"Troy," he whispered.
"Hibernating. Permanently." I hoped.
"Bet you'd rather be doing yoga," Sam mumbled.
"Bet you'd rather be watching a Cougars game." I smiled, trying to keep up his spirit. A whistle called my attention to Raul, who stood guard at the mouth of the alley between the pharmacy and a neighboring hotel. His signal meant Doctor Ramsey had arrived. "Be right back," I whispered to Sam.
Sam clutched my arm. "Jules." Through chattering teeth he managed, "I don't really... wanna be alone... right now."
"Of course not." I crawled behind him, wrapping my arm across his chest so I was hugging him from behind to hold him still.
"People like us. Eh, Jules?"
"Shhh." Instinctively I kissed his clammy temple. And again.
Sure, people like us. We didn't trust anyone. Relationships felt like tending a constant sprain, so we cultivated solitude. Alone felt safe. Fewer people to hurt. Except in moments like this, facing death, when being alone felt like terror.
Sam entwined our fingers and held my hand over his heart. His shivering escalated, like an earthquake coming into full motion, and no matter how tightly I clutched, I couldn't stop the tremors. The pain to his ribs must've been unbearable. I nuzzled his cheek just to keep myself from screaming out loud, grateful he couldn't see my eyes burning. He needed to believe I was calm, in control. The rock.
Headlights flashed into our vehicle, and Sam fumbled for his gun.
"Sam, you need to trust me." I held down his arm till his grip wilted. "You need to trust me now."
When he turned his face toward me and started to protest, I kissed him again. On the mouth. For a second he stopped shaking and pressed back with what little energy he had. Then he let go and dropped his head against my chest. Maybe I was giving us both a little hope to cling to.
I'd just tucked his weapon behind my back when Doctor Victoria Ramsey tucked her head inside the car, her white lab coat stained yellow by the dingy cab light. With jet hair, fair skin, and a pencil-thin red mouth, she looked like a sixty-year-old vampire.
One look at Sam's shaking and my scraped-up hands and she pursed her lips. "Well, let's see the rest."
"Punk jumped me." Sam shifted as she pulled up his sweatshirt. Sam wasn't lying, but Ramsey wasn't buying. She grimaced at the bruising, which under the dome light gave a whole new meaning to Technicolor.
"Save it. I know exactly what that is." She set her stethoscope to his breastplate, was silent a moment, then said, "You think after thirty years in emergency rooms I haven't seen my share of gangsters and cops? A vest spreads out the impact of the bullet, but it's still the same amount of force hitting your body. Hence the star pattern. Now breathe." She moved the instrument to various parts of his chest and listened. When she pressed at his ribs, he nearly screamed. "Between broken ribs, liquid lungs and those contusions, you've covered your most important organs. You're a fool to think you'd survive on your own. And she's an idiot for humoring you." Her glare turned on me. "You and I will have a long talk later, Missy. For now, get him into my car. And you'll have to help him walk by yourself. I have a bad back." She raised her brow in I-told-you-so fashion. "Your patient, your burden."
Remind me never to be your patient. Again.
Instead of returning to her Mercedes, Doctor Ramsey beelined for the pharmacy, presumably to chew out her husband for letting me call her.
I pulled Sam backwards till he got one foot onto the pavement, and propped him against the taxi. Raul watched us from the street, smoking a cigarette in nervous twitches, clearly happy to get rid of us. We staggered forward, slamming into Ramsey's Mercedes so Sam's sledgehammer torso nailed my thumbtack body into the back door. The routine was getting old, and my body had the bruises to prove it.
Ramsey jogged toward me when I nearly dropped Sam into the alley and helped hold him upright. "Why don't you just kill him?" She shook her head. Her voice was sarcastic, but her drawn cheeks told me she worried for him.
She flattened her hand on his brow and flashed a pen light into his eyes till he jerked his chin from her fingers. She pulled a syringe from her lab coat and removed the cap. Sam held up his arm to stop her, but she grabbed his forearm and twisted.
"Any vein will do." She inserted the needle. Without tenderness.
Sam clenched his teeth. "Tell me that's gin."
Ramsey smirked. "It's a dose of reality."
She finished the injection and turned to me. "I gave him a push of antibiotics for the fever. A dangerous guess, but he seems to enjoy gambling." She opened her driver door. "And try not to scratch my paint this time. George bought me this car for our anniversary. It was this or a stupid puppy."
I turned away from her to help Sam into the car.
"I hate her," he muttered. "Reminds me of a CI we shot."
"Shhh." I couldn't let Ramsey hear his street talk about confidential informants, or she'd be the one informing Detective McCarthy about our fugitive patient. She'd only agreed not to call an ambulance after much pleading, and though I had my own reasons to hate Doctor Ramsey, she and her husband had saved my life, if not my sanity. When it came to good deads, I trusted them both implicitly.
"God, you're a workout," I muttered, trying not to drop Sam into the back seat.
He nuzzled my cheek as I helped him recline. "And you're a knockout." He blinked, refocused, and saw Ramsey staring at him from the front seat. "Did I say that out loud?"
Ramsey flashed dark eyes at me. I lowered my gaze to fasten Sam's seatbelt. Her assumptions were better left in place as our cover story.
"See you around, tough guy." I squeezed his hand and shut the door.
Sam's frown through the window said it all: I'd betrayed him. He'd trusted me, and I'd abandoned him to a stranger—an ice queen at that. To keep his identity secret at her clinic, she would claim he was a John Doe walk-in, which meant I had to stay out of the picture. Once he healed, Ramsey would send him on his way, like the homeless patients she helped.
Ramsey rolled down her window on my approach. From her rearview mirror hung a miniature hula girl, whose grass skirt glowed orange from the dashboard lights.
Ramsey grabbed the dancer, wrenching it immobile. "This better not get me into trouble."
I swallowed and tapped the hood twice, and she sped off.
Me either
.
***
"We were about to bust down your door," said Stone, referring to the cop on the landing when I found them outside my apartment. His citrusy cologne tickled my nose. A crisp white collar made his skin look richly tan, while his pressed lapels were untarnished, unlike ruffian me. For a pain in my ass, Stone was real eye candy.
Max barked inside, causing the old oak door to shake within its frame.
Stone glanced backwards and added, "Just waiting for animal control. I was worried something happened when you didn't answer your door earlier."
"Probably visiting one of my neighbors downstairs."
"Like now, I suppose."
"No, I was doing laundry in the basement."
He examined my torn jacket, scuffed jeans, scraped hands. "Another rough day."
"What can I say, I live with a dog." I raised my brow when he wouldn't let me pass.
Gluing himself to the threshold wasn't winning my good favor. He slipped his hands in his pockets and leaned to one side, examining my red cheek where I'd hit the pavement underneath Sam. Stone's lips hinted at a smile before he schooled his face of emotion.
"You'd probably like to call it a day," he said. "Get a good night's sleep, then have me call in the morning so we can do this dance all over again tomorrow."
"Something like that."
He held up a document. "Unfortunately, I've got this piece of paper that says I need to look around your place."
Unfolding the paper, I surveyed the official seal, legal signatures, random excuses Stone used to leverage his way into my life. "Interesting way to build a friendship, serving a warrant."
"One of my officers saw a suspicious person in your window yesterday."
"Probably the same officer who told me I was paranoid when I asked him to search my apartment the day he dropped me off." I shoved the warrant into my coat. Once I'd fallen asleep, Sam must have gotten up to check for the cop parked on the corner. "He probably saw my neighbor, Duke, bringing Max home from a play date."
"At two in the morning."
I shrugged under the pressure of Stone's watch. "So we don't keep business hours."
"I dropped by to check on you myself yesterday, but you didn't answer."
"Laundry day. I heard Max bark, but I assumed the neighbor's cat was setting him off."
"Thought today was laundry day." Holding his hand out, Stone smiled.
I thumbed the nameplate attached to my keys deep in my pocket. If I didn't open the door for the cops today, I'd be calling a carpenter to replace it tomorrow.
"Either I can execute the search myself," he said, "or have my officer do the honors. I assume you'd rather I do it, since..."
"Since what?"
A detective who knew how to take advantage of my good graces: there's nothing new. I unlocked my door, grabbed Max before he bit a cop and got himself put on death row, and blocked Stone's entry.
"I'd prefer your officer do it. I'm sure you don't mind waiting in the hall." Sure, I didn't have a leg to stand on when it came to preventing Stone from searching my apartment, but at least my message was clear: you've blown your chances with me.
"Of course." Stone's face lit with amusement. With his salt-and-pepper hair and laser blue eyes, he struck a fine balance between mysterious and brooding, protective and dangerous. He waved to his uniform on the landing.
Officer Houston tiptoed up the stairs, tucking his head with a quick "Ma'am" as he gave Max a wide berth, despite the fact I'd signaled Max to lay down. I was banking on Houston's inexperienced eyes over Stone's X-ray ones.
"Strange thing happened to that officer you mentioned," said Stone. "Got himself shot." He paused for effect, his eyes never wavering from my face. "Tonight, in a Turkish deli not far from here. Never reported his location, so we don't know why he was there. Or how he wound up in the alley with two bullets in his gut."
That made two of us. I didn't move an inch. Not having checked Petosa's eyes or pulse flooded me with guilt. Maybe he'd survived, crawled to safety. But there was only one answer for the second bullet: Troy was alive.
"You wouldn't know anything about that, of course." Stone scanned my face as my cheek muscles went slack. "Since you were downstairs, sipping tea."
"Laundry," I reminded him, but even I was getting confused which lie to use.
My heart was racing, as Houston was rummaging through the front room, where I couldn't be sure I'd hidden all evidence of Sam's presence. I couldn't hold still much longer.
"So is Officer Petosa okay?" I asked. And had he already told Stone he'd spotted me with Sam?
"Funny thing is, I put him on watch here, over you."
"That isn't funny at all." I could feel my face redden, but I wasn't pretending how pissed I was at Stone's invasion of my privacy. "But I'll forgive his trespass, since he was just following orders, and wish him a speedy recovery. To which hospital should I send flowers?"
Stone glanced behind me and nodded Houston into my office for a thorough search. "And then there's the description of the blonde at the scene. About your height, your build, in the arms of a male, brown hair, about six foot, two hundred pounds. But I happen to know you wouldn't get within a hundred feet of that deli, not after what happened there three years ago."
If he spoke my deceased fiancé's name, I'd lose it for sure.
Be the rock, Jules.
"I can address a card to Petosa's precinct, if you think that's more appropriate."
"You can send flowers to the cemetery." His gaze fell back on me. "Interesting. I see that startled you. Odd, I never mentioned Petosa's name."
I swallowed. "I thought we were discussing the officer who dropped me off."
"Of course." He sighed, like he was disappointed he couldn't trip me up. "Never gets easy, this job. I can't imagine how to tell his wife, especially when he was only a couple years from retiring. That's where I'm headed next. Haven't seen his kids in a while. Must be in high school by now."
The churn in my stomach was nearly audible. "I'm sorry it has to be you who informs the family." My eyes refocused on Stone's weary face. My condolences seemed counterfeit considering my role in Petosa's death, but remorse cramped my gut real enough.
"I recall you lost both your parents when you were young. Must have been hard to grow up without a mom and dad, all alone. You must have resented that."
All I could do was stare at the ground. The man was determined to get on my bad side. "I wasn't alone."
"And you're not alone now either." He frowned when I shook my head in feigned ignorance. "Interesting. You're not even worried."
My head came up. "What that's supposed to mean?"
"If Petosa was supposed to be watching you when he got shot, then the shooter could be our suspect from the park, and he may know where you live now."
"You said Petosa was at some deli. Maybe he went on break and interrupted a robbery."
"Same caliber bullets as those at the park, same fingerprints from bullet casings as those on the peacoat you gave us, so at the least we've got him on the park murder. And now Petosa. He's a cop killer. Those perps don't last long on the streets."
"How? I mean..." I choked back words that might land me in an interrogation room again. Stone was clearly prompting me for help in capturing Sam.
But the evidence wasn't adding up. I'd been at the scene, knew Sam didn't shoot Petosa. But the park murder... I couldn't be sure of what happened that day. Either someone was framing Sam, or he wasn't the man I thought he was. Yet instinct told me he was exactly the cretin-in-over-his-head he seemed to be.
"Maybe I'm paranoid, but I'm assigning a unit to your building twenty-four-seven. I can't take any chances losing my best witness. Don't worry, I'll take care of you." Stone's eyes softened as he began to reach for my shoulder, but Max's low growl halted his hand.