by Julie Vail
“Shit,” muttered Gonz. Alex came back around, started to say something, then stopped. I held what was left of PFC Alton’s head. He deserved more.
“You’re good, son. You’re okay now. Go to sleep. Sleep it off, now . . . there you go . . .” He moaned again, his body took one final spasm, then he slumped against me.
I got out from under him, and lay him flat. I heard the scream of the paramedics as they pulled up and rushed in.
“Woman’s alive, but in bad shape,” Alex started, giving enough due respect to the dying marine before taking care of business once again. We all had our jobs. “Hit in the gut. Clerk is dead behind the counter, woman is dead by the door, old guy behind me . . . dead.” To the paramedics who had just entered, he said, “Take care of her first,” showing them down the next aisle. I walked past and saw her slumped against the canned goods, holding her stomach. She was bleeding profusely, and I could see by her eyes that she was close to losing it. I heard a movement behind me. I turned and drew down.
“Mama?” She stood just outside the plastic vertical strips that separated the back cooler from the store. Her pink dress was dotted with blood, as was her brown face. Her black hair, held back with two Dora the Explorer barrettes, sparkled with what appeared to be glue, and then I saw that the glass door to the dairy case was shattered, and milk was running in rivulets down the shelves and out onto the floor. The elderly man lay in front, glass surrounding him. He, too, had been christened with the gluey substance. A pint of sour cream, what was left of it, lay in his closed hand. The little girl had been hiding in the cooler when the old man was shot. The bullet, glass fragments, and globs of sour cream blew into the cooler where she stood. She was no older than three.
I knelt down in front of her. “What’s your name, sweetheart? Como se llama?”
She did not take her eyes off her mother.
“Can I look at your face, mi’ja? Su cara?”
She turned her eyes on me and nodded.
“Bueno.” I smiled. I gently checked her over. Glass was imbedded in her face, and she winced when I touched certain places.
“Okay, sweetheart. What’s your name, baby? Como se llama?”
“Mama?” Her eyes were back on her mother.
“Please,” she whispered softly. “My baby . . . please . . .” Her eyes met mine.
“Where are you taking her?” I asked the paramedic.
“St. John’s.” They lifted the woman onto the gurney.
“My baby,” she pleaded. “Isabel!”
“Mama!”
“I’ll bring her along,” I said, taking Isabel’s hand in mine. “I’ll bring her to the hospital.” The paramedics wheeled the woman down the aisle.
“Mama! Mama! Mama!”
I knelt down in front of her. “Shhh. Listen to me, now. Isabel, listen to me now. Mama toma hospital. Comprende?” I glanced at Alex. He knew my Spanish was shit.
“Esta bien, Isabel,” Alex said.
“Mama.” She stared at the place her mother lay seconds ago. Blood covered the floor. I picked the little girl up in my arms and carried her outside. She rested her head on my shoulder, and I held her until she picked her head up again, then I set her down. I, too, was covered in blood. Her pink dress came away with a faint red patch running the entire length. Alex came outside.
“Now what?”
“Coroner needs to get in there before we can finish. Let me take her to the hospital, make sure she’s with a family member, and I’ll meet you back here.”
Alex glanced over at Gonz and Shin. “Hang on a minute.” He walked over to where Gonz and Mike Shin were standing. Officers Laborteaux and Jakes were standing on the sidewalk outside the market. I wondered how long Jakes would last before he became an asshole, too. A moment later, Alex was back.
“They’ll handle things till we get back. Let’s go.”
I crouched own in front of the little girl. “We’ll see mama now. Vea mama. Si?”
“Mama.”
“Yes, we’ll go see mama now, honey.” I looked up at Alex.
“She’s in shock, Johnny. Let’s go, huh?”
“C’mon, sweetheart.” I picked her up and carried her to our car. I got her seated in the back, and turned to see Jakes alone in front of the store. He was young. Probably fresh out of the academy, and he walks in to find three dead bodies, a possibly fatal injury, and a suicide, all in one convenient location. And he got stuck with the worst of the worst to learn from. I sat in back with Isabel and held her in my arms while Alex drove. In a few minutes, she was asleep.
“Bravo 6 . . .” squawked the radio
“Six,” answered Alex. It was Gonz.
“Ortiz, the vic from the market has been transported to County . . . repeat, vic from market shooting is being transported to County Hospital. Get back here and call CFS.”
“No,” I said from the back seat. The kid was traumatized enough. Just what she needed—to be handed over to an overworked social worker from Child and Family Services.
“Negative. See you later. Six, out.” Alex turned the car around and got on the 10 freeway and headed toward downtown.
When we got to County I had Alex park in the ambulance bay, off to the side so an ambulance rig could park, too. I carried her in through the emergency room doors and past the receptionist. They had been expecting us. A nurse came out and reached for her without a word. Isabel was having none of it. She clung to me and buried her head in my shoulder.
“We need to have a look at her, detective,” she said tersely. When I didn’t respond, she huffed impatiently. “Detective, we need to take her now.”
“Where do you want her? I’ll take her in.”
She huffed again. “Follow me.”
I followed the nurse into the ER, and placed Isabel on a narrow gurney inside a sterile room. The nurse backed me out of the room, while Isabel started to cry.
“You need to work on your bedside manner, lady,” I growled.
“Yeah? Do this for a day, then talk to me about bedside manner.”
“You really wanna compare days?” I yelled after her as she stormed away.
“What the hell are you doing?” Alex asked, standing beside me.
I stood there a moment, unable to move. I wasn’t sure if it was anger over how this nurse was treating a scared, traumatized little girl, or the events of the last hour—for that was all the time it took for one Marine and three other people to lose their lives. I heard Alex say something else—to me, I thought—then turn and talk to someone else. I felt dizzy. The room was stuffy. I looked down and saw that I was covered in PFC Alton’s blood. Had he ‘been in the shit’ as they say, or was he a ‘wannabe’ who had never seen boot camp, much less action? The elderly man who had the sour cream shot out of his hand belonged to someone, didn’t he? How about the young cashier, visibly pregnant, who lay behind the counter, shot through the right temple. I could smell all of them on me now. I turned toward Alex’s voice and then everything went black.
SEVEN
The boy sat next to his mother in the stuffy room, his sisters on the other side. The room was crowded and people fanned themselves to keep cool. It was the boy’s birthday. He was nine.
They walked across the stage single-file. His father led them.
Your father is first out, Johnny. He’s getting the top honor. The father was dressed in a full police uniform, something the boy had only seen once or twice, before his father became a detective.
He looks so handsome, his mother whispered. The father stood at attention and the man at the podium read from a paper, telling the story of the father’s bravery in the line of duty. Then he introduced Sergeant Vincent Testarossa.
The girls squealed and grabbed on to their mother, and the mother turned to the boy.
Your father’s been promoted to Sergeant, John. Isn’t that wonderful?
The father looked over and winked at the boy as he accepted his badge and his commendation. The boy was beaming with pride. He
looked over to the other side of the room and he saw the lady, the one from the park. She was smiling. But the father did not look at her. He looked at the mother instead and winked at her. The men on stage were called to receive their promotions, but the boy didn’t notice. He stared at the lady. He hoped his father didn’t see her.
When I came to, I was lying in a room. A chair, occupied by Alex, and the bed I was lying on, were the only things in the room. The odor of smelling salts still lingered.
“There he is,” said a female voice.
“You okay, bro’?” Alex’s voice was far away, and when I tried to focus on his face, it faded in and out like a spiraling top.
“Detective, are you nauseous?” the woman asked. I focused and saw she was a nurse—not the witch who’d brought us in here. This was good.
I tried to sit up. “No, I’m fine.” I was embarrassed. This had never happened to me before, and I’d seen just about everything: decomp, puke, shit, guts hanging out, pus oozing from wounds . . . and I pick this time to pass out? I sat up and took a couple of deep breaths and in a moment, I felt close to human again.
“I’ll be right back, detective. Sit tight.” I nodded. She was nice. A really nice lady. Whoa! I was woozy. What the hell was going on?
“We go back a long way, you and me,” I began. “We have shared many secrets and . . .”
Alex started laughing. “Oh, shit. You really are an asshole.” He shook his head. “Can you get up?”
I did, and nothing spun, I didn’t fall, I didn’t yak. Good. “I’m okay, Al.” I took a deep breath and looked at him. “Where’s the kid?”
“She’s been fed to the wolves. She’s in good hands, padna. She’s in a hospital, for Christ’s sake. She’s getting looked at in one of these other rooms, and by someone who pretty much looks knowledgeable. Quit worrying.”
“What about the mother?”
“Dunno. Where the hell did that nurse go? Can we leave, you think?” Alex, moving on.
“I wanna make sure that kid is okay.” I stood, and took a step toward the door. And before I could get there, the door opened, and in she walked.
“Well, hi there,” Dr. Karen Gennaro said with a grin. Then her face changed, and she looked at me with something resembling horror. I looked down and noticed that I was still covered in PFC Alton’s blood and brain matter.
“You’re not injured, are you?”
I looked down again. “No.” I looked like hell, and I knew it. But she was a sight to behold.
“Sit down, please . . . before you fall down.” She held my elbow as I sat. I was suddenly dizzy again. It was her fault this time.
“I’ll be in the lobby, bro’. Doctor?” Alex raised his hand and retreated.
“Detective,” she responded. She studied me. “I’ll be right back. Don’t move.”
“Not at all?”
She smiled. “Not at all.” She left the room, and a moment later she was back.
“Put this on, before you freak out my patients.” She tossed something in my direction. I opened it and saw it was a scrub top, like the one she was wearing, only darker.
“You’re serious?”
“It’s a rare day that I’m anything else.”
I stared at it. “And I’m supposed to go back to the station in a . . . what is this thing?”
“Scrub top . . . yes, please.” She stood with her arms folded and a smirk pasted on her puss.
I started to pull my shirt out of my pants, checking with her for a reaction, and getting none. I took it off, wadded it up and set it on the chair Alex occupied a moment ago. My gun banged against my hip as I moved around, and I caught her staring at it. A nurse entered—the rude one from earlier—and set a bucket with soapy water, a wash rag, and a large towel on the bed next to me. The blood had seeped through my shirt. I was covered in it. I stared at the bucket.
“Thanks.”
“I’ll leave you . . .”
I shrugged. “Don’t bother. I’m not going to show you anymore today.” I took one of the towels and worked it under the waistband of my pants so I could stay dry, then took a washcloth, got it wet, and ran it over my torso. I had to do it a couple of times before I was clean. I took the towel out of my pants and pulled the scrub top over my head. It was snug.
“This should go over big at the stationhouse,” I said, spreading my arms out.
“You think the ‘Night of the Living Dead’ look is better?” She paused. “It’s a little small. Let me see if I can find a bigger size.”
“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”
“It’s a good color on you.” She stared, not moving. “You fainted.”
“Yeah. What are you doing here—not that I mind, or anything—”
“This is where I like to hang out when I’m not in surgery.” Then I remembered the trauma/critical care/emergency medicine title. She reached for a blood pressure cuff. “Has that ever happened to you before?” The sound of Velcro ripping apart echoed in the otherwise quiet room.
“What, the fainting?”
She smiled. “Yes, the fainting.”
“Nah.”
“I see.” She paused. “You and I should play poker sometime.” She took my arm, stretched it out, slipped it under her arm, and wrapped the cuff around my bicep.
“I’d like that,” I said, before I realized she was politely calling me a liar. I felt hot embarrassment creep up my neck. My wrist rested against the outline of her breast, and my fingertips grazed her bra through the thin material of her scrub top. She pumped the do-dad and the cuff tightened around my arm.
“Might want to get that checked out. I can refer you to someone.”
“I like to put particularly embarrassing moments out of my mind, doctor, not explore them.”
“You’re BP is very low—ninety over sixty-two.” She ripped off the cuff and hung it back up. “Did you eat today?”
“No.”
“It’s hot.”
I smiled. “Yes.”
She arched a brow. The last thing she needed was to be ogled by a battle-weary detective. But that’s what I was doing. Ogling. God, she was beautiful.
“You’re probably dehydrated. Just sit a minute, okay?”
“You’re the doctor.”
“Yes, I am,” she said without humor, and walked out. She returned a moment later with a big Styrofoam cup of ice water.
“Thank you,” I said, after I drank the entire thing down. She turned to the sink and filled it again, then handed it to me.
“Ignoring this is definitely not something I recommend—professionally speaking. Personally speaking, it happens to the best of us.”
“Oh, really?”
“Mmm hmm.”
“And you have first hand experience?”
“Mmm hmm.” She cleared her throat. “What I am about to tell you is highly classified, and it is going to make your day.”
“I’m listening.” I drank my water.
“It was the first day of Anatomy, the class in med school where you actually get to work on a cadaver. The competition was fierce,” she whispered excitedly. “I was so excited, so looking forward to it. I was all prepared. I couldn’t wait.” She stared at me for a second. “You know, I’m revealing a secret to you that I have never shared with anyone. I can trust you?”
I nodded and stared at her a bit longer than I should have. “Yes, ma’am. I’m wearing your scrub top and everything.”
“That you are,” she smiled. “I got in there, very confident that I would find all the parts and identify them all correctly. So the professor takes the sheet off the cadaver, and the smell . . . the dead body . . . all of it. Ooof! I fainted immediately, face first onto the cadaver’s . . . umm . . .” She looked down, her face crimson.
I laughed. “You didn’t.”
“I did, and there wasn’t much left, either.” She reached for the blood pressure cuff again Her touch was electric, and my arm tingled under her fingers. “That part kind of shrivel
s up when you’re dead, no matter what you were blessed with while alive.” She stared at the monitor again. “Better. One hundred over eighty. Your BP normally good?”
“Yes.” I took more water. “That’s a good story, Gennaro.”
“I had quite the rep in med school after that. I can’t begin to tell you all the nicknames they gave me. So, you see? You’re not alone here. And as embarrassing situations go, mine wins.”
“Hands down.” I finished the water and tossed the cup in the trash. “You know anything about the little girl we brought in—Isabel?”
“She’s going to be fine. Some glass in her face. She’s in shock . . .”
“And the mother? She was shot . . .”
She stared at me a moment. “I’m sorry, detective. She didn’t make it. She died in the rig.”
I nodded and looked up at the ceiling. I knew how many holes—133—occupied each twelve by twelve square. I counted them before she came in and blew concentration right out the window.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Guy came into a convenience store and started shooting the place up. We think the child ran into the cooler to get away—not sure if it was before or after she saw her mother get shot. Guy fired into the glass door of the dairy case . . .”
“At her?”
“No. I think she was hiding. I’d like to think that whatever voices were telling him it was okay to blow everyone else in the store away, told him to let her be. But he shot an old man, and the bullet went through the dairy case after passing through the sour cream he was holding.”
“Ah. That explains a lot.”
“She know her mother’s dead?”
“I don’t know, detective. I’m going to leave that to the doctor treating her.” She moved away from the wall and toward the door.
“Back to business so soon?”
She stared at me, unsmiling. She probably had a hundred men a day flirting with her. I was just one more. “She’s in room six if you want to see her.”
“Hey,” I said before she walked out. “Thanks for the water. And the story.”
She smiled. “Take care, detective.”
“John.”
One more smile, and then she was gone.