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S adie didn’t know what the hell had gone on, but suddenly she was here with her long-lost twin brother, his features so close to hers and yet different enough to be his own person, yet he was barely breathing.

“No sign of an obvious wound,” Morrison shared with Gage, as they quickly looked him over, pulling his IDs from the wallet in his pocket, and taking photos of everything in it.

She sat back and looked around at the bare apartment. “I don’t even think this is his.”

“It’s probably somebody else’s, maybe a short-term rental,” Morrison noted. “Was he drinking anything? Do you feel anything? Is anything around here?”

She got up and walked around frantically.

“Don’t touch anything.”

She nodded. “I don’t see anything.” Then she stopped and pointed. “A cup of tea is over here.” She frowned.

“Interesting,” Morrison replied. “Don’t touch it. We can always get it tested.”

She stared at him and asked, “Why? Isn’t this just a heart attack?”

“Yeah, but how old is he?” he asked, turning to face her, and she understood his sarcastic tone. “Would you expect to have a heart attack at your age?”

She frowned. “Considering how upset he was, it’s not shocking.”

“That’s an interesting point,” he noted. “Anyway, I hear the ambulance. We just have to ensure there’s no sign of foul play—murder or poisoning or something along that line.”

She sucked in her breath, hovering over her brother. She stared at him, wondering how he could look so much like her and yet be so very different. She gently stroked his cheek. “I don’t know what happened to you, but I’m so glad I found you.”

He opened his eyes ever-so-slightly and stared at her. His voice faint, he whispered, “Mom?”

“No,” she corrected, “not your mom, your sister.”

His eyes were clouded, and there was no recognition, no acknowledgment, no understanding, and then he fell silent again.

Within minutes, the door burst open as paramedics came in with a gurney, and they began to work on Don.

Sadie was picked up and moved out of the way by Gage, as she was right in their workspace.

In a frozen state, she watched as they worked on her twin brother, before he was suddenly packed up and moved out.

She hadn’t even had a chance to talk to him again.

At some point she realized that Morrison was holding her close.

She looked up from the circle of his arms and whispered, “Can we go to the hospital?”

“Everybody needs to be on this one,” he agreed, nodding in agreement. “No way Don will be allowed to be on his own.”

“And yet,” she added, “we really don’t know anything about him.”

“No, we don’t,” he conceded, looking down at her with a sympathetic smile.

“Yet we do, right?” she muttered, with a wince.

“Yes, we do,” he replied, with a clipped nod.

Gage added, “Good job, by the way.”

She stared up at Gage. “I don’t even know what I did, and I doubt I could do it again.”

“You would be surprised that you could, and the fact that your twin brother gave you a big step up in order to track him,” he explained. “Being able to track somebody like that is a skill set that a lot of people would love to have. Forget about others. I would love it myself.”

“I don’t know about a skill set,” she muttered. “I remember tripping my way down the hallway in a panic.”

He gave her a grin. “You did look as if you’d been drinking hard all night.”

She laughed. “Yeah, felt that way too.” Before she knew it, she was back outside, and they all stood beside Gage’s vehicle.

“Hop in. I’ll give you a ride back to your car.”

They got a ride to the Italian place, where Morrison’s vehicle was parked. Then Gage took off again. Sadie looked over at Morrison. “I guess you’re still on babysitting duty, huh ?”

“I am,” he confirmed cheerfully. “Besides, we’ve got an awful lot going on here, and a lot of it is good stuff now. The fact that we’ve found your twin brother is huge.”

“What if I’m wrong?” she asked, staring at him.

“You mean, that he’s not your twin brother?” he asked, startled.

“No, but what if he doesn’t have anything to do with the robberies?”

“Then we’re no further ahead, and that would suck,” he admitted, “especially considering that we have an injured guard in the hospital as well. However, considering what you just did, how could you pick up his energy if that man wasn’t your twin brother?”

“Maybe you’re right about that,” she conceded, “but I don’t want Don to be a part of this crew, killing and stealing.”

“Of course you don’t want it to be him. Nobody wants to find out that somebody they have just found in their life is involved in that,” Morrison agreed. “That doesn’t mean we get to bury our head in the sand either.” She glared at him, and he shrugged. “Just calling it the way I see it.”

“And if I don’t like the way you see it?”

He laughed. “That’s not exactly unexpected, is it?”

She sighed. “I don’t think I like your job.”

“No, you probably wouldn’t,” he agreed. “In many ways it sucks. A lot of things we learn about people are pretty tough.”

“Right,” she muttered, and they were driving again. “We are going to the hospital, aren’t we?”

“We are. Gage will start security on Don, and he’ll fill in Terkel and the government. We’ll need their support here.”

“ Great , that means the cops will be all over the place.”

“They will be, and that’s not our issue. What we have to figure out now is what happened to your brother, and, to do that, we need to talk to him.”

“And if there was no foul play?”

“If there was no foul play, that’s great. However, if there was foul play, then Don should have some idea as to who might have wanted to do him in.”

“I don’t suppose anybody will be interested in that teacup, huh ?”

“I took it,” Morrison admitted. “The pot is still sitting there, and, if he dies, then I’ll hand it over. I probably shouldn’t have taken it in the first place, but, if Don doesn’t die, and it’s a poisoning, we need to know. So, I’ll get it analyzed.”

“Do you think that jewel heist crew would do that?”

“If your brother’s having second thoughts and if he’s looking to be the weak link in all this, then absolutely they’ll do that.

It’s everyone for themselves. The rest of his crew has gone down this pathway too far for anybody to have any remorse now,” Morrison explained. “The stakes are higher than ever.”

“Nobody will forgive them for having killed those guards, will they?”

“Nope. It’s one thing if it happened once, but this crew did it time and time again,” he reminded her. “There will be no forgiveness when it comes to sentencing on this one.”

With that, Sadie fell silent.

*

Morrison and Sadie pulled into the hospital parking lot and parked. He got out and walked around to her side. “Come on, and remember we have to accept whatever they tell us at this point, both the hospital staff and the local police.”

“Meaning they won’t let me in to see him?”

“I don’t know if they can. If you could prove that you are family, maybe, but another aspect would be the fact that the medical personnel will be working on Don for a while.

Plus, because the local authorities are now heavily involved, they won’t want you in there talking to him without their being around too. ”

“Will they likely think I’m involved?” she asked.

“I’m not sure what anybody’ll think, but enough deaths are involved in this already that have upset people all over.

So the surviving family members will ensure the cops are on top of this as much as possible.

The authorities can’t afford to make any mistakes.

And such a mistake in this instance would be allowing you to talk to Don without somebody in there with you. ”

“How do I explain what we found?”

“That is something I’ll leave to Terkel,” Morrison said, with a laugh.

She winced. “Can he do that?”

“You might be surprised at what he can do,” Morrison declared.

“The fact that MI5 brought him in is already huge. But that also means anything involving him means we give no answers. Terk would just firmly shut it down or talk to Jonas and get Jonas to deal with it,” he explained, “so keep that in mind. Don’t go talking about what you did or how you did it because that’ll just make you come across as a crazy person. ”

She winced at that. “Thanks for that reminder.”

“You’re welcome,” he said cheerfully. “The motto in all this is Don’t say anything if you don’t have to , and, in this case, you definitely don’t have to say anything about how you found him.”

“So, we’ll just assume that, because I’m his sister, I obviously knew where he lived?”

“That sounds good to me,” he replied.

She rolled her eyes at that. “I would appreciate it if Terkel or somebody backs me up because if it goes sideways—”

“Not sure anybody would back you up, but, in this instance, we won’t need your testimony to put your brother behind bars, which is a good thing, as long as they can nail him for his crimes.”

“ Great ,” she muttered. “That’s not exactly what I wanted to hear either.”

“No, but you already know the score, and that’s just where we’re at.” With that, he led the way into the hospital ER and wasn’t surprised to see Gage there.

Gage walked closer as they approached and shared, “They’re still working on him. He’s alive, but it does seem he’s had a coronary.”

“He’s awfully young for that,” Sadie noted.

“Apparently it may have been drug induced.”

“Interesting,” she murmured. “I presume we’re not talking prescription drugs.”

He shook his head. “I doubt it. I guess heart problems and drug use tend to go hand in hand.”

“Wow,” she muttered. “It amazes me to think that anybody would do drugs if this could be the end result.”