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“That’s what Darren’s hoping you’ll do now too. He’ll try to get you to take the fall for him, right? Why not? You’ve done it all your life.” She turned and looked at Morrison, but the amiable look was gone from his features as he studied Don a lot more intently.

She gave Morrison a gentle smile. “Yeah, I’m learning.”

“And quickly,” he murmured. “I’m glad to see it.”

“What is he to you?” Don asked suddenly. She was again seeing the same brother she expected to see, and she answered him. “He’s a friend,” she said, with a gentle smile.

“He’s more than a friend.”

“Not yet he isn’t, but maybe in the future,” she replied in complete honesty. “We have to get through this nightmare first though.”

“What nightmare?” he asked suspiciously.

“You, Darren, and whoever else is in your gang,” she stated.

“There has to be at least one if not two more.” She hesitated and then shrugged.

“You came so close to talking to me, so close to trusting me, and then you backed away. I guess it’s that hold Darren has over you.

He’s controlled you all your life, so it’s pretty hard for you to recognize when you’re being controlled now, isn’t it? ”

“I just gave up fighting,” Don admitted. “It was easier to let him come and go as he wants to.”

“Do you always remember what he gets you to do?”

“No, sometimes I blank out if it’s ugly.”

She sat back and shuddered under the weight of the understanding. “You don’t even realize when somebody is dying, do you? When he’s shooting people?”

“I’m not looking,” he muttered.

“That’s because you know how wrong it is, how horrible what you’re doing to other people is, and yet you’re okay with him using you.”

“No, I’m not okay with it or with him. I just blank out in order to make it go away,” he cried out in frustration. “You don’t understand what it’s like to have him around.”

“Okay, so tell me this.… What if he’s not around?”

“My brother is many, many things, but he is not as easy to get rid of as you think.”

“No, I’m not at all surprised,” she murmured, and, with that, she stood up. “I came to see you, to see if there was any way to talk sense into you, but I can see that you don’t really want to have anything to do with me.”

“I absolutely do want to have something to do with you,” he cried out. “However, I can’t deal with him at the same time.”

She nodded. “I’ll come back later and talk to you.”

“Okay. Do you promise?” Such a pathetic, plaintive tone filled his voice that she walked over and hugged him again.

“I promise,” she whispered.

And, with that, she headed out to the door and to Morrison. Outside the doorway, with the guard looking at her, she stepped a few feet away, looked down at her trembling hands, then looked back up at Morrison and whispered, “What the hell was that?”

*

Morrison led Sadie out of the hospital and into the vehicle, where he stood outside and contacted Terkel.

Terk greeted him by saying, “Something very strange is going on.”

“I’m definitely getting strange vibes,” Morrison agreed, looking at her shaking hands.

“We need to get her back home and keep her safe. She’s very susceptible to whatever this is,” Terkel murmured. “Just so you know, Don is doing fine medically speaking, and he’s being moved to the local jail today. As a matter of fact, that transfer should be happening very soon.”

“Okay, I’ll tell her that,” Morrison said. “I’ll take her back home again and see if I can help her to decompress.”

“We have the address for the other brother,” Terkel added, “so we’re sending somebody over there to see if we can pick him up.”

“It would be great if you could, though I don’t know what we’re supposed to do to stop him from whatever else he is capable of doing.”

“That’s a whole different challenge,” Terkel agreed, with a snort. “As you know, this stuff always freaks people out.”

“Sure, and what are we supposed to do in the meantime?” Morrison asked.

“Stay calm, stay safe, and keep,… well, try to keep Sadie balanced and aware another attack could happen at any time.”

“Got it,” he murmured. He got back into the driver’s side and shared, “Terkel says a team is heading to pick up Darren at his home.”

She looked at him in surprise. “They found an address for him?”

He nodded. “Apparently so, and they’re on their way.”

“Perfect,” she murmured.

“It might help us if he’s distracted by them, so we’re heading home, and you’re supposed to stay calm, cool, and collected, knowing they are on it.”

“ Great ,” she muttered. “In other words, try not to think about all the craziness going on.”

“Exactly,” he murmured.

Once back at the hotel, he kept a wary eye on Sadie.

Morrison wasn’t sure just what had gone on in the hospital, having picked up on something that made absolutely no sense.

Still, he wasn’t sure about even talking to her about it.

She had enough to deal with right now as it was and had done incredibly well, considering her lack of training and experience in this, Yet what he was hearing, seeing, and thinking was a step even beyond that.

Back in the hotel room, he smiled at her and asked, “Coffee?”

“Sure,” she murmured. “We should have picked it up.”

“We should have. I was thinking we would go back to your place, but…”

“Maybe I can now.”

“No, you can’t, not yet,” he stated, “but, hey, these are the facts of life right now.” He pondered his options and quickly texted Gage. “Gage is on his way back, so he’ll pick up coffee and some more food.”

She smiled. “He does well as a delivery boy, doesn’t he?”

“I suspect he’s great at whatever he does and happily does whatever is needed to be done,” he shared, with a smile.

“It really is a case of day to day. We don’t worry about the little things as far as roles and who does what.

We just get it done. There are plenty of other things to worry about right now. ”

She nodded. “I won’t argue with that either,” she whispered. “I just want to know that everything will be okay.”

Inside the room she paced nervously, making him wonder if this really was the best location for her.

“What about taking a trip back to my apartment?” she suggested. “At least there I could potentially grab some fresh clothes.”

He pondered that and then shrugged. “That may be something we can make work.”

“Yes, I could really use some clothes.”

“Yeah, I’ll talk to Gage about it when he gets here.” She smiled and settled down immediately, playing games on her phone for something to do. When Gage walked in with coffee a little bit later, Morrison presented her request. Gage pondered it and then shrugged.

“If we make it fast, then sure, why not?” Gage sent off a message to Terkel to let him know what they had planned. As soon as the coffee was gone and the sandwiches Gage had brought were consumed, he led the way back outside.

They hopped into Gage’s vehicle this time and headed over to her apartment.

“It feels so strange to even think about going back there, and yet it’s my home.”

“It is your home, but now everything feels different,” Morrison stated.

She didn’t say anything to that, but, as they approached, he felt her getting more and more nervous.

They walked up to her apartment, grateful that absolutely nothing was untoward.

As she quickly packed up a bag of personal belongings and started to step outside, his phone rang.

He answered it and froze, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her back inside.

With Gage standing there, staring at him, clearly worried, Morrison quickly ended the call, looking at her with a concerned expression.

“Don escaped while being moved from the hospital to the corrections facility,” he shared. “And it was hours ago.”

She stared up at him, a smile breaking free, and then she immediately realized the ramifications and sighed. “I’m not supposed to be happy about that, am I?” She shook her head. “I’m so confused over the whole thing. I don’t know how much is him and how much is our brother.”

“Exactly,” Morrison agreed, “so, for the moment, try not to be too happy about it.”

“But it’s not as if he’ll come here,” she stated. Then she pondered that. “He won’t really. No, I don’t think so, but I’m not sure where he’s going and why.”

“You did startle him at the hospital with your knowledge of his crew, along with your energy skills.”

“I know,” she muttered, as she glanced around. “I’ve had a really strange feeling for the last little while.”

“You and me both,” Gage announced. She looked at him, and he nodded. “Definitely an odd feeling, I just don’t know what it is.”

“No, I don’t know either,” she admitted, “but it’s as if we’re being watched, but not being watched.”

Morrison interjected, “Because we’re being watched on the ethers.”

As she stiffened, Gage nodded.

“That’s it.” Gage gave Morrison a slug to his shoulder. “That’s exactly it. Somebody is tracking us, not in person, but out there.”

Morrison nodded. “That’s my take on it.” He looked around, then announced, “It really won’t matter where we are, but…” He looked back at Gage. “I’m not getting the sense of them planning on coming here, but I can’t trust that, as I’m not really getting the sense of anything at this point.”

Gage frowned and nodded. “Let me see if I can get some help tracking this,” he murmured, as he stepped a few feet away and contacted Terkel. When he got off the phone, his voice was deep and dark as he added, “One of the policemen was badly injured in the escape.”

“Crap,” she whispered. “That won’t go well for Don.”

“None of it was supposed to go well for him anyway,” he murmured to her. “Remember that. We already have a dead security guard and innocent bystanders have been killed left, right, and center on the other heists, so nobody will go easy on Don anyway. No way that’s happening.”

Morrison nodded. “Which is why he’s on the run because he believes there is no other option.”

Sadie asked, “Is there any chance,… any chance it will go easier on Don if it wasn’t him but Darren controlling him?”

“How will you prove it?” Gage asked.

She winced and shook her head. “Nobody’ll believe it, will they?”

“No, they won’t,” he stated. “That’s always one of the challenges that we face when we do this energy work. Those who can get away with it, get away with it, and those who can’t get away with it will pay the price.”

She swallowed and nodded. “I feel as if we need to move.” She suddenly headed for the front door.

As soon as she got there and reached for the knob, it opened, and Don stepped in.

She looked at him and smiled. Then her smile fell away.

“As much as I’m happy to see you, I really wish you hadn’t escaped. ”

He just nodded, then looked at her, over at Morrison, and his frown settled into something much deeper and uglier. Then he turned to face Gage. “Wow, you really do have protectors here, don’t you?”

Morrison studied him, not sure exactly what he was seeing.

Again not liking anything about this, he reached into Don’s energy.

He could tell from Gage that he was correct, and something was very off.

But before he had a chance to say anything, Don raised his hand to reveal a handgun and pointed it directly at Gage.

“I don’t like anything about you,” he said with a snarl.

Then she stepped right in front of the gun and looked at him in shock. “What are you doing?” she cried out. “He’s done nothing but help me.”

He glared at her. “Help you do what?” he asked. “Help you to get us? Help turn you against your family? What help is that?”

“I’m not turning against you at all,” she cried out.

But he wouldn’t hear any of it. Of course, from his perspective, she’d done nothing but turn against him. Just as Morrison went to say something, the gun turned in his direction, and that same hard voice echoed again.

“Don’t speak.”