Rapid Fire (17 page)

The blood
froze in Maya’s veins and the air fled from her lungs. A massive, leadlike
weight pressed on her chest.

He didn’t
know. He couldn’t know.

Could he?

“I take
it you have a theory?” Thorne asked. His expression remained cool and closed.

“An
observation, at the very least. My investigators looked into her background and
found a few details I intend to pass on to your chief when I feel the time is
right.” The lawyer, Pennington, stood in the shadows behind his client,
creating an odd juxtaposition of dark and light between the two men.

“Officer
Cooper’s past is her own business,” Thorne said coolly. “I’m sure the chief
already has all the relevant information.”

He
thought Henkes was talking about her drinking, Maya knew. He didn’t realize
there was more. She reached out and touched his sleeve. “We should go.”

“You’re
right.” Thorne turned away, but Henkes’s voice called them back.

“Ask her
about the accident, Officer Coleridge. Ask her about the dead boy. And then ask
yourself whether that explains anything.”

Thorne
didn’t react, didn’t turn back or demand an explanation. He shot Maya a tight,
angry glare and said, “Get in the car.”

He had
the engine revving before she dropped into the passenger’s seat, had the
Interceptor rolling before she got the door closed. She thought he would ask
her about it once they reached the open road, where driving would give him an
outlet for the restless, angry energy emanating from him.

Instead,
he pulled over to the side of the road once they were clear of the Henkes
mansion. He slammed on the brakes and turned to face her full-on. “Talk.”

After a
long, agonizing heartbeat, Maya opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

How could
she talk about it? How could she explain?

She
swallowed and forced the words past the knot in her throat. “I’m sorry. I
should have told you sooner.”

“Damn
right.” His expression was furious. Uncompromising. “Tell me now, so I know
what we’re dealing with.” When she didn’t respond right away, he said, “Damn
it, Maya! If you’ve been withholding information that could make the PD look
bad—”

“No, I
wasn’t!” She paused. “Not intentionally, anyway. I just didn’t think it was
relevant.”

Thorne
scowled. “Apparently, Henkes does. So spill it.”

“I was
married the day after my eighteenth birthday,” Maya said, then paused,
surprised when the pressure on her chest shifted to let her breathe more
easily. Emboldened, she continued, “My parents approved the match—albeit
reluctantly—because Dane was older and made a good living as a journalist. They
thought he could control me the way they hadn’t been able to. They figured once
I was a married woman, I wouldn’t be able to sneak out and party anymore.”

“You told
me about it,” Thorne said unexpectedly. “That night at the academy, you told me
about your marriage, how the only thing that changed was that the parties came
home. You and your husband. His friends. One big bash. Then you started crying
and passed out. You want to tell me the rest of the story now?”

Maya
sucked in a breath. It didn’t surprise her to learn that she’d spilled her guts
that night. She talked freely when she was drunk.

But she
was surprised by the burn of shame. Embarrassment. Grief.

The
emotions still felt as sharp as they had eleven years earlier.

She
swallowed and said, “Dane and I drank. A lot. We called it having fun, but in
reality we were drinking to get drunk probably four, five nights a week.”
Unable to look at Thorne, she stared out the side window at a landscaped stand
of trees, probably part of the Henkes estate. “One night, about eleven months
into our marriage, Dane was supposed to pick up rum for me on the way home. I’d
asked him that morning and called to remind him at lunch, but of course he
forgot. I got mad and we had a fight, which was nothing new at that point. We
really didn’t have much in common.” She had been bored and restless, annoyed
with his absences and adrift without her parents ordering her around. “We were
still bickering when we got in the car and headed for the liquor store. Dane
had been drinking and I hadn’t, because I was out of rum. But I let him drive,
because it was no big deal to us. It had never been a problem before.”

She
swallowed, slammed anew with the knowledge that she could have prevented it,
could have saved a life if she’d insisted on driving. I’m fine, Dane had
snarled, don’t be such a nag.

“I take
it you hit someone?” Thorne said, drawing her eyes back to him.

She
nodded, feeling the touch of his gaze as though it was a physical force. “It
was a rainy Saturday night in May. Dane took the highway off-ramp too fast,
lost control and hit a car carrying four high school kids on their way to the
prom. Our car stayed on the ramp, but we pushed the other car through the rail
and over. It flipped and fell…” Her eyes filled with tears as the rage of grief
and horror rose up to swamp her again, as fresh as it had been that night. “I
knew the kids. They were two years behind me in school. Luce and Krista were in
the drama club. Jason played on the football team. They wound up with broken
bones. Internal injuries. Jason spent a month in the hospital, learning how to
walk again. No NFL for him.”

“And the
fourth victim?”

Maya
closed her eyes. “He died.”

“What was
his name?”

She
opened her eyes and looked at Thorne, saw the knowledge in his eyes. “Kiernan.
His name was Kiernan. And before you ask me, yes, that was the first thing I
thought of when Child Services called me on Kiernan Henkes. There’s even some
resemblance—they’re both athletic, both have rusty blond hair and freckles.”
She twisted her fingers together in her lap. “That’s what Henkes meant. He’s
implying that I went after him because saving his Kiernan from danger helped me
feel like I was atoning for the other Kiernan’s death. Depending on how good
his investigator is, he could very well tell the inquiry board that I took a
drink that night because I couldn’t handle the memories, that I was drunk when
I attacked him.”

“Were
you?”

She
wanted to deny it, to snap at Thorne for even asking the question, but she
couldn’t. All she could do was stare at her hands. “God help me, I don’t know.”

Silence
thundered in the small space as she waited for his response, for the scorn and
the accusations she deserved.

Instead,
after a long moment he cursed under his breath, shifted the transmission back
into Drive and gunned the Interceptor into a tight U-turn that headed them back
toward the city.

She hung
on tightly to the door handle. “Where are we going?”

“To the
hospital,” he grated. A muscle worked at the corner of his jaw. “We’re going to
find out whether you were drunk that night.”

Maya’s
fingers tightened their grip. “And if I was?”

He
glanced at her, expression unreadable. “Then we’ll deal with it.”

The
promise was scant comfort.

ONCE THEY
REACHED THE HAWTHORNE Hospital Emergency Room, Thorne commandeered an intern
and showed his badge. When he had the kid’s attention, he said, “Do you
remember a shooting about three months ago?”

The young
man’s eyebrows drew together. “We get a few of those a week. Can you give me
deets?”

Maya
said, “Two victims—a fifty-something-year-old man shot in the arm, and a
thirtyish woman, unconscious from a blow to the head.” Her voice was subdued,
her skin pale, but Thorne buried the surge of concern.

She’d
lied to him and to her chief, if not actively, then by omission. She should
have disclosed the connection to the other Kiernan the moment she regained
consciousness, and she should have checked the hospital records months ago.

The fact
that she hadn’t set off warning bells for Thorne.

The
intern’s eyes lit. “You mean when the cop shot Wexton Henkes? I heard about
that. That happened just before I started here, but I heard—”

“Can you
direct us to the admitting doctor, please?” Thorne interrupted, fighting to
keep the snarl out of his voice.

The kid
fell back a step. “Um, sure. Wait right here.”

Within
five minutes, they had the third-year resident who’d worked on Maya, and they
had her chart.

But they
didn’t have the information they needed.

Dr.
Rashid, a lovely, dark-haired, dark-skinned woman, shook her head. “I’m sorry,
Officers. The test wasn’t performed at the time of admission.”

Aware of
Maya standing at his side, pale and drawn, Thorne said, “Wouldn’t it be
standard procedure to take a blood alcohol level when an unconscious patient
was admitted with reports of irrational and violent behavior?”

“Normally,
yes,” the doctor agreed, “and I drew blood for the examination. But there is no
evidence that the test was ever run. I’m sorry. I don’t remember why the order
was canceled. It was…hectic that night.”

Thorne’s
suspicions prickled. “Did someone cancel the order? A cop, maybe?”

“I don’t
remember, and there’s no note. I’m sorry.” But the doctor’s eyes slid away from
them. “If there’s nothing else, I have patients to see.”

“Do you
still have the blood samples in storage?” Maya asked, voice stronger than he
would have expected.

Dr.
Rashid shook her head. “They wouldn’t do you any good now. Decomposing blood
generates alcohol. Even with anti-clotting agents, preservatives and frozen
storage, the sample would likely show positive for alcohol, regardless of the
original levels.”

Maya’s
shoulders slumped. “Right. I knew that.”

The
doctor excused herself and left them alone in the treatment room.

“You
okay?” Thorne asked, though it was damn clear she wasn’t even close to being
okay. Her skin was so pale it was nearly translucent, except where it showed
the duskiness of angry bruises along her arms. Her eyes were shadowed and sad,
and she looked small, tinier than his mental image of her, and fragile with it.

“I’ll be
fine,” she said, stressing the last word as though trying to convince herself
of the fact. “It’s just…” She blew out a breath. “I wasn’t sure I wanted to
know the answer before. But now it’s a huge disappointment to realize the damn
test was never run.”

“And a
huge question mark as to why it wasn’t?”

She
frowned. “I hope you’re not implying that I had anything to do with that
decision.”

“You were
unconscious. You had no say in the matter, which leads me to wonder who did.”
Thorne considered the possibilities. “And why didn’t whoever it was want your
levels tested? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Which
probably means it’s just one of those random things. An oversight.” She
gestured to the door. “Come on. We need to keep looking.”

But when
she reached for the doorknob, he saw that her fingers were trembling. The sight
of that fine tremor, that fragility, reached inside him and squeezed his heart.