Deciding it was time to get the hell out of Dodge was easy.
Acting on that decision? Not so much.
Noah hated the idea of calling for help, but what else could he do? No wallet meant no ID, no cash, no credit cards, no driver’s license. No way to fill his truck’s gas tank. He wasn’t going to make it back to DC on half a tank.
He stared at the phone in his hand, trying to nerve himself up to press the buttons.
“Everything okay?” Avery asked. The innkeeper had generously and without prompting offered Noah the use of a cell phone when he’d explained about the bear, his backpack, and the lost key to his room. “You need me to look up a number for you?”
“No, I’m good.” Noah held up the phone and gestured toward the door to the patio. “You mind if I take your phone outside?”
“Feel free.” Avery continued wiping down the counters in the small kitchen.
Noah stepped outside. The day was warm, the aromas of the flowering plants lifting into the air and saturating the breeze. He sat on the nearest bench, hand closing around the phone. He had two choices, the only two numbers he knew by heart, but the decision was obvious. And it could be worse. At least he had the choice.
He tapped the number. It rang once, cut off in the midst when his brother picked up.
“Yeah?”
“Yo.” Noah’s tone was more brusque than polite. But he was fighting unexpected emotion.
What the hell. It was just his brother. But how long had it been? Six months? More?
“Noah?” Niall breathed out the name. Noah could hear that he was in a crowd, background chaos hammering away. “Hang on.”
Noah rubbed the back of his neck and waited. Shit. He shouldn’t have called. Or he should have called sooner, a couple of days ago, that imagined friendly call to ask about hot redheads. That would have been infinitely better than this plea for help.
Niall must have shut a door because the sound fell away. “Dude, where are you?”
“Um, Florida.”
“Florida? Seriously? Uh, okay.”
Noah wanted to laugh. His brother sounded so surprised. Maybe he should have told his family when he came back to the States. Well, yeah, he should have. But he hadn’t.
“I need some help.”
“Yeah? Anything, you know it. You’ve got it. What do you want? Money? A lawyer? Dancing girls? Tell me, dude.”
“Dancing girls?”
Niall chuckled. “Whatever, man. If that’s what you need, you know I’d make it work.”
Noah’s smile seeped into his tone when he said, “No dancing girls. But — long story — I lost my ID. And my cash, credit cards.”
“Drunken binge?” Niall said the words lightly, but Noah could hear the undercurrents.
He tilted his head back and stared up into the clear blue sky. The muscles in his neck had tied themselves into knots already. Dealing with his family always did that to him these days. It’s not that he didn’t love them. It’s not that they didn’t love him. But finding common ground felt like shooting in the dark. He wanted to defend himself — he hardly ever drank, he didn’t even like alcohol — but it wouldn’t help.
“Bear, actually.”
“Bear?”
“Yeah, the big furry kind. Growly? Annoying? Big. Seriously, way bigger than you’d imagine.”
“Okay. Could be worse. Crocodiles, right? You got lucky, dude, good thing you didn’t get snapped up by a crocodile.”
Noah rolled his eyes, but a smile stole across his face as his brother started humming, then half mumbling, half singing, the lyrics to the old Peter Pan song about smiling at the crocodile.
“Pretty sure it’s alligators in Florida,” Noah said.
“Oh, right.” Niall stopped singing. “Disney, though. Hey, how close are you to Orlando? I could hop a plane, we could hit a theme park or two. Ride Space Mountain?”
“Don’t you have a job?”
“Friday afternoon, bro. I could be there by midnight. We could play all weekend and I’d be back at work by the time the market opens Monday morning. Easy.”
Noah took a deep breath. “Maybe next time. Right now, I want out of Florida.”
“You got it.” Niall sounded more resigned than disappointed.
“Not after we tried so hard to get him here!” the kid’s voice protested. “We have to stop him.”
“Stop him? We can’t do anything. We’re totally and completely helpless.” The crying girl sounded bitter, but at least she wasn’t crying.
“Hush. Not around him, remember?” Joe said, sounding annoyed.
“I’m sorry. I wish I…” Noah covered his eyes. The damn voices. They were driving him crazy. Surprising himself with an abrupt decision, Noah added, “I’m gonna get help. I’ll call the VA. Make an appointment, see a shrink.”
The hallucinations had been bad enough. But the idea that General Directions had done something to his brain, as tempting as it had been, as hopeful as he’d found it, had to be delusional. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, his problems were growing into more than he could ignore away.
“Noah, if you’re ready for help, you don’t have to wait for the VA. Come on.” His brother sounded impatient. “Come to New York. I’ll get you into the best doctor in the city in 24 hours. It’s just fucking money. EMDR, that’s how they’re treating PTSD now. It’s some eye motion thing. You stare at a light or something.”
Noah gave a puff of laughter. He shouldn’t be surprised that Niall had researched treatments for post-traumatic stress. His whole family had been trying to fix him for a long time. “Did you look that one up or did Mom?”
“Dude.” Niall sighed. For a moment, a burst of noise came through the phone as if someone had opened the door. “You didn’t even call on Christmas.”
“Yeah, I was…” Noah let the sentence trail off. He didn’t want to lie to his brother. He hadn’t been busy or away or any of the other excuses that came to mind: he’d been newly laid-off, sitting in his barren apartment, staring at the walls, and wishing something, anything, was different. Calling home had crossed his mind a hundred times, maybe more.
But he hadn’t done it.
Silence. It stretched. Painful and awkward and miserable.
And then one of his voices broke it. It was the kid, asking, in a piercing whisper, “That’s the holiday with the fat man in the red suit, right? I like him.”
“Shush,” Joe said.
“He should have called his mother. She gave him life. A phone call is the least she deserves.” The Arabic woman was whispering, too.
“It was right after AlecCorp lost their contracts, remember? He was laid off. He didn’t want to worry them.” That was Joe, also low-voiced.
Noah didn’t need to hear any more of his voices chime in. He knew already that the clean freak would complain about dust, the crying girl would cry, the angry guy would say it wasn’t right and the fake Chinese guy would make no sense.
Right on cue, the singing lady’s voice drifted into his ear, crooning, “Sleep my love, and peace attend thee…”
“Can’t we get her away from him?”
“It’s not right.”
“Look, can you help me?” Noah stood, feeling the urge to move, to escape.
“Of course,” his brother answered. “Money? Where do you want me to send it?”
“I’m in this little town called Tassamara. Florida, obviously.” Noah walked across the patio and into the yard, eyeing the overgrown bougainvillea draped along the back fence.
“Tassamara.” Niall sounded thoughtful, before his voice burst into excitement. “Holy shit, seriously? What the hell are you doing there?”
“I’m… I… it’s… what do you know about this place?”
“Hot babe alert,” Niall muttered. “Man, I would like a piece of that action.”
“What?” Noah snapped. His brother might be part of a Wall Street culture that Noah didn’t love, but he wasn’t crass. At least, not usually.
“Not the blonde,” Niall said hastily, before adding with a chuckle, “Although, I gotta admit, she’s quite something. You know who I’m talking about?”
“Grace Latimer?” Noah asked reluctantly.
“Yeah. Gorgeous, smart, oblivious. But the company — they’re golden, my man. They buy crap. Shit you’d steer your worst enemy away from. And then it turns out the company they’ve bought holds some obscure patent that everyone working in solar power needs, or has some no-name technician who turns out to be a super genius, or whatever. They’ve got the Midas touch. And the blonde — butter wouldn’t melt. Cool as can be as she walks into a boardroom to announce that they’ve just scarfed up majority interest and she’s the new owner.”
“It sounds like you’ve seen her in action.”
“Yeah, there was a deal a couple years ago. A subsidiary of Davis Corp. We had an option on…” Niall started talking stocks, percentages, shares — jargon that made Noah’s eyes glaze over. But he got the general point. His brother knew of General Directions and not as a top-secret research facility working on military experiments.
He interrupted Niall to ask, “Do you know anything about the research they do?”
Niall chuckled. “Eh, rumors only. I’ve got the impression that it’s whatever strikes Latimer’s fancy — teleportation, I heard. Like that’s going to go anywhere. But you never know, I guess. I wouldn’t rule it out.”
“Military work?”
“DoD stuff? Nope, definitely not. Government funding is public info. I’d know.”
“Why? Aren’t there thousands of companies doing military work?”
“Yeah, but that one’s got the Midas touch,” his brother repeated. “You know me. Any edge, bro.”
Noah’s lips curved up. Yeah, he did know his twin. He didn’t know how they’d come out of the same womb, though. How had he gotten every idealistic gene and his brother every pragmatic one? But if Niall thought profit could be made by watching General Directions, he’d have the company under a microscope. “So, no shady medical experiments?”
“Huh.” Niall snorted. “No shady anything, as far as I know. Some SEC investigations into their stock trades, but that’s just because their luck is unreal. None have ever gone anywhere. Have you heard something? I think one kid is a doc, but she’s maybe a radiologist? Something to do with imaging, anyway. Nothing creepy. What do you know?”
“Not a thing. I’ve met a few people who work there, that’s all.”
“The blonde?”
“Yeah.”
“She’s a babe, isn’t she?”
Noah ran his tongue over his teeth, half amused, half annoyed. He probably shouldn’t tell his asshole brother that he was an asshole, not when he needed Niall’s help.
“Yeah, don’t answer that. Twin telepathy, I know what you’re thinking.”
Noah chuckled. It had been so long. Years since he and Niall spent real time together. But in the moment, they could be back in high school, bickering over who’d called dibs on Niall’s hot lab partner first.
“Man, it’s good to hear your voice,” Niall said, sobering.
“Yours, too.” The words caught in Noah’s throat. Who was he to call his brother an asshole when he was the one who’d let his family down?
“So, money,” Niall said brusquely. “Wire transfer? Or Fedex. That’s easier. Yeah, I can overnight you a debit card and a cell phone. I’m assuming this number’s not yours?”
“Borrowed it from the guy — uh, person — who runs the place I’m staying, yeah.” Noah still hadn’t decided whether Avery was male or female.
“Give me the address. I’ll get you what you need by tomorrow midday.”
Noah closed his eyes, but recited the address to his brother. He didn’t deserve Niall. He was a crap brother. But his litany of self-reproach was nothing he hadn’t thought before.
“One condition. Call Mom.”
Noah shoved the heel of his hand into a closed eye, his other fist clenching on the phone.
“She’ll be happy just to know you’re breathing.”
“No, she won’t.” Noah sighed. “Nothing I do can make her happy.”
“She’s a mom. She worries. She can’t help it.”
“Yeah, but… it’s better this way.”
“For you, maybe.”
“Are you going to call her when we hang up?” Noah asked.
“Yes,” Niall snapped. “Of course I am. Dude, she worries about you every single day. It was bad enough when you were in the Army. At least then she knew she’d get a phone call. It would almost be easier if you were—” His heated words stopped, as dead as the word he hadn’t said.
“Yeah.” Noah’s eyes burned, but his voice stayed steady as he said, “I know the feeling.”
“Shit,” Joe said.
“If he dies, what happens to us?” The crying girl sounded more thoughtful than worried.
“You know I didn’t mean that.” Niall’s voice was rough. “It’s just… we miss you.”
His family missed the old him, Noah knew. The him who laughed. The him who let people in. The him who could be honest.
He missed that guy, too.
“No, seriously,” the crying girl said. “If he dies, what happens to us? Do we get to stop following him around all the time? Because that might not be so bad.”
Great, now his subconscious wanted to kill him.
“It’s okay,” Noah reassured his brother. “I miss you, too. I’ll…” He paused. He didn’t want to lie. But he dreaded calling home with a passion most people reserved for root canals. He’d rather have a root canal. At least a dentist would give him good drugs.
“Compromise?” Niall suggested.
Noah felt a smile creeping up his face. “Go.”
“Postcards. Five of them. And you call on our birthday. I’ll be there, so I can, you know, take the phone away if it gets too much.”
Their birthday wasn’t until July. “One postcard a month or can I send them all tomorrow?”
“One a month,” Niall said firmly, but his voice softened when he added, “First one to Mom, but you can mix it up on the next four. I wouldn’t mind getting the occasional postcard myself.”
“All right.” They chatted for a few more minutes, but the noise level on Niall’s side rose and lowered as if a door kept opening and closing, and he finally said he had to get back to work. Noah let him go with relief, grateful his brother hadn’t asked more hard questions.
He stood, phone in hand, planning his next moves. He should have been smarter about stashing some cash in a safe spot in his truck, but it was too late for regrets. Damn, but he was hungry. He could seriously go for a Big Mac, but Avery’s cocktail hour cheese and crackers would have to do for the night. At least breakfast was covered. He wouldn’t starve before Fedex arrived. He headed into the house, head down.
“Bad news?” Avery asked from the kitchen area.
Noah looked up, shaking his head. “No, it’s…”
But his words trailed off when he met the even gaze of Grace Latimer. She was perched on one of the stools at the breakfast bar. He swallowed, his mouth instantly dry. She’d changed her clothes. The fashion-plate suit was gone, leaving her in jeans and a black fleece pullover. She’d looked good in the heels and skirt, but she looked just as good, maybe even better, dressed for the outdoors.
Noah crossed toward the bar, holding the phone out to Avery. “Thanks for letting me use your phone.”
“No problem,” Avery replied. “Let me know if there’s anything else I can do.”
“I appreciate that.” Noah gave a brief nod.
He was standing close enough to Grace that he could feel her warmth, a shimmer of heat that radiated from her like one of those heat lamps at a fancy restaurant with an outdoor patio.
“I don’t have your wallet,” she said.
He looked directly at her for the first time since crossing the room. “I didn’t think you did.”
“I do have people looking for it.” One corner of her lips rose. “My staff was surprisingly enthusiastic about taking the afternoon to stomp around the forest, scaring off the bears. I think they’ll find it.”
“I’m okay if they don’t.” He tipped his chin toward Avery and the phone he’d returned. “I have a… friend, sending money.”
“In the meantime, can I buy you that lunch you missed? Maggie’s Place? She does a great meal. As you know.”
Noah wanted to say no. The last thing he needed was to spend time with the woman next to him. She was disaster, looming like a pile of drugs laid before a junkie. He figured she was somewhere between pot and heroin — maybe a casual painkiller addiction?
But his mouth formed the word, “Sure,” entirely against his will.
“Terrific.” She grabbed his hand, folding her fingers around his own. They felt warm against his skin. He wondered how long he’d been cold without noticing, but let himself be tugged along as the phone he’d handed back to Avery rang.
“Hello, Sunshine Bed-and-Breakfast,” Avery said into the phone, before letting it drop and adding, “Enjoy your lunch.”
Grace waggled the fingers of her free hand at Avery, saying, “See you later, Ave,” and Noah nodded with a quick glance over his shoulder.
As they entered the hallway, Avery started talking, words fluid and completely unintelligible to Noah, but somehow familiar. He pulled Grace to a stop, listening. One of his voices — the one that spoke in fake Chinese — burst into speech, the sound drowning out Avery’s voice.
“Something wrong?” Grace asked. She let go of his hand.
“What language is that?” Noah asked.
She cocked her head back toward the kitchen and then said, “Quechua. Avery’s family still lives in Peru.”
“Does it sound like Chinese to you?”
She looked surprised. She paused, listening. “I could see that,” she said with a nod. “Something about the rhythm? And maybe some of the sounds.”
He had to be imagining the similarity. No way could his subconscious speak in a language he’d never even heard of. It was impossible. Unless…
“I don’t know much about languages, though,” Grace said. Her clear gaze met his.
Noah’s suspicions faded. He was being paranoid again. General Directions hadn’t put a transmitter in his brain. He wasn’t the victim of some illicit experimentation. Grace Latimer ran a legitimate holding company with a solid reputation. His brother had told him so and if there was anyone on the planet Noah could trust, it was his twin.
His fake Chinese voice fell silent. In the kitchen, Avery continued speaking.
Noah listened for a moment longer.
It was impossible. Absolutely impossible. But the words sure sounded like those of the voice he’d been listening to for months.