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"Who were you selling to?"

"Someone local. None of your business. And nothing to do with what you're looking into," the man replied bitterly.

Cora knew she couldn't fully trust what they said, but the problem was she believed them. These guys had been bullies during training, but after hours, their focus had been elsewhere and she doubted they would compromise their cocaine selling racket by going into other barracks and beating soldiers to death. The stakes for the drug sales were too high. That was why they’d fought so hard to evade pursuit.

It didn't make sense that they’d also drag random recruits out of barracks and kill them. And if the recruits had somehow known about the drug activity and reported it, then Cora was sure these guys would already have been arrested by the military police. The Army took drug trafficking very seriously. It would have been nipped in the bud immediately, not suppressed. These four were going down for what they'd done. They were going to be inside for a long time and they were not going to be back in the barracks, ever.

She needed to look further to find the killer.

She had a ruined car that was going to need major work, she'd come close to being shot, she'd risked both their necks in taking these men down.

Cora tossed the package back in the trunk and turned away, walking off, leaving their groans and shouts behind her as she headed to her trashed car, walking in step with Gabe.

"We need to get your car out of here," he said. "There's nothing else to do, Cora. They're bad guys, but not the ones we're looking for."

"I guess we call a tow truck, get it to a panel beater, and hand these guys over to the police," she said despondently. She didn't think the day - late as it now was - could get any worse. But she might be wrong, she realized.

Because, at that moment, her phone started ringing.

One a.m. and it was her father on the line?

Cora picked up the call in a hurry, her stomach twisting.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"Dad?" Cora could hear all her tension in that one spoken word. She waited, holding her breath, to hear the response.

"Honey. I had to call. I had to tell you. She's just gotten worse," her dad replied.

Worse. The word clenched at Cora's gut. Her mother was worse. This was something she'd dreaded, she'd been fighting against it, believing that if she did her part, the universe would be kind.

The universe wasn't being kind. It was being cruel. But at the same time, it wasn't the worst news. It wasn’t the final news she’d been dreading. Not yet, anyway.

Cora took a deep breath. For a moment, she felt as if she was channeling right into her mother's psyche.

"Look, she's alive. She's alive. Maybe this gets worse before it improves, Dad. She's fighting. I promise you that. Mom is fighting. Did you go see her again?"

"They said not to. That was just the progress update when I called," he said.

"That was the middle of the night? Who's at their best in the middle of the night! She'll be better by morning. Mom's a morning person," Cora insisted.

She saw Gabe's worried glance at her, and knew that he was stressing now, just like she was.

"I hope you're right." But her dad didn't sound hopeful. His voice was dull and wooden.

"You need to rest. Being up won't help. Worrying won't help. Mom would want you to rest."

"How can I rest after this news?"

"Because you can't do anything! Would Mom want you to worry? Will she heal faster if she knows you're up at one in the morning, fretting and stressing and raising your blood pressure? No. Mom would want to know you were resting, Dad. That's what she'd tell you. I know it's hard. But Mom always liked us to make the hard choice, right?"

That got a small chuckle out of her dad. Even that was a relief.

"She's my world," he then said, the tone dull and flat again. "Cora, I can't say what will happen if I lose her. I can't visualize it. I fell in love with her. For life."

Now, bizarrely, Cora felt tears prickling her eyes.

She'd survived a hard day, she'd had bullets come her way, she'd battled gangs of hardened Army fighters, she'd hidden in a car’s trunk, and caught a ride under a truck. And she'd done all of that feeling barely a flicker of emotion.

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