One Clean Shot

by Danielle Girard

  That the doctor could confirm that the gun that shot Bruce was the same one that had shot Jim. To confirm it was the same shooter. But it had to be, didn’t it? And what did it really matter. Knowing that it was the same gun didn’t get them any closer to a name.

  Nothing short of a copper jacket etched with a name was going to help.

  When the resident came by at midnight, Hailey asked why Bruce wasn’t awake yet. How long would it take?

  “The bullet struck close to the spinal cord, so there’s always the chance of paralysis.”

  “Paralysis.” Bruce could not be paralyzed. Not after John. Not while sitting in front of her house.

  “Sometimes it’s just the shock to the body,” the doctor added. “We have to wait and see.”

  Hailey was still waiting.

  She stood in the middle of the room and felt the weight of the last year come down on her.

  Jim’s shooting. Hal’s distrust. John’s death.

  The girls.

  Ending things with Bruce minutes before he was shot by a bullet that was meant for her.

  She sobbed as she hadn’t since the days after John’s death. Let herself fall apart.

  Only when her phone buzzed did she fight to calm herself.

  Jamie Vail.

  Hailey answered. “Hey.”

  “I heard,” Jamie said.

  “It’s four in the morning,” Hailey said.

  “I know. I always wake up at this hour.”

  “Lucky you.”

  “It’s amazing what YouTube videos you can get sucked into in the middle of the night.”

  “Do you want company?” Jamie asked, the joking aside.

  In the days after John’s death, Hailey had struggled with needing to be alone and never wanting to be alone. Not that she’d had much choice—the girls had been glued to her. “I don’t know,” she admitted.

  “You want to talk about it?” Jamie asked.

  “It’s a royal shit storm, Jamie.”

  “You’re talking to the right person, then. I’ve lived through a few of those.”

  Hailey drew the chair to Bruce’s bed and held his hand as she told Jamie about Hal’s request for a transfer and Jim’s shooting.

  She told Jamie everything she had intended to tell Hal.

  Then, she told Jamie about the conversation with Bruce—that he had come on official business. And soon, Hailey was telling Jamie all of it—about going to his house when another woman was there, about breaking up with him minutes before he was shot. “I was breaking up with him.”

  “You didn’t get him shot.”

  “He has to wake up, Jamie. I can’t lose him, not after…”

  “He’s going to be okay.”

  “I know it’s the middle of the night, but I hope they are in the lab working on this.”

  “Roger’s there.”

  Hailey sat up. “He is?”

  “He had the team working on matching the tread marks from the street.”

  “They find the casing?” Hailey asked.

  “No.”

  She exhaled. “Who’s working it?”

  “A team out of CAP, but I don’t know who.”

  Crimes Against Persons would process the scene as an assault. Unless he died. Then, the case would get routed to her department.

  How soon would the shooter realize he got the wrong person? Would he come after her next?

  She couldn’t think about that now.

  “Go get some sleep,” Hailey said.

  Jamie promised to touch base in the morning and, when they were off the phone, Hailey stood beside Bruce.

  The bristle of the day’s growth on his jaw was rough her fingers. She raked her hands through his hair as she had countless times. It fell, thick, across his cheek and she brushed it off.

  She pressed her face to his. “I love you. I’ll let you go. Just wake up, okay? Come back.”

  She sank back into the chair. If she called the lab, she would only be pulling Roger away from the work. He would text if he made any discovery. She couldn’t imagine calling him at four thirty in the morning.

  Hal. He was the guy she’d call at four thirty in the morning.

  She looked at the missed calls.

  Hal had so many questions. Where would they begin?

  She must have drifted off because when she woke again, people were arguing in the hall.

  Hailey sat up and rubbed her eyes. She expected the doctor.

  When the door opened, it was Hal who entered.

  The anger in his face was gone and relief poured over her as she started to cry. “Hal.”

  Chapter 26

  Seeing Hailey’s face took Hal back to the day John had died. The awful tightness in his throat, a burning in his eyes.

  He glanced at Bruce Daniels, lying in the bed. His neck was bandaged, the machines, the IVs, saw how she watched him.

  He rubbed his eyes with one hand, stretching his thumb across the bridge of his nose. “Damn.”

  Hailey was scared. She couldn’t have been taller than five-three, the size of his ten-year-old nephew, but she was a force.

  He had never thought of her as small.

  From their first meetings, she was the size of her intellect, her power. It was immense.

  Often, he felt small. He’d never been comfortable around small women, feared the fragility. Though lean, Sheila was almost five-ten.

  He’d always thought of Hailey as stronger.

  Curled into the chair beside the bed, she could have been the patient. Tiny. Frail.

  She stood and swept her palms over her hair as though to tame it, pull herself together. Then, her gaze drifted to Daniels and her expression crumbled.

  It hurt to watch.

  There was another secret she’d kept.

  “Since when?”

  “Almost two years,” she said, her voice cracking. The tears fell faster.

  He closed the distance between them, wrapped an arm around her and pulled her, easily, against his chest. He looked down at the top of her head and felt the sobs against him. Said nothing.

  Hal had met the doctor in the hallway. He would be in to check Daniels soon, but he didn’t have a lot of good news.

  Daniels should have been awake.

  The longer the coma, the lower the chance of coming out of it.

  Hal had requested a few minutes with Hailey before the doctor came in. Maybe he could get her out of there. Just for a while.

  It was Kong who called him, some time around three.

  Hal had been asleep. He was pissed.

  He expected Sheila. Ignored the first two calls before he checked the number.

  “Daniels took a shot to the neck. He’s at General in the ICU,” Kong said when he answered. “Wyatt’s with him.”

  “Wyatt,” Hal repeated, acting like he knew what the hell she was up to. Trying not to be furious.

  “She was with him when it happened. Department car, parked in her driveway,” Kong explained.

  “When was the shooting?” Hal asked.

  “About two thirty this afternoon.” Hal was working through the timeframe while Kong went on. It had happened right after she’d left him at the B of A building. Before he’d come to the hospital to see Shakley, who was finally awake enough to answer some questions. He was working with a police artist this morning to create a composite of the man who had shot him. A white man, just like Hailey said.

  “Marshall assumed you knew, but he told me to call,” Kong was saying. “Someone should relieve Wyatt. I guess she’s been there the whole time and won’t leave.”

  Why was Daniels at Wyatt’s house in the middle of the day? A partner would know.

  “I’ll head to the hospital now,” Hal said. “You can get me on my cell.
”

  Hal held her, fighting his own welling emotion. He’d only seen her cry a couple of times—both right after John’s death. It had been awful, seeing her like that. But this felt so much worse. Like he was part of it. Part of her pain.

  A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door and they both looked up as the doctor came in. Hailey stepped away from Hal, moved to the bedside as the doctor came in with two others behind him.

  “Let’s go get some coffee, Hailey.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t.”

  Hal grabbed her hand. “He won’t be alone. We’ll be right back.”

  She was trembling and whispering “no,” but Hal held tight to her arm, pulled her toward the door.

  The hallway was bright and loud in comparison to the room. Hailey stood, blinking and watching the activity at the nurses’ station. Phones rang and a line of metal charts clinked against each other as nurses in patterned tops and green pants passed by and slid one in or out.

  A male nurse, a white guy almost as big as Hal, filled in a wall-sized chart on a white board.

  Third from the bottom was “B. Daniels.” In the next box was the attending physician, the one Hal had met. Baker. Next to that, a bunch of letters he couldn’t understand—some sort of acronym.

  He pulled on Hailey’s hand, not wanting her to try to decipher the board. The nurse directed him to the cafeteria.

  He saw the elevators, paused instinctively.

  Hailey kept walking. “Stairs.”

  Her pace was slow. She yawned, barely raised her hand high enough to cover it.

  They passed a series of rooms. A game show played on a TV—Wheel of Fortune or maybe Jeopardy.

  The patient was maybe seventeen. On his head was a metal halo. Long pins drilled into his skull. A woman adjusted his covers, though they were straight already, like she just needed something to do with her hands. She had the same expression in her eyes that he’d seen in Hailey’s. Please don’t let something else go wrong.

  They reached the stairwell and Hal pushed the door open. Hailey stepped inside and stopped, looking around as though it was a place she remembered.

  The last stairwell he’d been in with her was at the jail, the night before he’d asked Marshall for a transfer. This one was bright. Windows lined one wall and it smelled clean. Hailey made her way to the steps then turned and sat.

  “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “No.”

  “How about some coffee?”

  She shook her head again.

  “Shakley’s awake,” he said.

  “He’s going to be okay?”

  “Better than okay and he’s meeting with the police artist this morning to create a composite of his shooter.”

  Fresh tears trailed down her cheeks.

  “He said it was a white guy,” Hal added.

  “I saw his face. I told you.”

  “And I believe you…” Hal moved to sit beside her but she put a hand out to stop him. “You should go.”

  “I’m not leaving,” he said firmly.

  “You have to.”

  “Did you see him?” She wiped at her tears. “That happened because of me.”

  He shook his head, stepped forward.

  “Don’t.”

  “That did not happen because of you.”

  “Yes, it did,” she said. “I let it happen. Somehow, I let it happen.”

  “How?” Hal asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Come on, Wyatt. You’re the most honest cop I know. Who are you protecting?”

  She rose and started to climb the stairs. “You have to leave, Hal.”

  Hal caught up and took hold of her shoulders. “I’m not leaving.”

  She looked angry now. “I’m telling you to leave.”

  “And I said no,” he shouted. His voice echoed in the stairwell. “Who are you protecting? John? Are you protecting John? Because he’s dead, Hailey. You don’t have to protect him.”

  She broke through his grip. “Don’t talk about John.”

  “Is it Jim, then? Why are you protecting him? He doesn’t deserve your protection.”

  She said nothing.

  He watched her, the hesitation as it almost came free. He knew she needed to tell it. “Where’s Hailey Wyatt? Where is she? Your husband died. He was shot, but this isn’t about him. It’s about his father, a man who belongs in jail. If John were the kind of man I think he was, he’d agree. He’d help me. Why the hell won’t you?”

  Hailey dropped her head in her hands.

  The anger in him burst. She’d held this secret too long. It was wrecking them. It was wrecking him. He had to know. Damn it. She had to tell him. “What about the girls? Is this the legacy you want to leave them with? Because I know what that’s like, Hailey. I know what it’s like when the only thing anyone wants to remember about your old man is that he was crooked.”

  He wouldn’t let Hailey sweep it under the rug the way his mother had. If his father was guilty, he wanted to know. If he wasn’t, Hal wanted to fight for his pension, for his reputation.

  How could his mother just walk away from that? Did she think his father was guilty? He didn’t believe it.

  And now Hailey, too. How could she turn her back on the truth?

  What would make her do that?

  Why would she protect Jim Wyatt? She said she trusted him. She believed him. How could she after all the lies? He had to have been involved. He didn’t buy that it was Hailey’s mother-in-law with her lace doilies and her floral teacups. If she’d shot her son, she never could have hid the secret. It would have eaten her alive.

  How many times had he studied that file? Most of the window glass had been found in the room, but there were a few shards of glass fragments on the ground outside.

  Someone had broken the window from the outside to make it look like the shot came from there.

  Hailey held her arms against her midsection. As though protecting herself. She’d done that when she was pregnant. Rubbing at her big belly.

  Pregnant.

  Hal staggered back. His hands fell from her shoulders. “Christ.” He knew. He raked his hands across his scalp. “It’s the girls,” he whispered. “You’re protecting the girls.”

  Terror made her brown eyes black. She started to speak. Stopped. Started to walk but didn’t move.

  She shrank as though a box was closing in around her.

  Hal sank onto a stair, set his elbows on his knees.

  Above them, a door opened. Shoes clicked on the stairs then another door opened and it was quiet again. Hal hid his face in his hands, filling his lungs in deep breaths.

  In. Out.

  “I’ll give you Jim,” she whispered.

  He waited, listening.

  “But if you take him down, you take me, too.”

  Why hadn’t he realized sooner? She was protecting her girls. Of course she was. But why would she tell him? Him of all people.

  They could solve it if only she’d trust him.

  God, he was sick to death of holding it in, of pretending. He steeled his breath, pressed his hands into his knees. “Was it Camilla or Ali?”

  Her eyes went wide. Her hands were pressed to her chest as though she couldn’t breathe. She sank into a chair. “No.”

  “Ali,” he guessed. Camilla was too old. It would have come out. But Ali had only been four almost five when John died. “Ali shot John.”

  Hailey leaned into the wall and cried. Silently. Streams of tears that she let drip off her chin and nose.

  “How?” He sat on the stair, giving her space.

  She pushed him away.

  He didn’t yield. “How?”

  “Oh, God. She can’t ever know. She can’t ever remember.”

  “It’s me. It�
�s just me,” he whispered.

  And then she began to talk, to tell the story. “It was Jim’s gun. He gave it to John because of the threats at the DA’s office. He was teaching John to use. Ali was bored—” She caught a sob. “—Liz was taking Camilla to a show and Ali wanted to go, so she went into Jim’s office. They started talking, got distracted…” She paused. “I heard them arguing from the kitchen. But they did that a lot, Jim and John.” She met his gaze. “It wasn’t loaded. Jim swore he’d checked it and John would’ve, too. I’m sure he would have.”

  He hadn’t. If it hadn’t been loaded, John wouldn’t be dead. One moment of oversight, a little carelessness—that was how it happened.

  “Ali turned the barrel toward her dad. He reached for it—to take it away…”

  There had been so much blood in the crime scene photos.

  She touched her hand to the back of her neck, the place where John’s wound would have been. Had she watched him die?

  He gave her time and after a moment, she went on. “Jim came out of the room, shouting. He had Ali in his arms.” She looked up at him. “His only child was on the floor, dying and he took her out of there, didn’t want her to see it.”

  He couldn’t imagine what Jim had gone through, leaving a dying child.

  He pictured his own father.

  The photos he’d seen of his murder.

  Rubbed his eyes.

  “Can you imagine that? Can you imagine leaving your child to die to save Ali the agony of seeing it?”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “I got to him, but the bullet grazed the jugular. It was too fast.”

  Her eyes clouded. Her stare went flat.

  “Christ, Hailey.”

  She looked at her open palms. “There was too much blood. I tried, but…”

  She had spent the last year trying to save her child. Lying to her bosses, her partner. To everyone. Avoiding that file because she already knew who killed John and the reality was too painful to relive.

  Why didn’t he see it?

  Why didn’t he realize how tortured she was?

  “Do you know what John said, lying on the floor?” The words came out as a whisper then she halted.

  He didn’t think she’d told this story to anyone. “Tell me.”

  The sun shifted across the windows beside them. Hospital windows. Another man shot, another man who might die. He couldn’t imagine how this was for her, how it had been then.