Waking up had been a gradual process for Heather. She thought her mother
was there, but she wasn't sure. It could have been a dream. The black fog
finally receded enough where she could sit up and think. It was still dark
though. No, not plain dark, nighttime. It was night. Oh. Night. So
late. They...no, she...it was just she now.
The memory of the long beep that heralded Cole's death burned into Heather's mind, making the pain in her arm and shoulder weak in comparison. She had to bite back a sob. He was gone. She wanted to scream and deny, but something made of out steel deep inside of her told her that denial was useless. He was gone and there was only one way to make it right. He was not going to have died in vain. Finish, she thought numbly. Have to finish.
Heather looked around; her head feeling like it weighed a thousand pounds. The dark wasn't affecting her vision in the slightest though as she fought to keep her mind clear and focused on what she needed to do. A gym bag was on the floor next to the chair beside her bed. She knew whom that belonged to. Heather wanted to wait for her mother to come back in, but she couldn't face her. How was she supposed to apologize to her mother for killing her favorite brother and then ask for help? No. She started this; she was going to finish it. No matter what. The key. All for the key.
Heather pulled the IV out of her hand, wincing slightly. She stumbled out of the bed, her normally graceful reflexes deserting her as the world swam around. She went to grab the edge of the bed for balance and sickeningly sharp pain jagged down her arm and across her chest, biting through the dizziness. Okay. Lesson learned. Do not use the arm.
Heather opened the bag and thanked God for Mom's background. In one gym bag were the preparations for a small war. There was no way that Heather was going to try and get a shirt on, but there were sweatpants and on the back of the chair, a long jacket. She wasn't sure if she was moving slow or fast, the medication in her body combining with pain to make most of her senses totally unreliable. She pulled on the sweatpants and slid her good arm through the jacket, wrapping it around her body. It was a little small, like most of Mom's clothes, but since she didn't have to button it, it would do. The boot-style slippers in the bag weren't exactly shoes, but they covered her feet well enough, though tight.
There was a small hidden pouch in the inner part of the bag that Heather undid and pulled out cash. Always there, always prepared. That was Mom. Heather slid out of the room so quietly that the nurse in the station who was crouched down as she did some restocking didn't hear the movement at all. She plodded down the hall, getting into the elevator as her mother was answering the last couple of questions for nurse Laurie.
The cabbie in front of the hospital was a little surprised to see a little redhead come out of the hospital and climb into his cab. He was a little irritated as well. Sure, outside of the ER was an easy enough place to pick up a fare, but he was due to knock off in ten minutes. That's why he was at the front of the hospital and not by the ER. Since the wife had gone to the night shift at the diner, as long as he got home in time, he was actually coming home to a hot dinner instead of reheated leftovers and he was looking forward to the roast she had taken out when he left home that day.
The cabbie looked in the rearview mirror and decided this girl wasn't going to be going for a ride in his cab. Sure, a kid looking this drugged wasn't unusual coming out of the ER, but she had come out of the front entrance. Mental patient, he decided. It happened from time to time. And then the girl pushed a hundred dollar bill through the slot. It wasn't Monopoly money or a piece of paper with numbers scribbled on it. Mr. Franklin himself was grinning knowingly at the cabbie and the cabbie grinned back.
"Where d'ya wanna go?" the cabbie asked and the girl tiredly gave him an address. He debated again for a second. That was not an area to drop off a little thing like her all doped up. Money was money, but the man had two daughters of his own. "You sure?" he asked. "You looking like I should be dropping you off, not picking you up, you know?"
She smiled weakly. "I broke my arm," she said. "I have friends waiting for me there and they're going to get real worried soon. That's enough for a fare, right?"
"That and then some." Great. Kid wasn't a native. Not with that accent. The cabbie had seen this story a million times and wondered who had broken her arm. She was very pretty under all the stress lines. Probably came here to be a model and ended up with the wrong set.
"Good. Rest is yours if you can get me there quick. Don't want to worry anyone." The cabbie sighed, knowing that no speech in the world was going to help her until she decided to help herself. Wasn't his business in any anyways. That's what social working kinds of people were there for. He pulled away smoothly from the hospital's entrance, heading towards the address she wanted to be taken to.
Upstairs on the seventh floor, all hell was breaking loose, but Heather didn't know that. She let her head fall back against the seat, her energy reserves extinguished. He thinks I'm a junkie needing a fix, Heather thought about the cabbie. Maybe a hooker going back to her pimp. He wasn't too far off on that thought. She had sold her body and going back to the man she had done it for. Not sex, no, but oh, there were worse things than selling your body for sex. There was...there was...
Victoria.
Poor Victoria. Even now there was room for pity. Victoria didn't know what was happening. But she had something they needed. When Heather had suggested the plan to Cole, even he remarked how oddly cold-blooded it was for her. Heather had just shrugged and said that the ends justified the means. And couldn't it get fixed later? Wipe it out and make like it never happened? Cole thought about it and yes, it was possible. With some pharmaceutical help it would be pretty easy. And since they knew about her and alcohol, the set up was too perfect.
So they had done what they did and it was time to pay for their sins. They would have fixed it. That was the plan. But they had been surprised with what they could get from Victoria. Neither of them had realized what she had in her. And then it was theirs and time was critical. They had to make it look like an impetuous thing, like they had run off together in a moment of foolish passion. And then they could get there early, make the switch and nobody would be any wiser. The key was the key and it would make a lot of things happen once that lock was undone.
Heather could remember Cole's laughter at the room. He was so glad he wasn't going to have to live in a mess after tomorrow. Keeping everything just right was critical, but it was driving them both crazy to have those nasty cartons of take-out sitting on the dresser. She didn't want to pack those rags she was referring to as clothing, but this had to be done right or else. There wasn't going to be a second chance at this. Oddly enough, it wasn't the watchers. It was Victoria's wailing that was going to have to be dead on and if she thought something was odd, then Dominick was going to suspect as well.
They both heard the car come screeching into the parking lot, but ignored it. There were lots of tires screeching in and out of this place. It seemed to be a hotspot of extramarital trysts. Lots of people screaming they'd kill someone as tires peeled out and a lover escaped being shot by the skin of his or her teeth. Then there was a knock at their door. The maid had been in the other room. She must have been there to clean. That was what they assumed when Cole opened the door.
Everything moved in slow motion at that point. Heather had been looking down into her purse making sure the key to the bus station locker was still hidden in the lining. Her phone was still in hand. The first gun shot. Cole being thrown backwards. Victoria screaming as she stepped into the room, her gun swinging towards Heather. Cole throwing himself in between Victoria and Heather. More shots. Grabbing her gun from the bedside drawer. Cole falling. Pain in her arm and shoulder. One more shot. Victoria flying back, half her head missing. The air misty with fine blood droplets. Everywhere. Blood everywhere...
"Lady?" The cabbie's voice brought Heather back to the present. "Hey, lady, we're here." He looked around. Sure, this wasn't his business, but she was just a kid. "You know, this ain't the best area at night. You sure you don't want to go somewhere else?"
"It's okay," Heather said softly as she painfully got out of the cab. The cabbie watched her walk between two buildings and disappear into the dark before he drove off. He thought that maybe he should call the hospital anyways, but then there was the matter of his tip. That was one nice tip she had just given him and he earned it by doing exactly what she wanted. He didn't need no bleeding heart trying to take it from him, claiming coercion or something. He was just trying to make a living after all. Nah...it was time to go home and have dinner and not show this bill to the wife.
Heather was grateful that the cabbie didn't try to "rescue" her. Rescue. Wouldn't that have been a comedy? She stumbled onward, hoping nobody would try to mug her or anything. She didn't have any reserves left for defense. Hell, she was going to be lucky to get where she was going. But from the way she was stumbling more than walking, any observers would think she had just spent her last two dollars on cheap booze and had nothing left for them.
The correct door finally loomed ahead and Heather practically fell into it. She hit it limply a few times with her good arm, gritting her teeth against the pain that motion was causing through the rest of her body. Her hand was damp. Blood. She was bleeding again. It didn't matter. There was a long moment of silence and Heather thought she was going to start crying. What if it wasn't that night, but the one after? What if she was a day off? No. They had to be there. Had to be...
The door almost flew open, yanking Heather forward into the dark interior. Strong arms caught her before she could hit the ground. She could sense more than see the cluster of men around her all of a sudden. Her vision cleared and she was looking into the dark brown eyes of the man holding her up.
"Heather?" Special Agent Tynell Chambers gasped. "Oh dear God, what happened? Where's Cole?"
She was fighting to stay conscious, but at the mention of his name, a wordless agony gutted her, forcing out a small sob. Ty could see those ice- blue eyes glaze with tears, pain echoing out of them. His stomach clinched. He knew. Nothing else needed to be said. He knew.
"Victoria," she whispered finally. "She...and Cole...before I could do anything, she..." a sob broke through her words, ending any chance of a coherent explanation.
The other men in the room knew exactly why she was upset. Their knowledge was the reason they had been selected for this assignment. Two days after Daniel's article had hit the stand, an extremely bad situation for HRT had developed. Months before, a very wealthy and powerful man in Africa had gotten bored with collecting the usual things. Nothing was interesting or unique enough to suit him anymore. He wanted something none of his friends could boast of having. He chose to collect members of law enforcement. One person representing each organization would do. He had been at it for months, picking up a London Bobby, a member of the NYPD and a Beijing police officer. Seeing them in uniform in their glass prisons was too thrilling to ever think of giving up.
His next sight was on the FBI, specifically a member of the elite HRT. A hostage situation was faked and led to five members of HRT being captured. Unfortunately, the truly unique specimen, the only female, was killed in the capture. The collector's men were shooting at her and she fell off of the roof of a four-story building. They had looked over the edge and she was face down in the concrete. Must be dead, they decided. Their bad.
Heather would have called for backup and gone by procedure. But the boat bringing the collector was there and he was going to select someone and take him away. There wasn't time for backup. There was only time for her to go all-out. Inside, the collector was trying to decide and not a soul expected the "dead" agent to come crashing through a skylight, dropping thirty feet onto concrete and landing lightly. Three men aimed guns at her, but a casual glance in their direction and all three of them were off their feet, crashing violently into the cinderblock walls behind them. That got some of the remaining henchmen running for the safety of the boat and the rest quickly learned how good Heather was at hand-to-hand combat. The collector got away, but what the other HRT agents inside never knew was that a young CIA agent wondered many times over the course of his later career why he was sent out to sink a yacht in the middle of the ocean with all hands on board. But when you get a direct order from Xander Brickman, it's a matter of do and never question why.
Later, the four HRT agents that had witnessed Heather in action were briefed on what they saw. They had all read the article in "The Truth" and more than suspected. Heather confirmed it. In a way it soothed some male egos as to why a woman passed the requirements and could beat out some of them in physical tests. Heather held her tongue and didn't mention she could beat them all if she wanted. But they did want to know if Ty knew. Ty had thought many times over the last ten months what would happen if Heather were found out. He had debated on all the possibilities, but never knew what he would do. Now it was decision time. When he was asked if he knew, he told them that he hadn't known until after she had completed HRT training, but yes, he had known since then. They wanted to know if there were any other transgenics in the Bureau. Heather refused to answer. Ty finally answered and said that there were a total of three including himself and Heather.
That admission had been far more startling than knowing about Heather. They had known Ty for years and never suspected he was anything but an above-average person and leader. Heather supposed them knowing she wasn't a "freak" and was as normal as Ty helped them deal with it. And since it was out among a very select group in HRT, Heather didn't have to hold back anymore when she was with just them. It certainly made things more interesting. And now, when it came time for this assignment, those four agents were the natural selection since Cole was also to be involved.
Heather could hear the noises of sympathy being made around her, which coming from men consisted more of a few obscenities followed with, "sorry, that really sucks". She was being laid back, a pillow of sorts under her head. And then she heard Ty say that they were going to have to abort. Heather's eyes flew open and she gripped Ty fiercely, both physically and kinetically.
"No," she snarled, her words separated by painful gasps as she continued, "He didn't die for nothing, Ty. We finish it."
"Heather, you two were the only way around it," Ty said more calmly than he really felt. Of course he wanted to finish! He had lost his brother and he wanted to salvage something from that, but there was no way he was going to send four more men to their deaths. The odds of success were impossible now. They were going to have to figure out something else.
"We were leaving early," Heather choked out. "Victoria came because we were leaving early."
Ty blinked. Cole risk a timeline? Unheard of. Simply unthinkable.
Everything was getting blurry and gray again, but Heather forced out the words. "We could leave early because we had the key."
The oxygen level in the room dropped as the men gasped. Impossible. Couldn't be. They weren't even sure what they were looking for, but these two found it and got it away from its keepers? They couldn't. Except...except this was Heather. And she excelled at the impossible, didn't she? Heather's eyes were drifting closed again.
"Heather?" Tynell called urgently from a million miles away. He patted her face lightly. "Heather, where's the key? You can rest all you want in a minute, but I need to know where the key is."
Her eyes opened briefly and the bitterest of smiles crossed her lips. "The key," she muttered and then let out a harsh, brittle little laugh. "Is me."
Heather's eyes shut again and for a while, all was darkness.
The memory of the long beep that heralded Cole's death burned into Heather's mind, making the pain in her arm and shoulder weak in comparison. She had to bite back a sob. He was gone. She wanted to scream and deny, but something made of out steel deep inside of her told her that denial was useless. He was gone and there was only one way to make it right. He was not going to have died in vain. Finish, she thought numbly. Have to finish.
Heather looked around; her head feeling like it weighed a thousand pounds. The dark wasn't affecting her vision in the slightest though as she fought to keep her mind clear and focused on what she needed to do. A gym bag was on the floor next to the chair beside her bed. She knew whom that belonged to. Heather wanted to wait for her mother to come back in, but she couldn't face her. How was she supposed to apologize to her mother for killing her favorite brother and then ask for help? No. She started this; she was going to finish it. No matter what. The key. All for the key.
Heather pulled the IV out of her hand, wincing slightly. She stumbled out of the bed, her normally graceful reflexes deserting her as the world swam around. She went to grab the edge of the bed for balance and sickeningly sharp pain jagged down her arm and across her chest, biting through the dizziness. Okay. Lesson learned. Do not use the arm.
Heather opened the bag and thanked God for Mom's background. In one gym bag were the preparations for a small war. There was no way that Heather was going to try and get a shirt on, but there were sweatpants and on the back of the chair, a long jacket. She wasn't sure if she was moving slow or fast, the medication in her body combining with pain to make most of her senses totally unreliable. She pulled on the sweatpants and slid her good arm through the jacket, wrapping it around her body. It was a little small, like most of Mom's clothes, but since she didn't have to button it, it would do. The boot-style slippers in the bag weren't exactly shoes, but they covered her feet well enough, though tight.
There was a small hidden pouch in the inner part of the bag that Heather undid and pulled out cash. Always there, always prepared. That was Mom. Heather slid out of the room so quietly that the nurse in the station who was crouched down as she did some restocking didn't hear the movement at all. She plodded down the hall, getting into the elevator as her mother was answering the last couple of questions for nurse Laurie.
The cabbie in front of the hospital was a little surprised to see a little redhead come out of the hospital and climb into his cab. He was a little irritated as well. Sure, outside of the ER was an easy enough place to pick up a fare, but he was due to knock off in ten minutes. That's why he was at the front of the hospital and not by the ER. Since the wife had gone to the night shift at the diner, as long as he got home in time, he was actually coming home to a hot dinner instead of reheated leftovers and he was looking forward to the roast she had taken out when he left home that day.
The cabbie looked in the rearview mirror and decided this girl wasn't going to be going for a ride in his cab. Sure, a kid looking this drugged wasn't unusual coming out of the ER, but she had come out of the front entrance. Mental patient, he decided. It happened from time to time. And then the girl pushed a hundred dollar bill through the slot. It wasn't Monopoly money or a piece of paper with numbers scribbled on it. Mr. Franklin himself was grinning knowingly at the cabbie and the cabbie grinned back.
"Where d'ya wanna go?" the cabbie asked and the girl tiredly gave him an address. He debated again for a second. That was not an area to drop off a little thing like her all doped up. Money was money, but the man had two daughters of his own. "You sure?" he asked. "You looking like I should be dropping you off, not picking you up, you know?"
She smiled weakly. "I broke my arm," she said. "I have friends waiting for me there and they're going to get real worried soon. That's enough for a fare, right?"
"That and then some." Great. Kid wasn't a native. Not with that accent. The cabbie had seen this story a million times and wondered who had broken her arm. She was very pretty under all the stress lines. Probably came here to be a model and ended up with the wrong set.
"Good. Rest is yours if you can get me there quick. Don't want to worry anyone." The cabbie sighed, knowing that no speech in the world was going to help her until she decided to help herself. Wasn't his business in any anyways. That's what social working kinds of people were there for. He pulled away smoothly from the hospital's entrance, heading towards the address she wanted to be taken to.
Upstairs on the seventh floor, all hell was breaking loose, but Heather didn't know that. She let her head fall back against the seat, her energy reserves extinguished. He thinks I'm a junkie needing a fix, Heather thought about the cabbie. Maybe a hooker going back to her pimp. He wasn't too far off on that thought. She had sold her body and going back to the man she had done it for. Not sex, no, but oh, there were worse things than selling your body for sex. There was...there was...
Victoria.
Poor Victoria. Even now there was room for pity. Victoria didn't know what was happening. But she had something they needed. When Heather had suggested the plan to Cole, even he remarked how oddly cold-blooded it was for her. Heather had just shrugged and said that the ends justified the means. And couldn't it get fixed later? Wipe it out and make like it never happened? Cole thought about it and yes, it was possible. With some pharmaceutical help it would be pretty easy. And since they knew about her and alcohol, the set up was too perfect.
So they had done what they did and it was time to pay for their sins. They would have fixed it. That was the plan. But they had been surprised with what they could get from Victoria. Neither of them had realized what she had in her. And then it was theirs and time was critical. They had to make it look like an impetuous thing, like they had run off together in a moment of foolish passion. And then they could get there early, make the switch and nobody would be any wiser. The key was the key and it would make a lot of things happen once that lock was undone.
Heather could remember Cole's laughter at the room. He was so glad he wasn't going to have to live in a mess after tomorrow. Keeping everything just right was critical, but it was driving them both crazy to have those nasty cartons of take-out sitting on the dresser. She didn't want to pack those rags she was referring to as clothing, but this had to be done right or else. There wasn't going to be a second chance at this. Oddly enough, it wasn't the watchers. It was Victoria's wailing that was going to have to be dead on and if she thought something was odd, then Dominick was going to suspect as well.
They both heard the car come screeching into the parking lot, but ignored it. There were lots of tires screeching in and out of this place. It seemed to be a hotspot of extramarital trysts. Lots of people screaming they'd kill someone as tires peeled out and a lover escaped being shot by the skin of his or her teeth. Then there was a knock at their door. The maid had been in the other room. She must have been there to clean. That was what they assumed when Cole opened the door.
Everything moved in slow motion at that point. Heather had been looking down into her purse making sure the key to the bus station locker was still hidden in the lining. Her phone was still in hand. The first gun shot. Cole being thrown backwards. Victoria screaming as she stepped into the room, her gun swinging towards Heather. Cole throwing himself in between Victoria and Heather. More shots. Grabbing her gun from the bedside drawer. Cole falling. Pain in her arm and shoulder. One more shot. Victoria flying back, half her head missing. The air misty with fine blood droplets. Everywhere. Blood everywhere...
"Lady?" The cabbie's voice brought Heather back to the present. "Hey, lady, we're here." He looked around. Sure, this wasn't his business, but she was just a kid. "You know, this ain't the best area at night. You sure you don't want to go somewhere else?"
"It's okay," Heather said softly as she painfully got out of the cab. The cabbie watched her walk between two buildings and disappear into the dark before he drove off. He thought that maybe he should call the hospital anyways, but then there was the matter of his tip. That was one nice tip she had just given him and he earned it by doing exactly what she wanted. He didn't need no bleeding heart trying to take it from him, claiming coercion or something. He was just trying to make a living after all. Nah...it was time to go home and have dinner and not show this bill to the wife.
Heather was grateful that the cabbie didn't try to "rescue" her. Rescue. Wouldn't that have been a comedy? She stumbled onward, hoping nobody would try to mug her or anything. She didn't have any reserves left for defense. Hell, she was going to be lucky to get where she was going. But from the way she was stumbling more than walking, any observers would think she had just spent her last two dollars on cheap booze and had nothing left for them.
The correct door finally loomed ahead and Heather practically fell into it. She hit it limply a few times with her good arm, gritting her teeth against the pain that motion was causing through the rest of her body. Her hand was damp. Blood. She was bleeding again. It didn't matter. There was a long moment of silence and Heather thought she was going to start crying. What if it wasn't that night, but the one after? What if she was a day off? No. They had to be there. Had to be...
The door almost flew open, yanking Heather forward into the dark interior. Strong arms caught her before she could hit the ground. She could sense more than see the cluster of men around her all of a sudden. Her vision cleared and she was looking into the dark brown eyes of the man holding her up.
"Heather?" Special Agent Tynell Chambers gasped. "Oh dear God, what happened? Where's Cole?"
She was fighting to stay conscious, but at the mention of his name, a wordless agony gutted her, forcing out a small sob. Ty could see those ice- blue eyes glaze with tears, pain echoing out of them. His stomach clinched. He knew. Nothing else needed to be said. He knew.
"Victoria," she whispered finally. "She...and Cole...before I could do anything, she..." a sob broke through her words, ending any chance of a coherent explanation.
The other men in the room knew exactly why she was upset. Their knowledge was the reason they had been selected for this assignment. Two days after Daniel's article had hit the stand, an extremely bad situation for HRT had developed. Months before, a very wealthy and powerful man in Africa had gotten bored with collecting the usual things. Nothing was interesting or unique enough to suit him anymore. He wanted something none of his friends could boast of having. He chose to collect members of law enforcement. One person representing each organization would do. He had been at it for months, picking up a London Bobby, a member of the NYPD and a Beijing police officer. Seeing them in uniform in their glass prisons was too thrilling to ever think of giving up.
His next sight was on the FBI, specifically a member of the elite HRT. A hostage situation was faked and led to five members of HRT being captured. Unfortunately, the truly unique specimen, the only female, was killed in the capture. The collector's men were shooting at her and she fell off of the roof of a four-story building. They had looked over the edge and she was face down in the concrete. Must be dead, they decided. Their bad.
Heather would have called for backup and gone by procedure. But the boat bringing the collector was there and he was going to select someone and take him away. There wasn't time for backup. There was only time for her to go all-out. Inside, the collector was trying to decide and not a soul expected the "dead" agent to come crashing through a skylight, dropping thirty feet onto concrete and landing lightly. Three men aimed guns at her, but a casual glance in their direction and all three of them were off their feet, crashing violently into the cinderblock walls behind them. That got some of the remaining henchmen running for the safety of the boat and the rest quickly learned how good Heather was at hand-to-hand combat. The collector got away, but what the other HRT agents inside never knew was that a young CIA agent wondered many times over the course of his later career why he was sent out to sink a yacht in the middle of the ocean with all hands on board. But when you get a direct order from Xander Brickman, it's a matter of do and never question why.
Later, the four HRT agents that had witnessed Heather in action were briefed on what they saw. They had all read the article in "The Truth" and more than suspected. Heather confirmed it. In a way it soothed some male egos as to why a woman passed the requirements and could beat out some of them in physical tests. Heather held her tongue and didn't mention she could beat them all if she wanted. But they did want to know if Ty knew. Ty had thought many times over the last ten months what would happen if Heather were found out. He had debated on all the possibilities, but never knew what he would do. Now it was decision time. When he was asked if he knew, he told them that he hadn't known until after she had completed HRT training, but yes, he had known since then. They wanted to know if there were any other transgenics in the Bureau. Heather refused to answer. Ty finally answered and said that there were a total of three including himself and Heather.
That admission had been far more startling than knowing about Heather. They had known Ty for years and never suspected he was anything but an above-average person and leader. Heather supposed them knowing she wasn't a "freak" and was as normal as Ty helped them deal with it. And since it was out among a very select group in HRT, Heather didn't have to hold back anymore when she was with just them. It certainly made things more interesting. And now, when it came time for this assignment, those four agents were the natural selection since Cole was also to be involved.
Heather could hear the noises of sympathy being made around her, which coming from men consisted more of a few obscenities followed with, "sorry, that really sucks". She was being laid back, a pillow of sorts under her head. And then she heard Ty say that they were going to have to abort. Heather's eyes flew open and she gripped Ty fiercely, both physically and kinetically.
"No," she snarled, her words separated by painful gasps as she continued, "He didn't die for nothing, Ty. We finish it."
"Heather, you two were the only way around it," Ty said more calmly than he really felt. Of course he wanted to finish! He had lost his brother and he wanted to salvage something from that, but there was no way he was going to send four more men to their deaths. The odds of success were impossible now. They were going to have to figure out something else.
"We were leaving early," Heather choked out. "Victoria came because we were leaving early."
Ty blinked. Cole risk a timeline? Unheard of. Simply unthinkable.
Everything was getting blurry and gray again, but Heather forced out the words. "We could leave early because we had the key."
The oxygen level in the room dropped as the men gasped. Impossible. Couldn't be. They weren't even sure what they were looking for, but these two found it and got it away from its keepers? They couldn't. Except...except this was Heather. And she excelled at the impossible, didn't she? Heather's eyes were drifting closed again.
"Heather?" Tynell called urgently from a million miles away. He patted her face lightly. "Heather, where's the key? You can rest all you want in a minute, but I need to know where the key is."
Her eyes opened briefly and the bitterest of smiles crossed her lips. "The key," she muttered and then let out a harsh, brittle little laugh. "Is me."
Heather's eyes shut again and for a while, all was darkness.