Code Triage

by Candace Calvert

  “Is that all?”

  Sam licked the cake crumbs off her finger. “Yes, thank you. And again, I’m sorry for disturbing you at home. I tried to reach Nick, but no luck.” She paused, the moment much more delicious than any chocolate. “I should have asked him when he was here tonight.”

  There was a long stretch of silence, and then the call disconnected.

  Sam hit the End button. Tomorrow the ball would bounce back to her court.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “What’s this?” The flower vendor—purple beret pulled low over one brow and silhouetted in the morning light against buckets of outrageous blooms—peered into the paper sack. “Oh, my goodness, a marranito?” He lifted the molasses-rich pastry from the bag. “You brought me a cute little gingerbread pig?”

  Nick shrugged. “Got up early to run the Panhandle and passed by this Mexican bakery next to a tattoo shop.”

  The middle-aged man shot him a wide-gapped, toothy grin. “That big gun doesn’t fool me a bit, Officer Stathos. You are one sweet guy.”

  “Careful, Oly,” Nick warned, pretending to scowl. “My new partner’s next door getting coffee. He won’t want to hear a ‘sweet guy’ has his back. Just sell me my Chronicle, same way you’ve been doing every morning for five long years.” He winced. No, not the same, my friend. You’re alone now.

  Nick watched as the man reached toward a pile of papers stacked below a photo of himself with an elegant older woman—gracefully tall and slender next to his short and stocky, but with identical smiles—taken at the Brannan Street flower mart. Two engaging grins, a million blossoms. He’d added a second photo, a well-worn black-and-white, the same woman maybe forty years younger, in ballerina shoes, a gauzy dress, and a crown. The lead in the San Francisco Ballet’s production of Cinderella, Oly had often boasted—his mother and business partner. Until a few weeks ago.

  “So how are you doing?” Nick asked gently as Oly handed him the newspaper. He waited, watching the man’s face. The sounds of morning—under-caffeinated honks, the ding-ding and brakes of cable cars, and soft cooing of pigeons—filled the short stretch of silence.

  “Oh, you know . . .” Oly glanced away and broke off a bit of pastry to toss at the clutch of birds strutting, heads abob, on the damp curb. “Selling mostly mums now that fall’s here. Burnt copper, lemonsota, maroon pride; thinking I’ll make an adorable stack of mini pumpkins and New England leaves, pull out my kitchen witch . . .”

  He met Nick’s gaze and cleared his throat. “Sometimes I forget. I wake up thinking that I need to get over to the hospital, take her a fresh nightgown—she refused to wear those hideous hospital gowns. Or I’ll circle a theater review in the Chronicle, thinking I’ll read it to her so we can plan delicious revenge on those heartless critics. And sometimes I hear her setting the table for dinner . . .” Oly’s eyes glistened. “She fought hard. Wouldn’t quit; she thought she could hold on forever. You know?”

  “Yes.” Nick had hoped for that, too. Prayed for these good-hearted people. Seeing the pair together, their playful banter and unconditional love, had let him imagine the way it might have been with his own mother, if only . . .

  “So I’m not going to quit either,” Oly said, beginning to smile. “I’ll be okay. I have my sister, my baby niece, my friends—” he raised the pastry—“and a fresh marranito. What more could I ask for? Except maybe that you’d start buying flowers again.”

  Nick hesitated for a moment, imagining the look on Leigh’s face if he showed up at the hospital with flowers. “No,” he said, tucking the newspaper under his arm. “Just the paper this time.”

  “Think it over.” Oly’s smile widened. “It would support your image.”

  “Image?”

  “Sweet guy.”

  Nick groaned. “One more word and I confiscate the pastry.” He pointed toward someone looking at flowers on the other side of the cart. “You’re ignoring your customers.”

  Nick paid for the paper and walked down the street to the patrol car, glancing back one more time as he reconsidered taking Leigh flowers. He was planning to drop by the hospital to see Finn Johnson, anyway. . . . He dismissed the thought for the same reason he’d resisted taking her into his arms Sunday night. Or calling her yesterday, though it had seemed as natural as morning prayer. Too much, too soon. Besides, walking into a hospital in uniform carrying a bouquet of flowers was about as obvious as you could get. There had already been enough drama at Golden Gate Mercy this week. Today was Tuesday—they’d have that talk tonight as planned.

  He watched as Oly’s customer, a young man wearing an oversize 49ers jacket and sunglasses, waited for a pair of bicyclists to pass before unlocking his MINI Cooper. He shifted the huge bouquet of flowers in his arms, then finally managed to get it through the car door. Nick smiled as he noticed the man’s scrubs. Apparently this guy didn’t care about being obvious. Someone at a San Francisco hospital was in for a surprise today. Although the guy could have chosen something better than white lilies—they always reminded Nick of funerals.

  +++

  “Sorry, boy.” Leigh squeezed Frisco’s upper lip with the nutcracker-like metal twitch and twisted it sideways. A restraint that seemed barbaric by human standards was doing the trick: distracting her horse from the fact that Dr. Hunter had threaded a large plastic tube through his nostril and into his stomach.

  “I feel like I should be doing more,” she said, watching in pale morning light as the veterinarian instilled the last two liters of viscous fluid into Frisco’s stomach. She glanced around the saddling area, where they’d secured him by lengths of chain attached to his halter. “Beyond holding a twitch.”

  She grimaced, thinking that the 5 a.m. call from the stables had been her own twitch, distracting her from sleepless brooding about that call from Sam. And Nick’s lie. “She’s not part of my life.” According to Sam, they’d been together Sunday night. Maybe even again, since then.

  Dr. Hunter peered at her. “You’ve kept this big fella from kicking and striking. I consider that the best kind of assistance. I’m sorry we had to get you out of bed, Leigh. But when Patrice says one of her horses isn’t coming along, I believe her. And as you can see, he’s been uncomfortable.”

  She nodded, running her other hand gently along Frisco’s neck, feeling the dried nervous sweat in his hair. “Will we need to trailer him to your clinic? or to UC Davis?”

  “Not sure yet. I’m giving a couple of liters of mineral oil and a gallon of water—maybe a bit more; he’s dry. But there’s no gastric reflux; he’s still got bowel sounds. And his vital signs aren’t alarming. Still . . .”

  “You don’t like it,” Leigh said, relieved to see Frisco’s eyelid drooping. The pain medication was working, thank goodness. She leaned closer, feeling his comforting warmth.

  “No,” the vet agreed. “I don’t like it.” He turned his head, peering toward the stalls as a series of plaintive brays sounded. “Your horse has a concerned friend, it seems.”

  “The rescue donkey. I’m surprised. Frisco’s never been a social animal.”

  “Don’t kid yourself; horses aren’t that different from humans.” He smiled, tapping the stomach tube. “Beyond the hundred feet of intestines, of course. All God’s creatures need fellowship. Donkeys, children, even this stubborn horse of yours.”

  “I guess that’s true. But every time we move, it takes Frisco weeks to settle down. And then I have to worry about him biting or kicking someone.” She sighed. “That’s why I pay for the empty stall. To give him a cushion of space. It seemed safer that way, less complicated, and . . .” She let her words trail off, suddenly uncomfortable for no reason she could identify. The image of Caro’s tear-filled eyes rose, unbidden.

  Dr. Hunter shrugged his shoulders. “I’ve seen some unusual equine friendships. Horses and goats, horses and pigs. I once had a huge Clydesdale that thought the sun rose and set in a homely little banty hen. You never saw such a devoted pair. Amazing who the good Lord brings toget
her as family.” He clucked his tongue. “Anyway, hang on to that twitch until I get this tube out and draw a couple of vials of blood. Then I’ll write some instructions. You have to get back to the hospital, don’t you?”

  “I’ve got coverage for another hour or so.” She moved slightly as Frisco shifted beside her. “And I can be reached by phone if needed. Patrice can call me. I’m off tomorrow, all day. I’ll be here.”

  Twenty minutes later Leigh walked Frisco to his stall and secured the gate, fortified with instructions, but not completely reassured that her beautiful horse wouldn’t end up in a University of California surgery suite due to a twisted gut. And she could lose the best friend she’d ever . . .

  A plaintive bray swept down the stable aisle, and Frisco—sweat-crusted and medicated—answered with a low, exhausted whinny. Leigh walked past the empty space to Tag’s stall, and her throat tightened at the sight of him. His eye, ruptured by the pellet gun, was gone, the eyelid dark and sunken.

  “Hello, Tag,” she whispered, extending her fingers through the wooden slats. “Where on earth did you come from?” Her mother’s voice rose without mercy: “Who are his people, Leigh?” She flinched, shoving the memory away, and amended her question. “How could you have ended up where someone would do this to you?” Her gaze swept his tidy body. The gang graffiti had been clipped away in raggedy fashion. His hooves shone with oily polish, and his wispy forelock was secured by a glittery pink clip-on bow. By horse show standards, he looked like the butt of a snide, tittering joke. As the object of girlish love, he was unabashedly beautiful. Leigh glanced up as Maria arrived at her side, one side of her hair in a tidy braid and the other still hanging loose.

  “Hi, sweetie,” she said, offering a smile. “Did you come to say good-bye to Tag before you go to school?”

  The little girl watched her silently, dark eyes unblinking as her fingers played with her necklace, a silver chain and small cross. Leigh tried not to focus on the circular scars on her forearms. Why shouldn’t she be silent? What on earth could she say about what she’s endured? Why should she even try?

  She watched as Maria walked down to Frisco’s stall, reached her hand through the slats.

  “Be careful, he . . .” Leigh’s warning faded away as Frisco moved to rest his muzzle in the little girl’s hand without a hint of malice.

  Patrice called from the doorway to the stable. “Maria? I have to finish your hair. The school bus will be here in a few minutes.” She acknowledged Leigh with a wave. “I’ll talk with you as soon as I get her off to school,” she promised.

  Leigh looked down as Maria appeared beside her again. She gazed at Leigh before pulling a clip out her hair. She handed it over, smiling faintly, then turned and scurried down the stall aisle toward her foster mother.

  Leigh closed her fingers around the hair clip and walked back to the empty stall beside Frisco’s. She opened the latch, walked inside, and sank down into the soft, untouched mound of pine shavings. She leaned back against the heavy oak planks at the back of the stall, closed her eyes, and listened to the always-soothing blend of sounds: Frisco’s breathing, deep and steady, to one side, Tag’s snuffles and chewing noises on the other. She heard the high chit-chit of barn swallows swooping through the rafters, a wheelbarrow laden with feed squeaking down the barn’s aisles accompanied by the steady thud of work boots, nickers of horses, and faraway strains of a radio playing something in Spanish laced with guitar and trumpet. All so different from the chaos and turmoil of her hours in the ER. It was peaceful here, bone-level peace. No, it was the soul-level peace she craved. She wondered, idly, what it would be like to sleep here, to bed down in the stables. She opened her eyes. Maybe Nick hadn’t been so far off when he’d chided her about living at the barn.

  His words drifted back: “I still love you.”

  After all that happened, had she wanted to believe him? Had she really been close to letting herself trust him again? Because of one evening that began with her sister’s tears, brought the McNealys’ dinner table to their dining room, and—for a few minutes—put her back in her husband’s arms. One crazy, disconnected evening, and she’d almost started to believe.

  Leigh glanced at the hair clip in her hands, noticing that it matched the one she’d seen in Tag’s forelock. Pink, glittery, with a plastic picture in the center—Cinderella. Tears sprang to her eyes as she remembered Caro’s little suitcase of fairy tales and how she’d said they were the first thing she’d pack every time their mother pulled up stakes and moved on. Even though Caro, like Leigh, had been told that there was no such thing as forever. And now this little girl, mute after such unimaginable abuse . . . Oh, how can it be?

  “How, Lord?” Leigh whispered, staring up at shafts of light filtering through the stable’s roof. “How can she have faith in happy endings? And how can you expect that of her after all she’s been through, all she’s seen? You’re supposed to be a loving God and you take that child’s mother, a poor donkey’s eye, and . . .” She closed her eyes, struggling against a sob. My husband. Our baby. She wrapped her arms around herself and a moan escaped her lips. “How am I supposed to trust you, Lord? How can I believe you’re really there?”

  She turned the Cinderella barrette over and over in her hands and listened for the barn sounds, wanting the soul-deep peace to soothe her again. What she heard was Frisco’s slow, deep breathing in perfect rhythm with that of the donkey. She thought once again of what it would be like to sleep in a stable. But then, sleep wasn’t an option—she was going back to the ER. And with Finn Johnson still in the hospital, Nick would likely make a visit. He’d probably stop by the ER, want to see Leigh, too.

  A metal twitch sounded like a much better prospect.

  +++

  “Will you be taking Finn home today?” Riley asked, watching as Abby Johnson leaned over the arm of the rocking chair to press a kiss on her brother’s curls. He giggled around his bottle, dribbling milk from the corner of his mouth. His eyes were bright, face chubby and pink. Such a relief to see Kristi’s children looking healthy again. Even if their mother still seemed so troubled.

  “I think so. I hope.” Kristi’s gaze darted toward the door. “He’ll still have to be checked regularly for several months. Miss Gordon’s talking with the doctors right now, and then she’ll come tell me what Child Crisis wants me to do. . . . Has she said anything to you?”

  “No, not at all,” Riley said quickly. “But I’d imagine that all your good efforts would factor in. Along with the support you have from friends. Like the friend who babysits for you and the people at church.” She pointed to the vase of white lilies on the table. “Did someone from church send those?”

  “No. I mean . . .” The young mother’s eyes shone, and color rose to her cheeks. “I’m not sure. There wasn’t a card.” She watched as her daughter moved across the room and settled down in front of the DVD player. “It could be that Officer Nick sent them; he’s been so good to us. I’m hoping he’ll stop by today.”

  Leigh in the ER, Sam Gordon up here on the second floor, Nick Stathos coming in. Riley took a slow breath, thinking about how this little family’s near tragedy had drawn the three of them together. And how hard that must be for Leigh. Probably for all of them. Riley had to trust that God had a plan in the works. The same way she trusted that he had one for her life as well. She rubbed her fingers over her sling and smiled at Kristi. “Officer Stathos sounds like a good friend. I’m glad he’s been there for you and your children.”

  “He loves kids. He never says much about his personal life, but I think he wants children. I can see it. I hope someday he and Dr. Stathos—”

  “Good morning, Johnson family.”

  Sam Gordon smiled from the doorway, then shifted her briefcase to her other hand. “If you’ll excuse us, Chaplain, Kristi and I need to get our plan on target.”

  +++

  Kurt waited outside the hospital’s loading dock doors beside an idling linen truck. He pretended to smoke, well within
smelling distance of a huge metal compactor stinking of medical waste, melted plastic, and every other kind of gangrenous garbage, probably. It looked like some surreal graphic novel character. A Transformer belching fumes from burning body parts, boiling germicides, and radiation waste. He bit back a laugh, picturing how cool that would be. Then he took a deep breath, filling his lungs and imagining the compactor’s spewed molecules—toxic to anyone but him—combining with his own DNA. Feeding his awesome and destructive power. He trembled with excitement, ran his tongue over his dry lips. Then glanced down casually as a worker from the linen truck off-loaded another cart.

  Caution was important. Even if he’d walked right through the front doors of this stinking hospital a half-dozen times before, today had to be different. Today was his last chance to make things right. He couldn’t risk that someone would finally question his identity. The scrubs helped, but today his jacket barely closed over the rumpled navy top. Even walking was awkward. But he’d still have to take the stairs. Get up to the second floor. His timing was perfect. Kristi and Abby were there, and the Gordon woman had arrived. He’d asked a volunteer to deliver the lilies—they’d be in the room when he arrived. Kristi would be wondering who sent them. Then he’d sweep in, and . . .

  He took one more deep breath, then followed the linen cart through Golden Gate Mercy’s back doors. Walking as casually as he could with his mind whirling. And a 9mm Glock and a second semiautomatic pistol under his jacket.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Let’s give ketorolac,” Leigh ordered, “thirty milligrams, IV. If that doesn’t get it, we’ll titrate some morphine. And I’ll get something on board for nausea, to stay ahead of that. Promethazine 12.5.” She turned back to her patient, a thirty-year-old construction worker, pasty-pale despite his deep tan. He writhed on the gurney. “There’s blood in your urine, Mr. Phelps.”