by Molly Rice
By the time she heard Donegan’s tread on the stairs, she was ready.
“Gosh, Charlie, am I ever glad to see you,” she said sweetly, putting a little pant of desperation in her voice.
“That’s a first,” Donegan said. “Too bad you’re too late, Miss Got-Rocks.”
Panic welled. She swung her head to gaze up at the windows placed high on the walls. “It’s still light out,” she said.
“Too late meaning I’m not going to change my mind at this point.”
“All I want is to use the bathroom, Charlie,” she wheedled.
Donegan pushed away from the tub he was leaning against and then hesitated.
“Please, Charlie, I’d be so humiliated if I had an accident all over myself.” She lowered her eyes demurely. “And I drank so much water, remember.”
Charlie thought about it.
The thought of handling her after the accident she described was intolerable. And she couldn’t get away with him right behind her after all.
He bent to unlock the cuff at her wrist. “Don’t try anything stupid, Dana,” he warned, retrieving the gun from his back pocket, “or we won’t wait until dark.”
The bathroom window was barred. She’d anticipated that but held out the tiniest glimmer of hope that she’d be wrong. She shut the door and turned the lock, waiting for Donegan to protest, to demand she leave it unlocked.
He was quiet on the other side of the door. She turned on both taps in the sink to cover the noise of opening the medicine cabinet.
It was empty! Her heart sank. Nothing, not even a dull disposable razor. Trembling, she turned off the taps and sat on the closed toilet seat. Now what?
“Hurry it up, Dana, I don’t want to be standing here all day.”
Donegan! She swallowed threatening tears. Her plan had come to nothing. At least if she’d had her purse, she could have tried her fingernail file or the little scissors in her emergency manicure kit Even keys would have served if she could surprise him with a direct hit at his eyes.
But she had nothing. Not even a toilet plunger. She put her head in her hands and stared down at the floor, desperate to come up with another, instant plan. None came to mind.
She was about to give up, accept the inevitable, when her eyes glimpsed a familiar green bottle on the floor behind the toilet.
Of course! One of the most lethal of all household products. She had read the stats on the poison control pamphlet in the pediatrician’s office when Krystal was about four years old. She recalled rushing home and gathering all the products listed as potential hazards. She’d thrown them into a leaf bag and tossed them in the garbage can set out for early morning pickup. This particular cleaner had been near the top of the list More devastating than hot pepper, quicker acting than Mace, she was sure it would give her at least a couple of minutes to get away if she took proper aim.
Just then Donegan kicked at the door. “What’s taking you so long in there?”
She stood, holding the green bottle slightly behind her in her right hand. She leaned forward and said, “I’m finished, I’m coming.” His muttered response told her he was right outside the door.
She jerked open the door and threw her right hand up, aiming right into his face. She pulled the trigger back before he knew what had hit him. He yelled, staggered back, fell to his knees. His face was a mask of thick white foam.
Dropping the bottle, she pushed past him and raced down the hall, his screams echoing behind her.
At the end of the hall she veered to her right into the living room and made for the front door. Locked. No key.
She wondered about a back door, perhaps off the kitchen. But that would take her back in Donegan’s direction and she had no idea how long the spray would affect his vision.
As if to prove her point she heard a gunshot from the end of the hall and a loud crash as Donegan screamed her name.
Mouth dry, heart pounding, Dana ran into the dining room, hoping that her fallen captor wouldn’t spot her in the kitchen.
The kitchen door was not only locked, it had a wooden bar nailed across it and she didn’t think she’d have time or strength enough to get it off without a crowbar.
A growl of rage, followed by guttural cries of pain from her right. Donegan lurching through the door, his face so red and puffy he was no longer recognizable.
She skirted the table and ran back toward the front of the house. More shots, though none hit her. She dived behind the couch and knelt, holding her arms around herself, biting her lip to keep from crying out.
It suddenly struck her that the shots had missed because he was firing blindly. He couldn’t see well enough to aim true. She was about to stand when she realized that his aimless shooting could just as well hit its target by accident, that she’d be more at risk than if he could see her, direct his fire right at her. At least then she could try to stay out of his sight.
She got down on hands and knees and began crawling in the direction of the hall. His shots had seemed to hit high, perhaps she could stay beneath the line of fire.
She recalled that there had been a half floor above the first, with dormered windows. So there had to be either a second floor or an attic, and somewhere there had to be stairs leading up to it.
Her eyes were squeezed tight as she cringed at the thought of one of those bullets finding its target. Her left knee landed on an unexpected obstacle. Her eyes popped open. Her purse.
Shaking, she rummaged through it, seeking anything that she could use as a weapon.
Her fingers closed around a familiar, forgotten object. With a cry of triumph, she pulled out her pager.
Chapter Seventeen
Nico pounded the steering wheel, but even that didn’t alleviate the anger and frustration. Maybe Lieutenant King was right, maybe he’d been getting himself all worked up over a simple misunderstanding.
Rational thinking didn’t work. His gut told him something was seriously wrong. Especially after he’d called Heather to ask if Krystal was all right, if she’d heard from Dana.
“It’s about time you called us,” Heather said, sounding really miffed.
“Us?”
“Yeah, boob. Krystal and I. We’ve been waiting here over an hour and a half. I’d just decided to take her back to your mom’s when you rang.”
“Waiting for what? Where?”
Heather’s sigh was heavy with impatience.
“Dana’s secretary called me at Rose’s and told me Dana wanted me to bring Krystal to the west entrance of the mall, next to Waldenbooks, so she could take Krystal shopping for more school clothes and stuff. We waited an hour, she didn’t show up, we went into the Pizza Hut, had lunch, she still didn’t show up. So where the hell are you guys?”
“Well, first of all,” Nico snarled, “Dana doesn’t have a secretary of her own and she would never ask any of the pool stenos or the receptionist to make a call for her, let alone give you a message from her. And lastly, there are no secretaries or receptionist here today. It’s Saturday, people work on their own, if at all.”
There was a pause as Heather absorbed the facts Nico had laid out for her. Guilt warred with worry. “Dana didn’t send the message? Then who…why…”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” Nico yelled. “And how did they get my mom’s phone number? It means they know where Krystal is. We’re going to have to move her again. But first, I’ve got to locate Dana. Get Krystal back to Mom’s. Make sure all the doors and windows are locked, keep your gun handy just in case, and if I were you, I’d contact the S.P.P.D. and ask for cover. No, call Stella to have her take care of that, she’ll get quicker results.”
He hung up the phone, got out of the car and began pacing the driveway. It was as if Dana had disappeared into thin air. He thought he’d go mad if he didn’t come up with an idea, soon. He slumped against the side of his car and put his head in his hands. He was about to get back in the car when his pager began beeping.
THERE WAS NO TIME to c
ode in more than the address, for just then a bullet whistled past her, barely missing her. She scrambled to her feet and, changing direction, headed into the dining room, away from the hall, from Donegan’s lurching progress toward her. If she could only find a safe hiding place, until Nico got here. If she was sure of one thing, it was that he would know the message was from her, because by now, he had to be tearing his hair out, wondering what had happened to her, why she had sneaked off without him.
NICO BROKE every speed law, heading toward the Uptown area, to the address left on his pager. If the cops stopped him, so much the better, he’d have backup.
But no one stopped him and when he arrived at the house there was no car in sight. Furthermore the house looked deserted. It was already twilight and no lights were on and as far as he could tell, no curtains at any of the windows. A vacant house?
He moved stealthily around the house, looking for a way to see inside when suddenly he heard a sound like gunfire from within. No time to waste.
He ran around front and made a lunge at the door. Locked. Yelling Dana’s name, telling her to get back if she was near the door, he shot at the lock. The door sprang open at the kick of his foot and Nico crashed into the hall in time to hear another shot and watch in horror as Dana appeared in the room to his left and fell to the floor.
Nico rushed toward her just as a man with a hideously bloated face stumbled in after her, waving his weapon. Nico aimed at him, ready to shoot, but the other man gave an unholy scream, clutched his face in his hands and fell to the floor before Nico could pull the trigger.
BOTH DANA AND DONEGAN were in the hospital, Donegan with a police guard stationed outside his door.
Dana no longer needed protection, now that the threats no longer hung over her head. In the ambulance, on the way over, she’d drifted in and out of consciousness, each time she came to begging to see Krystal.
“Shock,” the doctor told Nico in the quiet of her room as they watched her drift off again. “More serious than that bullet in her shoulder. But she seems to be suffering from exhaustion, as well, and it will take a little while to get her vitals up to par.”
“Can I bring her daughter to see her? I think that would help.”
“Ah-hh, Krystal,” the doctor said.
“Right.”
“She kept muttering the name, even while she was under. I could only assume it was someone very special to her.” He scratched his head. “Don’t see why not. Probably will set her mind at rest. But let’s wait until tomorrow, she’s going to be in and out of it most of tonight. More out than in, is my guess, and she needs as much rest as she can get.”
“If you don’t mind, I’m going to sit with her for a while longer,” Nico said.
“It’s what I’d do if I were in your place,” the doctor said with a grin, “that’s a beautiful lady you’ve got there.”
They shook hands and the doctor ambled down the hall. A man with tired feet but a wide-awake heart, Nico thought.
He went back into Dana’s room and pulled a chair up to the side of the bed. He lifted her hand and stared at it. So fragile-looking, and like her face and neck, so pale.
He had a flashback image of those little hands holding that big police weapon and he softly chuckled.
Her hand twitched and he looked up and saw that her eyes were open.
“Thanks,” she rasped. She seemed to have cotton mouth and he held her water up so she could sip through the straw.
He shook his head and took her hand in his again. “No thanks to me, love. You really saved yourself. I got there in time to see you go down and Donegan right behind you. I didn’t save you from anything.”
“You were there, you came and got me,” she whispered.
“Oh, Dana, I pray I’ll always be able to be there for you.”
“Krystal?” she asked.
“Safe and sound with Heather. Your Prince Charlie had someone call and give Heather a phony message so they wouldn’t be there when you called to check.”
“Krystal was never…”
“Not for a minute. She’s never laid eyes on Donegan up to and including today.”
Tears slid beneath Dana’s lashes and her grin was tremulous. She nodded, her mind at rest at last.
“I’ll bring her to see you right after breakfast,” Nico promised.
Dana tried to wet her lips with her tongue. Nico saw that and gave her another drink.
“Donegan?”
He cleared his throat. “We found the handcuffs on the tub in the basement, he didn’t…hurt you, did he?”
“He was mostly a gentleman,” Dana replied, squeezing his hand as firmly as she could manage. “He didn’t mean me any harm but he did mean for me to die.”
She flinched as she spoke the words and then her eyelids began drooping and she drifted off, still clinging to Nico’s hand.
He carefully withdrew his hand and stood. Quietly pushing the chair back, he knelt on the floor beside the bed, took up her hand again and began to pray in a soft, beseeching tone.
Once started, he seemed unable to quit talking. It wasn’t just about keeping Dana and Krystal safe, not only about asking God to give him a chance to bring happiness into their lives. Some of it was about helping him relinquish such things as pride, arrogance, the desire for control. To give him humility. To teach him to love with an open heart rather than an open hand.
And last, he asked, “Lord, let me always be worthy of her love.”
A nurse had started into the room, seen him there, heard that he was praying, and quietly backed out, her eyes filling with tears. She was head nurse, Myra Jackson. All of her staff referred to her as Jack the Bear. She snuffled into a tissue before returning to the desk.
Nico was about to rise when he felt Dana’s hand on his head, her fingers inching through his hair.
He lifted his face and saw that she was conscious again. He turned her hand over and kissed the palm. The floor felt like solid stone beneath his knees but he stayed there just the same.
“Go home…rest,” Dana whispered.
Nico shook his head. “I want to be with you.”
“We have…whole lives,” she stammered.
He got the paper cup and held the straw to her lips.
“I want you to leave while I’m awake,” Dana persisted. “Want to think about you…us.”
He had to laugh at that. “You’re adorable,” he said, kissing her hand again.
She made a face and pointed to her lips. “Don’t waste…” she murmured.
He laughed again and stood up to lean over her. His kiss, though infinitely gentle, lingered a long time, softly moving over her mouth, nipping with his lips at hers, his tongue laying the dryness. She opened her mouth to let him in and he drew back.
“None of that naughty French kissing tonight, my girl. Your doctor would kill me.”
She gave him one of her adorable pouts, the one that showed her dimple and gave her lips that bee-stung look. Or was that from his kiss?
“Oh, you fight dirty, my love,” he whispered with a growl.
“Go home,” she ordered, grinning at him. “I have…reputation to protect.”
“I’ll see you first thing tomorrow,” he reiterated.
“Yeah.” She smiled and closed her eyes.
But she wasn’t asleep. She felt him kiss her cheek, heard his footsteps moving to the door, heard the door close with a gentle snick.
She drifted off with a smile on her face, thinking about having Nico in her bed, in her life, forever.
SHE DIDN’T KNOW how much time had passed, but she came awake with a start, more alert than she’d been since Donegan’s bullet brought her down.
The door was slightly ajar and a bit of light spilled into the room from the dim night-lights in the hall. Dana lay there, listening. Silence. Long after visiting hours were over, she guessed, a long time since Nico had left. Probably only a skeleton crew on night shift. She listened for the sound of rubber soles on the tiled floors, th
e swish of uniforms. Nothing.
She turned onto her left side, aware for the first time of the heavy bandages on her right shoulder. A throbbing there suggested she’d soon need pain medication. Would they come in at the scheduled time for her meds or was she expected to ring for them when the need arose?
Wait and see. She sighed happily. All the trauma and threats were over. She’d hold her little girl in her arms tomorrow. Well, one arm, anyway. And she’d see Nico again. Her heart seemed to want to burst from all the love there.
And then she heard a sound at the door. She started and then laughed softly as she turned onto her back. The door was closed, the room in full darkness. “Nico, you fool, what are you doing back here?”
No answer. She felt a tremor move down her spine. She lifted her head, trying to see, making a ribald comment about alley cats and prowling at night.
The words were muffled as a pillow came down over her face, pushing her head against her own pillow.
She tried to fight, but handicapped by her shoulder, remnants of anesthesia and pain meds, her movements were slow, ponderous, ineffectual.
She was losing the battle, on the verge of suffocation.
Donegan. How had he found the strength to pull this off, and how had he got past the guard?
NICO WAS ALMOST at the Lexington exit in St. Paul. His parents had insisted he come no matter how late it was, and tell them everything that had occurred and how Dana really was.
He’d automatically put his hand in his pocket, reaching for cigarettes that he hadn’t carried in years, when his hand closed around his pager. Funny, he thought, I never put it there.
He pulled it out. Dana’s pager. He panicked for a moment and then realized she wouldn’t really need it tonight. She was most likely down for the count until morning and besides, the villain was locked in a room on another floor with a cop stationed outside.
He put the pager back. He’d return it in the morning. He patted his jacket pocket and signaled his turn onto Grand.
He hadn’t seen Grand Avenue in its late-night deserted state since he was in college and customarily come home well after closing hours. Come to think of it, it had been quite a while since he’d stayed out this late, even on a date.