Blood Games

by Lee Killough

  When he finished, Woodard stepped back with arms folded. “Well, if I hadn’t admitted you myself, I wouldn’t believe you came into the ER this morning more dead than alive. Get a good night’s sleep and in the morning maybe we’ll see about taking you in to visit Miss Lebekov. Trina, as soon as this Ringers runs out, discontinue the IV drips.”

  He breezed out with Lucas in his wake. Garreth lay with mind churning. Wait until morning? Could he afford that? Besides, though what he needed to do needed only a few moments, how could he manage that with a nurse watching? Pulling loose from the monitors would certainly have the nurses all over him.

  Shortly, Dr. Woodard came back into the corridor, giving instructions as he walked. “...holding steady in the morning we’ll transfer her to Hays, but if there’s any drop in her blood pressure or sign of more hemothorax, call me immediately. I’m going to make rounds, then I’ll be sleeping on the couch in the physicians’ lounge.”

  Garreth chilled at the tension in his voice. If Woodard was that worried, morning was definitely too long to wait to see Maggie. But if he went now, he needed move fast.

  Careful of the IV tubing, he reached out through the side rail and picked up the syringe on the bed table. A press of the plunger emptied the contents onto the floor. Then he pushed the needle through the cap on the catheter that had been used for the transfusion and drew back the plunger. The syringe filled with blood. Now all he needed was a few seconds to inject the blood into one of Maggie’s IV’s. After recapping the needle, he slid the syringe under his pillow.

  Not a moment too soon. Lucas came in to disconnect the IV and pull the catheter. While she put pressure on the insertion site, she said, “Miss Lebekov seems to be holding her own. Her blood pressure is up almost to normal and she’s beginning to respond to touch, so there’s every hope she’ll regain consciousness.” She moved a finger to check his arm and her brows rose. “You clot fast.” She moved around the bed and pulled the other catheter.

  The other nurse, who looked like a Wagnerian soprano, leaned in the door. “Are you about done there? I need to run down to my locker for a minute.”

  “Go on. I’ll be right out.”

  Brewer moved out of sight up the corridor.

  Now! “Trina.” When she looked at him he stared into her eyes. “Go back to the desk. Don’t look up from it or pay any attention to my monitors.”

  As soon as she turned her back he snatched off his leads, grabbed the syringe from under the pillow, and vaulted the side rail. Bruised muscles protested but he had no trouble standing or walking. Night and blood had worked their restorative magic. He grimaced more at the rush of air up his back as he sprinted for Maggie’s room. Hospital gowns!

  Martin glanced around as he entered, and started in a double take that almost made him drop Maggie’s hand. “Garreth? Good god! How--what--”

  Garreth waved him silent and circled to the far side of the bed. “I had to see her.” He hardly recognized her, though, with her face swollen and bruised and her body festooned like some science fiction cyborg in bandages, tubing, and wiring. The room swam in blood scent from the blood running into her. “The nurse says she’s holding her own and maybe starting to come around?”

  Martin looked down at hand he held. His grip tightened. “When I call her name, sometimes she moves. But her hands are ice cold. Her feet, too.” His voice trembled. “Her mother and my mother were like that as they went...like they died from the edges in. Maggie!” He raised his voice. “Maggie, it’s Dad. Can you hear me?”

  Did her hand move? Garreth could not be sure. He hovered in an agony of indecision. Should he give her his blood or not? Did she need it?

  But even as he asked himself, the answer slid down his spine and crawled through his gut. Before his eyes her color changed, going not so much pale as translucent, transmitting light from some unseen source. He Felt death coming.

  Do it now, man. Once the other nurse came back and they found him out of bed, his chance disappeared. But even with the syringe in hand and Martin oblivious to anything beyond Maggie’s hand and face, Garreth could not make himself reach for the IV tubing mere inches away. Voices chorused in his head. His grandmother’s on the price of forever, Irina’s pointing out how she and he hated their rapists, and loudest of all the tormented cry belonging to Christopher Stroda, suicide number whatever off the Golden Gate Bridge, brought across under exactly these same circumstances, without consent, and unable to live with what he became. No, it would be wrong to bring her over by force. She must agree.

  Surely she would. She must want to live.

  “Maggie.” He added his voice to her father’s, putting all possible persuasive power into his words. “Maggie, wake up! Open your eyes and let me talk to you. I’ve lost Grandma Doyle. Don’t let me lose you, too!”

  Incredibly, it seemed to work. She stirred, rolling her head, sighing. Her eyelids fluttered.

  Joy lighted Martin’s face. “That’s it, Maggie girl! That’s it! Come back to us!”

  Garreth felt himself grinning, too. Contrary to his Feeling, maybe she was going to be all right without his blood.

  The grin died as he noticed her chest tube. Blood trickled through it. A trickle turning to a scream as he watched.

  An inner voice screamed: Now! Screw consent. You can help her adjust. So do it now you stupid flatfoot or you’re going to lose her! But even while his head urged action, he shouted, “Nurse!”

  They came in seconds, followed seeming seconds later by other nurses and aides. Garreth dropped the syringe in the waste basket and backed into the corner. Brewer reached for the joystick on Martin’s wheelchair to back the wheelchair away from the bed. “We need you out of the way.”

  Fear twisted Martin’s face. “What’s happening?”

  No one had time to answer in the scramble to administer drugs and more blood. The stream in the chest tube thickened. Woodard arrived panting, but still with breath enough to rattle off orders while he grabbed one of the blood bags and squeezed, trying to push blood into her faster. Then, suddenly, the stream became a gush. The smell of blood flooded over Garreth. She stopped breathing. The cardiac line on the monitor fluttered, hiccupped, and went flat.

  Its single high, monotonous tone overrode every other sound in the room.

  The nurses and doctor stared at the monitors, then each other, faces grey with defeat. Woodard laid down the half-emptied blood bag and in a voice as flat as the cardiac line, said, “Time of death is ten-oh-four p.m.” He turned toward Martin. “I’m so very sorry.”

  “No!” Martin stared at the bed in disbelief. “No! I don’t understand. What happened?””

  Guilt ripped through Garreth. Why did all the big decisions in his life come down to lose-lose? Damned if he dragged her across to a life that might freak her out, and certainly damned for standing with life in his hands and just letting her die.

  “We need an autopsy to tell us, “ Woodard said.

  Garreth had one guess. Marti had talked about one of her patients she lost this way...whose aorta had been abraded by the collision of internal organs during the crash, weakening the wall to the point that when blood pressure came up to normal, it ruptured.

  The stricken expression on Martin’s face wrenched at him. He came out of his corner around the bed. “Martin.”

  Everyone stared, noticing him for the first time.

  Dr. Woodard recovered first. His sigh echoed of bone deep weariness. “I won’t ask how you manage to be in here. You appear to be not only part Lazarus but part Houdini. I won’t even suggest you return to bed since you clearly value your own medical opinions over mine and the bed can be put to better use for patients who want help.” Pulling the half glasses from his scrub shirt pocket, he headed for the nurse’s station.

  Leaving Garreth feeling like a dog accident on the carpet. He cringed inwardly under the stares, some curious, some exasperated, of the departing crash team. He pulled the gown together behind him.

  Lucas and B
rewer began disconnecting their equipment from Maggie...pulling off leads and removing catheters.

  Martin watched, stone-faced. “I wish to God I still had legs so I could help you hunt down those cop killing bastards!”

  Anger flared in Garreth. Bitterly he reflected that the county attorney should have no question now how to charge the three.

  As the nurses finished, they smoothed the sheets and drew them up to Maggie’s chin. Lucas turned to Martin. “Can I get you anything? Call someone for you?”

  He shook his head. “I just want to stay here with her for a while.”

  “As long as you like. But you--” She stabbed a finger at Garreth. “--back to bed. No arguments!” she said as he opened his mouth. “People accomplish astounding feats when they’re pumped up, but I think your adrenalin is running out. Look how you’re shaking. Let me help you back before you collapse.”

  He was trembling, he realized, but from emotion...grief, guilt, anger. Martin’s words reverberated through him. Those cop killing bastards stole life from him he could not bring himself to give Maggie, who deserved it infinitely more!

  “Officer Mikaelian!”

  He nodded. Anger and vengeance cried for him to start hunting now, but emotion would only cloud his judgment. He needed to sit back and plan. More, he needed to stage a suitable “recovery” period.

  Martin clamped a hand around his wrist. “You catch them for me, Garreth! You make them pay for what they’ve done to my little girl!”

  Anger fed in through the touch. Garreth gripped the back of the hand on his wrist. “You’ve got my word!” He had to catch them! He had the only chance at tracking a vampire, and if they turned out to be merely human, they still might carry a vampire time bomb in their blood. Maggie’s death ratcheted the manhunt up to a whole new level of intensity...which could end in bloodshed. He needed to find them first, to capture them alive so they remained human.

  Chapter Seven

  They discharged him to the medical ward the next morning. Where his resolution to play sick faltered when a lab tech came in to draw blood from him.

  She looked shocked at his refusal to let her. “But it’s for tests your doctor’s ordered.”

  “Which I decline to have.”

  Of course he had to repeat the refusal to the floor nurse, and then Woodard...who eyed him in utter disgust and stalked away, telling the nurse: “Don’t bother arguing; just log his refusal in the chart.”

  Garreth tried to sleep, but could not find a comfortable place or position in the bed. Every inch of the sheets felt hot and sticky, and wrinkled in creases sharp as edged weapons. The two times he did start to doze he faced the albino, grinning at him through the van’s windshield, and heard Maggie’s scream, then spun off into a blackness filled with mocking laughter. He started awake with his head throbbing from anger and the glare coming through the blinds the old man sharing the room insisted be kept wide open.

  The old man also complained loudly to the aide picking up their lunch trays, “He didn’t eat at all, not a bite...just messed everything up with his fork! Young people don’t know how to appreciate food anymore. They wouldn’t have to worry about gaining weight if they’d get out and do some work in the world, not just sit around on their backsides watching TV and playing computer games!”

  Garreth cursed silently. Just what he needed for a roommate, a stoolie!

  The deputy who appeared with at mid-morning with the Identikit to help Garreth put together composite sketches of the suspects provided the one bright spot in the morning.

  Reflecting back as he lay fighting the sheets and contemplated raiding the old man’s flowers for moss and soil to dump under the bottom sheet, Garreth realized that his restlessness came not from being unable to sleep but resentment at being idle while the albino and his bobbsey bitches roamed free. Instead of wasting time here he should be out tracking them down! He phoned the Sheriff’s Office to see if they had been spotted yet.

  To his frustration, no one had seen them or the van.

  Late in the afternoon Reichert dropped by, sitting down in a chair he dragged over to the bed. “I want you to know I understand how you feel about finding these dirtbags--we all want them--but can I ask you to quit bugging my dispatchers asking if we’ve heard anything? I give you my word we’ll let you know the minute we have anything.”

  Garreth frowned in protest. “I haven’t been--”

  Reichert interrupted with a cluck of his tongue. “One or two calls an hour, according to them. Even Emma’s protesting and you know she feels you can do no wrong.”

  Because fifteen years ago when she was kidnaped during an attempted jail break, Garreth had been the officer who slipped in through the rear of the barn where the kidnapper held her and rescued her. He winced in chagrin at leaving her in the position of being annoyed but reluctant to tell him so. “I’m sorry. Lying here all I can do is think about--”

  “I understand,” Reichert said. “But from now on wait for us to call you. Okay? We’ll let you know as soon as there’s any new development. There’ve been sightings of similar vans, but none had left front fender damage.” Reichert grimaced. “The vehicle description didn’t give us any hits from NCIC, so apparently it isn’t stolen, and while the suspect descriptors turned up some possible matches, none look like our guy. We’ve photocopied and faxed out the sketches you put together this morning. Maybe they’ll produce something. One thing we have accomplished... processing your car.”

  His pleased tone brought Garreth sitting up and leaning toward him. “You found some good prints?”

  “Yep.” Reichert drew the word out into two syllables. “Before I forget, I have a carton of the personal stuff we salvaged sitting down at the office for you, except for your radio, which I returned to your office. Here’s what we took off you in the ER.” He handed Garreth a manila envelope.

  Garreth emptied the envelope into his lap. Along with the contents of his pockets and his cell phone, out fell his glasses. Scratches marred the mirror lenses and the frame had bent, but straightening the frame the best he could, Garreth longed to slip them on. “Tell me about the prints.”

  Reichert nodded. “A recent wash and wax--thank you for that--made a near clean surface to start with, then the crash damage and the coat of road dust gave us the perfect device for identifying post-crash prints.”

  For a moment Garreth heard nothing beyond “crash damage.” His stomach lurched. Though he had heard the windows breaking and the top crumpling, until this moment he never considered what that meant in terms of the car’s physical condition. “How much crash damage?”

  Reichert grunted. “You heard me say ‘salvage’, didn’t you? The car landed upright, but the suspension didn’t take at all kindly to that, and we had to cut the top off and pry the doors open to pull you out. You’ve worked enough accidents to imagine its condition now.” Reichert cocked a brow. “So...about the fingerprints.”

  “Go on.” But while Garreth listened, he stared into a gaping hole torn inside him, watching Marti disappear down it...now truly lost to him, their last physical link gone.

  “Once we eliminated everyone in the rescue group, we had prints from two individuals, the juvie females judging by the size, so either the male didn’t come down or he was careful not to touch the car.”

  Did not come down to the car, Garreth guessed, because if he came down, why stand back and let the girls have all the fun cutting up dying cops?

  “The females didn’t take much care, though. We lifted good prints from the roof above each door--good thing we cut off the roof instead of prying it up or we’d have damaged them like the ones on the doors--and we have two complete hand prints just behind the driver’s door. It looks like when they came down the hill one of them stopped by catching herself against the car. Now we just have to catch these freaks so we have someone match prints to.” He grimaced. “Too bad the male didn’t touch the car. I’ll lay bets we’d get a hit on him.”

  Maybe not. St
aying in the van suggested the albino wanted to avoid the sun, and that in turn favored the albino being a vampire. Cold settled into his gut. If that were indeed the case, the question became: how old, how powerful a vampire? He can destroy you, Grandma Doyle said.

  Reichert leaned back in the chair and propped a boot on the opposite knee. “Since he hasn’t been kind enough to supply prints we’re trying to reach the owner of the Lexus the tags belong on. She hasn’t reported the tags stolen so I’m hoping she’s involved with the suspect and can give us a name. In the meantime I called Colby to see if what happened there gives us anything useful. The story is, a housekeeper at the Ramada Inn found blood in a cup in a room registered to a Gerald Greenstreet of Cheyenne, Wyoming. She also found wet towels in the bathroom that someone had tried to wash bloodstains out of and a wet discoloration on the carpet where it looked like someone tried to clean up blood there. She called the manager, who called the police. It was blood, but turned out to be animal blood, probably from the dog they found with its throat cut in one of the motel dumpsters. But before they learned it was animal blood, Colby ran Greenstreet’s DL and his tag number from the registration through the Wyoming DMV. The tag came back on a burgundy 1998 Lincoln Continental, and Greenstreet’s driver’s license describes him as forty-five years old, five-eleven, a hundred ninety five pounds, brown hair, brown eyes.”

  “Obviously not the albino.” Garreth pursed his lips.

  Reichert nodded. “Colby called this Greenstreet, who said yes, he had checks stolen, but it happened about a year ago and he has no idea who stole them or how. The suspect’s description didn’t ring any bells. We’ve faxed the albino’s sketch to the Cheyenne PD and asked if they’ll show it to Greenstreet. I’m hoping a picture will jog his memory.”

  Just the albino’s picture? “What about the bobbsey bitches? He--”

  “Bobbsey bitches?” Reichert’s brows hopped. “That’s cute.”