The fight had woken me up to something. I’d assumed it was over, between Corrigan and me, because he’d said so. I’m a dormouse. I always do what I’m told.
Except... it wasn’t right. I knew he was in pain and I was the only one who could see it: even Krista couldn’t. Maybe I was the only one who’d ever seen it. Soon, he’d break the rules and he’d be bounced on to some other hospital, or he’d lose his license completely, and this chance would be gone forever. And this thing we had together... it was real. Just thinking about him made something inside me rise and float like a balloon. I needed him. And maybe... he needed me.
The idea of me doing what no other woman had been able to seemed laughable. Maybe Krista was right, maybe I was naive, and maybe I was trying to fix him. But.... I felt something inside me harden into stone.
I wasn’t quitting.
This dormouse was going to fight for her man.
* * *
When I ventured into the ER, it was still eerily quiet. Taylor was treating an old lady with a broken wrist, but no one else was around. They were probably grabbing a nap while they could: until the roads reopened and more staff could get in, we’d all have to work continuously and sleep when we could. Maybe I should do the same. The sun hadn’t quite set, but I was exhausted. If I got my head down, I could probably—
Someone grabbed my arm and pulled me through the curtain into Exam Two.
I yelped and slammed into a big, warm body. I jumped back and looked up, but I’d already recognized that vanilla and sandalwood scent.
“Shh,” said Corrigan before I could speak.
I stood there open-mouthed. I was furious at the way he’d grabbed me but the glowing aftershock of the contact was still throbbing through me: the way his pecs had pressed into the upper slopes of my breasts, the way one of his thighs had pressed right between mine….”What?” I hissed.
He moved me further away from the curtain and spoke quietly. At first, I thought it was just because people were trying to sleep. His Irish accent was even more magical when he spoke softly, like silver silk caressing my ears. “That head injury case you worked on?” he began.
I nodded that I remembered.
“He didn’t make it.”
My eyes snapped wide, my mind full of all the things I might have done wrong.
He raised a placating hand. “Nothing you did. As far as I can tell, he just stopped breathing.” He pressed his lips together for a moment. “His monitors were switched off.”
I blinked. I’d never heard of that happening. “It was crazy,” I whispered cautiously. “Everyone was running around… people are strung out. Maybe a nurse made a mistake?”
He crossed his arms. “You know the nurses here better than me. You think one of them could have messed up like that?”
I thought about it. “No.” My stomach knotted. Now I knew why he was speaking so quietly, why he’d pulled me in here, out of sight. “You think someone killed him?”
“I think Colt killed him. Or sent someone to kill him. He really didn’t want us talking to that guy.”
I imagined Colt creeping through the ER, right next to us, but unseen, and wanted to throw up with fear. I was right there. Jesus, Rebecca was right there! “What do we do?”
“I don’t know. We need an autopsy and an investigation and an APB for Colt. That’s all state police stuff and they can’t get here.”
We heard the electronic hum of the main doors sliding open. “That’s probably Earl and Lloyd,” whispered Corrigan. “I called them. Can you grab them?”
I slipped out of Exam Two and looked across the room towards the doors. It was Earl. The setting sun was behind him and I’d have recognized that big, cuddly silhouette anywhere. And behind him was the lean outline of Lloyd, awkwardly shifting from foot to foot. I started forward to say hi.
Just at that moment, Maggie emerged from the basement, lugging a huge bag of tools and muttering something about cheap pipes that weren’t worth a damn. She nodded towards the doorway. “Earl.”
Earl came to attention and whipped off his peaked cap. “Ma’am,” he said, breathless. His eyes tracked her as she walked away. His gaze only broke off when it crossed my own disbelieving stare.
“Maggie?” I mouthed silently at him.
He flushed crimson and looked at his feet, wedging his cap back on his head.
That’s why he was always dragging Lloyd to the hospital? I hurried over and pulled him forward. “Earl, you have to tell her how you feel!”
He shrugged and mumbled. He was pushing sixty, but suddenly he was a teenager, more nervous and awkward than Lloyd. “Ah, I don’t—She might not—”
“She would!” Both of them had been single for at least a decade. Both of them were lonely. “Earl, you have to say something!”
He shook his head. Behind him, Lloyd caught my eye and shrugged helplessly: welcome to my world. He must have figured it out months ago and he’d had no luck convincing his mentor, either.
I brought them to Exam Two. “Beckett agrees with me,” Corrigan told Earl. “It wasn’t an accident. That guy was murdered, most likely by Colt.”
Earl looked queasy. The worst thing he normally had to deal with was a couple of drunks or a fender bender. “I got worse news. I found something on Colt. He pulled a printout of a newspaper clipping from his uniform pocket and unfolded it. “Told you I recognized the name.”
It was a front page story from a Denver newspaper. The man in the picture was much younger and looked less bitter, but he was definitely the same man. “Colt Blackwood,” I murmured. “Sentenced for... oh my God.”
Colt had led an ultra-right militia called the Colorado Guardians of Freedom, or CGF. It had grown over the years from a small band of extremists into a statewide movement suspected of multiple counts of arson, murder and extortion. Colt himself had become quite rich and owned a sprawling ranch...until the FBI raided it, confiscated everything, and sent him to federal prison. “Why did I never hear about any of this?” I asked.
“Look at the date,” said Earl.
I focused on the tiny numbers at the top of the page. Colt had been sentenced twenty years ago.
“That’s why I couldn’t place him, at first,” said Earl. “He just got released a few months ago.”
Corrigan spoke up. “The men he has with him, they’re—”
“Members of his militia, yeah,” said Earl. “That tattoo, with the crossed rifles and the fist? That’s their symbol.”
“So he’s reforming his militia. But what’s he doing here?” I asked.
Earl let out a long sigh. “Been trying to figure that out myself. Drove by the mining company. Some of the razor wire was missing from the top of a wall. The place was all shut down on account of the snow, but I called the boss and had him come in and yep, they’ve had a break in. They’re making a list of what’s missing now.” He shook his head. “But what would they want with mining equipment?”
Corrigan thought for a moment. When he spoke again, he had a sick look on his face. “Earl, do they keep explosives there?”
Earl drew in his breath...and nodded.
Oh Jesus. So an ultra-right militia was in our town and they were stealing explosives? “We have to get some help,” I croaked.
Earl nodded. “I’ll call the FBI. I don’t care if the roads are blocked, this is too big. They can send a damn helicopter if they have to.” He pulled out his phone, then frowned at the screen. “Dammit! Check yours.”
Corrigan pulled his out. I ran to the locker room and got mine. None of us had a signal. “The wind must have taken out the cell tower,” said Earl. “It’s right at the top of the hill, pretty exposed.”
We were completely cut off. Not only couldn’t we call for help, we couldn’t send a warning. Oh God... Colt could do anything here, and no one would even know.
We heard the main doors to the ER slide open and a blast of frozen air lifted the curtains. All three of us raced out just in time to see a man stagger in. He was barely through
the doors when he fell forward—he would have hit the floor if Corrigan hadn’t grabbed him under the arms.
The guy was in his twenties with short, sandy hair and a light build: he could have been any college kid from the city. But he was in a bad way. His jeans were soaked through and clinging to him, his jacket—a light thing, no more substantial than a dishtowel—was plastered with snow and frost caked his hair and eyelashes. And he was trying to say something, but he was too weak and frozen to get the words out. “So,” he said, looking right at me. “So.”
“He’s ice cold,” said Corrigan. “Heated blankets, warm saline, now!”
The ER came alive as we lifted the man up onto a bed. I winced as I saw his fingers. They looked as if they were about to burst, skin stretched tight over swollen redness. I’d never seen frostbite before. Corrigan saw me looking and gave me a little shake of his head when the patient wasn’t looking: he was probably going to lose at least some of his fingers.
“So,” said the man again. His eyes were pleading, desperate to tell us something but his lips, his jaw, his vocal cords were all too cold to work properly. While the others swaddled him in blankets and got an IV going, I tried to understand. He was getting more frantic, not less, even though we were helping him, so it wasn’t himself he was worried about. I looked down at his clothes. His jeans were soaked right up to the waist, like he’d waded here through deep drifts. And he was so cold, he must have been walking for hours. Someone was out there, in the snow, way out of town.
“Sophie,” he managed at last.
24
Dominic
“No,” said Bartell. “Absolutely not!”
I pointed through the ER’s glass doors to the world outside. “It’s, what, ten degrees out there? The sun’s going to be down in an hour and then it’s going to get even colder. She’s already been out there for hours, she can’t have long left.”
“You’re a doctor,” Bartell told me. “Not a paramedic!”
“We don’t have any fucking paramedics!” I snapped. “We’re it!”
As Sophie’s boyfriend had warmed up, he’d managed to tell us how their car had slewed off the road, up in the hills outside town. How she was trapped in the wreckage and, with the cell service down, he’d been forced to hike for hours through the snow to get help.
Bartell ran a hand through his hair, gave an exhausted sigh, and nodded. “The roads will be blocked,” he warned.
“Yeah,” I muttered, pulling on my thick orange parka. “I’ll have to drive as far as I can and then walk the rest of the way.” I started throwing medical gear into a paramedic bag.
A field surgery kit landed in the bag. I spun around and found Beckett standing there, jaw set in determination.
“No,” I told her. “No way.”
“You think you’re going to find her on your own?” she asked. “I know the roads around here. Besides, she might need surgery.”
I glared and took a step towards her. I know how to use my size to intimidate.
But she just stood her ground, determined. She didn’t want to go out there: I could see the fear in her eyes. Being out in the wilds, in this weather... that was as far from her safe, snug OR as it was possible to get. But she was going to go anyway because—
Because she didn’t want me to go alone.
“Let’s get going,” I grunted.
And we ran.
25
Amy
THE PARKING GARAGE was almost empty. I ran towards my car while trying to do up the zipper on the huge paramedic’s parka I’d found in a closet. Skidding to a stop, I blipped the lock and—
“You can’t be serious,” said Corrigan behind me. “You live in the mountains of Colorado and that’s your car?”
I blinked, hotly embarrassed and angry at the same time. “What? What’s wrong with it?” My car is a little electric thing, just big enough for two (as long as your shoulders aren’t too wide). It’s small, quiet, and efficient: the planet doesn’t even know it’s there.
“It’s very you,” said Corrigan. Then he grabbed my arm and pulled me over to his car, a big red pickup with a light bar on top and huge chunky tires. You didn’t get in, you climbed in. The engine came to life with an angry, chest-thumping roar and we tore out of the parking garage already pushing forty.
Some of the roads near the hospital had now been plowed but as we reached the edge of town, the pavement disappeared beneath a hard, packed-down crust of snow as slippery as ice.
As we turned into a bend, the hiss of the tires on the snow suddenly disappeared and the world went utterly silent. Corrigan cursed and turned the wheel... but nothing happened. Instead of turning, we slid towards the edge of the road, the headlights catching a wall as it loomed up to meet us. I grabbed a grab handle and closed my eyes—
The tire noise returned as they finally found grip. We swung around, fishtailed, and then straightened out. Corrigan let out a sigh of relief and slowed the pace...but only a little. We couldn’t go slowly or we’d never reach Sophie in time.
We skidded another three times on our way to the hills. I spent the journey grimly clinging to my grab handle, wondering what the hell I was doing. Even paramedics wouldn’t be out in snow like this: this was a job for specially-trained rescue teams, not ER doctors. Certainly not a surgeon.
But when Corrigan had been planning to go on his own, all I could think about was that moment when he’d faced off against Colt. Part of him had wanted a fight. Had longed for it, even. And I put that together with all the dangerous places he kept going and….
There was no way I was letting him go into danger on his own. However much this scared me, losing him scared me more.
The snow deepened and thickened as we climbed up into the hills, coming up over the top of the wheels. Eventually, on a narrow track that cut into the forest, the wheels began to spin. Corrigan pulled over. We’d have to go the rest of the way on foot.
26
Dominic
BACK AT THE HOSPITAL, we’d worked out a plan. We’d reach Sophie and get her out while Krista got hold of a local man with a snowplow and got him to clear the road along the bottom of the hills, all the way back to the hospital. We’d have to carry Sophie down to the road and meet them, and they’d then take her back to the ER. It was a mile from where we were now to the crash, then maybe another mile to the road.
That hadn’t sounded so bad, back in the warm. But as soon as I opened my door and the cold flooded in, everything was different. I’d never felt cold like it: the temperature was so low, it was actually painful just moving your exposed hand or face through it. And when I stepped down, the snow was up above my knees. It was worse for Beckett: it was high up her thighs. We were both wearing thick parkas but they did nothing to protect our lower halves. Moving through the snow was like wading through an ice bath. Both of us shuddered. Jesus!
I grabbed the bag and we started to move, working our way uphill through the trees. The sun was sinking rapidly, now, throwing out one last blast of orange fire that was carved by the tree trunks into golden wedges atop the snow. Despite the fierce cold, it was beautiful. I saw Beckett gazing around her in wonder. I got the feeling she’d never been out in the wilds in the snow, despite living here. In fact, I got the feeling she’d never been out in the wilds at all. She’d missed out on all this, huddled in her OR.
But at least she’d been safe there. That protective urge came back, stronger than ever. If we got into trouble there was no cell service and no one to come for us. The lack of cars on the road and the way the snow deadened all sound made it seem even lonelier. All we could hear was the crunch of our shoes: it was like we were the only two people in the world.
I was fighting with myself. I didn’t want her here. But there was no one I’d rather be alone with.
It got tougher and tougher as we climbed higher. Our scrub pants were soaked through and the cold crept into our muscles, then our bones. Every breath of air was painful: it was so far below freezing, th
e air felt like a million sharp-edged ice crystals, burning our lungs. A mile in this would seem like ten. “Talk to me,” I said. I’d been on plenty of long hikes in Africa and one thing I’d learned was that talking makes them go faster.
Beckett glanced across at me, as horrified as if I’d asked her to strip naked.
“Anything,” I pressed. “Tell me about growing up.”
And slowly, grudgingly, as we panted and shivered and forced our way through the drifts, she told me. She told me about how her dad had won awards for his painstaking work, spending weeks teasing out the secrets of some minute insect’s anatomy. How he was even more shy and awkward than she was. She never used the word Asperger’s, but all the signs were there. When I heard about her mom dying, it suddenly all made sense. A shy kid, raised by a dad who was probably a high-functioning autistic. No wonder she’d gotten used to hiding, no wonder she needed order and quiet.
And now she was having to deal with the ER, in a crisis, with some far-right maniac on the loose. She was braver than even I’d given her credit for. A big swell of hot emotion rose up inside me, so fast and strong it took me by surprise. She needed protecting, dammit! From the world, but from herself, too. She needed to be gently tempted out into the daylight, to be shown the world she was missing. She needed—
Me?
My jaw set. Memories of Chrissy grabbed hold of me and tugged me down, down into the blackness. I couldn’t give her that. I couldn’t give anyone that.
We reached the top of the rise. The trees thinned out and the ground mercifully leveled off. And there it was in front of us, a car crumpled from impacts with trees but still recognizable, a dark shape visible in the driver’s seat.
Beckett was a second faster than me to react. She ran forward, staggering in the deep snow. The last rays of sun sparkled on the surface, blinding bright. Hiding the—
I gave an animal cry of fear and lurched forward. Grabbed for her and missed. Snagged the hood of her parka and hauled, pulling her right off her feet. I tumbled backwards and we both went down on our asses with her on top of me. At first, she couldn’t see what I’d saved her from. Then the sun’s glare faded a little and she went pale.
Mount Mercy Page 11
