Blood Kin (38 page)

Lucas brushed aside the white lab coat, and Daniel caught a glimpse of the butt of a Glock tucked into his waistband. “Give me one reason why I shouldn't wrap this up here and now.”

Daniel smiled. “Because I've left proof. Classified information. Names, dates. Pictures. Taped conversations. Members of Congress and other public servants who would be very unhappy if their dealings with the Afghani underworld became public. And they will. If anything happens to me—if I have heart attack, if I'm mugged by a crackhead on the street, if I go for a late-night swim and accidentally drown—it will all come out on the evening news. CNN, CNBC, FOX—”

“You're bluffing.”

“Am I?” Daniel snatched the stethoscope off Lucas's neck and tossed it into the sink. “I'm no crusader. So long as no one pisses me off or decides to use Tawes for a missile base, your photo and biography stay out of the newspapers. Just make it clear that Bailey Elliott and my brother are strictly off-limits. Do we understand each other?”

A muscle twitched along Lucas's jawline. “I'll have to clear—”

“So, clear it. Make it all go away, Lucas. And you go with it. Because if I ever get the slightest notion that you're within a hundred miles of Tawes or of anyone I care about, you'll have your one moment of fame.”

Lucas smiled with his mouth, but his eyes remained as expressionless as glass. “I told them that they were overreacting, that you could be reasoned with.”

“It never was about Marshall's death, was it? It was always the coming election.”

Lucas shrugged. “I wouldn't consider running for public office yourself, or writing a book. That would be . . . unwise.”

“Nothing further from my mind. I'm just a country carpenter, a burned-out bureaucrat who saw a friend blown to bits and decided—”

“He didn't have the balls for this kind of work?”

“Let's just say I left for health reasons. I lost my appetite when I discovered that some of our most respected members of the U.S. Senate, and others within spitting distance of the Oval Office, are partners with some of the world's biggest drug-running warlords—”

Lucas touched his closed lips. “I think our conversation is over. We're satisfied that Marshall's death was accidental and that—”

“Was it true? Did he father Bailey Elliott?”

“There was a paternity blood test done several decades ago. Whatever else you might think of the senator, he wasn't stupid. He wouldn't have paid if he weren't the biological father.”

“But Grace couldn't know that.”

“No.” Lucas smiled. “I'm certain she can't access the same information the agency does. It must have been a lucky guess on her part.”

“And blackmailing Creed Somers or the other men involved wouldn't have been as lucrative.”

“Exactly.”

“Is your information accurate? Lab mistakes have been made before.”

“Not those reinforced by DNA tests twenty months ago.”

“How did . . . Never mind,” Daniel said. “Our business is concluded, other than that small matter of Grace Catlin's eight-hundred-thousand-dollar bank account in the Caymans.”

Lucas adjusted the hospital badge that identified him as John Lazzaro, MD. “The amount you mentioned is correct, but you're mistaken about the owner. That money's all in your name, Danny-boy.”

“Drug money.”

“It all spends the same, and as far as the agency is concerned, it doesn't exist.”

“Why in my name?”

“Insurance that that conscience of yours doesn't cause us any more trouble.”

“Blackmail?”

“Call it a severance package. You start talking, you're the first to go down. And you'll never live to see the inside of a federal prison.”

“The money's mine? No strings?”

“All yours—with the agency's blessings.”

Without another word, Daniel turned his back on Lucas and the agency and hurried back to take up his vigil outside the cubicle where Bailey's condition was being assessed. She was all that mattered now. He could sort out everything else later.

“It's time we were getting you back to your bed, Mr. Catlin,” the nurse said as she entered Bailey's hospital room.

Daniel glanced over his shoulder at her. “Give us a few more minutes.”

“That's what you said thirty minutes ago. It's time for Ms. Elliott's blood work and . . .”

“Ten minutes.” He flashed what he hoped was his most charming grin. “Please.”

The nurse frowned and glanced at Bailey. “Ms. Elliott?”

“Five,” Bailey bargained.

Daniel edged his wheelchair closer to Bailey's bed and took her free hand, the one not encumbered by the IV. Once they'd scheduled him for surgery late yesterday, he hadn't been able to convince a nurse that he had recovered enough to leave his room or that he needed to see Bailey more urgently than he needed another X-ray of his thigh.

The physician had cut a .22 from his calf and one from his arm. The bullet that had cut a furrow through
his scalp wasn't a problem, and his surgeon decided that the safest course of action was to monitor his condition for another day before making a final decision on whether the last remaining bullet should be removed from his thigh.

It was nearly two o'clock in the afternoon, and Bailey was receiving pain medication as well as IV antibiotics for her bullet wound, the extensive insect bites, and the infection she'd picked up from swallowing so much marsh water. Her face, hands, and arms were swollen and bruised, and her hair was still a mess, but she looked beautiful to him.

“You scared the hell out of me,” he said, picking up where they'd left off when the nurse had interrupted their conversation. “One minute you were joking with me, and the next I was trying to get a pulse. I was afraid you'd had a heart attack or you'd bled out on me.”

“Sorry,” she croaked. Her wan smile was genuine, but he could tell that she was in a lot of discomfort, despite her protests to the contrary. “I was cold. I'm still cold. I don't think I've ever been so cold.”

“It must be the blood loss. You've got enough blankets on you for three people. You should have tried camping with me in midwinter in a tent in the mountains of Afghanistan. You'd have loved it.”

“ ‘Just hide, Bailey,' ” she teased in a hoarse whisper. “ ‘Hide until I come for you.' ”

“I did, didn't I?”

“You damned well . . . took your time about it.”

He stroked the back of her hand, then lifted it, turning it palm-up so that he could press his lips to the underside of her wrist. Her skin was fair, and the veins ran blue just below the surface. She seemed so small and fragile, so precious to him, that it was difficult to
keep his own voice from cracking. “I told you, it was your fault that it took so long to find you. When I told you to hide from Grace, I didn't mean for you to hide so well that I couldn't find you.”

Bailey closed her eyes and swallowed. “See if I can have some more ginger ale the next time Nazi nurse pops her head in. I'm so thirsty. I can't get the taste of mud out of my mouth.”

“Most people don't try to eat it.”

“Most people aren't tied to rotting posts to drown and be used for target practice.” Her mood grew solemn. “She was frightening, Daniel. Grace wasn't just jealous of my mother. She wanted to be Beth—to steal her life. It was creepy.”

“Not so creepy, if you consider what kind of family she came from. Sexual abuse, violence, alcohol. Her stepbrother's doing life in Virginia for stomping a man to death in Virginia Beach.”

“She said things . . . awful things about her stepfather. Augie or Angie.”

“Arney Murrain. He's dead, shot to death in an argument over possession of some stolen crab pots off Smith Island back when I was in college. Her mother froze to death in an alley outside a bar in Baltimore long before that.”

“It's no excuse for killing all those people. It breaks my heart to hear of children being abused, but if they all became murderers . . .”

Daniel used a spoon to slip some ice chips between Bailey's swollen lips. “You're right. It's not an excuse.” He grimaced. “But my brother will try to make it one. Matt's already hired an expensive criminal lawyer to defend her.”

“When they find her.”

“If they find her.”

She swallowed a little of the melted ice. “Not Forest?”

“Matt asked. Forest turned him down flat. Said he wasn't qualified.”

Bailey glanced at the ice pitcher. “More, please.”

“As wily as Grace has proved herself, she might be getting a tan on some beach in the Caribbean by now.”

“You don't think she'll get away with it, do you?” Bailey's eyes widened. “That she could come back to—”

“I highly doubt it. She's the chief suspect in Joseph Marshall's death, and that's not the kind of crime you walk away from. The world's not as big a place as it used to be.”

“I thought his death was ruled an accident.”

Daniel offered her a half smile. “That's the
official
version. In my experience, the authorities don't like loose ends when it comes to congressmen.”

“Loose ends,” she repeated softly. “Speaking of which, Elliott was here early this morning. He wanted to have me transferred to the hospital in Lewes to be closer to him. I thanked him for his concern and sent him packing.”

“That's over, then?” he asked as lightly as he could manage.

She nodded. “I'm seriously considering having my legal name changed from Elliott.”

“To?”

She smiled with her eyes. “I don't know yet. I was thinking about Tawes. It has a nice ring to it, don't you think?”

He kissed her wrist again. “Since you've brought up the subject, I don't think it's as good a choice for you as Catlin.”

Bailey stiffened. “There are things we need to be absolutely certain of before—”

“I am certain of your biological father's identity.”

Her lower lip quivered.

“I can tell you his name, and it isn't Catlin.”

“Positively?”

“DNA confirmed. I just found out yesterday.”

“How did you . . .” She pressed pale lips together. “Tell me.”

“Your father was Senator Joseph Marshall, now deceased.”

“And there can be no mistake about that?”

He shook his head. “The agency doesn't make mistakes of that sort.”

She studied his face carefully for a moment. “I don't suppose you can tell me how you know this, or what the CIA has to do with my paternity? Why would they have cared or known in the first place?”

He put his finger to his lips. “Not here. Later. Just trust me. He was your father. Grace blackmailed him, but she never really knew the truth. He verified it years ago.”

“But they haven't been doing DNA that long. How could he—”

“I can't give you all the details. Well, I could, but . . .”

“Oh . . .” She let out a long sigh. “But that means you and I aren't related.”

“The Marshalls are relative newcomers to Tawes, no more than six generations. We can't be any closer than third cousins twice removed.” He looked at her hand, stroking it, adding a playfulness to his voice. “So there's no reason why you and I can't—”

“One step at a time, all right? This has all been pretty sudden.”

“Not for me, babe. I think I've been waiting all my life for you to come along.”

Moisture sparkled in her bloodshot eyes. “But there was someone else, wasn't there? Someone in Afghanistan? A woman that you loved—”

“No.” He shook his head. “Not loved. A woman that I was involved with . . . a woman that I might have come to love if we'd had the time to work on it. The Catlin boys may be a little slow to pick a wife, but when we marry, we do it for life. Mallalai, the girl I thought I could love . . .” His voice thickened. “She tried to lure me into a trap. A buddy of mine was going to meet us there, and something went wrong. A mechanical flaw in the wiring of the timer, I believe the report read.”

“Daniel.” She squeezed his hand. “You don't have to—”

“You have a right to know what happened. Mallalai and I were on different sides, and I didn't know it. If my taxi hadn't gotten stalled behind an overturned donkey cart, I've have been blown to bits along with George Marker, Mallalai, and a dozen or so innocent civilians. I'm not nursing a broken heart for her, Bailey. Regrets, maybe, but as Grace liked to say, it never could have worked out between us.”

“And you think we might have a better chance? What about my being a mainlander?”

“You do come from good island stock. And if you're looking for work, I have friends in high places. Two cousins and an aunt on the Tawes school board. I just might be able to find you honest employment, if you'd like to stay on at—”

“You expect me to pick up my life, just like that, and move to an island in the Chesapeake?” She looked at
him expectantly. “Live in that drafty old farmhouse on the water?”

“Someone has to feed and exercise Elizabeth's horses. It would be a shame to disrupt their lives. Horses are creatures of habit.”

“And you're suggesting me? Or are you suggesting something more permanent between us?” she teased. “Are you asking me to move in with you? Or are you proposing marriage to me before you've discussed this with my great-uncle Will?”

Daniel groaned. “I was afraid you'd get around to that.”

His cousin Jim Tilghman and Jim's wife, Cathy, had been at the hospital at nine o'clock sharp this morning to give them firsthand news from Johns Hopkins on Will and Emma. Apparently the two had already become celebrities at the shock trauma unit. Will had required several units of blood and survived a seven-hour surgery, with a second, less critical operation yet to come. Will's attending physician had told Jim that he wished he had the older man's heart and muscle tone, and he saw no reason why—with a few weeks of physical therapy—Will shouldn't make a full recovery. Emma remained in intensive care but was stable and sitting up, joking with nurses, and wanting to know when she would be discharged.