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“Nope.” With his free hand, he grabbed his flight bag and headed for the bathroom.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to shower and then get some sleep.”
“Sleep?” Brynn placed herself in his path. “We don’t have time for that. If you don’t believe anything else, believe me when I say that it’s imperative I get that box to its destination.”
“Which is?”
He gave her a ten count, and when she didn’t reply, he bumped her aside with his hip, continued on into the bathroom, and slammed the door behind him.
9:01 a.m.
“We lost her.”
Goliad’s update wasn’t what Delores and Richard Hunt had expected to hear, and the news certainly didn’t go over well with either.
Following their bodyguard’s last call, Richard had demanded to know everything Delores had been withholding from him about the situation in Howardville. She had laid out the fac
ts the way a blackjack dealer dealt cards, methodically, one at a time. After each, Richard had calculated his odds of winning the hand or losing huge.
He’d been dismayed over how badly the job had been botched, and angry at Delores for glossing over the worst of it. “All I got was a weather report!” he’d shouted.
Her only defense had been that she’d wanted to prevent him from worrying.
“I appreciate that consideration,” he’d told her in an effort to suppress the full ferocity of his anger. “By the same token, I resent being kept in the dark. Don’t do it again. Ever.”
He had accepted her tearful apology along with her promise not to hold back anything from now on, no matter how dire circumstances became. She’d sealed her promise with a kiss and reminded him that the situation wasn’t all that bleak.
No one knew of his connection to any of last night’s events. No one knew of his illness. The media had believed the statement his office had released about their plans for the holiday: They were spending a quiet Thanksgiving alone at their beloved estate in Georgia. They welcomed a respite from the Washington social scene. They valued their time together at home. Blah blah blah.
With confidence, she had said, “We encountered some speed bumps, but they’re behind us now. I have Nate’s assurance that all is well.”
Her confidence had been premature.
Dr. Brynn O’Neal’s whereabouts were unknown. Goliad and his nitwit partner had lost track of her.
Propped up in bed with pillows behind his back, Delores at his side, Richard had assumed the facial expression that opposition senators hated to see at the podium during a debate.
There was no gentleness in it, no suggestion that he might reconsider his position and compromise. His visage was as indomitable as the faces carved into Rushmore. It could intimidate even Delores.
She covered his hand with hers, but he shook off the comforting gesture and barked, “What happened, Goliad?”
Talking to them through the speakerphone, he gave them bullet points, as was Richard’s preference when receiving bad news. He wanted to know the worst aspects of a crisis first. The fine print could be added later.
“She left the sheriff’s department with the same deputy she’d ridden with before. He dropped her at the hospital.”
“The hospital?”
“The ER, sir. My guess is that she went to see about White, the airfield guy. The deputy returned for her a few minutes later. They went to a café. Timmy and me went in, sat fairly close, but not so close that they’d notice. They talked a little, ate breakfast.”
“Talked about what?”
“We weren’t close enough to hear. But they were smiling, friendly.”
He described how the two had parted company. “She went down the hall to the restroom. She didn’t return in a timely fashion. I went to check. Restroom door was open, nobody in there. An exit opened into an alley. I ran to both ends of it. She was nowhere in sight.
“When I rejoined Timmy in the dining room, there was a man asking the waitress had she seen the doctor, said that he was to meet her there with a car. The waitress pointed him toward the back. He was out of sight less than a minute, returned looking steamed. He left in the car he came in.”
