Blood Hunt

4

Unlike San Francisco General, the ER at St. Francis smelled mostly of disinfectant. Garreth breathed that happily while he and Verl sat in the waiting room alone, with Sharon the only patient until Fire Rescue’s ambulance brought Wayne in. The doctor diagnosed Sharon’s injuries as abrasions of the hands and knees, a laceration on her chin needing two stitches, and the worst injury, a bad bruise and cracked rib where the door handle struck her back. Toews recorded the visible injuries on her with Polaroids while Dr. Lawrence moved on to examining Wayne.

“I think he was going to grab me as I came out!” Sharon said, voice trembling. “But I’d already left to walk home. I looked back and there he was, driving straight at me!” She sucked in a shuddering breath. “I thought he was going to kill me!”

Toews laid the drying Polaroids on a table beside the ER cart. “Well you don’t have to worry about him again. This will put him away for a long time.”

“Which is too bad for his parents,” Toews added after Verl drove her home. “They’re good people and have tried to bring their kids up right.”

He used the ER phone to call them while the doctor finished Wayne’s examination and studied his x-rays. On the cart Wayne cursed and writhed in obvious agony, his good wrist handcuffed to the cart’s side rail, his injured one wrapped in ice bags.

“How’d they take it?” Garreth when Toews hung up.

Toews sighed. “I woke them up of course. That made it worse for them. Earl sounded like he’d been expecting something like this. Dottie was crying in the background.”

Garreth sighed in turn. “I always hate family notifications. At least you didn’t have to say we killed him.”

They stood silent for several minutes, until Toews said, “You know, it seems to me you do want to be a cop. You didn’t have to deal with Wayne in the Main Street. You didn’t have to follow me to the alley. You didn’t have to go after Wayne there. But you did…I’m thinking without ever considering not getting involved. Because it’s what you do…what you are.”

Garreth grimaced. “Which got my partner shot.”

Toews shrugged. “I didn’t see any sign of you freezing up tonight. And you weren’t a cowboy. It all looked cooly calculated to me.”

Dr. Lawrence came over to them.

“Your man has a moderate concussion. Nothing that ought to cause permanent damage. But…every metacarpal in his hand is fractured, with multiple fractures of the first and fifth metacarpals. It’s like his hand got caught in a vice.”

Toews glanced at Garreth. “That’s some grip you have.”

Garreth put on a shrug. “Adrenalin is amazing stuff.”

Inwardly he winced. He needed to be more careful about how much strength he used. Wayne did not necessarily deserve to be maimed for being a bastard. What was that saw about walking softly and carrying a big stick? In his case, because he had a very big stick he needed to sure he walked softly indeed to avoid tripping himself.