I took a deep breath and wiped my face clean. Both actions sent ripples of pain down my back, muscle seizing up where I’d hit the stairs. I was sitting on the second one from the bottom, now. Apparently I’d not only wiped out, I’d then slid. And the police station had security cameras running twenty-four/seven. I’d end up in their Greatest Hits collection as soon as they were sure I was all right. I reached back and touched the back of my head. My fingers came away bloody and slushy. Muscles in my back spasmed again.
I explained in as few sentences as I could. Morrison’s expression went from disbelieving to disappointed to dismayed as it became clear I, at least, didn’t think I was hallucinating.
“You used to be so straight.” He stood up, looking frustrated and disgusted. I decided not to follow suit just yet, trying to concentrate enough to heal myself through the rhythmic throbbing of my head. I couldn’t, gave it up as a bad job, and concentrated on climbing to my feet instead.
“I’ve got to find a way back.” I clutched at Morrison’s sleeve to keep myself upright. It wasn’t dignified, but it was almost worth the startled expression it garnered. Maybe I needed to work on the damsel in distress routine.
“You’ve got a job here to do,” Morrison said dismissively. I stared at him, not quite believing I’d heard him right. “Come on, Walker.” He handed me off to Bruce, who made quiet fussing sounds while I looked slack-jawed at Morrison. “You want to save a world, save this one. We’ve got plenty of lost souls right here.”
“You don’t get it.” I let go of Bruce’s arm and immediately wished I hadn’t. The deed done, though, I took a step forward, trying to tower over Morrison. My shoes weren’t tall enough. “For one thing, that place was full of souls and a lot of them were
I wished I would stop thinking that.
Morrison held his mouth tight, meeting my eyes without giving an inch. “I understand,” he said, low and harsh, “that you are an officer working in my department and you will God-damned well do as your superior officer tells you to do.”
“Fine,” I said, “I fucking quit.” From behind me, the collected officers let out a collective gasp. I yanked the badge out of my jacket pocket and threw it into the slush at Morrison’s feet. Snow and water sprayed up over our shoes. His gaze flickered to the badge in the snow and back up to mine.
“You don’t want to do this,” he said very quietly.
The real bitch of the thing was, he was right. But there I was with the badge in the snow and my dignity all tangled around it, and hell if I could think of a way to back down. The rage poured out of me, though, leaving me tired and remembering that I was injured. My head throbbed along with my heartbeat.
“Then let me do this my way.” I didn’t have any fight left in me, suddenly. Standing up took almost everything I had, and my voice was quiet. “I have a responsibility, Morrison. You’re the one who wanted me to live up to my potential.” I spread my hands. “I’m trying.”
Morrison looked down at the badge in the slush again, and back at me again. “Somebody get her a paramedic.” He stepped around me, leaving me on the second step of the station. I crouched very cautiously and picked up the badge. I guessed I’d won that round, but it didn’t feel like much of a victory.
Bruce offered me a steadying arm as I straightened, ushering me into the station. I leaned over his desk and punched out numbers on his phone while Linda, one of the paramedics, tried to doctor the back of my head. It hurt and I kept flinching. She kept swearing.
“Tripoli Cabs,” a rapid-fire, unfriendly male voice said into the phone almost before it rang. “This is Keith. Where do you need a pickup?”
“I don’t. Can you get a message to one of your—ow!” I glared at Linda, who glared back. “One of your cabbys,” I said resentfully.
Keith’s voice became a few notes more unfriendly. “This isn’t a public service line, ma’am.”
“This is an emergency. Please?”
Deep, put-upon sigh. “It’s always an emergency. Yeah, what do you need.”
“Can you tell Gary Muldoon that Joanne called, and she needs him to go by her apartment, get her drum and come to the police station as soon as he’s off work?”
“A drum is an emergency?” Keith mumbled, but I could hear the tap of a keyboard as he took the message down. “Joanne, get drum, police station. He gets off work at two.”
I looked for a clock. It was three minutes to two. “I hope you can catch him, then. Thank you. I really appreciate it.”
“Yeah, yeah. That’s what they all say, but does anybody ever send chocolate? I got work to do, lady.”
I grinned at the phone and hung up instead of asking if employees of Tripoli Cabs were contractually obliged to call women “lady.”
“Bruce?”
“Yeah?” He sounded relieved that I remembered his name. Linda put something that boiled on the back of my head and I shrieked. Bruce jumped, then glared resentfully at Linda, saving me the trouble of doing it again.
“Where do you order flowers and chocolates from when you’re in the doghouse with Elise?”
He pointed at the phone. “Speed-dial number nine,” he said in a voice that dared me to laugh.
I laughed. It made my head hurt more, but it was worth it. Linda swore again and reached over my shoulder to grasp my jaw in her hand. “Hold still,” she said impatiently, and swabbed the boiling painful stuff onto the back of my head again.
“Ow! What is that, battery acid?”
“Hydrochloric,” she corrected as I dialed Bruce’s flower shop. “There’s all kinds of gook in there. Stop whining.”
“Gook,” I said. “Is that a technical term?”
“Thanks for calling Forgiven Again Flowers. Hi, Bruce,” the woman on the other end of the line said. I laughed again, flinching away from Linda.
“Not Bruce,” I said. “Just borrowing his phone.”
Three minutes later a vase of wildflowers and a box of chocolates were set to be delivered to Keith at Tripoli Cabs, the ibuprofen was starting to kick in, and I was feeling slightly better about the world.
“I faxed that sketch over to Blanchet High,” Jen said from behind me. I turned around. Linda swore yet again and stalked off, muttering disclaimers of responsibility for me. I watched her go, nonplussed, then blinked at Jen.
“And?”
“And there are a thousand students there. The office didn’t recognize her off the bat, but they offered to send the picture over to the yearbook staff to see if anybody knew her. I’m waiting for an answer back from them.” She shrugged and wandered back down the hallway.
“Thank you,” I said, not very loudly, but she threw a smile over her shoulder at me. I sat on the edge of Bruce’s desk and rubbed my eyes. Little stabs of pain winked back through my head, but comparatively it was like a soothing massage, so I kept rubbing.
“When was the last time you slept?” Bruce asked. I smiled lopsidedly.
“I donno. I slept in the shower. I’m fine.”
“You look like the walking dead.”
“Thank you.” I laughed. It didn’t make my head hurt as much, for which I was grateful.
“Why don’t you go take a nap until your drum gets here?” he suggested. I had to admire the perfectly calm collected way he said that, like it was completely normal for people to hang around police stations waiting for drums.
“With a head injury?” I asked, bemusedly echoing Morrison.
“I don’t think it’ll kill you.”
“Mmmph,” I said, and looked around the station. Truth was, I couldn’t think of a damned thing I was good
