Vanguard (16 page)

He looked exhausted but clean when he emerged in fresh scrubs. A few days of treatment had made an enormous difference in him. His face had filled out now that he was hydrated, and his skin looked dramatically better.

“What?” he asked, noticing her gawking.

“Just looking at you,” she said defensively. “I haven’t seen you for a while, you know. Now do me a favor and brush your teeth. The state of your oral hygiene right now gives me the creeps.”

~~ - ~~

Sophie could tell it took all his strength to get back into the chair and stay sitting upright on the way back to the infirmary. Not that he would admit it. But neither did he waste time crawling into bed. Within minutes, he was asleep. She hooked up his lines again; she’d become quite adept at this rough-and-ready field medicine. She sat down on the bed beside him to work.

A few moments later, she felt a nudge. Then another one. She lifted her arm, and he snuggled against her body. She tried to concentrate on getting her work done, but it wasn’t easy. Especially when he flung his arm over her ribs and pulled her against him.

Sophie shut off the computer, tossed it on to the bedside table, and wrapped herself around him. She’d lived too long not knowing if he were alive or dead to waste these moments.

~~ - ~~

She didn’t know what time it was when she awoke. Michael’s face rested just a few inches from hers, his gaze uncharacteristically soft.

“Hi,” she said.

“I believe this is the first time we have shared a bed.”

“Unless you count the last few nights, yes,” Sophie replied. His brow furrowed. “Your fever spiked at 107 degrees. You became disoriented at times, and you wandered.”

“Where did I wander to?”

“My bed. Eventually Anjali agreed to let us share so you wouldn’t pull your lines out anymore.”

His cheeks went red with mortification. “I thought perhaps you were testing a new hospital bed allocation system.” He laughed, looking embarrassed. Then his face became very serious. “I told you not to follow me to Orlisia. Did I not?” She nodded. “
Mana mila
, why did you disobey me?”

“You should rest…”

“I am resting. See? I am lying down. I took lunch – if you could call that lunch – and received my medications. Now please tell me. Everything.”

“I will tell you what happened after you disappeared,” she said slowly. “But you must promise not to lose your temper.”

“I will try.” He twined his fingers through hers and waited.

So she told him. About receiving the last message from him. Forming the coalition. The
New York Times
story. The lunches with his parents. Pulling the mission together. The endless negotiations with the Soviet government. The achievements at the camp. As she talked, Sophie watched him struggle with his emotions. She paused for a moment, knowing that the things she would tell him next would be the hardest for him.

“Do you want me to go on?”

“Yes,” he said in a low voice.

She described her interaction with the Commandant. The game of strategy she had played to secure Michael’s life. She even told him about the two Soviet soldiers assigned to ensure his eventual return. The only thing she didn’t tell was the truth about the wound on her forehead. That, Sophie could not tell him, even when he asked directly what had happened. He had had enough for today.

She got to the end and waited for the explosion. Michael had clamped his hand so hard around Sophie’s that some of her fingers had gone numb. He looked down at the bed, so she couldn’t see his expression.

“You’re very angry, aren’t you?” He nodded. “I knew you would be. Still, I had to do this. I would have done it even if you’d been safe in New York because this is my job.”

“You took many more risks, did many dangerous things, because of me.”

“Yes, I did,” Sophie admitted. “Risks I never would have taken had you not been caught up in this war. Risks that, in the end, paid off for many people besides you and me. There are more than one hundred thousand Orlisians in Parnaas. More will live because of what I did to find you. Perhaps it will help if you look at it that way.”

She put a finger under his chin and tilted his face up to hers. In his eyes, she could see a wildly shifting array of emotions. Humiliation. Shock. Gratitude. Disgust. Confusion. And dominating it all, the black Nariovsky rage that had undone them a thousand times before.

He jerked his face away, which she took as her signal to leave. Judging by the light, it must have been midafternoon. She could get a few hours’ work done in her quarters before the team returned. Sophie pried her hand loose and slid off the bed, picking up her laptop and notes from the bedside table.

“Where are you going?”

She stopped but didn’t turn around, not wanting him to see the tears in her eyes. Michael was not the only one with pride.

“You appear to need some time to think through what I’ve told you,” she said. “Now that you’re lucid and no longer at risk of wandering, I don’t need to stay with you at night. I’m returning to my quarters.”

“Please do not go.”

She froze. She hadn’t expected this. “Are you not angry?”

“Yes, very much so.”

“Do you not require some time to think about what I’ve told you?”

“Yes, I do.” She heard him shift in bed. “But you do not have to leave. There is much for me to come to terms with,
mana mila
, but I do not wish to be away from you anymore. Even when I am angry.”

She turned back to him, trying to blink away the betraying tears. His eyes flickered immediately to hers, but he wasn’t fooled. Sophie couldn’t remember a single time that Michael had been able to swallow his temper, sacrifice his pride, to keep her close. But neither could she remember a time when she’d been willing to meet him halfway after a blowout between them.

She’d lived too long not knowing if he were alive or dead…

She walked back to the bed and climbed in, trying to leave a little space between them. Sophie opened her laptop and started to work. Michael appeared lost in thought. It was quiet, but not entirely awkward. New ground, for both of them.

After a while, he slid closer to her, his leg twining around hers and his face nuzzling against her arm. She smiled. All these years, who would have known there was a snuggly Michael inside this prickly, difficult man, just waiting to come out every time he fell asleep?

“What is so funny,
mana mila
?”

She jumped, letting out a squeak of surprise. “I thought you were asleep.”

“Why? Because I touched you? You think the only time I wish to be close to you is when I am asleep?” He sounded distressed by this.

Sophie glanced down at him and wished she hadn’t. He looked very appealing, even sick in a hospital bed. Her cell phone rang, causing them to jump. She examined the incoming number carefully. Most of the people who had called in recent days were media looking for a scoop.

“Carter?” She could hear a strange noise in the background.

“Sophie? Is that you?”

“Yes. Remember what I told you about the phones.” She’d instructed Carter before leaving America not to use names if they spoke during the mission.

“Yeah, sure, I remember. But listen…” Sophie could hear the odd sound get louder, and she suddenly knew why he was calling. She put the phone on speaker, and the lusty bawling of a baby filled the infirmary.

“Nine pounds, one ounce!” Carter shouted over the sound. “A healthy baby boy. He’s so beautiful!”

“I can hear him, Carter! I bet he’s gorgeous. How’s Janet?”

“Janet is fantastic, absolutely amazing. You should have seen her, she was a champ. I saw him coming out, I was right there!” Carter’s joy was overflowing.

“Wait, what’s his name?” she asked when she could get a word in edgewise.

“But you said no names.”

She rolled her eyes at Michael, who grinned. “You can say your son’s name, idiot.”

“We named him…we named him Michael Raine DeVries.” Carter’s voice broke with emotion. Sophie saw Michael’s jaw drop in shock.

“Go on.” She gestured to the phone. “Say something.” For a moment, she thought he was too overwhelmed to speak.

“Sophie? Shit, Janet, I think we got cut off.”

“Watch your language in front of the baby,” Janet’s voice ordered in the background. Michael picked up the phone and brought it closer to him.

“I like the first name. The middle name is too trendy,” he said.

Silence at the end of the line.

“Sophie, who just said that? That isn’t…”

“Yeah, it is.” She smiled broadly. “He’s right here with me. We’re safe. Everything’s going to be okay.”

“Oh my God. Oh my God. I can’t believe it,” Carter said shakily. “How did you do it?”

“Long story. We’ll tell you when we get home.”

“How? When?” Michael looked at her, eyebrows quirked. Unfortunately, she didn’t have answers for either of them.

“Not totally sure yet, but I’ll come up with a plan. Don’t worry. We’re both coming home very soon.”

Chapter 10

Michael was sleeping again when everyone returned from Parnaas in late afternoon. Sophie left him in the infirmary and went back to work.

Anjali had cautiously optimistic news. In the week since they’d discovered that
P. aeruginosa
had caused the pneumonia plaguing the camp, they’d loaded up all patients in the Parnaas infirmary with the appropriate antibiotics. Many were on their way to recovery.

“We’ve lost six patients to it since we started the new drugs,” Anjali said, “and their situations were complicated by other health factors.” Sophie saw the unhappy set of her friend’s mouth when she said it. Losing patients was part of a doctor’s life, but that didn’t mean this particular physician had to like it.

Intimate contacts with the existing cases had been rounded up and started on antibiotics. They’d combined the medication distribution with a widespread vaccination program. “Typhoid, hepatitis, anything else that might be a risk in a camp this size. The guards don’t know we’re administering conventional vaccines; they think we’re curing the pneumonia with the shots. By the way, I’m burning through antibiotics, gloves, syringes, and hypodermics.”

“We have a lot of that stockpiled, so take what you need. I…” Sophie grinned, catching her own mistake. “The Rev can get you more within forty-eight hours. Anything else happening?”

“Yeah, four more cases of dysentery.” Anjali’s face wrinkled with annoyance. She had an intense personal dislike of diarrheal diseases in her ward.

“Tough,” Sophie said with a grin. “I’ll order more bedpans.”

“Your lack of sympathy is noted.” Anjali made a face. Sophie turned to the Rev for an account of his interactions with the Commandant.

Commandant Jaros had been intrigued by the team’s efforts to stop the pneumonia. He had asked many questions about Michael’s condition and Sophie’s wellbeing.

“I think he misses you,” said the Rev uncomfortably. “But here’s the kicker. He wants either Sergei or Sevastian to report to him tomorrow, then return with us in the evening. Double-checking our stories, no doubt.”

An uneasy silence filled the room. The guards couldn’t have overlooked the fact that Sophie slept with the so-called guinea pig patient. Commandant Jaros would no doubt find that interesting in the extreme.

“I’ll take care of it,” she finally said.

“You’re not going to do anything rash, are you?” The Rev looked worried.

“Hardly. I’m going to make them an offer they can’t refuse. Just let me make a phone call first.”

~~ - ~~

The person at the other end of the line picked up almost immediately. “It’s me,” she said. This person didn’t need to be reminded about the risks of cell phone lines.

“Understood. We received your message. Thank you, dear. Those words are so inadequate, but thank you. Have you seen improvement in…?”

“Yes.” She sensed the relief at the other end of the line. “You two can talk in a minute. First, I need a big favor, and you’re the only person connected enough to pull it off. I’m going to send you an email in a few minutes. Can you read it and give me a fast answer, yes or no?” Sophie had a military-grade encryption program on her laptop; if the Soviets were monitoring their email traffic (and she had to assume they were), the encryption level alone on this correspondence would catch their eye. She just had to trust it would hold – or at least hold long enough to carry out her plan.

“Absolutely. I’ll be waiting for it.” They exchanged a few more pleasantries while she walked to the infirmary. She peeked in and saw Michael awake in bed, looking grumpy and bored. He brightened when he saw her.

“Hang on.” Sophie extended the phone to him. “Don’t use any names, and speak English.”

He nodded and put the phone to his ear. “Hello?” he said cautiously. His eyes widened with surprise and happiness. “Yes, it is really me. I am okay. Really, I am okay…no, please do not cry.” She could see joy in his eyes as she left the room with her laptop under her arm.