Tom clasped his hand on her shoulder and said softly, “It’s okay, Kate. We both did.”
She nodded, but still she fought it.
“Fuck’s sake,” Timmons muttered. “Do we have a name? Age?” he asked no one in particular.
“Not yet, sir,” Tom said.
Timmons nodded towards the pushchair and then the other bodies on the pavement. “Brannon, get yourself to the hospital. Make sure Goodwin gets seen to. Quickly. The rest of us will be gathering witness statements and securing the scene while the CSIs do their thing. We’ll be basically standing around with our thumbs up our arses on standby to help as needed with the investigation under the purview of the National Counterterrorism Network.” He looked her in the eye. “If you can get statements from Goodwin and your girlfriend, that would be a bonus. She’ll need to be checked over too, after all. Two birds, one stone and all that.”
“Wait. Gina’s here?”
“Bollocks,” he said under his breath. “I thought you knew.”
“Knew what?”
“Seems Gina and Stella were having a girly shopping day or some bollocks when this shitstorm hit.”
“Oh my God.” Kate’s stomach threatened to reject her breakfast for the second time in less than a minute, and she was pretty sure her face had gone grey. All the blood in her body was rushing through her ears at that moment, so it must have done. “What happ…is she…where…where is she?”
Timmons wrapped a meaty hand around her arm and held her up. “When Stella called me, she passed out part way through. Gina talked to me. She’s fine.” He shook her gently. “Look at me, Kate. Look at me.”
She tried to focus on what he was saying. Gina had spoken to him. That was good. Right?
“She was in Ann Summers when I spoke to her. She should still be there. They’ve only moved the critically injured so far.”
Kate tried to swallow around the lump of pure fear that was lodged in her throat. “She…she wasn’t injured?”
“No. She’s fine. She was absolutely fine when I spoke to her. She got Stella into the recovery position, and she was moving around a little in there.”
Relief washed over Kate, and the noise of the surrounding area came rushing back to her. The discordant sounds hit her full force, like a twenty-foot wave crashing over her head. “Okay. Okay, that’s…that’s good.” She smiled in relief, then frowned as she remembered Timmons ordering her to take them both to the hospital. “Wait. Then why do I need to take her to the hospital?”
Timmons squinted at her. “Precaution. Purely precaution.” He pulled her a little closer. “There may be minor cuts or bruises to be checked out. No doubt there was a lot of flying glass.” He dipped his head to look her in the eye. “Cry now if you need to, but when you get to her, you need to hold your shit together. What went down in there… Well, I was fucking shitting myself when Stella was on the phone to me, Kate, so I can only imagine how Gina’s feeling right now.” He shook her gently. “Get me?”
Kate nodded, let out a long shuddering breath, and buried her face in her hands. And the tears fell. The sobbing began as Timmons wrapped his arms around her shoulders and held her.
She’d never cried in a man’s arms before. Never cried on the job, or on the shoulder of her boss, but today she finally didn’t give a shit. She truly didn’t. Gina and Stella were what was important now, not the ridiculous fronts they all affected for the sake of the job. Gina and Stella had gone through something she couldn’t even imagine, a horror she didn’t want to imagine. And God alone knew how this was going to affect them for the rest of their lives. But at least they still had their lives.
Kate wanted to know how many had died, but she didn’t think she could face the knowledge yet. She wanted to ask how many were injured, but she didn’t want to know that either. Not yet. Later, her police brain would need the answers, but right now she wanted to just be Gina’s girlfriend and help her through her emotions. Whatever Gina needed, Kate knew she would do.
“You’re sure she’s okay?” she whispered into Timmons’s shoulder when her sobs subsided.
He nodded and pulled back a little. “Positive.”
“Right. Okay. That’s okay, then.” The feeling of relief was palpable. Her lungs began to filter oxygen again, and the flood to her brain kick-started it into gear. “Why were they in Ann Summers?”
Timmons frowned. “Shopping, I assume.”
Kate frowned. “Right. But why? Why in there?”
He rolled his eyes. “Isn’t that what women do on girly shopping trips?”
“No.”
“Well, colour my delusions shattered.” He turned her towards the debris-strewn entry to the shop. “Come on. Let’s make sure they both get out of here now.”
A mannequin in barely decent attire lay across the concrete slab—head missing, leg in half, and one arm reaching out towards her like it, too, was begging for her help. Racks of lingerie, sex toys, DVDs, and books were scattered across the shop floor and out onto the street.
“Bloody hell.”
Kate crunched her way through the shop until she found Gina kneeling beside the body of an older woman and clutching a brown leather bag to herself. She was covered in blood. She was still, though. She didn’t appear to be hurt anywhere. Well, not seriously, anyway. She just stared at the woman on the floor.
Kate approached her slowly. Like she would a frightened animal. “Gina, sweetheart, are you okay?”
Gina didn’t look up, so Kate got a little closer. “Gina, baby, are you hurt?”
Gina shook her head. “Pat died.”
Kate looked at the woman on the ground. “Is this Pat?”
Gina nodded.
Kate looked up at Timmons.
He shrugged and moved over to Stella. He bent down and touched his fingers to her neck. Nodding, he checked his watch. Counting off her pulse, no doubt.
“Gina, I’m sorry about Pat. Are you okay?”
Gina finally looked up at Kate and smiled softly, sadly. “Yes. I would like to go home, though. I didn’t want to leave her alone, but I think…she’s gone now, so I think she’ll be okay now. Is that all right?”
Kate nodded. “We can leave anytime you want. But we need to go to the hospital first.”
“Why? I don’t want to go to the hospital. I’m fine. I just need a shower and some fresh clothes.”
“I know. But Stella needs to get checked out. Boss’s orders.”
Gina glanced over at Stella. “Is she okay?”
Timmons offered Gina a gentle smile and nodded to Kate. “Like she said, boss’s orders. For you too. Can’t have you deciding we didn’t take care of you at an incident and then suing us later. I’ve got my pension to think about.”
Gina snorted. “Fine. But you better find me something else to wear.” She motioned to her bloodstained jeans and jumper.
Kate didn’t have the heart to mention the future that lay ahead for Gina’s clothes. Timmons, it seemed, had no such compunction.
“No worries, Gina, that lot’s all evidence now,” he said. “Maybe Kate can get you a pair of those scrubs they all wear on casualty or something.”
“But this is my favourite jumper.”
Timmons looked her up and down. “You’ll never get all that blood out of it anyway. Ex-wife used to say that white wine was good for getting stains out, but you could probably buy a new jumper with the amount you’d need to get rid of that lot.”
Kate shook her head, trying to dislodge the image of Gina covered in blood, but it was no use. It wouldn’t be until she got her out of there and into something clean and dry. She tried not to think about what could have happened. There were just too many ways today could have gone wrong. No, that wasn’t right. It was wrong. All wrong. So wrong she couldn’t even think straight. But it could also have been so much worse.
Gina was whole, and she was talking to her. Everything else they would deal with when it came up.
She had no doubt this would affect Gin
a in the future. How could it not? Kate knew it was going to affect her, so how could it not affect Gina too? Seeing that baby outside, so young and so completely innocent, struck down without thought or care. How could anyone think this was justified in any way, shape, or form? It wasn’t. It was barbaric and cruel, and so entirely senseless. Such a waste.
Gina had fought so hard—worked so tirelessly to get herself back to some semblance of normal after Ally’s attack, and now this. How was Gina supposed to deal with this too? How could any of them deal with this?
“Brannon? You okay there?”
Timmons’s voice shocked her out of the desperate thoughts whirling around her head.
She caught his eye and dipped her head once, acknowledging that she was far from okay and thanking him for dragging her out of the whirlpool of unanswerable questions—the what-ifs and the could-have-beens.
This wasn’t getting them anywhere. They’d be here all day at this rate, and she needed to get Gina away from here. She needed to get herself away from here. “Can you stand up?”
Gina laughed. It was a sad laugh that seemed hollow and unnaturally light as it floated out of the gaping hole in the roof like a helium balloon taking flight. Her gaze slid behind Kate and seemed fixed on something Kate didn’t want to look at.
“I can.” Gina’s voice was thick and clumsy. Almost as if her tongue was suddenly swollen and too big for her mouth. She coughed and carried on. “I might need some help, though. My feet have gone to sleep.”
Kate reached out and helped her stand slowly as the paramedics loaded Stella onto a backboard and lifted her onto a trolley. They were heading out of the door by the time Gina looked down her body and said, “Jesus, it’s even worse than I thought.”
“We’ll get you cleaned up. Don’t worry.” Kate turned towards the door.
“I’m not worried.” She reached up and touched her hand to Kate’s temple. “You’re here.”
Kate smiled a smile she knew didn’t reach her eyes. It said, “I’m always here”. A smile that only Gina would ever see. “Whenever you need me.”
“I know.” She looked down at the woman on the floor again, and whispered something to her, but Kate couldn’t make out the words. It sounded a little like “I’ll find him for you”, but that didn’t make any sense.
Timmons acknowledged them leaving with a wave and a wiggle of his hand between his ear and his mouth. His sign to call him.
Kate nodded and led Gina back to the bus station and her car. She wanted to get to the hospital as close to Stella’s arrival as possible.
She covered the passenger seat with a plastic sheet. This, too, would be brought in for forensic analysis. Not that she expected it to be revealing. The bombers were dead, and Gina had had no direct contact with them anyway. The most that sheets were going to tell them was who the blood belonged to.
“I really don’t need to go to the hospital, you know. I’m fine.”
Kate looked at her. She looked a little pale. Blood smears on her cheek added to the ghostly pallor, but her eyes looked clear, her gaze was focused, and her demeanour seemed far more normal than Kate had expected. If she didn’t know any better, she wouldn’t have suspected that Gina had been at the scene of a terror attack. Shock? Maybe. Would the reality of it set in later? Maybe. But right now, Gina did indeed seem to be handling everything better than Kate was.
“I’m sure you are, but our protocol is to have you checked over by a doctor,” she said eventually, then offered what she hoped was a cheeky grin. “Like Timmons said, it’s a safety thing so you can’t sue, sweetheart.” She winked at Gina. Just in case she wasn’t sure she was joking.
“I would never.”
Kate reached over and kissed her cheek. “I know. But we also need to collect your clothes for evidence. And that really needs to be done in a controlled environment. The hospital’s as good a place to do that as the police station is. Maybe better. For you, anyway.”
Gina glanced down at the plastic-covered seat. “At least I won’t dirty your seats with that on there.”
“I really wouldn’t care if you did,” Kate said earnestly. All she cared about was Gina being okay. She helped her into the car before getting in herself and pulled away from the scene slowly, not at all like her normal self, but fully aware that she was in shock. Add to the fact that she had to dodge a plethora of people running, ambulances pulling away, police cars blocking almost every inch of the roads, and CSIs suiting up in what appeared to be a staging area under the covered walkway.
A crowd was growing. An angry crowd. Circling the bus station and filling the road. People were whispering amongst themselves, calling out to people within the cordoned area. Demanding information. And hurling insults when it wasn’t forthcoming. Kate wasn’t looking forward to the fallout from this.
At the other side of the road, news crews were gathering. Reporters stood in front of cameras, making sure to get the bus station in the shot behind them as yet another ambulance tore away, lights flashing, sirens screaming, and Kate followed in its wake, hoping it was Stella’s ride.
Chapter 4
Kate followed the ambulance but was quickly left behind. She had no lights or siren on her Mini, and Gina wasn’t in need of emergency help. With everything else going on today, she didn’t need to worry about her licence by breaking every traffic law there was. Never mind the icy road conditions to contend with.
“I need to get Sammy. I don’t want her to see or hear about this. I don’t want her having more nightmares because of this.”
“I’ll sort it. Will’s looking after her. I’m sure he won’t mind having her stay with him a bit longer.”
“No, I’m sure he’d be fine with that. We just need to figure out what to tell Sammy why I’m not going to be home when I said. I don’t want her to worry.”
Kate glanced over. Gina was chewing her bottom lip.
“Do you think Stella would mind if we told Sammy she’s in the hospital and we’re staying with her a bit?” Gina asked eventually. “That she’s banged her head or something? Something Sammy can relate to and won’t scare her too much.”
“She’s had concussion before?”
Gina snorted. “I’ve been worried on more than one occasion that social services were going to think she was a battered child the number of times she’s fallen out of trees or hurt herself one way or another.”
“So no skateboard for Christmas?”
Gina closed her eyes and banged her head against the headrest. “Please tell me you didn’t.”
Kate grinned. “I didn’t.”
“Thank God. We’d have to take up permanent residence at the hospital if you did.”
Kate sniggered as she reached the roundabout and took the second exit, joining the queue of traffic trying to get through the few roads left open around King’s Lynn. It was bedlam. Pure, unadulterated chaos on the roads… Well, it would be if anyone was moving.
“We’d be quicker walking,” Gina said.
“Not with your costume.” She pointed to Gina’s blood-soaked clothes. “You’d be accosted by plastic policemen in minutes.”
“You so need to stop calling them that, Kate,” Gina said with a grin.
“What do you want me to call our Police Community Support Officers instead?”
“How about PCSOs? Like Stella and Jimmy do.”
“Pft,” Kate mocked as she continually stole glances at Gina. She really was dealing with this remarkably well. Kate half expected her to be comatose or catatonic or something. In the past, panic attacks had been a dominant feature in Gina’s coping strategy…or rather her non-coping strategy. This calm and collected Gina was a bit of a mystery.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Kate asked again.
“Why? Because I haven’t fallen to pieces on you yet?”
“Well, yes.” Kate chuckled a little, embarrassed to be so easily read.
“I really am. Believe it or not.” She offered Kate a smile. “I had a really we
ird moment while I was in there, though, after Stella passed out and I’d hung up on your boss. He was really good, by the way.”
“I’ll not tell him that. He’ll get a big head,” Kate said with a gentle grin. “What happened?”
“Huh?”
“Weird moment.”
“Oh, right, yeah. It was like… I’m not sure I can describe it. I was surrounded by this kind of silence. And it was like I was looking at everything through someone else’s eyes.”
“Like an out-of-body thing?”
“I suppose so. I mean, that actually does describe it pretty well.” Gina crossed her arms over her chest and tucked her hands under her armpits. “It was weird, and felt like it lasted ages. But I really am okay now.”
Kate peeped at her, trying to gauge if she was still in shock or if she really was coping with it all. Time will tell, right? “Okay. I’ll take your word for it.”
“I am sad, though.”
“Yeah, it was… There’s a lot of people hurt there.”
“Yes but, specifically, I’m sad because of Pat.”
Kate frowned. “The lady you were sitting with? The one who died?”
“Yes.”
There was such sadness in Gina’s voice that it was clear what a profound moment it had been for her.
“She told me she was in there to buy a vibrator because she was recently divorced.”
“Wow. That…just… I mean…wow.”
Gina giggled. “I know. She told me how her father made her marry the wrong man because he wouldn’t let her marry the English soldier she was in love with.”
“Why wouldn’t he let her marry him? A soldier not good enough for him?”
“Definitely not. Especially as he was Irish Catholic and I assume the English soldier was anything but.”
“Oo. You didn’t cough up those details to start with.”
“No. She showed me a picture of him. She still carries—carried—it in her purse all these years later.” She reached into the bag and pulled out the purse and flipped it open to show Kate the faded picture.
The Last First Time Page 4