Backblast by Candace Irving (brene brown rising strong .TXT) 📗

Speaking of rats…

A swift glance at Gil assured Regan he had no illusions as to the cause of the fury that had fueled her entrance.

"Agent Chase, I don't suppose you'd mind if I—"

"Not at all, Colonel Chilcote." She kept her attention focused on the flush staining the base of Gil's neck. "I'd be thrilled to have a neurosurgeon of your caliber examine me. Perhaps you'd do me the honor of signing off on my readiness to return to duty when we've finished?"

A task her two-faced friend hadn't seen fit to accomplish.

"Absolutely. I'm about to head out for a meeting across post. Come to my office in say…two hours?"

"I'll be there." It wasn't as though she had anything else to do.

"Outstanding." The man nodded to Gil as he headed for the office door. "Dr. Fourche."

"Colonel."

Regan turned back to the desk as the door closed. Her triumph faded as she spotted Gil's frown; pissed or not, he still outranked her. "Sorry. I should've knocked—"

"Agreed."

"—but you should have warned me. At the very least. Buddy."

"I planned to. This afternoon. How'd you find out? You weren't scheduled to return to work until Monday."

Regan tossed her beret on the seat Chilcote had vacated and shed her ACU jacket. The digital camouflage followed her beret to the chair. "I stopped by CID for our morning brief. Figured I'd plow through the mountain of waiting paperwork, perhaps even put my name on the duty roster and catch the first case of the weekend. Let one of my fellow agents sleep in for a change. Imagine my surprise when my CO mentioned that my medical release form had failed to make its way across post."

Regan snatched Gil's spare Beetle Bailey coffee mug from the filing cabinet. His brows rose as she turned to thump the pea-green ceramic atop the calendar blotter on the desk—loudly.

"Surprise?"

"Okay, my fury." Which that stoic stare of his was causing to ratchet up again. "Where the hell do you get off insinuating I'm not fit for duty?"

"Because you're not."

She stalked so far forward, the edge of his desk cut into her thighs. "Excuse me? You told me two days ago that I'd passed my physical, lab work included. There is no psycho-toxin lingering in my body. Just a bazillion antibodies. In fact, one of your vampires drained a pint from my arm just yesterday to send to Fort Detrick so our biowarfare defense guys could study my astounding newfound immunity."

"True." Instead of elaborating, Gil turned to the filing cabinet to retrieve his massive thermos. Regan waited none-too-patiently as he charged the spare mug she'd plunked onto his desk with a generous portion of the steaming, black contents.

The moment the thermos resumed its post, she lit in. "So?"

His sigh filled the office. "Have a seat."

"No, thanks."

"Damn it, Rae. Sit."

Something in his voice forced her to scoop her beret and jacket out of the chair Chilcote had vacated. Gil pushed the spare mug to the edge of his blotter as she dumped her gear on the carpet and sat.

"Have some caffeine. You look like you could use it."

She didn't doubt it. Even if she hadn't caught sight of her admittedly haggard features in the mirror this morning, she felt the need for a piping hot pick-me-up deep in her bones. Unfortunately, ice-cold apprehension had just surpassed it.

Her blood was clean, wasn't it? Or had some lab tech at Detrick discovered otherwise?

Was that why Gil had refused to clear her for duty?

She dragged her air in deep, the burgeoning fear deeper. "Just say it."

To her horror, Gil abandoned the working side of his desk and snagged the spare patient chair along the wall. He dragged it to within a foot of hers and sank down into the seat. His proximity wasn't what scared her. It was the compassion simmering in that light blue stare. The same compassion that had simmered within nearly two weeks earlier as she'd crawled in and out of those godawful hallucinations for almost twenty-four hours, before she'd finally succumbed to coma.

"It's not your body that has me worried, Rae. It's your mind."

Oh, Jesus. First Art Valens dying, then John leaving—and now this. It couldn't get any worse.

Hallucinations.

Was that why—thirteen days after waking from his own coma—Sergeant Welch had yet to be released from the hospital? Had his hallucinations come back?

Was she next?

Regan swallowed hard. It didn't help. Acid still seared up her throat, and she was rapidly becoming too unhinged to care. "Gil…wh—what are you trying to say?"

"When was the last time you slept?"

Huh?

He reached for her hands. Warm, steady fingers closed over hers, squeezed.

She tugged them free. "Last night."

"Liar."

He was right. Damn him. The hallucinations might not have resumed yet, but the dreams had. The nightmares.

Who was she kidding? They'd never stopped.

Art's disembodied face floated before hers. It took several blinks before it faded. She stood, rounding the corner of Gil's desk, admittedly cowering behind his high-back leather chair as she dug her fingers into the padded shoulders for support. Anything to distance herself from that insidious compassion.

"I slept." Yesterday.

There. Close enough to the truth to be convincing, even for this man, who knew her better than most.

Gil nodded. "For how long?"

Long enough to watch Art's headstone drift into her dreams, coated with snow. Long enough to feel his wife's bottomless grief as it soaked into her neck. Long enough—as the dream twisted and morphed—to feel the desperately needed solid warmth of John's arms…until she woke and discovered that once again, John was gone.

"Rae?"

"Long enough, damn it. I slept long enough. Now will you please tell me what this is about? What did Detrick find?"

Confusion supplanted the compassion. Understanding followed. Finally, embarrassment. "I'm sorry I worried you. Chalk it up to my own running dearth of Zs. Except for the lingering tremor in your dominant hand, you're fine. There's no evidence of a medical relapse—absolutely none. But emotionally? You're at the edge, and you're teetering there with everything bottled up inside. I think that's why that