InSight

Forty-Five
    Payback

    L uke sat in a chair next to Abby’s hospital bed the whole night, nodding in and out of sleep. Morning light filtered in through the closed curtains of her room. He saw her move. She opened her swollen eyes and turned her head in his direction, reaching out her hand to touch him.
    “Is that you, Luke? I smell your aftershave.”
    “I’m not sure what you said, but I’m here.” He took hold of her hand, breathing a sigh of relief that she was okay.
    “How long have I been out?”
    “Repeat, darling,” Luke said. “I missed that.”
    She did, and he answered, “It’s the next morning. You’ve been out all night.”
    “Have you been here the whole time?”
    “All night. The doctor said you’ll be fine after some rest.” He caressed her face, careful not to touch the area around her broken nose.
    “I must look like I’ve gone ten rounds.”
    “Black and blue are good colors for you.”
    She chuckled and slapped his hand. “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts.”
    He bent down and kissed her cheek, then whispered in her ear. “Actually, I’ve never seen a sight more beautiful.”
    “Really? My eyes and nose are on fire from the fumes.”
    “It’ll pass.”
    “Whew, that’s a relief. I worried I might go blind.”
    “That’s not funny.”
    “I know. Sorry. Humor is my way of covering up how I really feel, which is very sore and scared to death.” She reached for his arm. “My chest hurts, too, from breathing in those vapors and from the wrong end of Collyer’s shoe. I’m afraid I antagonized him.”
    “Which accounts for the two broken ribs. You’re lucky it isn’t worse.”
    “Tell me the truth. Am I really going to be all right?”
    Luke’s gaze was fixed on Abby’s mouth, concentrating on deciphering every word. When he found her in that warehouse, unconscious and bloodied, his heart had stopped. In that brief moment of panic when he thought she might be dead, his only thought was that he failed to tell her how much he loved her. How he couldn’t imagine life without her. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, let the moment pass again. The words had never come easily, and he’d never said it straight out. Not to anyone.
    “I love you, Abby.”
    She reached for his hand and he took hold. She put it to her mouth, settling a soft kiss on his palm. “I love you, too, Luke. But you already knew that.”
    “I want you home with me, but the doctor is ordering you to stay here a day or two longer to run some tests as a precaution. He said we got you out in time ― any longer and it would have been iffy. But any longer and we wouldn’t have had anything to worry about. The building blew like a missile hit it.” He didn’t want to scare Abby by reminding her that there was a cop on her door.
    “Cleo?”
    “Cleo’s going to make it.”
    “Thank God. And that nice young cop?”
    Luke hesitated, anger and frustration building at the loss of another innocent person. “I’m sorry. He died at the scene.”
    “Oh, no.” Tears filled her eyes. “And the people inside the lab building?”
    “We got them out safely. A couple have serious problems, but none are life-threatening.”
    Abby tugged him closer. “Stewart tried to save my life, Luke. He jumped Collyer from behind, knowing he didn’t have a chance. From what I heard, he almost succeeded. But Stewart was weak and filled with drugs. Collyer shot him in cold blood.” Abby’s bottom lip quivered. “They experimented on him all those years to make him give up the papers, and he never would.”
    “I know. Scanlon’s talking like a parrot on a major dose of his own speed. Every time he opens his mouth, his lawyer tries to make a deal.”
    “Bastard. He needs to be locked up and the key put into the next space shuttle. He took a beautiful human being and destroyed him.”
    “This was major business, Abby. Murder, fraud, money laundering, illegal drug production and distribution in the States and out of the country. Scanlon, a.k.a. the infamous Dr. Quack, I mean Crock, developed illegal drugs. There was an operating room where he experimented on people who slipped through the cracks: homeless, mental patients, you name it. Been going on for years. It’s a mess.”
    “Mrs. Gentry told me all about it when they thought I wasn’t going to be around to implicate them.”
    “The FBI’s forensic accountants are going over Matt’s papers. Unfortunately, the ones you took from the safe deposit box went up with the