Bones felt a shiver of cold trickle down his spine. “Yes, but he – it’s complicated. The situation was dangerous. He had no choice.”
“I don’t care!” the Professor grabbed Bones by the throat, pressed his thumbs on his windpipe. Although the leader of the white gang was a half foot shorter than his lieutenant and seventy pounds lighter, he took Bones down with the ease of a street fighter.
Bones gagged, suffocated, saw stars flicker behind his eyeballs. He sank to his knees, saw black before the Professor let go.
“You were supposed to put Perkins on the job.”
Bones coughed and sputtered, still kneeling. “He – he had to tie up some things first.”
The Professor grabbed a hank of Griff’s hair, pulling tightly until the skull felt like it was on fire. “Perkins owes the Lords first. Understand? If he doesn’t have the job done by this time tomorrow, I’ll gut you like a fish.” He paused and took a cleansing breath. “Nod if you understand.”
Bones nodded, feeling the warm, wet flow of urine stain his pants.
“You, Bones, not Perkins. See that it’s done.”
Crossing the street from the hospital emergency room exit to the parking lot, Frankie was so engrossed in her thoughts she didn’t see the car until it was almost on her. The vehicle slammed into her body and the front bumper lifted her into the air, helicoptering her wildly before depositing her on the hard concrete curb.
In the way that physicians do by reflex, Frankie assessed the damages to her body with a clinical coolness, even while the sharp, hot pain of broken bones and bruised flesh seized her mind.
Serious damage, likely not fatal.
Hearing the screech of tires peeling out of the parking lot, emergency room personnel rushed outside, and quickly attended to Frankie. They staunched the bleeding and loaded her on a gurney while a room was prepared. Thankfully, Frankie had lost consciousness soon after her head hit the asphalt and was relieved of the knowledge of her condition.
Chapter 62
“I shouldn’t have left her,” Cruz said, waiting outside the emergency room while Frankie’s ribs were taped and her abrasions attended to. “After the first two attacks, I should’ve been more cautious.”
“Horseshit,” Slater said, not unkindly. “We couldn’t have anticipated this.”
“I should’ve.” Cruz stared at his hands, fixed on the long brown fingers. “Maybe it was a simple hit and run – nothing else.”
“Maybe, but stop beating yourself up,” Slater advised. “Won’t do Frankie any good now.”
Cruz shook his head in frustration. “I don’t know what else to do. I feel so – ”
The emergency room doctor interrupted him. “Good news, moderate concussion, a few broken ribs, bumps, bruises and abrasions, but she’ll be fine.”
In his relief Cruz staggered a half-step back before he righted himself. Thank God.
“We’ll keep her overnight just to be sure,” the doctor added, looking down at the patient chart. “You can see her now before they wheel her up to her room.”
Frankie looked pale, but far better than Angie Hunt had. She smiled wanly when she saw Slater and Cruz peek around the curtain. “I know, I know, it was a stupid move, going out on my own.”
“Damn straight,” Cruz growled as he reached for her hand.
For a long moment they looked into each other’s eyes, each afraid of what they’d see – or not see – reflected there.
“You missed all the action,” Slater announced. “We caught our killer.”
The fragile moment between Frankie and Cruz passed.
“Who was it?” Frankie said.
“Officer Jeff Rawley, a RPD beat cop, notorious for harassing and abusing street people. Angie identified him. And Sergei Petrovich picked him out of a lineup.”
“And the car that hit me?”
Cruz squeezed her hand. “No luck.”
“So Anson Stark or some gang member is still after me,” Frankie whispered.
“Maybe not, but I’ll put a deputy on your door tonight,” Slater promised, his eyes not quite meeting hers. “And when you’re discharged, you can come back to the ranch.”
He didn’t add, where you should’ve stayed in the first place, but Frankie saw the reproof in his expression.
When the attendant came with a wheelchair, Cruz leaned over and kissed her softly on the forehead. “You scared the hell out of me,” he whispered against her cool flesh.
Then, regardless of the audience, Frankie held his face in both her hands and pulled his face toward her. Her lips were soft and firm and full of promise. “Me, too.”
Cruz might be crazy, but he figured he had a day while Frankie was in the hospital, to do some investigating on his own. He knew she had secrets, some about her work at Pelican Bay, more about her father who’d been moved out of ICU to a regular ward at Sutter General in Sacramento.
“First thing tomorrow I’m going to make a trip to Pelican Bay to speak with Visitation Officer Walt Steiner,” he told Slater when they returned to the ranch to check on Cole.