Just as they were scurrying, Sloan stepped out of the bathroom. The roar of water filling a tub drenched the air behind her.
“What’s happening?” she asked.
“Sloan, go help Theo and Greg. They’re readying a bed for Evan,” she said dismissively. Her hands were quickly untying her brother’s boots and pulling them off with a steady yank.
“Meg,” Evan mumbled, delirious with fever, clutching his badly burned left hand to himself.
“I’m here little brother. I’m getting you ready for what is probably going to feel like a very cold bath.”
“Meg, you need to listen.” His voice was barely above a whisper, but Meg felt the urgency behind his words loud and clear.
“What is it, Evan?” Meg, the daughter of a soldier, and a soldier in her own right, felt her eyes burning with unshed tears.
“Not much time,” he groaned and coughed deeply.
“You’re going to have years, Evan,” she flung her will over him.
“Won’t work on me,” he mumbled. “I can see what will happen, sister.” Evan’s eyes locked on his sister’s and the connection seemed to steady his pain enough so he could speak.
“I can see it so clearly now.” His eyes glistened over for a moment as he stared past her shoulder at nothing.
“Let me tell you how it ends, sister and listen ‘cause I only have the strength to tell you once.” He began, speaking quickly.
“You may not remember me as I do you, Meg, but I’ll start by telling you how proud I am to have been your brother, now and always.”
“Evan!” Meg sobbed.
“Remember that game we would play back at the ranch? The one we called ‘Hunt or Be Hunted’?”
“Evan, stop! You can’t d—”
“Just let me talk, Meggie. Please? I don’t have much time.”
Meg knelt beside her brother, finally the calmest she had seen him since before the fire, and listened.
***
Two hours later, Evan was lying on a pile of towels with only a thin sheet to cover his still feverish body. Sloan agreed to take the first watch over him. The rest of the family moved to the adjoining suite. They turned on the television to see if they could learn anything about what the world was saying about them.
Chapter 29 He Lies
“Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen of the press. Senator Arkdone will be reading a statement, and then opening the floor for a select few questions. A copy of the statement will be simultaneously released to all social media outlets.”
The crowd murmured at the urgency in the voice of the press release agent for the Senator. A hush darted through the mass the moment the handsome, yet worried face of one of the most powerful men in the country came into view. Senator Arkdone struck a remarkably commanding figure at six feet, two inches and two hundred pounds. He wore his stylish though conservative suit with ease, as if he were just as comfortable in it as he would be in a pair of blue jeans and T-shirt. His face was solemn, brows knit with worry. Dark circles hung under his sharp black eyes.
“Three nights ago, my home and workplace in Kentucky was attacked by a group of terrorists who calls themselves The Winter Clan. They destroyed the hospital in which I care for the mentally challenged. These are the faces of my innocent patients who depend on me and my work to take care of them. With personal funds, I have already begun to rebuild their sanctuary.”
Images of desolate, dazed and confused looking elderly people were flashed on a screen on the left side of the room.
“I was unaware of this group until the moment gunfire and explosions ripped the walls down around me. Many of my staff and several patients were killed at their hands. At first, I believed it should have been me lying on the floor in a pool of my own blood.”
Arkdone paused for effect, giving everyone time to gasp and whisper laments before he continued.
“Then, through prayer, I realized the reason I was spared was to stop this Winter Clan.” His voice rose with a preacher’s tenor.
“I will stop them from taking up arms against anyone else and causing destruction the way they did in my home. So I immediately involved Homeland Security and other federal and state authorities. Working in cooperation, we tracked the terrorists here to Arizona, where we learned, through secret sources, that Union Medical University Hospital was to be their next target.
“The authorities gathered an elite SWAT team and thwarted the Winter Clan’s campaign by mere minutes. The Winter Clan fought back. We suffered the loss of dozens of good men and women. The Clan escaped capture by stealing a civilian’s truck. Their vehicles have been confiscated and found to have enough explosives to turn the hospital into a pile of rubble.” The Senator’s voice echoed powerfully off the stark walls of the conference room.