I pulled myself up using the car door and my one good hand. My other hand and arm were useless to me. Actually, my body was pretty useless considering that every inch of it screamed out in pain but I tried to ignore that. I wasn’t really certain that continuing to breathe was a good goal but my body for some reason wasn’t letting me give up.
I got to my feet and lurched forward.
I was in my nightgown or what was left of it. I knew I had no underwear on. I had no idea if the remains of my nightgown were covering me, if I was decent.
I’d deal with that new humiliation later (if I got the chance).
I staggered to the door with the stenciled sign that read “STAIRS”. It took me two tries but I got it open and I pushed myself through.
* * * * *
Jack
Jack Tatum stared at the screens in the Nightingale Investigations surveillance room.
Jack took night duty four or five times a week. The men thought he was crazy but he liked it.
Since he was a kid, he had a weird sleeping pattern. It drove his Mom nuts. He slept in the late afternoon and evening, was up all night and morning. His Mom couldn’t break him of it, the doctors couldn’t, no one could.
Throughout his adulthood, to fit his life around it, he’d taken a number of night jobs (mostly security) but they sucked. This job was the perfect fit.
It was boring a lot of time but when it wasn’t boring, it was really not boring.
Jack liked the anticipation, he fed off it. Because when something happened, he had to be on his game.
Days, weeks, months of nothing happening could weaken most men’s instincts.
But Jack was born to be sharp and alert at three o’clock in the morning. If something happened, he’d never let the team down.
That was why, when he saw on the monitors the Merc screeching to a halt in the garage, Jack was ready.
He reached out to the phone, hit the speaker button then number two and listened to it ring.
Luke and Hector had called in five minutes ago saying they’d be back in five. The car phone in their Ford Explorer was number two on speed dial.
Then Jack watched the woman fall out of the car. Her head fell down like she couldn’t hold it up. One arm was dangling uselessly on the ground. She was wearing a silky, lacy nightgown but it was ripped and torn.
He was rising out of his chair when he heard Luke’s voice answer the phone.
“Stark.”
“Fuck,” Jack swore.
“Jack?”
“Get here, now. There’s a woman –” Jack stopped as he watched her pull herself up using the car door.
For a second, he froze. She had clearly been beaten badly and was covered in blood.
“Jack. Status,” Luke barked into the phone.
“Call an ambulance. I’m leaving the room,” Jack responded.
“Jack –” Stark said but Jack didn’t reply, he didn’t even disconnect, he was gone.
* * * * *
Sadie
I made it up three stairs then fell. My bloody hand slipped on the stair and I couldn’t break my fall so I banged my head.
It hurt.
Since I hurt, like, loads, like, everywhere, I thought that was a good time to give up.
So Ricky found me. So he finished what he started. I’d be unconscious during the rest of it then I’d be dead.
Dead seemed a good option at that point. It meant no more pain and that was good. I was hoping for doves and angels and fluffy clouds but I’d take there being no more pain.
I heard footsteps and panicked.
Ricky.
Maybe I wasn’t ready for Ricky to find me just in case I didn’t go unconscious which didn’t, unfortunately, seem to be happening for me.
I pulled myself up to try and escape, lost my footing and I threw my arm out. Luckily, it caught on the handrail. My arm slid around it, holding on, my torso fell over because I couldn’t hold it up, my head hung down because I couldn’t hold that up either.
The rapid footsteps stopped and I felt hands on me.
“No!” I screamed and jerked away from the hands.
“It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re okay.”
The voice was a man’s, not Ricky’s. I couldn’t see him, I couldn’t hold my head up but he scared me all the same.
The hands came back.
“No!” I screamed again, leaned over and hanging onto the handrail like my life depended on it (which, in that instant, I had convinced myself it did) and pressing myself against the wall. “Don’t touch me. Don’t –”
“You’re safe. An ambulance is coming,” the man said, his hands gentle and trying to pull me away from the handrail.
“No. No ambulance. Nothing. Go away. Just leave me here.”
I wasn’t making any sense and I didn’t care. I just wanted to be alone. I’d been alone my whole life, alone and lonely. It was a place I understood. It was a place I could be safe.
I heard a door open and I tensed.
“Fuck,” another man’s voice said as the strength in my arm at the handrail gave out. I let go and slid down, my knees banged against a concrete stair right before my face smashed into another one. My useless arm again didn’t break my fall.
That hurt too.
I didn’t try to get up. I had nothing left in me.
“Pull the Explorer around,” I heard a new voice say right before I was turned gently then lifted.
“Hector –” another voice said.
“Do it!” This was sharp and loud but I didn’t have the energy to wince.
I was being moved quickly, being held against something immensely warm.
“Sadie, you with me?” I heard a weirdly familiar voice say.
“I think so,” I answered.
“Stay with me,” the weirdly familiar voice ordered.
“I’ll try,” I replied but felt myself slipping away.
Before the darkness could overwhelm me, I was jostled, the pain shot through me with renewed vigor, my eyes opened and I made a low, feral noise filled with agony that sounded scary, even to my own ears.
Then I could swear I saw Hector, he was contorting, going in and out of focus.
Then I was settled in his lap but I felt his arm slide up my back and his hand positioned my head on his shoulder, my face in his neck. It was then I closed my eyes again.
“Mamita, staying with me means talking to me.” Now I was thinking it was Hector who was the weirdly familiar voice.
Now, how bizarre was that?
We were still moving but not like before, it was smoother and it hurt a whole lot less.
“I need to go to sleep,” I told him.
“Hang on for awhile, don’t go to sleep.”
“I think, if I go to sleep, it’ll stop hurting. I need it to stop hurting.”
After I said that, it felt like the knuckles of a hand came to my cheek, they rested there lightly for a second. Then it felt like fingers were sifting gently through the hair at the side of my head, pulling it way from my face.
Now that was even more bizarre because it felt nice, nice and sweet and lovely even though everywhere else there was pain.
“I know, mamita, but you need to stay awake.”
“Why can’t I sleep?” I asked.
“Because when you go to sleep, I want you to be somewhere with doctors so we can make sure you wake up,” Hector told me.
I shook my head in his neck. “That’s okay.”
“What’s okay?”
“It’s okay if I don’t wake up.”
“Sadie, don’t say that.”
I snuggled closer to his heat and felt fuzzier. It wasn’t a bad fuzzier but a good fuzzier.
There was an edging sense of peace sliding over me and I wanted it. Peace was good. Peace was great. I liked peace. Who didn’t like peace?
“No really,” I whispered, letting the sweet, peaceful feeling steal over me. “It only matters if there’s someone to care if you don’t wake u
p. It’s okay if I don’t wake up because there’s no one to care.”
After I said that, with tremendous gratitude, I welcomed the peace.
* * * * *
Lee
Lee held the phone to his ear, listening to it ring but kept his eyes on Hector and Luke.
“Yeah?” he heard Eddie say in his ear.
Eddie Chavez was Lee Nightingale’s best friend. He was Hector’s brother. Lastly, he was a cop.
“I’m at Denver Health. Hector and Luke just brought in Sadie Townsend,” Lee told Eddie.
“Fuck. What happened?” Eddie asked and Lee could tell by his voice that Eddie was up and on the move.
“Don’t know. Jack called me in. She drove into the parking garage under the offices. Jack showed me her tape. He recorded her driving into the garage and getting out of her car. Maybe five minutes he got before he left the surveillance room to get to her so he didn’t switch to the camera on the stairs. She was in bad shape, covered in blood.”
“Luke and Hector brought her in?”
“Luke says Hector wouldn’t wait for an ambulance.”
They both knew what that meant. They also both knew what Sadie meant. They’d been through this a number of times before.
So far they’d been lucky but luck had a way of running out. It had, in the past, gotten pretty fucking ugly.
But never this ugly.
“I’ll be there in ten,” Eddie said.
Lee moved several steps away from Luke and Hector.
“Something else,” he said to Eddie.
Silence then, “Shit.”
“Jack says she was in her nightgown and wasn’t wearing any underwear. She was bleeding between her legs.”
More silence then some cursing in Spanish then, “You called the boys?”
“Jack’s on it.”
“You better call Shirleen, there’s the chance Vance, Mace and Luke’ll lose it too.”
Lee thought there was a chance, if this woman meant what Lee thought she meant to Hector, that Eddie might lose it too.
“Jack’s on it,” was all Lee said.
“You got any idea who did it to her?”
Lee closed his eyes and clenched his jaw. It took an effort but he got control.
“She came in this afternoon, asking for protection. There’s rumors she’s having troubles with the Balduccis but she didn’t confirm and she didn’t explain. I sent her to Dick Anderson.”
“Anderson is in Alaska, visiting his son.”
“Fuck!” Lee exploded and Luke and Hector’s eyes sliced to him.
Hector didn’t look good; Hector looked about ready to blow.
Lee watched as Luke closed in on Hector, not enough to be predatory but enough to offer containment then Lee turned his back and walked several more feet away.
Lee did not have a good feeling about this and Lee’s feelings were normally right on target.
“Eddie, it had to take everything she had to come to us with Hector there.”
“You’re blaming yourself, amigo. You didn’t beat her up and rape her.”
“She asked me for protection. I sent her away. Told her we had a full caseload.”
“Do you have a full caseload?”
“Yeah. But my caseload lightens when a five foot five, one hundred pound woman needs protection from someone who’d beat her close to death and rape her.”
“Lee, you need to keep your shit together. This is Sadie Townsend. We know –”
“We know,” Lee interrupted.
“Then you gotta keep cool because Hector is gonna lose it.”
Lee glanced at Hector. He was surprised Hector hadn’t thrown a chair through the window by now. Hector was a very edgy guy.
Lee pulled in a breath. “Hector’s gonna lose it.”
“I’ll be there in ten.”
* * * * *
Eddie
Eddie turned to Jet.
His fiancée was already out of bed and getting dressed.
“Lee needs Indy,” he said.
Jet nodded then pulled a t-shirt over her head.
“Sadie’s gonna need –”
Jet yanked the t-shirt down and walked to Eddie, leaned in, put her hand on his stomach, got up on her tiptoes and kissed him lightly on the mouth.
“I’ll take care of it, get to Hector,” she said.
When she moved away, Eddie grabbed her by the neck and pulled her to him.
His kiss wasn’t light.
Then he was gone.
* * * * *
Lee
By the time the doctor came to the waiting room, Luke, Hector and Lee had been joined by Eddie, Lee’s brother Hank (also a cop) and four men that worked for Lee: Vance, Darius, Mace and Bobby.
Lee had pulled in the boys because if Hector (or Luke, for that matter) went gonzo at whatever news they were going to get, they were going to need manpower to lock them down.
Lee had recruited men who, it turned out, had a strong ethic about women and how to treat them and an even stronger ethic about how they felt about men who didn’t treat them right. This wasn’t on the job application but, bottom line, it was the only kind of man Lee would have in his employ.
This was a situation that could blow his men apart. It had happened before and they knew the drill but it had never been this bad.
What he wasn’t prepared to see was Jet walking in with Indy, Roxie, Ava and Stella. He wasn’t prepared for it but when Jet smiled at Eddie and he realized Eddie had arranged it, he was glad for it. Nothing soothed the savage beast like a woman’s touch. His wife Indy’s crew (known as the Rock Chicks) would likely be busy that night.
Indy walked straight to him, put her arms around his waist and kissed the underside of his jaw. Usually this worked like magic but Lee didn’t feel soothed.
She tipped her head back to look up at him and whispered. “It’ll be okay.”
“Yeah,” he said but he didn’t agree. She hadn’t seen the tape. Fuck, but he’d never forget what he saw on that tape.
“It’s always okay,” she said, breaking into his thoughts.
“You don’t know who this is,” Lee replied.
“Yes I do, but Lee…” She hesitated because she didn’t want to say what she was going to say next then she continued, “You have to know, Daisy doesn’t think much of –”
Lee looked down at Indy. “Hector does.”
Indy’s head jerked at the shortness in Lee’s tone.
Then she got closer. “Is there something I don’t know?”
“There’s something no one knows. No one knows why he pulled out of the DEA after that job. At least no one knew until today, until she walked into my office.”
“Do you think he had a thing with her?” Indy whispered.
Lee turned to her. “Did you see her?”
Indy scrunched her nose, looking uncomfortable. “I saw her in the reception area. She’s gorgeous but she was cold as ice. Do you know they call her the Ice Princess?”
Lee shook his head and ignored her last comment. “I saw her too. I also saw Hector watching her the entire time I spoke to her.”
“Was it intense?”
Was it intense?
Hector never gave anything away, anything that was personal.
He gave it away that afternoon. He couldn’t take his eyes off Sadie.
“It was intense. Tonight when he got to her, Hector wouldn’t wait for an ambulance. He picked her up and made Luke drive them here.”
Indy’s eyes grew wide. “Was that smart?”
“No.”
“Holy crap,” she whispered as her eyes slid to Hector.
“Doctor.” They heard Stella say and everyone turned as the doctor walked in wearing scrubs, a white lab coat and an unhappy expression.
“Anyone here for Sadie Townsend?”
Everyone looked at everyone else except Hector who said a sharp, “Yes.”
The doctor looked at Hector as Stella moved close to him. “Are you her partner??
??
“Yes,” Hector lied, bold, bald-faced and without hesitation.
The doctor’s face changed and it wasn’t a good change. “We need to go somewhere and talk.”
“Say it,” Hector snapped.
The doctor’s face scanned the crowd then his eyes went back to Hector and said, “Sir, I think –”
“Fuckin’ say it!” Hector barked, his body rigid, his face filled with fury and the doctor took a step back as Stella took another step in, getting close, putting her hand on Hector’s arm and keeping it there.
“I don’t think you under –” the doctor began.
Lee got close to Hector. So did Eddie and Darius. Hank, Vance, Mace and Bobby closed ranks. Luke was already close. The doctor took this in and his body relaxed.
“Just say it,” Shirleen appeared by the doctor and she was speaking quietly. Lee hadn’t even noticed she arrived. This was unusual for Lee Nightingale, there wasn’t a lot he didn’t notice but that night his mind was on other things.
“You’re amongst Sadie’s friends,” Shirleen went on, also bald-faced lying and also without hesitation.
The doctor looked at Shirleen, she smiled encouragingly but he said, “We have a policy –”
“Ain’t no policy when there’s friends,” Shirleen interrupted. “We all gotta know. We’ll all eventually know. Just tell it like it is.”
The doctor sighed, pulled his hand through his hair and looked at Hector.
“She’s been beaten badly.”
“I guessed that.” Hector voice was sharp and impatient.
The doctor nodded and went on, “Five broken ribs, a broken wrist, dislocated shoulder, severe concussion and multiple cuts and contusions. She’s had to have a deep cut on her cheek stitched. She’s been admitted.”
The doctor stopped, his back went straight and everyone held their breath.
“I really think –” the doctor hesitated, eyes on Hector.
“She’s been raped,” Hector said for him.
The doctor did another group scan then nodded and took a step toward Hector. “I’m sorry but yes, Sadie’s been raped.”
“Fucking hell,” Hank muttered from behind Eddie and the atmosphere in the room changed to a strange, uneasy hopelessness. It wasn’t a feeling they were used to and it didn’t sit well with a single one of them.