Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

Four days later, Bob knew he was in big trouble. His wounds hadn’t gotten any better with time. In fact, they were infected, and any kind of touch to his back sent radiating waves of pain throughout his body. He wasn’t eating, because he couldn’t keep anything down, and was getting weaker and weaker by the day.

At first, he’d tried to keep his pain a secret from Marlowe, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew immediately that something was wrong. It wasn’t until two days ago that he’d had to admit what was wrong, when she’d wrapped her arm around him after he’d stumbled as they were walking—then jerked away from her and couldn’t stop the moan of pain from leaving his mouth.

She’d insisted on lifting his shirt and taking a look at his wounds, and her horrified inhalation told Bob all he needed to know. She’d wanted to find a doctor, but he’d refused. He needed to get her home. He’d lived through infections before, lived through beatings and torture, and come out of both just fine. He could muddle through until he was back in the States.

But in the last twelve hours, Bob knew he wasn’t going to make it home.

Every step was torture. Every movement felt as if he was right back in that cell overseas and his captors were slicing their knives deep into his skin.

He’d managed to get him and Marlowe to the small room in the back of a shop near the airport, the last place Willis had arranged for them. Then he’d fallen to the floor . . . and hadn’t been able to get up again.

Marlowe had been amazingly strong over the last few days, encouraging him, doing her best to clean the wounds on his back with what she could find, but the infection raging through his body had won.

“Kendric?” she cried frantically as he lay face down on the floor.

“I’m okay,” he mumbled, knowing he was lying through his teeth. “Just gotta sleep an hour or so. Then I’ll call Willis and we’ll go.”

“All right. You sleep. I’ll be right here,” she told him.

That was the last thing Bob remembered before he passed out.

Marlowe paced the room. It was small, only large enough for her to take about five steps from wall to wall. She’d known Kendric was hurting, but wasn’t aware of exactly how bad things had gotten. He’d hidden his pain well. Even though she’d seen his wounds two days ago, he hadn’t let her clean them since. When he’d passed out, and she’d lifted his shirt to see how bad the damage had become, she’d almost fainted herself.

The gouges in his flesh were a mottled green, enflamed red around the edges, and leaking pus. And they smelled awful. His skin was hot to the touch and puffy from the infection. He needed medical assistance immediately, but she had no idea how to provide it without one or both of them getting arrested.

Panic set in as she paced. She didn’t think about how close she was to getting home; all she could think about was the man she loved lying on the floor. He’d gotten them all the way to the airport, and now she seriously wondered if he was going to die. His breathing was fast and shallow, and she was scared to death that she was going to lose him.

She had no idea how to get in touch with his contact, Willis. Kendric had stopped along their journey, using pay phones and paying shopkeepers to use their personal cells, but he hadn’t shared the man’s number. She’d dug out his wallet and knew they were out of money. She had no idea how he’d planned to get a hold of Willis to arrange for their passports and flights, but it didn’t matter. He was in no shape to do anything more than lie on the floor at the moment.

Marlowe chewed on her thumbnail and thought over the last four days. How he’d gotten hurt climbing under that fence, then carried her through that foul-smelling canal. She’d stayed dry, but the feces-filled water had obviously gotten into his wounds. When they were in the barn, he’d lain on his back on the bare straw so she’d touch it as little as possible. Again, more germs had probably infected the wounds then.

They’d festered as they’d journeyed south—and he hadn’t said a word about it. Probably because he didn’t want her to worry. Well, fat lot of good that did. She was worried now. Petrified, in fact.

And she had to do something. But what? She had no money, no identification. Didn’t speak the language. She was a damn fugitive.

Every now and then, Kendric would moan or mumble, but otherwise he was totally out of it. It was terrifying, and Marlowe knew she had to get help for him. She had nothing of value that she could use to barter with someone to use their phone. All she had was the clothes on her back. Literally.

Kendric moaned again, and she stopped pacing to study him.

A plan formed in her mind. She hated to do it, but she literally had no choice.

She knelt next to him on the floor and reached for his arm. She quickly unfastened the fancy watch he was wearing, which they’d used to get them through Thailand and Cambodia. It had a GPS and a compass . . . and she hoped Kendric wouldn’t be too upset with her for taking it to barter for use of a phone.

Feeling sick inside, and worried about Kendric, and nervous about going out by herself, Marlowe took a deep breath. She had to do it. She was literally the only one who could help him. It was very likely he’d die of sepsis if he didn’t get antibiotics and fluids.

“I’ll be back really soon,” she told Kendric.

He didn’t move.

“You got us this far, and I’ll get you the rest of the way home. You’re going to be fine, hear me, Kendric?”

Again, he didn’t answer. Marlowe couldn’t help but think back to a few days ago when he’d seemed so strong and larger than life. When he’d made love to her. When he’d made her feel beautiful for the first time in years.

She’d do anything to make sure her rescue didn’t end in his death.

Her resolve strengthened, Marlowe leaned down and kissed him on the forehead before standing and heading for the door. She opened it and looked back one last time. Kendric was breathing way too fast, and she hated how vulnerable he looked lying there on the floor. Taking a deep breath, she turned and headed out to get him some help.

An hour later, she was hot, sweaty, frustrated, and as nervous as she’d ever been in her life.

The shop where she and Kendric were hiding was her first bust, followed by countless others. But she’d finally found a business owner near the airport who was willing to let her make a long-distance call on his shop phone, in exchange for Kendric’s watch. She was never so glad that Kendric had made her memorize the phone number of his business as she was right that second.

She wasn’t sure of the time difference, but figured it had to be about the same as it was when she was on the dig site in Thailand. Maine would be around eleven hours earlier than it was here . . . she hoped. Because that meant someone should be in the office. She carefully dialed the number, 555-824-8733, and held her breath.

“Hello, Jack’s Lumber. How can I help you?”

For a moment, Marlowe was so relieved that someone answered, she couldn’t even speak.

“Hello?”

“Hi, sorry! I’m here!” Marlowe blurted. “I’m calling for Chappy, Cal, or JJ. Please, it’s an emergency.”

“I’m April, their assistant,” the woman on the other end of the phone said. “Can I ask who’s calling?”

This was it. It was almost surreal to be talking to April, a woman who Kendric had talked about a lot. Someone he admired, and who he and his friends relied on.

“My name is Marlowe Kennedy, and I’m in Cambodia with Kendric Evans. He needs help, bad, and he made me memorize this phone number just in case, and I really need to talk to one of his friends.”

To April’s credit, she didn’t ask questions that would waste more time. She simply said, “Hold on, please,” then apparently put the phone against her chest or something—and yelled extremely loudly for her employers.

“Chappy! Cal! Jack! Get in here! Right now! It’s an emergency!”

Glad that she was taking her call seriously, Marlowe waited what seemed an eternity before April came back on the line.

“I’m going to put you on speaker, hon. Everyone’s here. Tell us what’s going on.”

Taking a deep breath, Marlowe did just that. “Again, my name is Marlowe, and I’m in Cambodia with Kendric. I’m an archaeologist who was on a dig in Thailand. I was accused of something I didn’t do and ended up in prison. My brother works in DC, and he has a lot of connections, and I guess he got a hold of someone named Willis, who works with Kendric. He came to Thailand and got me out of prison, and we’ve been on the run. We managed to make it into Cambodia, near the airport, and were supposed to fly back to the States soon. But Kendric got sick.”

Marlowe’s voice hitched, and she forced herself to keep going. “I don’t know how to get a hold of this Willis person, we don’t have any money, Kendric is unconscious, and I’m scared to death he’s going to die! Please, he’s talked so much about all of you. Will you help him?”

“Marlowe, this is JJ. You know who I am?”

“Yes,” she said, wiping away the tears that had fallen from her eyes as she’d been speaking. “You’re Jackson Justice. You were the one who decided to get out of the Army and play rock paper scissors to decide where to settle once you were all out.”

“Holy shite, she does know who we are,” muttered a man with a British accent.

“You’re Cal Redmon, from Liechtenstein,” Marlowe babbled. “You suffered the most as a POW because of those asshole captors, and Kendric admires you so much, you have no idea.”

“I’m scared to hear what Bob said about me,” a third man said.

Marlowe sighed. “And you must be Chappy. If you really want to know, he thought you were crazy for marrying a woman you’d known for days, who was trapped in your cabin during a snowstorm, but now he thinks you and Carlise were meant to be and he’s very happy for you.”

“You’re in Cambodia?” JJ asked, redirecting the conversation.

Marlowe took another deep breath. “Yeah, near the Phnom Penh International Airport. Please don’t be mad at Kendric! He lied to you about the sick aunt, and he’s been working with Willis because he’s been . . . unsettled . . . there in Maine. He loves it,” she said quickly. “Loves working with you guys and the weather and everything, but he said he needed more. So he’s been working with Willis to help rescue people overseas.

“But I think he’s officially done with that. He told me more than once while we were trying to get to the airport that he thinks he can fulfill his need to help others in a different way. Maybe working with a rope rescue group or something. He loves all of you so much, he’d be devastated if you kicked him out of the business and stopped talking to him,” she said, before realizing she was babbling again.

“Relax, Marlowe, we aren’t kicking him out,” JJ said.

“Although we are going to have words,” Chappy said sternly.

“Can’t believe the bloke didn’t tell us what he was doing. What a wanker,” Cal added.

“Will you help him?” Marlowe asked anxiously.

“Of course. Tell us where you are and what’s wrong with Bob,” JJ ordered.

Marlowe did her best to describe where they were staying. She couldn’t remember the actual name of the shop, mostly because it wasn’t in English, but she told Kendric’s friends that it sold a variety of groceries, then described all the other shops around it. She went on to give them the highlights of her escape from the prison, and how she and Kendric had barely made it across the border.

“He scraped his back on the fence and then waded through really nasty water. We slept in a barn afterward, which I don’t think helped. The scrapes are really gross now. Red and green, puffy, and there’s a lot of pus coming out of them. I’ve cleaned them as best I can, but it’s not helping. He’s been delirious and in and out of consciousness.

“I don’t care what happens to me, but please, please, can you come and get him? I’m afraid to bring him to a hospital, not that I know how I would even physically manage that. The Thai and Cambodian authorities are looking for us, and I can’t let him go to prison for helping me. He did nothing wrong—”

“Did you?” Chappy interrupted.

Marlowe closed her eyes. “No,” she whispered. “I swear. I don’t use drugs. I don’t sell drugs. I didn’t have anything to do with the yaba pills that were found in my stuff. I’m pretty sure it was my coworker who planted them. I caught him stealing artifacts from the dig site. Ancient coins. And I think he turned me in so he could get away with it.”

“Holy crap,” April whispered.

“Who?” JJ asked sharply.

“Um . . . his name is Ian West,” she answered, not sure why he wanted to know so badly. She closed her eyes, shaking her head as she added, “It doesn’t matter. Please. I seriously don’t care about myself. I’ll go back to prison if that’s what it takes to get Kendric help. He can’t die. He can’t! I’d never forgive myself.”

Marlowe finally opened her eyes and saw the shopkeeper frowning at her. Her time on the phone was going to come to an end soon, and she needed these men to believe her.

“Can you give us a second to talk?” JJ asked.

His words didn’t reassure Marlowe. “Yes, but . . . I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to talk. The shopkeeper whose phone I’m using is looking impatient.”

“It’ll just take a minute. Do not hang up. Understand?” JJ ordered.

“Yes.”

“Good. April, mute us for a second.”

There was a beeping noise, and Marlowe expected to hear music or silence . . . but instead, she could still hear Kendric’s friends. Whatever April had pushed, it wasn’t the mute button.

“I can’t believe Bob’s been lying to us all these years!” Chappy exclaimed. “If he was bored, all he had to do was tell us. We would’ve gone with him on these rescue missions!”

“I think he knew that, but he probably also saw how happy we were to be here,” Cal replied.

“None of that matters right now. We have to figure out how to get him out of Cambodia and to a hospital,” JJ said urgently.

“Do you think the airport’s been alerted? That he’ll be blocked from leaving the country?” Chappy asked.

“I don’t know. But it’s a possibility. I need to figure out who this Willis person is and see what he had planned for their extraction,” JJ said.

“What do we do about the woman? She’s probably for sure on a watch list. It’s not as if she can waltz into the airport and breeze through customs,” Chappy observed.

“I can use my family’s connections and get Bob out without too much of an issue,” Cal said. “You guys know my parents pushed hard to get you three added to their unofficial-official list of people the royal family are willing to aid, after what you did for me when we were POWs. But that’s not going to help this Marlowe woman. I mean, the royal protection extends to our direct relatives, of course, so Carlise and June are covered. But Marlowe isn’t any relation. She’s going to be on her own unless we can figure out how to help her.”

“If you can get a plane headed to Cambodia,” JJ said, “I’ll see what I can dig up about her brother and Willis. There had to be a plan to fly her out. A fake ID and passport. It’ll just take a while to figure it out and get the ball rolling again.”

Marlowe’s stomach rolled at the thought of being left behind to fend for herself, but she’d do it if it meant Kendric would get the help he needed. Still, she couldn’t help but say “Excuse me?” when there was a lull in the conversation on the other end of the phone.

“What the hell, April? I thought you put it on mute?” JJ grumbled.

“I thought I did too! It’s a new phone, I must’ve pushed the wrong button.”

Marlowe wasn’t quite so sure. Something in the other woman’s tone made her think she’d left the line open on purpose. But she didn’t have time to dwell on it.

“I’m sorry, but I heard what you were saying. And please don’t think I’m going back on what I said earlier, about getting Kendric out and leaving me here. I’m not. I mean, that’s fine. But . . . Cal, what you were talking about . . . Does it make a difference if I tell you that Kendric and I are married?”

There was dead silence on the line, and Marlowe panicked momentarily, thinking they’d been cut off. Then Chappy said, “Holy shit! Really?”

“Yeah. I wouldn’t lie about that,” Marlowe told them.

“Looks like he’s moved as fast as we have,” Cal said, sounding almost amused. “How did that happen? Because I know for a fact he wasn’t married when he left here two weeks ago.”

“We were on our way to the border, and at one of the safe houses, there was a woman who was old fashioned or very religious or something. She’d agreed to hide us for the day, but she didn’t realize we were a man and a woman. I think she thought Marlowe was a guy’s name. Anyway, the hiding space was tiny, and she refused to let us stay there together unless we were man and wife. We figured it wasn’t a big deal, so . . . we agreed.”

“You have any proof?” JJ asked.

“The lady gave us a marriage certificate before we left that night. It’s in Thai, and probably isn’t recorded yet or whatever,” she felt compelled to point out. “And we only did it to avoid looking for another safe place to stay.”

“Bob doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do,” Chappy said. “He could’ve figured out something else instead of getting married if he’d really wanted to.”

At the man’s words, Marlowe’s toes curled in the cheap shoes Kendric had found for her. She had been surprised at how quickly he’d acquiesced to getting married, but she’d figured he was even less interested in finding them another place to hide out for the day.

“I’m still wrapping my head around the fact that first Chappy, then Cal, and now Bob were all forced to share beds with women they ended up married to,” April said, sounding quite happy for her friends and employers.

“That’s that, then,” Cal said, ignoring April’s comment. “You and Bob are married, which means my people can get you both back to the States without fuss. Stay put, Marlowe. We’ll come to you.”

“Really? Soon?” Marlowe asked.

“Well, not me specifically,” Cal said. “We’re too far away to get there as fast as it sounds like Bob needs us to. Liechtenstein is closer. I’ll make a call after we hang up. My people will have identification and passports for you and Bob, and hopefully there won’t be a problem with customs. With the royal family vouching for both of you, it shouldn’t be an issue.”

It sounded too good to be true to Marlowe, but she wasn’t going to complain. “Okay.”

“Go back to Bob and stay put. They’ll find you. I’ll make sure a doctor is with the extraction team, and Bob’ll get the help he needs on the way to Maine.”

“Maine?” Marlowe asked in surprise. She figured they’d go to Cal’s home country.

“Yeah. I’m guessing the favors I’m calling in will be enough to get you out of Cambodia, but they aren’t going to want to harbor a fugitive in their country . . . political shite, you understand.”

Marlowe wasn’t sure she did, but she mumbled her agreement anyway.

“We’ll fly you both into Bangor and get Bob to a hospital right away,” Cal told her. “Your job is to keep him alive until my countrymen and women can get there. Got it?”

“Yes.” Her response was firmer now. She was so relieved, she could cry. But she held back the tears. She couldn’t fall apart now. She had to get back to Kendric.

“You did good, Marlowe,” JJ said quietly. “Thank you for calling.”

“Thank you,” she said with a small shake of her head. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

“I can’t wait to meet—”

The line abruptly went silent as April was speaking, and Marlowe looked over to see the shopkeeper had cut the connection.

He said something in rapid-fire Khmer, the official language of Cambodia, obviously letting her know her time was up. Marlowe handed the receiver back to him and thanked him in English, then quickly turned and headed out of the shop. She needed to get back to Kendric. Now that she knew help was coming, she felt cautiously optimistic.

That feeling lasted until she entered the room where Kendric was still lying on the floor. He hadn’t awakened while she’d been gone. If anything, he seemed worse. His breathing was shallower, and when she lifted the sheet she’d placed over him, the wounds on his back looked even angrier than before.

“You have to hang on, Kendric,” she whispered as she walked over to the last bottle of water he’d procured for them before he’d been too weak to do anything else. She poured some of the precious water onto a clean corner of the sheet and did her best to wipe away the green pus from his wounds. They needed stitching, and she’d kill for some antibiotic cream, but all she could do was try to clean out the wounds and wipe away the nasty infectious pus.

“Your friends are coming,” she told him, ignoring the tears that dripped from her cheeks. “Please hang on. They’re on their way. And we get to fly on a royal plane. Isn’t that cool?”

She tried to get him to drink some of the water, holding his head up to make it easier, but she wasn’t sure she was successful.

She kept talking to him. For hours she rambled, speaking until her voice was hoarse. She needed him to know that he wasn’t alone, hopefully make him keep fighting the infection raging throughout his body.

Marlowe wasn’t sure when to expect their rescuers. She didn’t even know how they’d find them, but Cal seemed to think they wouldn’t have any trouble locating them using the info she’d provided. She trusted Kendric’s friends. She knew they’d help him.

She hoped Kendric wouldn’t be too upset with her for telling them his secret about what he’d been doing behind their backs. But ultimately it didn’t matter if he was mad. If he decided he never wanted to see her again. As long as he was alive and healthy, she’d deal with the consequences of her actions.

She’d done everything she could. Now all she could do was wait . . . and pray.