“What?” he asked, confused, thinking he’d misunderstood. “Why? What happened?” he choked out. Derrick had hurt the rogue, but he wasn’t that hurt, and he wouldn’t have been able to get there that quickly, so that was good. His brother was clear of any suspicion.
“Dr. Maher brought him in,” Roseanne responded.
“Victoria Maher or her father?” he pressed.
“Dr. Victoria Maher, sir.”
Hanging up, Derrick pounded on the gas, weaving through the narrow streets of Boston, ignoring every streetlight. Kristina groaned from the passenger seat, and he realized he needed to take it easy with the potholes. He touched her arm, but kept his eyes on the road. After a few seconds, her hand covered his and he breathed a sigh of relief, glancing down at her. Her eyes were still closed, but she was cognizant enough to recognize his touch.
“Where do you hurt, Kristina?”
“My… head,” she said in a shaky voice.
“Did you hit it?” He was certain jostling her around while keeping from falling couldn’t have helped her.
“Don’t… think… so,” she sputtered, and he wondered if she’d passed out again. “He… drugged… pungent, alcohol-like... thirsty.”
Chloroform, Derrick thought. A common person couldn’t get it, but anyone associated with the clinic could, simply by showing their ID, as it was still used in lab work.
Derrick pulled into the parking lot and jogged around to the passenger side, pulling Kristina out. He was careful not to bounce her as he carried her through the ER doors and back to the operating room. It was small, but they had everything the larger hospitals had, if not more. Being a private organization had its benefits. There was no board of directors. If something new came out, Derrick or his father ordered it.
Derrick shouted to Roseanne as he walked Kristina to the back where they housed an MRI. “Tell my father I’m here, please.” An MRI was the fastest way to see if there was any internal bleeding. In public hospitals, they screwed around with cheaper tests, but he didn’t see any need in wasting time with x-rays or ultrasounds. As he trudged along the corridor, he scanned the rooms for his father or Michael, but saw no one.
After the tests were completed, Derrick went to move Kristina from the platform, but Victoria appeared behind the glass wall, streaks of tears running down her cheeks. Derrick checked on Kristina, who was still out, and then went to the door. He needed to get Kristina IV fluids, as it appeared there were no internal injuries. She was just dehydrated.
As soon as he opened the door, Vic fell into his arms. “Michael’s in the O.R. He was shot. I was beating the crap out of him, thinking he was the rogue, and then the agent shot him—”
“Victoria,” Derrick cut her off, “slow down. Michael was shot?”
She nodded.
“You were beating him up?”
She nodded again. “I… I thought he was the rogue,” she stammered. “I heard the man yelp, and then I saw Michael, only he was all in black, fighting him. I just assumed…”
“Agent? Does he have spiky blond hair?”
“Yes.”
“Where is he?”
“I have him cuffed to a bed upstairs in the psyche ward, since there’s no one there.”
“Is Michael okay?”
She exhaled a deep breath and more tears fell. “I don’t know. The man shot him.”
“Okay,” Derrick started, steeling himself. “Stay with Kristina. The rogue used her as bait to lure me to my roof, but then I had to make a choice to save her or chase him. So he’s still out there. He drugged her with chloroform, I think. So she needs something for nausea and IV fluids.” He stopped and stared at her, then lowered his voice. “Give her eight hundred milligrams of ibuprofen for her headache. Nothing stronger, okay?”
“You’ll go assist with Michael?” She swallowed hard, shaking her head as if embarrassed. “I couldn’t. I couldn’t pull myself together. Some doctor I am, huh?”
“That’s normal, Victoria.” He rested his hand against her cheek and then pulled her into his arms to comfort her. “He’ll be okay. Dad won’t lose him,” he said, as much to convince himself as her. He stepped over to Kristina and kissed her on the head. “Please protect her.”
“I will, Derrick. I understand. I saw your pain earlier. I don’t ever want to see you like that again. Do you hear me? We need you. You’re strong. The family can’t afford to lose you.”
He closed his eyes and released a shaky breath. He didn’t feel strong at the moment. He felt as if everything in his life was unravelling. He turned and exited the room, heading toward the O.R.
Derrick scrubbed up and entered the surgery area, but his father had just finished, it appeared.
Lynford turned to Derrick and gave him a quick nod. “He’ll be okay.” He motioned for Derrick to leave, so Derrick followed. Once outside the O.R., his father turned to him. “We have another patient. God only knows how, but Vic took them both out. Evidently, Mike had injured the human before Vic showed up, so we need to tend to him. Of course, then I don’t know what we’ll do with him.” His father ran his hands through his black hair that had only a sprinkling of gray, but right now, he looked older than usual. His normally olive skin was pale, and it looked as though someone had sponged a soft purple shade underneath his eyes. “Do you have any idea what’s going on? Why Michael would attack a human?”
Derrick chewed on his lip a second and then nodded. “Unfortunately, yes. We think he’s a government agent. I called his tag number into Michael the other day because he was following Kristina. Michael must have tracked him down. The man has the video of my dive off the bridge to rescue Kristina, and who knows what else.” He paused and whooshed out a deep breath, running his hand over his mouth. “But I’m sure Michael didn’t plan on killing him. I’m certain he just wanted the file.”
His father shook his head, seemingly exhausted of the entire situation. “Let’s go see what sort of medical attention he needs, and then we’ll decide what to do with him.”
Derrick shook his head at his father’s comment. He had to remember his father was around through two World Wars and several smaller ones. The mindset for them was you had to heal your prisoner of war, not dispose of him. Not that Derrick could ever hurt an innocent person, but if he’d seen Vic and Michael dueling it out after already witnessing his swan dive off the bridge, he’d know that they weren’t normal. So they’d definitely have to question the man. But then what? They couldn’t keep him prisoner in the psyche ward forever. Someone would come looking for him.
Chapter Forty-two
Michael glanced up from his hospital bed as the door inched open ever so quietly. He forced a smile when he saw Victoria, but inside, his stomach wrenched.
“Hey… you’re awake,” she whispered.
“I was hoping I was dead,” Michael groaned.
She sat on the edge of his bed, pressing the back of her hand to his forehead, obviously checking if he had a temperature. “Why on earth would you hope that you were dead?” She lifted up the pitcher from the bedside table, poured him a cup of water, and held it out to him. “You need to drink more; your temperature is still hovering above a hundred.” She glanced up at the antibiotics in his IV drip. His father must be concerned with the bullet causing an infection.
Michael accepted the Styrofoam cup, grazing her hand with his fingers in the process. It wasn’t his stomach wrenching, he realized, it was his heart. “Because I’m pretty sure if the bullet wound doesn’t kill me, I’m going to die of embarrassment.”
The edges of Victoria’s lips turned up and she wiggled her eyebrows at him playfully. She always did like it if she thought she’d beaten him in anything. Only she didn’t know that he let her beat him in sports and running, just because it made her happy. “You mean when everyone finds out I kicked your butt?”