The urge to lie down and sleep was strong; Martin was exhausted. He had no doubt whatsoever that he could simply ease down onto his side right here on the bathroom floor and sleep until morning, but as tempting as that thought was, there was still more to be done. He struggled to his feet and waited patiently for the accompanying wave of dizziness to pass, then reached once more into the medicine cabinet, this time pulling out a bottle of ibuprofen. His arm seemed to have returned to its normal length, at least for the time being.
After dry-swallowing five of those suckers, Martin stumbled back into the kitchen, half expecting the sneaky little Benedict Arnold to be waiting for him, awake and alert, and to come at him again. She might be his destiny, his little angel, but she had a lot to learn about loyalty and about not biting the hand that feeds you.
He rounded the corner and was relieved to see her still motionless on the floor where he had left her. She was moaning softly and her eyes were open, although they remained unfocused, and she stared straight ahead. The blood continued to flow slowly from her head where he had hit her with the butt end of the knife, and it was clear that, although he had clocked her pretty hard, she was in no real danger.
Maybe she had a concussion. Good. Served her right. She could consider that the first lesson in the retraining process that was going to have to take place, beginning right here and now and continuing wherever in this big world she finally ended up.
He kneeled next to her and slapped her across the face, hard, just as he had done to himself a few moments ago. She blinked rapidly and peered up at him blankly, confused at first. Then her brain engaged and terror blossomed in those beautiful eyes as her memory clicked in. She began moaning, “Oh, oh, oh…”
Martin nodded. “Yeah, ‘oh, oh, oh’ is right, little girl. You ever come at me with a knife again, you better kill me with the first swipe because this was your one and only mulligan. Next time I’ll put it places you don’t want to think about. Are you with me on this?”
Carli moaned again but nodded gingerly at the same time, and Martin knew he had nothing to worry about. Not for a while, at least. His angel wasn’t about to cause him any trouble for the foreseeable future. Maybe this little skirmish would end up being a good thing in the long run. Maybe some time in the next week, he and Carli would look back on this moment and laugh. Probably not, but you never knew. She might be a fast learner.
At the moment, though, it didn’t seem very funny. The pain continued to ratchet up in Martin’s arm, and he didn’t feel much like laughing. When the hell would that ibuprofen start to work? He reached under Carli’s armpit and pulled, and even in his weakened state, he was able to lift her to her feet using just his good arm. She really wasn’t very big. He walked her to the basement and down the stairs, supporting her with his good arm, and brought her back to her bed, shoving her down on it roughly and snapping the empty cuff back into place on the metal frame. She lay down in the fetal position and closed her eyes.
Martin thought briefly about getting her some of the ibuprofen from upstairs—although he didn’t think her head injury was severe, he figured she had to have a massive headache—then decided, forget it, she brought this on herself, it won’t hurt her to suffer a little bit, make her get the message loud and clear: Don’t cross Martin. He wants you, but he’ll kill you if he has to.
He watched her for a moment as her respiration smoothed out and her breathing became slow and steady. She was asleep. Lucky little troublemaker. She’d caused this disaster and then got to sleep like a baby, while Martin still had things to do. Life was so unfair sometimes.
He sat and watched his angel for a while, filled with lust and longing despite all the trouble she had caused him tonight. Finally, he rose unsteadily and headed to the stairs. It was time to get to the hospital, preferably before he passed out and bled to death.
CHAPTER 42
May 28
IT WAS BARELY 5:30 a.m. Agent Canfield had told Bill to meet him at one of the only places open at that time in the morning—a coffee shop in the tiny town of Union, just off the interstate, not far from the rest stop where this whole mess had begun. And the coffee was surprisingly good. Not as good as at Smokin’ Joe’s at that rest stop, but still, better than average.
He had been surprised at how quickly Angela answered the phone when he called, given the fact that it was the middle of the night, and he knew how exhausted she had looked in his apartment before she left. She must sleep with the cell phone next to her head on the pillow, he thought, because it had barely begun to ring when she was on the line. And she had sounded awake and alert. “Canfield.”
Bill had paused for a second, actually pulling the receiver from his ear and staring at it in surprise. He had expected it to ring a while. “Yes…uh…” Now that he had her on the phone, what should he call her? He decided to stick with formalities. He didn’t know if the FBI was in the habit of monitoring the calls of its agents, but figured he’d better be careful. And maybe she didn’t even want him to use “Angie” any more, after the events of a few hours ago. “Agent Canfield, this is Bill Ferguson. I’m sorry to bother you at this ungodly hour, but you asked me to call if I thought of anything helpful, and, well, I have.”
A moment of silence followed, and Bill could hear the rustling of covers in the background. He pictured the pretty agent sitting up in bed, hair tousled and falling in unruly masses around her face, nightgown riding up her long legs. It wasn’t an unpleasant image.
She coughed and cleared her throat. “Okay,” she said. “What is it?” She sounded distant, preoccupied, and he assumed she felt uncomfortable talking to him.
“You remember I told you the guy drove an old, piece-of-crap truck out of the plaza parking lot after the failed kidnapping? And it had been repainted, but the paint job was fading? Well, there was green block lettering, three rows of it, on the side of the cargo box. The lettering was just beginning to show through the fading, amateur paint job. I remember now what it said.”
Now she sounded focused, all business. “How soon can you meet me?”