Conscience (The Bellator Saga Book 2) (6 page)

Christine burst into the room. “What’s wrong? Are you in pain?”

Well, yeah. A little. But she’d only play that card if she had to. What on earth had Jack told Christine to make her run upstairs that fast? She’d have to ask later. Caroline patted a spot on the bed next to her. “Close the door. Come sit by me.”

Christine pressed the door shut. “Jack made it sound as if you were having some issues.”

“I just wanted to spend some time with you.” She looked at Christine closely. “Have you been sleeping at all?”

Christine slid onto the bed next to her. “Is that a polite way of telling me I don’t look very good?”

“No, you look like you’ve been stressing too much. I want to make sure you’re doing okay. I hope you told Tom how much I appreciated him being here.”

“He knows.”

“I think you should go home and be with him. Take it easy for a while, let him take care of you.”

“Are you kicking me out?”

Caroline sighed. “Chrissy, why do you make simple conversations so hard sometimes? I’m concerned about you. You’ve been avoiding me for days. It makes me sad.”

Christine rubbed her forehead. “I don’t want you to feel that way, Caroline. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I want you to focus on yourself, not running ragged worrying about me and the girls. We have Jack. You need to prioritize your needs for once.”

“Speaking of that,” Christine said. “What
is
going on between you two now?”

Caroline smiled. Christine would do almost anything to avoid a difficult discussion – especially if it involved feelings – even if it meant pursuing an equally problematic topic.

“It’s good,” she said. “He may have half-proposed to me while I was under the influence of drugs.”

“And what did you say?”

Caroline still couldn’t believe she’d reacted so flippantly. Maybe she’d have her panic attack later, once she and Jack started seriously discussing life-altering decisions and whether or not to make them while high on morphine. But her daughters still had a say in the process. “I told him he had to talk to the girls first,” she said. “It’s not completely my call.”

“That’s gracious of you.”

“If you really want, he could ask your permission too.”

Christine bit back a laugh. “So you’ve made up with him?”

“Yes. He’s been wonderful. We talked for hours after I woke up after my surgery. I’ve had a lot of time to think about things. I’ll have even more time during the rest of the recess.”

“I expect you to take it easy the entire month of August.”

“That sounds like an order. Are you my doctor now?”

“God forbid. You’re enough hassle as a friend.”

Christine seemed to be taking their entire conversation in stride. Maybe Jack’s talk of a permanent commitment wasn’t all that radical.

“You don’t appear all that shocked that Jack asked me to marry him,” Caroline said.

“I’m not,” Christine said briskly. “You’re good wife material.”

Caroline chortled. “Most of the men I’ve dated would disagree with you.”

“And there are now at least two who wouldn’t. How does your arm feel?”

“It’s fine,” Caroline said, then felt a stabbing pain and winced. She probably shouldn’t have laughed so hard. Christine picked up on it immediately and gave her a distraught look.

“It really is fine, Chrissy. I just have my moments.”

“Do you want a stronger painkiller? Some sort of muscle relaxant?”

“No, I want to wean myself off whatever I was on. I don’t want to get hooked on anything. Ibuprofen works.”

Christine wrung her hands. “Whatever you say.”

“I want to talk about what happened,” Caroline said.

“I don’t.”

“I know you don’t.”

Christine turned toward the window. “I don’t see what there is to talk about.”

“My surgeon told me I might have been in a lot of trouble if you hadn’t been there. Arterial bleeds are nothing to mess around with.”

“No, they’re not.”

“He would have told you that himself and probably said any number of complimentary things to you. But curiously enough, you kept leaving every time any medical professional came into my hospital room, including the nurses. You also left almost any time I wanted to talk to you.”

“Caroline-”

“Are you mad at me?”

“No,” Christine said instantly, sounding as upset as she looked. “Please don’t think that.”

Caroline stared at her sling. “I know what I did was stupid. I have no idea what I was thinking.”

“It wasn’t stupid. It was fearless. I don’t know how many people would have had the courage to do what you did.”

“Would you feel the same way if I’d left my children without their mother?”

Christine grasped Caroline’s good hand. “Don’t you ever talk about anything like that,” she said in a reproachful tone. “
Ever
.”

“It was bad, wasn’t it?”

“It wasn’t good. You were losing a lot of blood. I tried to help you the best I could. I have no idea why that ambulance took so long.”

A question that would never be answered properly. Jack wasn’t particularly happy about the response time, either. Caroline hadn’t really thought about it, didn’t
want
to think about it, and knew better than to say anything that would set Christine off. She curled her hand into a fist, feeling her fingernails dig into her palm. Pain was always a good distraction from reality.

Christine swiped her thumb over the bandage covering the spot where Caroline’s IV had been, only withdrawing when Caroline finally let her hand lay flat. “I don’t know what I would have done if something really catastrophic had happened to you,” she said. “I’m not sure I could have kept my composure. It was incredibly challenging for me to keep my wits about me while we were sitting there. I probably should have been a little nicer to those EMTs. They may have been able to do more than I could.”

“Maybe we should talk about that. I don’t want you to be so upset about this. You shouldn’t second guess yourself. You’re holding everything in and it’s not healthy.”

Christine shuddered. “I don’t particularly want to talk about it, either.”

Time for some encouragement. “You’re my best friend. You know that, don’t you?”

Christine shrugged her shoulders noncommittally and averted her gaze, remaining unsurprisingly silent. A typical reaction. She took compliments about as well as Caroline did.

“You are,” Caroline said. “And you sat there with me, and took care of me, and made sure that I made it to the hospital in one piece. I hope you know how much that means to me. Things might not have turned out as well if you hadn’t been there.”

“I don’t want to think about that.”

“You don’t have to think about it. Doesn’t mean I won’t.”

Christine looked Caroline in the eyes. “My husband almost didn’t wear his Monogram Club pin to that mixer the night we first met. You think you would have chatted with him if he hadn’t? Or talked to me?”

The Notre Dame connection had been the biggest draw. “I don’t know. Maybe.” Caroline smiled. “I’m pretty damn friendly.”

“I’m not.”

A huge understatement. Even aloof was a stretch. Sometimes Caroline had to remind herself that she had been elected to Congress based almost solely on a fluky response to her charisma, whereas Christine had done it the old fashioned way by scaring the crap out of everyone. If Tom hadn’t clicked so easily with both of them that night, Caroline and Nicky probably would have moved on quickly since Christine made it crystal clear that she had much better things to do than discuss the finer points of college football and beer.

“Thomas thinks the Blessed Mother brought you to me,” Christine said.

Caroline laughed. “Oh, he does not.”

Tom was many things, and even though he was quite conservative he was not particularly religious. He was a Notre Dame man who dutifully went to church every Sunday but wasn’t one to throw around theology or Catholic doctrine. Given the choice, he’d rather talk recruiting classes and player development, or make jokes about papal headgear.

“He does,” Christine said firmly. “He thought I needed you. And I did. I still do.”

Caroline was tempted to tell her that in her opinion, Christine Spencer Sullivan didn’t need anyone, but she didn’t want to spoil one of Chrissy’s rare sentimental moments. So she rested her head on Christine’s shoulder instead.

Christine wrapped her arm around Caroline. “I’m honored that you consider me your best friend but I’m not sure I’ve earned that distinction.”

“I’m not going to give you a presentation on the reasons why you’re so important to me,” Caroline said. “Unless you want me to.”

Christine smiled faintly. “I’ll pass, thanks. I’ve seen you cross-examining people during Congressional hearings. It takes you thirty minutes to tell a short anecdote. I don’t want to be here for hours.”

“Then you’ll have to take my word for it that you’re worth it.” Caroline straightened up. “You always seem to be bailing me out of things. I wouldn’t have gotten through what happened to Nicky without you and Tom. So maybe you’ve got it backwards. Maybe Mary brought you to me. Or it was the Holy Spirit. My mother was always a great fan of that third of the Trinity.”

Christine rubbed Caroline’s left shoulder affectionately, careful to be gentle. “If divine intervention truly exists, I’m not one to quibble about the reasoning or the celestial beings behind it.”

“So you don’t want to talk Aquinas?” Caroline asked.

Christine laughed and kept her arm around her, leaning into Caroline’s good shoulder. “You are not allowed to leave me,” she said softly. “Understand? Just, I don’t know, duck faster next time.”

“I’ll do my best,” Caroline said. “And before I forget, I’m still pissed that you wrecked that scarf I gave you. Do you know how much I spent on that fucking thing?”

Christine snickered. “You’re so vulgar. It was an accessory, Caroline.”

“You’re getting nothing but coal this Christmas.”

“Right.”

“You just wait. Coal and an Ohio State sweatshirt.”

Christine brought her head back up and looked at Caroline in mock horror. “You wouldn’t.”

“I would. It’d be Under Armour or some other slick brand, so you’d have to wear it or feel really guilty.”

“You are exhaustively rotten sometimes,” Christine said.

“I may be, but I’m still super fun to be around. Mo and Feef and I are going to watch some Julie Andrews movies later. Want to join us?”

“Sure.”

“But I want you to promise me that you’ll go home in a day or two. You need a break.”

“I don’t want to leave you here when you might need me.”

“I’ll be fine,” Caroline said. “I suspect we may come up to Philadelphia anyway. The girls want to see where Jack lives. Then I’ll only be a few miles down the road. Will that make you feel better?”

“I guess so. Does this mean I have to spend even more time with Jack?”

Caroline suppressed another laugh. Christine had a long way to go in her relationship with Representative McIntyre. “He has a big house. You can hang out in an entirely separate wing if you want.”

“Okay then.” Christine kissed Caroline’s cheek. “I’m very glad you’re in my life, Punky. The world is a much better place because of people like you.”

Caroline smiled. “I love you too, Chrissy.”

The Fed

She woke up shivering. Where was her blanket? And that comforter she owned? After their chat, Christine ordered her to take a nap. Caroline, too tired to object, watched as Christine dragged the giant thing out of the closet. She then schlepped it onto the bed and all but tucked Caroline in, insisting that the air conditioning would make the room too cold for her to sleep. And to think Chrissy claimed to have no maternal instincts.

Caroline’s head hurt. Her face. Her ribs. Not her left arm. Her free hand slid to the side of the bed, then up to her face. She could feel the blood crusted on her cheek and in her nostrils. Her eyes flew open, and she struggled to adjust her vision. She soon realized it didn’t matter. All she saw was darkness. Was she blind? She lifted up her hand, waving it around. She could make out shadows in the pitch black. Was something else moving? Her mind was playing tricks on her.

Her hand was hanging at a weird angle from the metal bedframe. That guard – Fischer – had cuffed her to the bed. Fucking asshole. So it was dark, cold, and she was stuck. And she sure as hell wasn’t in that warm comfy bed in her house in Maryland. Fan-fucking-tastic.

That’s it
.
Keep your sense of humor.

She’d been in prison cells before. Visited local jails. Seen pictures. She couldn’t remember any mattresses that sat on bedframes. Where the fuck was she? It was a big risk to give a prisoner anything to fight back with. Anything not attached to the wall could be made into a weapon. Even a bedframe, if given the right amount of moxie and strength. Maybe they’d underestimated her. Or maybe they needed something to keep her immobile. It seemed impractical to add those extra steps to her incarceration, but maybe they weren’t all that pragmatic.

She lay in the dark, randomly flexing the hand in the cuff, trying to regain circulation. She had nothing else to do. Nothing to see. She took a few calming breaths. She hated the dark. Caroline laughed at herself when she scanned the room again.

Still nothing to see, you goof.

Maybe that’s what they wanted her to do. Keep talking to herself until she went batshit crazy. No. Her darting eyes could serve a purpose. She saw no cracks of light. No windows. She could swear she could make out bars on her cell door but if they were there, the hallway was dark too. Weird.

Now was not the time for a pity party. Now was the time to plot. Some entity, some person, some underground group – surely her presence here was known. Surely
someone
planned to get her out. She ignored the nagging thought in the back of her head, tried to block out the rumors she’d heard. She and Jack had been trying to outrun a gathering storm until it finally crashed down on them with unexpected fury. It still seemed unbelievable. Something like this could not be going on in the United States without some watchdog figuring it out and putting a stop to it.

Have you been living under a rock for the past year, sweetheart?

She closed her eyes. Jack called her that. She could almost hear him admonishing her in that charming but not quite condescending tone he used when he was messing with her. When Fischer used that word as anything other than a term of endearment, she wanted to slap him.

Caroline didn’t want to think about Jack. Or anyone else she loved. God only knew where they were. Her hopes lifted, however fleetingly. He knew. They knew.
Someone
knew. And they were probably already en route to get her. This couldn’t last forever.

Why didn’t they get you out of the hospital, then?

She was a trained lawyer, but she hated arguments. Especially with herself. Maybe this was a giant mindfuck. See how long she lasts in a room by herself with nothing but her thoughts. That’ll drive her insane.

Shit. She’d last all of a day. No good could come from talking to herself all the damn time. She had yet to figure out why anyone else bothered doing it.

Don’t get negative, now.

Caroline was on the verge of telling her inner monologue to go fuck itself when the lights flickered on. She shielded her eyes with her free hand, adjusting to the brightness. Now she could see. She hadn’t really paid attention when Fischer first brought her into the room. She had been otherwise occupied, possibly because he was strangling her and punching her in the nose.

Time was precious. She had to make this quick. Take in what she could, search for ideas, familiarize herself with her surroundings. Who knew how long the lights would stay on? Or how long she’d remain in the room?

The room – no, the
cell
– was small. Not as small as a typical jail cell, but small enough. A toilet in the corner. Cold comfort, all things considered. A sink next to it. No mirror. No windows. No nothing. Except…

She tried not to gasp. Chains on the wall. Shackles hanging from the ceiling. Hooks too. Oh, this was not good. This was so not good. And a camera in the corner, its red light blinking. Sadistic voyeurs. What an unpleasant combination.

No, not a typical jail cell. Not exactly a torture chamber but she’d take a room in any one of the prisons in the federal system right about now. This room had been specially equipped. She wasn’t egotistical enough to think that it had been done up for her personally. It had been prepared for anyone who dared defy the rules. And damn it, she’d done more than defy them. She’d taken the rules and repeatedly set them on fire, sometimes on national television. As Fischer had put it, she was their little celebrity. She doubted she’d be receiving the star treatment. There would be no mint on the pillow, no monogrammed robe to greet her at the end of a long day.

The cell door creaked open, and Fischer walked in alone.

“The FBI would like to have a little chat with you,” he said.

Caroline shook her head back and forth. Wishful thinking, but perhaps they’d leave her be if she refused.

He uncuffed her from the bed, yanking her up by the elbow. “You don’t get a choice.”

Of course she didn’t. But she didn’t have to make it easy for him, or for them. She shuffled her feet as he started to drag her out of the cell, and he slammed her head against the wall.

“Cooperate,” he said.

Now her ears were ringing on top of everything else. Maybe she could throw them a little bone. Maybe they’d go easier on her. At least she wasn’t cuffed anymore. A surprisingly poor judgment call on his part. How easy would it be for her to knock him down and make a run for it?

No, that was silly talk. An unwise move. She couldn’t do anything rash or impetuous. She had to plan ahead. Caroline started walking at a normal gait. It could be worse. She could have to take a piss. How considerate of him not to ask beforehand.

The room he led her into seemed normal enough. A table and chairs. Bright lights. Two agents sitting there, smiling at her. And not in a good way. Both male, both white, both oily looking as hell. One significantly older than the other. Was it wiser to remember facial features and characteristics or try to forget? Caroline decided to make a mental note of each person she saw, just in case.

Camera in the corner. Of course. Wouldn’t be a creepy repressive federal facility without constant monitoring. Fischer unceremoniously shoved her into the chair across from the agents.

“Be nice,” he said. “I’ll be back for you later.”

She couldn’t quell her curiosity, and spun to face him as he headed toward the door. “You’re not staying?”

Fischer laughed. “Getting attached to me so early?”

Disgusted with herself, Caroline turned her back to him and heard him laugh again.

“Take your time,” he told the agents.

The older one spoke first. “I’m Howard, this is Bradbury,” he said, nudging a thumb at his companion.

How quaint. They were being polite and introducing themselves. Caroline abandoned her own rules of etiquette and stayed silent. She started making a mental list of names. Howard, Bradbury, Fischer, Cameron. And Gary, who apparently wasn’t an important enough member of the club to warrant a reference by his last name. It was like a fucking white boy dudebro convention with less money, fewer beers, and more violence.

“How are you feeling?” Howard asked.

His tone indicated that he really couldn’t give a shit, but she was going to be honest anyway. She could talk about nonessential topics. Her wrists were red, the outline of the handcuffs still visible. She rubbed them vigorously, but they weren’t her main concern.

“My ribs hurt,” she said.

“Why is that?”

“Some soldiers beat the crap out of me.”

“That doesn’t seem nice.”

“Welcome to my world.”

“Maybe we can get you something to help the pain.”

Right. She wouldn’t be hanging her hat on that one. “I’ll believe that when I see it.”

“Give a little, get a little. You know how it works.”

“Which one of you is the good cop?” Caroline asked. “Is it you, since you’re playing at pretending to help me out?”

Howard smiled at her. “I appreciate your honesty. Perhaps we’ll be able to get somewhere today. And in case you’re wondering, neither one of us is the good cop.”

Refreshing honesty from him as well. “I have nothing to say to either one of you. Also, shouldn’t you have read me my rights?”

Bradbury spoke up. “You don’t have any rights.”

A young asshole. Predictable. Probably only a year or two out of Quantico, if that. “So we’re just abandoning any and all constitutionality in here?”

“Traitors don’t have rights,” he said.

“You presume I’m a traitor?”

“You tell me.”

She wasn’t going to fall for that one. Caroline pursed her lips and turned her head away from them, fixating on the concrete blocks of the wall. Counting them. Rearranging them in her head. Imagining patterns and movement. Like a game.

“Let’s drop the charade. You know why you’re here,” Howard said.

Caroline continued to stare at the wall.

“We found your laptop,” he said.

He was lying but she wasn’t going to correct him. He wanted her to admit she had a laptop. Or a cloud drive. Or a message board. Or a website. Or anything else. They were bluffing. They had no way of knowing what she’d been doing. They were trying to get her to admit facts that weren’t in evidence, so they could start building a roadmap toward their version of the truth.

Unless they really knew about the laptop. Or that she’d attempted to destroy it in the first place. Or the secret online discussions, the passwords, the standalone server, the wireless hopping, the backups, the code words, the plotting…

No. All her laptops had been encrypted before being swept clean and tossed into the Susquehanna. They couldn’t have gotten anything useful off of any of them, even if they managed to find corrupted remains. As for everything else…it had never happened. None of it. It had all been a dream. Like now. Now was a dream.  A very terrible, awful dream.

She had no such thing as plausible denial but she had a very strong incentive to keep her mouth shut. Caroline banished thoughts of the rebellion from her mind. If they stayed at the forefront, she was liable to let them slip out without realizing it. She started counting the blocks again.

“We know who you were talking to,” Bradbury said.

She began to twiddle her thumbs.

“It’s best if you cooperate,” Howard added.

Caroline looked over at him. At one time he had probably been quite a capable agent.  He had a moderately friendly face but his pleasant expression was a mask. She knew the score. They likely did know bits and pieces of what she’d been doing. They were waiting for her to confirm it. To help them fill in the blanks so that they could continue to build their intelligence. To bolster whatever case they thought they had against her. To strengthen whatever plans they had to take out the rebellion. And she wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction.

They’d start out nice and then devolve if they didn’t get what they wanted. She knew better than to think that they’d abide by the policies and procedures that were in place when she was working for the DOJ.  Not if they weren’t Mirandizing prisoners. It was an entirely new ballgame. And she wasn’t going to play.

Howard frowned at her. “We’ve seen the classified information you obtained.”

Stay focused. Give them basic identifying information. Talk about the furthest topic from what they want to hear.

“My legal name is Caroline Joan Gerard,” she said quietly.

His eyes narrowed. “What?”

“I was born at Highland Park Hospital in Highland Park, Illinois on September 4.”

The two agents exchanged glances.

“Who were you working with?” Bradbury asked.

More people than you think, asshole.
“I graduated from St. Mary School in Buffalo Grove, Illinois.”

Bradbury glared at her. “How did you get on a government server?”

Very subtle. They thought she’d turned into a hacker in order to obtain classified information. Interesting. Were they bluffing, or did they know?

“I am an alumnus of Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois,” she said.