I wish to thank Kathey'ssis (My real Sister) for helping me with Beta reading my Story.
Men, Can't Trust Them
Chapter 1
A New Neighbor
Johnny eyes lazily popped open and he stretched his arms and legs. He'd been out late the night before, getting in around three am that morning. He had been on a first date with Susan, one of the new nurses at Rampart. The evening had been fun. They had a fast food dinner, went for a stroll on the beach and then they went to a club for a drink and some dancing. He laid in bed thinking about the night and weather or not to ask Susan out a second time. Though they both seemed to have a good time there wasn't any spark to the evening.
He rolled over and looked at the alarm clock next to his bed to find it was after eleven o'clock. He hadn't set his alarm since he didn't have to work today, but he was a bit surprised to see how late it was. He had several errands to run and things he needed to accomplish before reporting to work the next morning. He quickly showered and cooked himself a couple of eggs and toast and washed it all down with the last quart of milk in the house. After he had finished cleaning up from breakfast he wrote up a "To Do," list and a shopping list and headed out.
As he hurried down the stairs towards the parking lot and his Rover, he found the way blocked by a box that was being carried up the stairs. "Hello, could you use some help?" He asked.
"No, I think I've got it, but thank you any way." A female voice drifted up from around the box.
A grin coming to his face as he realized a woman was carrying the box. Johnny quickly took the box from the lady, ignoring her comment and turning to head back up the stairs, "What apartment are you in." He asked. Before the young woman had a chance argue with him, he was already at the top of the stairs well.
With a sigh she called up to him. "215."
"Hey, that's next door to me. That would make us neighbors." Johnny stopped as he reached the apartment next to his and waited for the woman to open the door for him. Johnny gave her a quick smile as he walked past her into the apartment.
"Just put it down in the living room," she called to him. Johnny quickly did as instructed then turned to find the young women standing in the open door way of her apartment.
Johnny approached the woman and offered his hand to her. "Hi, I'm John Gage. Welcome to the neighborhood." Johnny quickly scanned her from top to bottom, disappointed in what he saw. She was an average type woman with long, brown hair and brown eyes. She was wearing a loose tee shirt and a pair of jeans and no make up.
With a polite smile she took his hand and shook it. "It's nice to meet you John, I'm Elizabeth." Johnny waited for a few moments to see if she had anything more to say but it was apparent the she had no intentions of doing so.
"Well you have a good day. See yah around." Johnny told her as he turned and walked back towards the stairwell.
It was around six thirty that same evening when Johnny returned home. He had his dry cleaning over one shoulder and a sack of groceries in the other arm. As he approached his apartment, he could hear a rattling noise that continued to get louder as he grew closer to his apartment. "Oh no." he thought when he realized it was coming from with in his apartment. He sat down his groceries and unlocked his door and hurried in to the apartment. He quickly laid his dry cleaning over a chair as he hurried back to his bedroom where the noise was emanating from to find it was his air-conditioner. It being August, he had been running it 24 hours a day. He quickly hurried over to it and switched it off, realizing that his apartment was already heating up. "Great just great," he said to himself, "Just what I needed." He returned to the opened door to retrieve his groceries as he stood back up he caught sight of Elizabeth coming towards him. In and effort to be a good neighbor he smiled and said, "Good evening, all moved in?"
"Almost." She answered.
Johnny notice that she had stopped a couple of feet away from him and remained there until he had nodded his head towards her and stepped back into his apartment with his groceries. At this point Johnny realized that his new neighbor was not very sociable and he decided that it was probably best to keep interaction with her at a polite neighborly minimum.
After putting all his groceries away, he decided that eating out would be a good idea with the air conditioner being out of commission, he knew that his apartment would only get hotter until after dark.
It was after eleven when he returned home. As he approached his apartment he noticed that Elizabeth had left her front door open and had positioned a fan in the door way, to help move the evening air through her apartment. "Her air conditioner must be out too." He thought to himself. Johnny stepped over to her doorway and raised a hand to knock, but stopped when he saw her sitting on the floor pulling items from one of the boxes. "Hi, I was wondering if you could do me a favor?"
Elizabeth, turned her attention from what she was doing and looked at Johnny but didn't responded. Felling a little uneasy with her lack of communication he plunged forward. "It seems that your air conditioner isn't working and well mine went down today too and I have to work tomorrow, so I was wondering if the repair man should come by tomorrow, could you ask him to work on mine too." He paused for a moment or two waiting for a response but when there was no comment, he added. "After he fixes yours first. And if you're not at work yourself."
Elizabeth took a deep breath and let it out and then nodded at Johnny and replied, "I'll tell them."
Thanks, Johnny acknowledged and with a quick nod and a smile he turned and headed into his apartment. As he stepped thru the door he was hit by a wave of heat that had been building up through out the day. He left the door open as he moved through the apartment and opened all the windows to let the night air circulate through the apartment and cool things off. Then he went back and closed his door. He took a cool shower and turned in. However it took an hour for the apartment to cool enough for Johnny to finally fall a sleep.
Johnny was jolted awake by a scream. He quickly sat up in bed and listen wondering what had woke him. He could hear someone banging on the wall in the apartment next door and then another short scream. Johnny quickly pulled on a pair of sweat pants and ran for his door. As soon as he stepped out the door Johnny saw that Elizabeth's door was still opened, and he could hear sounds of a struggle coming from the back of the apartment. He quickly pushed the fan away and hurried over to the bedroom door. Inside the room he found a man on top of the young woman and the two were struggling. Without further thought Johnny ran over and grabbed the man and pulled him back off the woman, yelling, "Leave her alone!"
The man pulled out of Johnny's grip and spun around. He had a knife in his right hand that he used to cut Johnny across his bare chest. The sting of the knife broke his concentration for a moment, which was just enough for the assailant to drop his shoulder and ram into Johnny knocking him backward as he ran past him out of the room. Johnny's head hit the open door to the bedroom and for a moment his vision blacked out. But he could hear the young women's sobs and rolled over onto his hands and knees and crawled over to where she lay curled up on the floor. He reached out to brush her long hair out of her face but his touch frightened her and she lashed out at him kicking with her legs and screamed, "Stay away from me!"
Johnny pulled back and in a calm voice began to talk to her in an effort to calm her down. "Elizabeth it's Johnny, from next door. I won't hurt you. I just want to see if you're hurt?"
Elizabeth stopped screaming and looked up at the man kneeling in front of her. Her eyes took in his face and then the bloody cut on his chest. In a soft voice she whispered, "Your hurt."
Johnny noticed that Elisabeth was bleeding as well. He slowly stood and went to the bathroom and grabbed the towels on the rack and hurried back to the bedroom. Kneeling down in front of her he saw her shirt was ripped half off and that she had a cut on her arm and another under her chin. "I'm a Paramedic for the Los Angeles Fire department. I'm not going to hurt you, just let me treat your cuts." He reached over cautiously and took her chin and lifted her head so he could get a better look at the cut there. He quickly realized that the cut under her chin was not that deep, but the one on her arm was bleeding freely. Quickly he took one of the towels and ripped it in two. With one piece he tightly wrapped it around the cut on her arm and then he folded the other half and put it against the cut under the chin. "Can you hold this?" he asked her. "It will help stop the bleeding." Elizabeth reached up and held the towel to her cut, while keeping her eyes on Johnny.
Johnny then turned his attention to his own wound. With a quick inspection he found that the knife wound was across his ribs thereby keeping the cut shallow. Taking the other towel he folded it and pressed it against his bleeding wound and wrapped an arm over it to apply pressure.
"Please stay here, I'm going to call the police and the fire department then I'll come right back." Johnny stood up quickly, only to have the room start spinning. He dropped to his knees and waited for his head to clear. Then with a reassuring smile towards Elizabeth he slowly stood back up and made his way to the phone in his apartment. He called Dispatch and requested a squad and ambulance and asked them to also send the police. With that done he slowly returned to Elizabeth. As he reached the open bedroom door he saw she was now sitting against the wall with her legs pulled up to her chest and her uninjured arm wrapped around them.
Johnny was aware of a pounding in his head and feeling a little light headed and he leaned against the door frame and rapped his other arm around his chest to apply more pressure to his wound.
Johnny heard the sirens approach and headed to the open door arriving in time to see a police car pull up. He recognized the officer as he stepped out of the vehicle. "Up here," he called to Vince.
"Gage?" Vince called back.
"Yah," he replied as he leaned against the door frame and waited for the officer.
Before Vince had reached Johnny, Squad 8 pulled into the parking lot. Johnny watched as Peters and McGuire climbed out of the cab and hurried to the side compartments for their gear.
"Up here guy's."
"Gage is that you?" Peters inquired.
"Yah, could you hurry up."
As Vince approached Johnny he was alarmed to see him covered in blood and realized Johnny had been hurt. Before he could ask how he was doing Johnny nodded his head towards the bedroom and said, "In the bed room," and pushed himself away from the door frame and stumbled towards the bedroom. Vince grabbed his arm. "Sit down Johnny, I can find the bedroom my self."
Johnny tried to push on towards the bedroom saying, "Elizabeth's hurt."
Vince kept a hold of Johnny's arms and told him, "Sit down and let the paramedics on duty take care of the woman." At that point Johnny's legs gave way and Vince controlled his descent to the floor. Peters appeared in the door way and hurried over to Johnny, "What happened here?"
"I can wait," Johnny said, "Go help Elizabeth first, she's in the bedroom."
"McGuire, will take care of her, and I'll take care of you." He said as he pulled out a blood pressure cuff and wrapped it around his arm and began taking his vitals, while Vince and McGuire disappeared into the bedroom.
After he had finished gathering his vitals and made a quick assessment of his injuries he turned and set up the bio-phone. "Rampart this is squad 8, do you read?"
"Go ahead 8." Dr. Bracket's voice replied.
"Rampart we have two victims, the first is a male, approximately twenty-nine years of age. He has an eight inch cut across his chest and a possible concussion. His vitals are, respiration's' 25, Pulse is 135 and blood pressure is 100/55. He is also diaphoretic."
"10-4, 8, Administer IV/D5W apply a pressure dressing and transport as soon as possible."
"IV/D5W, apply pressure dressing and transport 10-4 Rampart."
"8, what are the vitals on the second victim?"
"Hold on for info on second patient," Peters said then he turned and called towards the bedroom, "McGuire have you got vitals on your patient?"
"Coming," McGuire responded, as he handed his note book to Vince and asked, "Can you take this to Peters for me."
Vince quickly took the information to Peters who was busy wrapping a dressing around Johnny's chest wound. "Could you give that info to Rampart?" He asked.
Vince knelt down next to the bio-phone and grabbed the receiver. "Rampart second victim is a female around 25 years of age, she has two knife wounds, one on her left forearm and the second is under her chin, she is a victim of an attempted rape. Her vitals are pulse 126, respiration's' 22, and Blood pressure is 95/63."
"10-4, 8, apply pressure dressings to cuts and administer IV-D5W and transport as soon as possible."
"Apply pressure dressings and IV-D5W, 10-4 Rampart." Vince acknowledged as he wrote the information on to the note book and took it to McGuire. Then he returned and knelt next to Johnny, who was lying on his back with his right arm over his face. "Can you tell me what happened?"
"I was awakened by her screams and when I got to the room that creep was on top of her. I grabbed him and he turned and cut me and pushed me back and ran out. I hit my head on the door and was stunned for a moment, I don't know which way he went."
"Can you tell me what he looked like?"
"I didn't get a good look at his face, but I would say he was about 25 years old, brown hair, and he was wearing jeans and a black jacket."
While Vince was talking to Johnny the ambulance arrived and they had loaded Elizabeth on the gurney and took her out to the ambulance first. Then they returned and loaded Johnny on the stretcher and put him on the bench in the ambulance and Peters climbed in with them. Vince closed the doors then slapped twice to let the driver know the doors were securer.