Kiss Me Awake (29 page)

“What’s going on? What happened?” Auggie’s questions were muffled by the commotion. He stood there in the hub of the fray looking bewildered. But what answer could she give him when she was confused herself?

Kevin ran, and Carl chased after him.

Jaida sensed someone beside her and glanced up.
Carina
. Carina knelt down in the dirt. There was humility in the penitent pose, but it went no deeper than her hunched form.

“I swear, this was all Kevin’s doing, you have to believe me,” she said.

Jaida kept her eyes fixed on Spencer. She couldn’t look at the woman, couldn’t bear the sight of her. They had set her up. She could see it clearly now, understood what was behind the push for a relationship with Kevin and his offer to assist her with her finances. It was always about the money.

“I came for you. I could have left you, but I came to take you to the hospital.” She grabbed Jaida’s arm and clung. “You’ll tell them that won’t you? You have to tell them.”

Mercy, absolution, a get-out-of-jail-free card, Carina wanted it all, including Gale’s eight and a half million dollars.

“You came after me because you thought I had the money. Just leave.” Spencer was her concern, not Carina’s guilt or innocence.

A policeman approached, his uniform thick with dust. He asked about Spencer then yelled for a paramedic. From a distance she saw Carl point at Carina, and within seconds handcuffs clicked shut around her wrists.

Carina shrieked. “I am a prosecutor!”

“Then you should already know your rights, ma’am, but I’ll give them to you anyway.” Carina dug her feet in, but the policeman dragged her. Soon she would be sitting in the back of a police car. “You have the right to remain silent…”

“Tell him, Jaida. Tell him I tried to help you,” Carina yelled over her shoulder.

“Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

Paramedics swooped in and surrounded Spencer. Skilled hands worked quickly to plug the holes in his chest. Though barely responsive, they asked him a question, checked his pulse, and slid an oxygen mask over his head. Everything around her instantly fell away. All that mattered was right here in front of her. She couldn’t lose it. Not now.

Someone tugged at her arm. “Leave me alone.”

“Let the paramedics do their job, chica. It’ll be okay. You’ll see.”

She stood, dodging Auggie’s awaiting arms. She didn’t want to hear his promises or be comforted until she relaxed into a false sense of wellbeing. He wasn’t God. He couldn’t guarantee her anything. 

She touched the arm of a policeman, and he turned. “Who called you? How did you know what was happening?” There were no houses near enough to witness the violence and call for help. 

He held up a cell phone. “This has a panic button that accesses emergency assistance. Someone pressed it, and it alerted the authorities to the situation. It was also kept live, so everything that was happening was heard. We found it on the injured man.”

Spencer’s actions had saved everyone, but him. If only they had arrived before he was shot. She watched as they strapped him to the stretcher and lifted him up. Their steps swift and sure, they carried him toward the waiting ambulance.

“Wait!” Jaida ran after them. When she caught up, she kept pace alongside the stretcher.
I won’t leave you, Spencer. Not this time.

She followed them up the embankment where they secured him in the ambulance. The doors slammed shut. “Can’t I ride with him?” she asked.

“Too serious. Follow in another vehicle.” The driver rattled off the hospital as he climbed in, the sirens already blaring.

Spencer shouldn’t have come. This should not have happened. Not to him. She felt Auggie come up beside her. “How did he get in the middle of this?” she asked.

“I’m not sure myself,” he said. “But no matter what happens, you need to know that this is what he wanted.”

“He wanted to die?” She wrapped herself in her arms, holding in the pain.

He looked at her as if she were slow on the uptake. “For you? Yes.”

She closed her eyes, the earlier pain that pummeled her skull had returned. Or maybe she’d slowed down enough to feel it. He shouldn’t want to die for her. Shouldn’t have to.

The officer she spoke with earlier approached, peppering her with questions for his report. The area had thinned out with only a few stragglers working around the crime scene. Carl was with them.

“I can’t do this now,” she said. “I need to go. I have to be with my husband.”
Husband.
It had been too long since she’d referred to Spencer as her husband. She turned to Auggie. “Will you take me to the hospital?”

En route to his vehicle parked thirty yards ahead, Auggie said, “Now is not the best time to tell you this, but under the circumstances it’s wrong to keep it from you.”

Jaida shook her head. Whatever he had to say, she didn’t want to hear it. No more grim news. No more Jerry Springer-like surprises. “Not now,” she said. “Just take me to Spencer.”

The hospital waiting room was full, the cloying air tinged with the smell of sweat and fear. The room reached legal capacity an hour ago, but family and friends waiting to learn the fate of their loved ones continued to trickle in. Must have been an accident.

Jaida sat slumped in a vinyl chair, her eyes fixed on the clock above the door. The hands had channeled around twice since she arrived and still no word on Spencer’s condition.

He’d been rushed to the operating room on arrival, but the nurse she spoke with offered little more than vague replies to her concerns.

“Has he lost too much blood?” 

“Probably.”

“Is he strong enough to be operated on?”

“We’ll find out.”

“Will he live?”

“No one can say.”

What
did
they know? And what was taking so long? Auggie remained beside her, a sentry standing watch, his back pressed to the wall.

She pushed herself upright in the chair, stretching the stiffness from her spine. “You don’t have to stay. I’ll be all right.”

He stuffed his hands in his pockets. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.”

Jaida slumped back down. She shouldn’t have left that hotel room. She studied the clasped hands resting in her lap. Dried the shade of Indian clay, Spencer’s blood lined the tips of her fingernails. She’d scrubbed them at the bathroom sink until they were nearly raw, but her guilt still marked her. 

If she hadn’t ventured out on her own, none of them would be here right now. She turned her hands over and gently pressed a finger against the gash from the can. Raw and bruised, it ran
the length of her palm, but the blood had congealed.

“You should have that looked at,” Auggie said.

She shook her head. “Not now.” When she told him about the blow she’d taken to the head he insisted she be examined. She’d already had her head probed, tests done, and a CT scan. She wasn’t up for anymore examinations.

Jaida closed her fingers over her palm, hiding the laceration in the center of her fist. Besides, what did it matter if her hand rotted to the bone and fell off? There were holes in Spencer’s chest, and he was dying.

Fear seized her at the thought of losing him. She squeezed her eyes shut.
Please, God, don’t let him die.

Auggie touched her shoulder. “Go ahead and cry. You’ll feel better if you let it out.”

She shook her head. “He’s been in there a long time.” How much longer could it take? 

Across from her a young woman’s eyes welled with tears before she broke down and wept. The man with her wrapped his arm around her and led her out into the hall.

The only reprieve from the somber atmosphere was the random bursts of childish laughter from the two toddlers playing in the corner. The sullen mood was broken long enough to breathe in hope, but that hope evaporated before she exhaled. 

She dropped her head back against the wall, and rested her eyes. She should pray, but she was at a loss. How many more times and ways could she beg God to let Spencer survive?

“You’re dirty.”

Jaida opened her eyes. Standing in front of her was a child, her round face scrunched up, her green eyes narrowed.

“I guess I am,” she said then sat up and smoothed her rumpled shirt.

A rail-thin woman with fine pale curls swept the little girl away, apology in her face. “I’m so sorry.”

If it didn’t hurt so much right now she would laugh. “Whatever smart remark you have lurking around in your brain, I don’t want to hear it.”

When Auggie didn’t respond, she rolled her head to the side and looked up at him. No humor curled the corners of his lips as she anticipated. 

“Why don’t you go wash up?” he said. “There’s a bathroom down that hall.” He jerked his thumb toward the door and to the right.

What if the doctor came while she was gone? She couldn’t leave. Not yet.

“I’ll come and get you if I hear anything before you’re back.” He must have sensed her concern. He nudged her shoulder, and she pushed herself to her feet.

The bathroom was a single occupancy. Jaida shut the door and locked herself inside then leaned her palms on the cool porcelain sink. When would this nightmare end? And how would it end?

She lifted her face to the mirror. Pale and drawn, dirt smudged her left cheekbone, her forehead, and her chin. She twisted her hair into a loose knot at the back of her head then ran the water until it went from cold to warm. She tested it then plunged her hands in the stream. She splashed it on her face and watched the dirt swirl down the drain. The little girl was right.

Drops of water clung to her eyelashes and dripped from her chin. She tore off the paper from the bottom of the towel holder and pressed it to her face. She was as clean as she was going to get with liquid soap and paper towels.

She dropped the wet paper in the trashcan then shook her hair free, running her fingers through the tangles. It was a modest improvement, but an improvement nonetheless.

Jaida turned out the light, and when she stepped from the bathroom, she saw Auggie speaking with a doctor across the hall. The man was in his scrubs. Her throat suddenly felt too thick to swallow. Good news or bad? She tried to gauge his expression, but it was unreadable.

She hesitated before joining them. Auggie saw her and reached for her arm. “Jaida, this is Dr. Bowman, the surgeon who operated on Spencer.” He turned back to the doctor. “This is Spencer’s wife.”

She dipped her head to acknowledge the man then asked, “How is he?”

His mouth worked as if he didn’t know what to say, or perhaps how to say it; how to deliver the awful news. Didn’t they usually do this in a private room?

I can’t do this. I can’t bear to hear him tell me what I already know.
Sensing her need to flee, Auggie set a staying hand on her arm.

Dr. Bowman
shook his head. “I’m at a loss here.”

Jaida pressed her eyes closed.
Just hurry up and say what you have to say.
 

“His survival is nothing short of a miracle. I’ve been a surgeon for over twenty-eight years, and I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Her eyes flew open.
“What?”

“By no means is your husband entirely out of the woods, Mrs. Gordon, but he is doing very well.”

“He’s alive?” She didn’t mean to sound so skeptical, or shocked, but he’d sounded so dire and she’d been so sure.

He nodded his head as if he still couldn’t quite believe it himself. “Yes, he is. And he’s been asking for you.”

“Where is he?” She had to see him, had to touch him to believe it was true.

Dr. Bowman walked her to a room at the end of the hall in the critical care unit and pulled the curtain back, the metal rings scraping across the rod.

“Oh my…” Jaida gasped, unprepared for what she saw. So still, he lay there like a corpse groomed for the casket, prepared for the grave.

She hesitated then touched his face, felt his breath on the back of her hand. He was sleeping now. His skin was colorless, nearly translucent, his face and bared arms blending into the bleach-white linens he dozed on.

The doctor said he was doing well. He didn’t look well. She turned to question him, to reassure herself, but he was gone.
Don’t leave me here alone.
She stood staring into the empty hall. She couldn’t do this by herself.

She gripped her hands at her waist and turned back, her throat thickening at the sight of him. “I wasn’t worth this, Spencer.”

Oxygen was piped in through the tubes in his nostrils, his breathing light and raspy. The doctor said he would be in and out of consciousness, but the potent painkillers transported through his veins kept him so deathly still it frightened her.

Jaida slid a chair next to the bed and sat down. The pinging of the monitor stole her attention.  She watched the numbers flicker and change—Spencer’s pulse, his oxygen, the weak, but steady rhythm of his heart. It was beating, and that was good.