matter of national security.”
“Oh, they’re going to love that.” Her tone was sarcastic enough to make him smile.
“I talked to Terry. She said she was looking after your place and had a key to your house. I asked her to bring a clean uniform and some other stuff. It’s in the closet. I hope that’s okay with you. Even though you’ll be working on my team, it’s better if you’re outfitted in your official gear for now.”
“I prefer it, actually. Thanks for thinking ahead.” She was touched by both his words and his tone. He seemed more human in that moment, displaying a capacity for thoughtfulness she wouldn’t have expected.
He gave her a sketchy salute. “It’s part of my job, Sarah. I’ll be back in a few hours. Get some sleep.”
He left without further words, and only then did she look out the window and realize it was nighttime. There was a clock on the table next to her bed. Its glowing numerals told her it was close to midnight. He must’ve been waiting for her to wake. Who knew how long he’d kept vigil in the halls of the hospital. The thought gave her pause and caused a warm glow to begin somewhere in the region of her heart.
She’d been alone a long time. Oh, she had her family, but her dad and brothers tried to smother her at times and disapproved of her choice of profession. Her mother had died a long time ago, so Sarah had almost always been the odd woman out in a house full of overbearing males. She placed the inevitable phone call to her dad and spent a good part of the next hour reassuring him that she was all right.
As she had predicted, her dad didn’t take well to the national security argument, but as a retired New York City police detective, he understood when some things had to be kept under wraps. He wasn’t happy by any stretch of the imagination, and he kept asking subtle questions to get her to give him more details. He was a skilled interrogator, but his daughter had picked up a few things from him over the years. She didn’t reveal any more than she had to.
After the challenging phone call to her dad, she made another quick call to Terry. Her best friend and neighbor was a lot like her. Terry worked long hours at her research job, and they got together a few times a month to share dinner or go out shopping together. That was the extent of Sarah’s social life at the moment. It was kind of pitiful, actually, but it was her life.
Sarah sat awake in her bed, thinking for a while, but eventually she drifted off to sleep. Seven o’clock came early and she wanted to be ready.
At seven sharp, Xavier tapped on Sarah’s door. He wasn’t surprised to hear her chipper voice telling him to enter. As he’d expected, she was already awake, dressed in her uniform and ready to go. All he had to do now was get her past the phalanx of doctors who no doubt wanted to keep her under their microscopes.
Xavier wouldn’t allow that to happen. A set of doctors had tried to make him a prisoner of their medical ward, too, but had been overruled by his superior’s need for him to be out in the field, fighting the monsters some of their colleagues had created. No way was he going to become a human pincushion, being stuck by needles every five minutes, his life lived at the pleasure of a bunch of pencil-necked geeks in white lab coats.
He didn’t want that for Sarah, either. She was too good at her job. Everyone he’d talked to about her had the same high opinion of her skills, personality and dedication to her duty. She couldn’t help being bitten by a nightmare creature any more than he could have. She didn’t deserve to have her life turned upside down by a medical community that was as guilty as sin, as far as Xavier was concerned. They’d created this menace.
His brother Special Forces soldiers had ended it once before. Now the damn scientists had moved on and were taking their terror with them, unleashing it on an unsuspecting populace. Even though they’d been prohibited by the government and had sworn all kinds of vows to drop this line of research under penalty of death. Despite all that, the greedy bastards were pursuing something they knew was