The Girl Next Door (26 page)

I got as close to her as I dared without jostling her, then made myself very still. I couldn’t see any breathing, so I reached out toward her arm, which was splayed on the dirt, and grabbed her wrist to check her pulse. To my relief, I could feel a small thumping—weak but extant. Then I looked at her chest and saw it rising and falling slightly beneath that summer dress.

My next concern was the blood. There seemed to be a lot of it, too much of it. I couldn’t tell where it was coming from, and I didn’t dare touch her. I tried as best I could to get close to her scalp and see if I could locate the wound, but all I could see was wet, blood-matted hair.

It was about that time I heard the first siren. Then I heard several. They were crying out at varying pitches and rhythms, everything from the long, low fire engine’s blast to the short bleep-blipping of an ambulance. We had to be the only emergency in Bloomfield that night because they seemed to be coming from everywhere. I grabbed Nikki’s hand.

“Help’s coming,” I said. “Just hang with me.”

The ambulance got there first. A short, stout guy and a tall, thin guy, both in tight T-shirts and multipocketed pants, hopped out of the back of the truck, with one of them carrying a duffel bag laden with even more pockets. I released Nikki’s hand, stood up, and shouted, “Over here, she’s over here.”

“What’s going on?” the short one asked, as he walked up my lawn.

“A car tried to hit us,” I said. “I had to push us out of the way and she hit her head.”

The short guy glanced at his partner and they shared some silent agreement on the subject—something along the lines of,
Sounds like the worst excuse for domestic violence we’ve ever heard, but let the cops sort it out
.

“She’s breathing and has a pulse,” I continued, trying to be helpful. “But she’s bleeding from the head. I tried not to move her.”

“What’s her name?” the second one asked.

“Nikki.”

“Nikki, are you okay?” he started yelling. “Nikki, are you there?”

She was about as chatty with them as she was with me. So they got to work, stabilizing her neck, rolling her onto a backboard, mauling my shrubs in the process. One of them started raking his knuckle down her sternum, which looked like it must have hurt like hell. I couldn’t discern the medical purpose of it—unless they were now encouraging torture in CPR—but Nikki didn’t stir.

A second ambulance had showed up by this point, as had a fire truck. I kept getting shoved farther out of the way. I could see they had gotten a breathing mask on her face and a collar on her neck. They seemed to be doing other stuff, too, I just I couldn’t tell what. Then they lifted her into the back of the ambulance.

I was just sort of tagging along at that point, and they weren’t paying much attention to me until the tall guy turned and said, “We’re taking her to Mountainside if you want to follow us in your own vehicle. Just don’t follow too close. Nikki doesn’t need any more trauma right now.”

*   *   *

The next few hours at Mountainside Hospital were a blur of antiseptic corridors, stiff-backed waiting room chairs, interrupted naps, and at least two less-than-fun conversations.

The first was with a lady from the admissions staff, to whom I had to explain that I knew next to nothing about the young lady I had accompanied to the hospital. No, I didn’t know her address. No, I wasn’t sure if she had insurance. No, I didn’t know how to contact her next of kin. No, I wasn’t really her boyfriend. Before long, the woman had decided I was some guy who hired a hooker, then decided to throw her around a bit, and so she was treating me with all the warmth and kindness you might expect.

The next uncomfortable chat was with a pair of young Bloomfield cops, who came to ask me questions. I told them what happened, giving them as many details as I could—which, admittedly, were quite few. They were noticeably unimpressed by my version of the events and were debating whether to arrest me or just take me out back and rough me up a bit. Guys who hurt nice girls like Nikki are not looked upon fondly by the law enforcement community.

The only thing that saved me was my insistence they would find tire marks on my lawn. I also dropped the name of Detective Owen Smiley at least four times, promising he would vouch that I wasn’t a total scum bucket. They still weren’t entirely convinced, but they eventually left me alone, making vague noises about how I shouldn’t go on any extended trips, in case they had more questions. They never asked if I thought someone might be trying to hurt me, which was probably good. It would have been tough explaining that one of the potential suspects was the injured girl’s father.

Sometime toward dawn, Nikki was considered stabilized enough that I was allowed to enter her room. I glanced at her, lying sedately with gauze wrapped around her head, but mostly had to focus my attention on a guy in blue scrubs who didn’t introduce himself but was likely a doctor. He had that full-of-himself air about him.

He explained to me what I probably could have figured out myself: Nikki had sustained what he called a “mild traumatic brain injury” (what they used to call a “concussion”) and might be out for a few more hours. The gash on her head turned out to be superficial. It just bled like crazy, as head wounds tend to do. They had given her an MRI and determined there was no “intracranial hemorrhaging” (what they used to call “bleeding”) or “cerebral contusions” (what they used to call “bruises”) inside her skull. Her respiration was fine, her oxygen level was adequate, her blood pressure had started a little low but was improving. When she came to, she might be disoriented, confused, or suffer from short-term memory loss. But even if she seemed fine, I should summon a nurse.

The doctor asked if I had any questions, but he was already inching out of the room, so I let him go. I didn’t need medical science to explain to me that Nikki had bumped her head. Bad. And she needed some time to rest and give her body a chance to make itself better.

I pulled a chair next to Nikki’s bed and held her hand for a while, because it felt like the hospital thing to do. Then I thought maybe I should talk to her a little bit. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do with people who have lost consciousness? Give their brain a little bit of something to chew on in hopes you could make it hungry for more?

“You looked beautiful tonight,” I said, sounding hoarse and throaty. “I was planning on telling you that when we got into my house, but I sort of got interrupted.”

I looked at her, her chest rising and falling steadily, her color surprisingly good. Then again, she was Greek and this was the middle of the summer, so I suppose that shouldn’t have been quite so remarkable. I stroked her hand a little bit.

“That SUV that tried to run us over is probably the same one that got Nancy. I didn’t really get a look at it. Or the driver. But I think I know who’s behind it.”

And it might be someone you know pretty darn well,
I thought. But that hardly seemed the right thing to say to whatever small part of Nikki was still processing information.

She breathed some more. I babbled some more.

“You have to understand, I’m coming out of this
thing
—I’m not even sure I could call it a relationship—with someone who was basically my boss,” I continued. “It was pretty messed up already. And then she fired me. Yeah, I got fired yesterday. I didn’t want to tell you that. Because what girl wants to think she’s on a date with some unemployed loser? So I guess you could say it’s over now. The relationship. My job. Yeah, all of it is over.

“Anyhow, I don’t think this thing with you and me is some kind of rebound situation. But it might be. I probably should have warned you about that. I usually try to be up front about my emotional baggage. But you were so nice to talk to. And you looked so damn hot in that dress with that little tie on the side. It’s like you were some kind of present, and all I wanted to do was pull the string and unwrap it so I could see what was inside.”

I looked over at the clock. It was quarter past five in the morning.

“Oh yeah, and I’m sorry I tackled you,” I said. “You should know I’m generally not that rough with women.”

Suddenly, a smile crept across her face, and she croaked out, “That’s too bad.”

“Nikki? Nikki! Are you awake?” I said, standing up, as if I was in the presence of a miracle. I had never been around a person as they regained consciousness—or around someone who lost it, for that matter—but it had the feeling of rebirth. She coughed and opened her eyes.

“I actually woke up when the doctor was still in here,” she said in a stronger voice. “But you guys didn’t notice. And then I just sort of felt like resting for a while.”

“So you, uhh, heard everything I said just now, huh?”

“It’s fine. I’m glad you liked my dress.”

I felt my face getting red.

“And sorry you lost your job,” she continued. “You don’t have to feel bad about that. It doesn’t matter to me.”

“Yeah, about all that rebound stuff…”

“Don’t worry about it. It was just a first date.”

“And
some
date it’s been,” I said, gesturing to the surroundings. “I want you to know, I don’t take just
any
babe to a classy joint like this.”

She smiled and closed her eyes again. I took her hand and let her relax for a while.

“Nancy’s funeral is this morning,” she said, her eyelids still shut.

“Yeah, I guess it is.”

“I want to go.”

“I’m not sure that’s the best idea. In any event, I don’t think they’re going to let you out of here.”

Her eyelids opened, and she fixed those two lovely green eyes on me.

“Can you go for me? Tell her I’m sorry I couldn’t make it.”

I patted her hand and assured her I would. It seemed to be the least I could do.

*   *   *

I fetched the nurse, who did the necessary poking, prodding, and assessing, then left us in peace. Mostly, I just hung around as Nikki dozed. I might have caught a small nap myself, bringing my evening’s sleep to a grand total of perhaps three hours. Then I had to go home and ready myself for a funeral.

When I returned to my house in daylight, it was difficult to tell what might have happened there the night before. I expected the SUV would have left deep, vivid tracks. But it had been so dry and the ground was so hard, it was difficult to make out where it had been. The trampling of my lawn and shrubbery was more from the EMTs than anything else.

Upon entering my front door, I was greeted by Deadline, who had not been affected by the previous evening’s folderol, except for one important disruption to his daily routine: he hadn’t gotten his morning kibble. And he was rather frantic about this. He took one glance at me, walking in the front door, then ran to his food bowl in the kitchen. When he realized I wasn’t getting the hint, he came back and looked up at me, impatiently, as I thumbed through some mail. Then he dashed to the kitchen, because clearly I would fall in line and follow this time. He returned again, his anguish so pronounced—
why doesn’t this moron take the hint?
—that I finally walked toward the kitchen to remedy the situation.

That’s when I noticed Deadline was leaving bloody paw prints on the hardwood floor. There were three distinct sets of tracks—one for each trip—and I followed them into the kitchen, where they became even more vivid on the off-white tile.

Then I saw a brick, sitting in the middle of the room. There was broken glass scattered all about, which explained why my cat was bleeding. A strip of paper was wrapped around the brick.

“Oh, what the…” I started to say.

But I interrupted myself. The paper had block lettering on it:

MESSAGE FOR CARTER ROSS

Deadline, sitting by his food bowl, let out an urgent meow. I walked over to him, crunching on the broken glass, and scooped him up so he couldn’t frolic through any more of the wreckage. He allowed me to inspect his paw, which had a small cut in one of the pads. I know even less about feline first aid than I do about human first aid, but the wound didn’t seem mortal.

Nevertheless, I couldn’t have my cat bleeding all over the place. The police were probably already looking at me hard for assault and battery. I didn’t need to add animal cruelty to my booking.

I dumped some food in the bowl, then took it and the cat into the bathroom, where I unrolled a length of toilet paper and wrapped it as tightly as I could around his bloody paw. Then I set him down and observed. He attacked the kibble, unconcerned about his injury, so I closed him in the bathroom and returned to the mess in the kitchen.

The brick looked old and well used, like it had been tossed around a lot in its day. The paper, which appeared to have been torn off a standard 8½-by-11 sheet, had been tied tightly to the brick with two pieces of twine—one lengthwise, one widthwise—in a very neat, tidy little package.

I bent down and studied the “
MESSAGE FOR CARTER ROSS
” up close. The lettering seemed to be self-consciously anonymous, as though the writer wanted to make sure it could not later be identified by a handwriting expert. It had been done in black ink, probably a disposable ballpoint pen.

“You couldn’t have just sent me an e-mail?” I said out loud.

Picking up the brick, I pulled on the first string, then the second, then the third, letting the twine fall to the floor. I unfurled the paper and turned it over to find the same block writing on the backside:

BACK OFF. OR YOUR NEXT.

I stood there for perhaps a minute, brick in one hand, note in the other. Oddly, what really bothered me about it was not that they had brought my cat into this fight or that I had to replace a broken kitchen window. It was that either Jackman—or Gus Papadopolous, or the rent-a-goon they were using—didn’t know the difference between “your” and “you’re.” It’s one thing to be threatened. It’s quite another thing to be threatened in grammatically incorrect fashion. I felt like some basic right as a literate American had been violated. I folded the note and tucked it in my notepad.

So, obviously, the drive-by had been a scare tactic, with the ol’ brick-through-the-window routine tossed in to make sure I didn’t miss the message. What I couldn’t figure out is why I was being left alive at all. Whoever I was dealing with didn’t place much value on human life. Maybe he just couldn’t figure out a way to kill me and make it look like an accident, and he thought frightening me off the story would accomplish the same purpose.