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When she discovered the large scar on her chest, she was told they’d tried to save her heart, but in the end, they had to look for a transplant candidate and got one just in time, thanks to her mysterious benefactor. It was explained that some piece of metal had crushed her in the front seat, had one straight through her heart and lungs. Her lungs were able to skirt some of the damage, but the heart took nearly a direct hit, and although she had started to improve, it was going to fail eventually. The lack of blood would kill her. Her function was less than thirty percent, they told her.
In her dream today, she saw the grassy plains of Africa, or what she assumed was Africa. She smelled something, fire and blood. In her dream, she tried to look behind her. Someone picked her up and pulled her into a truck. That’s when she blacked out and didn’t wake up until she was clean, safe, and lying in a comfortable hospital bed attended to by nuns and nurses.
She remembered asking who she was and if she had any identification. She asked the nurses if anyone had reported a family member missing in the area, if anyone had inquired about a car accident. Nobody knew anything at all, told her all the contents in the auto were destroyed. Did this happen in Africa? She thought it was odd she would be driving through Africa, and they corrected her.
“No, no, Sweetie,” they said in their beautiful lilting Italian accent. “You were in Florence, outside of Florence. That is where your accident was. Not Africa. We wouldn’t take care of you here, you would be at a hospital there.”
There were still so many questions. Maybe Lipori had some answers, not that she could trust him.
She drifted into a deeper sleep, and this time she had real flashbacks—burning huts, the smell of decay in the hot sun, and again, being pulled into the back of a flatbed truck. She could see thatched huts in the background and palm trees riddled with machine gun fire, their fronds hanging on strings of green thread. It was very different than Italy. Italy was arid and rocky. Africa was lush and green with red-brown soil and the smell of death all around.
She remembered the first time she saw Lipori after the accident. She’d been sleeping, and he was just there when she woke up. He’d brought flowers, had laid them on her chest. She wondered first if he was her husband or boyfriend or a lover.
“Who are you?”
“Georgie, you don’t remember me? I am Jakob Lipori. We are friends. We are good friends. I was able to rescue you from the accident. I was following you from behind, and a very large truck veered off the road, sending you down an embankment. You hit a large olive tree. It was horrible. I pulled you out just in time before the car exploded. Do you remember any of this?” he asked.
She shook her head, and then she looked at the flowers.
“Yes, these are for you, Georgie. I don’t know if you remember, but my parents are very wealthy. We were able to afford you the very best care. I don’t want you to be afraid. All the bills are taken care of. But you must rest and get better. We have great adventures ahead of us!” he said with a wide, winning smile.
She was fairly certain, although her mind was still foggy, that she didn’t smile back. It was just all too sunny and bright. And it didn’t explain the carnage and death she had in her dreams. She knew there was something more, something much more evil out there. Just as she knew there was something or someone out there who would save her.
Chapter 12
“You’ll do fine,Sweetheart. Just remember what I told you. Stick to the truth; don’t reveal anything. He’s going to tell you some things you don’t want to hear, and I think just about all of them are going to be untrue. So don’t fret about what he says. Suspend your disbelief. Do not trust him for one second.”
Lydia knew he was telling her the truth. She also knew Jakob Lipori could be very convincing. He had an easy manner about him, and Lydia had fallen into his routine before when she didn’t know any better. He probably counted on her still trusting him.
There was no way that she still did. But he’d test her.
The attendant walked her down the gray, brightly lit hallway into an anteroom filled with tables, looking like a cafeteria or a family reunification center. Everything was starkly white or dark gray, very clean, and with plenty of light. Even in the great room, there were skylights, which did much to make someone forget they were in a maximum-security prison. She was impressed.
Then the attendant led her down along a narrow hallway that was also well lit, but with fluorescent lights that buzzed. They passed a series of rooms covered in doors with a small window in wire glass. At one of the doors toward the end, she stopped, unlocked it, and let Lydia inside. There was a gray table in the middle of the room on one side. Hooks were embedded in it, presumably to connect the chains of a prisoner and keep them fully shackled. On the other side, where the attendant showed her a metal chair to sit in, there was nothing.
She had given her purse and all her belongings to Harper before she entered, but the attendant dutifully did a soft body search, not very intrusive.
“Okay, ma’am, you can sit here. We will bring him in just a couple of minutes. Do you have any questions?”
“Will somebody be at the door the whole time?”
“Yes, ma’am. Both doors. They’ll be right outside. If you need anything, bang on the desk or raise your voice a bit, but they will be visually checking through the window. The prisoner will be fully shackled, both ankles and wrists. His wrists will be attached to the table here. He will be unable to reach across and touch you. You are also not allowed to touch him. And I know you’ve already been searched, but in case you’re thinking about passing him a note of some kind, a weapon, or file, you’ll wind up in jail if you try to do that. Not saying that you would.”
For a prison guard, she thought he was rather friendly and non-threatening. She appreciated this. Her nerves were caving by the second. She needed all the courage she could muster, having never been in this position before.
“Okay, I think that’s it. I’ll just have a seat and wait. How long will the interview be allowed for?” she asked, looking up to him.
“I think you can take as long as you like. The rules here are a little soft on that respect, but if it gets to be over an hour, we may call it. You may have to reschedule. We generally don’t have interviews that last longer than half an hour to forty minutes. Anything else?”
“What if I wanted to go back and have my husband come in and do an interview with him, again? He’s seen him before.”
“Well, he’d have to ask to make an appointment, and it won’t be today. If the prisoner agrees, it could be tomorrow or the next day. But not today. We schedule these in advance, and we make staffing decisions based on the requirements we have for the day. I hope you understand.”
“No, that’s fine. I don’t think it will be necessary.”
She sat in the bright sterile room, feeling like a small child waiting in the doctor’s office or the school nurse’s office when she was in grade school. She was grateful it was clean and not grungy like a dungeon. She’d seen some of those in museums on display when she traveled. But this one, as prisons went, seemed to be well run. She guessed it was managed by an outside company, not by the Federal system itself. In a very unsafe environment, she felt relatively at ease.
Keys on the other side of the door across the room began to rattle, and soon it creaked open. Jakob Lipori, in a light blue and white striped prison uniform, walked toward her, his head bowed. His hair had gotten longer, hanging around his neck and shoulders. She had been used to seeing him with his distinctive ponytail. He appeared to have lost weight.
