Body Parts (Rye & Claire 1) (2 page)

Rye looked up from his splinting to see a blood-soaked shirt as Claire tore away Rusty’s jacket and began palpating.

“We’ve got a bleeder. Lung
collapsed, heart compressed,” Claire said as she attempted to re-inflate
his lung without success. One rib poked out through his side and when
she moved it, blood bubbled out. The pressure pad couldn’t stem the
flow. She tried a series of pressure points and still the blood gushed.
She watched in frustration as the man’s blood pressure plummeted. Unable
to stop his bleeding at the scene, they finally loaded him into the
ambulance.

Claire drove while Rye rode
in the back. If he could slow the blood loss there might be a chance
once they reached the hospital. Fifteen minutes later, Rusty Kidding was
DOA at Medford General Hospital.

Claire jumped from the cab
and ran to the back of the ambulance. She flung open the double doors
and looked first at Rusty’s inert body then at Rye who simply shook his
head.

“It would have been a miracle if he’d survived.”

Together they pulled the corpse from the ambulance. It was covered from head to toe with a blanket and strapped onto the gurney.

“I’ll take him in,” Claire said.

Rye held onto his end of the gurney for a minute. “Are you sure you’re OK with this?”

“Yeah fine, the paperwork’s all yours.”

Rye stayed in the ambulance
jotting down notes they’d use later in their report while Claire rolled
the gurney up the ramp leading to the front of the hospital. A hundred
yards from the entrance the path turned off heading down toward the
morgue.

Normal procedure was for her
to be met by two morgue assistants, so she was surprised when a doctor
came up to her holding a clipboard. She extended her hand. “Hello, I’m
Claire Anderson, Mad Dash Ambulance.”

The doctor smiled shaking her
hand. “Glad to meet you, Claire, I’ll take it from here.” He laid the
clipboard on the end of the gurney, pulled a pen from his pocket and
handed it to Claire. Taking the pen, she signed off on Rusty, then
looked up still puzzled at the doctor’s presence.

He noticed her expression.
“You can’t save them all, you know.” He then turned his back on her and
guided the gurney down the path. She hesitated, wanting to find out who
he was and why a doctor would perform a task normally carried out by
staffers. She watched him until he took the next turn, restrained only
by Medford General’s no interference policy between EMTs and hospital
employees. Sighing, she turned and walked back to the ambulance.

“That didn’t take long,” Rye said, looking up from his notes. “Why the frown?”

He knew that losing an
accident victim wasn’t supposed to affect an EMT until hours after the
event, though Claire often took such losses personally.

She climbed in, instinctively fastening her harness. “Have you ever turned a DOA over to a doctor before?”

Rye slid the clipboard with his notes into its slot at the base of the driver’s seat. “No, why?”

“I just did, and when I introduced myself he didn’t say who he was.”

“He have a name tag?”

“No.”

Rye watched as she settled
into her seat, tightening her harness, staring at her feet, deep in
thought. The thrum of the engine starting startled her. She looked over
at him, “I just don’t feel good about this.”

He paused then shut off the
engine. They looked out of place in their jumpsuits, as they passed into
the foyer of Medford General and up to the information counter.

A cheerful receptionist looked up as they approached.

“Well hey you two, nice to see you walking for a change.”

Claire smiled and leaned on the counter. “Hey, Casey. I was wondering if you can solve a mystery for me?”

“Shoot.”

Claire looked up at Rye then
back at the receptionist. “I just delivered a DOA to a doctor instead of
two Mutt and Jeff’s up from the morgue, definitely not procedure.”

Casey held up one hand to
stop Claire’s inquiry. “Hold on a second.” She walked to the end of the
counter, grabbed a clipboard and read over it as she walked back.

She ran a finger along a
line. “No one brought into the hospital in the past hour or through the
morgue in the past two hours.” She set the clipboard down and looked up.
“Anything else I can help you with?”

Claire picked up the clipboard to see for herself. “Any new doctors on staff?”

Before Casey could answer, the headlights and horn of their ambulance went off, indicating a call.

Claire reluctantly put down the clipboard. “Gotta go,” she said, turning to run back to the ambulance. Rye was already ahead
of her.

He guided the ambulance out of the hospital parking lot while she tuned in the 911-call center. “Unit 88, disregard.”

She looked over at Rye. “Good let’s go back and find that doctor.”

Rye changed lanes so he could
make a U-turn but stopped when the scanner crackled back to life. “Unit
88, code 1111, house fire, 415 Silverado Avenue.”

Claire grabbed the microphone, then looked over at Rye. “What do you think? Let the fire department handle it?”

He was already reaching up
clicking toggle switches for lights and siren. “I don’t think so, you
heard the code, could be more than one structure.”

She slammed the mic back onto its mount on the dashboard. “What about Rusty and that phony doctor?

“C’mon Claire, I’m sure Rusty
found his way to the morgue, as for the doctor, no name tag and
receiving a DOA, he’s probably new, unfamiliar with procedures. Just get
me to Silverado Avenue. Alright?”

She picked up the map, giving Rye a dirty look. “I hope you’re right, if we lose a body the county will yank our license.”

He ignored her as he scanned the street ahead. “Are you sure of this route?”

Claire glanced up from her
map ready to snap at the question but one look at the burned out
neighborhood, derelict cars, and she bit her tongue.

A mixture of fire engine and
police sirens filled the air as Rye slowed the ambulance, surveying the
mayhem that blocked the street ahead.

“To late to turn back now,”
Claire said, and dialed in the 911 dispatch. “Emergency dispatch, this
is unit 88. What’s the 1020 on Silverado, over?” She looked over at Rye.
“Any guesses?” Before he could answer, dispatch came back on. “Meth
fire. Multiple homes involved. Proceed with caution. Out.”

Rye pulled up behind a
Medford police cruiser, and looked on in horror as Claire’s door was
yanked open, and she was pulled out by the hair.

“Claire!”

Rye reached behind his seat
for the billy club as he shot out the drivers’ door, driven into a
frenzied sprint by Claire’s chilling shriek.

Her attacker towered over her
by a foot, his hand firmly against her head, fingers interlaced with
her hair. She dropped to one knee placing both hands on her attacker’s
hand, pinning it to the top of her head, touching her chin to her knee,
crimping his wrist in the process.

“You bitch!

She suddenly straightened up,
holding the attacker’s hand in place, stretching his arm, snapping a
kick to his exposed right side. The man staggered back in a furious
struggle to regain his balance.

“You’re fucking dead, bitch.” He charged her but suddenly collapsed into a heap at her feet.

Rye dropped the club to his
side and leaping over the unconscious form, grabbed Claire by the arm.
“Get in,” he said, half lifting her into the ambulance.

She scrambled in, slamming and locking the door at the same time, barely before Rye whipped the ambulance into a U-turn.

Chapter Three

“Oh shit! hang on.”
The
ambulance rocked as it clipped the rusting burned out hulk of a Chevy
van and bounced onto a lawn mower. Rye then guided the two-ton rig off
what used to be somebody’s front yard and into the street.

“We’re outta here,” Rye said, as he snatched up the mic. “Emergency dispatch this is unit 88 calling in a 1044-out of service.”

He slammed the mic onto its hook, and accelerated down Silverado and out of the neighborhood.

“You alright?”

Claire slumped against the
door, “Yeah, I guess so. You know, I’m always surprised at the shit we
put up with. I mean what was that all about? What did that guy expect to
get by attacking me?”

She never got an answer.

Rye suddenly sat up straight shifting the ambulance into neutral and revved the engine.

Momentarily forgetting the attack, Claire turned in her seat. “I hear it, too.”

“It’s not the engine or the drive train,” he said.

She powered down her window. “Kill the scanner, it sounds like something’s scraping.”

Rye rolled his window down as he turned the scanner off. He heard the strange noise again. “I’m pulling over.”

He flipped on a couple flashers and eased the Beast onto the shoulder. Claire jumped out.

“Ouch.”

Rye was around the front of the ambulance and at Claire’s side. She had her hand on her neck.

“What is it?”

“I think that jerk gave me a whiplash when he grabbed my hair.”

“Why don’t you get back in, I’ll check this out.”

He watched Claire’s stiff
movements as she stepped up into the cab. Rye shut the door and leaned
in the window. “I’m filing a report on this, and you’re seeing a
chiropractor tomorrow morning.”

She gave him a weak smile and leaned back into the seat. He reached in and patted her arm. “Hand me the flashlight.”

Rye dropped to his stomach
and scanned the undercarriage, holding the light on what was left of a
lawn mower jammed between the chassis and the exhaust system.

Scrunching under the
ambulance, he grabbed one of the blades and pulled. Nothing. He wiggled
his way back out and stood up, met by Claire’s worried look. “What is
it?”

“I ran over a lawn mower when I hung the U-turn, we need a tow.”

Claire picked up the mic. “Unit 88 needs 1241.”

Rye could hear her calling in their location as he walked around the front of the ambulance. He suddenly stopped.

She hung up the mic, puzzled
when he turned on the flashlight and dropped out of sight. Claire peered
through the windshield and over the hood, then got out. When she came
around the front, Rye was squatting, shinning the light on the left
headlight and the smashed grill. When she got to his side he was
pointing the light at an ever-growing pool of antifreeze.

“Looks like you really clipped that van,” she said.

He just nodded.

A few minutes later the tow
truck arrived. The driver reached across and opened the passenger-side
door. Rye grabbed a bar on the dashboard and pulled himself in, then
reached out to give Claire a hand. It was a tight fit.

“Man I’d hate to see the
other dude’s car. That’s a helluva gash in your grill, you’re gonna need
a new radiator for sure.” The driver paused to call in his destination.
“And what the hell is that underneath?”

Rye smiled. “A lawn mower.”

The driver did a double take. “Right.”

They rode in silence to the
garage. Claire stayed in the cab of the tow truck, while Rye filled out
papers and explained for the second time about the lawn mower. He
watched the tow-truck driver unhitch the beast, wanting to rush over a
tell him to be careful.

Task finished, the tow-truck driver looked over at Rye and smiled. “Get in, I’ll take you and the missus home.”

“You sure? We could call a cab,” Rye said.

“No problem, I’m headed down Snoop anyway.”

Claire got out allowing Rye
to sit in the middle. The shift arm would cause her to sit at an angle
to keep it from going between her legs, and she didn’t think she’d be
able to sit like that all the way home.

As they stood on the darkened
porch watching the tow truck pull away, Rye put his arm around Claire.
“Long day, huh?” She sagged into his shoulder, wrinkled her nose.

“You smell like grease,” she said smiling.

“You didn’t have to sit next to the driver,” Rye said, as he fished in his pocket for the keys to the door.

“What did the mechanic say about the Beast?”

He fumbled with the key in
the dark. “Said he’d give us a call tomorrow after he checked it out,
could be a week if he has to order anything.” He jiggled the front door
knob to get the key out, and shouldered the door open.

The lights from the clock
radio, computer, and the alarm dimly lighted the living room. The phone
machine light was blinking. Rye disarmed the house, thumbed the switch
that brought the two lamps to life and walked across the floor to check
the message; Claire bee-lined it to the bathroom.

The mirror fogged up as she
adjusted the water as hot as she could stand it, attempting to work the
knots out of her neck and shoulders. She desperately wanted to wash her
hair but found her scalp too sensitive.

“Damn, we need a bigger hot
water heater,” she yelled, practically leaping from the shower as the
water turned cold. She dried off, then wrapped only in a towel walked to
the bedroom, noting that Rye was on the phone. When she emerged
barefoot, in jeans and a T-shirt, he was just hanging up.

“Long phone call.”

Rye grimaced. “Jeff Olden. Better sit down for this.”

She plopped into her favorite chair, tucking her legs under her. “OK, you have my attention.”

Rye sat on the couch across from her. “You were right.”

She sat puzzled for just a heartbeat. “Oh shit. It’s Rusty isn’t it? Somebody came to claim the body and he wasn’t there.”

“Something like that. Olden has reduced our status until Rusty shows up.”

Claire was on her feet.
“Great, we’ll be answering every midnight call until they find him.” She
folded her arms. “The doctor broke procedure, Olden knows we can’t
argue with hospital staff.” She turned an accusing eye on Rye. “Did you
tell him about the doctor?”

He stood, took a step extending his arms. “Claire I…”