The Trouble With Murder (24 page)

“Are you okay?” he asked, his voice
tight.

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

I hit the highlights.

He turned to Frye. “Can I have a
couple minutes?”

Frye nodded and walked away.

Ellmann turned back to me. “I was
on my way over here,” he said. He sounded guilty, like he felt responsible. “I
stopped at my house to get a couple things. Then I was coming here. I should
have been here.”

“That wouldn’t have changed
anything.”

This was a reversal of the
conversation we’d had in my mother’s basement a few days ago. I’d felt guilty
for not being there when Stacy Karnes had needed help the most. Ellmann had
pointed out then that something similar or worse might have happened to me had
I been in the lobby when Stacy was attacked. Now I was telling him the same
thing, and it was true. If Ellmann had been in that room when the shooter had
come in, he could have been shot, or worse, much worse. For that reason, I was
glad he hadn’t been. I really did like Ellmann, a lot. I didn’t want anything
to happen to him. Still, I knew from personal experience this argument wasn’t
likely to lessen the guilt he was feeling.

He went to see about things, and I
finished my statement. Like anything else a person does over and over again, I
was getting pretty good at these things. I figured if this continued, I’d be able
to write an entire report in five minutes flat.

The body was removed, and the
coroner van departed. Troy and one of the other crime scene guys finished up in
the office and went to my room. Ellmann was moving around the parking lot,
talking to the other cops, interviewing witnesses, directing the activity. I
was beginning to wonder how long I should stay. The fire in my shoulder had
caused it to go numb, but that feeling was equally painful. The entire left
side of my upper body was stiff, and I could feel the blood running down my arm
and shoulder. Had the sweatshirt been a lighter color, it would have been
obviously saturated.

Ellmann started over toward me
again, and I decided to ask him about leaving. There was nothing else I could
do here, anyway. He was a few feet away when Troy emerged from the room and
called his name. He stopped and waited while Troy hurried up to him. The tech
held several little plastic baggies in his gloved hands, each containing small
bullet fragments. He held them up for Ellmann to see while he talked.

I realized I was swaying slightly.
I felt lightheaded, and the little black spots were back. I gripped the edge of
the tailgate to steady myself.

I listened as Troy explained the
problem. Basically, the bullets they’d pulled out of the wall were too damaged
to be useful. Something to do with the way the structure had been changed
during the remodel. Something had been added to the walls to help eliminate the
noise from other rooms. The point of the story was, it would be impossible to
determine if the bullets they’d found in my room were fired from the same gun
as the bullets recovered from Pezzani’s place or the restaurant.

“Actually,” I said, drawing their
attention. “There is one more bullet.”

They both looked worried when they
turned to me, and Ellmann hurried forward.

“What bullet?” he asked. “Zoe, you
don’t look well.”

I pushed the sweatshirt off my
shoulder as a particularly strong wave of dizziness swirled around me.

“This bullet,” I said.

Then I was falling. I remember the
terrified look on Ellmann’s face and nothing else. Just blackness.

I was in the lobby of Elizabeth Tower. Stacy was standing
beside me. We were facing a figure dressed in black, wearing a ski mask. The
figure’s eyes were as black as the mask. I didn’t know the shooter. I was
scared. Stacy was screaming.

I reached over and grabbed Stacy’s
arm. I wanted to push her out of the way. But the gun barked. Her body jerked
as bullets struck her: one, two, three. Suddenly her body was falling, her weight
pulling me with it to the floor. Blood poured out of her in dark red rivers. It
covered her body and the floor around us.

I sobbed, horrified. I clung to
Stacy’s body, unable to move, to run, to defend myself. I looked up, and the
shooter was standing over me. The gun was pointed directly at my forehead. I
heard another scream. Then someone was squeezing my hand. I looked down. Stacy
was gone. Ellmann was beside me.

Gasping, I came fully awake and
tried to throw myself backward, away from the threat that didn’t, at that
moment, exist outside my dreams. My chest heaved as I sucked in air and sweat
ran down my face.

“It was just a dream,” Ellmann
said, squeezing my hand. He reached his other hand out to touch me then
hesitated. I could only imagine the look on my face.

It was daylight. I could feel a
horrible pain just out of reach under the numbness brought on by narcotics.
Normally, such medications clouded my thinking, causing me to feel the
constant, inviting tug of unconsciousness. But the adrenaline that had been
dumped into my bloodstream by fear temporarily countered that side effect.

I could feel the worry radiating
from Ellmann. I tried to slow my breathing. To satisfy myself I was safe, I had
a look around. I saw enough to tell me I was in a hospital. I tried to sit up,
but the movement only caused the pain to reach right through the buffer layer
of numbness and bite me. I winced and lay flat.

“Don’t try to move. Here.” Ellmann
reached out and pressed a finger to a button I couldn’t see. The head of the
bed began to rise. “There’s no one else here.”

He was right; the room was empty.
My breathing was returning to normal. The fear was receding. Ellmann sat with
me, patiently holding my hand.

After a few minutes, the
pharmaceutical barrier was back in place, and the pain had subsided. As the
adrenaline burned off, the foggy effect of the narcotics moved in. I rolled my
head to the right and saw Ellmann. Even in my drugged state, I could see he
didn’t look good. His eyes were bloodshot and ringed by the dark circles of
fatigue. His hair was a mess, he hadn’t shaved, and he was wearing the same
clothes as he had the day before. I saw dark red stains on his t-shirt and knew
what they were.

I squeezed his hand, then pulled
mine away and lifted it to my left shoulder. Under the blanket, I saw a clean
white gauze dressing. I picked at the tape, ignoring Ellmann’s protests, and
peeled up one side of the bandage. I saw the orange stain Betadine leaves
behind and lots of black stitches.

“What time is it?” I asked. My
throat was hoarse. No doubt from being intubated.

“A little after eleven.”

I’d had surgery. Ellmann, no doubt,
had been up and by my side every minute since I’d collapsed in the parking lot.

“When was my last dose of
narcotics?” I asked.

“I think you got a dose this
morning, a couple hours ago. Why? Do you need more?” He reached out toward the
call button.

“No,” I said quickly. “I can’t have
anymore. I may have to work today.”

“Work?”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you. I
got a job at King Soopers. If I didn’t actually get fired last night, I need to
work.”

He rubbed a hand over his face then
back through his hair.

“Zoe, you’ve been shot. You just
got out of surgery. Forget about work.”

“I don’t want to get fired for
real. Getting fired from two jobs in a week is excessive.”

“You didn’t actually get fired the
first time, and I think your boss will understand in this case.”

I reached up for the IV and thumbed
the line closed. I twisted the line free from the buff cap in the back of my
hand. Then I punched the call button for the nurse.

It helped to be awake and moving.
The numbness was lessening, and I felt the drug beginning to lose its affect
again. I threw the blanket back, against Ellmann’s wishes, and struggled to sit
on the side of the bed.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“I have to pee.”

“You have a catheter.”

“Oh.”

A motherly-looking woman with
graying brown hair came into the room. She looked surprised and worried to find
me sitting up, half out of bed, the IV disconnected. The syringe pump on the IV
pole had begun to alarm, no doubt alerting staff to a malfunction caused by the
interrupted flow. She hustled around the bed and fussed with the pump until it
was quiet.

“What do you think you’re doing?”
she scolded. I noticed there was still caring and love in her tone. She was
probably a wonderful mother. I’ve never been scolded out of love or affection,
and I think people who have are very lucky.

“I was going to go pee.”

“You have a catheter,” she said.

“I know that now. But it took so much
work to sit up, I didn’t want to just lie down again.”

“Did you unhook this IV?”

“Yes. No more narcotics.”

“There’s an antibiotic in this. You
need that.”

“Are there also narcotics?”

“Well, yes, but—”

“I’ll take antibiotics, but no more
narcotics. Can I see the doctor, please?” 

The woman looked at me.

“I’d like to leave,” I said. “I’m
guessing that sort of thing has to go through a doctor.”

“Oh, my word,” she said. “You’ve
been shot! Why on earth do you want to leave? You need to rest. You need medication.”

“I’ll take the medication and rest
at home. I have a thing about hospitals.”

An hour later, after threatening to
sign out against medical advice, the doctor was finally paged. He arrived half
an hour later. Tall, stocky, balding on the crown of his head, he wore glasses
on his nose, corduroy pants, and a white lab coat.
dr. eugene allen
was embroidered on the jacket, just above
the pocket. He strolled into the room and took up a seat on the end of the bed.
He shook hands with Ellmann then turned to me.

“I’m Dr. Allen,” he said, offering
me his hand. “We didn’t get a chance to be formally introduced when I saw you
earlier.”

“It’s nice to meet you.”

“And you. I’m glad to see you
awake. So awake, in fact, I hear you want to leave.”

“I’d like to recuperate at home, in
my own space.” Never mind the fact I didn’t actually have a home at the moment.
“I have a thing about hospitals.”

Allen leaned toward me. “Me, too,”
he whispered. Then he chuckled.

I couldn’t help a smile.

“Is there any real reason I should
stay here?”

“We typically like to keep patients
like yourself for twenty-four hours or so for observation. But there are no
hard or fast rules about this sort of thing. If you’re feeling up to it, I
don’t see any reason why you can’t rest at home. Of course, I’ll need to see
you in my office first thing Monday morning. I’ll have an appointment made for
you.”

“That sounds fine.”

“If you have any problems, any at
all, in the meantime, don’t hesitate to call my service and have me paged.
Okay?”

I agreed, and he left. He returned
twenty minutes later with the nurse and handed me his card.

“Eight o’clock Monday morning in my
office,” he said. “The address is on the card there.”

Fifteen minutes later, Ellmann
pushed me down the hall and to the front lobby, then instructed me to stay put
while he went and got the car. I was too drained to argue. I was exactly where
he’d left me when he returned. He helped me into the front seat of the Charger
then left the wheelchair with an elderly volunteer.

_______________

Ellmann’s house is huge and not what I pictured for him at
all. Located off Timberline, south of Harmony, the neighborhood is deceptively
new looking. The mature trees in the yards are the only real indicator the
place has been around a while. That, and the occasionally dated design or
feature on some of the houses.

Ellmann pulled the Charger into the
driveway and raised the garage door. Inside, I could see an 80s-era Jeep
Wrangler parked beside a first-generation Camaro with the hood up. Turned out
Ellmann has great taste in cars.

The garage opened to a large tiled
mud- and laundry room. I followed Ellmann out of the mudroom and into a large
kitchen. It was all tile and marble and dark mahogany wood. And now that I was
inside, I could see the place was even bigger than it appeared from the
outside. How much were cops making these days?

The kitchen counters were empty,
with only a toaster and coffee maker visible. A dish drainer held a single bowl
and coffee mug. To the right, the kitchen opened into the rest of the house: a
large office, a spacious dining room, and a living room beyond that. A large
staircase led to the second floor. To the left, a short hallway led to the back
of the house and the master suite. This was where Ellmann took me.

The French doors were standing
open, the curtains closed. Ellmann went to the windows and opened the drapes.
Warm sunshine filled the space. The king-sized bed was made of oak and seemed
to fit Ellmann somehow. A large, worn recliner sat in one corner, a small table
beside it. An open doorway led to the bathroom and closet. My duffle bag sat on
the end of the bed.

“I grabbed a few of your things,”
Ellmann said. “I figured you’d want to take a shower.”

“I do. Thank you.” I paused. “You
know, I really appreciate everything, but I can’t stay here.”

He looked up at me. “I know. I had
the motel manager transfer you to a new room, and I moved the rest of your
stuff. I just brought you here because I need to do a couple things.” He walked
over to me and kissed my forehead.

“It can’t be a good idea for you to
be spending so much time with me. I’m the number one suspect in the cases
you’re working.”

“I’ll worry about that.”

Showered and dressed, my stuff
repacked, I left the bedroom and went to the office.

The office was located in front of
the house, the large windows overlooking the yard and street. There were two
sets of French doors, both of which were open. A large oak desk sat in one
corner with a desktop computer, printer, and other assorted office equipment
arranged on it. Ellmann was sitting in a leather chair, talking on the phone, a
couple files open in front of him. I went to the brown leather loveseat and sat
down. Well, mostly fell down. I lay down with my feet on one armrest, crossed
at the ankles.

I was just beginning to relax when
my phone rang. I dug it out of my pocket and answered.

“Would you be able to come in?”
Karen Lerman asked. “I think it will be easier to discuss things in person.”

She didn’t sound mad, but she
didn’t sound totally reassuring either.

“Sure,” I said. “I was planning to
be there for my shift anyway.”

“Great. See you then.”

I punched the phone off and dropped
it on the coffee table as Ellmann turned to look at me.

“What’s the word?”

“Report at four,” I said.

I saw the barely perceptible shake
of his head as he turned back to whatever he was doing.

Exhaustion pulled at me, and the
next thing I knew, Ellmann was shaking me gently and calling my name. I awoke
and found him sitting on the coffee table, his elbows on his knees.

“It’s close to three thirty,” he
said. “Did you still want to go to work?”

No. I felt like shit. What I really
wanted was to go back to sleep. “Yes.”

I groaned as I pushed myself up.
The last of the pain medicine had definitely worn off, and my entire upper body
was stiff. Ellmann helped me get the sling back in place and then drove me to
King Soopers. I was sweating by the time I got to the podium, and all I really
wanted to do as I clocked in was sit down. For the first time, I appreciated
just how long this shift was going to be.

The podium was unoccupied. I looked
around for someone wearing a black vest, then spotted a middle-aged man with
brown hair, warm brown eyes, and glasses. He was walking my way with Karen
beside him.

“What on Earth . . .” Karen began
when she got closer, her eyes wide. “Are you okay? What happened?”

I assured her I was fine then quickly
introduced myself to the man beside her, pulling her attention away from my
injuries.

His smile was genuinely friendly,
his handshake firm and confident. He introduced himself as Mike. I learned he
normally worked at the store on Timberline and Drake (my favorite of all Fort
Collins King Soopers locations) but was helping out here because of the current
staffing problem. I liked him immediately.

“If you’re ever in, find me and say
hi,” he said. “I’m not sure how long I’ll be helping out here, but I’ll be back
where I belong soon enough.” He chuckled.

“I might have to do that. It’s nice
meeting you.”

“Karen needs a quick word, then
hurry back. I don’t know much, but I’ll teach you what I do know about this
job.”

Smiling, almost lightheaded with
relief that I wasn’t working with Tony again, I fell in step with Karen and
followed her up to her appropriated office. I was slightly dizzy when I finally
collapsed into a chair beside her desk.

Our meeting was brief. She
confirmed Tony did not have the authority to fire me, and that his behavior the
night before “might have been” considered out of line. She’d arranged for him
to take a couple days off; he was obviously stressed. I asked if he would be
reprimanded, and she told me she’d contacted regional management for guidance
on what to do next. She was waiting to hear back. I left her office without
many definitive answers.