Page 13 of What Remains (John Worthy #3)

“Cepha …ow.” Wincing, Davila gritted his teeth against a groan but managed not to snatch his bad arm out of the medic’s grasp. “Take it easy ,” he said, the small muscles of lower jaw jumping. “There was a bullet in there not so long ago, you know. It really does hurt.”

“Yeah, and that infection’s not doing you any favors.

” A tall man with the muscular build of a swimmer, Harvey stripped off a pair of latex surgical gloves then checked the fluid level in an IV bag which hung from a coat tree John had found in the hot spring’s office.

“Think we caught it in time, though. Lucky I decided to bring along a couple bags of cepha-gets-them-all.”

“What?”

“A flavor of cephalosporin,” John translated.

That the medic was packing bags of the stuff was lucky.

In the time since Driver had given John the shock of his life by showing up alive, Davila had gone downhill.

He was pale, his skin shiny with new sweat, and the skin beneath his eyes was the color of used coffee grounds.

That faint whiff of decay John had detected a few hours ago seemed stronger, too.

“They’re a class of broad-spectrum IV antibiotics. ”

Harvey grinned. “Never leave home without it.”

“Okay, so what does this mean?” Davila asked.

“The same thing it did…” John checked his watch.

“Two hours ago. Even if the infection wasn’t an issue, you trying to hike your way out of here is a non-starter.

We take you back to Dushanbe in the van, you have a better shot of your lung staying inflated and doing its job—and speaking of which.

” He turned to Driver, perched on a rolling office chair near Matvey, the boy John had rescued.

“What are you guys doing here? And don’t tell me you happened to be passing through. ”

“Not exactly, no,” Driver said. “We parachuted in.”

“Seriously? In winter ? Around all these mountains?”

“Hey, don’t forget at night, too. Southeast of here. It was easy-peasy. Just, you know, go between the snowflakes. Of course, it was dark, so…” Harvey shrugged. “Made it interesting.”

“How’d you manage it?” John asked.

“With great difficulty.”

“I didn’t think you could do that on account of all the mountains.” Ducking his forehead, Davila smeared sweat from face on his good forearm. “In fact, I don’t think we used anything but fixed wings to go in and out.”

“Certainly made it interesting. We landed just as the storm revved up,” Driver said. “Fair number of mountain lakes in this area, east of Khorog. Just a matter of finding a bowl wide enough to account for drift.”

“And then we did some hiking,” Harvey said.

“Sounds rough,” Davila said.

“I’ve done some firefighting back home,” Harvey said.

“You’d be amazed what you can parachute into and carry out on your back.

Of course, some fires in places like Yellowstone where you got the animals and people, that can be pretty hard going.

I remember this one flare-up…” Harvey launched into a story about a wildfire in Wyoming, but John had ceased listening about three or four seconds after Driver had talked about where but more importantly when they’d come in-country.

Well, I’ll be damned. He broke in. “When did you make your drop? How long ago?”

“Ah…” Clearly surprised at the interruption, Harvey stopped in mid-sentence then said, “Two days ago. Then we got orders to divert.”

“Divert?” And then John got it. “Oh, my God. We’re not the reason you’re here, are we?”

“Not, uh…” Harvey’s gaze flicked to Driver then back. “Not officially. But now that we are, we’ll just rescue your ass and then be on our way.”

“On your way to where?” John asked at the same time that Davila said, “I can take care of my own ass just fine.” They exchanged a glance, and then Davila said to Harvey, “To follow up on what John said, your drop was part of a different mission plan.”

“Notice that he wasn’t asking a question,” John said.

“Thank you, John,” Davila said. “And no, I was not.”

“He was stating a matter of fact.”

Davila nodded. “I believe I was.”

“As an invitation to expand on the real reasons for you being in-country,” John said. “More or less.”

“Preferably more,” Davila said.

“Well, I was giving them a degree of wiggle-room. Plausible deniability, as it were.”

“Ah.” Davila nodded. “Good point.”

“I thought you’d see it that way.”

“What are you?” Harvey asked John. “His translator?”

“Merely the chorus,” John said. “You have them in every good Greek tragedy, which I sincerely hope this isn’t.”

“Really?” Davila looked impressed. “I didn’t know that about the Greeks.”

“Yeah, the chorus’s function was to summarize and provide information. Me,” John said and spread his hands. “I’m amplifying.”

After a quick look to Driver, Harvey said, “We were asked to make a detour. Really, man, we were as surprised to find you guys as you were to see us.”

“You weren’t told who we were?” John asked.

“No,” Driver cut in. “We weren’t. We didn’t know there were any friendlies in the area.”

“So, in other words, like cool and all that we’re alive,” Davila said, “but we’re not the reason you dropped by for a visit.”

“Yeah, well, no. But .” Flexing his fingers, Harvey held his hands over a heater. “You guys really lucked out finding this hot spring.”

“Wouldn’t have without the van,” John said.

“Or Matvey.” At the sound of his name, the boy’s dark gaze flicked toward John.

When the men started talking, Matvey had hunkered down to a squat next to Davila.

Which I would, too, if a bunch of guys are talking in a language I didn’t understand.

Matvey was probably worried he’d be left behind.

Or—given what the boy had been and seen and done—worse. “Don’t forget that. Matvey helped us.”

“After he fleeced you,” Harvey put in. “And shot your pal here.”

“An accident,” John said.

“Yeah.” Davila draped a protective forearm around the boy’s shoulders. “We’ve already kissed and made up.”

“And don’t change the subject,” John added.

“Fair enough, but let’s reverse the equation,” Harvey said. “How about you tell me how you know Driver ? You guys on a mission together or something?”

“Yes,” John said at the same time that Driver said, “In a manner of speaking.”

“Uh-huh.” Harvey stroked his chin. “So, which is it?”

John glanced at Driver. “You want to answer that? Seeing as how I was a touch indisposed at the time?”

“Oh?” Davila’s eyebrows arched. “Indisposed? Do tell.”

“Maybe later,” John said. “If you’re good.”

“Which of you is the ventriloquist,” Harvey said, “and which is the dummy?”

“Him,” John and Driver said at the same time.

“Cute.” Driver favored them both with a dead-eye. “You guys practice a lot?”

“Only when I’m alone,” John said, cribbing from Woody Allen, a man with the moral compass of a chipmunk but who had, nonetheless, directed some spectacular movies. He made a go-ahead gesture to Driver. “Answer the man. Like I said, I was there only in body.”

Driver turned to his men. “Let’s just say that neither John nor I figured the other made it out alive.”

“Yeah? Sounds like some story, Boss.” After a pause, Harvey added, “That was a hint.”

“Noted,” Driver said.

“Don’t feel left out or anything, Harvey,” Davila said. “I’ve found out more in the last four minutes than I have in all the days I’ve been trapped up here.”

“That’s because it’s a long story,” John said.

Harvey checked his watch. “We got some time, I figure.”

John opened his mouth, but Driver cut in. “Nothing to tell.” His tone carried a note of finality, as in discussion over . “Ancient history.”

With which John begged to differ. “Driver, they told me at Ramstein that you were dead. That you’d died with Roni.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Harvey held up both hands like a traffic cop. “Died with who? What’s he talking about? When we got orders to divert, Boss, you never said anything about?—”

“First off,” Driver said, “because I didn’t know for whom we were diverting.”

Meaning what? John had to press his lips together to keep that from leaping from his mouth. That you would have slow-walked here if you had known?

“Second,” Driver continued, “it’s a long story and some things truly are only need to know.”

Davila cut in. “What he’s saying, Harvey, is however high your clearance or mine, it still ain’t high enough. Just to clarify, you understand. Which means you and me, we have something in common. We’re both working with guys with secrets. Me, I’ve gotten over that. You, though…”

Oooh, he’s good. John was developing a new level of appreciation for Davila. When in doubt, sow division.

Harvey stared up at Driver for a long moment then said, “You’re team leader. If there’s something you haven’t told me yet, then you must have your reasons. I’m taking it on faith you aren’t gonna get us into any situation we can’t handle.”

“You know I wouldn’t. If I think there’s something you need to know, I’ll tell you,” Driver said.

John put up a hand. “Then I have a question.”

“Yes?” Driver gave him a weary look. “What?”

“You were asked to make a detour. Which means you were in communication with someone who…what? Did a flyby with a drone? Someone had to verify our signal.”

Harvey opened his mouth, but then Driver held up a finger and the other man zipped it.

“ We picked up your SOS,” Driver said, “because we were already in the general area. We relayed the information and then received orders to divert to this location and check it out. See if a rescue was warranted.”

“Without knowing who we were?”

“I guess someone knew your specific frequency or call signal.”

“I don’t know.” John made a face. “Ours is a pretty generic little satellite distress doohickey. Of course, it might only look that way.”

“Man, I love it when you get all techy,” Davila said.

Okay, the man never would be Flowers, but Davila was growing on him.

He also realized, with something almost like a pang, that he would miss Davila once they parted ways.

Because, of course, there was no question now of their continuing on with the retrieval of Roni’s remains.

Unless…he and Driver were two pieces of the same mission but didn’t know it?

“Look,” he said, “we were to meet up with a contact who’d get us to Roni’s remains. Is it possible that the contact’s job was to hand us off to someone else? Because, Driver…what are the odds that we’re both in-country?”

Driver gave him a bland look. “What are you asking?”

“Don’t play stupid. Could you and I be part of the same mission but not been told because of our history?”

“No,” Driver said. “Because we’re not here to retrieve remains. I don’t know anything about Roni or why her remains are so far from where she died. Our missions are completely different.”

Harvey scratched his head. “Yeah, but, Boss, you gotta admit it’s a hell of a coincidence.”

“As in no coincidence.” John decided to press. “Driver, think of it probabilistically. It’s like that old one about the chances of two people sharing the same birthday.”

“That’s an easy one,” Harvey said. “The probability’s one in three hundred and sixty-five because that’s how many days there are in a year. Assuming no leap years and an even distribution of birthdays through a given year.”

“Yes, but how many people in a random sampling do you need to reach a fifty percent probability of finding someone with your birthday?” After a moment’s silence and blank looks, John said, “Twenty-three people.”

“Get out,” said Harvey.

“No,” Davila said, “he’s right. Do the math. Increase the number of people in the room to seventy-nine, the chances jump to almost a hundred percent.”

“Actually, 99.9 percent,” John said.

“I was rounding up,” Davila said. “I didn’t want to confuse them. So, here you are.”

“So, here we are,” John said. “Driver and I in the same room, same region, same time. Given who we are and what we’ve done, there are only two reasons why that might be so.”

“Yeah, you already said that,” Driver ground out. “I told you, we’re not here for Roni.”

“I wasn’t going to say that. But I’d lay down good money that your mission is, at the very least, peripherally related. I’m willing to go even further than that. I bet your superiors figured you to be their ace in the hole in case Davila and I screwed up or couldn’t continue.”

“As, in some ways, we have and can’t. Well,” Davila amended, “ I can’t.”

“So, whoever thought of putting you in the same theatre of operations was pretty damn smart. Underhanded, too, not to give either of us the skinny. Think of all the stars that have aligned. First off, we know each other. Second, we were in the same place at the same time when things went completely FUBAR. And now, neither of us was told the other was in the area.”

“Until you guys needed to know, only that happened sooner rather than later because Davila here got hurt?” Harvey shrugged. “Can’t beat the logic. Except why not tell you two?”

“Man,” Davila said, “you got to ask? Why do spooks hold anything back? Because they figure it’s a need-to-know thing and you didn’t need to know. Neither did we.”

“I’ll give you that. But why did we not need to know?”

Bad blood. Although John couldn’t very well say that out loud any more than he could admit to unfinished business. If he had known that Driver was his backup or in theater or whatever jargon spooks used these days, would he have agreed?

Yes. For Roni, he could do anything.

“Tell you what.” Planting his hands on his knees, Driver pushed to a stand. “I’m going to check out that van. Worthy, that thing got chains?”

“Uh.” The abrupt change of topic caught John off-guard. “Yes, it does. I’m pretty sure.”

“Great, then let’s go check it out.” When John nodded, Driver tipped his head toward the door. “Harvey, start packing things up. Check the supply stores here, see if there’s anything we can use to make up for the detour.”

“Okay,” Harvey said, “but why do I feel like I’ve been given busy work while the grownups talk?”

“Because you have.” Driver turned on his heel. “Come on, Worthy.”