Close To Home_A Sam Prichard Mystery

by David Archer

  Indie was going into labor.

  “Hey, are you okay?” The people standing around the car were staring, not sure what to do.

  “I called 911,” said another man, “there’s an ambulance on the way.”

  “Thank you,” Sam called out. He forced himself upward and climbed out onto the rear deck of the car, then hobbled around to the passenger door. He tried to open it, but it wouldn’t release.

  “Indie? We need to get you out of there.” She nodded, and Sam reached through the broken window and got her under the arms. As she pushed with her feet, he lifted her enough to help her stand, and then picked her up and lifted her bodily over the ruined door. When he set her on her feet, she was staring at the car.

  “Oh, Sam, your car…”

  “Forget the car,” Sam said. He reached back into the car and picked up her phone, slipping it into his own pocket for the moment. “There’s an ambulance coming, honey, just hold onto me for a minute till it gets here. Are you hurting anywhere?”

  She looked up at him, with her eyes wide, then suddenly grimaced. “You’re damned right I’m hurting,” she yelled. “I’m having a baby, you idiot!”

  The rattling foghorn sound of an approaching ambulance was suddenly heard, and Sam helped Indie sit on the back end of the car as it maneuvered through traffic and into the parking lot. She was doubled over in pain, one arm wrapped around her belly while her left hand squeezed Sam’s hand so hard he was almost ready to scream. The ambulance stopped close by and the paramedics leaped out while Sam started shouting to them that his wife was going into labor.

  “Okay, let us have her,” said one of the paramedics. He pushed Sam gently away, then wrapped his arms around Indie and started walking her toward the ambulance.

  The other one took hold of Sam’s arm and pulled on him. “Sir,” she said, “how badly are you hurt?”

  Sam tried to push her away. “I’m fine, don’t worry about me,” he said. “We gotta get her to the hospital…”

  “Sir, you’re bleeding,” the paramedic said. “We’ve got to see how bad it is, please.”

  Sam looked at her for a moment, and then glanced down at himself where the paramedic was pointing. A bright red something was sticking out of his chest, and Sam felt a detached sense of curiosity about what it could be. The color looked so familiar, but he just wasn’t sure…

  Holy crap, he thought, that’s a piece of my car! That’s a shard of the fiberglass from the front end of my freaking car!

  Suddenly, there was excruciating pain and Sam’s legs almost collapsed under him. The paramedic caught him and helped him walk to the ambulance, where it took both of them to help him get inside. They put him into a seat, because Indie was laying on their gurney, and the paramedic began checking his vital signs.

  Two squad cars arrived, and one of the officers asked Sam what had happened. He gave a short explanation of the events that led up to the crash, but then the paramedics told the officer they could talk to Sam at the hospital. A moment later, with Sam, Indie and the officer reassured that he wasn’t going to die on the spot, the ambulance took off toward it.

  Over the protests of the paramedic, Sam took out his phone and called his mother. “Mom,” he said, “we’re not going to make it. Go with the security guys, just to be safe.”

  “Samuel? Samuel, what is wrong?”

  “We sort of had a wreck,” Sam said, “and then Indie went into labor. We’re on the way to the hospital. I’ll call you as soon as I can.” He ended the call over his mother’s protests, then dropped it back into his pocket.

  20

  When the ambulance arrived at the hospital emergency room, two orderlies were waiting for it. One had a wheelchair, and they helped Sam into it as the paramedics pulled the gurney out and rushed Indie inside. One of the orderlies pushed the wheelchair, and they put the two of them into adjacent exam rooms. The center curtain was pulled back, so they could see each other.

  “Is this your first baby?” The nurse asked Indie the standard questions, while another one was checking her blood pressure and other vital signs. “Just relax, honey, you’re doing fine.”

  Another nurse was going over Sam, and had already helped him take off his jacket, then cut away his shirt. “Sir? We’re going to have to take you down to x-ray. We need to find out just how deep this thing has penetrated, okay?”

  “Like hell,” Sam growled. “That’s my wife over there, having my baby! I’m not going anywhere!”

  “Sir, we have to get an x-ray. We’ll only be a few minutes, I promise you, but we’ve got to get an x-ray to see just how long this thing is. That’s the only way we can…”

  Sam pushed the nurse away and grabbed the fiberglass shard that was sticking out of his chest. It was just over his left nipple, he figured, and appeared to be going in at an angle, so he wrapped his hand around it and pulled. It came out with a ripping sound, and blood began to pour down his side, under his armpit.

  Sam held the piece and looked at it. “About seven inches,” he said. “Only about two inches of it was stuck inside me and oh my God, that hurts!”

  The nurse’s eyes were probably as wide as they had ever been, and she suddenly stuck her head out through the curtain. “Doctor Miller,” she shouted, “Doctor Miller, get in here, STAT!”

  A doctor stepped through the curtain and looked at Sam, who was still holding the bloody shard. “He ripped it out,” the nurse said. “I told him we had to get an x-ray to see how deep it was, and he just ripped it out!”

  Doctor Miller looked at the wound, then gently took the shard from Sam and looked it over. A moment later, he looked into Sam’s eyes. “That was about the dumbest thing you could have done,” he said. “This thing was just long enough that it could have reached an artery. You’re an extremely lucky man, do you know that?”

  “Look, Doc, I…”

  “Shut up,” the doctor said. “Now, if you had let us take an x-ray, we could have gotten that out of there without doing any further damage, but you’ve managed to rip yourself wide open. This is a piece of fiberglass, and the way it’s broken tells me it probably came off of a car. The edges were jagged, and you probably got bits and pieces of fiberglass still stuck inside the wound. What you’re going to do now is lay still, while I try to get all of them out.”

  The doctor barked a few orders at the nurse, who rushed out and returned a few moments later with a stainless steel tray. On it were numerous surgical implements, and she set it on a wheeled table that she pushed over near the doctor. He was drawing liquid into a syringe, and then thumped it to get the air out before quickly jabbing it into the area around the wound.

  “This is a local anesthetic,” he said. “The pain should go away in a moment, and it’ll let me do what I’ve got to do to try to fix the damage you caused. I understand that’s your wife beside you, and you are perfectly free to watch what’s going on, but if you so much as move while I’m trying to clean this up you could make things a whole lot worse. You understand?”

  Sam looked up at him. “I understand,” he said. “Listen, I need to get word to somebody upstairs. There’s a Deputy Jenkins up on the fourth floor, and I need to talk to him right away.”

  “I’ll see what I can do about that,” the doctor said. He glanced at the nurse, who nodded and stepped out again. “Now, hold still.”

  Sam turned his head to watch what was going on with Indie. There were two nurses over there, now, and one of them was encouraging her to breathe through a contraction. The other was setting up an ultrasound device, and a moment later another woman arrived to operate the machine.

  Sam watched as they squirted gel onto her belly, and then the ultrasound tech did her job. He could hear them talking, and was relieved to hear that the baby seemed to be all right. One of the nurses told her that she was in early labor, and should do her best to make herself comfortable in between contractions.

  The nurse came back a few minutes later. “Doctor? The deputy is here.”

/>   Doctor Miller nodded. “He can come in,” he said. “Just tell him not to breathe on my patient.”

  Jenkins stepped through the curtain a few seconds later and looked at Sam. “Good Lord, Sam,” he said. “What the hell…”

  “Samara spotted us,” Sam said. “He turned on the lights and tried to get me to stop, but I knew the car. Chased me across half of Denver, I think, and I wiped out trying to make a turn. Piece of fiberglass from the hood got me, and Indie has gone into labor. Last I saw of Samara, he was running from a couple of other squad cars. You heard anything?”

  “Only that he’s still on the loose,” Jenkins said. “I don’t know how, but he gave the officers the slip and got away. I heard there was a wreck involved, but I didn’t know it was you. You gonna be okay, Sam?”

  “Of course I am,” Sam said. “I’ve got Doctor Miller, here, taking care of me.”

  “He’ll be fine,” Doctor Miller said, “if I don’t decide to euthanize him. This idiot decided to perform surgery on himself before I could get here, could have killed himself.”

  Jenkins grinned. “Meet Sam Prichard, Doctor Miller,” he said. “There’s not a lot about him that would surprise me.” He turned his eyes back to Sam. “I’ve got the men upstairs on alert,” he said. “It sounds like Samara has a grudge against you personally. I think I’m going to put a couple of men on you, as well.”

  Sam nodded. “The way he was acting, I wouldn’t be surprised if he tries again.”

  “I’ll call it in now, Sam. Should have somebody here in fifteen minutes or so. You stay quiet and do what the doctor tells you, you hear me?” Jenkins turned and walked back out through the curtain.

  Sam glanced down at what the doctor was doing, and saw him using tweezers to pull pieces of fiberglass out of the wound. He was fascinated for a moment and watched, but then Indie groaned and his attention went back to her.

  She was having another contraction. Sam tried to think about how far apart they were, but he really didn’t know that much about women in labor. It just seemed to him that things were going a lot faster than he would’ve expected.

  There was a scream from out in the emergency room, and then Sam heard a gunshot. He reached for his pistol, but the nurse had removed it in its holster and put it somewhere out of reach. Doctor Miller pressed him back down as he tried to sit up, but Sam shoved him away.

  “Back off,” Sam said. “That son of a bitch is coming to try to kill me and my wife. Where the hell is my gun?”

  The nurse pointed to where she had laid the gun on the counter to the side of the room, and Sam slid off the table onto his feet. He felt a little wobbly, but managed to hobble across and grab the pistol out of its holster, then eased up to the curtain.

  “All of you stay out of sight,” he said. “I’ll handle this.”

  “Mr. Prichard, you’re still bleeding profusely,” the doctor said, but Sam ignored him. He found the gap in the curtain and poked his head out quickly, and saw Jenkins laying on the floor, blood pooling around him. There was no sign of Samara, but there was no doubt in Sam’s mind that was who fired the shot that took the deputy down.

  “Stay here,” he said. He stepped into the emergency room, his gun held at the ready as he scanned the area. There was no one in sight at the moment, and Sam figured everyone had ducked into whatever cover they could. He slowly walked down the aisle between the examination rooms and finally spotted a nurse who was bent over a small child on an examination table. She was obviously trying to protect the child with her own body, and Sam felt a split second of great admiration.

  “Where did he go?” Sam asked, and the nurse turned her head to look at him.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I think I heard the elevator.”

  Sam took one more quick look around, then ran as quickly as he could with his bad hip to the elevator. The indicator overhead said it was on the fourth floor, and Sam pushed the button to call another one down. The one beside it opened immediately, and Sam got in and pushed the number four.

  Several gunshots rang out overhead, and Sam allowed himself to hope that the deputies had put an end to Daniel Samara. He braced himself against the wall of the car as the elevator came to a stop and the doors opened, then quickly stuck his head out and looked toward the room where the Davises would be found.

  Both deputies were down on the floor, and Sam heard another shot ring out. He took off out the elevator, ignoring the screaming in his hip and his chest as he raced to the room. He hit the door with his shoulder and whipped around, his gun ready, but all he saw was Tom and Melinda Davis huddled together on her bed. There was no sign of Samara, so Sam checked behind the door to be safe, then looked at the frightened couple.

  “Was he here? Where did he go?”

  They shook their heads, neither of them able to speak. Sam turned and looked up and down the hallway, and that’s when he saw the streak of blood on the floor. Samara had apparently been hit in the last exchange of gunfire, and he was dripping blood.

  The radios on the belts of the deputies were squawking, and Sam reached down to grab one. He keyed the mike and spoke quickly. “This is private detective Sam Prichard,” he said. “I have three officers down and an active shooter in St. Joseph’s Hospital. The shooter is wounded, and I am trying to find him. I am injured and need all the help I can get, so send backup.”

  He let go of the button and the dispatcher came back instantly. “We’ve got help on the way, Mr. Prichard,” she said. “Stand down, let our deputies do their job.”

  Sam keyed the mike again. “And how many will die while I wait?” He dropped the radio and stepped out into the hallway, following the trail of blood.

  Something isn’t making sense, Sam thought. He came all the way up here and shot these deputies, but didn’t go after Melinda. What’s he doing?

  A moment later, Sam heard a noise ahead. The trail of blood was beginning to veer toward one of the walls, and the sound Sam heard came from a room three doors up on the right. A sign sticking out from the wall said, “Medical Supplies.”

  That was it, Sam realized. Samara was wounded, so he had gone for something to deal with the injury. He was undoubtedly planning to come back to Melinda and Tom, but Sam wasn’t about to let that happen. He eased over by the wall and moved as silently as he could toward the supply room.

  When he got to the door, he listened for a moment and then sprang into action. He leapt around and shoved the door wide open, his gun aimed ahead of him, and there stood Samara. He had apparently heard Sam coming in spite of his efforts to be quiet, because his own gun was pointed straight at the door and at Sam.

  “Drop the gun, Samara,” Sam shouted. “I got back up on the way, there’s no way out.”

  “Yeah? That’s what that asshole Rivers thought, too. How about you drop your gun? Put it down, and I’ll let you live.”

  “No way. I’m taking you in, Samara, and you’re going down. We’ve got you on at least three murders now, and I’m betting we can pin a few more on you before it’s over. Did you know your buddy Zeno was really an FBI agent?”

  Samara laughed. “He wasn’t a very good one,” he said. “Come on, Prichard, this is a Mexican standoff. If either one of us fires, the other probably will and we both die. Don’t you have a wife to get back to?”

  “Put down the damned gun,” Sam said. “I’m not gonna tell you again.”

  Samara fired once, throwing himself to the right as he did so. The bullet whizzed past Sam’s ear so close that he felt the air in its cup, and he inadvertently flinched. He squeezed off a shot of his own, but Samara had gotten behind a metal cabinet and was pushing it forward. It crashed into Sam, knocking him down onto his back, and his elbows struck the floor. His hand opened as his arm went numb, and his gun clattered to the floor and skated away.

  The cabinet was shoved aside and Samara filled the doorway, his gun aimed directly at Sam’s face. “I gave you a chance, Prichard,” Samara said. “You could have just walked away, but you
’re too stupid for that.”

  Sam looked up and realized he could see straight down the barrel of the gun. A dozen things went through his mind, but most of them was the regret that he would never see the child that was being born downstairs at that moment. He raised his eyes to look directly into Samara’s own, and the killer smiled at him.

  The shot rang out, and Sam was amazed that he was able to hear it. He would have thought the bullet would enter his brain before the sound could reach his ears, but then he saw Samara jerk. The killer turned his head to the left and started to aim his gun that way, and Sam looked to see what he was aiming at.

  “I won’t let you kill him,” screamed Melinda Davis. “I won’t let you kill anyone else!” She was standing in the hallway, holding a gun she had obviously taken from one of the fallen deputies. It was she who had fired the shot Sam heard, and now Samara was raising his gun to aim at his own pregnant daughter.

  She was holding the pistol in both hands, and squeezed the trigger again. Sam heard the bullet fly by, missing Samara completely. The evil bastard began laughing, as he took a stronger stance and leveled the gun directly at her.

  “What’s the matter, baby girl,” he said mockingly. “Did you miss Daddy?”

  Melinda screamed, a scream of rage that had no meaning other than pure hatred, and she fired once more. This time, the bullet struck Samara in the center of his forehead, and Sam was shocked to see an expression of utter surprise on his face. It wasn’t real, of course; a bullet entering the brain that way meant there was no time for any sense of surprise, no possibility of realizing what had happened. It was just that his face went slack, and that was what made it appear that way.

  And yet, somehow, Samara stood for several seconds. His arm slowly lowered, the weight of the gun pulling it downward, but it wasn’t until it was actually pointing at the floor that his knees finally gave. He dropped straight down, collapsing like a puppet whose strings had been cut, and Sam scrambled over to snatch away the gun.