Page 81 of The Burning

I’m trying to decide if I should put my coat on over the gown I’m wearing or slip back into my blood-spattered uniform shirt when the curtain is yanked open. I look up to see Tomasetti enter. He slows as his eyes sweep over me. I try not to squirm beneath the weight of his stare, and I resist the urge to raise my hand to cover my throat. I can tell by his expression that he’s already seen the damage.

“Did they get him?” I ask.

“Dogs lost him in the woods,” he tells me. “There were tracks. Looks like someone picked him up.”

“So, there were two people involved.” It’s not a question.

“Evidently.”

“Tomasetti, there’s no way he had time to call someone. There’s no way someone could have gotten there so fast. It had to have been planned.”

Tomasetti’s not listening. Shaking his head, he crosses to me, eyes on mine. Not quite angry, but unhappy with me nonetheless. “Kate, what the hell…”

“I’m okay.”

“I can see that,” he says dryly. His anger shows as he gets a better look at the bruises and the bloodstains on my trousers.

I hate it that I’m finding it difficult to hold his gaze. That I feel as if this were somehow my fault.

I try to steady my hands. I can’t help thinking about how this scenario might’ve played out if I hadn’t had that knife. Or if the son of a bitch who ambushed me had decided to use the .38 instead of running. That Tomasetti might have been making a trip to the basement instead of the ER.

“I’m sorry,” I finally manage.

“I know you are.” He practically snarls the words.

“I didn’t—”

He cuts me off. “How many times am I going to walk into this ER and find you bloodied and beaten and cracking jokes like some twenty-year-old fucking rookie?”

Angry, I snap at him, “Cut it out.”

I know he loves me and doesn’t want to lose me to violence, the way he lost his family years before. But I feel the need to remind him that I had no choice in the matter. I was doing my job and sometimes that’s the way it goes.

The silence that follows seems to cool the temperature a bit.

“Did you recognize him?” he asks.

“He was in the back seat, waiting for me. Once I realized he was there, things happened fast.” I’m not sure what it means that both of us are more comfortable dealing with this in terms of our jobs rather than our roles as husband and wife. I think there might be a lesson in there.

“Any chance you got him when you fired your weapon?”

“He didn’t react,” I say. “I don’t think so.”

“Same guy from before?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” I say. “One thing I do know is that I did not leave the Explorer unlocked when I was inside the Heritage Center.”

“I know you didn’t.”

It’s not the response I expected. “You do?”

He nods. “Mona found what’s called an ‘air wedge’ in the parking lot.”

“I have no clue what that is.”

“An air wedge is a tool used by burglars to gain access to vehicles. It’s basically a flat, heavy-duty balloon they stuff into the opening between the door and the frame. They pump up the balloon, which gives them enough space to use a reach tool to either unlock the door or roll down the window.”

“Odd tool for your everyday average Joe to have in his back pocket.”