Chapter 11
The doctor was a man about Diane’s age. He spoke to the nurse at the information station, and she pointed to Diane. She, Neva, Andie, Korey and Kendel all rose in one motion, as if connected, and walked over to him.
“We’re friends of Mike Seger. I’m Diane Fallon, his employer. We were with him when this happened. Can you tell us his condition?” asked Diane.
“I’m Dr. Nolan. The knife nicked a vessel and his colon, but he’s going to be all right. He lost a lot of blood, but I didn’t have to transfuse, and that’s good. He should be able to go home in a few days if he progresses as well as he is now. I understand this happened at a funeral?” The doctor looked at them as if expecting them to tell him he had been misinformed.
“Yes. We don’t know who or why. First thing we saw was Mike falling to his knees.”
Chief Garnett came through the waiting room doors and joined them, introducing himself to the doctor.
Diane had expected a detective to show up soon. She wasn’t surprised that the chief himself was taking the lead. It had become a high-profile case, not because of the victim, but because of where the crime had taken place. At least Mike would get their undivided attention.
“Can you tell us anything about the weapon?” he asked the doctor.
“It cut clean like a scalpel-very sharp. Given the depth of the wound, however, whatever kind of weapon did this, it was longer than a regular scalpel.”
“Has he said anything?” asked Garnett.
“No. He’s in recovery now, just coming out of the anesthesia.”
Chief Garnett took hold of Diane’s upper arm, and she yelped at the sudden pain. Garnett quickly withdrew his hand and looked down at his palm. He frowned at her.
“You’re bleeding.”
Diane shook her head. “It’s Mike’s. My arm is just sore because I pulled a muscle at the gym this morning.”
The doctor walked around her and looked at the back of her arm. “I don’t think so. That blood looks too fresh. Let’s get your jacket off and take a look.”
The doctor and Garnett slid the jacket off her shoulder. She heard Andie and Kendel gasp.
Diane felt his fingers on her upper arm just beneath the short sleeve of her blouse.
“You have a deep laceration in your arm.” He turned to the nurses’ station. “Nurse. We need to get Ms. Fallon into an examination room.”
Diane looked at the expressions of surprise on all their faces. She imagined it matched her own. She handed Andie her purse and asked her to give her insurance information to the receptionist. She tried to look at her arm.
“Let’s not move too much. You’re starting to bleed again,” said Dr. Nolan. “Chief Garnett, this looks like a scalpel wound. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was done by the same weapon.”
The nurse led her to the examination room, then helped her change into one of those embarrassing backless hospital gowns. She had Diane lie down on the examination table on her good side.
A few minutes later, the doctor came in, washed his hands, then slipped on a pair of latex gloves. He examined the wound. She flinched several times as he palpated the area on the back of her arm.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m trying to be as gentle as I can.”
The doctor stepped around the table and stood where she could see him.
“We need to irrigate the wound before I can sew it up. It’s going to be uncomfortable, but nothing you shouldn’t be able to handle.”
“I’m fine. I just want to get this over with and go home.” Diane suddenly remembered the pills she’d taken. “I just took a couple of aspirin.”
“That’s probably why it started bleeding again.”
“Why didn’t I feel anything?”
“You felt nothing?”
“A twinge when it happened. I just thought I had injured a tricep when I was rock climbing at the gym this morning. I often pull muscles when I’m climbing. But I didn’t feel like I had been stabbed.” Diane felt incredulous that this had happened to her. She could imagine how Mike must feel.
“Probably all the adrenaline in your system’s been giving you some pain protection. When did you first feel the twinge?”
“Just after I saw Mike fall to his knees at the cemetery. I was pushing through the crowd to get to him. I remember someone stepped on my foot, and right after that I felt a sharp pain in my arm. As I said, I thought it was a pulled muscle.”
Dr. Nolan moved to the end of the table and examined her feet.
“There’s no bruising. Flex your toes. Does that hurt?”
“Just minor soreness. It wasn’t that hard. It was just pinned to the ground for a moment.”
“Any other pains or sore spots anywhere that you didn’t have before?”
“No, nothing else. Just the arm and the foot.”
“We’ll get you fixed up. I’ll come back when the nurse has cleaned your wound. Is your tetanus up-to-date?” Diane nodded. “Good. I’m going to give you some powerful antibiotics,” he continued. “And we’ll have to take precautionary blood tests for possible infections, but I don’t see any reason you can’t go home right away.”
“I’d like to see Mike before I leave.”
“He should be awake by then. Now this is going to sting. . ” The doctor stuck in the needle to numb her arm.
Damn, she was pissed at whoever did this.
Neva and Korey were waiting for Diane when she walked back into the waiting room after the doctor had stitched her muscle and skin back together. She was surprised anyone was still there. It seemed like it had taken several hours. Neva said she had taken Kendel and Andie to the museum and had come back.
“What did the doctor say?” asked Korey.
“Just a few stitches and minor muscle repairs. They’re letting me go home. How is Mike?”
“Mike’s doing okay,” said Neva. “He had me go to his apartment and bring him some things. I left him asleep, but if you’d like to go see him he may be awake. I’m going to stay the night. . ”
“Don’t worry about coming to work tomorrow morning. We’ll call if we need you.”
Mike was asleep when she, Neva and Korey entered his room. Diane and Korey turned and started to leave.
“Hey, guys.”
Diane turned around. “You awake?”
“More or less,” Mike said, sounding a little groggy. “I think we must have really pissed someone off in an earlier life. Neva said you were getting sewn up.”
Diane shrugged and sat down in the chair Neva had pulled up for her. “The doctor said I’ll live.”
Mike moved and winced in pain. “What the hell happened? Who’s doing this?”
“I don’t know. Do you want me to call your parents?”
He shook his head. “They were so worried when I was shot; I’ll tell them myself when I’m not feeling so out of it.”
“Do you know of anyone who doesn’t like you?”
“Enough to stab me? No. That detective-Garnett-asked the same thing. Graduate school can be cutthroat, but not literally. Besides, that wouldn’t explain why they went after you.”
Diane deeply hoped that this was not somehow her fault, that it had nothing to do with the crime scene lab.
