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Tavia acknowledged those sober facts with a grim nod. She couldn't argue with any of it, and she didn't know why she felt compelled to dissect and examine any of what she had heard in the police station viewing room. She didn't know why she couldn't get the man and every bizarre word he said out of her mind.
And his eyes ...
She could still see their steely blue color, and the intensity with which he held her in his unflinching - undeniably sane - stare.
She could still feel the peculiar heat that seemed to radiate out from those stormy irises in that instant when their gazes clashed and held, mere seconds before the Tasers' probes bit into him and the bullets began to fly.
She was so deep in her thoughts, she jumped a little when the senator lightly smacked his palm against his knee. "Ah, damn. I knew I was forgetting something."
"What is it?" she asked, turning to look at him as the SUV exited the highway to begin the couple-mile stretch of rural blacktop that would lead to her house.
He gave her a sheepish look, the one he usually reserved for those times when he was about to ask her to work the entire weekend or help him find a last-minute gift for some society function hostess whom it was crucial he impress. "Tomorrow morning is the charity breakfast for the children's hospital."
Tavia nodded. "Eight o'clock at Copley Place. I sent your dry cleaning to your house and emailed your speech to both your mobile and your home computer before I left the office for the police station tonight."
She'd covered all the bases for him, as usual, but he didn't look satisfied. He winced a bit. "I was thinking of making some changes to the speech. Actually I was hoping you might help me rewrite it completely. With everything that's been going on lately, I haven't had a chance to talk to you about it. I'm sorry, Tavia. And I know you're probably exhausted, but can you spare me an hour or so tonight yet? We can work at my house, since we're halfway to Marblehead already - "
"I can't," she replied, the words tumbling out even before she realized she was going to say them. She'd never refused any task he gave her, but something about tonight - something about Bobby Clarence himself - made her instincts stir with an odd wariness. She shook her head, even as his look of surprise turned to one of disappointment, then cool disapproval. "I wish I could help, but my aunt is very sick. I have her medicine right here." She reached into her purse and pulled out a prescription bottle full of white pills. "I'm afraid if I'm not there to make sure she takes it and has a proper meal ..."
"Of course. I understand," the senator replied. He was aware of her general living situation - the fact that her aunt Sarah had raised her alone for most of Tavia's life. She was the only family Tavia had ever known, and the fact that Tavia would drop everything to take care of the older woman was no stretch. At least that much was true.
The Suburban slowed, crunching ice and snow under its tires, as they approached the little gray Cape with its neat black shutters, Christmas wreath on the front door, and cheery yellow light glowing from nearly every window. Tavia met the senator's watchful gaze from across the wide bench seat. "I'm sorry I can't help this time. I'm sure your changes will be just fine." He nodded. "Give your aunt Sarah my best. Tell her I hope she feels better soon." His mouth curved into a smile that might have looked sympathetic if not for the dark gleam of doubt in his eyes. "I'll see you in the morning, Tavia. We can talk more then."
She opened the SUV door and started to climb out.
Perhaps she should have bitten her tongue, but a question had been riding the tip of it since the moment they left the police station - a question that disturbed her almost as much as the ones now swirling in her head about the senator himself. In fact, it was something that had been nagging at her even longer than that ... from sometime last week, and the instant she first laid eyes on one of Bobby Clarence's most generous supporters.
She paused outside the vehicle, pivoting to peer in at the senator. "How well do you know Drake Masters?"
She saw it then. The slip in an otherwise careful facade.
"Drake Masters," he said, less a question than a demand. The senator cleared his throat and attempted to school his features into a mask of mild befuddlement, but Tavia had already seen past it. "What does Drake Masters have to do with anything?"
She let the question linger and stretch out. She didn't have an answer for it. Not yet. But she fully intended to find out.
"I have to go now," she said, and turned to make the short walk up to the house.
Aunt Sarah met her at the door, dressed in a red velour track suit with a green Christmas- themed apron tied around her hips. Holiday music poured out into the night, along with the aroma of fresh-baked bread and cinnamon and something meaty simmering on the stove. "There you are, at last," the older woman exclaimed. "Why haven't you been answering your cell phone? I've been trying to reach you all evening."
"I'm sorry. I must have the ringer turned off." Tavia stepped inside the house and watched as the black SUV slowly rolled away from the curb. "It's been a long day, Aunt Sarah. I should have called. I hope you didn't worry."
"Of course I worried. I love you." Her brown eyes crinkled at the corners as she looked Tavia over. "How was your visit with Dr. Lewis? Did you tell him about the night terrors and headaches you've been having lately? Did you pick up your medicine?"
"The appointment went fine, same as the last ten thousand of them. Got my new drug supply right here." Tavia shook her purse, making the pill bottle rattle as she met her aunt's welcoming gaze. She smiled at the older woman and all her questions and worry. It was the first real sense of comfort, of normalcy, she'd had all day. "I love you too, Aunt Sarah. What's for dinner?"
AT FIRST, Chase thought he was in hell. In addition to feeling as though he'd been run over by a truck - repeatedly - his mouth was cotton-dry and his head was ringing with the relentless beep and hiss of electronic machinery somewhere nearby.
He lay there for a moment, eyes closed, senses still attempting to come back online after a long, smothering sleep. Someone was in the room with him. Two people. Humans, a male and a female. They were speaking softly from both sides of him, the woman covering his bare legs with a thin sheet and blanket while the man reached over Chase's head to press buttons on one of the complaining monitors.
"BP's still wicked high," said the man, his booming Boston-roughened voice coming out of what sounded like a deep barrel chest. "Heart rate ain't come down much in the last hour either. This fella's body idles as fast as a damn race car."
"He's just lucky to be alive," replied the woman. "With all those bullet holes in him, his vitals should be flatlining, not clocking off the charts." She sounded middle age and tired, a wad of minty gum snapping as she chewed it noisily while she spoke. "I hear the lab screwed up his blood work again, so they're rerunning everything for the third time. Buncha clowns down there tonight or something, I swear to God. Meantime, looks like I'm going to have to start another bag of O negative before the next shift change."
Holy shit.
He wasn't dead, wasn't in hell either. He was in a human medical facility. Judging from the cold metal handcuff that secured his right wrist to the rail of the wheeled bed, Chase guessed he was still technically in the county lockup.
He had to get the fuck out of there.
