Splintered and broken wood from the shelves.
Books opened and pulled onto the floor.
The small hallway is dark and empty. When I reach over to flip a light on, nothing happens.
“Shit.” I pull my cell phone out of my pocket and switch on the flashlight. The room brightens, but barely, and I take a step forward. And then another. Apprehension prickles like tiny ants on the back of my neck, and I shiver, side-stepping the glass on the floor to the best of my ability.
“Hello? Maddy? Tara?”
Only silence greets me. A chill of apprehension crawls up my spine, and I almost turn around and back out to wait for the cops. But I don’t, because I can’t. Not if Maddy or Tara are hurt. Not if I can do something now, at this moment, to help.
I step on something hard, and it crunches under my foot. A glass vase. A small groan escapes my throat, and I almost laugh, just to make myself feel better, but I have no time at all to do anything else because suddenly something–or someone–hits me from behind, sending me careening to the floor in an electric shock of pain that travels from the top of my head down to the ends of my toes.
I scream. It’s all I can think of to do. It’s all my bodyletsme do, and the masked man now standing over me kicks my hand, sending the cell phone flying from my fingers to clatter across the floor, probably broken. I scramble to my knees to find something for defense, anything at all, but as my hands wrap around what feels like a copper lamp base, the man kicks me again, harder this time and right in the ribs, and my fingers drop the weapon. I try to scream out, but it’s useless. My voice is gone. The man screams something at me, but I can’t knit the words together. When he kicks me again, I can actually hear the sound of a rib cracking. I curl into the fetal position to protect what’s left of my stomach, but the stranger is relentless, and he aims another steel-toed boot at my face.
Warm blood spurts from what I’m assuming is my now broken nose, and I scream so hard and so loud that I think I might rupture my lungs before this madman can. Blood pools at the back of my throat, and I cough, gasping, trying to fight through the thick blood to find some air. The pain is spectacular, so intense that I can’t see much anymore, just vibrating patterns of agony that flash like starbursts in front of my eyes. Just when I think I’m about to pass out, the man kneels next to my still body, his lips near my ear. He smells like chewing tobacco and sweat, and I cringe as he grabs a handful of hair and lifts my head off the floor.
“Mind your own business next time,” he growls and slams my head back down. A blinding pain washes over me, and then I see nothing but black.
26
ELY
“Fan out, search the house, see if the culprit is still here, and keep your eyes open.”
Jake and three other officers, including Katie McCully, are hot on my heels as we enter Tara Hill’s apartment building, guns raised, ready to fire at whatever threat decides to present itself. Our flashlights light up the room, and the very first thing I see is Jami lying in the middle of the living room. And for a second that goes on for far too long, I’m convinced more than anything else in the world that she’s dead.
Just like Gin.
Just like Jake.
“Jami. Jesus Christ.” I fall to my knees in front of her, blood roaring in my ears, deafening in the silence of the house. My shaking hand reaches for the curve of her neck, checking for a pulse, and I have to hold my breath to even feel it. She’s alive, but barely, and she looks on the verge of death, lying there like a broken doll, tattered and torn. Her soft brown hair is matted with blood, and an open wound on the back of her skull where someone hit her with a heavy object oozes more scarlet blood. Her nose looks broken, her face is covered in dry blood, and a violent split in her lip is bleeding, pale skin bruised and sallow where red hasn’t caked onto her skin yet. I’m afraid to touch her, afraid that a tiny jostle will be enough to send her to the very brink of death.
My fingers move over her body, and I lift the hem of her shirt to expose a black and blue ribcage. I don’t realize Jake is standing behind me until he kneels down next to me. And when I look over at him, his face is ghostly pale in the glow of the dim lights.
“She’s alive?” he asks, and I’m not sure I could have told him anything other than yes, even if it wasn’t true.
“For now.” Anger tears at me, an anger so intense, it’s something I haven’t experienced since the night my wife and son were killed. I grab my radio and call in for EMS and backup, then reach out and touch Jami’s face gently. She moans, and after a second, her eyelids flutter, and a breath of relief escapes my lungs.
“Ely.” Her voice cracks with pain. Confusion. I reach out and pull her into me, careful not to knock into any injured part of her, which seems almost impossible to do.
“Who did this?” I ask. “Did you see his face? Where is he? Is he still here? I’ll fucking kill him.”
“No,” she tries to shake her head, but it only seems to make the pain worse. “I don’t know who …” She trails off, wincing in pain, and I rest my lips on Jami’s forehead, tasting blood but not caring even the slightest.
“Okay, sweetheart, don’t talk. The ambo is on its way, okay? Just hang in there.” I don’t know if she’s heard me or not, but Jami closes her eyes again, and this time when I speak, she doesn’t respond.
“What happened here?” someone asks behind me, and I glance over my shoulder to see Jami’s firefighter friend Matt and another paramedic–Paisley, I think her name is–roll the gurney into the room. Down the hallway, Katie calls for Jake and me, and Matt meets my gaze as he kneels down next to Jami and checks for a pulse.
“Go,” he says. “We’ll take care of her, I promise.”
I know that I can trust Matt, but it doesn’t make it any easier to allow Jake to pull me away from Jami and down the hall to where Katie is kneeling over Tara Hill. She looks just as bad as Jami, if not worse, and I’m so certain she’s dead that I don’t even ask, but Katie speaks before I do.
“We need a second gurney. She’s alive.”
“What about the girl?” asks Jake, and he speaks into his radio to call for a second ambulance. For a moment, I’m angry at myself for not even considering Maddy.
“Where is she?” I ask, and before Katie can answer, another officer of mine, Stella Riley, calls for me from the back bedroom. Jake and I look at each other, and I know we’re both thinking the same thing: What are we going to find, and do we really want to find it?
