“Dad, Nikki’s at the hospital. She’s been shot,” Clayton stammered, his face contorted in pain.
Tony sat for a minute, unable to sort through those simple words. How had that happened? She was at the shop; Laura was watching her. What they were saying, that couldn’t be right. “Are you sure it’s Nikki?” He didn’t want to believe it.
Steve nodded. “Tony, it’s Nikki. She’s been shot, and it’s not good. Laura’s in worse shape. There’s a dead girl and a dying gunman. The cops are still trying to sort everything out. But the doctors are working on Nikki now; she’ll be in surgery in a few minutes.”
Tony jumped up from the chair. “I’ve got to go. I’ve got to get to the hospital. Nikki needs me, and I need to be there with her.”
Steve shook his head. “Vic and Bart are on their way, and Freddie’s coming. Clayton’s going back to the hospital. You’re under home incarceration; you have to stay here.”
“Like hell! I’m going to the hospital!” As Tony ran to the bedroom he heard the doorbell ring. When he came back out with his shoes, Bryson Hawkins was standing in the foyer. “Bryson, goddamn it, I’m going to the hospital! Get this thing off me!” he yelled, pointing at the monitor.
“Tony, you know I can’t do that. If I do . . .”
“Look, it’s like this.” Tony put his hands on his hips. “You either take it off me, or I’m cutting it off and heading out this door. That’s the bottom line. Help me or get the hell out of my way, because regardless what anybody says, I’m going to that hospital. Now.” He set his jaw, and Bryson could tell he had every intention of cutting the monitor off his ankle. Short of shooting him, he’d be unstoppable.
“Aw, hell, I knew . . . okay, okay, I’ll take it off and I’ll take you to the hospital. Man, I’ll lose my job over this,” Bryson moaned, pulling the specialty tool for the ankle monitor’s lock out of his pocket and bending down to grasp it and take it off. “But you listen to me and listen good; you’re my responsibility. You stay with me. You give me any trouble, I’ll take you straight to the jail myself. Understand?”
“Completely,” Tony agreed, rubbing his ankle before he put his shoes on. “I won’t give you any trouble. Just get me there, please. I have to be with her.”
“Come on.” Bryson opened the front door and pointed at his car. “I’ll use the lights and siren; we’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Wilkes family?” A doctor in bloody green scrubs stood in the doorway of the waiting room, looking around.
Tony rose. “I’m her fiancé. How is she?”
“We think she’ll be fine. The bullet grazed a rib and went through her lung, then lodged in the inside of a rear rib. We got the bullet out, and she’ll most likely be okay. She’s lost a lot of blood, and we intubated her to help her breathe because her lung collapsed and the pain will be so bad she’d have problems breathing otherwise. It’s just going to take some time, and she’s not out of the woods yet, but I think she’ll make a full recovery.”
“Can I see her?” Tony reddened and filled with tears.
“She’s in recovery now, and she’ll probably be there for another hour or two. One of the nurses will come and get you when you can go back. But you’ve got time to take a nap or get something to eat if you want. I’ve got to get back, but don’t hesitate to ask if you have any questions.”
Tony extended his hand, and the doctor shook it. “Thanks for saving her, for taking care of her.”
“You’re welcome. Take a deep breath – if everything goes as it should, she’s going to be fine.”
“And Laura? How is she?” Tony was afraid of the answer.
“There’s a team still working on her. It doesn’t look too good right now, but you never know.”
“Thanks. Please ask somebody back there to keep us updated on her too.”
“Will do,” the doctor promised, waving as he hurried back into the surgical area.
After the doctor had gone, Bart and Freddie tried everything they could, but Tony wouldn’t leave the waiting room to eat, even though Vic promised to stay right there and wait in his place. Annabeth and Katie had come to sit with him too, then offered to go to Clayton and Brittany’s to stay with her and the kids and fill her in on Nikki’s condition. Tony couldn’t sit still; he stood and paced, then sat, then stood and paced again, up and down, over and over.
“Dad, you’re making the rest of us nervous,” Clayton told him, but Tony didn’t respond. His mind was churning out of control, and he was terrified, terrified of losing her, not to mention trying to figure out what had happened, mostly why she had been where she was and what she was doing there. The only person who could answer those questions was lying in a recovery room with a tube down her throat, and she wouldn’t be talking anytime soon.
When Tony noticed that Bryson sat quietly in the corner, having to be there but looking as though he felt very out of place, Tony walked across the room and sat down beside him. “Thank you for sticking your neck out and bringing me here. You didn’t have to do it, but you did anyway, and I’m grateful,” Tony told him. Bryson felt bad for him; he looked so sad and vulnerable. “And I know you’re one of the people responsible for me sitting in that jail cell, but I know that you know I didn’t do it.”
“You’re welcome, and you’re right – I know you didn’t. I just wish I knew who did so I could get the charges dropped once and for all,” Bryson told Tony. “And I’ve learned something else; I thought Fox was trying to hang you. I thought he was a piece of shit, but I’ve gotten to know him, and he’s really an okay guy. He just wants to see justice done.”
“Justice won’t be served by convicting me – I didn’t do it.” Tony sighed and closed his eyes, leaning back into the chair.
Minutes later, a nurse appeared in the waiting room doorway. “Wilkes?” Tony sat bolt upright, then practically sprinted across the room.
“Yeah, that’s me. I’m her fiancé.”
“You can come with me. She’s going to a room, but it’ll be a few minutes.” They started down the hall together. “She’s not conscious yet, but she’ll be waking up soon. The doctor wanted you to be there when she wakes up to try to keep her from pulling at the breathing tube. They all do that when they first wake up.”
They passed through the intensive care unit reception area until they reached the room in the back corner. Tony wasn’t prepared for what he saw; tubes and wires snaked everywhere, and Nikki lay in the bed, pale as death, still and quiet, looking tiny and frail, a tube down her throat and a nasal cannula strapped around her face. Dropping into the chair beside her bed, Tony took her hand and stroked it. It was cool and limp, and he kissed the blue veins on the back of it, his tears dropping onto her skin. A hand touched his shoulder. “There are documented instances of comatose patients being able to hear people talking to them, so go on, talk to her,” the nurse whispered to him. “It might help.”
Tony swallowed hard; she might hear how upset he was, and he couldn’t have that. It was important he sound positive to her. He took a minute to pull himself together, then whispered to her, “Nik, it’s me, baby. Look, we’ve only got a little over a week until Christmas, and you promised me you’d marry me on Christmas day. I don’t want to get married in a hospital room, and I need help with planning it all. So you’ve got to get better, you hear me?” He waited, but there was no response, no indication she’d heard him, and his heart sank. She was still motionless and silent.
“Dad?” Tony turned to see Clayton standing in the doorway of the cubicle. “I have to go home to Brittany and the kids, but they told me I could come back for a few seconds. Is she okay?” He came to stand beside Tony and placed his hand gently on his dad’s shoulder.
“They say she will be, son. They told me to talk to her in case she could hear me. Say something to her before you leave.”
Clayton very gingerly approached the hospital bed. He leaned over and kissed Nikki’s forehead, then leaned down to her ear. “I love you, Mom. You ha
ve to get better, especially for Dad – he’s lost without you. I’ll see you soon.” He turned, hugged Tony, and his face clouded up.
“It’ll be okay. She won’t leave us this soon. We need her too much.” Tony patted his son’s back, and Clayton spun and grabbed his dad, hugging him tight. “Go home to your wife and kids,” Tony told him, hugging him back. “I’ll call if there’s any change.”
Clayton was too overcome with emotion to speak, so he hugged Tony again and left. Sitting alone with Nikki in the tiny room, Tony thought about all of the fun he and Nikki had during the summer and fall, and all the long, sweet nights they’d spent together, whispering and laughing, making love until they were so spent they could barely move, then falling asleep in each other’s arms. And that night in Gatlinburg – thinking about it made him smile. That couldn’t end; it just couldn’t. He’d waited so long to find her. A hand on his shoulder brought him back to the present, and he turned to see Vic standing behind him.
The big guy looked pale and frightened. “God, that personality of hers makes her seem larger than life, but she looks so little in that bed,” Vic whispered, sniffing hard.
“I know, bud. I’m scared,” Tony admitted, his voice shaky. He would never dare say that to anyone but Vic.
“Don’t mind telling you, I am too.” Vic squeezed Tony’s shoulder. “Hey, Laura’s here somewhere. Do you know what’s going on with her?”
“I have no idea. There was no one in the waiting room for her. Might want to check that out.”
“Think I will.” Vic turned to the door. “I’ll be back in a bit.”
Tony rested his forehead on the rail on Nikki’s bed. If she didn’t make it, what would he do? He felt something on his head and looked up.
Nikki’s hand rested in his hair, and he took it in his hands and kissed it. Her eyes fluttered, then stayed partially open.
“She’s awake!” he yelled to anyone who could hear him. “She’s waking up!” He pressed the call button on the bed and a nurse came rushing in. “Look! Her eyes are open!” he burst out, too excited to contain his joy just from seeing the tiny slits between her lids.
“Well, good for her! Hey, honey, know where you are?” the nurse asked Nikki.
Nikki tried to think, but her brain was fuzzy. She remembered the dead girl and the guy with the gun. And where was she? Then she blinked and focused, and all she could see was Tony’s face. She felt like she was choking, but she kept looking at him, trying to make sure he was real.
“Hey, baby! It’s me! How do you feel? Clayton was here. Vic’s here, and Bart and Freddie are down in the waiting room. Steve and José are helping the police, and then they’ll be here too. Peyton came in with you, and I’m pretty sure he’s been here the whole time.” She made a face, and he added, “I don’t know where Laura is; she’s here somewhere. Vic went to check.”
“Can you tell me anything about her condition?”
“Are you a relative?” the large nurse asked Vic.
“No. Just a friend.”
“Then no, I can’t tell you anything.”
“Where are her people?” Vic asked.
“What people? No one’s been here for her,” the nurse told him as she bent to monitor some drains. No one’s been here?, Vic thought. Before he could ask anything else, the nurse asked, “So how well do you know her?”
Vic thought for a minute, then chuckled, “About as well as anybody, I suppose.” No one really knew Laura. He wasn’t even sure how much Steve knew about her.
The nurse didn’t catch his sarcasm; she thought he was being serious. “So how ’bout those scars? Horrible, huh?” she asked.
Vic decided to play along; maybe he’d learn something about Laura. “You mean the ones on her arms?” he asked, making something up.
“No – the ones all over her chest. They’re horrible, aren’t they?” The nurse shuddered. “Wonder how that happened.”
“I believe she said it was a car accident,” Vic bluffed, trying to bait the nurse into saying something else.
“Wow. I’ve never seen accident scars like those. They’re crazy.” She shook her head and made a face. “Call us if she wakes up while you’re here,” the nurse added, leaving the room.
Vic looked at the pretty brunette lying so still in the hospital bed. Scars all over her chest? He wondered why she never talked about what had happened. How bad could they be? Hopefully she would be okay so he could ask her someday. Maybe that was why she was such a loner; something horrible had happened to her, and she wouldn’t open up.
If Laura were awake, she’d jerk her hand away, but she was unconscious, so Vic could hold it and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. He took it in his, and marveled at its warmth and softness. It was tiny compared to the hugeness of his hand, and he held it for at least ten minutes, hoping she’d wake up. When she didn’t, he stood, leaned over her, and kissed her on the forehead before he left. “Bye, sleeping beauty,” he whispered to her. “I’ll be back later.”
“When will you be taking the tube out?” Bryson asked the nurse.
“Probably in a couple of days if she does well,” she replied.
“I really want to ask her some questions, but she can’t answer.” He stopped and looked down into Nikki’s face. “Nikki, be thinking what you’d like to tell me. I know you saw everything. And I know you were the one who shot the shooter. You were really brave, and you’re lucky to be alive. You saved yourself, and you probably saved Laura’s life too.”
Nikki’s eyes went wide, and she sounded like she was choking, even with the tube in. “Calm down, baby; you’ve got to stay still so you’ll heal,” she heard Tony say. But instead of calming, Nikki looked like she was in a panic. She made a gesture Tony couldn’t understand; she pinched together the first two fingers and the thumb of her right hand and pounded them into the palm of her left, rubbing them back and forth.
“We don’t understand, Nikki,” Bryson said.
“Honey, calm down. We don’t understand. You’ll be able to talk in a couple of days,” Tony kept telling her. But Nikki got more agitated and kept making the gesture. “Please, baby! We don’t know what that means.” Tony turned to Steve and Peyton, who were standing in the doorway. “Did you guys find anything in her things? Or anything missing?”
Steve shook his head. “No, nothing. All she had were her keys. She’d left her purse in the Yukon.”
Nikki kept frantically making the gesture, and they all looked at each other, bewildered. Clayton walked up to the doorway and asked, “What’s going on? Why’s she so worked up?”
Tony pointed at her gestures. “She’s doing this and we don’t know what it means.”
Clayton took one glance, shot them a look, and said, “Seriously, guys?” They shook their heads. “Oh, good god, that’s easy.” He left the doorway, then returned in less than a minute with a note pad and a pencil. “She’s trying to tell you she has something to write down. Here, Mom.” He put the pencil in her right hand and the notepad in her left. “Write away.”
Nikki grew visibly calmer, then held the notepad up and tried to make the pencil work. The pain in her chest made it hard to move her left arm, but she was determined. After a couple of false starts, she scribbled something and waved the pad toward Tony. When he took it and looked at it, cryptically scrawled on the pad was one word: GUM.
“What is it?” Steve asked.
“It says ‘GUM,’” Tony said, puzzled.
“Hey, she whispered that to me at the scene before she lost consciousness!” Peyton told the group. “I have no idea what it means though.”
Nikki waved a hand, and Tony handed the pad back to her. She tried to focus her eyes again and scribbled something else, then handed it back.
“TABLE,” Tony read. “I don’t get it, honey. I’m sorry.” Nikki grew agitated again and motioned for the pad, so Tony handed it back. She started scribbling again, then waved it at him. “FLASH.” He stared at the pad, trying to make some se
nse of it. “‘GUM, TABLE, FLASH.’” He shook his head. “Baby, it’s just going to have to wait until you can talk. It’ll only be a couple of days.”
At that, Nikki got really worked up and started pulling at the tube; Tony jumped up and grabbed her hands and tried to hold them, and Clayton darted to the nurses’ station to get someone to come and sedate her so she’d be still and quiet.
Suddenly, Bryson yelled, “Wait! I get it!” Nikki fell perfectly still, and Tony noticed there were tears running from the corners of her eyes. Bryson stood and walked to the bed so he could look down into her face. “Nikki, look at me. Gum, table, flash. When you say flash, do you mean a flash drive?” Nikki nodded vigorously. “There were tables at the scene. Was there gum under one of the tables?” Nikki was nodding even more vigorously.
Everyone looked lost except Bryson. Then he turned and looked at Steve. “McCoy, I need you to come with me. We’re going back to the scene.” Bryson looked back down into Nikki’s face, and he saw relief wash across it. “We’re going to find it, you hear me, hon? It’s going to be okay.” He looked at everyone else. “That girl gave her a flash drive, and she stuck it in some gum under a table to keep it safe. Our job now is to find it.”
“See anything?” Bryson asked Steve as they looked around the scene.
“No, looks like the techs picked it clean.” Steve looked at the underside of every table as they went along. Bryson was looking too.
“Where exactly were they?” Bryson asked Steve.
“Back here,” Steve told him from behind the old counter. “Wait!” He pushed a table over and pointed, and Bryson walked over to look. In a wad of gum on the underside of the table was a perfect impression of a small, rectangular object. “It was stuck here. But it’s not here now. Think the techs found it?”
“Not a chance or we would’ve heard. It’s here somewhere . . .” Bryson said, dropping to his knees.