Shane Read online

  “Will she be all right?”

  “Well, I don’t know the full story,” he said, “but she’s in good hands now.”

  Shelly smiled up at him. “It must have been a while since you were in a maternity ward, delivering babies.”

  He broke out into a low chuckle. “You’re right about that,” he said, “but I’ve delivered plenty. I must admit that everybody on board is pretty excited.”

  She smiled and snuggled deeper into the blanket. “I’m glad she’s okay. She’s been to hell and back.”

  “Doesn’t sound like you’ve had an easy time of it by any means yourself,” he replied. “Again, I don’t have the full story, but I’ll need to check you over.”

  She yawned and said, “I’m fine, you know?”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” he said gently. “In that case, you won’t have a problem with me checking you over.”

  She groaned and said, “What do you need?”

  “Just roll over on your back,” he said gently. And, with that, he did a thorough exam, including her pulse, blood pressure, and listening to her heart and lungs. She lay here quietly, letting him do his thing. When he was done, she said, “See? I told you that I’m healthy.”

  He looked at her, smiled, and said, “Yeah, so let’s take a look at that head.”

  “What’s wrong with my head?” she said, opening her eyes wider. “I’ve got one heck of a headache, so I think I must have bumped it.”

  “You think so, huh?” He gently parted her hair, and she cried out. “Yep,” he said. “Just as I thought. We’ll need to stitch this.”

  “Stitches? Did I cut it?”

  “Something like that,” he said in a noncommittal voice.

  She said, “I’m really tired.”

  “I’ll need you to stay awake a little bit longer,” he said.

  “I don’t want to,” she said in a cranky tone. “My head hurts. I told the nurse about it earlier.”

  “Yes, you did,” he said, “and that’s good. Sit tight. I just need to grab a few things, and then we’ll take care of the head.”

  “Stitches, you said.”

  “Yep, definitely stitches,” he said.

  She realized at some point that somebody else had joined him. They spoke in low tones, but she was starting to doze off again. The nurse suddenly reached over and gave Shelly a gentle shake that just hurt her head even more. She opened her eyes, glaring through the pain, snapping, “Don’t do that. It hurts.”

  “I get that,” she said, “but I need you awake.”

  “Wait. Am I hurt worse than I thought I was?”

  At that, the nurse chuckled. “We already knew you had a headache,” she said, “and you’ve heard the doctor say you need stitches.”

  “Yeah, but stitches don’t sound so bad.”

  “No, but it looks like you’ve got quite a bullet burn alongside your head,” she said.

  Shelly looked at her in shock. “Bullet? Wait. What? But not inside though, right?”

  “Nope. It skated along the surface of your head, so it looks like you’ve had a very lucky escape, but it’ll cause you quite the headache for a while.”

  “Lucky escape, yeah, you could say that. Kidnapped twice and a bullet skimming my head,” she said, yawning. “It’s been a hell of a week.” She immediately tried to close her eyes again.

  “No, ma’am, open those eyes, please,” ordered the nurse in a firm voice.

  Shelly opened her eyes and glared at her. “Pretty soon you won’t stop me,” she snapped. “I’ll just collapse.”

  “The doctor will be back in just a minute.”

  “I’m too tired,” she said. “Can’t you just give me some anesthetic, so I can sleep while you do it?”

  “It’ll be a local,” the nurse said in a firm voice, “and we’ll need you to stay awake.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “Because we don’t know how severe the damage is yet.”

  “It’ll hurt, won’t it?” she said, biting her lip.

  The woman looked down at her, with a smile, and said, “Surely somebody who’s survived being kidnapped twice in one week can handle a few stitches.”

  She glared at her. “That was a cheap shot.”

  The nurse chuckled. “You’re right. It was,” she said, “but it worked. You have a temper, and it looks like it’ll be enough to keep you going.”

  A soft chuckle came from inside the room. “Not only has she got a temper but she tends to let it out at very interesting times.”

  Shelly recognized his voice at once and cried out, “Shane!” Instantly she grimaced in pain. Yet she relaxed when he gripped her hand in his firm grasp and kissed her gently on the cheek.

  “What are you doing in here?” he asked.

  “You put me here,” she said, aggrieved. “If I was at home, I could have taken care of this myself and been sleeping right now.”

  “I don’t think so,” he said, after a moment. “You need stitches, I hear.”

  “They’ll cut my hair, won’t they?” she said sadly.

  He burst out laughing. “If that’s the only thing wrong here,” he said, “I think you’ll survive.” He looked at the nurse. “How bad is it?”

  “Bad enough,” she said in a low tone.

  He said, “I’d like to take a closer look, but I don’t want to hurt her.”

  “Don’t touch it,” Shelly said immediately.

  Just then the doctor returned. “We’ll take her into the OR and do this.”

  “What?” she said, trying to sit up and to get out of bed. Only then her view of the room got woozy. She looked up at Shane and said, “Uh-oh,” and fainted.

  “That’s my girl,” Shane said, with a smile. “Can we get her done before she wakes up again?”

  “We’ll have to,” the doctor said. “She didn’t seem to be aware of the head injury, until we mentioned it to her. She just said she had a bit of a headache.”

  “She’s always had a blind spot when it comes to pain. As long as she didn’t look at a needle when going in, she was fine. The minute she saw the needle, she was out. If she didn’t look at a cut, she was fine. The minute she looked at it and washed it, she would faint.”

  The doctor and nurse just smiled, nodded. The doc said, “Now, if you’ll step outside,”—he pointed—“we’ll go get her taken care of.”

  Shane took one last look, leaned over, kissed Shelly again, and said, “Take good care of her. She’s had a hell of a week.”

  “Got it,” the doctor said cheerfully. “She’s in our hands now.”

  And, with that, Shane stepped outside the room, where Diesel waited for him.

  “How is she?”

  “Heading for surgery.”

  Diesel’s expression showed his surprise. “I didn’t realize she was hurt that bad.”

  “It’s so hard with head injuries, since they bleed so much anyway,” Shane said.

  “We got her onto the ship really fast,” Diesel said. “They’ll do the best they can for her.”

  He nodded. “She’s got a bullet burn running along her scalp. A bullet from my gun. I feel terrible about it.”

  “You don’t know that for sure. We got her away,” Diesel said. “Matter of fact, we got them both away.”

  “Speaking of which …” He turned and stepped to the one nurse sitting at her desk. “How’s Aleah doing?”

  She looked up. “Are you the father?”

  “No,” he said, “we rescued her.”

  “Ah,” the nurse said. “She’s a couple hours away from delivering.”

  “That long still?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Unless things pick up quickly,” she said, “but everything is on target.”

  “Well, that’s good news. May I see her?” She hesitated, and he said, “I just want to know that she’s okay. We went through a lot together.”

  She got up and said, “Just a minute and I’ll check.” She disappeared into another room.

 
He looked at Diesel. “It’s kind of funny. You hand them over, and then you don’t get to see them again.”

  “Nothing funny about it,” Diesel said, with a wry smile. “It’s damn frustrating.”

  The nurse came back. She had a smile on her face. “Aleah would like to see you.”

  “Me too?” asked Diesel.

  “One at a time, please,” she said.

  “Deal.”

  Shane walked into the room to see Aleah stretched out on a bed, white sheets covering her massive belly, her arm hooked up to an IV, but a smile was on her face. He walked over and squeezed her hand and asked, “How are you doing?”

  “Thanks to you,” she said, “I’m fine.”

  “And Baby is making his appearance pretty soon, huh?”

  “Well, I hope so,” she said. “This would be a nice time to have my baby, when I’m safe and secure,” she said. “Listen. Do not trust that you have this issue taken care of,” she warned him.

  “Meaning?” He sat down carefully on the edge of her bed and studied her face.

  “He’s not done,” she added. “He’ll come back after you.”

  “And you too?”

  “I hope not,” she said. “With the doctor’s help, I’ve already sent word to my father that I’m free,” she said. “I hope, with that, he can turn around and take care of this problem, so I don’t have to keep looking over my shoulder.”

  “Wouldn’t that be nice,” he said. “I’ve also told my team that you’re out and safe,” he said.

  “There was a lot of commotion here about another woman,” she said. “What was that all about?”

  “My friend was taken prisoner in New York earlier this week, courtesy of your father. I brought her with me to London to keep her safe, but one of the MI6 agents turned out to be a double agent and was helping the same guy who kidnapped you. So, when I took you to the dock,” he said, “I found out that the agent had kidnapped my friend and was at the dock also, looking to make an exchange, right after we had sent you off in the Zodiac.”

  “Oh, so that’s what it was all about,” she said. She tossed her head from side to side. “God, this nightmare just doesn’t stop.”

  “Well, I’ve got my friend back. She’s in surgery right now,” he said, “but we have to reassess and figure out what we’ll do to put a stop to this permanently.”

  She opened her eyes, looked at him “You’ll have to take him out,” she said. “I’m not one to advocate murder,” she added, “but he’ll never stop.”

  “Who? Your father? Or your kidnapper?”

  “Both.” Her expression was grim but determined.

  “Well, your father now has my sister and her family,” he said. “We’re waiting for contact, so we can make a trade, but we’re getting mixed signals on who is calling the shots.”

  “Shit,” she said, staring up at him in horror.

  He shook his head. “No, we won’t hand you over,” he said, “to your father or anyone else, but we will get my family back.”

  “Do you think it’ll be … do you know they’re still okay?”

  “Well, I certainly hope so,” he said. “There won’t be a good end to this for anybody who harms them.”

  “Meaning, you’ll run him down?”

  “I’ll run him down and take him out, whether it’s your father or your kidnapper,” he said, his voice hard. “Nobody gets to do something like that.”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I know your family is important to you, but this guy—my kidnapper—has absolutely no conscience. He wants my father to do something, and he won’t stop until it’s done, and it’s clear that my father won’t buckle.”

  “He especially won’t buckle now,” Shane said, “now that he knows that you’re free.”

  She turned her head to the side and said, “I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t,” he said. “We’re working on it right now.”

  “Please don’t hand me over,” she said again, her voice shaking with fear.

  He reached down and gripped her hands and said, “We won’t. You have my word on that.”

  She sagged in place. “Thank you,” she said. “I feel safe right now. I just don’t know where to go from here.”

  “None of us do at the moment,” he said, “but we’ll figure it out.”

  Chapter 11

  Pain woke up Shelly first, and yet it was a building pain, almost like a hammer inside her head that kept her awake. She lay here, hot tears running down her cheeks, feeling weak, just wanting to go home and to be done with this. When someone gently stroked her hand and said, “We’re upping the pain medication,” Shelly let herself sink back under with relief.

  She wanted to tell them to raise it up so high that she was put out permanently. The pain was that bad. On the other hand, when she woke the second time, maybe the drugs were working better because she wasn’t quite so badly in agony. She surfaced a third time, realizing that the room was dark, and it was either the next day or late that evening. She was completely out of sync with the world around her.

  When she shifted in the bed and tried to sit up, immediately the door opened, and a woman walked in.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I need to go to the bathroom.”

  “Actually you have a catheter in.”

  She frowned, sagging back onto the bed. She hadn’t even noticed. “I really don’t like those.”

  “Maybe not,” she said, “but you don’t need to physically go to the bathroom then.”

  Shelly sighed gently to avoid any pain. “Well, I thought I needed to,” she said, shaking her head. “Ow,” she said, reaching to hold her head.

  “Sorry about that,” the nurse said cheerfully. “If you can go back to sleep one more time,” she said, “when you wake up in the morning, we can take out the catheter. Then you can get up and maybe have a shower.”

  “The magic word,” Shelly said and stared at the woman with hope in her eyes. “Am I that much better?”

  “It wasn’t too, too bad,” she said, “but you need to give it a chance to heal a bit.”

  “Fine,” she murmured, yawning deeply. “Until next time.” And, with that, she sank back into sleep.

  When she woke up the next time, it was morning. She saw people moving around the facility through the glass panels separating her room from the others. She took a long slow deep breath, realizing that she didn’t feel too terribly bad, as long as she didn’t move too much.

  The door opened almost immediately, and the doctor stepped in. “There’s my patient,” he said, with a bright smile. “How are you doing?”

  She looked up at him. “Outside of the headache?” she asked. “I’m fine. I woke up several times in the night from the pain, but I’m feeling much better now.”

  “Good,” he said. “Let me check your head.” He did a thorough exam and then continued, “If you feel up to it, and, as long as you have somebody to help you, a shower would make you feel a lot better. Then we can get you back into bed, where you’ll stay for at least the rest of the day. I’ll want to take a look at that head wound again tonight.”

  She grinned. As he walked out, she asked, “Does that mean I can get rid of this catheter?”

  “Yep, absolutely,” he said. He disappeared, and a nurse came back in and very quickly removed the catheter and helped her to slowly stand up.

  “See if you can walk a step or two,” she said. “That’ll determine how much help we’ll need to give you for your shower.”

  Shelly got up, slowly walked around the bed, into the bathroom, took one look at her face in the mirror, and winced. “Well, I can walk,” she said, “but I look pretty scary.”

  The nurse chuckled. “I don’t know about that,” she said. “That boyfriend of yours has been in here almost constantly. As much as we would let him, at least,” she admitted. “He didn’t think you looked pretty scary at all.”

  Shelly smiled at that. “Shane’s just a friend,” she said, �
�but we’ve always been close.”

  “I don’t know about that just a friend part,” she said. “That wasn’t a just a friend look in his eyes.”

  “He probably feels guilty.” But it made her heart feel good nonetheless.

  “Says you, but I know what I saw,” the nurse replied.

  Shelly just chuckled, shrugged, and said, “He’s a good man.”

  “I would agree,” she said. “A good-looking one too.”

  “He is that. He’s always got women trolling around him all the time.”

  “But not you?” the nurse asked, with curiosity.

  “No, because we’ve been such good friends, it just wasn’t anything that we particularly wanted to change.”

  “Hell, I would have hopped into bed with him in a heartbeat,” she said with a laugh.

  Shelly smiled. “But to hop in bed with him meant to lose him, and I didn’t want to do that.”

  “You are a stronger woman than I am,” she said with a smile. “So, how are you feeling about a shower at this point?”

  “That would be awesome.”

  “If you need a hand, I’ll be in here changing your bed.”

  With that, Shelly turned on the water and sat on the edge of the bench, until she was strong enough, and then used the rails and pulled herself up and just stood here, letting the hot water slide down her body. She hadn’t realized just how much this last week had preyed on her. It had been a cycle of adrenaline rush and shock, over and over. And yet the only thing she could think of was the fact that Shane had apparently stayed here with her all night. But, if their positions had been reversed, she would have done the same.

  She did love him; she always had. They’d never taken their relationship past that because they always had other relationships in their world. She wondered if they had deliberately avoided having something between them, but it was just way too confusing to sort out.

  She did like the fact that he was here for her the whole time. And maybe that was the difference. Just the fact that they were older, and they were different, and maybe it was a better time for them to have a different sort of relationship. Anytime she thought about him, it was always with that warm, cozy feeling of somebody very special to her, and that had never changed. He was special. Always had been.