Dash tossed Carter’s phone onto the bedside table. He rubbed his jaw again. He turned to Sara.
“Doctor, if I could have your attention?” He pointed to the front and back of the room. “I’ve got your exits blocked. I can handcuff you to the bed, or you can believe me.”
Sara swallowed so hard that her throat made a sound. “I believe you.”
Dash left, but the tension did not leave with him.
Beau was clearly angry. He yanked on the zips to his field kit. He collected the trash into a pile—the bloody gauze, the scissors, even the water bottles. He used an alcohol swab to wipe down the field medical kit. Sara bit her lip so that she would not smile. Carter’s blood would be embedded in the seams, the teeth of the zippers. Beau’s sentimental attachment would put him in the middle of a double homicide.
Sara looked at the television. She read the scroll at the bottom of the screen.
. . . two Dekalb Co. police officers, one Fulton Co. sheriff’s deputy and two security guards among murdered . . . Official Statement: “GBI will put on active duty ATL agents to assist local and state law enforcement . . .”
Sara’s heart flipped inside her chest. Her eyes followed the text before it disappeared from the screen.
. . . will put on active duty ATL agents to assist local and state law enforcement . . .
She kept her eyes on the television as the program went into a commercial break. Sara tried to do a reality check. Amanda would’ve been responsible for writing the official statement. Was Sara reading too much into the stilted language? Was she so desperate for news that she was making crazy leaps?
Will put on active duty. ATL. Agents assisting local and state law enforcement.
Tears welled into Sara’s eyes. She wanted so badly to believe that Amanda had written the statement specifically for her, because what the statement could be saying filled her with relief.
Will was classified as active duty.
ATL was the common abbreviation for Atlanta, but it was also police slang for Attempt to Locate.
Will was all right. He was looking for Sara. Local and state law enforcement was looking for her.
Beau said, “Dash is suspicious.”
Sara wiped away her tears.
He said, “The news hasn’t mentioned Michelle. They just keep saying local doctor missing.”
Sara tried to get her shit together. She knew GBI protocol was to withhold names. “You say missing like I walked out of the house and got lost. I was abducted. Michelle was abducted. We’ve both been kidnapped. We are being held against our will and forced to do things we do not want to do.”
His jaw tightened down. “It’s making him suspicious, is all I’m saying.”
“Your friends set off two bombs on a university campus. Eighteen people are dead, almost fifty more are wounded. Three cops were murdered. Two security guards. That field kit and your training tell me you’re ex-military, but you’re helping a group of mass murderers. That’s all I’m saying.”
Beau angrily shoved trash into a plastic bag.
Sara’s eyes tracked the news scroll. She wanted to see the information again, the confirmation that Will was okay. He had survived. He was looking for her.
The time was in the right-hand corner.
4:52 p.m.
Just over two and a half hours since Sara had sent Faith that useless message.
Three hours since she’d had her mouth pressed to Will’s in the shed.
Beau said, “Don’t be stupid in here, okay? Dash is fine until he ain’t fine, and you don’t wanna ever see that happen.”
Sara kept her eyes on the TV. The scroll was repeating.
Official Statement: “GBI will put on active duty ATL agents to assist local and state law enforcement . . .”
Beau finally left, slamming the door closed behind him.
Sara stood up. She walked to the window at the front of the room. The curtains were drawn. She could see the large shadow of the sentry outside.
She listened, holding her breath so that she could make out any sound. She picked up the low tones of Dash talking to Beau. They were close, but not too close.
Sara got down on her knees, keeping herself low.
She lifted Carter’s iPhone from the nightstand.
Beau was right that the fingerprint ID required a capacitance signal. The human body was basically an electrical capacitator. Positively charged protons and negatively charged neurons created conductivity; a battery of sorts. This was why you got a shock when you dragged wool socks across the carpet, then touched another person. The low current of electricity in the body was also what activated the fingerprint reader on older iPhones.
When you died, that charge dissipated, but not as rapidly as Beau thought. It took about two hours before the skin desiccated. That was the real reason that Carter’s finger could not unlock the phone:
He was dehydrated.
Unlike Vale, Carter had not been given an IV bag of saline. The heat and trauma had caused him to sweat for hours. Dehydration had flattened out the ridges of his fingerprints. The reader was detecting a capacitance signal, but it wasn’t recognizing the fingerprint.
Sara lifted Carter’s right hand.
A sudden revulsion sent a shudder through her body.
Sara put the man’s index finger in her mouth.
She gagged, but she kept her lips closed tight, trying to generate enough saliva to rehydrate the skin.
Hepatitis B. Hepatitis C. HIV.
There was no telling what diseases the man carried.
Sara held the finger in her mouth, sucking to move the saliva around. Her eyes went from the door to the clock on the television, then back again. She did this until a full minute had passed.
Her hands shook as she pressed Carter’s finger to the home button.
The screen was cracked. He could’ve programmed his thumb or a different finger into the reader. The door could open and Dash would see what she was doing and shoot her twice in the chest the same as he had with Vale.
None of that happened.
The screen unlocked.
Sara didn’t have time to celebrate. She tapped the telephone icon. No luck. The crack in the screen radiated up from the bottom. The glass wasn’t recognizing her touch. She touched the text icon. The keyboard slid up. The cracked glass made most of the letters unusable. Through fits and starts, she was able to enter Will’s phone number.
Sara never texted him words. She sent him sound files or emojis to save him the trouble of reading.
She pressed the microphone icon. She opened her mouth to speak, but only a sob came out.
Will—
She sent the sound file anyway. Her heart pounded like a metronome until the blue status bar indicated it had been sent.
She pressed the microphone again. She opened her mouth, but to say what?
The name of the bar across the street. Beau. Dash. Carter. Vale. The box truck. The fact that they were a group. That they were organized. That she loved Will. That she ached for him. That she knew he was looking for her.
Sara started to speak, but the doorknob turned.
Dash opened the door. His back was to her.
He was still talking to Beau. “Well, son, I’m sure we can make that happen.”
Sara clicked the phone off. She had tossed it onto the nightstand by the time Dash turned around.
Sara stood up. She smoothed down her shorts. She had been so eager to transfer Carter’s DNA onto them, but now she was almost soaked in his blood. “You said you would return me to my family after I helped you.”
“In fact, that’s exactly what I told you.” He watched the television. They were showing aerial video of the decimated parking garage. “What does your husband do?”
Sara realized the truth might be something that could work to her advantage. “I’m a widow. My husband was a cop. He died in the line of duty.”
“I’m very sorry for your loss. The streets are a dangerous place these days.” Dash stared at her, still full of suspicion. “Tell me, Miss Pediatrician, do you have a familiarity with measles?”
Sara felt her head shaking, but only to bide time while she tried to see around his question. She answered, “Yes.”
“Good. We happen to have ourselves a bit of a problem with measles at our Camp. An outbreak, you’d call it. If you’re amenable, there are some very sick children who could use your help.”
Measles?
Was that why they had taken Michelle Spivey? They thought they needed an infectious disease expert to control a measles outbreak?
“Dr. Earnshaw?” Dash prompted.
Sara said, “You’re framing this as a choice.”
“We all have choices, Doctor. Sometimes, there are good options and sometimes, there are bad ones. But there’s no such thing as not having a choice.”
“I need to go to the bathroom.”
“Will an empty bladder assist you in your decision-making?”
Sara didn’t answer, nor did she dare to leave without his permission.