An hour later, Sam was ready to visit Gigi in the hospital. She went downstairs, put on her coat and headed out the door like it was any other day. However, the Secret Service agents standing on the ramp, wearing black from head to toe and toting machine guns, were a stark reminder that this day was like no other.
“Gentlemen,” she said to agents she didn’t recognize. “If you’ll let me pass, I’ll get out of your way.”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible, ma’am.”
“Why not?”
“You’re not to leave here without a detail, ma’am.”
“And where did that order come from?”
“The top, ma’am. The very top.”
Meaning Nick. Huh. That was surprising—and a little disappointing.
“I’d be happy to arrange transportation for you anywhere you wish to go, ma’am.”
Sam realized she had two choices. The first would be to make a scene with the agents, who, as fellow law enforcement officers, were merely following orders. The second would be to allow them to do what they did and take it up with Nick later. She chose option B.
“Give us ten minutes, ma’am.”
Sam went back in the house, stuffing the annoyance deep inside so no one would see how upset she was. Nick didn’t need to hear through any grapevine that she was pissed. Not today, anyway. But they’d be discussing her desire to move freely as soon as possible.
Twelve minutes after the agent had asked for ten, Sam was about to go back outside when the door opened to Vernon and Jimmy. The two agents had recently been assigned to her after Nick’s announcement that he didn’t plan to run in the next election had led to an uptick in threats against him and their entire family.
“Gentlemen.” Vernon was an older Black man with graying hair, his partner a baby-faced blond with an eagerness about him that annoyed her. “I’d rather hoped I’d seen the last of you.”
“Likewise, ma’am,” Vernon said with the cheeky sarcasm that had endeared him to her. She respected the hell out of anyone who could meet sarcasm with sarcasm. “Sadly for all of us, our time together is just beginning.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“Indeed we will, ma’am. I understand you wish to go to the George Washington University Hospital?”
“I do. One of my detectives is a patient.”
“We’d be pleased to get you there and back as safely as possible,” Vernon said, signaling to Jimmy to do something.
Sam wasn’t sure what the signal meant, but Jimmy clearly understood it.
“Right this way, ma’am.” Jimmy smiled widely, as if this was the greatest day of his young life. It probably was. He was protecting the nation’s first lady. He’d probably dine out on that for the rest of his days.
Sam got into the back of one of the black SUVs and put on her seat belt, determined to go with the flow and not to do anything to cause Nick any more grief than he was already contending with. If she raised hell with the agents, that would cause trouble for him that he didn’t need. So she kept her mouth shut and did what she was told.
For once.
If there was one advantage to the Secret Service, it was that people got the fuck out of their way, which meant they arrived at their destination that much quicker. As someone who rarely had time to waste, there was something to be said for that kind of efficiency.
Jimmy opened the back door for her, and the two agents followed Sam into the hospital.
The young woman working the reception desk did a double take when she recognized Sam. “Mrs. Cappuano… Ma’am. It’s such a pleasure to meet you.”
“Thank you. I’m here to see a friend. Giselle Dominguez. Can you please tell me what room she’s in?”
“Of course.”
While Sam watched, the woman typed in Gigi’s name, and if her eyes weren’t deceiving her, the woman’s hands trembled as she did so. For fuck’s sake. It would never be “normal” to Sam to provoke that kind of reaction in people.
“She’s in room 520. Take the elevators on your left to the fifth floor, and check in at the nurses’ station.”
“Thank you very much.”
“If I may…”
Sam, who’d started toward the elevators, stopped and turned back.
“I’m sorry about what happened to President Nelson, but I’m very excited that your husband is president and that you’re our new first lady.”
“Thank you. I’ll be sure to pass that along to Nick.”
The woman nearly fainted when Sam said that. She quickly headed toward the elevators, aware of Vernon and Jimmy following her.
“Ma’am,” Vernon said. “Let me go ahead.”
Sam forced herself to stop and allow the agents to arrange things to their liking before she followed Vernon onto the elevator, gritting her teeth and biting her tongue the whole time. On the fifth floor, she inquired about Gigi and showed her badge.
“We know who you are.” The nurse had short gray hair and wore glasses with gold frames. “Everyone knows who you are.”
Her words had an edge to them that put Sam on guard. “That doesn’t mean I can’t be polite and say please when I ask if I can see my detective.”
“She won’t be your detective for long.”
Sam told herself she shouldn’t engage, but damned if she could resist. “Why’s that?”
“You aren’t going to keep your job as first lady.” She paused, took a closer look at Sam and probably saw bullish determination. “Are you?”
“That’s the plan. If you don’t mind, I need to see Detective Dominguez.”
“Down the hall on the right.”
Sam walked away, but could feel everyone looking at her as she headed toward Gigi’s room, escorted by Vernon and Jimmy. Sometimes she wished people could just mind their own damned business, but she knew that was too much to ask, especially today when the world had woken to the news of a transfer of power in Washington. If she allowed herself to think about the implications of that seismic shift…
Nope. Not going there. Denial was her friend.
Outside of room 520, she glanced at Vernon. “You need to wait for me out here.”
“One of us needs to check the room before you go in.”
“That’s not going to happen.” The last thing Gigi needed was strange men in her room. “I’ll be fine. Please wait for me here.” Without giving them time to respond, Sam entered the darkened room, where Carlucci was standing guard over her partner’s bed. Dani, who was tall, blonde and curvy, came over to Sam.
Sam hugged her. “I got here as soon as I could.”
“You must be losing it. Both of you.”
Sam waved her hand to send the message that she didn’t want to talk about what was happening in her life. She wanted to talk about what was happening to Gigi. “How is she?”
“She had a rough night. She’s in a lot of pain. The son of a bitch ruptured her spleen. She had surgery overnight.”
“Jesus. Any sign of him?”
“Not yet. I want to be out there looking for him myself, but I don’t want to leave her, especially with him in the wind.”
“We can put people here to screen any visitors.”
“It’s okay. I’m in touch with Patrol and doing what I can from here. She doesn’t want her family to know she’s here, so I said I’d stay. I took leave.”
Sam finally ventured a glance at Gigi and bit back a gasp at the sight of her bruised and bloody face. The petite, dark-haired woman looked extra tiny in the hospital bed. “Son of a bitch.”
“I want to fucking murder him.”
“Don’t do that.”
“I won’t, but I want to.”
“Right there with you. What do we know about him?”
“Ezra Smith. Gigi went to high school with him in Fairfax. They’ve been on again-off again for years, and when she tried to finally end it with him for good, he didn’t take it well. That’s what I told you about last week. They’d had a big verbal altercation that’d nearly gotten physical, but she felt confident that she’d made her point.”
They already knew the guy had a sealed juvie record, but no record as an adult. Carlucci had investigated him on social media and picked up a vibe about him and past issues with other women, but had walked the fine line of giving Gigi a heads-up about that without tipping her hand that she’d been looking into him.
“Has she been awake?”
“Here and there. She’s due for pain meds soon, so she’ll probably be waking up. I haven’t asked any questions yet…”
“I’ll wait until she wakes up, and I’ll ask so you don’t have to.”
“Thanks for coming, LT. It’ll mean a lot to her, and it does to me too.”
“I would’ve been here sooner, but it’s been a weird day.”
“I can’t even imagine.”
Thirty minutes later, Sam and Dani were standing at the bedside when Gigi’s soft-brown eyes opened and immediately filled with tears when she saw Sam. “You didn’t have to…”
“Hush, of course I did.” Sam gently placed her hand on top of Gigi’s. “I’m sorry this happened.”
“My fault.”
“In no way was this your fault.”
“He’d changed into someone I barely recognize, but I kept letting him come back,” she said as tears rolled down her face.
Dani gently dabbed at her partner’s tears with a tissue. “Take it easy. It’s not your fault. Caring about someone doesn’t give him a right to do this to you.”
“I never thought he would… He said he loved me.”
“Can you give us any insight into where we might find him?”
Gigi closed her eyes and let out a deep sigh, wincing as she shifted to try to find a more comfortable position. “He has a group of friends he goes way back with. You could probably start there.” As she recited the names, Dani wrote them down.
“Go call it in,” Sam said to Dani. “Take a break.”
“I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll be here.”
“She’s upset,” Gigi said after Dani left. “Blames herself.”
“There’s only one person to blame for this, and we’ll make sure he pays for what he did to you.”
New tears leaked out of the corners of Gigi’s red-rimmed eyes. “I’ve known him all my life. We were in kindergarten together.”
“Which is all the more reason why he never should’ve laid a hand on you.”
Before Gigi could respond to that, the door opened, and Detective Cameron Green came in, looking as if he could kill someone. The blond detective, who was always dressed to perfection, looked like he’d thrown on clothes and run for the hospital the second he heard the news. He wore faded jeans and an old sweatshirt. His hair stood on end, and his jaw was covered in stubble. Sam had never seen him so undone.
“Gigi…” He stopped several feet short of the bed. “Son of a bitch.”
She started to cry again, her chest heaving with sobs.
Cameron went to her, took her hand and gently brushed the hair back from her face. “We’ll nail him for this.”
Sam stood back to give him room, intrigued by the close bond between her two officers, a bond she hadn’t noticed before now.
“What do we know?” Cameron asked Sam, his expression fierce and furious.
“Gigi gave us a list of his friends. Dani is calling that in.”
“I’ll go look for him myself,” Cam said. “I’ll find him.”
“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” Sam said.
He whirled to look at her. “Why not?”
“You seem to be… How shall I say… Personally involved?” She raised a brow in inquiry.
Cameron blinked, appearing confused for a second before his eyes widened and his mouth opened as if he was going to speak. But no words came out. And then he seemed to sag all of a sudden as some sort of truth settled on him. “Maybe.”
The single word seemed to cost him something. As far as Sam knew, he’d been dating someone else for quite some time. Sam had met the woman a couple of times. “Let’s leave it to the others, then.” Her phone rang, and she stepped out of the room to take the call from Gonzo. “What’s up?”
“Nothing yet. Dani called me with his list of friends, and I’ve sent McBride and O’Brien to Fairfax to track them down. We ran them all and found a couple of outstanding warrants we’re going to use as leverage to get them to talk.”
“That’s something, anyway. Green is here. He’s extremely upset.”
“Really. Well, that’s interesting.”
“I thought the same thing, suggested as much to him, and it seemed to be the first time he entertained the idea of feelings beyond that of a colleague.”
“Doesn’t he have a girlfriend?”
“He does.”
“Hmmm…”
“I suggested he might want to leave the vengeance to the rest of the team.”
“Good call. Speaking of vengeance, Lenore Worthington is here looking for information about her son’s case after the developments overnight.”
Sam had promised to take a fresh look at her son’s fifteen-year-old unsolved homicide. “Is she still there?”
“She is.”
“Let me speak to her.”
“Hang on.”
Sam heard Gonzo speaking to someone in the seconds before Lenore came on the line.
“Lieutenant, I’d ask how your Thanksgiving was, but…”
Sam laughed. “It was pretty great until around nine o’clock.”
“I know you must be reeling today and have so many other things on your mind. I didn’t come here expecting to see you.”
“I made you a promise that I fully intend to keep, Lenore. My plan is to continue my life as it was on Wednesday.”
“Is that so? Well, that’d be quite something.”
“No matter what happens, I promise I‘ll investigate Calvin’s murder with fresh eyes and do everything I can to get you some long-overdue answers.”
“Thank you,” she said, sounding relieved. “That means so much to me.”
“I also fully intend to remain engaged with the grief group.” Along with the department’s psychiatrist, Dr. Trulo, Sam had recently founded the support group for the victims of violent crime. Their first meeting had been a big success, and a second was planned for mid-December.
“I’ll see you at the next meeting, if not before?”
“I’ll be there.”
“I know your participation meant so much to the other attendees, especially those who’ve just begun this journey,” Sam said.
“It helps me to help them. Thank you for making that possible.”
“I’ll be in touch, okay?”
“Thank you, Sam, and if I may… God bless you and your husband as you begin this new adventure. I’ll be cheering for you both.”
“Thank you. That’s very kind of you. Talk soon.”
Lenore gave the phone back to Gonzo, and Sam heard her saying goodbye to him.
“Whatever you said made her very happy.”
“I told her I fully intend to honor my promise to reopen Calvin’s case.”
“Let me know what I can do to help with that.”
“I will. For now, let’s find the guy who put our Gigi in the hospital.”
“I’m on it.”