Krugman dropped his stare and shook his head. ‘Fine, Agent Whitestone. If you’re absolutely sure this is what you want, I’ll get the ball rolling for you. I’ll have someone in admin contact you just as soon as the process is started.’
Despite everything she’d just been through – despite everything she’d gone through in her entire life – Dana’s body practically floated up out of her hospital bed as a joy like none she’d ever experienced before flooding throughout her being. ‘Thank you so much, sir,’ she said. ‘You don’t know how much this means to me.’
Just then, Krugman’s cellphone sounded in his pocket. He held up a finger to Dana and motioned for her to wait while he dug it out.
Flipping open the phone, he placed it to his ear. ‘Hey, honey, how are you feeling?’
A nervous thrill swirled around deep in the pit of Dana’s stomach while the Director talked with his wife. It wasn’t that she was already having second thoughts about adopting the little boy, of course – far from it, actually – but holy crap, what had she just gotten herself into? What did she know about being a mother? About taking care of someone else? Hell, she could barely take care of herself these days, much less a four-year-old boy. Still, who knew? If everything went well for her, she might just have the chance to become a mother, something that had seemed utterly impossible just five minutes earlier. Maybe that particular window hadn’t been nailed shut for good, after all. And she’d become mother to the handsomest little guy she’d ever seen in her entire life. A regular GQ model if ever there’d been one.
Then again, when in the hell had been the last time anything had actually gone well for her?
Dana shook away the troubling thought when Krugman flipped shut his cellphone and lifted his eyebrows. ‘Sorry about that, Agent Whitestone,’ he said, slipping the phone back into his pocket and stretching his neck. ‘Marie was just calling to remind me to take my blood pressure medicine.’
The Director paused, shaking his head in bemusement. ‘That woman, I swear. Always thinking about someone else and never about herself.’
Dana smiled. From the look in Krugman’s eye, she could tell that he loved his wife more than he loved anything else in the world. And Dana knew exactly how he felt, too. Because – despite the overwhelming newness of it all – she already felt the exact same way about Bradley.
Rising to his feet, Krugman snapped open the latches on his leather briefcase. ‘Anyway, he said, ‘I’ve got to get out of here. Much as I don’t want to, I’m supposed to have lunch with the head of the Northeast Ohio regional office in twenty minutes.’
Krugman extracted a pile of magazines and newspaper clippings from his briefcase before handing it over to Dana. ‘A little light reading for you while I’m gone,’ he said. ‘I’ll be back later on tonight to say goodbye before I head back to DC.’
Dana looked down at the pile in her hands and felt her breath catch in her throat. Her brain buzzed with an electric charge. On the top of the pile and highlighted by her standard FBI ID picture, Newsweek’s cover teased readers to the main story inside:
AMERICA’S TOP COP IN COMA AFTER PLANE CRASH
Dana looked up at the Director, stunned. ‘What in the hell is this?’
Krugman leaned over the bed railing and patted Dana’s left shoulder. ‘This,’ he said, ‘is just some of the press you garnered while you were taking your extended nap. Seems that you became something of a national celebrity while you were sleeping it off in dreamland, Agent Whitestone. Enjoy the quotes from me in there. I said some really nice things about you. But, Dana?’
Dana looked up at the Director and held her boss’s stare. ‘Yes, sir?’
Krugman smiled. ‘Don’t let it go to your head, OK? I don’t need any prima donnas making my job any harder than it already is.’
CHAPTER 10
Dana spent the next several days reading and re-reading the articles detailing her life and her career.
It was absolutely astounding the information the press had dredged up. From the murder of her parents way back in 1976 to the Cleveland Slasher case involving her half-brother two years prior to the Chessboard Killer slayings out in New York City earlier in the year, they hadn’t missed a single trick.
Dana sighed, having always cherished what little privacy her job allowed. They didn’t know