Chapter 3

There was a jarring thump a split second before Della's head cracked sharply on the side window, and she felt her already sore hand get slammed between the door and her body. Dazed, she reached for the door handle only to cry out as pain shot all the way past her elbow to her shoulder when she pulled. She used her left hand, got the door open and slid out, leaning on the car to keep from falling down. There was more pain, this time in her head, as she was caught in the headlights of a car that had pulled up behind the accident.

Officer Mark Donovan had seen the accident happen as he turned the corner. Although it wasn't a hard crash, he couldn't quite tell what had caused it.

The driver was moving around inside the car, but the officer's attention was drawn to the passenger side when the door opened and a girl slid out, stumbling back against the car as she tried to orient herself.

Flicking on his flashlight, Donovan made a couple of cursory passes over the vehicle before turning it on the girl. She was well dressed and there were no visible injuries although she was holding her head. He saw her grimace and dropped his light so it wasn't shining directly in her eyes.

"Are you alright, miss?"

"I hit my head." Lowering her hand, she looked blankly at the darkened fingertips of her white glove. Her stomach flip-flopped when she realized it was blood. She swallowed hard and prayed she wouldn't embarrass herself by losing her dinner.

Donovan saw her waver. "Why don't you sit in the car -"

"No, thank you." Her head still hurt but as the fog in her brain began to lift she knew she didn't want to be in Stephen Raines' car ever again for any reason.

Noting the unusually strong response, Donovan said, "All right, let's step up onto the sidewalk. How did this happen?"

Stephen was out of the car now and he moved in front of Della to answer the question. "It was nothing serious, officer. There was a dog in the road; I didn't see it until the last minute. I swerved to miss it and lost control of the car."

The officer played his flashlight around the dark area beyond the pool of light afforded by the street lamp they stood under. "Where is this dog, Mister -?"

"Raines, Stephen Raines. I don't know where the dog is; it must have run off."

Turning off the flashlight, he slipped it into a loop on his belt then pulled out a notebook. He wrote down Stephen's name, asked for his address and also noted the car's license plate.

"Your name, miss?"

"Della Street." She gave him her address without making him ask for it.

Eyeing the girl, Donovan reached into his pocket and took out his handkerchief. He held it out saying, "You're still bleeding."

"Oh, um, thank you, but I have my own." Opening her purse, she scrabbled through the contents, uncomfortably aware of both men watching her. She found the square of cloth, shook it out and pressed a corner to the wound on her forehead. It hurt more that it had the first time she touched it, but she didn't really want to be standing around with blood on her face.

"Did you get that nose in the... accident?" Donovan's question was deliberately abrupt.

Caught off guard, Stephen's fingers hovered over the bridge of his nose but didn't touch it. "Yes, uh, I was thrown forward by the impact and hit the steering wheel."

The patrolman's raised eyebrow conveyed his skepticism of the story. A lot of things about this situation didn't read right.

"Wait here," he instructed the pair.

Taking out his flashlight once more, he directed the beam through the car but there was no sign of blood except for a small smear on the window of the passenger door. He walked around to look at the front end of the car where it rested against the telephone pole. The fender was crumpled a bit, but he had expected worse. He returned to the sidewalk.

"If you'll park your car properly, Mr. Raines, I'll take you both to the hospital."

"That won't be necessary, officer. I can see Miss Street home -" he broke off as Della moaned and swayed slightly.

With the handkerchief concealing her face from Stephen, the look she gave the patrolman was unmistakable.

Donovan nodded his understanding of her silent request not to be left with Stephen. "Well, since the lady's the one doing all the active bleeding, why don't we hear from her?"

"I believe I should go to the hospital." Della thought her high school drama teacher would be pleased by the way she embellished her response with a soft quaver in her voice.

"You heard the lady; park your car, please, Mr. Raines." Donovan's own tone left no room for argument.

Stephen stomped back to his car, moved it parallel to the curb, got out and stomped to the passenger side of the prowl car where he climbed into the front seat. His impersonation of a petulant child was embellished with door slams, tire screeches and glowering looks.

Ignoring the man's antics, Donovan took Della's elbow and guided her to the driver's side of the patrol car where he opened the back door. "Why don't you sit behind me, Miss Street?"

She offered her silent thanks as she slid into the seat.

~P&D~

Officer Donovan pulled his prowl car into the ambulance bay. Shutting off the engine, he got out and opened the rear door for his passenger. He gave her a sympathetic smile as he helped her out while Raines sulked on ahead without them.

The emergency room was unusually quiet, even for a Tuesday, but Dr. Adam Milburn was still half a pot of coffee behind. His hope of catching up on his caffeine ration went out the door when he saw the trio come through it. Mark Donovan was a familiar face, but the folks he usually escorted tended to be shot, knifed, beaten or at the very least considerably more inebriated than these two appeared.

"Evening, Mark. What do we have here?"

"Hi, Doc. This is Miss Della Street and Mr. Stephen Raines. They had a little traffic accident; the lady needs to be seen first." He glared at Raines, silencing the other man's weak protest. "She hit her head, and she's still bleeding."

"Let's take a look at her then," the doctor agreed. He noted Mark was taking the lady's side in whatever was going on. The officer was too level headed to be taken in by a pretty face, even one as pretty as this, so he had to have a good reason for his partiality. "Nurse Barrett, you can put the gentleman in Exam 4. Come with me, young lady."

Officer Donovan watched Milburn guide the girl away then hurried to catch up with Raines as he followed the nurse into a room down the hall.

"Have a seat," Nurse Barrett instructed, pulling some forms from a drawer. "The doctor will be a while, but we can get your chart started in the mean time."

Choosing a chair rather than the exam table, Stephen slouched down with an aggrieved air.

"Could you wait on that for a minute?" Donovan asked. "I'd like to go over the incident again with Mr. Raines."

The nurse shrugged her consent, but Stephen wasn't so agreeable.

"I don't see the point, officer. I swerved to miss a dog. I lost control of the car. The dog ran away. Those facts aren't going to change."

Donovan didn't believe those were the facts, but he did believe the man's story wouldn't change. Raines was consistent if not convincing.

~P&D~

Escorting Della to a room marked Exam 1, Dr. Milburn helped her up onto the exam table.

"Now, why don't you tell me what happened?" It was as much a medical test of her short term memory as a quest for information. He used a penlight to check her pupils.

"Mr. Raines yelled 'hang on', I didn't, the car the hit pole, my arm hit the door and my head hit the window," she itemized, blinking against the dancing spots left by the assessment. The small light didn't carry with it the shooting pain that the prowl car's headlights had but it still didn't do her head much good.

Dr. Milburn chuckled. 'The girl can't be hurt too badly if she's making jokes.'

"How are you feeling?"

"I was a little nauseous right after it happened, but that's gone now. I've got a slight headache and my arm hurts."

"Okay, we'll start with that cut on your head." Della removed the handkerchief and Milburn used a gentle hand to lift her hair out of the way. "Hmm, not too bad... going to need a couple of stitches though. Don't worry, my dear, I'll use small, fine sutures so there will only be a minimal scar. Let me see that arm." He saw her make a face as she pulled off her glove. Carefully, the doctor manipulated her wrist, taking note of the small scrapes on her knuckles that corresponded with the blood he had seen on the top of her glove.

"I don't think you've got anything more than a sprain, but we'll get an X-ray of your arm to be sure and one of your head as well. Is it possible you're pregnant?"

"No."

"Are you certain? There's no need to be embarrassed," he assured her, "I understand how this sort of thing can happen."

She appreciated his straight forward approach. Della wasn't a stiff-necked prude or a tremulous virgin but it felt good to be able to face the doctor and reply, "So do I. I know where babies come from, doctor, and I know how they get there. I'm not pregnant."

"Good. Nurse Gates, if you'll clean up that wound a bit, we'll see about those stitches. After that I want to get X-rays of your head and arm."

The doctor made quick work of putting three tiny stitches above the outside of her right eye about a half inch from her hairline. Local anesthetic numbed the pain, but lying under the sterile cloth and feeling the tug of the sutures brought back the nausea. When it was over, Della was surprised to find she was clutching the nurse's hand.

"Sorry," she said as she sat up, "having my face covered bothered me for some reason. I'm not usually claustrophobic."

The nurse patted her shoulder. "It happens a lot. Let's go get your picture taken."

~P&D~

Dr. Milburn ignored the stony silence that filled Exam 4.

"You'll have to step outside, Mark," he said, reading over the chart Nurse Barrett had started. "I need to examine the patient."

"When can I talk to Miss Street, Doc?" Donovan asked, watching Raines for a reaction. Stephen kept his gaze focused on the floor.

"What? Oh, in a little while. She's gone up to Radiology."

"I'll go get some coffee then." Signaling the doctor an invitation to join him when he got the chance, Donovan left.

Stephen started to rise, intending to sit on the exam table but Dr. Milburn waved him back into the chair. The lower seat gave him a better angle on the injury.

"So, Mr. Raines, a car accident, was it? You were driving?"

"Yes." Stephen let the one word answer both questions.

Lightly grasping Stephen's chin, Dr. Milburn tilted the man's face this way and that.

"How did you hurt your nose?"

"As I keep saying, I was thrown forward and hit the steering wheel."

"You're, what, six feet tall?"

"Six-one, actually," Stephen corrected.

"Hmm." The doctor reached for the afflicted area. "This is going to hurt a bit." His Hippocratic Oath kept him from inflicting deliberate pain, but he didn't regret the unavoidable pain quite as much as he had with Miss Street. "Yep, it's broken. Nurse Barrett, you can take the gentleman to get his nose X-rayed now and we'll find out just how badly."

TBC