Kelly McKenny stood on the sidewalk outside the Greek hospital and looked around trying to figure out what her next move was going to be when a black SUV pulled to the curb. The passenger window came down and a voice from inside said, "Get in, Mrs. McKenny." She bent down and looked into the vehicle and looked at the man in the driver's seat.
At first she didn't recognize him, then her memory unfogged and she nodded and opened the door, getting into the passenger seat.
"What are you doing in Greece?" She asked.
"I heard about your accident and I was on my way to the hospital to see if there was anything I could do to help," the man answered. "I'm sorry about your family. We all are."
"Yeah...I'll bet," she said sarcastically.
The man looked at her and smiled wanly. "You're very important to us, Mrs. McKenny. Of course we are concerned." He pulled away from the curb and into the busy street.
"Where are you taking me?" Kelly asked.
"Well, I assumed you'd want to go back to your hotel and put on some clothes," the man chuckled.
"Then what?" She asked. "I doubt you came over here just to visit me and pay your respects."
"I figured you might need a hand with arrangements," the man answered. Kelly was surprised to hear sincerity in his voice. "I'm sure you have never had to deal with something like this before and customs in these matters can be a pain in the ass."
Kelly nodded. "You're right. I don't know what to do. I hadn't thought that far ahead yet."
"I'm assuming you want to take your family back to the States."
"Yes...of course," she said. She was still somewhat curious as to why she didn't feel more sadness than she did. "Maybe I'm just in shock and it will hit me later," she thought to herself.
"Do you know where they are?" The man asked as he turned into the entry drive of a posh hotel.
Kelly looked at the front of the building and wondered why it didn't look at all familiar.
"Mrs. McKenny?" The man said.
"Yes...I'm sorry. Actually I didn't stick around the hospital long enough to ask", she answered.
"No problem. I'll call them and find out."
He pulled up to the front door and a valet came around and opened his door at the same time a doorman opened Kelly's door. The doorman tried to hide his curiosity at her attire but she saw it and lowered her head, embarrassed. The man who had picked her up came around the SUV and placed his hand on her elbow and escorted her into the hotel lobby.
Kelly walked up to the front desk. When the clerk came up to her she asked, "May I have the key to my room, please? Room 412." She was surprised that even though the hotel didn't look at all familiar she knew the room number.
"Yes, of course, ma'am." The desk clerk nodded and turned around, plucked a key out of the coinciding mail slot and turned back around, handing Kelly the key. "We're all very sorry about your loss, ma'am," he said softly.
Kelly looked at him and smiled politely. "Thank you."
"If there's anything at all we can do for you..." the clerk said.
"Thank you," Kelly said simply, turned and started walking towards the elevators. She and the man who had picked her up got into one of the elevators when the door opened and rode to the forth floor in silence.
Kelly opened the door to her suite and stepped inside. She looked around. There was a vague sense of familiarity but it was very vague. She dropped the room key on the table by the door and went straight into the bedroom.
"I'll call the hospital while you're freshening up," the man said.
Kelly opened the closet and looked inside. There were a few men's clothes and some women's clothes, but none of them seemed familiar. She chose an outfit and laid it on the bed and went into the bathroom where she turned on the water in the shower, discarded the lab coat, hospital gowns and booties, untied her hair and stepped under the hot water. As she stood in the shower and let the hot water flood over her she thought about her first day in the Organization as if it was yesterday.
She had been recruited because of her Immortality although it had taken several months for her to decide to accept their offer. She was one of four Immortals who were employed by the Organization. They worked side by side with 90 mortals whose job was to make sure that evil Immortals didn't survive. The Organization believed that it didn't necessarily have to "be only one" as long as the "good" ones prevailed. The Organization was also experimenting with ways to turn those "evil" Immortals into "good" Immortals. They didn't want to kill all Immortals because, "Immortals are a necessary part of history. They see more than most historians."
At first Kelly worked along side of the medical research team, and then she was transferred to field operations where she and a mortal teamed up to track certain problem Immortals. When they located their assignment they turned the case over to another specialized team who would neutralize the problem (which Kelly was led to believe meant that the Immortal was taken to their medical facility where attempts were made to change them.). Once an Immortal had been located and the Neutralization team took over, there always seemed to be another assignment that needed immediate attention and Kelly never had the time to follow the process after the case left her hands.
Kelly got out of the shower, dried off and donned one of the hotel robes. She went back into the bedroom and dressed. She ran a comb through her short strawberry blond hair and walked into the front room of the suite. There was a door on the opposite side of the front room that was open and she absentmindedly walked over to it and looked inside.
It was another bedroom with two single beds in it. Each bed had an open suitcase sitting on a luggage stand at its foot. She walked over and glanced at the contents of the suitcases. It was children's' clothing. She reached in one and pulled out a sweater and held it up and looked at it. It was Laurie's her mind told her. She smelled of it. There was no tug at her heart at the scent of her stepdaughter. She set it down and picked up a t-shirt from the other suitcase and she smelled it. Mark had worn this shirt since it had been laundered and his scent was strong, but still no tug at her heart. She replaced it and frowned at her lack of emotions. Finally she turned and left the room.
The man who had picked her up was still on the phone and he looked at her as she came out of the children's room. She had a frown on her face and he wondered if she was holding back her emotions to appear strong for him.
Kelly went to the large sliding glass door that opened out onto an ample terrace. She slid it open and walked out into the warm air. She took a seat in one of the chaise lounges and watched a small cloud change shapes in the afternoon sky. She could hear the man's voice inside the suite, although she couldn't make out what he was saying.
When Kelly married Brian McKenny, who was a mortal researcher for the Organization, they put her on "on call" status which meant she was called in to assist a tracking team who was falling behind in their case load, unable to track an assignment or was in trouble of some sort. This was so she could spend more time with her new family.
Kelly could not remember a time when any of her superiors ever treated her unkind or showed her any disrespect. Working for the Organization was satisfying and she felt like she was doing something meaningful for her kind.
Robert Woods, the man on the phone, was the Vice President in charge of the Western U.S. Division. She had sat in meetings with him, had a few business lunches with him and other team members, even invited him to dinner a couple of times after a late night on the job. But she would never had thought him to be the kind of boss who would drop everything to fly to Greece to assist an employee in her current situation. And she definitely never thought she was that valuable an employee to warrant the kind of treatment she was getting. Brian, yes...but he was a researcher...she was only a tracker.
Kelly suddenly felt very tired, the stress of the day catching up to her. She closed her eyes to rest until Woods got off the phone and almost immediately fell asleep. Again her dreams were filled with people she didn't know and places she had never been.
TO BE CONTINUED