Free No More Running by Jayton Young Page A

jealous of them, though.  Why?”
    “This couldn’t have been directed at me, so that leaves only him.”
    “But nothing started happening until you came here.”  Claire added.
    I flinched at that because I knew she was right, but even I didn’t know I’d be going over there, so why would Chuck poison everything.  Unless…
    “Oh my God!  He’s doing it again.”
    “What?  What’s he doing?”
    “He goes after my friends; those who have helped me or associated with me.”
     
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    I had explained everything to them.  I told them the whole story and about everything that happened to Jamie and Patty in Tacoma.  Since Tacoma, I had tried to leave before he had the chance to find me, or do anything if he had found me, but I knew that my friends were right.  I couldn’t run anymore.  I had to make this stand against him, and try to find a way for him to pay for his crimes against me and others that he’d hurt.
    Stefan came back into the room after checking on Garret.  He had a grim look on his face, but stayed silent as Claire was talking to me.
    “Garret will be here in a while.”  He said when she had finished telling me about the plan for everyone to move into Stefan’s house, which was in Claire’s neighborhood that was a gated community, but his house had better security.  “He is signing himself out so we can work out a solid plan on what to do.”
    “I’ll sign out, too.  I’m sure Doc will help us with that.  I don’t really like being in a hospital, I feel more exposed here.”  I figured the sooner we did whatever, the better.  Chuck obviously was already watching me, so it wouldn’t be long before he made his move against me.  But it wouldn’t be before he ‘toyed’ with the people around me.  “Has Doc been around?”  I asked, thinking about how worried he must have been.
    “Actually, he was here for your initial treatment, but I didn’t see him anymore after that; yesterday or today.”  Claire stated, looking over to Stefan.
    “What is it?”  I asked looking between the two; I knew they were keeping something from me.
    “Um,” Claire sounded very nervous.  “He didn’t show for work last night.”
    Doc had been working the twelve am to twelve pm shift in the ER to cover a doctor shortage.
    “Can you send someone to check on him?”  I was getting nervous.  What if Chuck did something to him?  I took the cover off and was going to try to stand, but a wave of dizziness came over me and I fell back on the bed.
    “Hold up short stuff, where do you think your going?”  Stefan asked, scooting my legs back around straight on the bed.
    “I have to go see if he’s alright.  Like I told you, Chuck goes after everyone else first.  Doc could be lying dead somewhere.”
    “We already had Alex over to his house to check.  His car was not there, and the house was
locked up tight.  He wasn’t home.”  Alex was one of their ex-marine buddies that worked for Garret as a bodyguard to people who hired our services.  When he wasn’t doing that, he was pretty much a jack of all trades in the office, doing anything that needed to be done.
    Claire came up on the other side of the bed, grabbing my hand.   “Are you sure you know Doc as well as you think?”  She asked softly.
    “Of course!  I’d trust him with my life!  I have trusted him with my life.”  I said, as I tried to calm myself down.  Being upset was only raising my blood pressure making the dizziness worse.  I had to work at it to get my breathing back under control.
    Clair squeezed my hand.  “I’m sorry Di, but you have to see it from our point of view.  Nothing started happening until he got here.  Did you tell him about your date?”
    “Yes I did, but it’s not Doc!  If you’ll both remember, I got shot before he got here.”  I told them.  I couldn’t believe they’d accuse Doc.  He’s the one who