Monahan 02 Artificial Intentions (40 page)

“Michael. How’s Michael?” I asked and begged him with my eyes to tell me the truth.

Kelly paused and I could see him taking a deep breath. “He’s going to be okay.” He seemed relieved to tell me and I was relieved too. “He was shot in the upper thigh, and was bleeding from an artery but the medics got to him in time.”

Michael was badly injured but at least he was alive. I got little comfort from that - if not for me, he wouldn’t have been shot. Guilt tore inside me and made my body ache even more.

“He told me what happened,” Kelly said. “How you disarmed that guy and took off after him.” Kelly grinned a little. “You did good, Ma’am.”

Personally I didn’t think so, considering where I was at the moment. I tried to give him a wee smile back but it hurt too much. I couldn’t believe that even my face was aching.

“Did anyone catch the guy?”

Kelly shook his head. “No. Some witnesses at the scene said he took off running down one of the side streets. He never stopped, never looked back. Did you get a good look at him?”

“Yeah. I won’t forget his face for a long time.”

“Was he someone you know?”

“No. Never seen him before.”

There was some activity behind Kelly and a nurse stepped around and stood beside him.

“Sir, we’re moving her to a room so we’ll have to ask you to step outside for a bit.”

I looked around me for the first time. The paraphernalia around me belonged to an emergency department in a hospital. I was lying on a narrow stretcher, there was an IV in my left hand, and the small area was enclosed with curtains, giving me a modicum of privacy. I tuned in to the surrounding noises and could hear voices, moans, and the public address system.

“When you’re settled in,” Kelly told me, “the police need to get your statement.” He backed away and disappeared through the curtains.

“Do I really need to stay in the hospital?” I asked the nurse.

“You sure do, dear. We need to keep an eye on you. You’ve got a nasty concussion. You’ll be here at least twenty-four hours.” While she was talking she covered me with a warm blanket which felt divine and made me realize how cold I was feeling. She fussed around the gurney, efficiently raising up the sides, hooking the IV bag to a pole on the end of the stretcher, and releasing the brakes with a clang. She threw back the curtain and pushed me through the emergency ward, out into a hallway and onto an elevator. Whatever was in the IV bag was working its magic, because I was asleep as soon as they helped me into a real bed.

It was dark outside when I woke up, disoriented and having to pee badly. Gingerly lifting my head from the pillow, I peered around the room. Frank Sanchez was sitting in a chair at the foot of the bed and Jay was in a chair beside me. Pain shot through my neck to the top of my head so I lowered it back on the pillow, and lifted my hand in a small wave.

“Hey,” I croaked out. Jay took my hand and gave it a little squeeze.

“Hey yourself,” he said. “How’re you doing?”

“Gotta pee. Badly.”

“Let me get the nurse,” he offered, and then he was gone.

Twenty minutes later I was feeling a little more human. A visit to the bathroom, teeth brushed and two very large pain pills helped. Which was good because the nurse told me there was a crowd of people waiting to see me.

My headache came back in style as soon as I saw that Detective Shipley was the first one through the door. Another detective who I had met at the meeting with the Chief trailed behind her. I couldn’t remember his name.

“Good evening Ms. Monahan.”

“Hi, Detectives.”

“We’re sorry to hear about your injuries,” Shipley intoned disingenuously.

Sure
, I thought.

She didn’t look at me as she dug around in her bag and I wondered if she’d been forced to come here. They asked me some questions about my attacker. Did I recognize him? No. Would I recognize him if saw him again? Definitely yes. Describe him. White, about five foot eight, in his late twenties or early thirties, dark brown hair, nervous type.

How did I get the gun away from him? My description caused Shipley to snort in disbelief, so I looked at her partner who just rolled his eyes. They finished up after that and left me in peace for about eight seconds.

Jay and Frank came back through the door, followed by Kelly and one of the bodyguards whose name escaped me. Hopefully all this name forgetting wasn’t a side effect of the concussion. One of the nurses was on the heels of the bodyguard, tsking and harumphing in stereotypical fashion.

“Gentlemen, it’s past visiting hours. Our girl needs her rest. I’ll give you a few minutes,” she told them, and then took me by the shoulders, sat me up, fluffed my pillows and gently helped me lay back down again. She glared at all of them and said, “Ten minutes.” Then she efficiently tucked me in so tight I wasn’t sure I could get out of bed if I had to.

Frank told me he was sorry for what happened but that he was proud of me for how I handled the situation. Kelly told me that he was sorry for what happened and that Jason, the bodyguard whose name I remembered as soon as Kelly said it, would be sitting outside my door, guarding me. Jason nodded in my direction and then they left. Jay pulled up a chair beside my bed, sat down and took my hand in both of his.

“When did you get back in the City?” I asked him.

“Around four o’clock. After we talked this morning, I decided to catch the first flight I could. When I landed and called you at the office, Carrie told me what happened. I came straight to the hospital.”

I turned my head on the pillow and looked at him. His face had aged ten years. His hair stood straight up because of his nervous habit of running his hands through it. His eyes locked with mine and I felt more guilt because he was suffering. Because of me.

“What are we going to do Kate?” he asked me quietly.

I was suddenly very pissed. Not at Jay. At whoever was behind all of this. Pissed that some madman, or madwoman, had thoroughly taken over our lives. Feelings of rage boiled inside me, causing my head to ache and my broken ribs to throb.

“We’re going to find this fucker and kick his ass, royally.” I said it like I meant it.

Jay smiled. “Good plan.”

chapter fifty-seven

It was likely the drugs they gave me. I was loopy, in and out of wakefulness, with restless legs and dreams that wouldn’t stop. The nurses woke me regularly to do those things they go to nursing school for. At least they kept the lights low in my room. My whole body ached and every few seconds I would get stabbing, shooting pains in a different part of my body. I could hear moaning and realized it was me. At one point in the middle of the longest night of my life, as the nurse was mindlessly taking my blood pressure with a cuff that squeezed the life out of my arm, I remember wryly thinking to myself, so this is what it feels like to get hit by a Mack truck.

Around four a.m. I woke with a start. All of my limbs had jerked me awake. I felt claustrophobic and wanted to be free of the sheets and blanket that I had been tucked into. Try as I might I couldn’t lift either of my hands to move the bed sheets and although I signaled my feet with my brain to kick off the covers my body wouldn’t react. When I realized that I couldn’t move my head, I started to panic. Bright light was shone in each of my eyes, blinding me momentarily. My voice was useless because I couldn’t open my mouth to make a sound. My body was totally paralyzed.

What was the matter with me? Were my injuries worse than the doctors thought? Did I damage my spine? Did I have a stroke? All of these thoughts screamed inside my head. Who was there? Why weren’t they talking to me? Had I gone deaf too?

The bedcovers were removed and my brain was working well enough for me to realize that I could still
feel
- I just couldn’t move. What the fuck was going on? Somebody!

I felt hands under my legs and two hands on my shoulders and those hands lifted me and put me on a stretcher. Thank God, I thought. Somebody realizes something is wrong.
Somebody say something
my mind pleaded. We were rolling out of my hospital room and into an elevator. My eyes darted back and forth but all I could see was the ceiling and walls of the hospital hallway, and then the ceiling of the elevator. Whoever was wheeling me away was not within my vision. After the elevator ride we went down a long, dark, tunnel-like hallway. The dim lights were spaced far apart in the ceiling which was bare cement. And then the end of my stretcher was banged hard against a door, which opened to the outside.

Where was I going
? We were outside the hospital now. Something was really wrong and it just wasn’t the fact that my body was paralyzed. The stretcher started moving faster and whoever was pushing it must have started to run. Just as quickly we stopped, and for the first time I heard some mumbled voices. Vehicle doors were opened and the stretcher was lifted up and wheeled inside the back of a truck. Doors were slammed, the engine turned over and we started moving. Tears were pouring out of my eyes now and draining into my ears.

My ears were wet from my tears. Unbelievable. What the fuck was going on and why was I worried about wet ears?

Lights were turned on in the back of the truck and my eyes darted left and right and I realized that I must be inside an ambulance. On both walls small cubbyholes were jammed with medical supplies, blood pressure cups and bags of intravenous fluids. A stethoscope hung from a nearby hook.

Something was tightened around my knees and then my chest. They now had me strapped to the stretcher. Who were
they
? What were they doing? I felt so helpless.

My bowels loosened and my mouth went dry when a face finally came into my vision.

The face belonged to the big cry baby Belinda Moffat.

Why was she here? She had a stethoscope plugged into her ears and she was listening to my heart which thankfully was still beating.

Why
,
why
,
why
my brain screamed? What is happening? Belinda smiled at me and my eyes pleaded with her.
Why
are you doing this
? She just continued to smile.

When she was done listening to my heart, she fitted me with a blood pressure cuff and took my blood pressure. While she worked, she had the same stupid smile plastered on her fat, ugly face. She didn’t speak. My brain tried to compute her presence and to figure out what part she was playing in this evil game. But overriding my internal computer was a voice in my head screaming a constant stream of
why
,
why
,
why
.

The ambulance continued in motion and eventually went down a steep slope, a sensation I could feel because I felt my body shift on the stretcher. A few moments later we stopped and I heard the engine turn off. My stomach roiled. Belinda and another person - who I couldn’t see or hear - unstrapped me from the gurney and I was lifted up and carried out of the ambulance. Belinda had me under the arms and my body shifted up as I was carried down the steps of the ambulance. I could see the back of a man between my feet, holding me by my legs which he had tight against his body. Still unable to move any part of my body except my eyes, I frantically looked around, taking in my surroundings, looking for something recognizable.

And then at last, I heard a voice.

“Over here. Easy. Easy.”

I was being lowered down.

“Thank God she’s small,” the voice said.

Why? Why is it good that I’m small?

I could see Belinda’s face above me as she lowered me to the ground. She gently tucked my arms close to my body and turned me on my side. Less than two inches away from my face I could see black, satiny fabric.

What is it?

Oh my God. Is it a coffin?

I needed to scream. Screaming will make me feel better.

Pain came back swiftly in my midsection as my legs were bent and my knees jammed into my chest. They were bending me like a pretzel and mother of God, the stabbing pain in my ribs left me breathless.

And then everything went black.

Something had been put over me and everything was dark, and black, and smelled like men’s aftershave. I could hear a vehicle start up and the sound of it was gone in a few moments. The voices hadn’t spoken again and my ears were desperate for human voices. Even Belinda’s, the fucking gargoyle. Why was she doing this to me?

I heard a long, ripping noise, and couldn’t calm my brain down enough to determine what it was. And then I was lifted again and the container I was in was rolling.

I was in a suitcase. The ripping noise was a zipper. A fucking suitcase. Now I was sure I must be dreaming. Why in God’s name would I be in a suitcase?

I needed to get out of here.

Started to panic.

Just fucking lovely, I thought. I’m going to end up claustrophobic after all this. You stupid bitch, Kate, focus, focus.

And then I felt my hand move. Ever so slightly.

And then my big toe on my right foot started to move. Maybe my paralysis wasn’t permanent. I tried pushing on the side of the suitcase with my hand, but it was useless. My toe had stopped moving but I could feel sensation in it. I pushed down with the toe but nothing happened. I probably had the sum total strength of a two-hour old baby.

The suitcase with its Kate Monahan load stopped rolling and after a few seconds I heard a distinct
ping
and then we started rising. In an elevator. Another
ping
, then more rolling for a few feet, stopping, and then rolling to a final stop, where I was laid back down on the floor. Muffled voices came to me from a distance.

My body parts were not responding the way I wanted them to but my knees were starting to ache from being jammed into my chest. I tried moving my fingers and was thrilled when I realized I could make fists. The paralysis was leaving my body. My jaw was working and I was able to open my mouth. I couldn’t really tell though what else was working and what wasn’t because being packed into the suitcase didn’t leave much room for movement. There might have been room for a small, travel size shampoo but nothing else.