Emergency Reunion

by Sandra Orchard

Cole rolled to his side and tried to push himself up. “Let him go. He didn’t—” His voice cut out on a frown.

  “You need to lie still.” Sherri exchanged a worried glance with Dan as he caught Cole’s shoulder and compelled him to stay put.

  Cole’s gaze shifted to her lips, his forehead wrinkling. “I can’t hear.” He pressed the heel of his hand to his temple, his gaze bouncing from her to the commotion around them. “I can’t hear anything.”

  She leaned over him so he’d see the reassurance in her face and maybe read her lips. “You need to lie still so we can help you.” She flicked her penlight over his eyes. “Pupils round and reactive.”

  His gaze darted back to his brother.

  She laid her palm on his pounding chest and waited until he looked at her, her own heart galloping at how vulnerable he looked lying there. “Eddie’s fine.” She stuffed down the silly disappointment that Cole hadn’t been here for her as she’d first supposed.

  “He’s got a contusion on the side of the head,” Dan reported. “No bleeding or fluid from the ears. Check for broken bones.”

  Mentally cataloging the serious injuries they could still be looking at, she continued her palpitations, her fingers trembling. “Breathe,” she coached. He’d only been here because he’d been following his brother, not her. She wasn’t to blame.

  Not this time.

  Below his hipbone, Sherri’s fingers pressed into something hard. Probing it, she felt the distinctive shape of a prescription bottle. Glancing up, she found Eddie’s gaze fixed on her hands and swallowed the bile rising in her throat. They’d been buying drugs?

  Cole’s hand locked on her wrist. “Please, don’t,” he whispered, a soul-deep pain shadowing his eyes.

  Disappointment clutched her chest. He must’ve followed his brother here, confiscated the drugs Eddie had just bought. He wasn’t helping Eddie by covering for him. But just like the silly teenager who’d have agreed to anything if it’d meant Cole would notice her, she couldn’t say no. Was ignoring what she found the same as lying? Her heart seesawed in her chest, her gaze fixed on Cole’s. His brother had held a knife to her throat. Only an idiot would keep this to herself. Eddie was a danger to himself and anyone who came between him and a fix.

  “You find something?” Dan’s voice cut into her thoughts.

  She held Cole’s gaze for a long moment. She couldn’t not keep his secret. Not after he’d just saved her hide. No matter why he’d really been here. She tugged her wrist free of Cole’s grasp and quickly palpated the rest of his leg. “No broken bones.”

  “Okay, our gurney’s toast. I’ll bring the ambulance around. We need to get it out of the way of the fire trucks anyway.”

  “I can walk,” Cole said, his hearing apparently returning. He tried pushing himself to a sitting position with a frustrated groan.

  She cupped his elbow to help him. “On a scale of one to ten, how bad’s the pain?”

  “Three,” he said through gritted teeth.

  She rolled her eyes. “I’ll give you some meds anyway, tough guy.”

  “Thank you,” he murmured.

  Warmth surged through her and with it the memory of the last time he’d thanked her for nursing his wounds. His soft kiss. Her first. And the hug that neither of them had seemed to want to end. She’d relived that moment too many times to count in the seven years since. She blinked away the memory, cleared her throat. “Just doing my job.”

  He started to shake his head, winced at the movement. “I mean thank you for trusting me.”

  Her heart flip-flopped. He was talking about the drugs he’d asked her to keep secret. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  * * *

  Two days later, Cole walked into the sheriff’s office, his head still throbbing along with his ribs, but at least his hearing was back to normal.

  Or at least enough not to miss Zeke’s gloating stage whisper to the deputy beside him that his nephew wouldn’t have been off on sick leave less than a week into a new job. Cole pressed his fingertips to his forehead and temple, wondering how much of today’s headache was due to the mild concussion the doctor said he’d suffered and how much from dreading this interview.

  He’d had every intention of handing over the drugs he’d found on Eddie to the sheriff and explaining the situation. But that was before Sherri had showed up and everything had blown apart. He hadn’t needed to hear what her partner had ranted to the deputy to know he figured Eddie had lured her there.

  He had a bad feeling that whoever made the 9-1-1 call had deliberately set up Eddie. But who? And why? Questions he had hoped to have answers to by now. Cole sliced a glance at Zeke. The whole scenario had played nicely into his disgruntled partner’s agenda, but...that didn’t mean he’d set it up.

  According to Eddie, the same guy who’d prodded him to raid Sherri’s ambulance had given him the tip on the supposed great deal at the drug house—not Zeke. Trouble was Eddie still couldn’t identify the guy.

  The deputy who’d taken control of the scene outside the drug house motioned Cole to an interrogation room. “I figured you’d appreciate some privacy. Don’t pay any attention to Zeke. Trust me, no one else wanted his nephew to get the job.”

  Taking a seat, Cole opted not to respond, since he had no idea who might be listening in on the other side of the two-way mirror.

  I hope you know what you’re doing. Sherri’s words whispered through his mind for the hundredth time as the lanky deputy straddled a chair and laid a file folder on the table.

  “Okay.” The deputy tapped his pen against the folder. “Why don’t you start by telling me why you were in the neighborhood?”

  “I already told you.” At least a half dozen times when the deputy had interrogated him in the hospital. “It’s no secret that my brother’s an addict. I spotted him sneaking out his bedroom window. Figured he was up to no good. Followed him to the drug house and yanked him out before he could make a buy.”

  “Did he stop at the variety store on the corner?”

  Cole’s insides jumped at the new question. “No.”

  The deputy studied him for an uncomfortably long minute. “You’re sure?”

  “Yes, why?”

  “The 9-1-1 call that summoned the ambulance was made from a phone booth there.”

  The knots in Cole’s neck eased at the confirmation that his brother couldn’t have secretly made the call without Cole noticing. “I already told you he didn’t make the call. Since when is a deputy’s word not a reliable alibi?”

  “You’re his brother.”

  “Yeah, and I’m Sherri’s friend.” He winced at the memory of their argument in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. She’d been furious that he’d asked her to keep quiet about the pill bottle in his pocket. Or more accurately “to shelter Eddie from the consequences of his actions.” Consequences that might get him the help he needed...or so she thought.

  Never mind that the pill bottle had turned out to be an old codeine prescription of their father’s. But yeah, the fact that Cole had asked her to conceal it a mere day after his brother had held a knife to her throat was testimony to how hard he’d smashed his head.

  Any other woman would’ve been jumping at the chance to get Eddie off the streets. Except—Cole planted his elbow on the table and buried his fingers in his hair—with her hovering over him, those beautiful blue eyes filled with concern, he hadn’t had a hope of thinking straight.

  Worse than that, he’d asked her to compromise her principles.

  “You okay?” the deputy asked.

  Cole blinked. Massaged his forehead. “Yeah, sorry, still nursing a headache.” And still nursing a seven-year-old infatuation that had started when Sherri found him pounding his fist into the fence that had separated their yards after he’d learned his father had been cheating on Mom.

  Sherri had dabbed antiseptic on his grazed knuckles, and he remembered feeling as if just by allowing her to help him, he’d been sullying her somehow,
tainting her innocence by exposing her to his family’s mixed-up morality.

  Seven years later nothing had changed. Same girl. Same infatuation. Same insurmountable obstacle of his family.

  Cole glanced at the clock on the wall behind the deputy and wondered if Dad was keeping a better eye on Eddie today. As much as he would have liked to avoid his dad, he’d had no choice but to allow Dad to visit him in the hospital to warn him about the prescription Eddie had stolen on top of sneaking out of the house to buy more drugs. The fact that Dad had seen the conversation as an invitation to pick up where’d they’d left off the day before his selfishness blew apart their family was proof of how mixed up his morality was.

  But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.

  Cole rubbed his forehead harder, wishing he could rub out the scripture verse that had flitted through his mind too many times since. He dropped his hand to the table and returned his focus to the deputy. “What are you doing to keep Sherri safe?”

  “Sending a patrol car along on any calls. Not much more we can do.”

  That was something anyway. It would give him time to hang with Eddie without having to worry about Sherri every second. Helping Eddie escape the mess he’d made of his life was the whole reason he’d moved back to Stalwart. The attacks against Sherri had sidetracked him, but getting through to Eddie was no less urgent. Kids younger than him died of drug overdoses every day. And Eddie was clearly addicted.

  The deputy grilled Cole about what he’d seen around the house before the explosion, which amounted to nothing helpful. The fire marshal had already confirmed it was a drug house, but they had yet to identify, let alone catch, the guy who’d escaped on the motorcycle.

  “The house was a rental,” the deputy explained. “And the name on the lease agreement turned out to be fake. Our working theory is that he’d already had the house rigged to blow to give himself a chance to get away if the need ever arose. It doesn’t seem likely he could’ve done it in the short time you were there.”

  Cole studied the descriptions of the renter offered by neighbors. “Yeah, I’m not buying that he’s the one targeting Sherri, either. Not when he had to know his operation would be outed by luring her to the house. I think we need to look for the guy who gave Eddie the tip.”

  “Sure.” Skepticism flickered in the deputy’s eyes. Apparently he wasn’t buying that Eddie was being framed. “But your brother’s description doesn’t give us much to go on.” The deputy closed the file. “The guy’s heavier than the motorcyclist and balding. That probably describes half the men over thirty in town.”

  Yeah, and chances were the suspect wouldn’t risk making contact with Eddie again anytime soon. But if Cole could convince Eddie to show him around his usual haunts they might find him that way.

  As Cole stepped out of the police station a few minutes later, the urge to drop in on Sherri before seeing Eddie drew his gaze across the street. The fire station blocked his view of the ambulance base, so he meandered toward the street. After all, the least he owed Sherri and Dan were coffee and a donut to thank them for yanking him away from that drug house the night before last. He pressed the butt of his hand to his throbbing temple. Besides, the caffeine might help kill his headache.

  A guy in faded jeans and a dark hoodie skulked along the side wall of the ambulance base, his hands bunched in his pockets.

  Cole quickened his steps. The guy who sideswiped Sherri’s ambulance had worn a hoodie. Cole’s gaze fixed on the punk’s pocketed hands. The uneasy feeling that they concealed a weapon tripped his pulse into overdrive.

  Sherri stepped out the front door, calling “Double? Double?” over her shoulder, oblivious to the threat lurking around the corner.

  “Watch out!” Raising his hand stop-sign style, Cole dodged traffic, narrowly escaping being hit by a horn-blaring car. He glanced at it only a moment, but when he turned back to the ambulance base, Sherri was gone.

  So was the punk.

  FOUR

  Sherri braced her hand on the door as Dan careened the ambulance onto Park Street. “Dispatch said he was on the north side of the park.” She glanced in the side mirror as a patrol car turned onto the street behind them, and wondered what Cole had been shouting about when the call blared over the loudspeakers and she’d had to dash back inside. Her mind flashed to the sight of him cupping his forehead as they’d blasted out of the ambulance bay. He should still be on bed rest.

  Dan pulled to the curb next to the four-acre park in the center of town. “He’s over there.” Dan pointed to a homeless man ranting at a rose bush. He wore several layers of filthy shirts and pants that once might have been tan in color. “It’s Harold again.”

  “Yay,” Sherri said mockingly. He was one of their frequent flyers and it was always a toss-up as to which personality they’d be dealing with. To make matters worse, he was borderline diabetic and lately he’d been spending more time over the line than not. They unloaded their gurney from the back of the truck.

  The deputies met them at the curb. “Maybe we should handle this.”

  Harold’s gaze snapped their way and his entreaties to the rose bush grew louder. “Watch out. Hide. They’re coming. They’re coming.”

  Sherri felt sorry for the poor man. He wasn’t enough of a threat to himself or others to warrant locking him up, but he refused to stay at the shelter, where staff could help him monitor his blood sugar and his meds, if he’d take them. “Let’s see what we’re dealing with first. He’s usually harmless enough when he’s only ranting at vegetation.”

  Dan wrinkled his nose. “At least the roses might mask his BO. Last time we transported him to the ER it took half a can of air freshener to kill the smell afterward.”

  At that reminder the deputies looked a little too happy to step back and let them take the lead.

  A couple of blond-haired youngsters raced over to them from the playground and gaped up at the deputies in wide-eyed awe. “Are you going to arrest that man? He’s scary.”

  Their mother caught up to them a moment later and caught their hands. “I’m sorry. I told them to stay on the playground. I’m the one that made the call. I’ve seen him here a lot, but never like this.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” Deputy Vail said. “We’ll see to him. It’d be best if you take the children home now.”

  Sherri circled upwind of Harold so he’d see her approach and lifted her hands palms out to appear unthreatening. “Good morning, Harold. What’s bothering you today?”

  His nostrils flared. “I’m not going with you.”

  She patted the air. “That’s okay, Harold. Let’s just talk.” His breathing appeared normal. He wasn’t clutching his chest. His eyes seemed to focus on her okay, although they immediately darted back to the rosebush.

  “Don’t let her take you,” he hissed to the bush. It would’ve been comical if he weren’t dead serious.

  “He doesn’t seem disoriented,” Dan said. “Or aggressive like the last time his blood sugar nosedived. We’re likely not looking at a diabetic issue, and something tells me he’s not going to willingly let us take a sample anyway.”

  “Harold, have you had anything to eat this morning?” She took a step closer. “Can we get you something? You guys have any extra donuts in the cruiser,” she called over her shoulder to a grumbled chorus of “Ha-ha.” Harold didn’t seem to think the quip was funny, either.

  In a blur of motion he pulled a knife from his pocket—a dinner knife—but it was startling enough that the deputies closed in.

  “Get her, officers,” Harold ordered them. “She’s an alien. She’s trying to abduct me.”

  Deputy Vail motioned her back. “Okay, Harold. Take it easy.” As Vail kept him distracted, the other deputy skirted behind him and easily commandeered the knife, then cuffed him.

  Harold went berserk. “Not me. Not me.” He jerked from side to side, trying to break out of the deputy’s hold. “She’s the one you have to stop.”r />
  “Take it easy, Harold. We’ll make sure she doesn’t get you.” Deputy Vail winked at Sherri. “I guess we’d better deliver him to the ER.”

  The other deputy approached with Harold.

  “Whoa.” Vail stepped back and pinched his nostrils. “On second thought—”

  “Nope.” Dan started pushing the gurney back to the truck. “He’s all yours.”

  The deputies escorted Harold to their cruiser, but when he spotted her helping Dan load the gurney on the truck, he went berserk.

  “You won’t get away with it. I know what you are. They told me. They told me.”

  Terrific. He was hearing the voices again. She should’ve figured. Across the street passersby stopped to stare at her. Cole pulled up in his pickup. What was he doing here?

  “I’m going to get you,” Harold vowed. “As soon as I get out, I’m going to kill you!”

  The deputy shoved him into the back of the cruiser. “You don’t want to do that.”

  Cole stalked across the street, fists clenched, expression fierce, looking ready to tear the poor man limb from limb.

  My hero.

  Deputy Vail intercepted him with a palm to his chest. “This isn’t your man. He’s a regular. Made the same threat to me four weeks ago, and today I’m his best friend. Why don’t you follow the ambulance back to the base?”

  Cole held his ground for another thirty seconds, his glare burning a hole through the cruiser’s rear window, before he finally took a step back and let the deputy climb in his car.

  “What are you doing here?” Sherri allowed herself a moment to relish the sight of him back on his feet. He wasn’t in uniform, but that didn’t diminish his commanding presence one iota. And only intensified her wholly inappropriate pleasure at seeing him here looking so protective of her. “You’re supposed to be resting.”

  His surreptitious visual sweep of the surrounding park and streets before he joined her on the sidewalk chilled her a hundred times more than Harold’s empty threats. “Who was that guy? Has he threatened you like that before?”

  “He’s harmless,” Dan assured, slamming the ambulance’s rear doors shut. “He has a psychotic episode every once in a while, but he doesn’t have the power to back up his threats. And he doesn’t remember them by the time he comes back to his senses.”