Page 51

Forty-One

When it becomes clear that Lapsford will live for at least another hour, Anna backs away from the bed. She feels the others watching as she stands. Sal and Dante and Seamus, whose gaze is particularly unreadable.

Inside her own room, she collapses on the bed and stares up at the ceiling. Even if she did try to sleep, she knows it won’t happen. She remains too upset by the stress of stitching up Reggie, Judd’s murder, and the situation with Lapsford.

“Do you want to talk about what just happened back there?” Seamus says as he enters her room and drops into the chair by the window.

Anna keeps her eyes on the ceiling. “I needed answers.”

“No, you needed to save him. The answers you could have gotten later.”

“Not if he was dead,” Anna says.

“I just wish you had talked to me about it first. We can’t keep things from each other.”

Anna props herself up on her elbows. “Like why you’re carrying around a stash of muscle relaxants?”

“That’s different,” Seamus says.

“Is it? A man was poisoned—”

“He faked being poisoned.”

“We didn’t know that at the time,” Anna says. “Yet you didn’t think to mention how you were carrying around a box of mysterious pills.”

“Because it doesn’t concern you.”

Anna scoots forward until she’s sitting on the edge of the bed. “But it does. If it’s on this train, it concerns me. Now tell me, why do you have them?”

“They were prescribed to me,” Seamus says, the usual boom of his voice replaced by something so vulnerable, so small.

“Why?”

“Because I have an affliction.” Seamus lets out a bitter chuckle, as if he finds the word ridiculous.

“What kind of affliction?”

“My nerves,” Seamus says. “My brain has trouble controlling them, so I get tremors. And occasional spasms. And sometimes, I just can’t move the way I want to.

It’s like I’m being grabbed by an invisible force, and it’s shaking me.

The pills numb my nerves just enough to give me back control. But only for a little bit.”

Anna thinks about the way his hands shook as he gave her the pill. Looking back on it, there must have been a hundred instances in which she’d noticed a tremor but thought nothing of it.

“How long has this been going on?”

“A few years.”

Seamus says it with such forced nonchalance that Anna suspects it’s been longer. She edges closer to him, a newfound concern simmering in the pit of her stomach. “So, before we met?”

“Yeah.”

“After this, we’ll find you a doctor. A good one.”

Seamus levels his gaze at her. “With what money?”

“That doesn’t matter. We’ll find the money. And then we’ll get you the best doctor and he’ll be able to cure you.”

“There is no cure.”

“But there has to be,” Anna says.

“You think I haven’t looked? I’ve been to all the doctors, Anna.

I’ve tried all the treatments. Some of them helped, for a little while, at least, but then soon I’m right back to where I was.

” Seamus also moves to the edge of his seat, reaching a hand out to Anna.

She takes it, alarmed by the way it trembles between both of hers.

“That’s why, when your aunt wrote to me, I wrote back.

And that’s why it was important for us to do this now.

I’m running out of time to bring justice to the people who killed my brother. ”

“Of course there’s time,” Anna says.

Seamus lets out a long, frustrated sigh. “You don’t understand.”

“But I do! Yes, you’re sick—”

“Anna, I’m dying.”

The rest of what Anna intended to say dries up, leaving her momentarily speechless.

“The last doctor I saw gave me five years at the most,” Seamus says.

“Probably less. Soon the pills won’t be enough to stop it.

I’ll need help walking. Then I’ll be in a wheelchair.

Then it’s just a matter of time before the illness takes over completely.

” Seamus turns to gaze out the window. The sun has cracked the horizon, painting his face in shades of pink and gold.

“I meant it when I told you my future is just a swath of black. It’s the truth, Anna.

There is no future for me. Not much of one. ”

Tears well up in Anna’s eyes. She quickly wipes them away, trying to be strong for Seamus’s sake. But it’s hard to be strong in the face of so much loss. Her brother. Her parents. Aunt Retta. She can’t lose Seamus, too.

“I’m not going to give up,” she says. “And I’m not going to leave your side.”

Seamus shakes his head. “You say that now—”

“Because I mean it. We’re bound together by what happened to our brothers. And that bond will remain long after this trip ends.”

Seamus stands, lifts Anna off the bed, and pulls her to him. When he kisses her, the act is so sudden and unexpected that it makes Anna seize up. Feeling her tense, Seamus lets go.

“I’m sorry,” he says, backing away.

“Don’t be,” Anna says. In truth, she’s the one who’s sorry. She wishes she could bring herself to reciprocate Seamus’s feelings. But he was right after their lone, misguided night together. It’s all too sad. “I wish—”

Seamus stops her with a raised hand. “Don’t say anything more. Please.”

Anna nods and returns to the edge of the bed, giving Seamus the space to regain his composure. He takes a deep breath and stretches, his face emotionless.

“I should check on our patients,” he says before dipping a hand into his uniform pocket.

Anna watches his hand move inside the pocket, the fabric bulging then retracting. Seamus checks his other pocket before moving on to the one on the inside of his jacket. Soon he’s patting himself down like he’s both cop and criminal.

“What’s wrong?” Anna asks.

“My gun,” Seamus says. “It’s gone.”

Anna bolts from the bed, instantly on alert. “Do you think it fell out of your pocket?”

“I don’t know,” Seamus says.

“When was the last time you noticed it?”

He continues to pat his pockets, as if it’s possible he’s mistaken and the gun isn’t really gone. “An hour ago. When we were all in the lounge after finding out Judd really wasn’t dead.”

“So it could be anywhere,” Anna says.

“Or with anyone,” Seamus adds. “We need to check the lounge.”

They bolt from the room, spilling into the corridor of Car 11 before rushing to the first-class lounge. Inside, Seamus immediately begins overturning chairs and cocktail tables, desperately searching for his missing revolver. Anna joins him, crawling across the floor on her hands and knees.

“Keep looking,” Seamus says as she reaches the piano. “I’m going to check the observation car.”

He hurries out of the lounge, leaving Anna to continue the search on her own.

She continues along the floor for thirty more seconds before confirming there’s no gun here.

The only place left to look is the bar. She climbs to her feet, about to approach it, when her attention is caught by strange sounds in the next car.

A bang.

A shatter.

Another bang.

Hearing them, Anna goes statue-still. The mirrored shelves behind the bar capture her motionless reflection, splitting and distorting her shocked face into dozens of pieces.

Wide eyes. Opened mouths. Flared nostrils.

Anna stares at those broken bits of herself as she slowly identifies the noises she’d just heard.

They were gunshots.

Two of them.