White Lies Read online

  Steve! Sudden tears blurred her eyes as she stuffed the cosmetic bag into her small overnighter. She hoped he would be all right.

  At the last moment she remembered to pack fresh underwear. She was rattled, oddly disorganized, but finally she zipped the case and got her purse. “I’m ready,” she said as she stepped out of the bedroom.

  Gratefully she saw that one of the men had carried the coffee things into the kitchen. McCoy took the case from her hand, and she got her coat from the closet; Payne silently helped her into it. She looked around to make certain all the lights were off; then the three of them stepped into the hallway, and she locked the door behind her, wondering why she felt as if she would never be back.

  SHE SLEPT ON the plane. She hadn’t meant to, but almost as soon as they were airborne and she relaxed in the comfortable leather seat, her eyelids became too heavy to keep open. She didn’t feel Payne spread a light blanket over her.

  Payne sat across from her, watching her broodingly. He wasn’t quite comfortable with what he was doing, dragging an innocent woman into this mess. Not even McCoy knew how much of a mess it was, how complicated it had become; as far as the other man knew, the situation was exactly the way he’d outlined it to Jay Granger: a simple matter of identification. Only a handful of people knew that it was more; maybe only two others besides himself. Maybe only one other, but that one carried a lot of power. When he wanted something done, it was done. Payne had known him for years, but had never managed to be comfortable in his presence.

  She looked tired and oddly frail. She was too thin. She was about five-six, but he doubted she weighed much over a hundred pounds, and something about her made him think such thinness wasn’t normal for her. He wondered if she was strong enough to be used as a shield.

  She was probably very pretty when she was rested, and when she had some meat on her bones. Her hair was nice, a kind of honey brown, as thick and sleek as an otter’s coat, and her eyes were dark blue. But now she just looked tired. It hadn’t been an easy day for her.

  Still, she had asked some questions that had made him uncomfortable. If she hadn’t been so tired and upset she might have pinned him down on some things he didn’t want to discuss, asked questions in front of McCoy that he didn’t want raised. It was essential to the plan that everything be taken at face value. There could be no doubt at all.

  THE FLIGHT FROM New York to Bethesda was a short one, but the nap refreshed her, gave her back a sense of balance. The only thing was, the more alert she felt, the more unreal this entire situation seemed. She checked her watch as Payne and McCoy escorted her off the private jet when they landed at Washington National and into a government car waiting on the tarmac for them, and was startled to see that it was only nine o’clock. Only a few hours had passed, yet her life had been turned upside down.

  “Why Bethesda?” she murmured to Payne as the car purred down the street, a few flakes of snow drifting down like flower petals on a light breeze. She stared at the snowflakes, wondering absently if an early-winter snowstorm would keep her from getting home. “Why not a civilian hospital?”

  “Security.” Payne’s quiet voice barely reached her ears. “Don’t worry. The best trauma experts were called in to work on him, civilian and military. We’re doing the best we can for your husband.”

  “Ex-husband,” Jay said faintly.

  “Yes. Sorry.”

  As they turned onto Wisconsin Avenue, which would eventually take them to the Naval Medical Center, the snow became a little heavier. Payne was glad she hadn’t asked any more questions about why the man was in a military hospital instead of, say, Georgetown University Hospital. Of course, he’d told her the truth, as far as it went. Security was the reason he was at Bethesda. It just wasn’t the only reason. He watched the snow swirling down and wondered if all the loose threads could possibly be woven into a believable whole.

  When they reached the medical center, only Payne got out of the car with her; McCoy nodded briefly in farewell and drove away. Snowflakes quickly silvered their hair as Payne took her elbow and hurried her inside, where the welcome warmth just as quickly melted the lacy flakes. No one paid them any attention as they took an elevator upward.

  When the elevator doors opened, they stepped out into a quiet corridor. “This is the ICU floor,” Payne said. “His room is this way.”

  They turned to the left, where double doors were guarded by two stern young men in uniform, both of whom wore pistols. Payne must have been known on sight, for one of the guards quickly opened a door for them. “Thank you,” Payne said courteously as they passed.

  The unit was deserted, except for the nurses who monitored all the life-support systems and continually checked on the patients, but still Jay sensed a quiet hum that pervaded every corner of the unit—the sound of the machines that kept the patients alive or aided in their recovery. For the first time it struck her that Steve must be hooked up to one or more of those machines, unable to move, and her steps faltered. It was just so hard to take in.

  Payne’s hand remained under her elbow, unobtrusively providing her with support. He stopped before a door and turned to her, his clear gray eyes full of concern. “I want to prepare you a little. He’s badly injured. His skull was fractured, and the bones in his face were crushed. He’s breathing through a trach tube. Don’t expect him to look like the man you remember.” He waited a moment, watching her, but she didn’t say anything, and finally he opened the door.

  Jay stepped into the room, and for a split second both her heart and lungs seemed to stop functioning. Then her heart lurched into rhythm again, and she drew a deep, painful breath. Tears sprang to her eyes as she stared at the inert form on the white hospital bed, and his name trembled soundlessly on her lips. It didn’t seem possible that this…this could be Steve.

  The man on the bed was almost literally a mummy. Both legs were broken and encased in pristine plaster casts, supported by a network of pulleys and slings. His hands were wrapped in bandages that extended almost to his elbows. His head and face were swathed in gauze, with extra-thick pads over his eyes; only his lips, chin and jaw were visible, and they were swollen and discolored. His breath whistled faintly but regularly from the tube in his throat, and various other tubes ran into his body. Monitors overhead recorded every detail of his bodily functions. And he was still. He was so still.

  Her throat was so dry that speaking was painful. “How can I possibly identify him?” she asked rawly. “You knew I couldn’t. You knew how he looks!”

  Payne was watching her with sympathy. “I’m sorry, I know it’s a shock. But we need for you to try. You were married to Steve Crossfield. You know him better than any other person on earth. Maybe there’s some little detail you remember, a scar or a mole, a birthmark. Anything. Take your time and look at him. I’ll be just outside.”

  He went out and closed the door behind him, leaving her alone in the room with that motionless figure and the quiet beeping of the monitors, the weak whistle of his breathing. Her hands knotted into fists, and tears blurred her eyes again. Whether this man was Steve or not, a pity so acute it was painful filled her.

  Somehow her feet carried her closer to the bed. She carefully avoided the tubes and wires while never looking away from his face—or as much of his face as she could see. Steve? Was this really Steve?

  She knew what Payne wanted. He hadn’t actually spelled it out, but he hadn’t needed to. He wanted her to lift the sheet away and study this man while he lay there unconscious and helpless, naked except for the bandages over his wounds. He thought she would have a wife’s intimate knowledge of her husband’s body, but five years is a long time. She could remember Steve’s grin, and the devilish sparkle in his chocolaty brown eyes, but other details had long since faded from her mind.

  It wouldn’t matter to this man if she stripped back the sheet and looked at him. He was unconscious; he might well die, even now, with all these miracle machines hooked up to his body. He would never know. And