Ghosts That Haunt—8
Casey's amusement was short lived. Riah stood there a moment, still, watched the roofline. He heard the shot through her mike, and he saw her crumple on the monitor. He threw his pen and the clipboard with the evaluation forms at the console and ran.
He shouldn't have been the first to reach her, there were others closer than the command post, but he was. His heart nearly stopped when he did. There was a spreading pool of blood. She was face down and bleeding out fast. He noted the entry wound on her back, and when he had her facing up, there was a larger hole in her lower chest. Not good. Blood trickled from her mouth, and her eyes weren't quite closed. "Riah?" he demanded, and he heard his voice break.
She closed her eyes and slowly opened them again. "John?" she whispered.
"Stay with me, honey," he said tightly. He put a hand over the hole just below her right breast and pushed hard. His right arm was below her shoulders, and he lifted her slightly, groped for the hole where the bullet entered. "Stay with me, Riah."
"Miss . . . you," she said faintly.
"I missed you, too," he said, and pressed his lips against her pale forehead. Her eyes fell shut, and he said urgently, "Riah, sweetheart, stay awake. Stay here, honey."
"Love . . . you," she murmured, and her eyes closed again.
"Riah," he moaned, "don't go to sleep, honey. Stay here, Riah. Don't leave me."
He kept talking to her, made her answer him when he thought she was slipping away, and he felt her blood drench his sleeve and then his chest when he clutched her against him when she stopped answering. He begged her to stay with him, to stay awake, to stay alert, anything he could think of. His hands weren't slowing the blood pumping out of her, and he realized the bullet must have nicked an artery or something else for her to be losing that much blood that fast, and the faint, whistling rattle in her breathing sounded a little like a lung collapsing. When the medics finally got there, Casey knew it couldn't have been much more than a moment, but it felt like a lifetime.
He started to let her go, let them have her, but she clutched his arm weakly. "I'm right here," he promised her. The medics asked him to lay her back on the ground, so he did. When he started to move out of their way, she appeared to panic weakly, and one of them said sharply, "Stay close. Talk to her."
Casey moved out of their way, took a position near her head, knelt in the blood pool, stroked her hair, and talked to her. Afterward, he was unable to remember what he said to her. He just knew he talked to her. They let him go with them in the ambulance—probably because he made it obvious he would insist. He stayed out of their way, watched every move they made as they struggled to keep her alive. When they reached the hospital, he stayed with her until they took her into surgery. He was shown to a waiting room where he took a seat.
It wasn't until V. H. Adderly joined him that he even remembered the other man. He'd been so tightly focused on Riah he hadn't spared a single thought for her father. Sitting in the chair next to him, V. H. said, "I've just called her mother. She's on her way."
Casey nodded numbly.
"Faraday's under arrest."
Casey gave another mechanical nod. He wondered how long it would be before they knew something. He wondered if she was alive or if she had died, wondered if they were trying desperately to revive her. His hand shook when he raised it to his face, rubbed it along his chin. He glanced at his watch, numbly wiped at the reddish smear on its crystal with a shaking thumb. How long had she been in there?
"You're not hearing anything I say, are you?" V. H. asked.
The question caught his attention. Turning to look at the other man, Casey realized he was right. He hadn't heard much of what the other man had said. He'd been so wrapped up in his own concerns he hadn't thought about her father. Now, though, he noticed the man's pale, drawn face and the worry in his dark brown eyes. "No," Casey admitted.
V. H. sat back and turned slightly to look at Casey. "I've asked Mariah, but I've never managed to get an answer. What happened between the two of you?"
Casey swallowed thickly. He wasn't sure he knew himself, and as a result, he wasn't sure he could give the man an answer. He closed his eyes, heard Riah's faint whispers again: Miss . . . you . . . . Love . . . you. "We—" he cleared his throat, "—we . . . . Christ!" His hands shook and he folded them together to make them stop. He blinked rapidly, his vision blurry.
V. H.'s hand went to his shoulder. "Just tell me this: do you love her?"
He looked at the other man sharply.
Adderly sighed heavily when Casey didn't answer. "She saved your cover, you know," V. H. said. "She told the Buy More that you were in the reserves and had been recalled to active duty and sent to Afghanistan. She told Diane she did it so you could go back when it was time."
Casey couldn't help wondering if she would be there if he did go back. He had to acknowledge the story she concocted to explain his absence was smart, one he should have thought of himself, but Riah thought faster on her feet than he did when it came to things like this. If the General had been smart, she'd told Bartowski a version of the same.
A door opened, and both men looked up, expecting to see a nurse. One of the surgeons came through, and Casey's heart sank. Dead. She had to be dead for him to be out here this soon. Jesus. He was coming to tell them. Would he even let Casey stay, or would he have to leave while the man told her father?
"Mr. Adderly?" he asked, looking from one to the other of them.
V. H. cleared his throat. "Yes?"
"Your daughter—" the man broke off, looked at Casey.
"This is Mariah's fiancé," V. H. said, falling back on the lie from Banff.
The surgeon went on to say there was considerable blood loss, which Casey already knew, especially since he was wearing a good bit of it. The doctor continued, told them they were doing their best, but the bullet had done a lot of damage—something else Casey didn't need to be told. The doctor told them someone would keep them up to date on her condition. Casey wanted to tell the bastard to just get back in there and save her. They could talk when she was okay.
Time dragged. Neither man spoke much. Occasionally a nurse came out to try and reassure them, but Casey just glared and said nothing. It was left to V. H. to talk to them, to thank them. Casey simply sat there and came as close to actually praying as he got these days.
When Ariel Taylor breezed in with a white-faced Emma MacKenzie in tow, Casey tried for the first time to act human, even if it was only for the obviously upset girl's sake. Ariel ignored him for V. H., firing questions at her former partner about Riah's condition. Emma just stared at Casey, and he wished he had thought to see if he could change clothes. What showed of his once-white shirt was reddish brown with Riah's dried blood, and his suit and tie were crusty where the blood had soaked in and now dried. Emma sat beside him and asked him quietly if her sister would be alright.
Casey turned his head and looked at her. She looked so much like Riah it hurt. Emma might be blonder and younger, but she was unmistakably Riah's sister. "We don't know yet," he confessed.
She looked like she was going to cry, and Casey hoped she wouldn't because he had never been able to deal with weepy females—he ignored the fact that he'd been able to deal with Riah when she broke down. The truth was that he wasn't sure he wouldn't join Emma if she did. To his surprise, she slipped her long, thin hand in his, and he held it, took some comfort from her light grip on his.
When the surgeon finally came to talk to them again, Casey had lost track of the hours. They had sent her to ICU. The surgeon painstakingly explained the damage and what they had done for Riah. He told them they didn't know for sure yet that she would survive. When the volunteer arrived to take them to her, Casey followed the others. He was supposed to be on a plane headed to the Middle East by now, but he would at least see her before he went.
They were shown into a waiting room, and Casey became aware of stares from the other people in the room. When the nurse came to tell them they could go back to see Riah, he started to tell V. H. it was time for him to go, but Ariel Taylor put a hand on Casey's arm and told the nurse to take him back first.
She looked so small in the bed, he thought. He stepped to her bedside, and looked down at her. She was so very pale, and she was on a respirator. As he had done the other two times she'd been in the hospital, he took her hand. After a moment, he raised it, kissed it. His other hand touched her temple, and he leaned forward and kissed her forehead, careful not to bump anything. He cleared his throat and whispered her name. He stroked his thumb over her temple. There were several things he wanted to say to her, but not like this. When the nurse came for him, he kissed her forehead again and whispered that he'd see her later.
When he went back into the waiting room, V. H. held his bag and a volunteer stood beside him. He handed Casey his luggage and gestured at the volunteer. "She's going to take you somewhere you can clean up," he said. "Apparently, your appearance is disturbing the others."
Casey stripped out of his blood-caked clothes and got into the shower. The volunteer had taken him to a locker room for the doctors, and he made quick work of washing and redressing in clean clothes. As he zipped his bag closed, he stared at his ruined suit. He emptied the pockets, transferred his badge from his jacket and his wallet from his trousers. Riah's blood, he noticed was on the case holding his badge. He ran a thumb over it. He tucked the badge in his bag.
He found his cell phone and called General Beckman then, explained what had happened. She wanted him on a plane immediately. For one of the very few times in his life, he refused to do what his commander said. She told him she'd make it an order, and he told her he'd disobey. The silence dragged on while he questioned his sanity. He was about to ruin his career for a woman who might not live. The second he thought that, he sank on the bench behind him, stared blindly at the lockers in front of him. The General didn't make it an order, conceded that Mariah still worked for the NSA in a roundabout way, and told Casey he could stay until they knew whether she would survive.
For the next couple of days, he didn't leave the hospital except to shower and catch a few hours of sleep. V. H. gave him a key to Riah's loft apartment and told him to stay there. It wasn't far from the hospital, and it allowed her family some privacy, so Casey did. The first time he let himself in, he felt like a thief. She hadn't invited him in, and she couldn't object.
He looked around, curious. In Los Angeles, she had done a little to make their apartment more like a home. This was where she lived for real. It had an open floor plan and a stunning view from the ceiling to floor windows. The furniture was big and comfortable. There were two low sofas and a couple of armchairs. Cool greens and blues dominated with touches of red and orange. She had a fireplace, and on the mantel she had lined up family photographs. Most were of Riah and her father, though there were several of Emma, and on one end was her mother's wedding photo from when she married Ben MacKenzie. There were a number of truly beautiful paintings on the walls, mostly landscapes. He especially liked the seascape, surf breaking on a rocky coast during a storm before a lighthouse. It looked familiar to him, and he finally placed it as one in Newfoundland.
Her kitchen was roomy, and like his in Los Angeles organized with a military precision that let her find what she needed when she needed it without thinking. The stove was one of those expensive professional quality ranges. It and the other appliances gleamed polished stainless steel. The kitchen was separated from the living area by a large island with sinks and a long section of countertop. Two barstools were under one end, and he would bet she sat there in the mornings and read the paper while she drank her coffee and ate breakfast.
There were two bedrooms, the only rooms other than the bath to be sectioned off from the main living area, and when he stepped inside the one she obviously used, he was surprised by the simple lines of the white furniture. The walls were palest sea green with white trim, and the bed was made with crisp white sheets and a comforter. The windows had white sheers under drapes that matched her comforter, both of which were a darker shade of the color on the walls. There were more photographs on her dresser, including one, to his surprise, of the two of them. He lifted it, realized it had been taken the same day as the one he carried with him, and he tried hard not to read anything into that. He looked at the image of Riah in his arms, and he studied her smile as she looked up at him in the picture, hoped he would see her do so again.
He put it back on the dresser and looked at the wall. Rather than paintings, there were several bold black and white photographs of buildings—or, more correctly, parts of buildings—in white frames. Her bathroom was almost clinically white—tile, fixtures, towels, all of it. The other bedroom was spartan, contained nothing but a narrow twin bed.
Casey sat with Riah whenever he could, and it finally dawned on him that Ariel Taylor was making sure he had time alone with her daughter. Emma sat beside him most of the time in the waiting room, neither of them talking much. Riah's parents talked softly from time to time, but they were subdued as well.
When the respirator was removed, he started sitting with her through the nights. Her family went to V. H.'s home at night, but he stayed. The nurses weren't happy, complained at first, but finally looked the other way. He was about to nod off one night when he heard Riah rasp quietly, "This is starting to be a habit."
Casey gave a choked laugh as he sat forward. He had her hand in his, and he lifted it to his lips while he sought something to say. "Maybe we should think about breaking it."
The corners of her mouth lifted a tiny fraction. "I would prefer that." She winced a little.
He stood and leaned down, pressed his lips softly against hers. "I never want to go through that again." She closed her eyes and made a sound like a soft moan. "Do you want me to call the nurse?" She nodded faintly, so he pushed the call button.
They made him leave, so he called V. H. from the waiting room, told the other man she was awake and that the doctor was with her. Riah's family arrived about the time the doctor came out to talk to him, and Casey listened as she told them Riah still had a ways to go and there were still no guarantees she would recover, though they thought her chances were considerably better now. He watched Riah's parents sag, put their arms around one another and then pull Emma in. He realized he no longer had an excuse to stay, so he turned and walked away.
Casey made quick work of repacking his things. As he let himself out, he realized he still had the key to Riah's apartment. He decided he'd go back by the hospital and leave them with V. H. before he caught the flight General Beckman arranged for him. He would fly to St. John's in Newfoundland and pick up an American military transport from there. The General called him with his flight details as he sat in the taxi on his way back to the hospital. He had three hours before it left.
He saw Emma first, and she looked angry. "Mariah's asking for you," she said when he walked up to her.
Casey ignored her statement. "Where are your parents?"
"My father's in Chicago," she told him curtly. "If you mean Mom and V. H., they're in with Mariah."
Handing her Riah's key, he said, "I have a plane to catch. Give this to V. H. and tell him thanks."
When he turned to go, Emma grabbed his sleeve. He jerked his arm loose, but she persisted. She followed him as he stalked down the hall. "You're not even going to go say goodbye to her, are you?" He kept walking. "Is this what you do, Casey? Just walk away?" She scored a direct hit with that, and his steps faltered. He ignored it, though, kept moving. "Is that why you were nowhere to be found when she lost the baby?"
That one stopped him in his tracks. He turned to face her, certain he had not heard what he thought she said. He stared at her angry face and read the truth there. It felt like a physical blow. His chest tightened, and his lungs seized. He took a step toward Emma, then another. "What?" His voice sounded wrong.
Emma's face didn't soften, nor did she moderate her tone. "Mariah was pregnant when you disappeared. She miscarried several weeks ago."
He dropped his bag and grasped Emma's arms. "Why didn't someone tell me?"
Emma blinked. "I thought you knew."
"No." His thoughts raced. He knew now why V. H. been so adamant that he call Riah, why he had sent his best operative to find him so he could insist he call her. He knew, too, why she hadn't responded to his e-mail or called him. He knew her well enough to know she wouldn't chase him down. He also understood why Ariel had made sure he had time alone with her. His thoughts were jumbled, and he kept thinking how much he wished V. H. had just told him. He would have still been half a world away, but he would have made sure she understood he hadn't abandoned her.
"Casey, we thought you knew."
"You just thought I didn't care," he said bitterly. Emma's face blanched. He studied her pinched face. "Emma—"
In the distance, he could see V. H. and Ariel returning to the ICU waiting room. Emma took his arm and dragged him back toward them. He felt numb and more than a little betrayed. Not one of them had said a word to him about Riah's pregnancy in all those hours they had waited together, waited to learn if she would live or die. Even Ariel, who usually took great pleasure in verbally stabbing him in whatever weak underbelly she thought she could find, hadn't said anything. When they reached Riah's parents, V. H. reached out and took his bag. Emma continued to lead him toward Riah's room. She sent him in alone.
It looked like Riah was asleep again, but he must have made a noise of some sort. She lifted a hand to scrub her knuckles against her eye before she opened both of her eyes and looked at him. She blinked. "John?"
He crossed to her bed and leaned down. "Hi."
She blinked sleepily. "These are pretty good drugs," she slurred.
"I'm glad," he said, amused despite himself. He searched for the words, but he couldn't find them.
"Mmm." Her eyes drooped.
"I'm glad you're alive, Riah," he said. It wasn't what he should have said, he knew, but he didn't have the words for the other. He was still trying to take it in, and he couldn't help feeling it was a conversation they should have when she wasn't so sedated she couldn't focus. He reached a hand out and cupped her cheek.
"Me, too," she said, "but when the drugs wear off I probably won't be."
He knew from experience how true that was. He leaned down and kissed her. Her lips clung to his a moment. He wanted to lie down beside her, wanted to hold her, wanted to tell her he'd never let anything like this happen to her again. "Riah," he whispered. "Why didn't you tell me?"
She looked up at him, and he could see she struggled to stay awake. "I don't know where you are."
Casey frowned. "I'm right here."
Riah lifted a hand, but it barely brushed his cheek before it dropped again. "Mmm. You feel real."
He watched her eyes flutter closed, and then she pulled them open again. "Riah." She looked at him, but he wasn't sure she really saw him.
"They're going to fire me this time," she whispered.
They wouldn't, he knew. What had happened had not been her fault. She had done what she was supposed to do, and it definitely wasn't her fault some moron decided to try and kill her. "I don't think so," he said softly.
"Mmm," she said. "I lost two of the team and a hostage. The terrorists got away. I'm toast." Her words were slurring more, and he knew she was about to go down for the count again.
"Riah," he said softly, deciding to try once more, and her eyes opened again. "I didn't leave you. I had to go where the job sent me. I would have come if I had known you needed me."
"Job comes first," she said, and he leaned closer as her voice weakened. "Job always comes first."
She was out again, and he stared down at her, puzzled. She knew the job, she knew they had to put it first, but why had that sounded so curiously bitter? He watched her sleep a moment, and then he leaned forward and kissed her softly before he laid the hand he held gently back beside her. As he walked back to the waiting room, he made a decision. He would stay until he could talk to her, until he could make her understand.
Her family stared at him when he came back out, and he suspected from the looks on their faces Emma had told them he now knew. He didn't care. He felt curiously empty. And tired. He felt exhausted, but he really hadn't done anything to tire him. As he approached Riah's family, he noticed two things: how much older her parents looked and the sympathy on Ariel Taylor's face as she watched him.
V. H. asked him something, but he didn't hear it. He looked at Riah's father and frowned. V. H.'s lips twisted a moment. "My driver will take you to the airport."
Casey's shoulders slumped. "I think I'll stay a while longer," he heard himself say. He needed to retract that, but he didn't have the energy. He swallowed, decided he needed to sit down. After he sank into a chair, he planted his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his palms. Pregnant. She had been pregnant. She had lost the baby, and she had been alone. He squeezed his eyes tightly closed and breathed in deeply. He dropped his hands from his face and stared unseeing at a square of tile on the floor of the waiting room. It kept running through his head, again and again, and he felt numb.
A hand curved over his shoulder, and he heard his name. He looked up slowly. Ariel Taylor quietly told him Riah was awake again and asked if he wanted to see her. He stood and walked blindly to her room.
He stopped in the doorway and looked at her. He made himself walk forward, and when she saw him, she gave him a fuzzy smile. He realized she might be awake, but she was still heavily drugged. He ached to hold her, to ask what had happened, but he did neither. Instead he leaned down and kissed her. She lifted a hand and cupped his cheek as she weakly returned the kiss. He covered her hand with his and turned his head to kiss her palm.
"Missed you," she said, her voice still raspy.
"I missed you, too," he admitted.
She sighed, closed her eyes. Casey thought she must have gone back to sleep, so he started to put her hand down once more. She opened her eyes and asked, "Did they tell you I got shot?"
He gave her hand a slight squeeze and shuddered, remembered the blood pool, remembered how he had thought she would slip away from him. He reached out and cupped her cheek. "I was there."
"I thought I heard you," she said faintly.
Casey began to realize she didn't think he was actually there. She had as much as said so the other times he had talked to her. He supposed it was the drugs. Casey stooped, and when she opened her eyes, he leaned closer. "Riah," he said quietly, but the words left him as she looked into his eyes.
"John," she whispered, "I wish you would come home."
She looked like she would cry, and he kissed her once more. "I can't come home yet," he told her. "I still have a job to do, but I'll come home as soon as I can."
"Your replacement gives me the creeps," she said, and her eyelids drooped.
He froze. Replacement? Beckman had sent someone to take his place on Mission Moron. Oddly, he felt betrayed by that. "How so?"
"He hits on me." She rubbed her cheek against the hand cupping it. "He keeps coming over and trying to get me to let him in, and he keeps asking me out." She made a face, and her body gave a spasm. She clearly was in some pain, but she continued, "I don't like him, and neither does Chuck."
Casey didn't like what she said. Riah was his, and there was some jumped up NSA or CIA operative trying to move in on her. He was about to ask her who this guy was, but she grimaced once more. "I'm tired, now," she said, and her eyes drooped. "Come home, John."
She was out again, and he looked down at her as she slept. He shot a glance at the clock. His flight had just left without him, and he realized he would soon be AWOL. He wished he didn't care, but he did. He had a sterling service record, and he had just tarnished it.
The rest of the day and the early evening went much the same way. She was awake and somewhat lucid for brief periods of time, and when he took his turn to visit her, she was alternately asleep or floating in a drug haze. He didn't try to talk to her about them, about the baby, but he did once try to draw who his replacement was out of her.
Emma and he were talking quietly about finding dinner somewhere when he heard a distinctive sound in the hallway. He looked up at two U. S. Marine MPs, and he knew Beckman had sent them after him. The senior MP was a sergeant, he noted, and he went straight for Casey. The guy was only about five-nine, so Casey stood up and stood straight, went for intimidating. "Major Casey?" the sergeant said. The kid next to him couldn't have been much more than nineteen and looked suitably cowed by Casey's scowl.
"Yeah?"
"Sir, we're here to—."
Casey cut him off. "Let's take this outside, Sergeant."
He walked slightly ahead and between the two Marines. When they were outside, he stopped. "Sir, we're here to take you into custody," the sergeant told him. Casey noted that he didn't say he was being arrested. He also checked the smart-alec instinct that made him want to ask and whose army? The guy had a job to do, and Casey was willing to bet he'd never been pulled from embassy duty to do something like this before.
"Let's go," Casey said agreeably. He wasn't going to fight this. Sooner or later he would be talking to Beckman, and, in the meantime, he wasn't going to make trouble for a noncom doing his job.
They took him to the embassy, and from there he was escorted to the local intelligence officer. Casey knew the man across the desk from him, and this time it was a friend. They shook hands, and Michael Tinsley dismissed the Marines with thanks. As he gestured for Casey to take a seat, Mike resumed his own. "You've caused a lot of trouble, Casey."
"Not the first time," he returned.
"Beckman says you're AWOL." Mike raised a brow.
He shrugged. "There's a first time for everything after all," Casey said easily. Truthfully, he was uncomfortable with all this. He had always done his job, rarely questioned his orders, but this time he felt betrayed by his superiors.
Mike apparently expected him to say more, but Casey didn't. Instead, he lifted an ankle on to the opposite knee, and folded his hands over his abdomen. He stared placidly back at the other man. Mike finally sighed and picked up the phone. "He's here," Casey heard him tell whoever was on the other end. He imagined it was Beckman. "Yes, ma'am," Mike said and hung up.
For a second, Casey thought the General had actually come to Ottawa after him. Tinsley, though, stood and gestured for Casey to follow him. He was led to a communications room, and Casey was dismayed to realize it was going to be the next best thing to a face-to-face dressing down. Tinsley made the connection to Beckman and then, tactfully, left the room.
He could tell Beckman was pissed. She usually looked unhappy, but she was unmistakably furious. "Major Casey," she ground out, "you had orders to catch a plane for deployment to Afghanistan. Why are you still in Ottawa, and why did I have to send Marines to get you?"
Casey had planned to take his dressing down and then go when she had him escorted to the airport. Instead, he resisted. Riah had occasionally sniped that she had rarely had a choice in her life, that if her godfather wasn't pulling the strings she danced to then her father was. He suddenly knew the feeling. "General," he began calmly, "may I ask why I was never informed that Mariah was pregnant or that she had miscarried?"
He couldn't be sure, vagaries of monitors and such being what they were, but the General seemed to blanch. "That's irrelevant, Major," she snapped.
"On the contrary, General," he returned, and he let a little of his own anger creep into his voice. "It's completely relevant to the matter at hand."
She leaned forward and folded her hands on her blotter. "It happened two months ago, Major, and you were inaccessible. Be that as it may, you are AWOL, you have disobeyed orders, and I would like to know why I should not have you court-martialed forthwith."
Casey ground his teeth. "With all due respect, General," he began, but she cut him off.
"Major, I would suggest you not pursue this line of discussion."
He heard the steel in her voice, and he was about to override his desire to preserve his job when her adjutant handed her something. He let her read it, tried to rein his temper in, and decided he would do what he was told like the good little major he had always been. He had, after all, borrowed time that was not his.
Beckman frowned at the paper and nodded to the adjutant before dismissing him. She looked even angrier when she turned her attention back to Casey. "V. H. Adderly just called. Apparently, your services are still required by ISI, Major. He says that you have not yet completed your duties as evaluator. He will arrange for you to meet with the teams involved so that you can share your observations with them." She picked up the paper once more. "He suggests day after tomorrow. I will let him know that is acceptable and arrange to have you escorted to meet your flight."
The General gave him one last steely-eyed look and disconnected.
Tinsley was on the phone again when Casey walked back through. When he hung up, he gave Casey a curious look. "I see you're still one lucky bastard."
He grunted, and Tinsley told him he was free to go.
Adderly's driver was outside, and he opened the back of the car. Casey stepped inside. Neither of the MPs had been in sight as he left the building. The driver returned him to the hospital, and when he reached the ICU waiting room, he found V. H. waiting for him.
"They moved Mariah while you were gone," he said, and he gestured for Casey to go with him. As they walked down the corridor to the elevator, he told Casey, "Diane's furious, and I doubt I can keep you here any longer." Riah's father gave him a sidelong look, and his mouth hooked up. "Unless you want to defect."
Casey snorted. "Whoever heard of an American defecting to Canada?"
V. H. grinned. "You're old enough to remember Vietnam."
"That was desertion," he growled. He knew the other man was joking, but it was no joke to Casey. He would not desert his country, not even for Riah.
He spent as much time as he could with her over the next two days, but she was no more lucid than she had been in ICU. He spent one afternoon at ISI answering questions about how he came to be the evaluator on Riah's training mission, what he saw, and his relationship with Riah. He nearly refused to answer the last set of questions until he remembered Riah's mike had still been working, and the recordings would reveal what he and she had said to one another. He told them that he and Riah worked together, lived together, and refused to tell them more. He explained he had not known Riah would be part of the exercise when he was told he was to evaluate it. He suspected the panel didn't believe him, knew he wouldn't in their circumstances, and wondered why his relationship with Riah was remotely pertinent to what had happened.
His frustration grew as his time shortened, and when he visited Riah before the MPs were due to collect him, he found her as doped up as she had been every other time he had seen her. He wanted—no, needed—to talk to her, but he wouldn't do it this way.
After they had yet another tangled conversation where she still didn't realize he was actually there, he leaned in and kissed her. "I have to go," he whispered. He hoped like hell she didn't ask him to stay.
"Be safe," she said faintly, "wherever you are."
Casey frowned down at her. What did that mean? He dismissed it as the drugs talking. He had almost never said goodbye to anyone other than his family, and he didn't know if he could do it. He had promised Emma, though. "Bye, Riah," he choked out.
She didn't answer this time, and he pressed his lips to her forehead and straightened up. When he left her room, Emma looked considerably less hostile. She put her arms around him and said, "Thanks." He returned her hug awkwardly.
They rejoined Riah's parents. "Diane called," V. H. said. "You're leaving as soon as you finish the debriefing."
Ariel said nothing, and Casey figured that was better than her usual sniping remarks, though he had been uncharacteristically spared those the last several days. He nodded to her, and Emma gave him a brief smile. He nodded to her as well before walking away with V. H.
Casey met Riah's team in one of the classrooms at the training facility after he'd finished with the negotiating team. When he walked in, they sat there laughing, waiting for him. It pissed him off, especially since Riah was still semi-lucid in a hospital bed, so he scowled when he entered, carrying the clipboard with his notes. They shut up when he stepped to the front of the room. Someone had put the maps and the floor plans on the wall at the front of the room.
He looked around, spotted where Faraday's friend Parker was, and made note of the way the man sprawled in his chair. The others at least sat like humans. It was Parker he would give special attention to, not least because he had been one of the two who ignored Riah's direct order and started the sequence that led to the mission failure.
The man who had designed the training scenario and overseen it called them to order, apologized for the delay in the debriefing, and gave them a cautious update on Riah's condition. Parker remained sprawled and inattentive, but at least the others were listening. Casey was introduced as the evaluator, and he stepped up. There were a few of them who recognized the name, he noticed, and that was a little gratifying. He started with the chatter. Parker made faces like a six year old as Casey noted the frequency with which the team was off task and talking. He pointed out that they were distracted during this time, neither listening nor concentrating on what was going on with the mission. Parker snorted and said, "We knew what we were doing."
Casey stared him down. He moved on to the orders they disobeyed and the consequences of those decisions. Parker once again made a comment, and then the man took it one step too far: "Adderly didn't know what she was doing."
He rounded on the man. "Adderly was getting the job done. Frankly, she was about the only professional out there."
Parker's, "Teacher's pet," earned him a couple of chuckles, and Casey calmly and with lethal speed drew a weapon and shot the man in the chest. It had only been a tranq dart, and a mildly dosed one at that. Riah would never have forgiven him for killing the man, but it felt good to shoot him, even if the result was neither deadly nor put the man out completely.
There was no question he had their undivided attention as he reholstered the tranq gun. He started to deconstruct the assault on the terrorists, but Parker said incredulously, "You shot me!" Casey did it again, basically for the hell of it, all the while continuing to detail errors and miscalculations, and he dinged the absent Riah a few times. While much of the debacle had not been her fault, she had made a mistake or two, especially toward the end.
Even though the darts had fairly mild doses, he was a little impressed Parker was still awake enough to say with some venom, "Fucking American prick! You shot me!" Casey did it a third time, still talking about the botched mission. He didn't miss a beat, and it felt good to nail the little bastard again.
He was losing the others, though, as their eyes darted back and forth between him and Parker, waiting to see what Parker would do, waiting to see if Casey would shoot him again. Casey, for his part, wondered if he should risk a head shot with the next dart—he was positive there would be a next dart—or go for the chest again. There were pros and cons, and he'd never shot anyone in the head with one of these before.
Might be interesting to see what happened.
Casey started to talk about their individual performances. He'd had to ask V.H. for names, and he'd been provided with photographs which he had attached to his notes to help him identify them. When he got to the third man on his list, the woman seated next to him asked, "Sir, is Parker going to be alright?"
It was easy for him to ignore her question, but then Parker slurred, "I'm dying here." Casey nailed him in the chest again.
He stepped over to Parker, who slumped over the table before him, and held the man's head up by his hair. He leaned down and used the soft, vicious voice that made his junior officers quake. "One of these days, that mouth of yours will get you killed. Shut it. Listen for a change. Do what your team leader tells you. You might live another day. For now, you're going to sleep about fourteen to twenty hours." He dropped the man's head and had a bit of satisfaction at the thump his skull made when it came into contact with the desk in front of him.
Casey finished the debriefing and with the trainer discussed with the still alert members of the tactical team what to do next time, other ways they could have handled the mission, and then they dismissed them. He watched V. H. enter the room. He figured he was about to be in trouble for shooting Parker, but he didn't much care. Adderly wasn't his boss, and he was soon out of there.
V.H. wore a grin when he reached him and the trainer. "Why didn't I think of shooting him?" He looked over at where Parker slumped unconscious on the table.
The trainer laughed. "I think that crowd will be too frightened to talk in future, and Parker's always been a worthless fuck." He eyed Casey. "Mind if I take a look at that?"
Casey handed it over, and they talked about the gun and the darts a few minutes. When the trainer gave it back, Casey holstered it and shook the man's hand. The man picked Parker up in a fireman's lift and left Casey and Adderly alone.
"You shot one of my operatives—multiple times."
"He deserved it."
"I didn't say he didn't." V. H. sat on the table and looked at Casey. "When are you leaving?"
Casey shrugged. He had a message on his phone from Beckman, but he hadn't played it yet. "As soon as you release me."
"Diane's been on the phone insisting you leave immediately." V. H. looked at him. "I can keep you here if you want."
He was tempted, but there was no way around the MPs who dogged his steps. Beckman would know he'd done the debriefing and expect him to be on the first plane out. He suspected the MPs had orders to see that he was. He met V. H.'s eyes. "I don't think you can," he said quietly as the day's two MPs appeared at the back of the room.
V. H. looked over his shoulder at them before turning back to Casey. He sighed. "No, I guess not—unless I press charges for shooting my operative, and even that would only delay the inevitable." He raised his brows in question. "Your boss is determined to get you off to wherever she's sending you." Casey was tempted to take the chance he dangled before him, tempted to let Adderly arrest him and stay a while longer while the Canadians bickered with Beckman over him, but he was afraid Beckman would just cut her losses and fire him. He shook his head at V. H. regretfully, and the other man gestured for Casey to go ahead and fell into step beside him. "If you don't hear from me, she's alright."
Casey nodded. He stopped just out of earshot of the MPs. "I want to know—no more games—if anything happens to her." He handed the other man a business card with nothing but his personal number typed on its white surface. "Anything. Even if it's only a stubbed toe."
The other man looked like he was about to say something, but then he visibly changed his mind. He held out his hand and shook Casey's. "Don't get yourself killed—for her sake."
He snorted. "Don't let her get killed." He walked toward the MPs alone, and when they were on their way, stared unseeing out the car that took him to the airport.