Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)(68)

“I can’t believe I’m eating this crap,” she said. “It tastes so good.”

“Convenience store haute cuisine.” He handed her another loaded cracker. “Stick with me, babe, if you want to live large.”

“So what are we doing here, anyhow?” she asked. “We can’t hide in this room eating crackers and having wild, crazy sex forever.”

“Wish we could,” he said, sounding wistful. “But I have a friend we can crash with. She’s expecting us late tonight.”

Liv went tense, and was angry at herself for being so. “She?”

Sean lifted his hands defensively. “Not an ex-lover, as God is my witness. I would never dream of getting it on with Tam. She intimidates the living bejesus out of me. She’s just a really unusual, ah, friend.”

“Intimidated? You?” She snorted. “Oh, please. Get real.”

“I’m kind of a wuss, if you want to know the truth,” he confessed.

“Right. Big lily-livered wuss.” She rolled her eyes. “Unusual how?”

“You have to meet her to understand. Tam is indescribable.”

“Whatever,” she said. “I need to contact my parents first.”

“Davy’s done that. They know you’re safe,” he said.

She shook with a burst of dry laughter. “Um, no, Sean. They know that I’m with you,” she corrected. “They don’t know that I’m safe.”

He handed her his cell. “Be my guest. If you have the strength.”

She took a deep breath, and dialed the number of Endicott House. It was snatched up on the first ring. “Hello?”

“Mother?” she asked. “It’s me. I’m—”

“Oh, my God, Livvy. Have you gone insane? Where are you?”

“I’m with Sean,” she soothed. “I’m fine, I’m safe.”

“How could you do this to me? Come home this instant!”

“Um, actually…no. I’m going to disappear for a while. I—”

“The police need to talk to you, Livvy! That man is dangerous!”

Huh. Her definition of dangerous had gotten a sharp adjustment lately. “You’ve got the wrong idea,” she explained. “Sean rescued me.”

“Are you trying to punish me, Livvy?” Her mother’s voice cracked. “When will it be enough pain to satisfy you? When will it stop? When?”

Liv swallowed back all the rest. No point. Nobody was listening. “Give Daddy a hug for me,” she said. “Bye, Mother. I’ll be in touch.”

“Livvy! Stop! Don’t you dare hang up that—”

Click. She broke the connection and stared down at the phone in her hand. She felt empty, light. She could float away, like a dry leaf.

“Well,” she whispered. “I’ve done my duty. For what it’s worth.”

She set the phone down. Sean was rifling through his big, heavy olive green duffel bag full of mysterious equipment. “There’s something I need to tell you,” she said. “Something that’s going to be hard to hear.”

He went motionless for a moment, then straightened up, gripping the mattress on either side of him. “Yeah?” he said warily.

“Remember how you told me that everyone breaks under torture?”

He jerked his chin in assent, and waited for her to go on.

“It’s not always true.” She tried to swallow over the stone hard bump in her throat. “T-Rex said…that Kev never told them anything. Where the tapes were, where the notebook was. Who I was. No matter what they did to him. He didn’t tell. So…I owe my life to him, too.”

Sean looked away. He got up and circled the bed. He sat down with his back to her and sagged forward, leaning his face on his hands.

Liv crawled across the bed and draped herself against his back.

They stayed like that for a long time, waiting for night to fall.





Chapter 14



“Hold still,” Osterman growled. “I’d already be done if you would just stop that goddamn twitching. Idiot.” His nostril flared with distaste as he swabbed the puncture wound on Gordon’s furry buttock. The man’s body stank. Yeasty and rank. This type of intimacy was repulsive to him. It was coming back to him, why he had abandoned the idea of practicing medicine, and chosen the realm of pure research. Fewer revolting odors.

He would have enjoyed the power that being a famous surgeon would have given him, but human bodies were disgusting. Particularly a sweaty animal like Gordon. He simply did not have the stomach for it.

“Spray on more anesthetic, you f*cking sadist,” Gordon barked.

Osterman ignored him. The slices on Gordon’s back, the jagged puncture wound on his cheek, the teeth marks on his wrist, had been duly taken care of, but Osterman had not been gentle.

Idiot. Jerking off, at Osterman’s expense. Correction. At Osterman’s huge, crushing, exorbitant expense. He dug the needle in.

“Fuck!” Gordon hissed.

“Keep your voice down. A professional with years of experience, trounced by an unarmed research librarian. The mind boggles.”

“I told you. Sean McCloud kicked my gun out of my hand while that crazy bitch was stabbing my face and biting my arm!”