Chapter 3
A/N: When I wrote, "Angels Among Us" I had honestly expected it would be the only Harry/Lash story I'd write. Had I known I'd write three or more of these, I'd not have given him the truck so early.
I was heading to the door after saying my goodbyes to Justine and Thomas when a strawberry blonde woman hurried to catch up with me.
"Mr. Dresden? Harry Dresden?" She asked loudly, nearly out of breath and waving at me.
"Yes, can I help you?" I asked turning to see the attractive woman in her early twenties come to a bouncing stop. Her voluptuous body adjusted itself under her expensive business-slutty clothes, which is the dress uniform for house Raith staffers. She wore a short charcoal colored pencil skirt with stockings and the garter just showing, due to her exertion. She also had on a thin white blouse that was possibly a thin cotton or polyester and 4" black stiletto heels. She took a deep breath, holding her hand up for me to wait.
"There's an emergency, a phone call for you... The police." she half panted, her full apple cheeks flushed as she pointed to an open door down the hall. "You can take it... in my office."
I didn't waste time asking questions. I hurried down the hall to the open door, my duster flapping behind me as I ran. Inside the room there was a phone with the receiver setting on the desk. I quickly snatched up the receiver and nearly barked into the phone, "Hello?"
"Harry, it's Murphy. There's been an incident, you need to get to Cook County Hospital. I don't know what happened Harry, but Lash is in the E.R. and there's a frightened little girl with her. Harry, she's been shot." Murphy said in her 'delivering bad news' voice.
I wanted to question her, but she already said she didn't know what happened. Now all I could do was get to the hospital and deal with the here and now.
"Murphy, put someone on that kid and make it someone you trust." I told her sternly. "Whatever happened, It's likely got to do with her. I'll explain when I get there." I told her and slammed the receiver down on the plastic cradle. The woman was just coming into the room as I turned to the door, my mood must have shown on my face as she stopped short and quickly moved out of my way.
"Should I call the car around for you sir?" She asked watching me stride past her with an unreadable look on her face, part shock and part something else.
"I'm fine, just be sure to tell Thomas I'm headed to Cook County Hospital. The woman the girl was with has been shot." I told her over my shoulder with a grimace, the words nearly sticking in my throat. My guts were twisting just thinking of seeing Lash in the hospital again. The tubes coming off her body and her laying unconscious. The more I thought about it the angrier and more worried I became.
I slipped the key into the door of the old truck and twisted it, giving a audible thunk as the lock popped up. I swung the door open and slid into the driver's seat, pulling the seatbelt across my lap and buckling it. As I put the key into the ignition the passenger door swung open and my brother lithely slipped into the seat next to me, slamming the door as he turned to me. His jaw was set and his face had a serious look on it. I knew it was a waste of time to argue with him and I didn't have any to spare right now. I simply nodded at him and stepped on the gas, the engine responding with a loud deep growl. The truck jerked forward and raced down the long narrow driveway of the park like estate.
The street lights and power poles came and went in quick succession as I hurried through the suburbs and then into the city. I explained to Thomas what Murphy had told me on the phone and stepped harder on the gas pedal. Thomas just smiled and put his hand on the dashboard. I have to admit, I did like this truck. It was a gift from Thomas a few years back when the Beetle was in the shop. It was close to my birthday and I needed a vehicle to go find the kidnapped Murphy, so he gave it to me a few weeks early. He had the truck 'customized' in many unique and wizard proofing ways. I have to admit I haven't hardly had any engine trouble and it's nice to drive a V8 for a change, especially when you're in a hurry.
I parked in emergency parking and was half out of the truck before the engine died. I slammed the door and raced past the double sliding glass doors and stepped into the waiting area.
"Harry, you need to calm down." Thomas said putting his hand on my shoulder. "Lash is somewhere on this floor and you coming in upset could cause a lot of problems. Take a second and take a few deep breaths before you break something important." He said softly but with a stern voice of reason.
I stopped and closed my eyes, bowing my head slightly. I took in a long deep breath and pushed the anger, fear and worry into a small door in the back of my brain and locked it away. When I exhaled I let my body relax and cleared my mind. It's not an easy thing to do and honestly given the situation I was a little surprised I could do it. However I've been training myself for years to control my emotions, pain, panic and other distracting things for years. In a fight or negotiations, losing your cool is never a good thing.
I opened my eyes and cracked my neck, then looked at my brother over my shoulder.
"You good?" He asked cautiously.
"I'm good." I told him diplomatically.
"Harry! Over here." I heard Murphy's familiar voice. Looking up I saw her standing near the nurses' station. She quickly walked towards us as we closed the gap.
"Murph, how's she doing?" I asked before she could speak.
"Well, she was shot in the left side. The doctors don't think it's too bad, her vitals are good, but the bullet's still inside her. It was a small caliber round so it didn't seem to do too much damage. She's in surgery right now to remove it." She said giving me a hopeful look. Murphy lead us to a small consultation room off to the side of the Emergency Room. She closed the door and motioned for us to sit.
"Murphy, do they know who did this?" I asked feeling myself becoming tense and making a mental effort to relax.
"Yes, we think we have all of them." Murphy said with a small smile. "It seems when the uniforms arrived to a 'shots fired' call, they found Lash and the girl in front of a strip mall loading bay. Lash had one of the guys pinned down behind a dumpster. The other two were unconscious with minor to moderate wounds." She said sounding a little impressed. "It would appear that she didn't want to use magic in the open so she went at them hand to hand and was winning until one pulled a gun and shot her. That's when she put up a shield and pulled her own pistol. She hit him in the leg and upper chest before he could duck behind the dumpster."
"How's Simone? The little girl, did she get hurt?" I asked remembering that Lash wasn't the only one here. "Where is she?" I asked having not seen her in the waiting area.
"She's fine. I have Rawlings watching her and someone from social services is on the way." she said eyeing me more intently. "Who is she Harry? I mean who is she to you?"
"She's a client." I told her with an impassive face. "She's in a bit of trouble. I'm not quite sure what's going on here yet myself but if someone jumped Lash, they were likely after the girl. They obviously didn't know who Lash was or they'd brought more men and bigger guns." I said honestly.
"We need to find her family and let them know what's going on. There's nothing I can do about that Harry. It's protocol." She said looking concerned as this may just turn into a big can of hard to explain worms.
"Thank you for taking such good care of my niece Officer Murphy." Thomas said from my side. He'd been so quiet I'd nearly forgotten he was with me. "Simone's parents, my half sister and her husband, passed away in an unfortunate accident a few years ago. My sister and I are her legal guardians." Thomas told her leaning back in his chair, crossing his legs in a slow, smooth motion.
Murphy looked at Thomas, her cheeks turning a light pink as he smiled at her kindly.
"You're her guardian? Harry, what's going on?" Murphy said, still looking at Thomas and sounding suspicious.
"Look, something spooked her at her boarding school, Easton Academy and she ran away. I found her on the streets last night and took her in. I just found out that she's part of the Raith family." I told her truthfully.
"What spooked her?" Murphy asked raising an eyebrow at the name of the school.
"I don't know. She said there was a circle of girls in a trance like state and then a monster appeared from a glowing circle. " I explained as succinctly as I could.
"A monster huh?" Murphy said frowning and shaking her head. "There's no way I can get a warrant to search the school for 'spooky monsters' and I don't think the headmaster there would willingly let the police onto the property without a damn good reason." Murphy said thinking it through. "You'll have to come up with something on your own Harry."
"It's complicated." I told her, rubbing my eyes with my palms as the room went silent.
There was an unexpected knock on the door that nearly made me jump. I turned to see a doctor in her scrubs come into the room. She appeared to be in her mid thirties and aside from the stress lines around her eyes she had a girl next door quality about her. The blood stains still wet on her scrubs.
"Officer Murphy, I wanted to let you know that she's out of surgery and doing as well as can be expected. The round didn't sever any major arteries or puncture any organs and we got it out safely. Still, we want to keep an eye on her for now anyway." the doctor told Murphy.
"Can we see her?" I asked relieved to hear it went well.
"Well she's lost a lot of blood and we have her sedated now. She'll likely be out until tomorrow morning, so you should wait until then." The doctor told me in a dispassionate, clinical manner.
"Is there any way I could just sit with her?" I asked quietly, looking up at the tired doctor who just sighed at me.
"Harry, let her rest for tonight. There's someone else you need to look after." Thomas said softly.
"Harry? Do you know the little girl that came in with the woman?" She asked, doing a double take noticing that Thomas was in the room. Her face suddenly taking on a softer look as she smiled slightly.
"I do, yes."
"She..." the doctor said staring at Thomas, who was smiling back and flirting. "She's been asking for you." The doctor said her voice now soft and warm. She self-consciously started twirling her hair around her finger and was rocking slowly from one foot to the other. "You should go see her..." Her voice trailed off as she was now completely ignoring me and Murphy.
"I can take you to her..." Murphy said with a smirk as we got up, the doctor and Thomas completely oblivious of our presence.
"Thanks Murphy." I said reaching out to grab my half brother, the vampire of Love, and haul him out of his chair by his shoulder.
"I should be going as well..." Thomas said smoothly to the doctor as he gracefully came to his feet and slipped my hand off his shoulder. Giving the nurse a dazzling smile and waving discretely as we left the room.
"Can't you turn that off?! We're in a hospital for crying out loud!" I whispered harshly at my brother.
"What can I say, it's not like I was trying to seduce her."
"You weren't trying to stop it either." I said in a harsher tone than was absolutely required for this situation.
"I am a bit puckish..." He complained defensively, he rolled his eyes as we followed close on Murphy's heels.
We went up two flights of stairs and then proceeded down a long hallway to a section of the hospital that appeared to be closed for the day. It appeared to be a general practice or outpatient area. At the end of the hall sat two uniformed police officers facing us and we could see the light coming from the examination room and could hear soft voices.
"I was in the closet for hours and hours. Then when the sun had come up I went to sneak out." Simone's voice was just audible. "I told Stacy and Krista what happened but they said I was making it up or trying to steal something from their closet. As if I'd want anything of theirs..." Simone said disgustedly.
"I see, that must have really hurt your feelings." Came the soft smooth voice I didn't recognize.
"It did..." Simone said with a sniffle.
Murphy raised her hand for us to stop, pointing at the officers vacant, glassy eye's. We waited listening as Murphy unlatched her side arm and Thomas pulled a large nasty looking knife from his jacket. I initially reached for my blasting rod, but being in a hospital I thought better of it and pulled out my .45, quietly cocking the hammer.
"I can help you forget about all of that and make them forget it to. It'd be like it never happened. Would you like that?" He asked in his smooth bass voice.
"I don't know... I think something terrible is happening to those girls..." Simone said in a soft, shy, worried voice.
Murphy slowly moved next to the door, careful to stay out of sight. Thomas and I followed suit, with Thomas bringing up the rear.
"Don't you worry about that. I'll make sure they're fine." He said reassuringly. "Now just close your eyes for me..."
"I... I don't know... Harry is coming for me..." She said sounding frightened and pulling away.
Murphy lithely turned and took three quick steps into the room, drawing her sidearm and pointing at the head of the large pale looking gentleman kneeling down in front of Simone. He had blond hair and light brown eyes. His face was round but lined with a hard life's worth of wrinkles. He appeared to be in his late 50's but it was hard to tell as his hair was full and without a hint of gray. I followed simply stepping into the room and then to the side, away from Murphy. I nearly bumped into Rawlings sitting in a chair peacefully, his side arm in his lap and his face had the same vacant stare as those in the hallway. Thomas brought up the rear, filling the door way as he gave the gentleman a particularly nasty look, which on a white court vampire still looks endearing somehow.
"Put your hands where I can see them and move away from the child." Murphy said in a well trained voice of authority. She stood with her knees slightly bent, her feet shoulder width apart with her hips and shoulders relaxed and in directly over her feet. She held the gun in both hands sighting down the barrel as she spoke.
"Don't look at his eyes..." I said moving just in front of Rawlings, taking a stance similar to Murphys. At this point I suspected him to be a Wizard, if he was a white council wizard or more likely a warlock had yet to be determined. Either way, especially in a hospital I didn't want to start tossing around magic. He on the other hand seemed to be more like my apprentice Molly, gifted at subtle magic's. If that were the case then he could cast a spell or enter your mind just by looking at you. That and being a Wizard there's always the chance of a Soul Gaze. Seeing into another person's memories and very soul and they see yours. it's a vivid experience that can't be forgotten. I've seen a few that still give me nightmares and every time I think about them it's as if I'm reliving the experience. They are powerful and extremely personal, so best to avoid them unless you really need to, especially in a fight.
"You're a little early. I was hoping to be gone before you got here." He said holding up his hands and turning slowly to face us. He had a confident smirk on his face as he looked us over.
"You heard the lady, step away from the girl." I said coldly, my eyes glued to his chest. Thomas just narrowed his eyes making him look dangerous.
"Now now... Let's not resort to violence. I'm actually looking out for her best interests. It's obvious this is distressing her. I was just going to take that burden off her shoulders" He said with a plastic, 'Trust Me' smile, as he spread his hands, palms up and about shoulder height.
"Take her burden and a chunk of her memories, that's one way to spin it." I said noticing him lean forward just slightly and shifting his weight to his left foot.
"Now let's not get hasty... Funny story, she just.." He started then threw his hands forward throwing a fine sand like substance into the air, it filled the air floating in two large overlapping clouds. He mumbled a couple of words I didn't understand making each particle shimmer, suddenly It smelled slightly of poppies and lavender and sparkled as it floated, hanging in the air.
Murphy, Thomas and I covered our eyes and faces as the dust came at us. I heard the 'POP' of Murphy's service revolver twice and Simone screaming as she dashed past me. I tried to get a look at what was going on while everything went blurry. Next the floor rushed up to greet my face. I didn't feel a thing, it was like I was floating in a warm place. I felt a slight burn in my eyes and lungs as my heavy eyelids fell shut.