Part 10 A little knowledge is a scary thing.
"Are you seriously telling me that you lost her not once, not twice but three times in the space of twelve hours?" Agent Harris could barely contain her fury.
"She had help." Dobbs protested.
Agent Harris turned a steely gaze on him. "Not the first time you failed to pick her up," she said coldly. "In fact if you had arrived a few minutes earlier or if you had bothered searching the house then we wouldn't have the LAPD all over our investigation now. You would have found the body and we could be dealing with this properly."
Dobbs continued his protest. He resented the fact that this younger woman was effectively senior to him, she was one of the fast track generation and he made no effort to hide his feelings. "The tip we had said that Mrs. Fielding had the code on her. We saw her running away from the house so we had no reason to come in here. When we saw her run we assumed she had been tipped off to our approach. Our only objectives were to follow, apprehend her and retrieve the disc." There was no way Dobbs was going to take sole responsibility for what was rapidly becoming a fiasco.
Steele was equally adamant about his lack of blame for anything that had gone wrong. "If she hadn't been helped by that local cop then we would have her and the code by now." He said, his tone challenging her to refute what he was saying.
"One local police lieutenant," agent Harris almost spat the words in her contempt at the inadequacy of the men she was expected to work with,. "And your handling of that means that we now have the LAPD breathing down our necks," She flashed a glance over to where Nathan stood talking to one of the uniformed officers giving him instructions. Then she breathed heavily and turned her angry gaze back on the two agents in front of her who, despite themselves, shrank back slightly from the ferocity of it as she continued her tirade. "With one of their own involved there's no way they will be persuaded to let us handle it and as for the injury to an innocent civilian..." She let it trail for a moment before continuing. "For God's sake what were you thinking involving yourselves in a gun battle in the middle of a residential area?"
Steele answered this time his pronunciation still somewhat muffled by the stiffness in his jaw. "They fired the first shots and took the doctor down. If we hadn't intervened he would have been killed for sure. Possibly the wife too then we'd have nothing"
Agent Harris took a moment to digest this information. She calmed a little but the annoyance was still clear in her voice. "Well I suppose that's something." She looked from one man to the other.. "You'd better get back out and look for her before our Asian friends find her. Meanwhile I will see what I can turn up here. There must be some lead as to who Mr. Fielding was dealing with."
"What about the police?" Dobbs asked
"They think the wife killed him," she replied, "and I have to admit from the evidence I've seen they could be right. In which case it is even more important that we find her before she injures anyone else."
"Could the Chinese have done it?" Steele asked
"Possibly but why take the time to frame the wife?" Stephanie replied with a question. Neither man could give an answer. "Of course there are at least two other suspects." She paused to let the implication sink in. It did not take long. Both men looked at her with a mixture of disbelief and anger. She ignored their stares as she continued. "Given the nature of this investigation gentlemen no one is above suspicion." Her tone turned cold. "Your incompetence in your attempts to bring the woman in could be misconstrued as deliberate. Can I suggest that if you find her again you don't lose her."
Once again Emma was concentrating on the purely practical task of driving, grateful that she had something to occupy her mind that did not involve thinking. Steve's silence worried her. She was amazed that he was still so determined to help her after all that she had put him through and still afraid that at any moment he would abandon her to her fate.
She did not want to think about how he would react when she finally got around to explaining what she could of what had happened. There were gaps in her knowledge and in her memory that worried her, but if she tried to fill them in, tried to remember, then she could no longer function.
Her concern about his physical state was also growing. His injury needed treating, however sound his reasoning for not staying at the hospital was. Still she knew that there was nothing she could say that would get him to change his mind, no matter how ill he became. Another thing to try not to think about. So she concentrated on the practical. Steve gave her directions and she followed them.
They finally arrived at the beach house and pulled on to the drive. Steve gave Emma a set of instructions. He had everything planned in his mind he just hoped that his body held out whilst he executed it. The next couple of hours would be quite a strain. He estimated that they had 30 minutes, at most an hour, before the LAPD came here to look for him. Possibly as much as two hours more before they treated him as a missing witness and started a more official search for them both. He did not know how long it would be before the other people who had reason to find them figured to look here. At any rate he did not want to stick around to find out.
He took a couple of deep breaths to try to prepare himself for the pain and then forced his protesting body out of the car. He moved as quickly as he could down into his apartment whilst Emma followed the directions he had given her. First she called for a cab and then she filled a bag with food from the kitchen enough to last them 3or 4 days. Next she went into the bathroom and retrieved a medical kit. She placed the items she would need to dress his wound on the table and waited for him.
Steve quickly washed off the worst of the blood and grabbed some clean clothes which he stuffed into a hold all. As he was grabbing clothes for himself he realised that Emma would need to change too. She had some blood on her clothing and anyway too many people had seen her in the dress she was wearing. He looked in his wardrobe and saw the clothes that Alison had started leaving at his place hanging there.
He reached out to grab them and stopped, his hand hesitating in mid-air as an overwhelming stab of guilt hit, deep in the pit of his stomach, as he realised what he was about to do. The sense of betrayal that he had felt earlier returned. He was going to take the clothes of his current lover and partner and give them to his former lover, still unsure of his feelings towards either of them but knowing that if the situation were reversed he would not be able to forgive.
The second that he stood with his hand hovering felt much longer, the powerful emotions clouding his sense of time, and then he was moving again, pushing the emotion back, waiting for a more suitable time to deal with it. Acutely aware that such repression would probably make it all the harder when that time finally came.
He made it to the top of the stairs panting slightly for breath, blood loss and exhaustion beginning to take their toll. He moved over to the couch where Emma was waiting for him. "How long 'til the cab gets here?" He asked as he sat down.
Emma had watched him approach from the stairs. He had not bothered putting his shirt back on after he had rinsed the blood off. Despite the slight droop of his shoulders at the moment he still looked as good as she remembered. Tall and muscular, he had lost that youthful, slightly sinewy quality and had filled out with the years but that just made him look even more handsome to her. As he got closer she noticed the ugly purple bruising on his side and winced inwardly knowing that she was the cause.
It took her a moment to acknowledge that he had spoken to her and another moment to register the content of the question. He was almost sitting down when she finally looked at her watch and answered. "About ten minutes."
"Doesn't give us much time then" Steve said putting the holdall down and easing himself on to the coffee table which Emma had draped in towels.
Emma moved behind him and for the first time saw the bullet wound. She let out an involuntary gasp as she looked at it. She had assumed, from the way that Steve had managed to keep going, that the bullet had just creased him but now she could see the ragged edges of a neat entry wound still oozing blood slightly and, more significantly, no exit wound. "Steve," she said when her voice returned., "The bullet is still in there." She was so shocked it did not occur to her that he must already know.
"I know," he said quietly. "How bad?"
She looked more carefully "The entry wound appears clean but I still should irrigate it." She moved round so that she could make eye contact before continuing, "Steve the bullet needs to come out. I need to get you back to the hospital"
Steve held her gaze. His voice remained calm and measured as he replied. "No, I won't go anywhere until you are safe."
"Let's call your father then." She ventured. "He could get the bullet out."
"No," Steve snapped and then regretted it. He spoke more gently as he explained. "We can't do that. If he treats a gunshot wound then he has to report it immediately to the authorities. If he doesn't then he could lose his license to practice medicine." He paused and broke eye contact. "If we call him he would help me and he wouldn't report it. I couldn't do that to him." He looked back up at her. "Look just clean the wound and dress it. We'll sort it out later once we're clear."
Reluctantly Emma nodded and moved back behind him. She had known before she started that arguing was useless and they did not have long. "Brace yourself this is going to hurt." She said as she prepared to irrigate the wound.
Steve took a deep breath and gritted his teeth.
Mark was sitting in a chair in the OR waiting room whilst Amanda paced up and down. Both of them had the necessary clearance to go into the operating theater and watch how things were going but they knew that that would not help, nor would it change the outcome. Jesse was in the hands of one of the best microsurgeons in LA. All they could do was sit and wait for news. Neither of them felt competent to work until they knew that Jesse was OK. So they did the only thing they could; wait.
The door to the room opened and both of them looked up expectantly hoping that it was news. They were a little disappointed when a young uniformed officer entered. "Excuse me," he said politely. "I've been sent to speak to the witnesses from a shooting incident. I understand the victim is still in surgery but I was told that you might be able to help me."
Mark stood up and introduced himself. "I'm Dr. Mark Sloan and this is Dr. Amanda Bentley we're both friends of the victim Dr. Jesse Travis but I really don't know how much we can tell you"
"Did he say anything at all about what happened?" The young officer asked his notebook poised.
Amanda looked at Mark, the strain of the memory of seeing Jesse on a gurney in the ER covered in blood, showed clearly in his features and in his tone as he replied quietly. "No, I'm afraid he was unconscious by the time he got here. He didn't regain consciousness before going to surgery."
The emotional response was not lost on the young officer. He knew that dealing with distraught friends and relatives would be one of the hardest things to get used to. "What about the people who brought him in?" He asked as gently as he could.
"That was my son, Lieutenant Steve Sloan, and a woman whom I don't know apart from the fact that her first name is Emma."
"And do you know where I could find them?"
"I'm afraid not they left before I got a chance to speak to either of them properly."
"So they didn't tell you anything about what happened?"
"No," Mark replied letting out a sigh. "I'm sorry that we can't be of more help."
"That's OK. I'll come back later when Dr. Travis is able to make a statement." The officer replied putting his notebook away.
"Steve's probably gone back to the station to file his own report on the incident." Amanda added helpfully.
The officer looked at her. "Thanks I'll check on that." He said and turned and left.
Emma wrapped the bandages as tightly as she could in an effort to stop the bleeding. Steve sat motionless apart from the deep breaths that he was taking. His eyes were closed and his face was ashen. He tried hard to concentrate on his breathing to take the focus away from the pain emanating in waves from his shoulder. He felt her hand gently touch his face it was cool and soft. He opened his eyes as she spoke to him. "There, all finished for now"
"Thank you," he said his voice still tight with pain. "but I still need your help with a less pleasant task." He forced a half smile "I need you to help me get changed."
Despite her concern she smiled back at his attempt at humour. "Good job I'm a woman of the world then," she replied helping him to his feet
As quickly as he could manage Steve changed out of the rest of his blood soaked clothes into the fresh ones he had brought up with him. Despite the pain and danger that they were both in, or perhaps it was heightened because of the situation, he could not help the small electric shocks that pervaded his senses as Emma's hands brushed against his skin. She was forced close to him as she helped to fasten his shirt and then his trousers and he could smell her scent. He closed his eyes, lost for a moment in a memory of a time long ago and a similar situation. He breathed deeply.
"Steve," Emma's slightly anxious voice finally penetrated. It was the third time she had called his name but the first he had heard. He opened his eyes again and stared into hers.
"Sorry I drifted off for a minute. I was remembering the last time you had to help me dress." He paused and seeing the flash of memory in her eyes continued, "and what that led to."
She smiled up at him and placed her hand tenderly on his good shoulder. "I remember too." She replied quietly as he leaned forward and kissed her and then they were both lost in the past. For a brief moment they were both nineteen again sharing their first kiss. The emotional response was overpowering now as it had been then.
The blare of the horn from the cab broke their reverie and they parted lips, once more regretting the interruption that dragged them back to reality. With Emma's help Steve rolled up the soiled clothes and towel and threw them in the trash. Then he grabbed the holdall and headed for the door.
Captain Newman read the brief reports in front of him again and frowned. The shooting at the apartment building was detailed in one. There were no suspects and nobody seemed to know what exactly had happened apart from the fact that there were at least four guns involved. Two men that matched the descriptions of the NSA agents who had been at the station earlier had been inquiring door to door about Steve Sloan and a woman but they had left the scene before the black and whites arrived and there were no witnesses to say whether they were actually involved. The other gun shots had been fired from rifles from a rooftop. Empty shell casings and bullet holes being the sum total of the evidence that there had been someone there.
The other report was of Jesse Travis's shooting. Steve had arrived with him at the hospital in the company of a woman, probably the same one the NSA agents were seeking, and had then disappeared without waiting to see if his friend was OK.
It did not take a genius to realise that these were two reports on the same incident nor that this was somehow linked to the homicide that detective Turner was working on, especially since the NSA agents in question had turned up at the murder scene, but how? And where the Hell had Sloan disappeared to? On leave or not he was duty bound to report a shooting. Dammit he could lose his badge for this.
The Captain took off his glasses and pinched his nose in an effort to stave off the headache that was rapidly growing behind his eyes. He picked up the phone to call detective Turner, since this all seemed to be related to his case he needed to fill him in and, if possible, get him to find Steve and bring him in before the wolves from IA got hold of it.
The door to the OR waiting room opened once more and Amanda and Mark both turned anxiously to look at it. They had been waiting almost three hours and the strain was taking its toll on both of them. Dr. Bill Taylor entered. He was still dressed in theater greens and pulled his hat off as he moved over to talk to his concerned colleagues. "So far so good," he said smiling reassuringly. "It was touch and go for a while because of the blood loss and we're going to transfer him to ICU initially just to make sure there are no complications but he came through the surgery well"
"Thank god," Mark uttered. Amanda let out the breath she had been holding as a sigh.
"What about his arm?" Mark asked remembering what he had seen in the ER.
"Well it was very badly damaged but Dr. Michaelson's a genius. Fortunately the blood supply wasn't stopped for long enough for the tissue below the injury to be permanently damaged. The bullet itself destroyed some muscle tissue and chipped the bone but we've managed to repair a lot of that and remove the bone fragments. As you know the major risk now is from infection and..." he paused briefly. He wanted to give them only positive news but knew that he had to tell them the truth "He's probably going to need further surgery to finish the repairs Dr.. Michaelson was concerned about keeping him under the anaesthetic for any longer than necessary until he's a little stronger." He studied the worried faces of his colleagues "The important thing is that he's alive and on his way to recovering." He continued attempting to lift their spirits.
Both Doctors allowed a sense of relief to wash over them. For the time being the news was as positive as it could be given the injury. "When can we see him?" Amanda asked and Mark could not help but notice how similar their questions were to those he had answered for hundreds of friends and relatives in this same room.
"He's in recovery. I'll page you when we've transferred him." Dr. Taylor smiled "Trust me he's a fighter, he'll be fine."
Nathan entered the OR waiting room just as Dr. Taylor was leaving. He walked straight over to the two doctors. "I just heard," he said as he approached. "How is he?"
Mark filled him in on Jesse's condition repeating what they had just been told by Dr. Taylor. "We're going to go up and see him soon. Try to find out what happened." Mark concluded.
"That's partly why I'm here." Nathan began. He was a little embarrassed at having to question people that he now considered friends. "I've been sent to investigate the shooting."
"I thought you were already working a murder case," Amanda said somewhat confused. "I was working on the autopsy report from this morning when I got the call that Jesse had been hurt. I'm afraid I've been here ever since." She looked apologetic. "I'm sorry I haven't finished it yet."
"Don't worry about the report I understand." Nathan paused debating how to continue. "Look there is reason to believe that there may be a connection between the murder and the shooting."
Mark was equally confused. "What could possibly connect Jesse getting shot with a murder half way across town?"
Nathan swallowed and looked Mark straight in the eye. "Your son."
"Are you seriously telling me that you lost her not once, not twice but three times in the space of twelve hours?" Agent Harris could barely contain her fury.
"She had help." Dobbs protested.
Agent Harris turned a steely gaze on him. "Not the first time you failed to pick her up," she said coldly. "In fact if you had arrived a few minutes earlier or if you had bothered searching the house then we wouldn't have the LAPD all over our investigation now. You would have found the body and we could be dealing with this properly."
Dobbs continued his protest. He resented the fact that this younger woman was effectively senior to him, she was one of the fast track generation and he made no effort to hide his feelings. "The tip we had said that Mrs. Fielding had the code on her. We saw her running away from the house so we had no reason to come in here. When we saw her run we assumed she had been tipped off to our approach. Our only objectives were to follow, apprehend her and retrieve the disc." There was no way Dobbs was going to take sole responsibility for what was rapidly becoming a fiasco.
Steele was equally adamant about his lack of blame for anything that had gone wrong. "If she hadn't been helped by that local cop then we would have her and the code by now." He said, his tone challenging her to refute what he was saying.
"One local police lieutenant," agent Harris almost spat the words in her contempt at the inadequacy of the men she was expected to work with,. "And your handling of that means that we now have the LAPD breathing down our necks," She flashed a glance over to where Nathan stood talking to one of the uniformed officers giving him instructions. Then she breathed heavily and turned her angry gaze back on the two agents in front of her who, despite themselves, shrank back slightly from the ferocity of it as she continued her tirade. "With one of their own involved there's no way they will be persuaded to let us handle it and as for the injury to an innocent civilian..." She let it trail for a moment before continuing. "For God's sake what were you thinking involving yourselves in a gun battle in the middle of a residential area?"
Steele answered this time his pronunciation still somewhat muffled by the stiffness in his jaw. "They fired the first shots and took the doctor down. If we hadn't intervened he would have been killed for sure. Possibly the wife too then we'd have nothing"
Agent Harris took a moment to digest this information. She calmed a little but the annoyance was still clear in her voice. "Well I suppose that's something." She looked from one man to the other.. "You'd better get back out and look for her before our Asian friends find her. Meanwhile I will see what I can turn up here. There must be some lead as to who Mr. Fielding was dealing with."
"What about the police?" Dobbs asked
"They think the wife killed him," she replied, "and I have to admit from the evidence I've seen they could be right. In which case it is even more important that we find her before she injures anyone else."
"Could the Chinese have done it?" Steele asked
"Possibly but why take the time to frame the wife?" Stephanie replied with a question. Neither man could give an answer. "Of course there are at least two other suspects." She paused to let the implication sink in. It did not take long. Both men looked at her with a mixture of disbelief and anger. She ignored their stares as she continued. "Given the nature of this investigation gentlemen no one is above suspicion." Her tone turned cold. "Your incompetence in your attempts to bring the woman in could be misconstrued as deliberate. Can I suggest that if you find her again you don't lose her."
Once again Emma was concentrating on the purely practical task of driving, grateful that she had something to occupy her mind that did not involve thinking. Steve's silence worried her. She was amazed that he was still so determined to help her after all that she had put him through and still afraid that at any moment he would abandon her to her fate.
She did not want to think about how he would react when she finally got around to explaining what she could of what had happened. There were gaps in her knowledge and in her memory that worried her, but if she tried to fill them in, tried to remember, then she could no longer function.
Her concern about his physical state was also growing. His injury needed treating, however sound his reasoning for not staying at the hospital was. Still she knew that there was nothing she could say that would get him to change his mind, no matter how ill he became. Another thing to try not to think about. So she concentrated on the practical. Steve gave her directions and she followed them.
They finally arrived at the beach house and pulled on to the drive. Steve gave Emma a set of instructions. He had everything planned in his mind he just hoped that his body held out whilst he executed it. The next couple of hours would be quite a strain. He estimated that they had 30 minutes, at most an hour, before the LAPD came here to look for him. Possibly as much as two hours more before they treated him as a missing witness and started a more official search for them both. He did not know how long it would be before the other people who had reason to find them figured to look here. At any rate he did not want to stick around to find out.
He took a couple of deep breaths to try to prepare himself for the pain and then forced his protesting body out of the car. He moved as quickly as he could down into his apartment whilst Emma followed the directions he had given her. First she called for a cab and then she filled a bag with food from the kitchen enough to last them 3or 4 days. Next she went into the bathroom and retrieved a medical kit. She placed the items she would need to dress his wound on the table and waited for him.
Steve quickly washed off the worst of the blood and grabbed some clean clothes which he stuffed into a hold all. As he was grabbing clothes for himself he realised that Emma would need to change too. She had some blood on her clothing and anyway too many people had seen her in the dress she was wearing. He looked in his wardrobe and saw the clothes that Alison had started leaving at his place hanging there.
He reached out to grab them and stopped, his hand hesitating in mid-air as an overwhelming stab of guilt hit, deep in the pit of his stomach, as he realised what he was about to do. The sense of betrayal that he had felt earlier returned. He was going to take the clothes of his current lover and partner and give them to his former lover, still unsure of his feelings towards either of them but knowing that if the situation were reversed he would not be able to forgive.
The second that he stood with his hand hovering felt much longer, the powerful emotions clouding his sense of time, and then he was moving again, pushing the emotion back, waiting for a more suitable time to deal with it. Acutely aware that such repression would probably make it all the harder when that time finally came.
He made it to the top of the stairs panting slightly for breath, blood loss and exhaustion beginning to take their toll. He moved over to the couch where Emma was waiting for him. "How long 'til the cab gets here?" He asked as he sat down.
Emma had watched him approach from the stairs. He had not bothered putting his shirt back on after he had rinsed the blood off. Despite the slight droop of his shoulders at the moment he still looked as good as she remembered. Tall and muscular, he had lost that youthful, slightly sinewy quality and had filled out with the years but that just made him look even more handsome to her. As he got closer she noticed the ugly purple bruising on his side and winced inwardly knowing that she was the cause.
It took her a moment to acknowledge that he had spoken to her and another moment to register the content of the question. He was almost sitting down when she finally looked at her watch and answered. "About ten minutes."
"Doesn't give us much time then" Steve said putting the holdall down and easing himself on to the coffee table which Emma had draped in towels.
Emma moved behind him and for the first time saw the bullet wound. She let out an involuntary gasp as she looked at it. She had assumed, from the way that Steve had managed to keep going, that the bullet had just creased him but now she could see the ragged edges of a neat entry wound still oozing blood slightly and, more significantly, no exit wound. "Steve," she said when her voice returned., "The bullet is still in there." She was so shocked it did not occur to her that he must already know.
"I know," he said quietly. "How bad?"
She looked more carefully "The entry wound appears clean but I still should irrigate it." She moved round so that she could make eye contact before continuing, "Steve the bullet needs to come out. I need to get you back to the hospital"
Steve held her gaze. His voice remained calm and measured as he replied. "No, I won't go anywhere until you are safe."
"Let's call your father then." She ventured. "He could get the bullet out."
"No," Steve snapped and then regretted it. He spoke more gently as he explained. "We can't do that. If he treats a gunshot wound then he has to report it immediately to the authorities. If he doesn't then he could lose his license to practice medicine." He paused and broke eye contact. "If we call him he would help me and he wouldn't report it. I couldn't do that to him." He looked back up at her. "Look just clean the wound and dress it. We'll sort it out later once we're clear."
Reluctantly Emma nodded and moved back behind him. She had known before she started that arguing was useless and they did not have long. "Brace yourself this is going to hurt." She said as she prepared to irrigate the wound.
Steve took a deep breath and gritted his teeth.
Mark was sitting in a chair in the OR waiting room whilst Amanda paced up and down. Both of them had the necessary clearance to go into the operating theater and watch how things were going but they knew that that would not help, nor would it change the outcome. Jesse was in the hands of one of the best microsurgeons in LA. All they could do was sit and wait for news. Neither of them felt competent to work until they knew that Jesse was OK. So they did the only thing they could; wait.
The door to the room opened and both of them looked up expectantly hoping that it was news. They were a little disappointed when a young uniformed officer entered. "Excuse me," he said politely. "I've been sent to speak to the witnesses from a shooting incident. I understand the victim is still in surgery but I was told that you might be able to help me."
Mark stood up and introduced himself. "I'm Dr. Mark Sloan and this is Dr. Amanda Bentley we're both friends of the victim Dr. Jesse Travis but I really don't know how much we can tell you"
"Did he say anything at all about what happened?" The young officer asked his notebook poised.
Amanda looked at Mark, the strain of the memory of seeing Jesse on a gurney in the ER covered in blood, showed clearly in his features and in his tone as he replied quietly. "No, I'm afraid he was unconscious by the time he got here. He didn't regain consciousness before going to surgery."
The emotional response was not lost on the young officer. He knew that dealing with distraught friends and relatives would be one of the hardest things to get used to. "What about the people who brought him in?" He asked as gently as he could.
"That was my son, Lieutenant Steve Sloan, and a woman whom I don't know apart from the fact that her first name is Emma."
"And do you know where I could find them?"
"I'm afraid not they left before I got a chance to speak to either of them properly."
"So they didn't tell you anything about what happened?"
"No," Mark replied letting out a sigh. "I'm sorry that we can't be of more help."
"That's OK. I'll come back later when Dr. Travis is able to make a statement." The officer replied putting his notebook away.
"Steve's probably gone back to the station to file his own report on the incident." Amanda added helpfully.
The officer looked at her. "Thanks I'll check on that." He said and turned and left.
Emma wrapped the bandages as tightly as she could in an effort to stop the bleeding. Steve sat motionless apart from the deep breaths that he was taking. His eyes were closed and his face was ashen. He tried hard to concentrate on his breathing to take the focus away from the pain emanating in waves from his shoulder. He felt her hand gently touch his face it was cool and soft. He opened his eyes as she spoke to him. "There, all finished for now"
"Thank you," he said his voice still tight with pain. "but I still need your help with a less pleasant task." He forced a half smile "I need you to help me get changed."
Despite her concern she smiled back at his attempt at humour. "Good job I'm a woman of the world then," she replied helping him to his feet
As quickly as he could manage Steve changed out of the rest of his blood soaked clothes into the fresh ones he had brought up with him. Despite the pain and danger that they were both in, or perhaps it was heightened because of the situation, he could not help the small electric shocks that pervaded his senses as Emma's hands brushed against his skin. She was forced close to him as she helped to fasten his shirt and then his trousers and he could smell her scent. He closed his eyes, lost for a moment in a memory of a time long ago and a similar situation. He breathed deeply.
"Steve," Emma's slightly anxious voice finally penetrated. It was the third time she had called his name but the first he had heard. He opened his eyes again and stared into hers.
"Sorry I drifted off for a minute. I was remembering the last time you had to help me dress." He paused and seeing the flash of memory in her eyes continued, "and what that led to."
She smiled up at him and placed her hand tenderly on his good shoulder. "I remember too." She replied quietly as he leaned forward and kissed her and then they were both lost in the past. For a brief moment they were both nineteen again sharing their first kiss. The emotional response was overpowering now as it had been then.
The blare of the horn from the cab broke their reverie and they parted lips, once more regretting the interruption that dragged them back to reality. With Emma's help Steve rolled up the soiled clothes and towel and threw them in the trash. Then he grabbed the holdall and headed for the door.
Captain Newman read the brief reports in front of him again and frowned. The shooting at the apartment building was detailed in one. There were no suspects and nobody seemed to know what exactly had happened apart from the fact that there were at least four guns involved. Two men that matched the descriptions of the NSA agents who had been at the station earlier had been inquiring door to door about Steve Sloan and a woman but they had left the scene before the black and whites arrived and there were no witnesses to say whether they were actually involved. The other gun shots had been fired from rifles from a rooftop. Empty shell casings and bullet holes being the sum total of the evidence that there had been someone there.
The other report was of Jesse Travis's shooting. Steve had arrived with him at the hospital in the company of a woman, probably the same one the NSA agents were seeking, and had then disappeared without waiting to see if his friend was OK.
It did not take a genius to realise that these were two reports on the same incident nor that this was somehow linked to the homicide that detective Turner was working on, especially since the NSA agents in question had turned up at the murder scene, but how? And where the Hell had Sloan disappeared to? On leave or not he was duty bound to report a shooting. Dammit he could lose his badge for this.
The Captain took off his glasses and pinched his nose in an effort to stave off the headache that was rapidly growing behind his eyes. He picked up the phone to call detective Turner, since this all seemed to be related to his case he needed to fill him in and, if possible, get him to find Steve and bring him in before the wolves from IA got hold of it.
The door to the OR waiting room opened once more and Amanda and Mark both turned anxiously to look at it. They had been waiting almost three hours and the strain was taking its toll on both of them. Dr. Bill Taylor entered. He was still dressed in theater greens and pulled his hat off as he moved over to talk to his concerned colleagues. "So far so good," he said smiling reassuringly. "It was touch and go for a while because of the blood loss and we're going to transfer him to ICU initially just to make sure there are no complications but he came through the surgery well"
"Thank god," Mark uttered. Amanda let out the breath she had been holding as a sigh.
"What about his arm?" Mark asked remembering what he had seen in the ER.
"Well it was very badly damaged but Dr. Michaelson's a genius. Fortunately the blood supply wasn't stopped for long enough for the tissue below the injury to be permanently damaged. The bullet itself destroyed some muscle tissue and chipped the bone but we've managed to repair a lot of that and remove the bone fragments. As you know the major risk now is from infection and..." he paused briefly. He wanted to give them only positive news but knew that he had to tell them the truth "He's probably going to need further surgery to finish the repairs Dr.. Michaelson was concerned about keeping him under the anaesthetic for any longer than necessary until he's a little stronger." He studied the worried faces of his colleagues "The important thing is that he's alive and on his way to recovering." He continued attempting to lift their spirits.
Both Doctors allowed a sense of relief to wash over them. For the time being the news was as positive as it could be given the injury. "When can we see him?" Amanda asked and Mark could not help but notice how similar their questions were to those he had answered for hundreds of friends and relatives in this same room.
"He's in recovery. I'll page you when we've transferred him." Dr. Taylor smiled "Trust me he's a fighter, he'll be fine."
Nathan entered the OR waiting room just as Dr. Taylor was leaving. He walked straight over to the two doctors. "I just heard," he said as he approached. "How is he?"
Mark filled him in on Jesse's condition repeating what they had just been told by Dr. Taylor. "We're going to go up and see him soon. Try to find out what happened." Mark concluded.
"That's partly why I'm here." Nathan began. He was a little embarrassed at having to question people that he now considered friends. "I've been sent to investigate the shooting."
"I thought you were already working a murder case," Amanda said somewhat confused. "I was working on the autopsy report from this morning when I got the call that Jesse had been hurt. I'm afraid I've been here ever since." She looked apologetic. "I'm sorry I haven't finished it yet."
"Don't worry about the report I understand." Nathan paused debating how to continue. "Look there is reason to believe that there may be a connection between the murder and the shooting."
Mark was equally confused. "What could possibly connect Jesse getting shot with a murder half way across town?"
Nathan swallowed and looked Mark straight in the eye. "Your son."