Dead On Arrival

by Lori Avocato

  I just knew it.

  When Jagger pulled into the hospital parking lot, I noticed Ambulance #456 still in the driveway of the ER.

  We parked and got out, hurried to the emergency-room entrance and went inside.

  Staff bustled about, running in and out of Trauma Room #1. Pansy. Had to be. There was a blackboard on the far wall, which listed patients, their conditions, time of arrival and a few other needed tidbits. I was thrilled to see her name there instead of erased off.

  “Think they’ll let us talk to her?” I asked, knowing full well Jagger would get us in somehow. I saw several police in the hallway near the room and figured they’d get first crack at questioning, but we wouldn’t be far behind.

  Because, of course, Jagger was Jagger.

  Nurse Grosch hurried past us with a “hey, Pauline,” and headed into Room #1. The few times I’d been here with ER Dano, I did get to meet several of the staff. Maybe that would help. I noticed one of the EMT women, Jennifer Shelton, who had been on duty during the memorial service. She stood near the main desk, talking to one of the nurses, Kim Gonzalez. I remembered her from when we’d brought in the phone-cord-around-the-neck lady.

  “Excuse me,” I said to Jagger, who looked a bit surprised. Good. At least he’d realize I had a brain and could work my cases alone too. I walked over to the two women, who were now talking with the receptionist. Her name badge read Nancy Pringle.

  The receptionist looked up. “May I help you?”

  She probably didn’t recognize me in my little black dress as part of the TLC ambulance team. “Oh, hey, Nancy. I’m Pauline. A nurse. I was here with ER Dano the other day.”

  Kim looked up. “Hi. Sorry to hear about Pansy.”

  Hmm. According to that segue; my prayers were answered pretty darn quickly today. “Yes, a real shock. How is she?”

  She and Jennifer, the EMT, looked at each other. Wow. What the heck? Was there something going on here, or was Pansy already gone?

  “I’m not working that room, but the staff is still in there. So, that’s a good sign,” Kim said.

  I nodded and leaned toward her. “Look, is there any chance that I can get in to see her?”

  All three looked at me as if I were nuts. Jagger was standing near the desk, and his expression wasn’t far off from theirs. I ignored him and tried to think of a lie. Again, that was not my forte. Nothing. I had nothing. What could I say that wouldn’t cause suspicion of my asking?

  “Why?” Nancy asked.

  Oh, well. That was not unexpected, I thought. “I…er…ah…just want to see how she is. I mean, I work for her, you know.”

  They looked around the bustling ER. No one else from TLC was there other than Jennifer and her partner.

  “I know no one else is here to check, but Pansy is a wonderful woman.”

  Jagger grabbed my arm and yanked me to the side, managing to shake his head at me while pulling me down the hallway. Over my shoulder I said, “Give her my regards,” and turned to push Jagger’s hand off my arm. “What the hell are you doing?”

  He looked at me, and I knew he wanted to ask the same thing of me-and understandably so.

  “Okay. Okay. Can’t you give a girl kudos for trying?”

  “Trying? How many employees of TLC do you see here? And how many would actually come here, with the reputation of the Sterling bosses? None, Pauline.”

  He was correct. I knew it. In all the shocking happenings of today, I wasn’t really thinking clearly, but telling that to Jagger would be a mute point. He didn’t do sympathy very well and that was the last emotion I’d want from him anyway.

  “I get it.” I refused to say I was sorry though.

  “Let’s go get a coffee,” Jagger said, walking toward the sign for the cafeteria.

  “But what if…” I paused. If Pansy died, we would miss our chance, but the cops surely would find out something if Pansy ever came to enough to answer. “Never mind,” I added, even though Jagger wasn’t even paying attention to me.

  Glancing out a window in the hallway, I noticed a male figure in the parking lot that looked an awful lot like Sky. Hmm. Could he have remained here only to make sure his boss was all right, or was there more to it?

  In the cafeteria, we found Buzz waiting in a short line. “Hey,” I said. “How was she when you brought her in?”

  At first he looked at me as if he didn’t know me. Had to be the damn black dress. Why was it that no one knew me unless I was decked out in my hated scrubs? Had they all only related to me as Nurse Pauline? Damn!

  Finally recognizing me, he started to answer, but I found myself looking around for Dano. Oh, geez. And with Jagger only feet away. Then again, I shared a few kisses with him, but he’d never made any attempt at asking me out, so no way was I beholden to him.

  No way.

  Jeremy sighed. “She was in bad shape. Great deal of blood lost. But when they hooked her up, she did have normal sinus rhythm, although also tachycardia.”

  “I’d certainly imagine her heart would be pumping faster with a blood loss.” Jeremy knew this, but I figured my simple explanation would help him relax with me and realize that I knew medicine.

  “Yeah. Blood loss.” He turned to the girl behind the counter. “Hot-dog platter.”

  Suddenly I realized none of us had eaten. There was probably a huge buffet of sorts at Pansy’s house. Maybe the cops would eat it. I smiled to myself and looked around for Jagger…who was gone.

  Things like that didn’t even faze me any longer.

  After more chitchat, and with the departure of Jagger, I followed Jeremy to his table-where Dano sat.

  My hands started to tremble.

  My heart started to beat a bit faster, although not in tachycardia.

  And my voice came out in a husky tone when I said, “Hey, Dano.” Even I was impressed with it, and by the looks of him, he was too.

  Good, since Jagger was gone.

  “May I join you?” I asked.

  Jeremy said, “Of course,” at the same time Dano said, “No need for an invitation.”

  Hmm. Did that mean I was always welcome to sit with him ’cause of our kiss or ’cause I was an employee of TLC?

  I was going with the kiss.

  “Have you heard how she’s doing?” I asked, sitting.

  Dano shook his head. “We usually don’t get reports from the ER staff.” He sounded a bit pissed, and I wondered if that was because Pansy was an employer, or if Dano had another reason why he wanted to know if she was going to make it.

  Hopefully that reason was because she was a human being and deserved to live, like everyone else.

  And nothing dreadful.

  I hung around the ER until the looks of the staff indicated they wanted to throw me out. After way too much small talk, Nancy even tried to look busy instead of talking to me. When Ted Grosch came out of Pansy’s room, I asked how she was doing. He said, “She’ll be off to surgery soon. Still alive, but barely,” and then hurried off.

  But barely. Damn.

  Two of the cops standing by the doorway started to look at me suspiciously. Of course they didn’t know who I was and Shatley was nowhere to be found, so I figured I’d better hightail it out of there before I was questioned as a suspect. Only Shatley knew I worked with Jagger. That was my cushion to fall back on and keep me from possible incarceration. There was that breaking and entering time…

  When I got to the exit, I realized Jagger had abandoned me without a ride. Damn it. Pulling out my cell phone, I stepped to the side while another ambulance company brought in an obviously “in labor” woman, who was cursing at her husband nonstop.

  I winked at her and punched in Goldie’s number. “Hey. I need a lift from the ER.”

  First, in his usual way, he shrieked, until I hollered into the cell to calm down. “A case, Gold. I’m fine.”

  “Oh, good. I’ll swing by to get you, but I’m meeting Miles for lunch at Madelyn’s. You’ll of course join us.”

  I coul
dn’t even use the excuse that I was not dressed up enough for the swanky-the only swanky-restaurant in Hope Valley. Sitting by the Connecticut River and having a Coors Light might be just what the doctor ordered right now. “I’m in,” I said, to Goldie’s delight, and I leaned against the wall to wait.

  Miles hugged me as if we were long-lost buddies instead of roommates who had just seen each other that morning. “I’m thrilled you can join us.”

  I always felt as if I were interrupting a romance with these two, but that was my take on it, not theirs. I knew that much but still always wanted to give them some space. But I was famished, dressed to kill, and had nowhere else to go but home to flop on my bed and contemplate a horrible day.

  “This turned out perfect,” I said, following the hostess as she made small talk with Goldie, who just about everyone knew, and showed us to a table with a water view, since Goldie had insisted on as much for his “Suga.”

  The woman set the menus down on the table, turned and stepped to the side, holding the chair for Goldie.

  He smiled, began to sit and gasped.

  Miles looked in the direction Goldie had and said, “Shit.”

  Confused, I turned to see what the big deal was-and froze.

  Sitting across the room was Jagger, still in his fantastic suit. Still looking like a GQ model from Testosterone Heaven, and still not noticing me.

  Thank the good Lord, since across the table from him was the most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen.

  Gorgeous with a damn capital “G.”

  Twelve

  “You’ve got it all over her,” I heard Goldie say as if in the distance.

  Maybe that was because I was in shock, jealous as all get out, although I tried to tell myself I had no right to be. I was still staring.

  Long black hair touched her shoulders. A mint green skirt suit with snakeskin shoes, of matching green and black, ivory skin set off by the darkened locks and no wedding ring blurred in the distance. My damn vision cleared enough, unfortunately, to notice teeth whiter than Pansy’s pallor. Okay, bad analogy, but someone that looked so perfect as this chick deserved a bad/ morbid analogy.

  Plus, she was with my Jagger!

  She looked at him several times and smiled-like a freaking magazine model, airbrushed and all. She made “flirt” the word of the day.

  He looked in her eyes and returned a smile. I had to think, though, that it wasn’t too genuine-looking and maybe should be classified as a half smile. I felt my complexion turn a lovely shade of green while I told myself that I was trying to manipulate the image for my own satisfaction. Honest Abe that I was. I really knew little to nothing about Jagger’s life outside of our investigating together and that he vacationed in Newport, Rhode Island, once a year.

  Maybe he was making it perfectly clear that we were only coworkers.

  I looked at my roomies. “Guys, I’m not really hungry,” I said, and turned and walked away despite their protesting.

  I yanked my cell phone out of my pocket. After I punched the buttons with much more force then needed and had to redial three times, I heard a voice that made me feel oh-so-much better.

  “Hey, Nightingale.”

  Ah…

  Earlier I’d only had to swallow a teeny, tiny bit of my pride to invite myself out to eat with ER Dano, I thought, as I looked at him across the table of the Dew Drop Inn diner, Hope Valley’s famous.

  Although I’d made the call to him on a whim and telling myself that if Jagger was spending time with the likes of Airbrushed Lady, then I shouldn’t be pining for him. I had to have a love life of my own-it had only dawned on me after the fifth ring that Dano might refuse.

  I smiled at him.

  He smiled back.

  Thank goodness for not refusing. Seems as if dear Dano was my saving grace today. He’d eaten with Buzz earlier, but graciously offered to meet me for coffee, which I took as a good sign.

  “I feel a bit overdressed for this place,” I said, knowing it was stupid small talk, but Dano-make that most guys-didn’t do small talk very well. Actually, they didn’t talk nearly as much as women, and when there was a lull in the conversation, I always felt obligated to fill in the dead airspace.

  Dead airspace. I was full of lousy analogies today.

  He looked at me. His eyes drifted down toward my hint of cleavage. Actually, when I bought the dress under Goldie’s impeccable taste and guidance, it fit differently. There was no cleavage. At least that’s the way it was after Goldie tucked here and there and then let me look in the mirror and insisted I buy it.

  When I dressed today though, there was about a two-inch cleavage that I couldn’t tuck away. Gotta love my Goldie!

  And apparently Dano couldn’t help noticing too.

  I felt like a naughty nurse, but leaned a bit forward. He said, “You look fine.”

  Fine? I gathered a statement like that coming from ER Dano could be likened to a compliment from Jagger. “Fine” was like the word “fantastic” in a normal guy’s vocabulary. I had actually convinced myself that it was so.

  As I had convinced myself that ER Dano and Jagger were not normal, run-of-the-mill guys.

  Way too delicious for that!

  He took a sip of his black coffee and looked at me, his eyes drifting occasionally to my chest as he spoke. “Pansy is in recovery now.”

  “Oh, wow. Good. Then she survived the surgery.” I nodded. “That’s great.” How I wanted to ask if I could talk to her, but realized I would have to do it on my own. I’d snuck into places before and was getting quite good at it. Besides, who’d question me in my scrubs? Certain there’d be police guards outside her door, I’d have to come up with something. Although lying was not my strong suit, I was getting better and better at it. Hey, practice makes perfect, Stella Sokol always said. However, I’m quite certain she never meant to use it for lying.

  In fact, I know she never meant to use it for lying. She was the main reason I stunk at lying-her and “Sister Mary I Can Get Away With Anything I Want Because I’m a Nun.” I think I had her throughout all eight years of Catholic School, and still had the scars on my knuckles from the wooden ruler to prove it.

  Dano sipped at his coffee, and I realized my mind wandering had caused a lull, the dead-airspace thing. Natch, he didn’t fill it, but merely looked at me over the rim of his mug.

  I owed Goldie for the cleavage.

  “So, are you going back to the hospital to see her tonight?”

  Dano looked confused, and well he should. There seemed to be no love lost between he and Pansy. Make that Pansy and any employee, so I guessed her room was not going to be filled with get-well cards, balloons or flowers.

  What a sad life to be so disliked.

  And, damn it, what a difficult case now, since there could possibly be a gazillion suspects! I made a mental note to ask Jagger…damn him…if he’d gotten anything from the lieutenant.

  I would give Jagger credit in that he did share what he learned with me if it pertained to my case. For as competitive as he seemed, he did try to help me be the best investigator I could be. He taught me well.

  But just what was he teaching Airbrush Lady?

  I told myself to stop that and shoved a spoonful of my clam chowder into my mouth.

  “Nice day, weather-wise,” Dano said, taking me by surprise.

  I nodded, yet hadn’t paid attention. The day had flown by so far. When I looked out the diner’s window, I noticed everyone with shorts, hats, tees or sunglasses on and a gentle breeze said it must be a gorgeous New England day. Very low humidity.

  I swallowed. “You’re right. It is.” After several minutes, I had finished my meal pretty much in disappointing silence. ER Dano was a pip. Quite possibly harder to figure out than Jagger-which seemed like a monumental impossibility.

  He paid the check even though I insisted I should, we walked out the door-with a dull disappointment in my gut-and I turned toward my Volvo.

  “Give me your address, Nightingale.”
>
  I swung around, scowling. “Huh?”

  “Be ready in an hour. Can’t let this day go to waste.” With that he turned and walked toward his white pickup truck.

  Ready? Ready? How ready? “Hey, wait!”

  He turned around.

  “Wear what?” I shaded my eyes with my hand since the late-afternoon sun was so crisp, clear and bright. “What should I be ready for?”

  He looked at me as if I should have known. “Beach.”

  I gave him my address and he waved away my directions and I had no doubt ER Dano could find me. And not because he drove an ambulance and knew the entire town of Hope Valley and surrounding areas.

  Nope.

  ER Dano always got what he wanted. Of that I was quite certain. Always? Hmm?

  Watch out, Pauline!

  “I think the pink is better than the peacock blue,” Goldie said as he hustled about me, stepping over the pile of clothes on the floor. My clothes. On my bedroom floor! And me standing there in my bra and white jeans without a hint of embarrassment in front of these two jokers. I didn’t even have to tell myself it was like a bathing-suit top.

  Miles hurried out of my closet. “Gold…hon, blue has always made her pale gray eyes look more silver. More noticeable. And she needs that with her hair. You know, so light next to that skin.”

  Goldie leaned into me as he held up the blue spandex top close to my face. “I see what you mean, but it also makes her pale complexion look…well, forgive me, Suga, but paler. No. She needs more help than blue.”

  I grabbed the top from him. “You two busybodies are going to make me late. I’ll wear yellow.”

  They both screeched.

  I shook my head and laughed. “Well, it’s only a trip to the beach. I’m sure we’ll just walk along the boardwalk and besides; I’ll need my denim jacket. With the sea breeze, it’s probably cooler down there. So it almost doesn’t matter what I have on underneath.”