“I see.” Athan shifted on his feet. “Do you know where he went after he left you?”
“I don’t know the exact location, no. He said he was meeting a client.” The smell of coffee brewing filled every space in the apartment. He wasn’t sure how to tell her he’d take it. Hadn’t drank any in God knows how long. She hissed from the bathroom, and he didn’t think before he stepped forward.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Got too close with the alcohol,” she said, facing him and fanning the wound with her hand. Before he could stop himself, he leaned down and gently blew against her neck, the whispers that he hadn’t heard in a while starting to rage in his head. He quickly realized what he was doing and lifted his head, both of them frozen while they stared at each other and shared breath that was quickening every second. Sarah’s eyes dropped to his open mouth, and she slowly raised her shaking fingers to brush against his bottom lip. He nearly choked. Athan pulled back, turning away from her and trudging toward the door.
“I should go. I’m sorry.” Gentle hands gripped the leather on his elbow, and he stopped, almost afraid to look at her.
“Wait … Kane, I’m—that was my fault, I shouldn’t have done that. Don’t go.” She tugged a little harder and the whispers in his head roared louder.Turn around.Athan swallowed hard.
“It wasn’t your fault. I shouldn’t be here, it’s against protocol. I know better than this. Let me go.”
“Fine, then at least have a cup of coffee with me and I’ll tell you whatever you wanna know. Then you’re working. Detectives make house calls, right?”Turn around.He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, turning to face her. When he opened them, she peered up at him, her eyes seeming desperate for him to stay. He knew then that there was no way he could kill her. He glanced at her neck. It was healing a lot faster than it should have by now. His teeth clenched when he met her eyes again and he finally spoke.
“Sarah, what do you know about this that you aren’t telling us?” She backed up a step, releasing his elbow and moving toward the kitchen. She didn’t ask him how he took it, she simply poured two cups of black coffee and sat one of them on a small coffee table in front of the loveseat in the living area. Her hand waved toward the couch, and he paused for a moment before stepping over and sitting down. When he didn’t pick up the mug, she reached down and handed it to him. The mug was warm against his palms.
“I’m—different,” she said, standing with both hands folded around her cup. “There’s been people after me ever since my mother died. I think they’re still after me.”
“What people?” Athan asked with lethal quiet. Just that admission alone was enough to set his blood boiling at the thought of someone hunting her.
“I don’t know.” She turned and walked to her bedside table, grabbing a framed picture, and bringing it back to him. Athan stared at it, realizing how much she favored the other woman in the photo.
“Is this your mother?”
“Mmhmm …” she hummed into her mug, taking a few sips and bringing it back down in front of her. “That was taken a few months before she died. It’s the last one we ever took together.”
“You look like her,” Athan offered, cautiously drinking from his cup. It was surprisingly wonderful. He took another. “How did she pass?”
“Turn it over. Open the back.” He sat the mug back down onto the table and flipped the frame, sliding the pins around the bulging stand. It popped open and a thin stack of folded papers fell into his lap. Athan raised his face to look at her. “Read that.” Sarah turned and went to sit at the end of her bed cross-legged, pulling the old blanket over her lap and kicking her boots off. He sat down the frame and opened the paperwork, skimming through every page and looking at her through lowered brows.
“So, your mother had a virus? And they contained her and kept her body?” Sarah nodded, holding up a finger.
“Everything but a small amount of her ashes. Which I now am also without. Can I bum another smoke?” Athan reached into his jacket and tossed her the pack along with the lighter. She lit one and took a longdrag, exhaling heavily before she continued. “I was lucky enough to get that.” She pointed at the papers. “I think the only reason they gave it to me is to keep me from filing a shitload of lawsuits. I did everything I could to fight them for her body. That necklace was all I had left of her. She never had a service. The last time I saw her face, she was minutes away from taking her last breath and then they forced me out. They ordered her incineration without my consent.”
“If they did all of that to contain this information and you stopped putting up a fight, then why do you think they’re after you? For this?” Athan held the papers up.
“No … for my blood? My body? I don’t know.” She took another long hit. “Wren is the only other person that knows any of this, I haven’t even told Brent. But after about a month, I started noticing people reappearing in places I frequented, heard weird shit around my house …and then one night after I’d gone to bed, I woke up and I was strapped to a table in some sort of medical facility.”
“What?” Athan asked, growing increasingly pissed. She nodded, holding the cigarette between her fingers and blowing smoke rings.
“There was a really bright light. I couldn’t see anything. I was gagged. I tried to fight my way out, or scream. I couldn’t move. They stuck me so many times in my arms and at some point, they either drugged me again or I passed out. I don’t know which. I woke up in my bed the next morning and thought maybe I had a nightmare, but … the needle marks were there.”
“Was that the only time?” Athan seethed, not realizing how badly his rage was building at what she’d just told him.
“As far as I know.” She tossed his cigarettes back to him. “You look like you’re in need.” He caught them and promptly lit one, looking back down at the papers.
“What did they do to you?”
“I don’t know that either. But nothing has happened to me ever since then. I never got sick or anything like that. It’s been years since then. I started making it my life’s mission to figure out what killed my mom.”
“Is that why you took the job at EverLife?”
“Yep. I got a letter when I was still in Seattle. A school I didn’t even apply to had their eye on me … said they thought I would be a great fit for the program they were offering and even offered me a full ride. I had already run out of the settlement money I had gotten after mom died, and I couldn’t afford our house. So, I sold it … and used that money to come to Boston and go to school. The idea was to start over.” She sipped on her coffee. “I worked really hard to get this far. And I feel like the closer I get to the truth, the more someone wants to kill me.”
“Do you think maybe this position at EverLife was given to you so they could use you?”
“Don’t know.” Sarah shrugged. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.”