CHAPTER 47.

Kate watched the aide push Josh away. The door swung shut behind him with a click that echoed into her soul. She stared at the closed door for a long moment, well aware time was short, but unable to surrender the memory of her last look at his face.

His words echoed through his mind. All of his words. She bowed her head, silent tears streaming down her cheeks. She hadn't had the chance to tell him how she felt about him. Or that she was doing this for him, that keeping him safe was worth anything, everything she had to offer.

Footsteps sounded in the hall and she shook herself back into action. Tabitha Rowen would accompany Josh down to CAT scan, so she had the room to herself for a few minutes until Marc Scher returned.

She remembered her vision. Now it made sense. Blake wouldn't return to his own place, hers would be too risky, so why not thumb his nose at the cops by hiding out at Josh's? He'd have no idea that she asked Anne to place it under surveillance.

Or maybe he didn't care, maybe after missing Carter he was willing to take the risk, maybe he was already stalking the officers at Josh's house-and she had sent them there.

Kate pushed her wet curls away from her face and wiped her tears on her sleeve. This was getting too complicated. All she knew was that every vision she'd had today showed Blake at Josh's. And Kate with him.

It had to stop now, tonight.

She opened the nightstand drawer and rummaged through it. She could break into Josh's house, but it'd be a lot simpler with his keys. Her fingers closed on the key ring, and she pocketed it.

Scher would be back any moment, but she wanted to leave Josh a message, something to explain how she felt. Just in case.

She scribbled a quick note on the back of one of the charting sheets and tucked it under his pillow. Hoped that she'd be able to explain in person. Someday.

Kate walked out into the hallway. She glanced up and down, nobody was looking at her suspiciously. Tabitha was down with Josh, but Scher would be back any minute, wouldn't let Anne keep him any longer than the fifteen minute break he was entitled to, no matter how excited he was by her FBI recruitment pitch.

Too risky waiting for the elevator out in the open. She pulled open the door to the fire stairs. And almost ran into Scher climbing the steps. His eyes met hers and he frowned, his hand moving down to his holster in that universal gesture that separated the good guys from the bad.

Right now Marc Scher obviously thought Kate wasn't one of the good guys.

"Stop right there," he shouted. Kate didn't give him time to finish. She braced herself against the railing and propelled a side kick into his abdomen, catching him off balance. He fell backwards down the four steps between him and the landing.

Kate prayed that she hadn't hurt Scher, looked like he'd landed on his well-padded butt. She raced down the hall to the other set of stairs and opened the door. Silence. She sped down them, emerging in the frenzied chaos of the ER, panting by the time she arrived. Her left side hurt like hell after the kick she'd given Scher. A couple days on her back, and she was totally out of shape. Of course, being dead probably hadn't helped either.

She moved down the rear hallway, toward the employee exit. You needed a key to get inside, but going out would be no problem and there were no guards stationed there, only a security camera. If she could get there before Scher had time to lock the whole place down.

She clutched her left arm to her chest. Never should've tried that kick. She turned the corner past the nurses' station. Almost there.

"Hey you!" A man's voice shouted behind her. Kate bolted for the door, twenty interminable feet away.

She pushed through the door, ignored the footsteps pounding behind her, finally gaining the cover of rain and darkness. She ran down the path into the parking lot. Just as she stepped off the curb, a squeal of brakes and flashing lights announced the arrival of reinforcements.

A patrol car pulled across the path. She skidded to a stop and swerved to her right, into the shadows beneath the skywalk that led from the main hospital building into the parking deck.

She'd stumbled into the hospital's trash collection area. Foul smelling dumpsters, some marked with large Biohazard signs, were lined up beside a large metal box. Incinerator, she realized, wrinkling her nose and trying not to think about what a medical center the size of Three Rivers might be burning in there.

One good thing about the dark maze of trash containers, it was the kind of place cops hated. Narrow, cramped, with plenty of places for an ambush. The men behind her would take it slow.

Not that Kate could move very fast herself. Each breath jolted through her rib cage, and the ground was slick with refuse. Once she moved away from the lights of the main hospital building, the darkness became impenetrable. Sweeping her good hand before her, Kate felt her way farther into the garbage collection area, praying she didn't tumble into any of the containers of medical waste.

A rustling sound came from beside her, and she froze. The skitter of tiny paws followed. She let her breath out. Rats.

Then the glare of headlights illuminated the cramped space behind her as someone had the bright idea of pulling the squad car down the service drive. She crouched behind a large red square plastic trash container that had the distinct odor of burnt and decaying flesh, watching as flashlight beams began to dance around the dumpsters and containers closest to the main building.

Kate used the light her comrades provided to look around. The space was flanked by hospital walls on two sides and the wall of the lowest level of the parking garage on the third side, the side she was moving toward. A mound of earth completed the fourth side of the area beneath the walkway. The service drive she'd entered through seemed the only way out as well.

Good job, O'Hern. Waltzed right into a trap. Forgot what your old man told ya, didn't ya? Never run anywhere without having a way out.

The crash of dumpster lids and oaths of officers recoiling from the assorted sights and smells of the hospital garbage covered the sound of her movement. She shimmied out from behind the red trash container and edged over to the wall of the parking garage. There was a small clearance between the top of the dirt and the concrete foundation of the walkway overhead. She could see the thick shrubbery, trunks of evergreens poking out through the dirt above her head.

No way she could climb that, not with a bum arm. Too noisy to use a trashcan as a ladder. She looked behind her. The lights were getting closer. She could hear someone's radio squawking.

She kept low, scuttled back until she was against the foundation of the parking garage. Water sloshed around her ankles. She felt around and realized there was a puddle collected at the end of a storm drain that tunneled beneath the dirt embankment.

Water streamed through a concrete pipe that was as wide as her shoulders. At least it was at this end, would it narrow once she was inside, trapping her? There could be worse fates waiting her. She looked into the maw of the sewer pipe. The darkness was punctuated by the scratch of claws and the sound of water rushing. The sights and sounds of Kate's nightmares.

There had to be another way. A flashlight's beam hit the wall beyond her. Whatever she was going to do, she had to do it fast. Her fellow officers were closing in.

Another rat, bigger than the last, ran from the storm drain. Kate tried to pretend that her heart wasn't racing with fear. The bright red Biohazard signs everywhere and the stench of decayed flesh weren't helping.

The grate protecting the entrance to the storm drain was wedged partially open by debris. Not enough for a bulky man, but wide enough for a woman Kate's size. Kate glanced heavenward. Finally, someone up there seemed to be listening. It took several movements worthy of a circus contortionist, but Kate squeezed past the grate and into the drain. The water was freezing, numbing her legs.

Kate took one last deep breath of fresh air and crawled into the tunnel. The voices behind her grew more agitated. She crawled forward on one hand, ignoring the pain that shot through her left arm every time it banged against the concrete walls.

Don't panic, don't vomit, don't make a sound, move faster, and for Godsake, don't have a vision and freak out. The words drummed through her mind in a mantra of anxiety.

Strange sounds like the tap-tap of a blind man's cane echoed past her and she froze. A rat's claws sank into the flesh of one exposed ankle. Kate bit her lip against her cry of surprise.

She shook her leg into the air, dislodged her unwelcome hitchhiker, and it splashed into the water. The smell of damp earth smothered her and the darkness was so complete she couldn't tell if her eyes were open or closed. Was this what it felt like to be buried alive? She had a sudden image of Josh, trapped in the darkness of the trunk. At least she could move. She had keep going, had to get out of here, make it to Josh's house.

The thought echoed through her mind, giving her the strength to continue forward, her body trembling with cold and fear. As she moved, Kate's thoughts slowly quieted to a state of calm acceptance. She now understood what Anne Ramsey had meant by losing control. Sometimes you had to let go of everything in order to save the people you loved.

Even now, with everything that had happened, Kate could still protect and serve. She would stop Blake. She would keep him from hurting anyone, especially Josh, most especially Josh, ever again.

And then, hopefully, she and Josh together could weave their own fairytale spell. After the magic of their night together, Kate almost believed it was possible.

She stopped. Almost wasn't good enough. She had to believe wholeheartedly that she and Josh could somehow find their way back to where they were last night.

Wholeheartedly. She whispered the word, savored it. Body and soul and heart.

Her breath echoed from the darkness. How far had she come? How far to go still? Kate had no idea. The pain in her left side, the frozen stabbing in her arms and legs ceased to be a distraction, had instead become familiar companions.

Body and soul. She was giving everything she had to complete this-quest? it felt like the right word-to stop Blake. And her heart?

Yes. Most definitely her heart. Without Josh and the love he had inspired, she would have never found the courage to come this far, much less keep going.

Suddenly, Kate wasn't cold anymore.

Finally she came to a dead end. A cascade of water flowed down a two-foot high vertical wall that blocked any further progress. She rolled onto her back and looked up, half expecting to feel the splatter of her own blood on her face, to see her face outlined on the grate above, eyes glazing over as she hemorrhaged her life away. She blinked hard and cleared her vision. There was no one above her. Just several pipes opening into the roof of the drainage system.

The opening on top of the short wall wasn't one of the narrow grates that lined the streets, but a wider one shaped in a semicircle. This grate was hinged to one side, like the one on the opposite end of the pipe, but this one was shut. She pushed at it, was relieved when it moved. It was designed to keep animals out, not people in, thank God.

It gave way easily, but there was no way she could muffle the squeak of the rusted metal. She froze, listened for exultant shouts, but heard nothing except the wind rustling through the bushes and the patter of rain hitting the overhang. Kate shimmied up through the drain, mud squishing around her as she rolled under the cover of some bare forsythia bushes.

Kate looked around. She was on the other side of the parking deck, away from any pursuers. She hauled herself to her feet and began to stumble through the shadows, headed toward Josh's house.

CHAPTER 48.

While he waited outside the CT scan, Josh looked through his chart, his fingers fumbling with the thin pages. He tried to think of it as physical therapy, tried his best not to imagine these same clumsy digits blundering while suturing a blood vessel or re-anastomosing a length of intestine. Tried to believe that he had a future.

Tabitha Rowen sat beside him, leafing through a two-year-old Newsweek without really looking at it. They both jumped when her radio squawked. Josh strained to make out real words in the midst of the cop jargon.

"All units, all units!" Josh recognized Tabitha's partner's voice. The man sounded hysterical. "Suspect is at 3RMC, proceed with caution, she's in the east stairwell, all units respond. Dammit, O'Hern!" There was a pause. "Lost her on the first floor, near the ER." Josh and Tabitha exchanged glances.

"You know she didn't hurt anyone, she wasn't working with Blake," Josh said. "If someone like your partner finds her, they might shoot first and ask questions later. Go, please. I'll be fine. Someone has to help Kate."

Tabitha's gaze narrowed. "I can't leave you alone."

The CT tech opened the door and began to wheel Josh into the scanning room. "You have to wait outside," he told Tabitha.

The tech closed the lead shielded door before Josh could argue further. Damn cops, were they all so stubborn? Blake wasn't going to find him here. He wasn't the one who needed protecting, Kate was.

He climbed onto the table and lay still for the exam, impatient for it to be over, his mind racing, wishing he was with Kate, anywhere but trapped here, helpless. The scan itself took less than a minute, but the tech left Josh there while he checked the images with the radiologist.

Tired of having nothing to do but wait, Josh sat up. If the cops weren't going to help Kate, then he was the only one left. He slid down from the exam table and walked through the connecting door. Good thing that after seeing his team this morning, he'd changed out of the flimsy hospital gown that marked him as a patient and had put on sweats and sneakers.

He crept down the hall to the nearest bathroom, tore off his bandages and pulled his IV out, stopping the bleeding with a paper towel. The gauze on his head was already gone, leaving only a row of staples in his scalp, mostly hidden by his hair. He emerged from the bathroom a free man.

He headed toward the nearest exit, rounded a corner and ran into Sal Bianchi pushing Josh's empty wheelchair. Busted. Damn.

"Thought I'd come see if your brain was okay," Sal said. "Imagine my surprise when I saw you pull a Houdini."

Josh looked past the anesthesiologist. "Did you see any cops?"

"There's a very attractive female officer looking bored on the other side of radiology." Sal parked the wheelchair in a row at the volunteer's desk and gestured for Josh to accompany him into the physician's lounge.

"By the way, I saw the CT, your brain looks fine. I take it this has something to do with your cop. They're swarming the hospital looking for her."

"She didn't do anything wrong."

Sal opened his locker, handed Josh his Gortex jacket. "I know. I'm parked on the second floor of the garage, keys are in the pocket. Do you know where to find her?"

"I have a pretty good idea." He hoped that by the time he got there Carter and Anne Ramsey and a brigade of burly FBI agents would already have Blake in custody and Kate would be safe.

"Need help? I could get someone to cover for me."

Josh smiled and shook his head. He couldn't risk anyone else's life. "No, thanks. Wait a few minutes and tell Officer Rowen that I've gone back to my house."

"All right. Be careful."

Kate's teeth chattered from a combination of cold and adrenalin, and she smelled like the sewer she'd crawled out of. Slowly she approached Josh's house, looking for any signs of surveillance and spotted none. Turner had probably pulled everyone over to Three Rivers, looking for her. So much for backup.

She walked up the porch, turned the key in the door, then looked over her shoulder. Nothing moved in the darkness and rain. She was going into the lion's den alone.

The thought of facing Blake again tightened her chest with terror. She shuffled one foot forward, closed her eyes for a brief moment, summoning all her strength to force herself to cross the threshold.

Nothing happened. She clicked on the hall light. There was no one there. The house didn't feel deserted, though. Kate stood inside the doorway, concentrating her senses. Blake was here, somewhere.

She considered her options. She was unarmed, defenseless. Should she antagonize him further by hunting him down, or let him assume that he was in control by allowing him to come to her?

Face it O'Hern, he is in control. For the time being. Just let it play out, the tide will turn. She remembered her vision, she'd been in the kitchen washing the floor. She edged through the hall way into the back of the house, turning on lights as she went. The kitchen and great room were a mess, blood mingling with debris left behind by the crime lab.

She retrieved a bucket and cleaning solution from under the sink. The hot water felt good, stopped the trembling in her hands. As she ran water into the bucket, she heard a floor board creak from upstairs. Blake was here.

He held a gun to her head. His fingers stroked her bare skin. Kate forced the vision away. She couldn't afford to have her mind clouded with possibilities, whether or not they might come true. And if she was going to die, she certainly couldn't bear to see that now.

She filled her mind with memories of Josh. The goofy grin he'd given her on the swing set when he told her he loved her, the tears he'd shed when he professed his belief in her visions, the way his eyes flashed when they made love....

With her good hand, she hauled the bucket out of the sink and took it over to the worst of the blood stains. Kneeling, she swished some of the water around, soaking the coagulated brown slime. She took a sponge and began to wipe the blood clean.

An eerie calm descended over her as her hand moved in a hypnotic rhythm. Then the hairs on the back of her arms bristled. The air around her grew still.

"Hello, Mason."

CHAPTER 49.

Odd, now that this moment had finally arrived, Kate felt relieved.

"Officer O'Hern," he replied with a casual formality. He came around her, kicked the bucket like a petulant teenager, splashing the blood-tinged water over both of them. He held the Taurus Raging Bull in his hands and a large knife was strapped to his right thigh. Fatigues, olive drab long-sleeved T-shirt, combat boots-he was dressed to face a platoon, not one half-crippled woman.

"Stand up," he commanded, the gun not wavering.

Kate reached out with her good hand and slowly pushed herself upright. She felt old, as if her time had come and gone like the grains in those old fashioned saltshakers that were shaped like hourglasses. Her mother had a set of those, she suddenly remembered, uncertain where the thought had come from. She almost laughed, what was she doing thinking of saltshakers at a time like this?

Concentrate, she told herself firmly. If you let him win, you know Josh will be next to die.