The Last Hour (Thompson Sisters), Sheehan-Miles, Charles [reading an ebook .txt] 📗

possible. Paris fell to his knees next to me, and we rolled Kowalski over.

“Oh, Christ!” Paris cried out, anguish in his voice.

I had to struggle to hold my stomach. There was no saving Kowalski. The grenade had gone off directly underneath him, ripping through Kevlar and the ceramic plates in his protective vest as if they weren’t there, tearing his chest open, leaving ribs and his chest cavity open to the air. His eyes were glazed, wide open, and one thing was certain: he’d died instantly.

I sank back on my haunches and looked up at the sky. I wanted to scream, but there was nothing I could do.

As we gathered up and bagged Kowalski’s remains, I saw the little girl in a doorway. She still wore the ribbon in her hair, and tears were running down her face.

I never learned her name.

She can have the belt (Carrie)

I still wasn’t anywhere near a hundred percent, but getting a chance to talk with Alexandra and Dylan and getting something to eat had done a lot. As we got up from the table, Dylan said, “I’m gonna go out front and smoke. Meet you back upstairs?”

Alexandra kissed Dylan, and he went on his way as we walked together to the elevators.

As Alexandra reached out to press the button, I said, “Do you know, I’m afraid to go back up there? It’s like any minute they’re going to come tell me Ray’s gone.”

I closed my eyes and shuddered. I hadn’t wanted to even think that. Much less say it.

“It’s okay. I’d be terrified too.”

“I don’t know how you dealt with it after Dylan was injured.”

She shrugged. “I ... I didn’t know he’d actually been hit. I didn’t know anything. It was just this crazy limbo, where the guy I loved disappeared.”

The elevator door opened, and we stepped inside. I pressed the button for the third floor, and said, “Has he gotten over his ... whatever it was? Inferiority complex?”

Alexandra smiled. “Dylan’s come a long way. But he’s still got a long way to go. You don’t erase all that trauma overnight.”

I gave a bitter smile. I knew that all too well. And Dylan at least talked about his. When it came to the war, sometimes Ray was so tightly bottled up I thought one shake would cause him to explode. I sighed and said, “Make sure he keeps talking. Sometimes Ray is so closed up, I don’t know what’s going on in there.”

“Is it a trust thing?”

I shook my head. “No. Yes. I don’t know. You know what happened with Martin. Ray was on the phone with him when it happened. I don’t think anyone in their unit got away without being really damaged.”

“What about you?” she asked. “I know you’ve been dealing with the trial and all that, but what’s going on with your fellowship?”

I looked at her and said, “It’s been a ... a challenge. NIH isn’t what I expected. I told you about the stupid accusations against me. I haven’t been to work in almost three months. I go back in two weeks, but … I don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s like … I won … but I feel like I lost.”

She gasped and said, “What?”

“Alexandra ... it’s complicated.”

Complicated it was, and I wasn’t even sure I understood the whole story. But it started with all those trips into the Rocky Mountains I’d taken with Bill Ayers tracking mountain lions, and it had ended the day I was called into Doctor Moore’s office at NIH.

They’re going to do the whole fucking academic witch-hunt. All my research is federally funded, Carrie.

That’s what Bill told me that day he called demanding to know if I’d reported him for sexual harassment. I hadn’t. I’d dismissed it, put it out of my mind. Irony, then, that the accusation ended up being turned on me instead.

We reached the waiting room again, and I said, “I’ll tell you more, later. It’s all been so confusing, I haven’t really discussed it much with anyone other than Ray.”

She put her arm around me in a casual hug and said, “Any time, Carrie. You’ve always been there for me.”

In the waiting room, Jessica was still curled up with a book. I sat down next to her and asked, “No news?”

She shook her head. “Nothing yet. Mom called ... from the phone on the airplane. She asked me to tell you she loves you. Their flight gets in at ten o’clock.”

“It’ll be midnight before they get here, then,” I said.

She nodded.

“You doing okay?” I asked.

She nodded. “Battery’s almost dead in my phone.” Her response was toneless. I was really starting to worry about Jessica. The first couple of hours we were here, I’d attributed her near silence to shock. But we’d been here for hours now, and she was still speaking in a shocked monotone. It was out of character and starting to scare me. I wondered if Alexandra would be able to get more out of her ... they were far closer in age.

I didn’t have an opportunity to explore it further, because a few moments later an exhausted looking surgeon walked into the waiting room. She was in her early forties, with dark hair tied in a bun at the base of her neck.

“Carrie Sherman? I’m Doctor Schmidt … I came by to check on you and to let you know Sarah is out of surgery and recovering nicely.”

Jessica leaned forward and spoke, her tone urgent, “Is she awake?”

The surgeon shook her head. “Not yet. But we’re feeling confident that her progress is very good. She’ll be in the intensive care unit for the next several days at least.”

I took Jessica’s hand in mine. She’s always responded almost physically whenever Sarah was hurt, and the news that she’s not just in the hospital, but in intensive care, for days, was going to shake Jessica up. I gave her hand a gentle squeeze.

Alexandra said, “When can we see her?”

“If you’re ready, I’m going to take