Page 9 of Outsider

Her voice is rougher than I remember. Weak despite the echo of the old attitude I used to admire back when I was too young, too naive, to know better. I don’t know what to say to her. Or how to feel. I can’t stop looking at her. I can’t believe she’s here in Painters Mill. That we didn’t part on good terms adds an uncomfortable dimension to all of it.

Her entire body quakes beneath the quilt. Her teeth chatter uncontrollably. Her complexion is shockingly pale, her lips tinged with blue. Her hair is wet. My EMT training kicks in. I look at Adam. “We need blankets. A dry towel. And hot tea, if you have it.”

Nodding, he leaves the room.

“Get me … electric blanket,” she says.

“How long were you out in the cold?” I ask.

“Not sure. A few hours. Too damn long.”

“You’re hypothermic. I’ll get you warmed up and then we need to get you to the hospital.”

“No … hospital,” she says between bursts of shivering.

I look down at the smear of blood on the floor. “You’re bleeding. Were you injured in the crash? How badly are you hurt?” In the back of my mind I acknowledge the possibility that if she’s seriously hypothermic, she may not know or remember. Confusion is a common manifestation of hypothermia.

“Airbag got me in the face, gave me a bloody nose,” she says. “That’s all. I’m fine.”

Something in the way she’s looking at me gives me pause, gives credence to the odd sense that something isn’t quite right with all this.

“We’ve got serious weather on the way,” I tell her. “Ambulances won’t be running long. I can get you to the hospital, but we need to leave now. I suggest you take me up on the offer because we may not be able to get out later.”

“Kate, I’m fine.” When I don’t respond, she musters a weak grin. “For God’s sake … I just … need to warm up.”

I turn to see Adam standing at the door, several folded blankets and a ratty bath towel in his arms. “The girls are making hot tea,” he tells me, his eyes flicking to Gina.

“Good. Thanks.” I take the blankets. As I drape them over Gina, I try not to notice the way her arms and legs are shaking beneath the quilt. The unsettling blue hue of her lips. The way she keeps clenching her teeth to keep them from chattering.

“Hair’s wet,” I tell her. “We need to get you dry. Are your clothes dry?”

“They’re … fine.”

“Can you sit up?”

“Yep.” Face contorting as if she’s in pain, she manages and reaches for the towel. “I can do it.”

I let her, trying not to notice the paleness of her hand, that she’s weak and doing her damnedest to pretend otherwise.

While she scrubs her hair dry with the towel, I tuck the blankets beneath her legs and layer yet another over her. “So what happened?” I ask. “What are you doing here?”

“I didn’t know we were in for this kind of weather. It was dark and snowing like crazy. I couldn’t see. Ran off the damn road and hit a tree.”

“Airbags deployed?”

“I told you they did.”

I nod. “Where were you headed?”

She hands me the towel. “To see you.”

“A heads-up would have been nice.”

“Yeah, well, hindsight.”

We stare at each other a full minute, minds working, neither of us speaking. “Are you still with Columbus Division of Police?” I ask.

“Last time I checked.”