Danger Calls. Caridad Pineiro

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СКАЧАТЬ bite humans.”

      “You bit my sister,” Sebastian challenged. He leaned against the edge of the desk and tried to adopt a nonchalant stance.

      “She told you about that?” There was a hint of surprise in Ryder’s voice.

      “We’re close. Have been since before Papi was killed.”

      Ryder rubbed his index finger across his lip as he considered the young man across the room from him. He’d sensed something between Sebastian and Melissa and had worried about it.

      Sebastian was too young, with a rebelliousness that normally boded ill. Despite that, he’d helped when called upon and Ryder had no doubt Diana strongly believed in her brother. Melissa also had clearly developed feelings for him. Feelings that could not only cause her a great deal of pain, but could place her in danger if she trusted this child to keep her safe.

      Child. It was the only way Ryder could think of Sebastian, given the age difference between them and the differences in their life experiences.

      “Melissa and I are close,” Ryder said. He was unprepared for what came next.

      Sebastian skewered Ryder with his gaze. “Do you love her?”

      Ah, so he has feelings for Melissa, as well. “I do. As a friend. As a sister. As my companion.”

      “Your companion,” Sebastian said with a strangled laugh. He walked across the room to stand directly before Ryder. “She’s trapped by that and by the loyalty she feels toward you.”

      Ryder didn’t need to be reminded. Melissa had confessed as much to him. It had come as a shock that she felt so differently from all the Danverses before her. Or maybe they had all felt the same, but lacked the courage to say it. He’d borne that guilt for months now and had told himself he was capable of dealing with it. Until now.

      “She’s free to go when she wants,” he growled.

      Sebastian surprised him again. He squared his shoulders and stood up to Ryder. “She won’t go until you set her free.”

      They stood there nearly nose to nose for several seconds until Sebastian finally stepped away.

      “I need to get some other equipment. I’ll be back later.” He walked out the door.

      Ryder watched him go. There was no hint of his having tucked his tail and run. On the contrary, there was a swagger that said Sebastian had no problems with standing up for what he believed.

      Ryder had to admire him for that. He also had to admit that he might be wrong about whether Sebastian was right for Melissa.

      But Sebastian was definitely wrong about one thing. It wasn’t Ryder who had to set Melissa free. That was something she had to do herself.

      As Ryder left the room and returned to his floor of the duplex it occurred to him that Sebastian could provide the goading Melissa needed to do it.

      Amazingly the thought didn’t displease him the way he thought it would have.

      Chapter 6

      She’d made a list.

      She’d checked it twice.

      She didn’t know who’d been naughty, only who’d been nice.

      The problem was, those who’d been nice might have been the ones who’d been the most naughty.

      Melissa hated having to second-guess everyone’s motives. It wasn’t in her nature to question what was behind someone’s actions or whether she was misreading a glance or an errant look. With as much time as she spent in the hospital, having to wonder about each of her co-workers was creating quite a strain.

      Tossing the list onto her desk, she closed her eyes and leaned back in her chair, once again going over the events of the night the journal was stolen. Where she had been and whom she had seen. How long she’d been in the E.R. and after, what she recalled from her walk back to her office and the discovery of the theft. As it had every other time, the same list of names came up. Number one on that hit parade was her friend Sara, the nurse in charge of her floor.

      Sara had been on duty that night and free when Melissa had been called to the emergency room. She’d been on the floor when Melissa had returned from the E.R. and had come by immediately after the theft to offer her help. Had her offer been a smokescreen to throw Melissa off?

      Although Melissa wasn’t one to normally plug into the hospital grapevine, she’d done so the last few days and discovered a great deal. Gossip said that Sara had been working a ton of extra hours, but no one knew why. Only that Sara needed the money.

      Tony, the muscle-bound security guard who had been with Melissa in her office, had supposedly been tossed out of some kind of competition for testing positive for steroids. Melissa knew little about Tony other than that he had always been unflaggingly polite and helpful. As for his purported steroid use, the grapevine hinted that he had passed the random drug tests done by the hospital. Nevertheless, the rumors made him a possible suspect. Who knew if he could trade the prescription medicines stolen from her office for the steroids he needed to bulk up?

      There had been a few other orderlies and nurses there that night, along with her father’s old friend, Dr. Edward Sloan, but overall, it was a rather short list. And she wanted to take her friend Sara off of it.

      Sara came from a tough neighborhood on the Upper East Side and had risen from poverty the hard way by doing a stint in the Army that had taught her the basics of being an EMT, and later had helped pay for a nursing degree. Melissa knew Sara had been trying to move her family to a better area. Maybe that was why she needed cash.

      Being her friend, Melissa could probably come right out and ask, only Sara was prideful about certain things, money being one of them. Melissa had it and Sara didn’t. That was always a source of conflict between them. Was it enough of an issue that Sara would steal or deal drugs to balance the scales? And why would she take the journal?

      It left a sour taste in her mouth as she scooped her list of names off her desk and stuffed it into her lab coat pocket. Taking a look at her watch, she realized it was time for her last rounds before going home.

      To most people, home was a sanctuary where they could escape the grind of their daily lives. For Melissa, it just meant a different kind of grind except…

      Sebastian might be there. He’d been around the last few days; busy wiring and setting up equipment. So far with her schedule, it had been easy to avoid him, but now that it was her turn for some midday shifts, they might finally run into one another. She was still conflicted about whether that might prove difficult…or decidedly interesting.

      The door to the women’s locker room was ajar.

      Melissa caught sight of Sara, who looked around before stuffing something into a knapsack. The knapsack tipped over and two blood bags spilled onto the floor. Sara quickly scooped them up and jammed them back into her bag.

      Melissa pushed through the door.

      Sara whirled, a look of worry on her face that turned to a broad smile as she recognized her friend. “Whew, you scared the crap out of me.”

      “Worried?” СКАЧАТЬ