Luminous (7 page)

He set her in the passenger seat, grabbed the cape from the backseat and tossed it over her. Keeping her warm would prevent shock and allow him to see the outline of her body. He sped around to the driver’s side, turned on the ignition, found her injured leg and propped it up on his knee.

Then he called the truck in as a hot pursuit, asking for a BOLO, warning that the suspects were armed and dangerous. He’d gotten the license plate, at least. Maybe they’d get lucky. Maybe some smart patrol officer would spot the vehicle and pull it over. Maybe when the responding officers arrived on-scene, they’d find someone in the warehouse to question.

He doubted it. But maybe. For now, he had to reach the hospital.

He pulled out, tires squealing.

“Hang tight. You’re going to get to see Leslie again, sooner than we both expected.”

“No!”

A hand gripped his elbow.

“What?”

“You bring me to hospital and all of a sudden, I’m a medical curiosity. I’m fucked.”

She had a point. “Better fucked than bleeding to death.”

“No! If you take me to a hospital, I’ll be terrified. I might start glowing again. Leslie won’t be able to treat me, and I’ll be revealed as a freak for sure.”

He frowned. That would be a serious problem. “How come you’re not glowing now? You’ve been shot.”

“I’m familiar with pain. Not the first time I’ve been bleeding all over the place. I’m not terrified. What I am is pissed that Jill got away.”

He grunted. “I can’t have you bleeding to death.”

“It’s not that bad. Can’t you bandage it up at your place? You could call Leslie. Have him walk you through it.” He heard her take a deep breath. It had a hiss of pain in it. “Please, Al.”

He turned left at the next street, half his mind on listening to the police chatter on his radio, half debating her plea.

He pounded the steering wheel out of frustration. She was right. Leslie might be safe, but the hospital could be dangerous for her. He saw a drugstore on the next block and pulled in.

“Fuck.” He looked at her. “Stay here. I’m getting what we need to fix you up. Keep your leg elevated. Brace it on the steering wheel.”

“Thanks, Al.”

“How about ‘sorry, Al’? I told you to leave the cop stuff to me.”

There was no answer, but he did feel her put her foot on the steering wheel. He rushed inside, grabbed sterile bandages, medical tape, hydrogen peroxide, antibiotic cream and a six-pack of Pepsi as a bribe for Leslie. Too bad the drugstore didn’t carry whiskey. Not for her. He was the one who needed the drink after tonight.

He dumped the bag in the back, near her hat, and pulled out of the store. Noir’s ankle settled on his leg again.

“Al?”

“Yeah?”

“Sorry.”

“If you’re sorry, tell me one thing.”

“What?” she asked.

“Why did you glow in the ER if you don’t glow when you’re shot?”

There was a long pause. He wished he could read her facial expression.

“I was terrified for you, Al. I wanted to protect you. I think that’s what triggered it.”

Of all the answers she could’ve given, he didn’t expect that one. “Lucky me.” He smiled.

Chapter Five

Noir wasn’t sure what was worse. That she’d been shot, that Jill had gotten away, or that Al was pissed off at her.

The last mattered a hell of a lot more than she’d expected when she’d waltzed into his apartment a few hours ago and blithely told him that she could help him catch Jack and Jill.

Some help I was.

The gunshot wound throbbed, but it didn’t hurt as much as she thought being shot should hurt. Maybe she was immune to pain after all of Jill’s experiments. God, she hoped not. She didn’t
want
to be immune to pain. Pain meant she was normal.

It was more hopeful to think that she wasn’t hurt badly.

Yes, she’d go with that line of thinking.

The car stopped so fast that she had to brace herself against the dashboard to keep from tumbling forward. “Watch it,” she said.

“Sorry,” Al mumbled as he parked the car.

He gathered up the bag from the drugstore, looped it over his forearm and then grabbed her clothes. He dumped the clothes in her lap. “Hold these.”

“Sure.”

He lifted her up, seemingly without effort again. “Keep the cloak over the leg wound.”

“Sure.” She let her head rest against his shoulder, as she had earlier. He had strong shoulders. “You’re carrying me up three flights?”

“Got a problem with that?” he growled.

“Um, no.” She wrapped her hands around his neck. Cranky Al didn’t seem like a good guy to have an argument with, especially with her leg hurting. Still, despite the pain, it felt good to be carried by him. She was very conscious of the corded muscles of his arms and his fingers on the side of her breast. True to his boast, Al carried her up the steps easily. On the second floor, a man poked his head out of his door, presumably alerted by Al’s heavy footsteps.

“Got a problem?” Al snarled again, this time at his neighbor.

“No, sir.” The neighbor shut the door.

Noir smiled.

Al set her down momentarily to get out his keys and open his apartment door. He picked her back up, shutting the door behind him with his foot. But instead of setting her down on the couch, as she thought he would, he walked down the hallway and laid her on the bed in his bedroom.

His bedroom. She realized she wouldn’t mind being here for reasons other than being shot.

He balled up his comforter at the foot of the bed. “Put your leg up on this.”

“Okay.” She let her head fall back on the pillow. So soft. “You have good pillows.”

“Nice to know.” Al opened the bottle of hydrogen peroxide. He put a towel under her leg, right under where he had tied off the wound. “Hold steady. I’m going to clean off this mess and then bandage you up. It’s going to sting like hell.”

She closed her eyes. “Whatever.”

The tie stuck when coming off. She winced as Al had to use more force to separate the cloth from the dried blood. She had to take a deep breath and let it out carefully to cure her lightheadedness.

His hands were gentler than she expected as they cleaned out her now-exposed wound. It burned, and she couldn’t help moaning. Hah, she wasn’t immune to pain as she’d feared. On this one thing, she was normal. Too bad she’d had to get shot to know that for sure.

Something cold splashed on her skin.

“Argh.” She winced and instinctively tried to move her leg, but Al had an iron grip on her ankle.

“I need to see where you are. Stay put.”

She nodded, her teeth still gritted. “How’s it look?” She was warm, sweaty, and her heartbeat hammered against her chest. Since her escape, she’d been so emotionally numb, as if she were looking at life instead of being alive. She sure as hell was alive now.

“I got a good look when the peroxide bubbled up. It could be worse. From the outline of the bubbles, I’m guessing the bullet caught the back edge of your calf rather than going through the leg. But I don’t know whether it needs stitches. Doesn’t matter, since we’ll have to do without because I can’t see you well enough to try that. You might have a scar, though.”

She laughed. “It’s not as if anyone could see it.”

He nodded. “True enough.”

Al wiped off the peroxide and slathered something cold on her leg. She bit her lip.

“Think you put enough antibiotic cream on that?”

“Think you could just shut up and let me do something that really should be done in a hospital?”

Right. Cranky Al. No arguing, especially since that lightheaded feeling was back. She took a deep breath and tried to think of something else. Anything else.

“Jill got away.”

“Yeah, I saw her jumping into the trailer as it pulled out. But we’ve got a lead now. You were right to want to look for her tonight.”

“Mm…” She was going to say something, but now Al was wrapping the bandage tight around her and it burned too much for her to talk. Still, those hands on her felt good and almost made up for the pain. She opened her eyes to look at what he was doing.

She saw a mound of bloody sterile pads on the floor beside Al, next to a half-empty bottle of hydrogen peroxide. There was another sterile bandage on her leg. Al had wrapped it with gauze and was now applying medical tape to keep it in place.

“Thanks,” she said. “Looks professional.”

He turned his head toward her. “Not bad, I guess. I took some EMT training a couple of years ago because it felt useless to be a first responder who had to wait to help people. But a real doctor should look at this. It could get infected.”

She bet a real doctor’s hands wouldn’t feel this good on her. He gathered up the bloody bandages and his ruined tie. “Be right back.”

“I’ll be here,” she said.

But he was gone for so long that she was almost asleep when he returned.

“Noir?” he whispered.

“Yeah?” She blinked.

“You should take these,” he said.

She reached for the glass of water and the Tylenol capsules and swallowed them quickly. She hadn’t realized how dry her throat had been before now.

“Did you find the truck?” she asked.

He scowled and rubbed the back of his neck. “Not yet. Working on it. That’s what took me so long. I made some calls.”

She took his hand. He looked so damn tired and it was mostly her fault. “Al? Are you okay?”

He sat next to her. “You should have stayed in the damn car.”

“I’m not under your command.” She drew his hand up to her face and kissed it. She was exhausted and she hurt all over, but she suddenly wished she could do more than kiss his hand. He had saved her life tonight. He’d carried her up the steps.

And they said there were no more heroes.

“No, you’re not. It was more my fault. I shouldn’t have brought you there.”

“I’d have gone on my own and you wouldn’t have been there to back me up.” He was right. She’d been dumb to attack Jill. She should have been smart and stowed away in the truck. That would have taken her right to Jill’s new lab. Then they could’ve rescued the missing bank teller and taken down the whole operation. But instead, she’d gone ballistic and attacked Jill. Next time she needed a better plan than trying to strangle the woman.

“What’s your name?” Al asked.

“I told you. Noir.”

“Your given name. If we’re going to be partners, I want to know your name.”

Partners?
“What do you mean, partners?”

“Obviously, I can’t let you go out there and play cop by yourself, rookie.” He smiled. “So what’s your name?”

“You won’t believe me when I tell you.”

“I’ll believe you.” His fingers outlined her chin. She almost moaned again but not from pain. Al’s touch was definitely setting her off. “Is your name Moon Unit Zappa or something?”

She took a deep breath. “Al, I don’t remember my name.”

“I’m sorry.” His thumb brushed her cheek. “But, you know, that’s something I can help you with when this is over.”

“What do you mean?” she whispered. How could he help her memory come back?

“I’m a cop. Part of my job is finding missing people. You’ve been found. We just have to match you up with who was lost.”

“Oh.” She swallowed hard. “But not until we get Jill, Jack, and save the bank teller.”

“Nice to see you have your priorities straight.”

He leaned down and kissed her cheek. His stubble brushed her skin. But it was the touch of his lips that made her face go hot.

“Get some rest, partner.” He sat up straight. “We’ll get the bad guys tomorrow.”

“So, do I get a badge?” Partner.
Partner.
She wanted him to keep saying that.

“Maybe I should dress in black leather, so we match.”

She laughed.

She smelled bacon, eggs and coffee when she woke up. She sat up and looked at the clock. That couldn’t be right. It was afternoon already.

What had happened while she was asleep? The hostage? Jill?

She shivered. It was cold in here. She spotted a dress shirt and a pair of sweatpants laid out next to her on the bed and put them on, thinking Al must have left them for her. As she gazed around the bedroom, she noticed her clothes, even her boots, were slung across a chair. She thought about wearing them instead but decided the cotton shirt was a nice change. And she was sick of keeping her face covered. Al wouldn’t care.

She hugged the bedpost as she stood up, having no idea what to expect from her injury. But she could put weight on the leg. Excellent. Still, she stood for a while to make sure there wasn’t a delayed reaction.

Al’s bedroom was definitely…interesting. It was neater than his office, that was for certain. The clothes were all hung in the closest or folded neatly in the bureau. At least, there were none on the floor, not even socks. He had a photo of what was likely his family on his short, squat bureau. She hobbled over to it and picked up the photo. There were five men and two women standing in front of a fire engine. She spotted Al all the way to the left in his CCPD hat. The other men in the photo were wearing Charlton City Fire Department T-shirts, except for the older man standing next to Al. He wore a T-shirt with an FBI logo.