“Right? But Rivera has it figured out. He thinks that when the power was turned off, it reset the system and booted up the emergency battery on the cameras. Would’ve been better to have all the footage, but really maybe it’s almost as good having the recordings from when the perp didn’t know the camera was on.”
“Wait, you got video of the second man?” The words shot out of her mouth without her practiced cool. Officer Blackford hesitated for a second before responding. He was a little more reserved this time.
“Uh, I think we will know more soon enough.”
Great, she thought. He was onto her. She decided to try one more time.
“So, did they get an ID on the body?” she asked.
“Sorry, Brown, can’t really talk about it. You’ll have to ask Rivera.” Blackford relaxed and leaned back against the wall, and Ellie knew he was done sharing.
Disappointment flooded over her in a hot wave that made it hard to breathe. Damn it. She stared at the crack in the heavy door, straining to hear any clue of what was going on inside. She took a side glance at Blackford who now had his hands on his hips in authority even though he was slouching against the wall with his bit of a belly rolling over the top of his belt.
“Well, thanks for the info.” She took a slight step backward. “Tell Rivera to get me when he’s done.”
“Yeah, sure, not a problem, Brown,” he said, waving her off.
On her second step backward, Ellie turned on the ball of her foot and, not hesitating, shoved the door open, palms flat against the polished wood door.
“Hey, Brown . . . what the . . .” His words melted away as the door flew open at her touch. A dim room stared back at her, curtain pulled around what seemed to be the only bed. Murmurs from behind the divider let Ellie know that she hadn’t been discovered yet, but that wouldn’t last long.
Ellie grabbed the edge of the curtain and yanked. It was lighter than she’d expected, nearly silky in her grasp, and it whipped aside, revealing two men—one totally unfamiliar and wearing a suit with a slightly out-of-date, oversize maroon tie that looked like it’d been worn by more than one generation of police detectives. The second was Travis, still in his uniform, hand hovering over what had to be a nearly full notebook at this point.
Then there was Steve—pale, drowsy, and lips in a thin line that told Ellie that he was in pain. She wanted to run to him, check his vitals, look him in the eye, and make sure that even if his physical pain level was managed, someone was tending to his emotional pain level. Unlike Travis and the detective sitting beside him, Steve didn’t seem to notice or care about her entrance. He continued to stare blankly at the closed blinds that not only shut out the flashing ambulance lights from the parking lot but also cut off his view of the world and a life changed forever.
“Hey!” Blackford shouted from the doorway. He looked at Travis and the detective apologetically. “Sorry, I tried to stop her . . . She started talking and then . . .”
Travis waved him off. “Tom, no worries. Why don’t you go grab yourself a coffee? I’ll cover the hall for a bit.”
“Yes sir,” Blackford said, running his hand over his balding head and mumbling something under his breath. He gave Ellie a confused but contemptuous look as he crossed the threshold into the hallway. She’d just made an enemy in the police department for sure.
The man in the suit rolled his eyes openly once Officer Tom Blackford had disappeared around the corner. “You couldn’t get anyone other than Tom for that post? God, what if she’d been the shooter, eh?”
“Who says she’s not?” Steve muttered with a gravelly voice, slurring the words together as though his lips were swollen. Ellie couldn’t help but smile. His voice, even coarse and tight with pain, was the best sound she’d heard all day.
“Steve!” Ellie ignored the two men at the foot of the hospital bed and lunged across the room to his side. He had IV tubes going into his arm and a nasal cannula to help his O2 count. His hair, which she’d never seen out of place, was matted down, a few stray pieces stuck to his forehead. But even the trace of a smile on his face made her feel like a little girl again. She took his hand in hers, careful not to upset the medical equipment next to him.
“L . . . I’m so glad to see your face. Amelia . . . She . . . Someone . . . ,” he started, and then abandoned several sentences, all seemingly about her sister, or the shooting or his fears for what had become of his wife. Tears welled up in his eyes, and all efforts at speech halted. Ellie took her free hand and patted his cheek, rough with stubble.
“Shhh. We will be okay. I promise. We will be okay . . .” The words tangled in her throat, and she didn’t believe them even as they hit her own ears.
CHAPTER 16
AMELIA
Thursday, April 14
Four weeks earlier
She’d driven past the Slatterys’ old place a million and one times during her life here in Broadlands. The old two-story colonial with a wraparound porch used to be her dream house. Every few years old Mrs. Slattery would call the local painter out to touch up the wooden siding and change the color of the shutters. Navy blue had been the color of choice when Amelia was in grade school. A brilliant red when she was in Broadlands High. They were black after Mr. Slattery died in Amelia’s first year of college. They were black for a long time.
Then, just before Mrs. Slattery joined her husband in heaven, the shutters were painted a light, gauzy yellow. Not harsh or brash like the skin of a lemon or an early-spring dandelion. Not dark like gold or mustard. Yellow, like sunlight streaming through white curtains on a summer morning. Yellow, like Easter dresses and the crocus flowers her mother had planted when Amelia was a child and that still bloomed every spring.
She remembered thinking back then that this must be what houses in heaven looked like. If so, Mrs. Slattery must have felt right at home when she crossed over in her sleep just a few weeks after the paint job was done.
But once Mrs. Slattery was gone, her home went into probate and sat empty for first one year, then another, and then another. Soon, the white siding was gray and covered on one side with a thin film of algae that had crept up from the pond. And only one of the shutters the color of sunlight remained. Now it was hanging upside down, off to one side on one screw like a woman losing her fake eyelash.