Well, here's the next chapter. I believe it should answer certain questions raised in some of your reviews. :) Enjoy, and please review. There will be two more chapters to go after this one, so stick around!
Chapter 13
3:45 p.m.
Considering how it was October in the mountains and how they'd been in a torrential downpour this time yesterday, Liz was very surprised to feel the sun beating down on the back of her neck. She could almost feel the skin burning. She reached up, pulling her messy bun tighter on top of her head.
They were in kind of a messy situation at the moment. She, Nikki, Greg Posey, and a rookie agent of Posey's—Paul, or Pete, or something, Liz couldn't really remember—had been staking out all four corners of the cabin all afternoon. They'd been positioned in such a way that there was no way Shore could sneak past them unnoticed.
And yet, that's exactly what had happened. About twenty minutes ago, Ralph Shore had taken them all by surprise. He had somehow made them before he'd made an attempt to enter the cabin. Or at least, he'd made the rookie agent. In hindsight, Liz didn't really understand why David or Colby hadn't stayed behind instead of this newbie. That had been a mistake, but oh well. Nothing could be done about that now.
Liz, having been at the cabin's opposite corner, hadn't seen exactly what went down. She'd just heard what had been relayed via radio, but that hadn't been all that clear. All she knew was all she needed to know—which was that now somehow Shore had taken the rookie agent hostage and was now standing just inside the rear entrance of the cabin holding the agent at gunpoint. Liz and Posey were facing him a few feet away from the cabin, and Nikki stood at the front door on the other side of the cabin. They were trying very hard to talk Shore down without shooting him.
"Do you think I'm stupid?" Shore was saying. "Do you think I'm honestly just going to let this guy go here just because you're asking me to? Believe me, I know what awaits me the second I give you guys control. You're going to take me to jail, and it'll be all over."
"Look, it doesn't have to be that bad," Liz pleaded. She considered her next statement carefully before saying it. "Okay? We found Agent Eppes a little while ago, and he's alive. You haven't killed anyone yet. Don't make it worse now."
"Oh, please!" Shore scoffed. "I kidnapped a federal agent, and I'm sure you'll get some prosecuting attorney out there to stick attempted murder on me as well. I'm assuming those are fairly serious charges. I think it's already worse, as you say."
Damn. This guy was obviously too smart to fall for her logically flawed arguments. She was obviously going to have to find a new way to convince this son-of-a-bitch to surrender.
"Well, maybe that's true," Liz agreed, "but this won't work either. You can't stand there with him forever. I've seen this so many times before, and it always ends the same way. You either land your ass in a jail cell, or you end up with a hole in your head."
"I don't plan to go to jail," Shore said, matter-of-factly. "Jail has never been part of my plan."
"Your plan?" Liz ventured. "You mean your revenge plan for Agent Eppes? What exactly was your plan, anyway?"
Shore fixed her with a hard look. "Look. Agent Eppes shot and killed my brother ten years ago. Then he the nerve to interrogate me, trying to dig up information on my brother. I don't know, maybe he was trying to justify what he did to my brother. Then, several weeks ago, he shows up at the hospital where I work, bringing another agent into the ER for treatment. I saw him, and I recognized him right away. I met his eyes once, and there was not one hint, not so much as a tiny flicker of recognition there. He had no idea who I was."
Unfortunately, that happened a lot. FBI agents dealt with a lot of cases; there was no way they could remember every single family member of every single victim or suspect they ever came in contact with.
Also, Liz remembered the instance he was talking about. About six weeks ago, a raid had gone bad. They'd lost one agent, and a few others had been wounded. Don had taken another agent suffering a minor gunshot wound to the ER—the one at UCLA Medical Center where Shore was a security guard.
"So that's when you decided it was time to get even," Liz filled in.
"Yes, that's precisely it, Agent," Shore spat sardonically. "That's when I knew that Agent Eppes held absolutely no remorse for what he'd done."
Liz had to hold back a scoff. Don hated killing people, no matter how low-down and scum-of-the-earth they were. Don hated pulling the trigger almost more than any agent she knew. Don wasn't a very outwardly emotional guy, Liz knew that from personal experience, but she also knew that he let things eat him up inside sometimes.
"There's always remorse," Liz said softly. "Every agent feels remorse, but we can't let it stop us from doing our job. But believe me, we don't like having to shoot people. Ever. I mean look at this, here. Why do you think you're still breathing? You're holding a gun on an agent. I'd be perfectly within the bounds of the law to shoot you right here, right now. But I would really rather not do that. And I won't, unless you force me to."
"Ha!" Shore smiled maliciously. "The reason you're not shooting me is because you know if you did, then your agent here would be dead."
Well, yes, that was true. Liz had to hand it to this guy, he was pretty smart. Wonder why he's spent his life as a security guard? He probably could have done anything he wanted to.
"That's right," she admitted. "I'm just trying to keep everyone here alive. I don't want anyone to die here today."
"Well, Agent, uh . . ." Shore trailed off.
"Warner," Liz supplied. "Special Agent Liz Warner."
"Well, Agent Warner," Shore continued. "I'm not delusional; I realize there's no way in hell you would ever just let me walk away from this."
"Then be smart about this," Liz implored him. "You have a choice here. The only reason we're all here right now is because you feel your brother didn't deserve what happened to him. Do you really want the same thing to happen to you?"
Shore didn't respond. He simply looked at her, as if he expected her to say more.
So she did. "Look. You're not a criminal. You've never done anything like this before. You didn't pull this off like you expected to because you're inexperienced when it comes to committing felonies, and that's how we found you. But now you still have a chance to make one more choice here. And I know you're smart enough to make the right one. So please, just put the gun down."
Shore kept staring at her. "I do have a choice here, don't I?"
Liz could recognize the tone in his voice and the look in his eyes as well as she could recognize her own face in a mirror. She lifted her gun higher, as she saw Shore point his gun at the young agent's temple.
"I can't go to jail, Agent Warner," Shore announced. "You're right, I'm not a hardened criminal. You and I both know what prison would be like for a guy like me."
She saw his finger twitch, and heard the sound of a gun being fired. Shore and the agent both toppled to the ground. The agent scrambled out from underneath Shore's body, and across the floor, standing up once he reached the door.
Liz looked up to see Nikki, standing at the opposite door, her gun still raised to the spot Shore had previously stood. A thin, wispy tail of smoke snaked upwards from the gun's barrel.
Nikki caught Liz's eye, and the two locked gazes in silent understanding. Liz silently thanked Nikki for performing the deed, and she caught Nikki's silent message of it had to be done.
It had to be done. And now they had a job to do, no matter how defeated Liz felt. But somehow, she felt her spirits lift ever so slightly as she realized that at least no agents had died here today—not this poor inexperienced rookie who'd just nearly had his head blown off, and most importantly, not Don.
4:55 p.m.
A thick fog swirled in his brain. It made it difficult for him to concentrate on any one thought. He kind of had an inkling of where he was. He'd been here before, in this fog. Maybe if he could remember more about the last time, then he could figure out what was happening now.
Think, Don, think. There'd been fog in his head. It had happened before. Why? What had happened after the fog?
After the fog. After the fog . . . what?
After the fog maybe there'd been sounds. No, he couldn't really remember. Had someone been there? Maybe.
No wait, someone had to have been there. He had this impression of a hand. His hand, another hand. Fingers. His fingers finding another hand, just barely brushing it. Where were the fingers now? No wait, not fingers. His fingers, someone else's hand. Where was the hand?
Whose hand? It had been rough and large. Probably not Robin's, then. Hers was soft, with long, bony fingers. Probably wasn't Charlie's, either. His hands were smaller and smooth and perpetually covered with chalk dust. Dad's? Okay, that made sense.
That made a lot of sense, now that he thought about it.
"Good book?"
"I've read better."
Definitely Dad's. Maybe he should look for Dad's hand now. He tried to reach his right hand out to begin his search. It didn't move; it was being pinned to his chest somehow. Well, that's what he had a left hand for.
It seemed to work. He shifted his left hand over. Interesting. He noticed there was already a weight resting on it—a weight which squeezed it gently.
"Donnie?"
Success. That was definitely Dad's voice. Dad was really the only one who ever called him Donnie.
"Donnie? I know you're awake. Come on, son. Open your eyes, please."
It almost sounded like Dad was pleading with him. Begging him. He'd better open his eyes. Something was clearly wrong. When things were wrong, he often had to fix things. He'd better open his eyes and fix whatever was wrong. It took a few short moments and a lot of effort, but he managed to pull his eyes open.
The light made his head spin, but it also knocked a sense of focus into his head. He blinked a few times before he finally found his father's concerned face.
"There you are," his dad breathed. "It's good to see you awake. I thought we'd have to wait a little longer."
"Dad," Don forced out. He was really glad Dad was there. He remembered really missing his father recently. Man, who the hell turned my brain into scrambled eggs?
"It's all right, Donnie," Dad was saying. "You're going to be fine."
What was wrong with him? He narrowed his eyes, silently imploring his father to explain the situation further. And good ol' Dad took the hint, thankfully.
"You're going to be fine. You just got out of surgery, and you seem to have messed your arm up pretty good, but it'll heal. But what's important is that you're safe now, and you're going to be just fine. Thank God, you're going to be fine."
Dad was clearly distressed. Probably time to do some reassuring of his own.
"I know, Dad," he breathed. "'M fine."
His dad chuckled. "Of course, you would say that. You look like you've swapped arms with a very fat mummy and you're barely awake from surgery, and you would tell me you're fine."
Don sighed. He really did feel like he didn't quite understand anything. Hmm. Dad had said something about his arm being injured and looking like a fat mummy arm. He looked down, noticing first the tan splinting on his wrist and then the heavy white bandaging encircling most of his upper arm and that was also wrapped a couple times around the top of his chest. Probably if he was injured, then he was on some type of drug, which would probably account for his overly fuzzy state of mind.
He smiled sleepily. "Really, Dad," he insisted, "I don't feel a thing." Man, talking was difficult. His words were slurred and he sounded like a drunk person.
Chuckling once more, his dad laid a hand on top of his head. "I bet you don't, Donnie. Do you think you can stay awake for a few minutes? Your brother and Robin are out there because we were only allowed in here one at a time, and I'm sure they'd really like to see you. Let me go get them."
Dad's hand was gone, and so was the warmth that had come with it. Don watched him leave. He didn't quite understand what had happened, so seeing Charlie and Robin would be comforting, he figured.
Wait.
Robin.
He remembered getting ready to marry Robin. Putting on his tuxedo, making sure his hair was in place, leaving his apartment . . . but why couldn't he remember the wedding? Wait . . . he hadn't made it, had he?
He'd gotten in his car . . . then what? He'd driven in the rain and he'd been scared. Someone else had been in the car, right?
Oh, man. Damn.
Now he remembered. Shore. Shore had made him drive away from his wedding. Stuffed him in a trunk, driven him to the mountains. Kept him in a basement. He remembered fighting with him, and then being in the woods.
Robin.
He'd missed their wedding. He'd ruined everything. Please don't let her be too upset. He was becoming anxious, waiting for her to walk in through that door. Oh, Robin, I'm so sorry.
The door squeaked open, and Don watched it intensely. First his brother entered, looking frazzled and worn out. Behind him Robin came through the door, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. She made her way over to him, grabbing onto his uninjured left hand. Don watched silently as she sat down in the chair previously occupied by his father and snaked her other hand out to stroke his hair.
"Oh, God," she breathed. "Don." Her eyes were filled with worry.
He squeezed her hand gently, and began stroking it with his thumb. "Robin." He paused, fixing her gaze with his own. He could feel the sting of wet tears in his eyes. He blamed it on the drugs. "I am so sorry, Robin."
"Don—" she started, but he cut her off.
"No, Robin," he said, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry about everything. I'm sorry about the wedding, and ruining it, and—"
This time, she cut him off. "No. Don, you have nothing to be sorry about. None of this is your fault, okay? And please, don't worry about the wedding. We can always plan a new one later. I'm just happy that you're okay." She gently stroked under his eye, wiping away the wetness he could feel there.
Don nodded, leaning slightly into the hand that had now moved more to the side of his head. He felt like there was more he should say on that issue, but his mind currently couldn't remember exactly what that was. All that mattered was that Robin wasn't upset with him.
He looked around the room, his eyes finding Charlie standing awkwardly in the corner, staring at his feet.
"Hey, Chuck," Don mumbled. Robin turned to the side, allowing Charlie to approach next to her. "Come here."
Charlie shuffled over to the bedside.
"It's a little fuzzy, but I can kind of remember David saying something about them finding me because of your math," Don told his brother. "Good job, buddy. Thank you." And boy, was he really grateful for Charlie. He swelled with pride for his little brother. It couldn't have been easy for him, but he'd managed to fight through it and because of it, Don was alive. The details were fuzzy, but that much he knew for certain.
Charlie smiled shyly. "Let's just hope I never have to do it again. Oh, and don't call me Chuck, by the way."
Don shot his brother a loopy grin. Man, did this feel good. Being here, with his three favorite people. He allowed himself to drift off back to sleep, knowing he was safe and with his family.
TBC