“We were,” Colt said showing the man his badge. Maren did the same.
The doctor glanced around, then drew them off to the side, away from the nurses’ station and into an alcove. Lowering his voice, he said, “There’s something strange about the agent’s wound. I’ve been debating whether I should say anything or not. But I think you should know.”
Dread and anticipation had Colt frowning. “Tell us. We’re here to help.”
The doctor looked about again to make sure no one was within earshot. “His wound isn’t fresh. It’s at least a few days old. He wasn’t treated after it initially happened, and that’s why he had so much blood loss. And the wound had time to become infected.”
Beside Colt, Maren let out a small gasp of surprise.
Stunned himself, Colt contemplated the ramifications of this news. Three days ago, he’d shot a masked man who tried to kill Maren. Was Agent Henry Spares that man? Was Henry the man known as Shadow? Or only working for him? Was that why he’d conveniently forgotten about telling them to come in the front door of the safe house when he seemed to clearly remember other details very well? Something was off with the guy.
“Doctor, please keep this to yourself for now,” Maren said in a take-charge voice. To Colt she said, “We need to go back and talk to Agent Spares. He could be in league with Shadow.”
“My thought exactly.” Colt appreciated that he and Maren were of the same mind. He really liked this woman.
They hurried back down the hall toward room 659.
A female nurse, covered from head to toe in green scrubs and a matching scrub hat and mask, slipped out of Spares’s room.
“Hey, stop,” Colt called. That bad feeling he’d had earlier amplified.
The nurse picked up her pace and disappeared out of sight.
Seconds later, a loud, shrill beeping emanated from Agent Spares’s room.
Maren bolted into the room ahead of Colt.
On the hospital bed, Henry’s body was convulsing, his eyes rolling back in his head.
“Get help! I’m going after the nurse,” Maren yelled. And sprinted out of the room, with Haven at her side.
He didn’t have to make the call as hospital personnel pushed past him and Rusk, rushing to the bed. For ten minutes the medical staff worked on Henry, but in the end the man expired.
Dr. Sweeney called time of death.
“What happened?” Colt said to the doctor. “Did that nurse give him something?”
“I won’t know until we can fully examine the body,” Dr. Sweeney told him. “But this wasn’t a natural occurrence. I would stake my professional reputation on it.”
Dread and anger surged through Colt.
Agent Henry Spares, who Colt might have shot a few days ago, had been murdered.
* * *
Maren and Haven took the stairs all the way to the exit that came out on the side of the hospital. With Haven sniffing the air, Maren searched for the nurse. But since she’d only gotten a glimpse of the person dressed in scrubs, she couldn’t be sure who of the hospital personnel or civilians walking around was the culprit.
A squeal of tires snapped her attention to a silver sedan racing out of the parking lot. Her stomach dropped. Theyhadbeen followed. And whoever was in that car had just been in Agent Spares’s room. What had they done to the man?
She headed back up to the sixth floor to find Colt talking with the hospital security.
“Agents Spares?” she asked as she approached.
The anger creating brackets around Colt’s mouth alerted her to the answer before he said, “Dead.”
Grief for a life cut short stabbed at her. “I lost the nurse. She left in a silver sedan.”
Something flashed in Colt’s eyes. “I saw a woman get out of a silver sedan when we came in. Maybe we can identify her.” He gestured to the security guards. “They’re going to let us see the hospital security footage.”
