The police, the fire department, and the paramedics tramped around my property. There was so much flash and color it looked like a county event.
I called Parker for moral support and Ryan Petry for Smooshie. I needed the vet to make sure she was okay. The sweet baby, once again, had saved my life.
A paramedic named Robyn, with short, tight curly hair and beautiful dark skin, put an oxygen monitor on my index finger and an oxygen mask over my nose and mouth. She was as short as me, but with a better, more feminine figure. “Breath deep,” she told me. The redness in my skin had already disappeared, and while I had a headache, I didn’t feel tired anymore.
I watched Parker rush past the fire truck to get to me. He stopped just short of the gurney Robyn had insisted I get on. “Is she all right?” he asked the paramedic. “Are you taking her to the hospital?”
I lifted the mask from my face. “She can talk.”
Robyn shoved the mask back down. “No, she can’t.”
I grabbed Parker’s hand and lifted the mask again, but not so far off my face. “Get Smooshie,” I said. “She’s over there with Jerry.” Jerry had kindly taken responsibility for her so that the paramedics could do their job and also keep her out of the way for the firefighters. “Ryan is on his way to check her out.”
I was proud of Parker for not even looking the tiniest bit jealous. Instead, he went into “I’ve got a purpose” mode and made a beeline for Jerry and Smooshie.
“That your fella?” Robyn asked.
I nodded, even though we hadn’t even had our first date. He was mine, and that was that.
“Bravo,” she said, a slow smile spreading across her lips as she gave him a cursory glance. “Brah-vo.”
“What in tarnation have you gotten into now?” asked the less-than-sympathetic voice of Sheriff Avery. “I swear I’m going to have to hire new deputies just to keep up with all your shenanigans. What do you have to say for yourself?”
I sighed and pointed to my mask. When he narrowed his suspicious gaze at me, I shrugged. If I wasn’t allowed to talk to Parker because I needed the oxygen, then I certainly wouldn’t break the rule for this jerk. He opened his mouth to protest, but Robyn, my new knightess in shining armor, stepped in.
“You’re going to have to ask your questions later, Sheriff. Right now, the patient needs oxygen. Carbon monoxide poisoning is very serious. I’m sure you don’t want to be responsible for any lasting damage Ms. Mason suffers.”
Avery’s face went a dark purple color. “Now you just wait a minute…”
“Sheriff!” Bobby Morris shouted. “The fire chief needs to talk to you.”
That was something I did want to hear. I tuned out the running engines and extraneous chatter and dialed into the conversation between the fire chief and the sheriff.
“The levels in the house were twenty times the normal limit, and that’s with Ms. Mason leaving the door open after she exited.”
“Is that a lot?” the sheriff asked. I could hear the incredulity in the chief’s voice.
“Yes, it’s a lot.”
“Any chance it’s an accident?”
Well, I knew that someone had taken the battery out of the carbon monoxide detector, and, I suspect, that my mishap with the front door, locking it when I turned the key, was because the door had been unlocked. I’d look for tool marks in the keyhole when all this was over.
“A rag blocked the vent to the furnace, and it didn’t just stuff itself in there. Someone did this on purpose.”
“Could be attempted suicide. Maybe she changed her mind.”
“Well, that’s for you to find out, Mike. My job is to investigate the cause and determine if it’s an accident or a crime. It’s a crime. That’s your territory.”
“You’re awfully testy tonight, Lloyd.”
“It’s my wedding anniversary.”
Avery laughed. “Once a year whether you deserve it or not, right?”
I groaned at the implied nod-and-wink then tuned the two men out as they jabbered about things that didn’t apply to me.
Ryan Petry pulled up in his sports car. Ouch, my gravel road probably gave that fancy little thing a beating. He popped the trunk, ran around to the back, and grabbed a bag and a small tank. He didn’t stop to check on me. Instead, he made directly for Smooshie, and I swear I never liked the man more. After Ryan went to work on my dog, who really didn’t seem worse for wear, Parker joined me at the ambulance.
I pushed the mask away. “What’s Ryan say? Is Smooshie going to be all right?”
“I’m about to glue that thing to your face. You’re going to look really funny walking around with a rubber mask as a permanent fixture,” Robyn said.
I snapped it back into place and gave her a quick salute before pressing Parker for information with a “hurry up and tell me” stare.
“You’ve got about a minute to wrap this up before I take you to the hospital,” Robyn added. “So make it quick.”
After she walked around to the front of her rig, Parker blew out a breath. “She’s a hard taskmaster.”
I nodded. My headache was almost gone now, and the nausea had disappeared shortly after she’d put me on straight oxygen. I took Parker’s hand. “Will you keep Smooshie?” I asked.
“I’ll go with Ryan and stay with her until we get the blood test results to see if she still has carbon monoxide in her blood.” He laced his fingers with mine. “Every part of me wants to be with you tonight, but I know you won’t be able to sit still and let the doctors do what they have to do to check you out if I don’t take care of Smooshie first.”
Smart man. I smiled, though I’m not sure he could see it through the mask. I squeezed his hand.
“How does this work, with, you know, your special condition?”
By condition, he meant the fact that I turned into a cougar sometimes. I’d read somewhere that animals are even more susceptible to carbon monoxide poisoning, so I’m not sure if it would be worse for me than a normal human. I guess I was about to find out.
Robyn rounded the corner with her driver, a paramedic named Steve. “Time to go, lovebirds.” She and Steve pushed the gurney into the back of the ambulance, and the wheels folded up as I slid inside. Robyn got in beside me. I picked my head up and gave Parker one last look before Steve closed the doors behind us.
Why would someone try to poison me? It made zero sense. I didn’t have the drive anymore. It was already with the cops, so what did killing me accomplish?
Then another thought occurred to me. What if this incident had nothing to do with my involvement in Donnie Doyle’s case?
I shared the emergency room with a crying baby, an elderly woman who kept shouting, “help me,” and a college student suffering from alcohol poisoning. A lab technician came in and took several vials of my blood. She got into my vein quick and with hardly any pain. My lucky night, except for the attempt on my life, of course.
A lanky man with a white lab coat, a stethoscope sticking out of his front pocket, and holding a chart, presumably mine, walked into my room. “I’m Dr. Wilkens,” he said. “What seems to be the trouble tonight?”
I wanted to point out that he was holding all my information in his hot little hands, but I played nice. “I inhaled a bunch of carbon monoxide.”
“How do you feel right now?”
“A little light-headed, which is probably due to all the oxygen they’ve been pumping into me tonight…” I tapped the plastic oxygen tube poking in my nose, “…but otherwise, not bad.”
He pulled the stethoscope from his pocket and placed it in his ears. “Lean forward,” he directed. He placed the cold disc end against my chest. “Take a deep breath for me?” I did. He moved it around and made the same request five more times. He stood up straight, nodding his head as he put the stethoscope back in his pocket. “Nice and clear. Yep, I think you’re gonna be just fine.” He smiled reassuringly. “I’ll be back when the test results are in, but I think you’ll get to go home tonight.”
“Thanks, Doc. Do you think I could get my robe? The nurse put it somewhere when she made me put on this gown.” My cell phone was in my robe pocket, and I wanted to call Parker.
“I’ll send in Judy to help you out.” He exited the room, while I played the game of hurry up and wait.
The baby finally stopped crying, poor thing. The elderly woman still occasionally belted out, “help me.”
Then I heard a familiar voice say, “Buzz Mason, what are you doing here?”
“I’m visiting my cousin. She was brought in here tonight. What are you doing here, Opal? Everything all right?”
“Pearl’s taken a turn. This is the second time in the past year.” I’d never heard the bold, elderly woman ever sound so…defeated.
“She’ll bounce back,” my uncle said. “She always does.”
“Until she doesn’t,” Opal said. “You better go find Lily.”
Then I heard another familiar voice. “Hey, Buzz.” The sultry sounds came from none other than Lacy Evans. I just couldn’t get away from that girl. “How you doing?”
“Is Freda sick?” Buzz asked.
“No. It’s Paulie. He started running a fever tonight, high enough that he had a seizure. They got it down to something manageable now, but they want to keep him for a while for observation.”
“Do you want me to call Freda?”
“No,” Lacy said. “I’ve got this.”
The conversation trailed off from there. Was Lacy really getting her life together? I mean, I still saw her out drinking on Tuesday nights, but she had sat for the GED just like me, and she hadn’t made her mom handle her kid’s crisis. Hell, she’d even thanked me for stepping in when Jock had been coming on strong. Maybe a leopard really could change its spots.
Judy, the nurse, came back into my room and handed me a plastic sack with my robe in it. “Buzz Mason is here to see you. He says he’s family, so I let him come back, but if you want me to send him out to the waiting room, I will.”
I gave her a half smile. “It’s okay to let him in.”
She poked her head out of the doorway. “Come on back!”
Buzz arrived and stood next to my bed, his gaze filled with concern.
“I’ll give you two a little privacy while we’re waiting for your results,” said Judy. She closed the door behind her.
Buzz held out a plastic shopping sack. “Nadine got these from your place after the fire department said it was safe to go inside. It’s some jeans, a shirt, and some undergarments. She said you’d need them.”
“That girl of yours is super smart.” I gratefully took the sack from him. “I don’t suppose she put a toothbrush and some toothpaste in there?” I must have puked after I stumbled out of the trailer because my mouth tasted disgusting.
“It’s in there. Along with a hairbrush.”
I grinned. “She’s a keeper.”
“For as long as she’ll have me,” Buzz replied. “Now, what in the hell happened out there?”
I knew Nadine had probably given him the official version, but I broke it down with theatrics and all. I told him how heroic Smooshie had been. “She saved my life, Buzz.” Tears blurred my vision. “She saved me.”
My uncle sat on the side of my bed and put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me into him. “She’s earned herself a free beef patty every day for the rest of her life.”
“She’s on a diet,” I sniffled.
Buzz chuckled. “Fine, then I’ll give her grilled chicken breast instead.”
“Perfect.”
A loud commotion out in the hall got our attention. Buzz went to the door and opened it.
We heard Lacy screaming then a man yelled, “You’re fired! Don’t bother picking up your last paycheck, you blackmailing bitch.”
And then we heard a gunshot.