Not a shot had been fired. At least not in the emergency room. The waiting room would need a bit of repair work from all the crap these two idiots tossed around.
I stood up and pulled my perp to his feet. After releasing him into Brodsky's care, I turned to look at Skip. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine."
"Why don't you come over here and sit down?" I didn't like how pale Skip was. His face was ashen white. His eyes were huge on his face.
"No, look." Skip glanced at the two perps as Clarke and Brodsky started leading them away. "They were looking for something. They—"
"Shut the fuck up!" the scruffy-looking one shouted as he tried to lunge at Skip. "Shut up or it'll be the last words you ever speak."
Clarke cuffed the guy on the back of the head. "You shut the fuck up."
Skip shivered as he watched them being led out of the emergency room.
"Were they after drugs, Skip?" Sal asked.
"No." Skip shook his head. "One of their buddies got shot tonight. He had something on him. Those two were here searching for it, but they got the wrong hospital. Their friend got sent to Metro East Hospital."
I frowned. "Did they ever say what they were looking for?"
"No, but they were desperate to get their hands on it, whatever it was. You might want to send someone to the morgue at Metro East and pick his stuff up. Since the guy didn't survive his wound, everything was bagged up for the police. His name was Dwayne Travers."
"I'll send someone over right now," Sal said as he pulled his cell phone out and started dialing.
I turned my attention back to Skip. "Are you going to be okay?"
Skip gave me a small smile. "I'll be fine. I'm just glad no one was hurt." He quickly frowned, the smile sliding off his face. "No one was hurt, right?"
"No, everyone is fine. We got everyone evacuated in time. Your front desk nurse could use a stiff drink right about now, though. She's a little roughed up and plenty scared, but nothing more than that."
"Yeah, me, too. A drink, I mean."
"Well, the good news is that this is a crime scene now, so your emergency room is closed down for the rest of the night. You can go home and get that drink." I glanced to where Sal was still talking on his phone. "After you give a statement."
"Right." Skip shivered for a moment and then squared his shoulders. "Can you take my statement?"
"No, detectives will be here soon to take everyone's statements. SWAT just does the takedown. They don't take statements."
Skip snorted. "Guess that makes your job easier."
I shrugged. "Sometimes yes. Sometimes no."
It was easy being the muscle of the police force. A bit harder when you never knew what you were walking into or what happened after you cracked a few heads together. I wasn't a police detective by any stretch of the imagination. Never wanted to be.
But there was a strange animosity between the regular police force and SWAT, one I never really understood. They often didn't want to share their intel with us, but they sure didn't hesitate to put in the call when their butts were in trouble.
When the emergency room doors opened and several people walked in, including uniformed officers, I said, "I'll go see if I can get someone to take your statement."
I started to walk away when I heard Skip call out to me.
"Hey, David?"
I turned to glance back.
Skip sent me a small smile. "Thank you."
I gave him a curt nod then turned back and continued walking. I didn't want to think about how that small smile lit up the handsome doctor's light brown eyes or the way that one simple smile lit me up inside and made my gut clench.
