Lost and Found (Masters & Mercenaries: The Forgotten #2)(8)

He opened the attachment and glanced through it as Ariel spoke.

“Dr. Walsh began showing signs of genius when she read at the age of three. By the time she was five years old she was working complex math and her father brought in a tutor.”

“Her father is Leland Walsh?” Tucker whistled.

“You say that like it means something.” Owen flipped back, trying to figure out who the bloke was.

“Leland Walsh invented a surgical technique that revolutionized the way we deal with brain tumors.” Tucker always sounded different when he talked about medicine. More competent. And then more scared because they were all almost certain he’d worked with Dr. Hope McDonald, evil mistress of the mind. Dead but not forgotten. Except by him, since she’d died after she’d dosed him but before he’d woken up.

“So she comes from a family of doctors?” Robert asked.

“Her father, grandfather, and two uncles were renowned surgeons,” Ariel explained. “Not that her mother’s side of the family wasn’t full of brainiacs. Her mother was a professor. She taught psychology and ran a women’s shelter. Rebecca chose to go into research, specifically into researching the brain and memory and how degenerative neurological diseases affect memory.”

His eyes lit on a specific fact. It was listed in the middle of the bio Nina had prepared, but it stuck out to him. “Her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.”

Nina nodded, but her eyes held a certain sympathy. “Yes, when Rebecca was nine, but from her accounts, she wasn’t told about the diagnosis until later, roughly nine months before her mother died. She spoke about it at a conference. It was a quite moving speech. She and her future stepmother cared for her mother at home until she passed.”

“Her future stepmother?” Robert asked.

“So her family life is rough, I take it.” He couldn’t imagine how the girl had taken that. Mum dies and dad marries her nurse?

“She’s quite close to her family,” Nina corrected. “She was the maid of honor at their wedding three years after her mom died. She’s close to her young sister, and from all accounts enjoys spending time with her father.”

“Must not have been close to her mum.” Owen didn’t get it. Not at all.

Ariel was frowning his way. “She was a teenaged girl who put aside her needs to keep her mother out of a nursing home. I would say she proved her love for her mother. As for being close to her stepmother, well, funny things happen to survivors. Sometimes they cling together. Until you’ve lost someone, you can’t judge how others react. Honestly, even when you have, you know damn well you shouldn’t. Grief is different for everyone.”

Tucker leaned over. “I think you should be quiet now. She looks pissed.”

She looked annoyed, but then he could do that to a woman.

He’d lost two someones, but he didn’t understand grief. How did he cry and ache for two people he couldn’t remember? “I’m sorry. I was surprised. Of course I don’t know anything at all. Please continue.”

“She doesn’t seem to have a large social circle here in Toronto. I’m surprised she has many friends at all since when she would normally have been forming her social identity, she was thrown in with much older students. She was much younger than the average student at the schools she attended. She would have been an outsider at best, a target at worst,” Ariel said.

“A target?” Robert asked. “What do you mean? I understand she’s our target, but why would her school friends want to investigate her?”

Ariel’s lips tugged up slightly. “It’s always odd to be reminded of how your memories break. You know so much about the world, so many facts, but often normal experiences are gone and with them the street-like knowledge that’s second nature to the rest of us.”

“That’s shrink talk for you’re a shiny new baby,” Big Tag explained.

“What she’s saying is Rebecca Walsh was so young she couldn’t relate to the other students,” Ezra explained. “Even though she was certainly smart enough to be in a class with them, emotionally she wasn’t ready to run in their circles.”

Sometimes he still felt like that. “You’re saying that even though she’s bridged that gap now, she still isn’t comfortable in social situations? Has trouble making friends?”

Ariel nodded. “She might be awkward at times. You’re going to have to be patient with her.”

“I don’t know about that,” Nina mused. “I’ve talked to her and I was surprised at how nice she seems. She ordered a vanilla latte instead of her normal plain latte. I mentioned it and she told me she’s on a quest to expand her horizons. She seemed enthusiastic about it. I know it’s only a shot of vanilla, but it’s outside her routine. I think she might welcome some new friends.”

“She loves animals,” Ariel pointed out. “She doesn’t have a pet right now, but I think that’s because of her long hours. She spends her breaks at a dog park, though she doesn’t own one.”

Jax gave her a thumbs-up. “Buster to the rescue. No one can resist his manly smell. No, seriously, River’s at the groomer’s right now. We’re getting rid of his stink. He thought a skunk would be a good playmate. It was really terrible.”