I nodded, suddenly ashamed at the murderous thoughts running through my mind.
I walked to where my phone lay, grabbed it and called 911. The dispatcher told me to stay on the line, until police and EMTs got there. I put it on speaker, grabbed dishtowels and knelt down next to Alyssa, taking her hands off Sabrina and replacing them with the dishtowels and mine.
Alyssa slumped back against the cabinets, and exhaled.
I made myself look at Sabrina. She was still conscious but clearly weak, watching me.
“Julian…” she whispered. “I’m—ahhh!”
I’d pressed down harder, and whatever she’d been about to say broke off. I wasn’t going to hear it. Telling her to be quiet would have been giving her my voice. Instead, I gave her the pressure that kept her alive and nothing else. I held her eyes to let her see what was in mine. Her face changed, and she swallowed, turning her head to the side, away from my eyes.
I never looked at her again.
The paramedics arrived in minutes, with police alongside them. I let them in and got out of their way as they focused on Sabrina first, since she was critically wounded.
Alyssa was still sitting with her back against the cabinet under the sink, dazed. I picked her up off the floor, carried her to the couch, and sat down with her on my lap, with my arms tight around her. I couldn’t let go.
“Does anything hurt, Lyss?”
“Head.” She took too long a pause. “Hit it. My leg.”
“Okay. Okay.” I pushed her hair back to find her eyes. She’d gone somewhere. Her gaze slid off my face to a point past me, to nothing, and stayed there. I held her, with one hand on the back of her neck, the other around her back, and pressed her to me.
She didn’t say another full sentence for a long time.
“Lyss, let’s get this off you. Go change,” I said, preparing to take her to my room. I wanted the blood off her, off her skin, off her hands.
“Sir.” The beat cop’s hand came up. “I need her exactly as she is. Don’t move her, don’t clean her, don’t wash. I’m sorry.”
I looked at him and understanding dawned on me.
She was evidence.
Then it hit me.Sabrina might die.If she died, self-defense or not, there would be investigations, potential charges. I was already moving.
If she died, it would not immediately matter that she’d broken into my home. There was a knife, and a body, and there would be questions that might not care what was obviously true. They would question Alyssa. They could even take her in.
I had to get in front of it. I took my phone out with one hand, while caressing her back with the other.
I called my lawyer first. “It’s Julian. There’s been an assault at my condo. The intruder is being transported now with a bad stab wound. I need you here.Now. Bring whoever you need.”
Then I called Kendra. She was an ADA, and even though she wouldn’t be assigned the case because of the conflict being my cousin, she knew the building this would arrive at. She knew the prosecutors, the detectives, the way a clean story could get twisted in the first hour if the wrong person asked the wrong questions before a victim had her head checked. She would be conflicted out of anything official. I knew that. But she would know how to stand in the room and make sure nobody forgot Alyssa was a victim.
“Kendra. A woman broke into my home and attacked Alyssa with a knife. Alyssa’s okay. The woman is not. I need you here.”
“On my way,” was all she said before she hung up.
Alyssa was still in shock and didn’t respond when I asked for any of her sisters’ numbers. I called Raschad and got his voicemail. I couldn’t leave that kind of message, so I called down to Fredrick in the lobby. “Alyssa’s sisters are staying in her unit. I need you to knock on her door and get them. Tell them she’s safe, but there’s been an incident, and escort them up.”
“Yes, Mr. Wade.”
My double doors were wide open, and her sisters hit them running up five minutes later, stopped at the threshold by the officer posted there. Jordan and Jada shrieked and they looked through the house to see Alyssa in my lap covered in blood. Tamika began yelling and pushing at the officer to let them through.
“Let them in,” I shouted out. “Let them in.”
Just then, Kendra arrived, badge up, moving past the officer. “ADA Wade,” she said. “They’re with me.” Over her shoulder, she gestured to Alyssa’s sisters to follow, instructing them: “Just to Alyssa. Do not touch anything.”
Jada was across the room and on her knees, both hands on Alyssa’s face, saying her name over and over. “Alyssa! Alyssa! Why isn’t she talking? Is she hurt? Look at me.” Jordan dropped beside her with her handsover her own mouth, asking me whose blood, and what happened. I told her what I could, which wasn’t much.
