Ace of Spades (16 page)

         
Big foam stickers were slapped on Jackson’s chest by a third medic. The cords
ran to a small, portable device.
An AED
, Melody remembered that much,
but what the letters stood for was a different matter. The AED demanded
everyone stand clear as it analyzed Jackson’s heart rhythm. The medics stood
back.

         
The room fell silent as everyone waited for the AED’s verdict.

         
“No shock advised. Resume CPR,” the mechanical voice decreed.

         
The medics obediently complied, immediately diving back into chest
compressions. Melody’s pulse thundered in her ears, drowning out the sound of
their methodical counting. Time stood still, moving slowly from one freeze
frame moment to the next.
Pumping Jackson’s chest.
Forcing air into his lungs.
Placing a
breathing tube down his throat.
Stabbing a needle into
his arm.
Injecting medications into his vein.

         
The medics worked over his body with calm efficiency, as though a man’s life
didn’t hang in the balance. If only Melody could feel half their calm. But
Jackson didn’t matter to them, at least not the way he mattered to her.

         
“First round of
Epi’s
in,” the medic with the syringe
announced.

         
Melody prayed that meant something good. Precious minutes ticked by, each
feeling like the passing of a century. The AED contraption demanded clearance
again and everyone stepped back. The sight of Jackson, so lifeless and alone
chilled Melody to the bone.

         
“No shock advised. Resume CPR.”

         
More compressions, more breaths, more syringes full of medicine.
But no noticeable change in Jackson.
Melody’s heart sank
lower and lower in her chest with each passing second. Every minute that passed
was a minute closer to Jackson never coming back.

         
After three rounds of medications, the medics mumbled quietly amongst
themselves as they worked on Jackson. Mel overheard something about “H’s and T’s,”
whatever the hell that meant, then ‘overdose.’ One of them turned to her.

         
“Ma’am, what did he take?”

         
Mel shook her head from side to side. “I-I-I don’t know.” She chewed her bottom
lip as she thought. “Uh, h-he used to do heroin, but he quit.”

         
To his credit, the man didn’t snort, smirk, or even comment on her naiveté, but
gave her a grim nod instead.
“Anything else?”

         
“Not that I know of, but I-I thought he quit. H-h-he never seemed like he was
using.”

         
The medic frowned and turned to his cohorts administering CPR.

         
Words like ‘hyperdynamic substance’ and ‘poly-pharmacy’ were tossed around
between the medics, followed by ‘myocardial protective side effects,’ and ‘naloxone.’
Whatever all that gibberish meant, it wasn’t good, but it seemed to determine
their course of action.

         
The medic in charge of medications injected another medication into the hub in
Jackson’s arm as his teammate continued to compress Jackson’s chest.

         
“
Nalaxone
is in.”

         
Melody closed her eyes, held her breath, and waited. It felt like an eternity.

         
“We have a rhythm,” one of the medics declared.
“Sinus
tachycardia, about one-thirty.”

         
Melody let her breath out. She didn’t dare open her eyes, for fear she’d
imagined the words. Jackson had a heartbeat again. He wasn’t dead. He would
probably live long enough for her to kill him for going back on his word, the
lying son of a bitch.

         
Whatever they’d given Jackson had brought back his heartbeat, but not his full
respiratory drive or level of consciousness. The medics had won the battle, but
the drugs continued to win the unseen war. The medics continued to administer
rescue breaths as they loaded him onto a gurney.

         
Melody trailed behind them as they took him down the elevator and out to the
porte-cochere where their ambulance waited.

         
They loaded Jackson into the back and slammed the doors shut, limiting her view
of Jackson and the team caring for him. Mel craned her neck to see, longing to
stay at Jackson’s side. The remaining medic gave her a sympathetic grimace.

         
“You can follow us to Palm Heights Medical, ma’am,” he offered softly.

         
Melody gave him a grateful, albeit wan smile. “Thanks.”

         
“You’re welcome.” He rounded to the front of the ambulance and climbed in.

         
“Actually,” one of the police officers interjected, stepping forward with an
apologetic frown, “we need to ask you a few questions before you go.”

         
With a deep sigh, Mel turned to him. “Of course you do.”

         
It had been a long night and it was about to become a whole lot longer.

Chapter 15

heartbreaker

         
After
providing all of her useless answers regarding Jackson’s drug habits to the
police officers, Melody woke Zane and Lenny. The three of them headed up to Palm
Heights Medical Center. She needed to know that Jackson was okay. She needed
him to be whole again, so she could yell and throw things at him for going back
on his word.

         
She had so many unanswered questions. What was he thinking? How long had this
been going on? Did he really think she was
that
stupid?

         
Okay, she already knew the answer to that one. Clearly, she was
that
stupid,
because she hadn’t had a clue he’d been using
anything. She’d been ignorant in her bliss. Maybe the warning signs had been
there and she’d just been too blind to see them. Or maybe she hadn’t wanted to
see them. Maybe she’d wanted to believe so badly that Jackson would change for
her, that she’d ignored the signs.

         
Either way, the blindfold was off now. The truth was out in the open for
everyone to see. Jackson had changed alright. The Jackson she used to know
would never have lied to her, no matter how much he knew she’d hate the truth.
This new, lying Jackson was far from an improvement over the previous, much
more reliable model.

         
Zane edged the car up to the curb as the ambulance that had carried Jackson
away from his house pulled away from the ambulance bay. He must’ve been taken
inside already. The medics had made unreal time.
Sigh.
What Melody would
give to have lights and sirens, especially in California
traffic.

         
Circling like vultures around a fresh carcass, reporters with their microphones
and cameras converged on her. Lenny shielded her as best he could, but they
were relentless. They barked questions at her, which she effectively ignored as
she stumbled past them like a zombie on autopilot into the Emergency Room.

         
Melody came to a halt before the receptionist behind the triage window. The
woman heaved a weary sigh, as though the fact someone had the nerve to come
into her emergency department seeking help was an unbearable burden. She glared
at Melody through the glass.

         
“May I help you?”

         
“Yes, I’m here to see Jackson
Blackner
.”

         
The woman tapped the letters of her keyboard, glanced at her screen, then back
up at Melody with a bored look. “I’m sorry, but we don’t have any patients
registered under that name.” 

         
“He’s here. I know he is. I was there when the paramedics picked him up,”
Melody insisted.

         
“Be that as it may, I have no record of a Jackson
Blackner
checking in as a patient,” the woman explained rationally, her tone implying
that Melody was being far from rational. 

         
“Bull shit.” Melody crossed her arms over her chest and stood her ground. Let
the woman call security on her. Shit-icing on the cow-pie of a cake her night
had already been.
Bring it.

         
The woman heaved an exasperated sigh. “Even if he were here, Ma’am, a high
profile patient such as Mr.
Blackner
would be
registered under an assigned alias with a ‘no information’ status.”

         
Melody gaped at the woman in exasperation. “So, he
is
here.”

         
“I’m not at liberty to say. However, if he were here, his next of kin would be
notified.”

         
Melody wanted to tear her hair out. She wanted to scream that Jackson had no
next of kin. That she was the only family he had. How could she explain her
relationship with him to a stranger though? Best friend?
Girlfriend?
Lover?
On paper, she was just an employee.
Wait.
An employee with a signed power of attorney.

         
“I have a signed power of attorney, giving me full authorization to act on Mr.
Blackner’s
behalf,” Melody blurted out in a rush of words,
hoping it was enough to get through Stonewall Receptionist.

         
The woman studied Melody through narrowed eyes.
“Oh, really?”

         
The dam of tears and raging emotion threatened to burst beneath the stranger’s
apathy. Mel had held it together thus far, but she made no promises if she didn’t
see Jackson soon.

         
“Damn it, lady,” Mel snarled.
“Enough of this.
My best
friend nearly died in front of me. I need to know that he’s alright. You can
stand here and argue with me all night, but I’m not leaving until someone tells
me what is going on.”

         
It was a battle of wills, waged in the form of a staring contest, as the woman
silently measured Mel’s resolve and Melody refused to back down.

         
“Very well.
Just a minute.”
The
woman picked up the phone receiver on the desk in front of her, dialed a
number, and waited.  “This is
Santanna
. I have a
visitor here at triage for the medical code that came in via ambulance.” Pause.
“
Mmhmm
, the twenty-four-year-old
male, ZZZ-Blue Mustang-ZZZ.”
Pause. “Thanks. I’ll let her know.”

         
The woman returned the receiver to its cradle and glared up at Melody. “The
social worker will be out in a moment to speak with you. Have a seat over
there.” She indicated the row of chairs lining the back wall of the adjacent
waiting room.

         
Melody couldn’t repress a sardonic smile and an acerbic retort. “See? Was that
really so hard?”

         
The woman ignored her.
“Next in line.”

         
Melody let it go, heading for an open seat in the waiting area, Lenny trailing
behind her. Waiting patients hacked and coughed around them, giving Mel the
heebie-jeebies. Though the place was immaculately clean, it still felt dirty,
as though unseen germs crawled on every surface. She’d need a long, hot shower
to decontaminate after hanging out in this melting pot of disease.

         
Time dragged by like a monster truck hauled behind a tricycle as she and Lenny
waited in deafening silence. After she’d played through every possible
nightmare of a scenario Jackson’s overdose could result in and had been coughed
on enough times that she’d need to bathe in bleach to get the cooties off her
skin, Melody thought she’d lose her mind before someone ever came to help her.

         
But at last, a man who might actually be the social worker burst through the
locked double doors of the Emergency Room. The petite older gentleman, with a
full head of cropped white hair and friendly eyes behind thin-framed glasses,
stepped out into the waiting area and glanced around. His shrewd gaze settled
on Melody.

         
Maybe her puffy eyes and defeated expression were a dead giveaway. Regardless,
her face must’ve announced ‘woman on the edge’ like a Las Vegas sign. For the
man quickly strode toward her with a reassuring smile.

         
“Have you been helped, Miss?”

         
Mel cleared her throat. “Um, yes, I’m waiting to speak to the social worker
about my friend, Jackson
Blackner
.”

         
“Well, that would be me. I’m Jim, the social worker on in the emergency
department tonight,” he offered with an extended hand.

         
Accepting his hand, Melody shook it and gave him a weak smile.
“Melody Davis, Jackson’s friend and business manager.”

         
“So you’re not family?”

         
Melody prepared for another concrete roadblock to be thrown in her way. The
last thing she needed was for this man to refuse to help her too.

         
“Yes. I mean, no. I mean, well, sort of,” she stumbled, not sure how to explain
where she fell in the scheme of Jackson’s jacked up life. “His father is dead
and he’s estranged from his mother. He has no siblings, no wife, and no kids.
We’ve been friends forever and I’m the closest thing he has to a family.”       

         
“Certainly you understand, Miss Davis, that when people of Mr.
Blackner’s
notoriety come to the hospital, extra
precautions must be taken to protect their privacy from curious bystanders as
well as the media.”

         
Round and round they would go then. Melody sighed. “I’m not just a curious fan
or even a concerned friend. And I’m sure as hell not from the media. I’m---”
She stalled. Friend didn’t quite cut it. Girlfriend didn’t sound right. And
lover sounded outright scandalous.

         
“--- the person Mr.
Blackner
has designated to act on
his behalf when he is incapacitated.” That sounded way too official and
uninvolved to Mel, but maybe it would crack through the shell of these hospital
bureaucrats and their damn privacy rules.

         
One snowy brow arched in question, intrigued. “Do you have documentation to
prove this?”

         
Mel fished the creased legal document from her purse, unfolded the wad of
paper, smoothed the seams in the pages, and held them out for the man’s
inspection. “See? Jackson
Blackner
gave me power of
attorney to act on his behalf.”

         
Jim studied the black and white print of the legal document
Grimms
had provided her a copy of,
then
turned back to
Melody.
“Very well.
Follow me.”

         
Halle-freaking-
lujah
.

         
Lenny nodded at Melody, resuming his seat amid the afflicted patrons. “I’ll be
right out here if you need me, Little Red.”

         
Scanning his badge against the card reader, Jim opened the double doors and led
Melody into the Emergency Room. The department around her bustled with life. Phones
rang and nurses chatted as they skirted back and forth between rooms. Machines
chirped and babies cried. Soaking it all in like a sponge dumped in a bucket of
cold water, Melody trailed behind Jim. They came to a stop outside of another
set of broad double doors, these marked ‘resuscitation.’ Jim turned to her, his
lips in a grim line.

         
“I apologize for the run around, Miss Davis, but we were only trying to protect
the privacy of our patients.”

         
“I understand,” Melody said, even though she wanted to be completely irrational
about the whole thing.

         
“We would’ve just asked Mr.
Blackner
if he wanted us
to divulge information to you, but he’s not in a position to give consent at
this time,” he explained quietly, nodding in greeting as a doctor passed by
them.

         
“What do you mean?” Melody choked out, panic rising like a buoy in her chest to
occlude her throat. She couldn’t breathe. “Is he okay?”

         
“He should be,” Jim said with a reassuring smile. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to
worry you. It’s just that Mr.
Blackner
has been a bit…
less than cooperative after his last dose of
nalaxone
.”

         
Melody studied him from beneath furrowed brows.
“How so?”

         
A
loud
thump rattled the door of the resuscitation room. Something metal
clattered to the floor beyond the door. A man shouted and cursed at the top of
his lungs and a woman tried to reason with him in a stern tone. The male voice
was Jackson’s, but the tone was one Mel had never heard before. He was out of
control.

         
Mel gaped at Jim. “Oh.”

         
Jim gave her a knowing smile. “Don’t worry. Most of them come out fighting mad
after the
nalaxone
kicks in. Do you want to see him?”

         
“Yes, but you may want to call security first,” Melody warned as she shifted
closer to the door.

         
“That shouldn’t be necessary,” Jim said quietly, offering her a reassuring
half-smile in response to her arched brow. “Mr.
Blackner
became combative after the larger dose of naloxone reversed the effects of the
opiates. He had to be restrained for the safety of himself and the staff.”

         
Melody returned his smile with a wry one of her own. “I meant to protect him
from me. That man is in deep shit.”

         
Jim chuckled. “Maybe the nurse should untie him, give the poor fellow a
fighting chance.”

         
“He made this mess, he can live with the consequences,” Melody shrugged. “Don’t
worry. I’ll try not to kill him.”

         
“That would be great. The hospital frowns on the murder of its patients, even
when it’s justified.”

         
“Oh, it’s justified alright.” Mel gave him a rueful smile, feeling numb from
the overwhelming shock of emotions she’d survived in the last hour.

         
Jim gave a sage nod. “I believe it just might be.” His brow furrowed with
concern. “I know it’s not my place, but as someone who has dealt with a lot of
junkies over the years, I’d like to share a little piece of advice -- get as
far away from that young man as you can. He’s quicksand and men like him don’t
change.