“He isn’t?” Melody could see her own confusion mirrored in her sister’s face. “I don’t understand.”
“I can probably tell you because his cover is blown. Joe is one of us. He’s a detective.”
Max stiffened, and for a moment Melody struggled to keep him from jumping from her arms. “A cop?” she said numbly. And now she realized he’d most likely been working undercover when her dad had seen him with the “seedy” people.
“That’s why I was so surprised to hear you were dating. After David died, I remember you saying you’d never date another cop.”
A cop.
So much worse than a criminal.
Sandra took down their information, then told them they could leave.
“How will I find out if… If he’s okay? I don’t even know his real name.”
“Joe is his real name. I’m not at liberty to tell you his last name at this point. Tell you what. I’ll give you a call as soon as I know something. And there’s nothing to keep you from following the emergency vehicle to the hospital right now.”
“Yes.” Could she do it? She had to do it.
“Will you drive?” she asked her sister.
“Of course.”
“But you have to be at work…”
“I can cancel my deejay gig.”
It was so hard to connect this world, the world of gunshots and maybe another dead lover, to the world of thirty minutes ago when the sisters were giggling together and thinking it was all some silly nonsense. A game.
Melody looked down. “I’m still Alice. Look at me. I’m still Alice.” Did anybody understand how ridiculous that was? When people were getting killed? Murdered in their homes? Murdered in their backyards? And she was wearing a blue dress with white tights and black Mary Janes? Did anybody understand how out of sync and wrong that was?
“I’ll take you home and you can change. We can drop Max off too.”
The sisters turned to walk away, back to the street and Lola’s car. Lola gave Melody another hug and said, “It’s okay to be Alice. You know that, don’t you?”
Melody shook her head. “No. No, it’s not. Where have I been for the past two years? Baking cupcakes? Dressing in costumes? Dressing poor Max in a thneed? This isn’t life. Not real life. Tonight. Tonight was real life.”
“We all need Alice and cupcakes,” Lola said. “Why do you think Joe was attracted to you in the first place? He needed some whimsy, some Alice in his life.”
A camera flashed, blinding them. Several flashes later, the man behind the camera explained himself. “I’m a reporter for the
“No,” Melody said, surprised by her rudeness.
“You were witnesses, right? Did you see anything?”
The sisters kept walking.
“Can I at least get a name and phone number?” the reporter shouted after them.
Chapter 12
“Let’s go straight to the hospital,” Melody said as soon as they were in the car. “I don’t want to take the time to drop off Max or change.” Because they might not have time. That’s what she was thinking.
Lola took Snelling Avenue to 94 E. Traffic on 94 was moving quickly, and in less than five minutes they were taking the downtown exit to Regions Hospital. Foregoing the parking ramp, Lola headed straight for the emergency lot adjoining the ER entrance. The sisters went inside the building, leaving Max alone in the car.
At least Joe had been shot within five minutes of a major trauma center, Melody thought. If there was anything good to be said about being shot.
In the past, whenever Melody visited the ER, the people at the desk had taken their sweet time gathering information. What a difference a little blood made. Before Melody could explain what had happened, or explain why they were there, trauma nurses swarmed. The next thing she knew, she was being forced onto a gurney. Then someone grabbed her arm and readied her for a blood draw. All of this in less than a minute. Melody was quite proud of them, and it was good to know they could snap to attention when the situation required it. But of course it didn’t.
“Where’s the injury?” This from someone who looked like a doctor. A young man with dark, curly hair.
Melody pushed herself up on her elbows just as a nurse began cutting at the hem of Melody’s dress.
Both she and Lola shouted at the same time.
“She’s not injured!”
“I’m not injured!”
“You’re covered in blood,” the doctor said. He didn’t believe her about the injury. Or lack thereof. She supposed they got a lot of crackheads who chewed on glass and had no idea whether or not they were hurt. And her costume didn’t really help. “It’s not my blood. I’m here to check on someone who was just brought in.”
“Name?” the nurse asked. She’d stopped cutting.
Name. “Joe.”
“Last name?”
Melody bailed off the gurney. “I’m not sure.”
“How do you know the victim?”
Now, from the corner of her eye, Melody saw a hospital security guard moving closer, a hand to his belt. Saint Paul wasn’t the sweet place painted by Garrison Keillor. Saint Paul could be as nasty and as violent as any other big city, maybe worse. Melody herself had been mugged twice.
“I’m his girlfriend,” she blurted out.
“And you don’t know his last name?”
“It doesn’t make that much sense, but…” Now several people were eying her with suspicion. Lola grabbed Melody by the arm and tugged. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
The guard stepped forward. He was an older guy. Old enough to be somebody’s grandfather. “I think you’d better leave,” he said, not unkindly but with a stern tone that made Melody want to obey.
She said, “This isn’t what you think.” What did they think? That she was a stripper? Maybe. “I’m a librarian.” As if that explained everything. As if that would suddenly make them back down.
From somewhere behind them came a snicker. Two young dudes slumped into waiting room chairs were finding the whole thing extremely entertaining.
“A children’s librarian. This evening was story hour.”
“Why don’t I just go check and see if I can get an update on the gunshot victim?” the receptionist said. She took off, and the crowd dispersed.
The woman returned a short time later. “He’s in surgery.”
Which meant he was still alive.
In the bathroom, Melody washed the blood from her face and hands and removed her apron, which was covered in blood. Back in the waiting room, a cop searched them out, and Melody found herself going over the story one more time.
“They’re crediting your cat with saving the young man’s life,” the officer said.
“My cat?”
“When the victim arrived here, he had a pink leash wrapped around his thigh. He would have died without it.”
Max’s leash. Melody hadn’t even noticed it was gone. “My cat certainly didn’t tie the leash around Joe’s thigh.”
“No, of course not, but from what I understand the cat was the first one on the scene. And he was dragging
