“I’m really sorry you had to push the issue,” Dr. Breaux said. “We’d stopped our work here because it was too dangerous, but then Monk insisted we start again. I knew impregnating Susannah would be a mistake, but we couldn’t afford to kill her. We weren’t sure how much her cousin had told her, and with her husband’s connections…”
He motioned to both of them with his gun. “Put your hands up and step out from behind that desk.”
Raissa glanced at Zach, who barely shook his head. There was no way to get to their weapons in time. They stepped out from behind the desk and walked toward the doctor until he told them to stop, about ten feet in front of him. “You”—Dr. Breaux waved his gun at Zach—“take out your gun. Slowly, or I shoot her right now. Slide it across the floor to me.”
Zach slid his pistol out of his hip holster and pushed it across the floor toward the doctor.
“Now you,” Dr. Breaux said, and motioned to Raissa.
Raissa removed her pistol from the back of her jeans and slid it across the floor. She made no move at all for her ankle holster and hoped the doctor had no idea she always doubled up on weapons.
Dr. Breaux shook his head. “I was hoping I was wrong about you, Raissa, but some things just never added up. And when Dr. Spencer told me you went to the police after the abduction, I was afraid my worst fears were right. You have a certain way of moving, of watching people, that’s familiar to me from my war days. You’re a well-trained machine.”
“How long has this been going on?” Raissa asked.
Dr. Breaux kicked both of their guns into a corner, then studied her for a moment. “I guess it doesn’t matter if I tell you. You’ll be the only people left who will know everything, except me, and that will all change in another couple of minutes.
“It started after the war…during the war, if you want the real beginning,” Dr. Breaux said. “I was captured in a village in Vietnam. There was an outbreak of influenza. Thousands of sick people and one doctor. When they found out I was a doctor, they put me to work in their makeshift clinic.”
“This wasn’t about the flu,” Raissa said.
“No. We cared for flu patients all day long and well into the evening, but at night, a Vietnamese doctor worked his own magic in nothing more than a pop-up tent and not even five thousand dollars’ worth of medical equipment. Pretty impressive, when you consider he made the first huge theoretical strides in building a superhuman race. He’d barely started work on human embryos, but if he’d had the equipment and more time, he might have been successful. His theories were mostly sound, and decades ahead of anything I’d ever seen.”
“So you and Dr. Spencer re-created his research in the States after you were rescued and returned.”
Dr. Breaux laughed. “I killed him for his research and escaped with all of it. Do you really think I was going to let someone beat me to this discovery?”
“You impregnated women without their permission. You genetically altered the embryos before implanting. You knew what you were doing was illegal on so many levels, not to mention morally reprehensible.”
“We needed a test sample, and we couldn’t afford for all the children to be raised in the same location or someone might clue in on complications. Mothers wanted children. And I had several potential investors lining up to make me a very wealthy man.”
“I thought Hank was a success. You could’ve cut and run,” Raissa said.
“Yes, Hank was a success, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t duplicate the results with girls. No girls, no deal with investors. With Melissa, I’d finally isolated the problem and was ready to move forward with a new round of babies, when Helena got cancer.”
Raissa felt the blood drain from her head. “Oh, my God. It was you who killed Helena.”
“I could hardly have her asking Hank for a bone-marrow transplant, then finding out he wasn’t her son. She would’ve made things very messy.”
“And then you kidnapped Hank,” Raissa said.
“Of course. I knew where Monk had kept an extra alien suit, but never figured on having to use it. It was quite a bit of fun, though, the look on Hank’s face.”
“And Melissa?”
“She’ll be safely home tomorrow—just like the others.”
“Why kill Dr. Spencer?”
“He was a liability. He was in a panic, ready to confess everything, and had forgotten entirely what a crack shot I was in the military. I’ve always kept in practice. You never know when you might need to kill something.”
Raissa stared at Dr. Breaux, his eyes cold and calculating, and realized this was the end. This man had been working toward a single-minded purpose for over half of his life. He believed he was God and wasn’t going to let anything get in his way.
She reached for Zach’s hand and held it tightly in her own, regret washing over her. “I am so sorry,” she said.
Zach shook his head. “I’m not.”
“Touching,” Dr. Breaux said. His finger tightened on the trigger, and Raissa closed her eyes, waiting for the end.
Suddenly, the door to the records room flew open and Sonny Hebert burst in. Sonny fired one shot at Dr. Breaux and caught him in the leg, but the doctor managed to squeeze off one of his own and caught the mobster in his arm. Sonny dropped his gun and launched behind a bookshelf to protect himself from more fire. Raissa and Zach hesitated for only a moment, then dove behind the computer desk.
Raissa pulled her pistol from her ankle holster and fired off a shot at the doctor, who slipped behind a set of bookcases just in time to avoid her shot. “Checkmate,” she whispered to Zach. “Two of us and two of them.” Raissa had no doubt that Sonny would only delay coming after her long enough to kill the doctor.
Raissa peeked around the side of the desk and gasped in surprise. Helena Henry was dangling from a ventilation pipe, pushing as hard as she could against the bookcase Dr. Breaux was hiding behind. The bookcase rocked back and forth, almost to the tipping point. Raissa tugged at Zach and pointed to the bookcase. “Helena,” she whispered.
Zach nodded and perched on the other side of the desk, prepared to dive for his weapon as soon as the bookcase toppled. Raissa held her breath as the bookcase tipped forward, then backward, then forward, and seemed to almost pause before it crashed into the bookcase in front of it, setting them off like dominos all the way to the front of the office.
The fallout was immediate. Sonny popped up from behind the desk, dove for his gun, and opened fire at the doctor, who in turn had opened fire at everything in the room. Zach grabbed his weapon and ran for the emergency exit at the opposite corner of the room, Raissa close behind.
She heard Helena yelling at her to hurry, when she felt the bullet rip through her thigh. She stumbled and tried to brace herself, but her head hit the side of a metal filing cabinet. The last thing she remembered seeing was Zach’s horrified expression as he looked back at her, and then everything went black.
Chapter Twenty-two
Raissa awakened to a burning pain in her leg and voices arguing above her. She opened her eyes, but everything was blurry. Finally, things sharpened a bit, and she saw Helena hovering right over her face, looking down anxiously at her.
“Are you all right?” Helena asked. “Say something if you are. Anything.”
“I think so,” Raissa said, a whisper all she could manage with her aching head.
“The emergency-room staff is on their way, although I have no idea how Zach is going to explain this mess.” Helena said. “And those two have been going at it ever since Sonny dropped Dr. Breaux.” Helena moved to the side and Raissa looked up at Sonny and Zach, squared off and equally pissed.
“I didn’t shoot her,” Sonny argued. “I was only firing at the doctor. And I’m not going to apologize for killing the bastard who messes with kids.”
“Your guy kidnapped those kids,” Zach pointed out.
“I suspected Monk was up to something, but I could never prove it until Raissa blew her cover. I got all over Monk and he told me some of it, but he said he didn’t do another job for them after I found out. I didn’t figure out the rest until today, after talking with Susannah Franco. Those doctor assholes convinced him to take that first girl by telling him she was going to die and they could save her. Monk said if they didn’t return the girl to her parents, he’d blow the lid off everything. Monk thought he was helping the girls, the dumb son-of-a-bitch. He never should have gotten involved, and he damn sure shouldn’t have gotten his cousin involved, especially after he’d been out of it for years.”
Raissa sucked in a breath. Finally, things were making sense. After the years spent trying to heal his dying daughter, Sonny would be the last man alive to intentionally hurt a child, despite his many other destructive ways.
“What are you even doing here, Sonny?” Zach asked.
“I came to talk to Hank, then saw you two and figured you were here for the same reason. You went off a different direction, so I waited a bit, then saw that doctor go the same way. I could see the outline of his pistol in his pocket, so I followed. I heard everything that sick fucker said.”
Zach shook his head. “This whole thing is unbelievable. Why in the world would Susannah Franco want to have a baby she knew would get cancer?”
“Monk told me the doctors said they’d fixed the problem,” Sonny said. “My guess is that Monk never even told Susannah about the illness. I think they were just using Melissa as a last test case before cutting out to another country. When Melissa got sick, Monk knew they’d lied. He confronted Spencer and Breaux, and they killed him.”
“You expect me to believe that?” Zach asked.
“I don’t give a shit what you believe. I know what I know. I just couldn’t do anything about it until I knew for sure Melissa was going to be all right. I’ve waited years to finally understand this, but it’s over. Melissa is the last of them, so there’s no longer a use for Dr. Mengele. Besides, he shot at me first.”
“He barely nicked you. It’s not even bleeding anymore.”
“Yeah, well, he didn’t just nick your girlfriend. I’d think you’d be thanking me instead of complaining.”
Raissa struggled up to a sitting position, distracting the two men from their conversation.
Zach dropped down beside her. “Don’t move. You hit your head and we need to make sure there’s no damage. The nurse is coming with a gurney.”
Raissa looked at Zach, his expression filled with worry and anger and love, and she felt her chest constrict. He really cared for her, and as much as she’d tried not to, she’d fallen for the surly detective in a big way.
The door to the office flew open and two nurses rushed in with a gurney. Zach barked orders, and the nurses made quick work of securing her to the gurney. As they wheeled her out of the office, Raissa looked back at the man who wanted to protect her, then at the other man, the one who wanted to kill her, and was suddenly overwhelmed with the hopelessness of it all.
Zach pulled out his cell phone and dialed Captain Saucier. This was one time his boss wouldn’t mind having to get out of bed. He told the captain everything he and Raissa had discovered about the girls, and the captain started making things happen. A quick real-estate search turned up a warehouse in New Orleans owned by Dr. Breaux, and thirty minutes later, Zach got word that Melissa was alive and well and on her way to a hospital.
Susannah Franco broke down when questioned by the police and gave up everything she knew about Monk, the experiment, and the other kidnappings. The mayor had caught her in a lie the day of the kidnapping and she’d confessed everything to him. In a typical move, the mayor had kept it all quiet in the guise of protecting his son and granddaughter, but Zach suspected he just wanted to increase his popularity.
Zach, Sonny, and the two policemen the captain had sent relocated to an exam room just off the lobby of the hospital. The police officers were trying to get everything Sonny knew on record, but kept double-checking with Zach. Not that he blamed them. Sonny’s story sounded more far-fetched than a Hollywood movie.
After ten minutes of disbelief from the officers and swearing and hand gesturing from Sonny, Zach stepped across the hall to the visitor’s lounge to pour himself a cup of coffee. What a night. What a mess. Raissa had blown the lid off of one of the most bizarre and corrupt things he’d ever heard of in his life. And she’d taken a bullet for her trouble.
His heart clutched when he thought about how close he’d come to losing her. And as much as he knew that Sonny Hebert belonged behind bars, he couldn’t hate the man who’d saved the woman he loved.
Holy shit.
He set his coffee down on the table and the liquid sloshed over the rim of the cup, burning his hand. He shook the coffee off his hand and grabbed a napkin from the counter to wipe off the rest.
You’ve really done it now, Blanchard.
He stepped up to a window and stared out into the darkness. How the hell had he allowed this to happen? He’d fallen for a woman who was going to disappear like the wind as soon as she checked out of the hospital, and the worst part was, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Raissa would never be safe with Sonny still gunning for her. She’d move off and become a bank teller in Idaho or a waitress in Seattle, and he’d never see her again.
He’d just go on the same way he always had.
No. He shook his head. Things would never be the same again.
Raissa sat propped up against the pillows of her hospital bed, her head still throbbing. The only good part was, the pain in her head had caused her to completely forget the pain in her leg. Maryse and Mildred had arrived earlier, and Raissa had filled them in on everything. Now they sat at the side of the bed, listening to Helena, who was perched on the bed, telling them everything that had happened when the New Orleans police arrived after Raissa had been taken away.
“The police were confused as hell, but the long and short of the immediate situation is that the only bad guy in the mix was Dr. Breaux, who is dead.”
Mildred shook her head, the dismay on her face clear as day. “I still just can’t believe it. How could we have been so wrong? We never noticed anything at all.”
Maryse patted her hand. “It’s not our fault. Obviously he’d been at this for a long time. We had no way of knowing that he was someone completely different. How could we?”
“I’m dead proof of that,” Helena said. “He admitted to Raissa that he killed me.”
Mildred gasped. “Oh, my God. Raissa, is that true?”
“Yes,” Raissa confirmed. “I’m sorry. With everything else going on, I left that part out. I accused him, and he said he couldn’t afford Helena finding out Hank wasn’t her biological son.”
“And if she found out about the leukemia,” Maryse finished, “then she’d have asked for a donor match and found out then. Shit.”
“But he didn’t say how he did it,” Helena said, “so I still don’t know.”
Maryse frowned. “I have an idea, but we’ll never be able to prove it.”
“I don’t care if you can prove it,” Helena said. “Just tell me something that makes sense.”
“When we were planting that listening device at Sonny’s you said you hadn’t paid for medicine in years—that you’d gotten samples.”
“That’s right,” Helena said. “Damned pharmacy was always out of my inhaler.”
“And Dr. Breaux gave you samples from his office.”
“Yeah.”
“I think the poison was in the inhaler. Try to remember, Helena. Did you use your inhaler before you drank the brandy?”
Helena’s eyes widened. “Holy shit, I did. That must be it.”
Raissa shook her head. “Genius. It evaporates into her system, and there’s no record of where she got it even if anyone asked. It was the golden opportunity. I think you’re right, Maryse.”
“It makes sense, as much as anything does,” Helena said, then sighed. “I want you all to know that I really appreciate everything you’ve done…for me and for everyone else. I can’t believe this is finally over.”
“Not quite over,” Maryse said, “or you wouldn’t still be here. But I have an idea about that, and I’m going to run it by Sabine tomorrow. I’ll fill you in as soon as I know more.”
“Thanks.”
“So, Helena,” Raissa said, “finish telling us what happened when the police got here. Did they arrest Sonny?”
“Oh, right,” Helena said, growing animated again. “They didn’t arrest Sonny for killing Dr. Breaux, because Zach backs his story that Dr. Breaux was holding you two hostage with the intent to kill when Sonny burst in, and that Dr. Breaux fired the first shot. Probably good for Sonny that Dr. Breaux at least grazed him with that shot.”
Raissa nodded, then flinched as her head throbbed more. “Makes him more sympathetic.”
“Exactly. And Sonny Hebert needs all the sympathy he can manage. Then the FBI showed up, all mad and everything. They told Sonny they want to question him, but I’m not sure if they can make anything stick, as he wasn’t actually the one kidnapping the girls.”
“Probably not,” Raissa said. “Sonny can always claim he didn’t know about the kidnappings until after the doctors killed Monk and he found the alien suit.”
“Which he has in his closet,” Helena pointed out.
Raissa shrugged. “Doesn’t prove anything. Besides, I have a feeling that suit is long gone by now anyway.”
Helena shook her head. “Sonny put himself in the middle of a big fat mess. How do you think he’ll get out of it?”
“There had to have been other people in on this—doctors, nurses…Someone else knows what they were doing, and the cops are going to want their heads on a platter big-time, especially since Dr. Breaux is dead. They’ll need Sonny to testify about what Monk told him of the kidnappings and Dr. Breaux’s confession, so the cops will deal. That ought to kill them.”
Helena blew out a breath and looked at Raissa. “But that means you’re still on the hook as far as testifying for Sonny’s other crimes goes. Shit. I was hoping the FBI could get Sonny on something else so you could live normally. I guess there’s no chance of that, is there?”
“No. If the FBI can’t get Sonny on the kidnappings, they’re going to want me to testify on the racketeering. The time on that case is almost up.”
“So you’ll be gone again.”
Raissa looked at their expressions, hoping there was another answer but not believing there was. “Gone or dead. There’s really no other way. I’m sorry, guys.”
“That’s bullshit!” Helena said. “I know Sonny’s a bad guy, but he was only trying to help those girls, and he told you where Hank was. It’s not fair that the FBI leaves you in a position of having no life, and no future but running from Sonny and his family.”
“I agree,” Maryse said. “Surely something can be done.”
Raissa shook her head. “I’m the only witness who can testify to the things I saw and did. No one else is qualified to provide that testimony. I’m all they have.”
“Makes me wish you weren’t so good at your job,” Mildred said. “If you didn’t know anything, you could marry Zach and live in New Orleans, or maybe even in Mudbug with Maryse and Sabine.” Mildred sighed. “I guess that’s just wishful thinking, huh?”
Raissa stared at Mildred, an idea forming in the back of her mind. It was risky in all sorts of ways. In fact, it was the biggest risk she’d ever taken, and that was saying a lot. But it just might work.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door. Raissa looked up in time to see the doctor who had examined her earlier, Agent Fields, and Zach enter her room, followed by Sonny and two NOPD officers. Zach went straight to Raissa and kissed her on the lips. “How are you feeling?”
“My head hurts, but I think I’m okay.”
The doctor gave her a critical look. “These people insisted on seeing you and asking some questions. I am totally against putting any more strain on you, given your head injury, but I was forced to give you an option.” The doctor shot a dirty look at the police and Agent Fields. “If you aren’t up to talking, just say the word, and I’ll clear the whole lot of them out of here.”
“It’s okay,” Raissa said.
“You’re certain? I don’t like to think you’re being intimidated.”
Raissa smiled. “I promise, if any of them get out of line, I’ll ask them to leave myself.”
The doctor nodded, but didn’t look convinced. He gave all of the men a frown and left the room.
Agent Fields stepped forward, followed by the two cops. “First off, we need to hear from you who shot you.”
“I have no idea,” Raissa said.
Agent Fields frowned. “You came to the hospital to get evidence against Dr. Breaux, and then Sonny showed up. Shots were fired, but you can’t say who hit you?”
Raissa frowned. “I came to the hospital?”
Zach looked over at Mildred and Maryse, his face filled with worry. “What’s wrong with her? Has she been talking to you?”
Maryse looked over at Raissa, her eyes wide. Raissa looked her in the eye, willing her to understand. Mildred started to speak, but Maryse took her hand and squeezed. “She’s been talking,” Maryse said, “but mostly about stuff we did months ago.” Maryse bit her lower lip and shot a worried look at Raissa. “We were just about to call for the doctor when you guys walked in.”
Raissa managed to look confused and made a mental note to talk to Maryse later about her superb ability to lie on command. The woman was a pro.
“I think maybe you should call the doctor now.” Zach leaned in close. “Do you know who I am?”
Raissa laughed. “No, I let strange men kiss me all the time. Of course I know who you are.”
Zach nodded. “We met because you were trying to figure out why those girls were kidnapped, remember? You figured it all out by looking at girls’ records.”
“Kidnapped…Melissa Franco. She was kidnapped.” Raissa sat up straight. “Is she okay? Did they find her? She always made her mom buy blue candles.”
“Melissa’s mother confessed to her part in everything, and they found Melissa at a warehouse Dr. Breaux rented in New Orleans. All his notes are there—decades worth of testing. We’ll be able to fi gure out everything he did. Melissa’s on her way to the hospital but appears to be fine.”
“Thank God. I’m glad to hear that.”
“There were other girls…from years ago. Do you remember?”
Raissa frowned. “I don’t know any other girls. Only Melissa.”
“You investigated the cases when you were undercover in Sonny Hebert’s organization.” Zach nodded toward Sonny, who cocked his head to one side and studied her, a confused look on his face.
Raissa stared at Sonny for several seconds, then gave Zach a bewildered look. “I don’t know that man.”
“That’s Sonny Hebert,” Zach explained. “You were undercover in his organization when you were in the FBI.”
“The FBI?” Raissa widened her eyes and looked from Zach to Sonny to the cops.
Zach sucked in a breath. “You left protective custody over nine years ago and have been pretending to be a psychic in New Orleans.”
Raissa laughed. “Pretending? I’m not pretending. I have a lot of clients. You guys are kidding me, right? Really, what’s all this about, Zach?”
The room went instantly silent, and Raissa was fairly sure no one was breathing. The doctor walked into the room and immediately checked Raissa’s vitals. “Do you want me to remove your visitors, Ms. Bordeaux?”
“No,” Raissa said. “They’re trying to pull a prank on me.”
Zach looked over at the doctor, his face panicked. “She doesn’t remember things. Some recent events and anything from about ten years ago.” He pointed at Sonny. “She worked for this man for two years, but doesn’t know him. I don’t understand.”
The doctor shone a light in Raissa’s eyes and felt her scalp. “The injury was to the section of the brain that stores memory. Memory loss is always a possibility, and long-term memory is the most likely to go.”
“But it will come back, right?” Agent Fields asked.
“There’s no way to know,” the doctor said. “I think it’s better if you all let Ms. Bordeaux rest, and no more questioning until I say she’s ready. Is that clear?”
Agent Fields and the New Orleans cops didn’t look happy, but they couldn’t exactly argue with the doctor, so they trailed out of the office. Sonny, following behind them, looked the most confused of the lot. At the doorway, he paused and looked back at Raissa.
Raissa stared at him, held his gaze. Sonny’s eyes widened and he barely nodded, then left the room. Maryse hopped up from her chair, pulling Mildred with her. “I think we ought to give you two some time,” Maryse said. “We’ll go get some coffee. Call if you need anything.”
Helena hopped off the end of the bed and trailed behind them, giving Raissa a wink and a thumbs-up on her way out the door.
“Thanks,” Raissa said. She lay back against the pillows and looked over at Zach, who was frowning at her.
“You’re faking,” he said. “Holy shit, Raissa! This is not a game. Why are you faking memory loss?”
“Between my undercover work and hiding because of my undercover work, I’ve lost eleven years of my life to Sonny Hebert. And the ironic thing is, if it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t have another eleven years to make things different. He saved my life, Zach. And probably Hank’s, too.”
“But the racketeering case—”
“I know Sonny’s done some bad things, but he did help us find out who was taking those girls, and he found Hank. If the FBI has to have me to make a case against him, then it wasn’t much of a case to begin with, was it?”
Zach nodded. “You know what? You’re right. You’ve given more than your share. Let someone else take up the slack. I’m sure Sonny’s not going legitimate anytime soon. They’ll get him, eventually.”
“Maybe, or maybe not. If they didn’t make a case in the nine years I was hiding, I can only guess that Sonny’s gotten a whole lot better at his job.”
“And what about you?” Zach asked.
“What do you mean?”
“What are you going to do, now that you’re free?”
Raissa smiled. “Well, I’m not going back to the FBI, that’s for sure. Honestly, I don’t know what I’ll do. I haven’t had the freedom to choose anything in a long, long time.” She leaned toward Zach and whispered in his ear, “But I hear there’s this detective who needs someone to keep him in line.”
Zach smiled. “And just what makes you think you can do the job?”
Raissa softly kissed his neck once, then again, then his earlobe. He groaned and turned to her, crushing her lips with his. He gathered her in his arms, and in an instant, Raissa knew she’d made the right decision.
She’d seen the future, and it was very bright, indeed.