Chet waved briefly at Sally and then refocused on Ellie. “Ellie, you okay?” And she hated to admit it, but when he pressed his fingers into her bare shoulder, she felt her knees wobble with the temptation to let him hold her up—just for a second—just until she could get this all figured out and determine if Amelia was alive or dead. Until she could fully understand what news she’d have to tell her father at the end of the night. She stretched her neck, tipping her head from side to side, and then stood up straight. No one was going to carry her today.
“I don’t know. Your friend Sally won’t tell me anything.” Ellie openly glared at the nurse. She’d learned how to be hard after working in a firehouse, how to give strong and concise orders. If she didn’t expect respect, if she didn’t demand it, she wouldn’t have lasted a week as a paramedic. Sally would respect her, damn it. Chet patted her shoulder briefly and then let go slowly, like he was worried she would fall down without him there.
“Ellie, hon, yelling at Sally won’t help.” His tone was so strongly parental, her internal child shouted that she should stick out her tongue and stomp away. Instead, she curled her lips in and looked at Chet expectantly. If he knew how to get information, then he’d better do it and fast. He nodded approvingly, his eyebrows sighing along with his chest, and then turned to face the nurse.
“Sal, can you tell me if they brought in a trauma patient, Amelia Saxton. Her husband came in too, Steve. Both shot.”
Sally’s countenance changed as she listened to Chet like this was the first time she was hearing this information, and Ellie had to force herself not to stomp her foot in frustration.
“Yeah, yeah, just got here. In surgery, both of them. But like I told your friend here,” Sally said, replicating the tone Ellie had used just moments earlier, “I will go and find out more information if you’d please take a seat.” She had stopped talking to Chet at that point and was focused only on Ellie.
“Fine. I’ll wait,” Ellie replied, taking a step away from the counter and then adding before walking off, “But could you at least try to hurry?”
Ellie heard Chet let out a gentle growl as she backed away. Tears of frustration and anger played at the edges of her eyelids, but rather than fight a losing battle with Sal, who seemed markedly less huggable at this moment, she stepped rapidly across the waiting room to a heavily decorated wall filled with pictures of doctors and administrators. The automatic doors swooshed open and closed as she stomped past them. There was one spot on the granite wall bereft of any photographs. Ellie leaned against it, the cool stone against her bare skin sending off a shock wave of goose bumps up and down her arm.
She became lost in her attempts to read what Chet was saying from under his unkempt mustache. How Sally could find any way to smile when Amelia was somewhere in this hospital, cut open, hooked up to machines, closer to dead than alive, she could not reconcile.
When Sal laughed and slapped Chet on the shoulder, Ellie thought she might lose it. Too busy holding back an angry stream of curse words she’d learned from her time in the firehouse, she didn’t notice the doors open behind her till a damp breeze sent a shiver through her bare arms. Her coat was still in the rig. Once Amelia was stable, once Ellie had answers, she’d grab it. Till then, she wrapped her arms around her body, pulling herself in tighter in the hope of making the shiver building inside her dissipate.
“Hey. You should put this on.” A deep voice from behind made her jump. Travis was standing by her elbow, holding out a limp gray women’s hoodie.
“Oh, Trav. Hey.” For the second time that day she’d slipped up and called Officer Rivera not only by his first name but also a nickname. She pushed away from the wall, forcing herself back into her “tough girl” routine as quickly as possible. “What? Did we drive too fast for you? Have a hard time keeping up?” Joking felt oddly comforting; a tiny bit of normalcy in what had already become the worst hours of her life.
“No, I needed to tell Smitty about the security cameras.” Travis chuckled politely and then jiggled the shirt in front of her. “Thanks for the heads-up by the way.”
Ellie reluctantly took the sweatshirt and threaded her arms into the sleeves, which came up a little short, just above her wrists. It rode high on her waist and was snug around her shoulders. Once zipped, the bedazzled embellishment across her chest read JUICY.
“Oh my God. Where did you get this? Off a stripper?”
“Maybe she was also a stripper,” Travis said, shrugging, a bit of mischief twinkling in his dark eyes, “but let’s just say that dancing wasn’t the only way she made money with her clothes off.”
“Ew, Rivera. I don’t want it.” She went to unzip the gold-toothed zipper, but Travis put his hand on hers to stop her.
“I’m kidding, Brown. Some runaway with less-than-legal moneymaking practices left it in my car this morning . . .” He tapped her hand gently until she let go of the zipper pull. Then Travis yanked at the golden metal and silently zipped it all the way up to her collarbone. “So don’t even think about trying to keep it, because I’m sure Crystal will be back for it in three to six weeks.”
“Tempting, but I think I’ll be able to resist this time.” Ellie almost laughed but then remembered she was wearing the sweatshirt to cover up Amelia’s blood. The half chuckle blew away immediately, and she fought against the choke of tears for the thousandth time that day.
Travis, still holding on to the zipper pull, shuffled across the sparkly linoleum, his black boots nearly touching hers when they finally came to a rest. In an attempt to hide her emotions, Ellie stared at the matching work boots, both covered in dark slashes of blood up the side and toes. She closed her eyes, trying to refocus, but even in the darkness, she knew Travis was just inches away. His arm came around her shoulders, his fingers dragging across the worn material of Crystal’s sweatshirt, close enough that she could smell the faint scent of his cologne.
Ellie didn’t try to talk. Instead, she let her forehead rest against his shoulder, just above the cold metal of his badge. Travis’s comfort was different from Chet’s—less fatherly, more tender.
“Brown . . . I mean Ellie,” he corrected himself quickly. “I’m sorry. It’s what we all fear, right? The bad things that happen on the job happening to the people we love.”
Ellie nodded and relaxed into him farther, turning her head to one side, eyes closed. The smoky smell of the runaway’s sweatshirt mingled with Travis’s musk was leaving her a little dizzy. But she liked the warmth of his arm and the fact that finally she felt like someone was strong enough to help her. She considered how appropriate it would be to ask if he could use some of his interrogation skills to get information out of good ole Sal. But before she could figure out how to ask, another rush of cold air sent a shiver through her warming body.
“Ellie?”