Page 51 of Gabe

“You don’t?”

I shook my head and one of my braids fell across my neck like a choker. “They aren’t clustered together enough to be claw marks. Despite working in the city, I’ve seen a surprising number of patients who have been attacked by wild animals to know what those look like. I didn’t know that bears could live in swamps, but apparently they can, and people are dumb enough to try and approach them.”

This time, Gabe didn’t say anything as he waited for my final verdict.

“Shrapnel,” I eventually declared. “Probably razor blades, or something equally sharp. You probably weren’t too close to the bomb when it went off, since there are no burn scars, but the shrapnel still reached you.”

Laughing quietly under his breath, Gabe buried his face against my stomach.

“I shouldn’t be surprised,” he said against my skin. “You are good at what you do.” He looked up at me again with a complicated expression. “My last mission with the Army Rangers, an IED went off and nearly took my arm with it. If I’d been any closer, I would have lost the limb, and it took several years of physical therapy to get a full range of movement again. Ended my active military career.”

He fell silent for a moment, and I could see him weighing different words in his mind. His gaze darted side to side, like he was reading the sentences as he considered them before speaking.

I would have been satisfied with that answer, but I left it up to him if he wanted to tell me anymore.

Eventually, after several minutes of silent debate, he found his voice again.

“I should have seen the IED before it went off. Looking back on it now, it was obvious, but I was distracted.”

“Distracted?” One disbelieving eyebrow journeyed to the top of my forehead. “Since when are you ever distracted?”

“I was distracted that day. I’d just gotten a message… I told you about how my sister died, right? Well, that was the day I was told about her death. I shouldn’t have been out in the field after getting that kind of news, but we were in enemy territory. We couldn’t just turn around and go home, even if we wanted to. I thought I could hold it together, but I wasn’t paying as much attention to my surroundings as I should have been. This is the result.”

I left his scars behind to wrap my arms around him instead. “I’m sorry. To hear that kind of news about your sister, and then immediately get injured, it must have been horrible.”

He slipped his hands under me so he could wrap them around my waist. “It was. I won’t say it wasn’t. For years, I hated the sight of the scars, but now, they’re a reminder.”

“A reminder of your sister?”

Gabe shook his head and let his chin rest on my stomach as he looked up at me. “A reminder to hold on tight to the things I care about.”

Moisture gathered in my eyes, and a knot in my throat kept me from speaking, but I didn’t need to. All I needed was to hold him close as his arms wrapped tighter around me and bask in the feeling of safety that he brought.

We lay there for several hours until Newt knocked on our door to announce that dinner was ready. There was a lot to do. My stomach was growling, Sebastian would need another round of physical therapy before the end of the day, and we still had preparations to make in order to investigate the upcoming charity event.

However, I used that moment to hold Gabe close just a little longer, clutching each other tightly until our fingers left identical bruises behind.

CHAPTER 19

Frankie

The charity fundraising event turned out to be an indoor carnival. Usually, carnivals were an outdoor event, but the spring weather was still too cold and wet to allow such a thing. One might wonder why the event would take the form of a carnival at all if the weather didn’t allow for it. Surely, there were plenty of other types of events that could be used to raise money.

As I stood at the center of it all, looking around at the various rides and attractions, I knew exactly why a carnival had been chosen and my heart sank at the sight of every smiling face. Carnivals catered to families and children. It provided plenty of opportunities for the Senator’s “people” to scope out new victims.

“This place is making my skin scrawl,” I whispered to Newt, who stood at my side as the two of us pretended to watch a juggling act.

Gabe had managed to land a spot among the event’s volunteer staff. It gave him a perfect opportunity to unearth anything suspicious about the event, but I hated the idea of him being on his own. He felt too vulnerable to me, although Newt and I were probably the ones more at risk as we played the role of visitors. If we ended up having to fight our way out of a dangerous situation, we wouldn’t fare nearly as well as the ex-military man.

If only Sebastian had been able to come, but despite my efforts with his physical therapy, he hadn’t been healed enough. Instead, we’d found a compromise. Sebastian stayed in the RV, which was parked just a few blocks from the carnival, and watched everything through a pair of pins that Newt and I wore that each held a small camera and a GPS tracker.

I had no idea where Gabe had gotten hold of the pins, but I suspected Lily was probably involved.

Occasionally, Sebastian texted us to point out things he’d noticed through the cameras. The man was, unsurprisingly, very observant. He had a good eye for just where to stand to get the best view of every attraction, and pointed out suspicious characters in the crowd long before Newt and I even noticed them.

It would be much easier if we actually knew what we were looking for. The instructions to look for “anything suspicious” weren’t specific enough. So far, our efforts had helped us catch two pickpockets, and a pair of teenagers making out behind the popcorn stand.

That last one was embarrassing for everyone involved, and not the least bit helpful.

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