Duby's Doctor

Chapter 18-A: RESCUE, pt. 1

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Averell's henchmen kidnapped Mitchell from the Coconut Grove Arts Festival when they didn't find the man they wanted. Their intended victim, Jean, was wounded attempting to catch the fleeing kidnappers, and he has since threatened to "come for" Agent Stone if Mitchell is not returned home safely.

Enjoy Chapter 18A of DUBY'S DOCTOR: "THE RESCUE, pt. 1."

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Frank Stone haunted the hospital for several days, annoying the nurses, stalking the doctors, and being a colossal nuisance. He kept uniformed officers on guard outside Jean's hospital room, at the doors to the stairwells, and at the elevator lobby – as much to keep Jean in as to keep potential assassins out.

For the first 24 hours, Jean's doctors had kept him sedated, for fear he would injure himself or someone else in his determined efforts to escape the hospital and find Mitchell. At the beginning of the second day, Jean reluctantly agreed to stay in bed at least another 48 hours in exchange for the doctors' promise to discontinue using mind-numbing, nausea-inducing drugs and uncomfortable physical restraints.

Stone knew enough to stay out of Jean's sight until day three, when he entered quietly just before dawn and tiptoed to a chair near the bed.

"I am not sleeping," Jean's voice came out of the semi-darkness.

"I thought you probably wouldn't be. Feel like talkin'?"

"Get me out of here."

"Maybe I can finagle that for ya, but if I do, you hafta work with me to take down Averell. It's the only way to get Doctor Oberon home safe. You can't go all Lone Ranger on me."

"Just get me out of here."

"Do we have a deal?" Frank Stone was well named. His heart might have been made of quartz for all the sympathy he showed for Jean's injuries or Mitchell's jeopardy. Frank's narrow agenda was all that mattered to him. He would do whatever it took to get Kyle Averell, without a second thought for Yves Dubreau, Jean Deaux, or Mitchell Oberon.

Yves Dubreau would have known this about Frank Stone, because he was an agent accustomed to doing things Stone's way. They had worked together in the nether world of covert national security operations for years. To Dubreau, someone like Mitchell Oberon would be merely collateral damage – regrettable, but acceptable.

Dubreau would not hesitate to fall in line with Agent Francis Stone, but Dubreau was dead.

Jean Deaux hesitated. A long minute of tense silence vibrated across Stone's nerve endings like electrical current.

Finally, Jean said, "These men are violent." It was not a question.

"So am I," Frank said. "And, so are you."