LITMIR.BIZ

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rifle and a silencer, waiting for the right moment, as opposed to the right victims, to shoot.

      “He had to have an escape route,” Nate said.

      “One thing at a time.”

      Collins took him through the shooting step by step, minute by minute. Nate could feel his anesthetic slowly wearing off, the bandage heavy on his arm, the reality of what had happened earlier in the day hitting him. He’d been taking down fugitives for a long time, guys wanted for murder, carjacking, drug dealing, torture, rape and every other manner of violent crime. He’d been shot at before, but never like this—never a sneak attack, never with a fellow deputy collapsing, maybe dying, at his side.

      “Deputy Dunnemore called his sister before the paramedics arrived?” Collins asked.

      Nate pulled himself back to the matter at hand. “That’s right.”

      “You dialed?”

      “He had her number in memory. He wasn’t in any condition to talk. I think he just wanted her to hear what happened from him.”

      “Then you talked to her?”

      “That’s right. Rob couldn’t hold on to the phone. I took it.” Nate related his brief conversation with a shocked, frightened Sarah Dunnemore. “I told her I’d call her back, but I haven’t been able to. I’d need Rob’s cell phone. I don’t have her number.”

      Collins wanted to know what Rob said to his sister. Nate told him.

      There were more questions. The guy wasn’t leaving a stone unturned.

      Nate’s head throbbed, and Special Agent Collins was getting on his nerves. Anyone would. He felt woozy from whatever crap Dr. Ling had pumped into him. A couple of Tylenol and directions to the exit would have suited him fine.

      “They’re twins,” Collins said, “Deputy Dunnemore and his sister. You have two sisters, right? You call them?”

      “Not yet, no. What the hell, Collins? You suspicious because Rob called his sister? For God’s sake, she didn’t shoot him.”

      Collins ignored him. “Okay, you rest. Doctors say they might spring you later on, let you sleep in your own bed tonight. That must sound pretty good right now.”

      “Just find the damn shooter. Never mind me.”

      “Yeah. We’re on it. You’re not going to get in the way, are you?”

      Nate said nothing.

      “One last thing,” Collins said. “What were you and Deputy Dunnemore talking about before you got hit?”

      “Tulips.”

      The FBI agent managed a small grin before he left. Even the stone-faced female agent in the corner had a twitch of a smile.

      

      Nate had his bed cranked up to a sitting position and was lying back against his skinny pillow, his shoes still on and his ankles crossed, when his family descended.

      Gus, Antonia, Carine and their new husbands, Hank Callahan and Tyler North.

      Collins had left almost an hour before. Since then, Nate had refused all company and stared at the ceiling, seeing Rob’s body jerking up as the bullet hit, hearing his sister’s shocked, frightened voice when Nate had talked to her. He saw the blood on the phone. Heard his own calm voice, as if he wasn’t really there, in the middle of chaos, shot, trying to save his colleague, trying to find the shooter. So much happening at once, but certain things stuck with him, wouldn’t recede.

      He hadn’t called the sister back. He couldn’t—her number was on Rob’s cell phone.

      Someone must have contacted her by now.

      Twins. Nate couldn’t remember Rob ever saying much about her.

      The image started replaying itself, like a movie, but Nate pulled himself out of it and sat up straighter. He tried to smile at his family. “I feel like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. All I need is Toto to show up. They let you all in here at once?”

      His white-haired uncle, built like Nate, grunted. “It’s Antonia’s fault. She told your doctors you could handle all of us.”

      Nate eyed his out-to-there pregnant sister, wearing what at a guess was one of her husband’s shirts. “I can handle the stress, but can you, Antonia? You look like you’re going to have that baby any second.”

      “Not for a few more weeks.” Always the doctor, she picked up his chart and scanned it, sighing. “How’s your arm?”

      “Anesthetized. I can’t feel a thing. Rob Dunnemore’s the one in rough shape.”

      She nodded. “So I understand.”

      Tyler North, Carine’s air force pararescueman husband, spoke up. “A wound like that. Chances are he’s either going to make a full recovery or he’s going to die. There’s not much in between.”

      Antonia winced. “Ty, for God’s sake—”

      But North wasn’t one to pussyfoot around. They’d all been friends since childhood, and Nate appreciated his straightforward assessment. Carine leaned over his bed, the stress of the past hours evident in her drawn, pale look, in the blue eyes all three siblings shared. Carine was the youngest. Her auburn hair was lighter than Antonia’s, Nate’s own hair so dark the red streaks were barely noticeable. Carine had been shot at. She knew what it was like. “I’m glad you weren’t killed,” she whispered.

      “Me, too.”

      Hank Callahan, Antonia’s husband, slipped an arm around his wife and eyed Nate. “Is there anything I can do?” Once a helicopter rescue pilot and now a junior senator from Massachusetts, Hank, like the rest of them, was used to taking action.

      “Get me a shirt. I feel like an idiot in this gown.”

      Antonia hissed. “I knew you’d be impossible. Didn’t I tell you, Gus?”

      Their uncle stared out the window with its view of the street. He was in jeans and a hiking jersey. He was one of the best outfitters in the White Mountains, content to stay home in Cold Ridge and hike, cook and redecorate the house he’d inherited from his older brother. But Gus had been shot at more than any of them. He’d served a year in combat in Vietnam before coming home, only to end up raising his orphaned nieces and nephew.

      He glanced back at Nate. “Why don’t you drive home with me? The mountain air’ll do you good.”

      Nate shook his head. “Last time I was home, you served orange eggs.”

      “They’re not that orange. You’re just used to New York eggs.”

      “I’m used to yellow eggs.”

      “It’s what Moon feeds them.”

      Moon. Moon Solaire. She was a newcomer to Cold Ridge. People called her the egg lady because she had dozens of chickens in a variety of breeds. She and Gus had been seeing each other for a couple of months. “Moon’s really into chickens, isn’t she?”

      Nate was starting to feel sluggish and achy, some of his earlier adrenaline rush wearing off. Or maybe now that his family was there, he could allow himself a letdown.

      “Who knew there were that many different kinds of chickens?” Gus said. “I thought she might be one of your people, with a fake name like Moon Solaire.”

      “What do you mean, one of my people?”

      Gus shrugged. “You know, some lowlife you’re protecting so they can testify against some bigger lowlife you’re not protecting.”

      He meant WITSEC. The Witness Security Program. Gus’s rendition of its mission of protecting government witnesses and their dependents was oversimplified and biased, but Nate was in no mood to argue. “Not all protected federal witnesses are criminals, and I’d be surprised if we ever

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