Page 60 of Free to Fall

Helplessly, she shrugs her shoulders to the person monitoring my session behind the one-way glass. Then his voice breaks through, causing all of us to turn in its direction in shock.

“Pause Payne’s session,” the agency’s director, Parker Thornton, declares. The agent in charge of my questioning jerks up her chin at his next order, “Unstrap him. I’m coming in.”

I brace even before I prepare to go up against my boss—one of the most respected intelligence gathering agents of his time.

Just this one time, he has to be wrong. Bailey can’t be hurt.

She can’t be.

Thorn storms into the room and immediately orders, “Payne, with me.”

Not having to be told twice, I follow him through the maze of deep, dark gray stone walls speckled with other agents watching as other polys are being conducted. Thorn takes a sharp left and uses a retina scan plus his voice to open a steel-reinforced door.

As if I’m being led by the Ghost of Christmas Past, I’m pulled through a vortex so instead of being pummeled by the words that changed my life, I’m transported to Bailey’s side at the hospital where they fished out the shrapnel and repaired the damage to her legs after the ER incident. Hand trembling, I smooth the tangled hair away from her beautiful, exhausted face.

Only the longer I spend ministering care to her, her image fades. Her hair transforms into dark sable curls. Her lips are fuller. Her eyes, as they flutter open, are Caribbean blue. Her lips part and instead of the childish rasp of “Daddy” I’m used to following me into this nightmare I live through every night, and something else escapes. She rasps, “Do you have something to tell me?”

Her eyes drift shut. Her hand falls out of mine.

“No!” I frantically scan her face. “Laura, come back!”

I’m about to shake her when ...

I surge awake in my bed, sweating. My heart is throbbing against my rib cage as if I’ve just sprinted a 10K. Swearing, I reach for the bottle of water on the side of my bed and take a healthy swallow, trying to calm myself down.

“What the fuck was that supposed to mean?” I ask the empty room.

The walls can’t talk nor can they make the sun rise any faster so I can stare into the eyes of the woman who just played a staring role in my nightmare.

Chapter

Twenty-Nine

I bound down to my car, excitement for my plans with my cousins quickening my step. I promised Bailey I’d pick up some pillows for our plans next week, so I told my cousins I wanted to drive separately. Sliding into my SUV, I let out a blood-curdling scream when I twist to place my purse in the back seat.

Immediately, I order, “Call Dad Mobile.”

It rings once before he picks up. “Laura.”

“Dad,” My hands are shaking when I summon up the courage to face what’s in the back seat of my vehicle. There’s a blanket wrapped around a doll that I’m certain is doused in human blood. “They were here.”

“Where are you?” His voice is calm, even if I know he isn’t.

“H-home.”

“Kalie? Grace?”

“Shopping. I’m supposed to meet them.”

He says exactly what I predict he’s going to say. “Stay right where you are and stay on the phone with me.”

“Dad?”

“I’m on my way.”

Relief floods me even as guilt mingles with the fear pumping through my veins. “Shouldn’t we tell Kalie, Grace? This is their home too.” Knowing I’m sitting in my damn driveway, our sanctuary violated, makes me want to vomit.

I hear the slam of a door, the rumble of his Porsche before he answers. “No. It might scare whoever is doing this to you away.”

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