That Summer Night (Callaways #6) (31 page)

"Maybe she gets what she deserves," Shayla put in, thinking that Lisa had done enough damage on her own. Perhaps it was her turn to pay the piper. "There's something I'm curious about. When did you bury that information in the woods? And why did you put it there? Why not a safe deposit box?"

"Lisa knew where my safe deposit box was, and if I tried to open a new one, there would have been a paper trail. I needed to put the evidence somewhere safe, and I thought the mountains were the perfect place. If something happened to me, I needed someone who could find it. I was hoping Reid would remember the treasure hunts we used to go on with our grandfather. But just in case, I put the coordinates into the sketches so he could figure out the GPS."

"It was actually Shayla who figured it out," Reid said.

Robert smiled at her. "You've always been too smart for your own good."

"You can say that again," Reid muttered.

She frowned as the two men exchanged a look. "Hey, a thank you would be nice."

"Thank you," Robert said. "Seriously."

"You're welcome. I'm glad you're all right, even though I'm angry with you. I don't understand why you couldn't tell me what was going on. I might have been able to help you."

"I debated that option more than once. But I didn't think I could risk it. In fact, I tried to make sure there was distance between us. So no one would suspect you knew anything.

That made sense. In retrospect she realized that Robert had made a point of not spending much time alone with her. "I guess I should thank you for not putting me on the hit list."

"You don't owe him a thank you," Reid said, anger in his voice.

"Maybe you do," Robert said.

Reid gave his brother an incredulous look. "What would I possibly thank you for? You almost got us killed—three times."

"True, but today I did save your lives. Let's not forget that."

"You got lucky throwing that rock," Reid said.

"Luck was not involved at all. I computed the size and weight of the rock, the distance of the throw, and the trajectory. Oh, and I remembered what Grandpa always said, put your heart…"

"Into it," Reid finished. "It was a good throw," he admitted.

"Damn good, considering I couldn't throw a baseball to save my life."

"You did save our lives, Robert. I thought we were at the end," Shayla said, remembering that terrible moment when she'd thought for sure she was going to die.

"Don't think about it," Reid advised, putting his hand on her leg. "We're all safe now."

She looked into his eyes. "Are we? Or are we just getting ready for the next round?"

Reid shook his head. "There's not going to be another round, Shayla. Now that we have Robert and his evidence, we're going to take Abbott Pharmaceuticals down."

She liked that idea a lot, but she had a feeling that wasn't going to be as easy as he made it sound.

Chapter Twenty-Three

The safe house was a luxurious two-story mansion on the western edge of San Francisco in a neighborhood known as Seascape. There was only one way into the house, through a pair of iron gates. The back yard of the house extended to a steep bluff that made accessibility from the beach two hundred yards below an impossibility.

While Reid spoke to Matt Kelton and some other men, Shayla went out to the back deck and sat down on a beach chair. It was almost four o'clock in the afternoon, and the adrenaline high had turned into a heavy lethargy.

Robert sat down across from her and gave her a tentative smile. "How are you doing, Shayla?"

"I'm hanging in there. I'm trying to wrap my head around everything that’s happened. I can't quite believe that Abbott Pharmaceuticals would do what they did. They're supposed to be in the business of saving lives not taking them. Is it everyone at the company? Or just Hal Collins?"

"It's not everyone but it's more than just Hal. They got greedy, Shayla. They saw a big payday coming with the drug we were working on. When results weren't what they wanted, they didn't want to see them."

"How long have you known that the drug wasn't working?"

He let out a sigh. "We've been working on variations of the drug for the past five years. Early results were good. That's what got everyone so excited. It got me excited, too. We started running clinical trials all over the world. The one I worked on in South Africa last year had mixed results, and it didn't compare with the trials run by others, so I thought it was an anomaly. I believed Colombia would be a better test based on the population and the cluster of Alzheimer cases. But six weeks in, I could see the same problems I saw in South Africa and more. The drug works some of the time, but with certain body chemistries it does more harm than good. I couldn't understand why my trial results were so different than the ones conducted by other researchers, so I started investigating. I pulled the raw data. That's when I began to see a pattern of deception."

"They were falsifying the results," she murmured.

He nodded. "Yeah. I couldn't believe it at first. That's when I talked to Karl Straitt. He told me I better have proof before I started making accusations, so that's what I did. When I first began, I really had no idea how many layers of deception I was going to have to go through. But it soon became clear that there was more going on besides the falsifying of reports. There were problems all over the place, and all of them were being covered up. Abbott wanted Branson to buy them, so they needed to look clean. And anyone who got in the way had to be taken out."

"The hit men they sent to the clinic were supposed to kill you."

"Yes, I think I was at least one of the targets."

"I'm glad you weren't there."

"I'm sorry you were. I really am. I should have sent you home from Colombia when I realized how bad things were going."

"I probably wouldn't have gone without asking you a lot of questions."

"True. Your rotation was almost over and so was the trial. All I needed was a couple more weeks. But Abbott worried that I was going to blow it all up, tell the world what I knew, raise enough doubt to send Branson running."

She saw the strain in Robert's eyes and realized the pressure he'd been under. "You've been alone in this, but you're not anymore. We're going to help you take them down, Robert. We're going to make them pay."

"I really hope so. Abbott is going to smear me, Shayla. I doubt I'll have a medical career at the end of this."

"They may try, but once the world realizes what they've done, it will get worked out. And I'll do everything I can to help you."

He smiled. "I appreciate that. So…"

"So," she echoed.

"Did Reid fill you in on our history?"

"You mean Lisa? Yes. That was a shocker. Why didn't you ever tell me?"

"It's not something I'm proud of. I hurt my brother and my family. And while I'd like to blame it all on Lisa, I can't."

"Your brother's fiancée was off limits, Robert. I'm glad you're not trying to make an excuse, because there isn't one."

"You're right. I've regretted my actions every day since then. Reid and I weren't that close, but he was my brother, and I destroyed our relationship."

"Yet you still asked him for help. That took some nerve."

"I wasn't sure he would agree to meet me, but he was the only one who would be able to find my grandfather's cabin in the wilderness. And I knew I could trust him, if he was willing."

"I get it. And I think you knew that in the end Reid would help you, because that's the kind of man he is."

"My brother does like to be the hero," he said.

"You made him one in your graphic novel. Razor is so obviously Reid."

"You think so?"

"Yes, and I think Rocco was meant to be you, at least in the beginning."

He smiled. "You think I made myself the dog?"

She smiled back at him. "I absolutely think you did that. You wanted to be Reid's friend. Or Razor's friend. And you couldn't put yourself in the story, because you were up in your bedroom studying, so you gave Razor a dog that could be his best friend. What's interesting is that in the end, the dog is gone, and there's a second hero. I think you finally stopped watching life go by and put yourself into the action."

"Interesting theory."

"And it kind of parallels real life. You were always the brain, but you wanted to be more than that. Like Razor, you wanted to save the day, and isn't that what you're doing now? You're saving the world from the evil men at Abbott Pharmaceuticals. And you saved me and Reid, otherwise known as Razor," she added.

"I like your theory that in the end I'm the hero, but I don't think I was ever the dog, Shayla."

"Maybe it was in your subconscious. You can't tell me you haven't wanted to have a relationship with your brother, your twin brother, another fact you never mentioned to me."

"My relationship with Reid was not like the one you had with your brother."

"It was actually a lot more like it than you think. But instead of drawing what you want to have happen in your life, maybe you should ask for it."

"You think so?"

"Yes, I have it on very good authority, that the best way to get what you want is to tell someone what you want."

"That authority wouldn't be Reid, would it?"

"He's smarter than you think."

"I always knew he was smart. He was the one who had doubts." Robert paused. "You and Reid seem to have gotten close really fast."

"Well, that started when a car almost ran us down."

"What?"

"I'll tell you about that later. I'm all talked out right now."

"I need to speak to Matt anyway." He got up. "Are you and Reid going to be friends or more than friends?"

"We'll see. Your brother doesn't like to commit."

"That's because of Lisa. He gave her his heart, and she stomped on it. And when she was done, I did the same. I wish I could make it up to him."

"Start now. Be the man you want to be and the man your brother wants you to be. You've already started the process. You just have to finish."

* * *

"I guess you have to give your brother a little credit for trying to take down a powerful pharmaceutical company," Matt said as he finished going through the pile of evidence Reid had laid out before him. "I wish you'd told me where you were going. I could have provided you with some backup."

"I didn't know I was going to be dodging hit men. Shayla and I are lucky to be alive."

"You should get your arm looked at."

"Shayla has already done that. I've got my own personal doctor."

Matt smiled. "Just how personal?"

"That's none of your business."

"It will be when you start working for me."

"I haven't agreed to that." Although the idea was more tempting now than it had been a few weeks ago.

"You will," Matt said confidently.

"We'll see. Right now I just want to get Robert's information to the right people and make sure that both he and Shayla are safe."

"My team is working on getting all the interested parties together without tipping off anyone at Abbott. And I've sent a team into the woods for cleanup."

"I suspect the second man is long gone by now," Reid said, wishing he'd been able to tie him up or put him out of commission, but he'd been more interested in getting Shayla and his brother to safety. And deep down he'd known that Shayla couldn't take seeing anyone else get hurt, even someone who had been about to kill her. She had an innate sense of kindness and compassion. He hated that she'd had to experience so much violence the past few weeks.

"It's not like you to leave a loose end," Matt said.

"I had other priorities."

"Yeah, I get that." Matt shoved back his chair. "I'm going to make some calls."

"Before I forget, thanks," Reid said, getting to his feet. "I really appreciate this, and I will pay for the time."

"Don't worry, I'm going to collect, but it won't be in cash."

As Reid walked out of the dining room, he ran into his brother, and for the first time in almost eight years, it was just the two of them.

"What's happening?" Robert asked.

Reid was happy with the question. It was easier to focus on the problem at hand then delve into the past. "Matt's team is arranging for you to meet with the right people at the right agencies."

"And you trust him?"

"More than I trust you," he said dryly.

His words brought a gleam into his brother's eyes. "I guess I deserved that. But I did not deserve a fist in my face."

Reid studied his brother's swollen nose and the purple bruise under his eye and felt not even a bit of remorse. "That punch was a long time coming. Last time you ducked." He'd been so blinded with rage and betrayal after he'd found Robert and Lisa together that he hadn't even been able to throw a good punch.

"Last time I was expecting it," Robert returned. "But in retrospect, I did you a favor. Lisa was a nightmare of a wife."

"You know I actually believe that now. But I don't want to talk about her anymore. It was a long time ago, and I am truly over it."

"Good. Can we sit down for a minute? I want to talk to you away from Shayla."

"All right." They moved into the living room. Robert sat on the couch while Reid took a chair in front of the fireplace. "Say what you want to say."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. But that isn't what you wanted to say."

Robert stared back at him. "I wish we'd been able to repair our relationship before now, and that it hadn't come down to a life or death situation to get us back in the same place at the same time."

"It was probably always going to take that. Both of us are stubborn."

Robert tipped his head. "Point taken." He drew in a weary breath. "I've made a lot of mistakes. I always thought the one thing I had that was better than anyone else was my brain. But I didn't use my brain. I didn't see what was right in front of me. I let myself be played, and in the process a lot of people got hurt. I think there's a chance I may end up in jail."

"Judging by the evidence you have, I'd say that's unlikely," Reid said, although he wasn't completely sure since he didn't have the whole story.