by Bill Hopkins
painkiller of some kind, although his arm still felt as if a thousand bees took turns stinging him. Nonetheless, he felt himself floating on a down comforter a mile thick. His mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton balls. Everything hurt except the parts he couldn’t feel.
He lay on death’s cold doorstep. The welcome mat invited him to leave the land of the living and enter the country of the dead.
The nurse squinted. “You awake, honey?” she said in a soft angel’s voice that didn’t match her balloon of a body. If she spoke in an angel’s voice, maybe he’d already passed. “You must’ve been dreaming. You were groaning and making a lot of noise. Mumbling about something.”
The exceptionally good dope dribbling into him made her voice sound heavenly. He spotted a crucifix hanging around her neck. When he turned on his side, a lightning bolt shot through his arm. Maybe the dope wasn’t as good as he’d first thought.
He said, “Am I dead?”
“No.” She rearranged his pillow. “Far from it. You’re in St. Luke’s Hospital.”
“Then, yes, sweetie. I’m awake.”
She giggled. The laughter and voice sounded familiar. “You’re going to be fine.” The nurse straightened the bed sheets while he tried to determine if he knew her. The sheets felt starched and smelled faintly of Clorox. Where had he seen her? Woozy as he was, she still reminded him of someone.
“When can I get out of here?”
“Maybe today. Definitely tomorrow.” She looked over her shoulder, out the door, then back at Rosswell. “I’m not supposed to tell you things like that. Wait for the doctor.”
“Tell me something else.” He tried lifting his left arm. The pain telegraphed spears to the far reaches of his body. “Will I have a cast?”
“No,” the chubby angel said. “You’ll have a bandage for a while but no cast. The doc will be in later to explain everything to you.”
“I need a priest.”
The nurse shuffled to an alcove by the sink and called up Rosswell’s chart on the room’s computer workstation. “Says here when they asked your religious preference early this morning, you said, ‘Occasional’.” She clicked some keys. “You want me to change that to Catholic?”
“No.” Rosswell closed his eyes. “Not yet.”
“Just let me know if you change your mind.”
“Nurse, hand me my glasses, please.” After he put them on, he struggled with putting a name to her face. “What’s your name?” He was sure that he knew the woman, but the dope and the pain kept him from recognizing her.
“Benita Smothers.” She shuffled to the bed and patted the arm without the bandage. “Mabel—she’s my daughter—waits on you down at Merc’s.”
Even with a fogged brain, he was astounded. Ollie’s love interest was Rosswell’s nurse. If she could put up with Ollie, then she had to be a saint. Comfort washed over Rosswell until a jolt of fear creased his spine with icicles straight from hell.
“Listen, Benita, what happened to Tina? Tina Parkmore. What happened to her?”
“The sheriff is waiting out in the hall. I’ll get him.”
That sounded bad. Tina was dead. Benita wasn’t supposed to tell anyone. Frizz would break the news to him.
Rosswell said, “About that priest, can you call one for me?” Without Tina, someone would have to pump him full of a good reason to keep on living.
“Sure, Mr. Carew.” Benita seemed delighted to be of service. “I’ll do that for you.”
“Am I going to die?” He turned his head so he wouldn’t have to watch her when she answered.
“Yes.” Rosswell turned back to gawk at her. Once more, Benita smiled and giggled, sounding like Mabel. “We all must die. It’s the rule.” She leaned over him and gently closed her hand on his arm. “But you’re not going to die from that cut. You have a lot of veins and arteries in your arm. The doc says the blade didn’t do that much damage and never hit anything major.”
“It hit something or I wouldn’t hurt.”
“You could’ve bled to death if it had hit something major. It didn’t hit anything vital.”
“It’s all vital to me. I’m quite attached to my whole body. And I still need a priest.”
“Mr. Carew?”
“Yes?”
“Do you mind if I call you by your first name?”
“No.”
“I’ll call my brother, the priest over at Sacred Heart. He’s in the hospital right now visiting people. He’s one of our chaplains.” She patted Rosswell’s arm again. “You’re going to be fine, Ross.”
He closed his eyes and whimpered.
Chapter Nine
Tuesday morning, continued
“Rosswell?” Frizz sauntered up to the open doorway, pausing in the hallway to rap his knuckles on the doorjamb. “May I come in?”
“Tina?” The dope stopped working. Rosswell’s heart galloped around his ribcage and sweat trickled down his chest. He reached the crescendo of an adrenaline high. His body reeked of fear. Frizz could not be the bearer of good news.
“It’s bad.” Frizz walked to the edge of the bed. The sheriff must have missed his sleep for the last two days, judging by the lines on his face and the bags under his bloodshot eyes. He removed his hat and rubbed the inside of it with his handkerchief.
After Rosswell belched an acidy belch, he closed his eyes. “When’s the funeral?” Visions of Feliciana’s funeral invaded his brain, soon to be joined by the reality of Tina’s final services.
Frizz dabbed at his eyes, then stuffed the handkerchief into his back pocket. “Funeral?” He put his hat on and stared at Rosswell. “Are you doped up?”
“I’m going to her funeral, I don’t care if you have to push me in this hospital bed, I’m going.”
“There’s no funeral, Rosswell.”
If he said that to calm Rosswell, it wasn’t working. “What’re you saying?” Had it been so bad that they’d already cremated Tina? “Has she already been buried? Did you cremate her and spread her ashes?”
“Listen to me.” Frizz sat on the edge of the bed. “You hurt your arm. Nothing that a tetanus shot, antibiotics, painkillers, and bandages won’t help. Tina got shot. That’s bad. But you’re both alive. She’s here in the hospital, too.”
“Oh, Jesus.”
“I’m not a doctor, but her wound wasn’t serious.” Frizz smiled. “In fact, she got off easier than you. A bullet grazed her arm and it doesn’t look as bad as your wound. You need to be more careful with that sword.” He lost his smile. “We need to talk.”
“Talk.” Rosswell slugged the pillow with the fist of his good arm. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“I don’t have any idea who broke into your house and shot Tina.”
“I do.” Rosswell waited a couple of seconds to build suspense. “I know.” Frizz would have to listen to him now.
“Who?”
He enjoyed knowing something Frizz didn’t about this case. “I got a text message right before the gunfire started. It said—”
“2 DWN UR NXT.”
Rosswell clenched his jaw until it quivered. “You searched my cellphone?”
“It was an emergency.”
“Damn it, Frizz.”
“The person or persons who killed those people at the park are after you. That’s my working hypothesis.”
“I’ve irritated a lot of people.” Rosswell knew where this conversation was headed and didn’t like the signposts to the destination. “It could’ve been one of a thousand people who’re pissed off at me.”
“No. What do you think 2 DWN meant? It’s an explicit reference to the two bodies at the park. Two down.”
Rosswell stayed silent, unwilling to acknowledge the elephant in the room.
Frizz said, “You were out there investigating and you dragged Tina into it. Whoever was after you was after her, too.”
“You don’t know that. It was just coincidence that she came to my house when she did. Wrong place at the wrong time.”
&nbs
p; “Tina got shot because she was helping you do something that you shouldn’t have been doing.”
The elephant took a big dump, right on Rosswell’s head. “You think I’d put Tina in harm’s way?”
“All I know is what happened.”
“Judge Carew?” A priest called his name at the hospital room door. It hadn’t taken long for him to arrive. “I’m Father Michael David Smothers.” He could’ve passed for the twin brother of a young Pope John Paul II, except that his hair was shockingly white and his skin was lighter—no, grayer—than the late Pope’s. “They call me Father Mike.”
Rosswell envied the man’s black pupils and clear eyes. No blood-shot there. Dressed in his black priest’s outfit, he carried an aura of power about him.
Frizz shook hands with Father Mike. “I’ll leave y’all alone. Rosswell, you’re off the case. Period. End of story. Even if.”
Rosswell took off his eyeglasses to rub his face, which felt gritty. Holding the glasses with the hand of his wounded arm didn’t work. He dropped the trifocals.
After Frizz left, Rosswell said, “I met you at your church picnic last year.”
Father Mike winked at Rosswell. “You’re the one who ate three helpings of chicken and dumplings.” The priest hadn’t moved from the doorway even though Rosswell had motioned him in.
“Your memory is excellent. They were a tad salty or I’d have eaten four helpings.” The pain in his arm increased, causing him to grimace. “Can I make a confession?”
The priest came in, pushed the door shut, and walked to the bed- side. “Are you a Catholic?” He spoke in a soft voice.
“No.” Rosswell squinted to focus on the priest’s face. “I need to confess because I put the woman I love in a
