over awkwardly, trying to relieve the pain in her side. She must have fallen on a rock. She sucked in a breath. “Good job, McKay.”

Molten silver eyes locked on her, their depths flowing with adrenaline and relief. “You’re okay?”

“Fine. I just have a stitch in my side. It’ll pass.” But it wasn’t passing. It was growing worse by the moment. She looked down at Talbot and felt, incredibly, a beat
of sadness. “He was a good doctor, once. But he said his ex-wives kept wanting more….”

Rathe’s eyes sharpened to flint. “This was his fault, not theirs.”

“I know.” Nia was suddenly tired. So tired. She sighed shallowly and tried to grin as she scanned the destruction all around them, the scattered bodies and the stretch SUV leaning drunkenly where it had plowed into a police-car roadblock. “Well, my first case is over. Guess this proves your point about women partners being nothing but trouble, huh?”

“No. Exactly the opposite.” He reached over and tipped her chin up. “At every turn in this case, you were stronger and more focused than me. We wouldn’t have gotten to this point without your skills.” He stepped in close. “You’re a credit to HFH, and I’d be honored to work with you again.”

His kiss told her more, and when their lips parted, he whispered, “I love you. Marry me. We can make this work, I swear it.” And he kissed her again.

The world shifted beneath her, lurching as though cosmic forces were realigning themselves below her feet. “I love you too, but I can’t…I can’t think.” She put a hand to her head, trying to block out the roaring, rushing noise. “I can’t—”

And the roaring caught her, swamped over her and carried her away on a swirl of chaos. She felt herself fall, felt strong arms catch her and cradle her against a warm, solid chest. She felt a gurney beneath her and struggled when hands tried to strap her down.

“Leave it. I’ll hold her.”

She turned toward Rathe’s voice, saw the panic in his eyes and reached out a hand to soothe. “It’s okay, I feel—” Not fine. The sting in her side evolved to a pulsing, sickening throb. The motion of the ambulance and the siren’s sob made it worse, and the whispered words fluttered above her.

Nicked the kidney…dialysis…transplant.

The last word shocked her back to awareness. “No!” She tried to sit up, tried to fight the hands that held her down.

“Nia, calm down. It’s me. I’m here. You’ll be okay.” Rathe gripped her hand, and she felt the strength flow between them. “I promise.”

The ambulance stopped, the doors opened onto the chaos of an E.R. Another gurney rolled past, and Nia caught a glimpse of white hair, sunken eyes, and pale, drawn skin. “Poor man.”

Rathe’s hand tightened. “He tried to buy your life from Talbot. There’s no need for pity—he’ll get what’s coming to him, death by kidney failure.”

“Nobody deserves to die that way.” She thought she said the words aloud, but she was floating away, into another reality, where her side didn’t hurt and she could barely feel the pressure of Rathe’s fingers on hers.

“Are you McKay?” The new voice was startling, and Nia fought to hold on to Rathe when he pulled away.

“Yes. Where do I go?”

“There’s some paperwork first. Jack Wainwright filled out your information, but…” The words trailed off
into the haze, but Nia’s brain struggled to comprehend as she was wheeled through corridors that were not, thankfully, those of Boston General.

A nurse leaned close. “You’re a lucky young woman. What are the odds of your boyfriend being a match?”

And Nia understood. “Get him in here.”

“Don’t worry, dear. Everything will be fine.”

Panic lent strength to Nia’s cotton-wool arms. She grabbed the nurse. “Get Rathe in here,
now.
”

He was there in moments, or maybe an hour; her concept of time had spun away along with the rest of her senses. But when she saw his dear face, saw the love shining in his eyes beside the worry, she found the energy to snarl, “Don’t you dare.”

“Now, Nia—”

“Don’t you ‘now, Nia’ me, buster. Don’t do it. I can go on dialysis until they find a match.”

“I am your match.” He said the words so calmly, with such conviction, that she couldn’t speak for a moment. They were the words she’d longed to hear, but not the situation she’d imagined. Not the sacrifice she would have chosen.

And in the moment she hesitated, the drugs kicked in and she was falling…falling…

And he was there to catch her.

A FEW HOURS LATER, she woke up with her mouth nearly dried shut and every cell in her body singing in pain. But it was a good pain, an
alive
pain that told her she’d made it, one way or the other.

She hoped it hadn’t been the other. Those last few fuzzy moments replayed in her brain, and guilt thrummed heavily. “He didn’t have to do it,” she whispered, though her words were nearly lost in the dryness.

“Huh? Whuzzat?” A heavy weight shifted at the edge of the bed.

Nia opened her eyes and found him there beside her. And if he’d been sleeping sitting up at her bedside, then… “They didn’t need your kidney.” The words came out clearer this time.

His wonderful gray eyes warmed. “Nope. Yours was fixable. It’ll be as good as new in a month or so.”

Remembering what she thought she’d said, thought she’d overheard, she picked at the sheet.

“What about Marissa? Logan?” They weren’t the most important questions, but they were the simpler ones. Easier than asking about them, asking about love.

A gleam in Rathe’s eyes chided her for being a coward. “Marissa will be fine, and Wainwright is on the lookout for a liver for her son Harry. We were right, Talbot had used the boy’s illness as leverage to force her to give the patients the extra drugs without asking too many questions. He told her it was part of a semiorthodox study he was running. It wasn’t until that last death that she realized there was something more going on.”

Poor Marissa. Nia felt a beat of pity. “And Logan?”

Rathe stretched, and a host of muscles pressed against his soft black T-shirt.
Her muscles,
Nia thought possessively, and was surprised to feel a slow surge of lust through the pain. He cocked his head, eyes glinting
as though he’d read her mind. “Believe it or not, Hart’s interviewing with HFH. Said he got a taste of things watching us work and wants to live the adventure—God help him.” Lips curving in a sensuous, almost carefree smile, Rathe leaned toward her. “He’ll stay here and reorganize the Transplant Department first. We’ll leave as soon as you’re feeling up to it.”

“Oh.” Disappointment sang through her like an ache and irritation built like a roar. “Where are you off to, then?”
Don’t you dare say on assignment without me, buster.

He slid her a glance. “Wainwright has a job lined up for us in the Outback.”