Page 104 of Asher's Assignment

It was after eleven.

It didn’t feel that late. But he’d filled himself full of caffeine while he worked. Between that and the anxiety from waiting for word on Esther’s condition, he was wide awake. He supposed it wasn’t all bad that there wasn’t any news. If they were still working, it meant she was still alive.

Clenching his teeth, he turned back to his computer, watching the last of the footage from the list of businesses Brooke gave him.

As with the other, he found nothing of note.

Getting up, he paced around the room for several minutes. It was a decent size, with a few groupings of chairs and a couple of tables that several people could sit around. He knew he was likely driving Edie and her parents up the wall with his pacing—not to mention the other people in the waiting room—but he couldn’t sit still. Breaking into the surveillance cameras had kept him focused, but now, without the distraction, he was already going a little stir-crazy. He couldn’t imagine it would be much longer. Essy had been in surgery over five hours now.

“Hello?”

Asher reversed direction at the sound of Edie’s voice. She held her phone to her ear. He walked closer, and she glanced at him.

“Uh-huh. Okay.” She paused, listening. “I’ll let him know,” she said, before pausing once more. “No. No news yet.”

When she paused yet again, Asher forced his feet to stay planted to the same spot so he didn’t yank the phone from her hand and ask what the person on the other end knew.

Finally, she hung up. “That was Audra. They struck out near the place where you and Leah were held, but she had a thought to check near the abandoned farmhouse where he instructed Esther and Connie to go. Half a mile from there, they hit paydirt. She said the footage is grainy, but she’s sending it to you to see if you can clean it up and get a plate.”

Asher walked around her to the laptop he’d left on the table near their seats. He sat down and logged in, downloading the video.

Edie and Esther’s dad, Conner, glanced over his shoulder as the footage played. “She wasn’t kidding. How are you going to get anything from that?”

“Magic.” Asher minimized the video and opened a program to clean it up. He pulled the footage into it and began messing with the different zoom levels and filters. “This might take me some time.”

He tuned the room out, letting the task take hold of his mind. This is what he did best. Focus.

The team all thought he was just great at hacking. But it wasn’t that. Yes, he could break into anything, but it wasn’t just because he saw the path to get in. It was his ability to zero in and focus. That focus is what let him follow the dots. It was why he decried the moniker “hacker.” If he applied his focus to other things—like cleaning up video footage—he could accomplish similar amazing things. He just happened to like computer tech, so that’s where most of his focus went.

Twenty minutes into his task, Edie poked him in the side. When he let out a grunt and didn’t look up, she poked him again. “Asher!” she said in a stage whisper.

Frowning, he glanced at her. “What?”

She pointed.

He followed her finger and saw a man in green scrubs standing at the reception desk. It was the same man he’d spoken to briefly before the O.R. staff wheeled Esther away for surgery.

Asher shut the laptop and stood as the man made his way toward them. Edie and her parents rose to face the doctor as well.

“Mr. Horn.” The doctor nodded, then glanced at the people with Asher. “Are you Esther’s family?”

“We’re her parents,” Conner said. “And this is her sister.” He gestured to Edie.

“Let’s all go into a room and talk.” The doctor motioned to the row of doors along the wall.

Asher spun on his heel and headed for an unoccupied one. The doctor shut the door behind them.

“How is she?” Faye asked. “Is she going to make it?”

“First, let me introduce myself. I’m Dr. Kerns. I’m the trauma surgeon assigned to Esther. I’ll start by saying she’s alive. She has stayed that way through the entire operation. We had a moment where her heart rate went a little crazy during surgery, but she never arrested.”

Asher said a silent prayer of thanks. That was a good sign.

“The bullet entered here.” Dr. Kerns pointed to a spot on his upper right abdomen just below the ribcage. “It went through the lower right lobe of her liver and nicked her right kidney before lodging next to a posterior rib. She’s incredibly lucky. It missed the large vein that runs through the middle of the abdomen, the inferior vena cava, by inches. If the trajectory had been the other way and the bullet went left through her body instead of right, we’d be having a much different conversation. We removed the section of damaged liver and repaired her kidney. She’s not out of the woods; she lost a lot of blood and this is a major trauma, but I’m optimistic.”

“Can we see her?” Edie asked.

“Soon. She’s in recovery right now. Once she’s moved up to the ICU, someone will be down to get you. Do you have any questions for me?”

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