he said, pointing to the slip that held the penned address.
“How can you be sure?”
“I’m not, but I don’t know what else to do.”
“Do you know exactly where it is?”
“In Colorado. We’ll need a map. You can buy one in there.”
“No credit cards I’m assuming.”
“Right.”
Ashley reached for her seat belt. Her heart pounded against her moral conviction of what he’d asked her to do. Did she not have a say? In fact, there could be an easy argument that she was of sounder mind and body than he was.
“I’m not doing what you ask.” Ashley turned and faced him. “I can’t steal a car. Whatever is happening here, I’ve already done enough to put my medical career at risk. Taking a patient from the hospital, if you corroborate my story that you came willingly...”
“You didn’t take me from the hospital without my permission,” Casper said. “That’s not a lie. I could have stopped you.”
She raised an eyebrow at the unlikeliness of that statement. Truly, he was in little condition to stop her from doing much. “Then that charge I can survive. The hospital won’t be happy that I drove a patient home, but a slap on the wrist might be punishment enough in their eyes.”
“I sense a rebuttal coming.”
“I just won’t steal a car. I’m willing to go on this...adventure with you to a certain point, but I can’t break the law.”
“Fine. I understand. This is all very confusing to me, as well—”
“I can only imagine.”
“Then what is your plan?”
She reached behind her, grabbed her purse and reached into its depths for her wallet. She opened it up and pushed her finger into the gap, a place she opened in the lining, for one of the last things her father ever gave her.
“My dad told me that if I was ever in trouble—‘weird trouble’ was the phrase he used, then I was to call this person and ask for help.” She opened the paper and traced her father’s blocky penmanship. “Horace Longbottom.”
She jolted as Casper laughed. “Seriously?”
In fact, he laughed so hard, he had to use the corners of the blanket to dab the tears from his eyes.
Heat flushed Ashley’s face. “Like you have room to laugh at a name... Casper? As in the friendly ghost? What sane parent names their kid something they know will be an automatic reason to bully their child?”
Casper raised his hand at her as his laughter died. “Point taken. I’m sorry. It’s just...sometimes you need to laugh when things get dark.”
True. That was one thing she could agree with. Black humor was a mechanism she used in the ER all the time to get through hectic shifts. It was a salve she and her coworkers depended on.
“You’re forgiven.” She opened her wallet again. Only about seventy-five dollars in cash. Enough to make a phone call, and buy some items for Casper. He was still shivering intermittently beside her. A slight wintery breeze drifted through the shot-out windows. Something hot to drink would help while they waited. “Stay here,” she instructed.
Ashley stepped from the vehicle and began to walk into the store, wondering if she’d be shot on sight just like her friend Noah.
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