Triggered Response Page 7

  Claire went online to get additional information on the research program Ulrich wanted. Printing it out, she waited until the middle of the noon hour when nearly everyone in the facility would be in the lunchroom. Less probability of her getting caught. Then she stuffed the new information in a folder—camouflage again in case she actually ran into one of the scientists—and headed for the research wing.

  Halfway down the corridor, a woman in a white coat left her laboratory, a cell phone to her ear.

  “Tell your brother to come to the phone now…. No, now!” The woman was too embroiled in some domestic problem to do more than give Claire a polite nod as she continued down the hall. “Jimmy, how many times have I told you to listen to Rhonda? Do you want a timeout?”

  Claire suspected from the woman’s on-edge tone that all the time-outs in the world weren’t going to straighten out little Jimmy. She glanced back once to make sure the woman was still distracted as she got to the door of Lab 12. Counting on an empty lab being open, she took a deep breath and tried the handle.

  It gave.

  The door swung open and she slipped inside, her gaze roaming the room, checking every corner. Not that she expected to find another Bray here, Claire thought, unable to stop thinking about him and their night of little sleep. The room was definitely empty but for lab tables and chairs. And a pail and mop pushed to one side of the storeroom door. Artur’s cleaning tools.

  She stopped and said a silent prayer in the old man’s behalf. She hadn’t known him well, but he’d always been friendly to her.

  Taking a deep breath, she then caught it. The horrible smell.

  Holding her breath for a moment, Claire made for the storeroom door. She couldn’t avoid seeing what looked like bits of partially digested food clinging to the mop. The old janitor must have heaved his cookies before having that heart attack. But what in the world had he been eating?

  Claire was glad to escape into the storeroom and close the door behind her. She clicked on the light and saw that this room was still in use. The shelves were loaded with janitorial products, cleaners and paper towels and such.

  Disappointed that she’d hit another dead end, she turned to leave when a glint off glass caught her attention. She stepped to the shelving, stooped and moved a carton of degreasers to the side.

  Her pulse sped up when she spotted test tubes partially filled with different-colored liquids. What were they doing among the cleaning supplies? she wondered. Could they be left over from when this lab was in operation?

  Somehow, she doubted it. What she didn’t doubt was that they were dangerous.

  Part of her wanted to take the vials and just get out of there, take them somewhere to be tested. What would that prove? She had no idea. Even if the chemicals could be identified, who would know what to do with them?

  A bigger problem was getting them out sight unseen. It would be just her luck to run into someone returning from lunch.

  Clenching her jaw in frustration, Claire set the box of degreasers back the way she’d found it, and then caught sight of plastic spoons and a black metal contraption next to the chemicals.

  She pulled out the device and frowned at what looked like a rectangular box with a bowl-like top. No markings on the body to tell her what it was supposed to be. Was this meant for use with the chemicals? Not just to mix them, which could be done in a beaker, but for some other purpose?

  Realizing she was taking too long, Claire replaced the device and made sure to leave everything in its proper place. Maybe if she told Bray about it, he would have some clue as to what it could be used for.

  She left the lab just in time. She’d gotten halfway down the corridor when voices alerted her that she was about to come face-to-face with workers coming back from lunch. She recognized one voice in particular— Hank Riddell.

  The research fellow started when he saw her. Then his expression darkened.

  “Hank, there you are,” Claire said breezily, as if she hadn’t verbally reamed him out just a few hours before.

  “What are you doing in the lab area?” he asked, his gaze shifting to a spot over her shoulder.

  He was looking in the direction from which she’d come, but there was no way he could possibly know she’d been in Lab 12.

  And if he did figure it out?

  What then?

  “I found some additional information on Bio-Chem Tracker that didn’t make it into the folder you took,” she said, holding it out to him. “It’s basically testimonials. Might help Dr. Ulrich make that decision about purchasing the program.” She simply couldn’t help herself. “What did he think of what you brought him?”

  Hank stared at her for a moment before saying, “He was favorably impressed. He wanted further time to analyze it, though.”

  “Of course.”

  Hank was nearly as good a liar as she, Claire thought. To what purpose, though?

  “I need to get to my lab,” he muttered, shoving past her.

  Claire took a big breath and counted to ten so she wouldn’t see red. If ever there was a more rude man, she didn’t know who that might be.

  Not that she had time to dwell on it. She needed to finish up a few urgent matters still in her in-basket, pull up an HR report on Bray and then get back to the marina before he flew the coop.

  Chapter Seven

  His thumb simply wasn’t working as well as it had the day before.

  Bray managed to get one ride and had to walk the rest of the way. Finally he was within yelling distance of the address that had been listed for him at Turtle Creek.

  Rather than walk straight down the street, he kept to the perimeter on his approach, using trees and bushes and anything else he could for cover. He half expected to find a team of cops staked out in front of the place, just waiting to bring him in. But as he drew close enough to see a red-brick house with white trim appear among the trees, all looked peaceful. Not a car in sight but the decade-old black Corvette in the drive.

  His car. His house.

  No one around.

  Fishing the keys from his pocket, he loped across the road to the front door. In a flash, he had it unlocked and himself inside.

  And then he stopped dead, expecting something…

  What?

  He looked to his right at the box installed next to the door and realized he was supposed to punch in a security code. A memory…he was getting a memory without touching something. If he didn’t disarm the system, an alarm would be set off at the Five Star office and one of the security guards would send the local police over to investigate.

  But the alarm wasn’t armed.

  He did touch the box and heard a female voice saying, Front door open, and seeing a delicate hand punch in the code, turning off the system.

  A woman…brown hair with blond streaks…a heart-shaped face…gray eyes like his own.

  Echo.

  So his sister had been here.

  Enough sunlight came in through the windows that he didn’t have to turn on a light. The living room opened into a dining area, and beyond that a kitchen area. Double-glass doors led to a covered porch overlooking a beautiful view of Turtle Creek.

  Bray looked around, hoping to find something familiar, something that would jog his memory.

  The place was a little messy with papers strewn on a table and a couple of open drawers in a wall cabinet. He started to shut one of the drawers and he saw a man poking through it. A cop. The cops had been here, but how had they gotten inside? The house hadn’t been broken into. No broken window. Front door intact. Someone with a key must have let them in. Echo, no doubt.

  Did his own sister believe he was some kind of villain that she’d worked with the authorities against him? The possibility saddened him.

  He looked around at the living area, nicely furnished in the basics: a mahogany-colored leather sofa, matching chair and ottoman, a glossy black coffee table and side tables with modern lamps, a distressed-wood dinner table and leather-cushioned wood chairs. There
were even a couple of modern brown and dark red area rugs.

  A very no-nonsense, masculine decor.

  The only personal item softening the living area was a framed photo of a smiling young woman holding a baby. He picked it up and remembered the baby grabbing onto his finger and gurgling at him. Zoe. His niece. He touched her face, a lump in his throat as he wondered if the authorities were any closer to finding her.

  If only he had a memory and didn’t have the cops on his own back he would find her himself.

  And then he looked into Echo’s face and remembered him threatening a prepubescent boy who’d given her a hard time. Her introducing him to his first girlfriend. Him rushing her to the hospital when she went into labor. Myriad memories swamped him like a montage in a movie. It came home to him that clearly he and his sister had been each other’s support system, especially since he’d come back to civilian life.

  The military…

  The blonde… He remembered her, too, and the reason he’d been forced to leave the army.

  Bray replaced the framed photo, wishing he could see Echo, so he could at least give his sister the support she needed until her child was returned to her. That she might not trust him darkened his mood.

  Running his hand over the sofa gave an image of him sprawled out on it, snoozing. The chair gave him an image of him reading the Sunday paper. At the dining table, he remembered eating breakfast.

  Alone.

  Every impression he got of this place was him alone.

  How could that be if Claire was his wife?

  He quickly went through the rest of the house. The two-bedroom, office and single bath were all masculine. No bubble baths or shower gels. No feminine clothes or frilly underwear in the closets or drawers. Running his hand over the desk in the office told him where to find a credit card and several hundred dollars in cash. The dock on his desk was empty; touching it, he saw a guy in a dark suit removing the laptop. Probably a Fed.

  There were no memories of Claire ever having been anywhere in this house.

  He put on clean underwear, tan slacks and a light blue cotton sweater and packed another change of casual clothing in an overnighter.

  He picked up no memories of what kind of a man he was, either, a fact that still troubled him.

  But his suspicion was confirmed. Claire had lied about being his wife to get him to come with her.

  The question was why.

  And what was he going to do about it?

  DISTRACTED BY THOUGHTS of Bray as she left the Cranesbrook lot, Claire wasn’t sure when the low, black car had pulled up behind her. It stayed the same distance behind, even when she put on some speed.

  Slowing in the hope that the other car would pass her, Claire felt her pulse speed up when it slowed, too. What was going on here? Was the person behind the wheel following her?

  Perhaps her extracurricular activities hadn’t gone unnoticed, after all.

  Her thoughts went straight to Hank Riddell and her finding him searching her office.

  What had he been looking for? If not the folder that had been practically under his nose, then what? And the way he’d stared at her in the hallway…he’d definitely seemed suspicious of her. But if he had reason to be suspicious about something, then he’d had something to hide. Something about the lab accident?

  Did Riddell think she knew something she shouldn’t?

  Could the research fellow be stalking her?

  Telling herself not to panic, she stepped on the gas. No matter how many times she checked her rearview mirror, the black car was right there behind her.

  The road leading into town and the marina came into view. Now what?

  She hesitated at the stop sign for a moment, and suddenly the black car was next to her. Her pulse thundered through her as the tinted window lowered. But when she got a look at the driver, her temper flared.

  “What on earth were you thinking following me like that?” she yelled at Bray whose expression remained calm. “Were you trying to cause an accident?”

  “Do you have reason to be paranoid?” he asked.

  “No, of course not.”

  “Good. Then follow me into town so you can park. We’ll take my car.”

  “To where?” she asked. “And why not park at the marina?”

  No answer. His window was already rolling upward and the Corvette was rolling into the intersection.

  So he’d gone home to get his car. Claire guessed she should have known. Brayden Sloane wasn’t an undemanding man. When he got focused on something, he wasn’t easily deterred. Apparently his loss of memory hadn’t changed that trait.

  Or was he starting to get his memory back? Was that why he was acting so weird?

  Nervous now, Claire followed him into town and parked on a side street, then got into the low-slung Corvette.

  “So what’s the mystery?” she asked, unable to keep the tightness from her voice. “Where are you taking me?”

  “To Baltimore.”

  “Baltimore?” Baltimore had nothing to do with her. The tightness in her chest eased. “That’s at least two hours of driving this time of the afternoon. Whatever for?”

  “Because that’s where Gage Darnell lives. He must know something about what happened to us. He can fill in some of the blanks in my memory.”

  “Why do you want to take that chance on him?”

  Even though Gage might have some information that would be of use to her, Claire didn’t know that. She also didn’t know how he would react to seeing Bray. One wild card at a time was enough for her to handle. She was counting on Bray’s help to get the information she needed to figure out what had happened to Mac. And Gage knew she and Bray weren’t married. He could ruin everything for her. She’d rather try to handle Bray herself, get at that selective memory she was hoping to jog.

  So she asked, “Are you certain your partner will welcome you back with open arms?”

  “Gage can fill in the blanks for me. Is there some reason you don’t want me to see him?”

  “I’m only concerned about you. The authorities think you might have been involved in the lab explosion. Gage could turn you in.”

  “He won’t.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “When you depend on each other for your lives for three years, that’s not an easily broken bond.”

  “You remember Afghanistan?”

  She’d pulled up Bray’s HR file and knew that he and Gage had served together in that conflict. She’d dug deeper and found that Bray had left the military before his tour was up. No reason, no hint of dishonor, no medical caveat. Something was up with that, only she didn’t know what. The army had needed men. They weren’t going to let a seasoned Special Ops sergeant go without good reason.

  Which increased her unease at having gotten so close to him. She really didn’t know what kind of a man he was. Indeed, he might be dangerous.

  “I am starting to remember certain things,” Bray admitted. “Finally. I imagine all due to you.”

  She waited for him to say he remembered that he didn’t particularly like her and no way would he be married to her. But if he knew, he kept his own counsel. So maybe he didn’t remember now. But if other things were coming back to him, it was only a matter of time before the truth smacked him upside the head. Or a matter of a face-to-face with Gage Darnell.

  How long would it be before Bray exposed her lie?

  And her?

  HE WAITED UNTIL DARK to drive to the marina.

  Checking over the few vehicles parked there assured him Claire Fanshaw was elsewhere. Good. Better for him. He was still careful as he approached the boat. For all he knew, Sloane could be on board.

  “Hello, Claire Fanshaw,” he called, as if he were actually hoping to find her. Just in case.

  No answer.

  He wondered what she would say if he told her he’d brought her a present.

  Climbing aboard, he called out again. “Hello, I’m looking for Claire Fanshaw.”r />
  Silence. He tried the door. Locked. Damn! Not that he couldn’t break it open if he set his mind to it, but he didn’t want the woman or the former security chief to know that anyone had been here. He didn’t want them to suspect that anything was wrong.

  Walking around the boat, looking for another opening, he noticed a porthole had been left open a few inches. He tried to get a look inside, but all was dark until he took out his flashlight. He was staring into the head.

  Swinging open the porthole, he dropped the backpack through the opening, then struggled through himself. His gift was cerebral, not physical, so it took some fancy maneuvering, but he managed to get himself inside in one piece.

  He exited the head to the galley and shone the flashlight around the room, over a single dish and a mug and a pan in the sink, the only indication that someone had been here recently. Only one person. But when he ventured into the sleeping area he knew he’d been correct.

  The woman was indeed hiding the former security chief here.

  More than hiding the man, he thought with a grimace as the smell of stale sex assaulted him. He flashed his light over the rumpled sheets, disgusted that she was doing Sloane, too.

  All the more reason to take care of them both.

  Together.

  He slid open the storage drawer beneath the bed and pulled aside some linens. Carefully he set the timer on the device and shoved it to the rear of the drawer, then moved the linens back in place in front of it.

  Claire Fanshaw and Brayden Sloane were going to get a big bang out of his little gift.

  He could hardly wait until midnight.

  Chapter Eight

  “So far, all this driving has been for nothing.”

  Bray thought Claire sounded more relieved than aggravated, no doubt because a face-to-face with Gage would have ended her game, whatever it was. He’d thought to leave a note telling his partner where to find him, but at the last minute had changed his mind. Until he started remembering the lab accident at Cranesbrook in detail, he meant to lie low. He wanted to keep his fate in his own hands.