them out on the seat beside him, going dark on any kind of satellite trace. Unfortunately, though, that meant he had no means of communication on him, either, until he could find a spot to stop where a bleeding man in a broken truck wouldn’t draw attention, and he could unpack the new phone in his go bag.
And since he was clearly off his game, Nash had driven into the heart of downtown instead of catching one of the highways and had the dumb luck to be caught in the heart of rush-hour traffic. Until he could get his bearings, until he could think this whole mess through and decide where he needed to go, he’d just keep driving.
He’d come to K.C. to hook up with an old friend, Jake Lonergan, a former agent who’d gotten out of the business. He’d hoped for a spare bed or sofa to bunk on for a night or two until he could make some inquiries and form a new plan of action. But Jake had a family now, complete with a wife and little girl, and another baby on the way. Nash seriously doubted his old friend would appreciate him bringing a drug war to his front doorstep.
He’d met a couple of guys at KCPD a little over a year ago, working on another case. But they weren’t the kind of buddies a desperate man called on for off-the-record help. He’d trusted every man on his team—would have called Torres or Richter in a heartbeat. But now they were gone. Besides, he didn’t want to be responsible for the deaths of any more cops. Whether the Graciela-Vargas war had extended its reach to Kansas City or they’d come here just for him, he could imagine they wouldn’t take too kindly to interference from anyone else who wore a badge.
Nash slowed his truck and followed the flow of traffic through a fancy shopping district decorated with more lights than he could count and window displays for the upcoming holiday. He hadn’t even thought about Christmas. Besides the fact his parents were gone and he had no siblings and was married to his work, he’d been too busy trying to stop the drugs and save his team these past few months. Celebrating the holidays was for men with families and kids who still believed in the kind of magic and hope he’d stopped believing in long ago.
Right now he just had to live long enough to ID a traitor and exact a little revenge on the man who’d sentenced his agent brothers to death. Legally, if he could. But a bullet to the head would be justice enough if he couldn’t find any other way to finish this.
Maybe he’d see Christmas next week. If he was lucky, he’d see New Year’s. He glanced down at the blood seeping through the hole in his leather coat.
Or maybe, if he didn’t clear his head and think of some options fast, he wouldn’t even live to see tomorrow.
* * *
“FINALLY. HERE’S THE horse I’ve been looking for.”
Teresa Rodriguez watched Laila Alvarez sag into her wheelchair, dropping the scissors and magazine she held into her lap. Despite the little girl’s brave smile and never-ending chatter, Teresa could tell that thirty minutes of making ornaments in the playroom of the Truman Medical Center’s children’s wing had taxed the eight-year-old’s energy.
Knowing her patients better than they sometimes knew themselves, Teresa slipped her hand over the glue stick on the table and dropped it into the pocket of her cartoon-print scrub jacket before Laila noticed. She nodded toward the image of a team of brown-and-white horses. “Those are Clydesdales. They grow big and strong and pull heavy wagons. They’ll be a nice addition to your stable.”
“Are they bigger than you?”
At five foot three, Teresa found that a lot of things, except her patients, were taller than her. “Bigger than you and me both.” She leaned in with a smile and gently took the magazine and scissors from her young friend. “How about I set the Clydesdale aside, and we can cut him out and put him on a new ornament tomorrow.”
Laila closed her fingers in a halfhearted grab. “But I want to finish decorating the tree.” She gazed longingly over at the Christmas tree in front of the bank of windows. An Appaloosa, a buckskin, a pinto, a palomino and a Lipizzaner stallion already hung from yarn bows in the branches, along with ornaments other children had made. “And I want one to hang in my room.”
“I said we could work until we ran out of supplies, remember?” Teresa gestured to the tabletop. “We’re out of glue. I’ll have to get some more on my way home. But we’ll finish them later. I promise.”
Despite the wistful expression in her cocoa-brown eyes, Laila nodded. She moved her small fingers to the picture of a barn and hay bales that she’d already glued to a piece of cardboard for Teresa to cut out and string a loop of yarn through. “I need a cowboy to watch the horses for me when I’m not here.”
“After I get the glue, I’ll go by a bookstore and find a magazine with lots of cowboys in it to bring to the hospital.”
“You’re the best nurse ever, Teresa,” Laila gushed on little more than a whisper.
Teresa smoothed her hand over the knit cap that covered the girl’s bald head. “You’re the best patient, sweetie.” With a quick glance at her watch, Teresa rose and turned Laila’s chair toward the hallway. “Come on. Let’s get you back to your room. It’s time for your medication, and I think maybe you can use a nap.”
“But I—”
“You want to be fresh and smiling when your mom and dad come in after work, don’t you?”
Laila nodded. “Can we show them the ornaments I hung up?”
“Absolutely.” Teresa parked her friend at the central desk to chat with an aide and a receptionist while she went into the dispensary and unlocked the prescribed medication. Then she wheeled her patient through the wide door to her room and locked the chair beside the bed before helping the determined girl stand and climb beneath the covers herself.
Teresa handed Laila the stuffed horse from her bedside table and the little girl hugged the well-loved toy to her chest while she chewed her tablets. After giving her charge a sip of water and tucking her in, Teresa checked the girl’s vitals and recorded the details and medication on her computer tablet. Laila was asleep before she was done.
“Oh, sweetie.” With a smile that was part admiration and part heartache, Teresa caught her long ponytail behind her neck and leaned over to kiss the girl’s pale cheek. Then she closed the blinds, unlocked the wheelchair and headed back into the hallway.
Returning to the playroom, Teresa quickly cleaned up their mess and pulled over an ottoman to set Laila’s artwork safely out of the way on the top shelf of the supply cabinet. As she climbed down to return the glue stick to a lower shelf, she made a mental list of other craft supplies they were running low on that she could pick up to keep the children who visited siblings or were patients here entertained. She suspected that Laila and a few of the other long-term care patients would be here over Christmas next week. Maybe she’d add some small gifts for them to her shopping list, too. Plan a party. Bring decorations from home to add more holiday color to their sterile environment. She had a couple of days off she could spend shopping, decorating and wrapping gifts. She glanced toward the waning sun and white flakes floating past the windows and grinned. If she cleared it with the doctors, maybe she could even bring the ingredients to help the children make snow ice cream.
No one should have to be alone on Christmas Day, denied the family and fun of the blessed celebration. No one should have to be sick or injured and in the hospital, either.
Humming a tune at the plan that was coming together in her head, Teresa locked things up and headed back to the nurse’s station to update her end-of-day reports.
