Trauma Alert

by Radclyffe

  “Ali,” Wynter whispered from somewhere behind her.

  “What is it you need?” Ali called to the man at the far end of the hall. “Go, Wynter. The door is just to your right. All you have to do is step through.”

  “Hey!” he shouted when Wynter disappeared. He took a step forward, his gun arm trembling.

  “It’s okay,” Ali said quickly. “I can help you.”

  “Where’s my wife?”

  “What’s her name?” Sweat trickled down the middle of Ali’s back. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Nancy pushing equipment carts in front of the glass door to the trauma bay, barricading herself inside. She must have heard what was happening. The security camera mounted above the main doors right behind the gunman swiveled slowly and Ali tried not to look at it. Someone was watching them from outside the double doors that separated the trauma wing from the rest of the ER. Help was on the way. She just had to keep him engaged until the police arrived. She wasn’t frightened. Wynter was safe, that’s all that mattered. She wouldn’t lose her.

  *

  Beau gripped the field trauma kit and edged closer to the ring of SWAT officers bunched around a video monitor someone had propped on a metal folding chair. SWAT had set up a mobile command post around the corner from the main doors to trauma admitting. She couldn’t see the entire screen, but she saw enough to make sweat run down her sides and nausea roll in the pit of her stomach. Ali stood alone at the far end of a deserted corridor, facing a man whose back was to the camera. His face was obscured but the weapon in his hand was plain enough, and it was pointed directly at Ali.

  “Can we get audio?” The SWAT team leader clamped a hand on the shoulder of a technician, who was fiddling with the video feed, and bent to stare at the screen. “Blind canyon in there. One way in, one way out.”

  “We’re lucky to have video. We can’t risk drilling. He’ll hear that,” the tech said, “and he looks pretty jumpy. We’ll have to snake a line down the hall and under those doors. That’ll take a few minutes.”

  “What about calling whoever is still in the trauma bay?” Beau said. “Ali can’t be the only one down there.”

  The SWAT commander shook his head. “I don’t want him to hear the phone ringing. He looks like the type to spook.”

  “What about the radio dispatch,” Beau insisted. “The one we use in the field. He won’t hear that.”

  “That’s an idea,” the SWAT commander said, turning to Risa Santos, who squatted next to Beau. “You have the frequency set?”

  “Here,” Risa said, handing him her radio. “Channel one.”

  Beau half listened as SWAT spoke to someone in the trauma bay and ascertained the number and location of hostages. Her gaze was riveted to the monitor. Ali was talking to the gunman and seemed remarkably—almost eerily—calm. Beau was afraid to take her eyes off her, but standing by doing nothing, helplessly watching the gun centered on Ali’s chest, made her feel like she was coming out of her skin. She had to figure a way to get through those doors and down that long empty hallway to shield Ali from this fucking maniac. Amped on adrenaline, she quivered like a racehorse restrained inside the starting cage, so wired she was sick with frustration.

  “He’s getting pretty agitated, Captain,” one of the SWAT officers reported urgently.

  “Let’s hope she can talk him down, because if we have to go in it’s going to get messy,” the SWAT commander replied.

  *

  “What’s your name?” Ali asked.

  “Martin Campbell. Where’s my wife?”

  For a second, the name didn’t register, then she put it together with the comatose patient inside. Trina Campbell.

  “Is Trina your wife?”

  His face twisted angrily. “Yes, goddamn it. And someone took her. Right out of our house.”

  “She needed medical attention. She’s here getting taken care of. Why don’t you put the gun—”

  “I want to see her now. Now.” He paced back and forth, gripping his head with one hand. The gun swung in wild arcs, the trajectory sweeping across Ali’s chest. “What did she tell you? Lies, all lies. Where is she?”

  “Mr. Campbell, I’ll be happy to take you to your wife as soon as I can. Will you please put down—”

  “No,” he shouted, grabbing the gun with both hands. “No, no no no. I’m not doing anything to help you! This is all your fault! Your fault.”

  Ali heard a sharp crack and her head exploded with white-hot fire. She lost her balance and fell, trying to keep her body in front of the door to the room where Wynter hid.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The SWAT commander shouted Go go go and Beau leapt to her feet, pushing to the forefront of the first wave of armed officers through the gray metal doors. The SWAT team swarmed the gunman but she catapulted over the pile of flailing bodies and raced down the hall. Ali lay on her side, one hand covering her face. Blood streamed between her fingers, down her forearm, onto the floor.

  “Ali,” Beau shouted, dropping to her knees next to her. “Ali, can you hear me?”

  “Wynter,” Ali gasped, dizzy from the pain in her head and fighting not to vomit. Her stomach revolted when she tried to get to her knees and she slumped down. “See about Wynter.”

  Beau’s heart rate dropped out of the stratosphere the instant she heard Ali’s voice. “The police will take care of her. Let me look at you.”

  “Beau?” Ali swiped at the blood in her eyes. “Beau?”

  “Yes.” Beau yanked a blood pressure cuff out of her kit and wrapped it around Ali’s arm. Shouts of Clear echoed in the hallway. BP 100 over 60, but she was bleeding at a good clip. She’d need fluid. Beau whipped a tourniquet around Ali’s bicep, ripped the plastic sleeve off an IV catheter, and threaded the needle into a vein beneath the smooth skin of Ali’s forearm. She secured it with tape and connected the tubing to a saline bag, all the while scanning Ali’s body for more signs of blood. Had there been only one shot? More than one? “Where are you hit?”

  “My head.” Ali squinted as the light stabbed into her skull. She had diplopia. “Bit of a concussion, I think. Wynter’s in the locker room. Make sure she’s all right.”

  “In a minute,” Beau muttered. She poured saline onto a gauze pad while a SWAT officer pounded on the locker room door and announced Police. “You’re sure you’re not hit anywhere else?”

  “No…oh…Damn. I’m going to vomit.”

  “Okay. It’s all right.” Beau quickly slid a small plastic basin close to Ali’s face. Then she held Ali’s hair back with one hand and pressed the gauze to a long gash in her left temple with the other. She supported Ali’s head as Ali’s stomach emptied.

  “God,” Ali gasped. “I hate doing that.”

  Beau laughed. “Me too.”

  “Help me sit up.”

  “Not a chance, Doc. You need to stay down until we can get you onto a stretcher.” Beau looked around and saw an African American woman in scrubs hurrying out of the trauma bay in their direction. “Bring a gurney over here, will you?”

  “Yes, right away. I called a trauma alert but they’re not letting anyone down here. Where’s Dr. Thompson?”

  “Right here,” Wynter said, emerging from the locker room. When she saw Ali, her face drained of color and she stumbled to a halt. “My God, Ali!”

  “I’m all right,” Ali said.

  “Status?” Wynter said, her eyes on Beau.

  “GSW to the head,” Beau said. “Vitals are stable. Alert and oriented. We need a stretcher over here, somebody!”

  The nurse and a firefighter pushed a stretcher over and Beau, still supporting Ali’s neck, lifted her with their help.

  “I’m fine.” Ali gripped Beau’s arm and tried to sit up on the stretcher.

  “You’re going to be fine, but you need to lie still until we look at you.” Beau motioned for the nurse to hold the gauze on Ali’s forehead while she kept her hand on Ali’s shoulder and pushed the stretcher into the trauma bay. She looked down into Ali’
s dark eyes, so relieved to see them crackle with sharp intelligence and a little bit of temper that she brushed the backs of her fingers over Ali’s cheek. “Try to be a good patient.”

  Ali’s lips parted in surprise, her eyes searching Beau’s. “I don’t have time for this.”

  “I know it’s hard,” Beau murmured. “Just hang on for a little while.”

  When they reached the trauma bay, Wynter sidled up to the stretcher next to Beau. “Let me look at her.”

  “No, page a resident,” Ali said. “Then call Pearce and have her come and get you. Go home.”

  “Ali. Don’t be ridiculous.” Wynter pulled on gloves and removed the gauze. “You’ve got a twelve-centimeter open wound that needs to be cleaned out and sutured. And you’re going to need a CAT scan. I’m not going home.”

  “Actually, Dr. Thompson, you are,” a deep male voice from behind them said. “I’ll see to Dr. Torveau.”

  “Ambrose,” Wynter said, clearly shocked.

  “You’re all right, I take it?” His gaze swept from Wynter’s face down her body.

  “Yes,” Wynter replied.

  “Pearce is on her way,” he said. “I suggest you lie down somewhere until she arrives.”

  “I’m fine—”

  Ali grabbed Wynter’s hand. “Do it for me, sweetheart.”

  Wynter closed her eyes and took a long breath. “All right. For you.”

  “Nurse,” the man said. “Please see that Dr. Thompson lies down. Then prepare a suture tray for me. Size eights.”

  “Of course, Dr. Rifkin,” the nurse replied.

  Beau straightened as the man finally focused on her.

  “I’ve got this now,” he said.

  “That’s all right. I’m staying.”

  His eyebrows rose minimally. “I see.”

  Beau doubted that he did, but she didn’t care what he thought. She didn’t recognize the patrician man in the expensive three-piece suit, but his demeanor suggested he was used to being obeyed without discussion. The nurse had called him Dr. Rifkin, so she figured he must be the chief of surgery. Whoever he was didn’t matter to her. She wasn’t leaving until she was certain Ali was all right.

  “Beau, what are you doing here?” Ali asked.

  “I was in the neighborhood, remember?”

  Ali smiled. “The last time I saw you, you weren’t on duty.”

  “I like to be where the action is, and this is definitely the happening place.”

  Ali winced as Dr. Rifkin injected lidocaine into the edges of the gouge along her hairline. Beau reached for her hand and held it, hiding her own grimace of pain when Ali squeezed down hard on her fingers. The bullet had torn through Ali’s scalp down to the bone, but apparently had not penetrated intracranially. If it had, she would be dead. Just like that, Ali would be gone. The few moments of communication outside the elevator, the tenuous connection they had just begun to weave, might have been destroyed. And the bright promise of what they might have shared would have been obliterated forever. The thought of losing the possibility of knowing Ali hit her hard, and she trembled.

  “Beau,” Ali whispered. “Hey. Are you all right?”

  Beau shook off the dark vision and forced a grin. “I’m not the one lying on the stretcher. I’m fine.”

  “You don’t have to stay,” Ali said.

  “Nope, I don’t. But I’m going to.” Beau checked the surgeon’s progress. He worked quickly and efficiently, cleansing the wound, snipping away the tattered edges of muscle and subcutaneous tissue that had been burned from the heat of the bullet’s passage. He handled the instruments with deft, precise, rapid movements. He was good, and she was glad.

  The trauma doors slid open and the brunette Beau had seen with Dr. Thompson in the lobby ran in. She wore maroon scrubs and looked both disheveled and frantic. “Wynter! Where’s Wynter?” She skidded to a stop next to the stretcher. “Oh, Jesus. Ali. Is Wynter—”

  “Fine,” Dr. Rifkin said coolly. “Dr. Thompson is fine. Lying down. I suggest you take her home.”

  “Pearce,” Ali said steadily. “She’s absolutely perfect. She was never in any danger. All the same, she’s going to be stressed. Keep an eye on her tonight.”

  “Dad,” Pearce said, appearing calmer now, “do you need a hand here?”

  “I think I can handle it.”

  Pearce glanced at Beau, who was still holding Ali’s hand, then leaned down and kissed Ali’s cheek. “How are you doing?”

  “I’ve got a bitch of a headache, but otherwise I’m okay. Go find Wynter. Take her home.”

  “You sure? We can stay until you’re ready to leave. You can come home with us.”

  “No, thanks,” Ali said immediately. “You two just take care of each other. I’ll be fine.”

  “We will be admitting Dr. Torveau for observation,” Dr. Rifkin said.

  “No, we won’t,” Ali said. “I don’t need to be admitted. I wasn’t unconscious. I’ve got a scalp wound. For God’s sake, Ambrose.”

  “I can see that Ali gets home,” Beau said.

  “I’m afraid that isn’t satisfactory,” Dr. Rifkin said. “A gunshot wound produces significant concussive—”

  “Concussive force waves that can cause tissue damage at a distance from the wound itself. Yes, I know,” Beau said. “There’s a small, but not insignificant, possibility that cerebral edema can result from non-penetrating gunshot wounds to the cranium. There’s also a risk of delayed bleeding. Therefore, the patient should be observed with regular neuro checks for the first twenty-four hours. Which is why I’m going to take her home and do that.”

  “You most certainly are not,” Ali said.

  “Very good. You’re a paramedic?” Dr. Rifkin asked, nimbly snipping the end of the running suture he had used to close the superficial layer of Ali’s scalp.

  “That’s right. I’m in the new TER-OPS program.”

  “Good. Then I’ll assume she’ll be in capable hands.” He snapped off his gloves, dropped them into a red-lined wastebasket, and removed his suit coat from the IV stand where he’d hung it before he had begun work on Ali’s forehead. He addressed Pearce. “I’ll be here most of the evening if there’s any problem. I can have the chief of OB come in to see Wynter if need be.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Pearce said, raking her hand through her hair. She glanced at Ali one more time. “You sure you don’t want me to stay?”

  “Please,” Ali said. “Find your wife and take her home.”

  Pearce smiled crookedly. “Yeah. I’ll do that.” She focused on Beau. “You’ve got this?”

  “No problem.”

  Ali sighed in exasperation. “I’m suffocating under a cloud of testosterone.”

  Beau grinned at Pearce. Pearce laughed.

  “I have to report in with my captain,” Beau said to Ali. “I’ll catch up to you in CAT scan.”

  “You don’t have to do this.” Ali kept her voice low so that Ambrose wouldn’t hear the conversation. “We both know I’m going to be fine. And you’re absolutely not spending the night with me.”

  “I’m taking you home,” Beau said. “We’ll figure out the rest of it later.”

  “I don’t need you to take care of me.”

  “No, you probably don’t.” Beau smiled wryly. “But I’m going to anyhow.”

  *

  Ali gripped the door handle of the taxi so hard her hand ached, but at least the pain distracted her from her desire to vomit. She’d only just gotten rid of the sour aftereffects of the first round with half a bottle of hospital-issue Scope, and she wasn’t about to go through another bout. Cool fingers slipped beneath her hair and circled the back of her neck. She closed her eyes and let Beau draw her head down to her shoulder.

  “Not much farther,” Beau murmured.

  “I never realized how many potholes there were between Thirty-fourth and Twenty-second.”

  The cab swung around the corner and Ali moaned quietly. Every bump, every sway and swerve of the cab, every lur
ch and stop made her feel as if her head were being severed from her cervical spine with a dull machete. The only thing keeping her from vomiting in Beau’s lap was her refusal to admit that she needed Beau’s help getting home. Walking was difficult when the slightest bit of light felt like ice picks being driven into her eyeballs, and objects swam and multiplied in front of her. She definitely had a concussion.

  “Tell him to stop,” Ali said urgently. “Beau, I’m going to—”

  “Breathe deep. Slow and easy. Hold on.” Beau gently massaged Ali’s neck and called to the cabbie, “Hey, buddy. Even it out a little bit, will you.”

  Ali kept her eyes closed and wrapped her arm around Beau’s middle to counteract the movement of the cab. Beau was solid, and as tender as she was strong. The fingers on Ali’s neck grounded her as much as they soothed her. And Beau smelled good. She hadn’t closed her jacket, and the soft cotton beneath Ali’s cheek smelled like a snowy morning. Crisp and clean and fresh. And beneath that, a teasing scent of musk and smoke, like a fire burning in a hearth on a deep winter’s night. She clung tighter, fighting down another wave of pain and nausea, and when she tilted her head, her mouth brushed Beau’s neck. Beau’s stomach jumped beneath her arm.

  “Sorry,” Ali murmured.

  “It’s okay.” Beau moved her hand from Ali’s neck and curled her arm around her shoulder. “Here we go. Ready?”

  “God, yes. Get me out of this torture chamber.”

  At the temper in Ali’s voice, Beau laughed softly and barely managed not to rub her cheek against the top of Ali’s head. Ali felt so damn good curled up against her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d held a woman, really held one. She could remember sex but she couldn’t remember feeling this satisfied even after an orgasm. Ali’s body was every bit as tight and beautiful as her sharp, strong mind. And oh, Christ, her skin was so soft. Beau’s fingertips tingled from the light caresses on her neck, and the electricity streamed all the way down to the ache between her thighs.