The Spia Family Presses On (20 page)

But the paramedics would have no part of it. None of us was allowed to walk into the hospital.

“We’re fine, Mom,” I said, as a male nurse ushered me into a wheelchair.

“Did they catch the bastard who tried to run you off the road?”

“Not yet,” I told her.

“Damn bastage. They should cut off his balls,” Val said.

“Drastic,” the nurse said behind me.

“Not enough,” Val countered. “If it was up to me, his dick would come off in the process.”

The nurse fell silent.

“Glad to see you girls are all right,” Federico said. “Good thing Lisa was driving.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Good thing.”

Leo came up alongside me, and took my hand in his. I held on tight, happy to see him despite his lying, although his concern was truly touching. “I’m here if you need anything.”

“I’m okay. Really,” I told him.

I wasn’t used to Leo caring about me. This was a new feature to his otherwise closed personality.

“You girls don’t look so fine,” Aunt Hetty said, her hair standing straight up in fuzzy tufts, lipstick smeared in the usual manner. Why the woman even wore lipstick remained a mystery. “You look like hell.”

“Thanks,” I said, wanting to say so much more.

“Wow! I’ve never been in a wheelchair before,” Jade announced as another nurse secured the foot rests. “Interesting.”

Aunt Babe came up on the other side, and walked with me as my nurse pushed me toward the glass ER doors. “You can tell me the truth, doll. How ya feeling?”

“I feel all right. A little unsteady, and uncomfortably dirty, but okay, considering.” It was the truth. I guess what was really bugging me at the moment was the whole idea of someone trying to run us off the road. I wanted to tell Leo all the details about the Tundra dogging me, but I couldn’t take the chance it would get back to Nick.

“That’s good to hear, doll.”

“That don’t mean nothing,” Uncle Ray said. “You could have internal injuries. All that bumping can move things around on the inside.”

“I can assure you, nothing moved,” I told him, still clinging to Leo’s warm hand. The nurse ignored everyone and kept moving me closer to the doors.

Uncle Benny chewed on his stogy. “You are going to be fine, Mia. These doctors are the best. Do not worry about a thing. I will see to it that they take good care of you girls.”

A tall female nurse waiting at the door rolled her eyes.

My mother leaned over to Jade who was coming up alongside of me. “Do you want me to phone anyone, dear?”

Jade shook her head then gave it a second thought. “You might call Dickey for me.”

All family members within earshot of that little statement backed off, except my mom. She leaned in closer to Jade and said, “Now’s probably not a good time.”

Jade’s forehead furrowed. “I tried to get him a couple times on his cell, but the call went straight to voice mail. Would you please call the Jack London Tavern in Glen Ellen and see if he’s there? It would be nice if he could come and get me, ya know?”

Mom patted her hand. “I’ll see what I can do.”

After that little reality reminder my family did their thing and let the ER staff do their thing. Even Leo let go of my hand and I wondered if someone had told him about Dickey.

But I immediately thought better of it. He wasn’t family. Murder would never go beyond family.

As it turned out Jade had a nasty looking bump on her forehead, which required an MRI, and I had somehow managed to wrench my left shoulder, which required a CT scan. Fortunately, for us both there was no major internal damage, just some superficial bruising that would heal in a week or so. A shot of something took care of my shoulder pain, and Jade was told that her bump would probably turn a bit yellow and blue, but wouldn’t leave any kind of scar.

Jade and I were released with a “To Do” list, and pain medication prescriptions from the doctor, but Lisa remained behind a curtain somewhere. Most of my family, except for my mom and Aunt Babe, left when they learned all was well. Leo offered to blow off the rest of his day and spend it with me, which was something he would never have done in the past, but I didn’t want him around. Way too much to discuss with Lisa.

After much discussion, and his mini-conference with the doctors on top of the millionth assurance that I was fine, he agreed to let me go home and rest. We would catch up at the Martini Madness Ball the following night, my first Martini Madness Ball in over two years. I was hoping to come out of it in one sober piece.

Once he was gone, and my mom and Aunt Babe went off to scope out the recently upgraded gift shop, and to fill my prescription for pain meds, my focus went to Lisa. I hadn’t seen her since we were all wheeled in and I needed to talk to her, alone, before we headed back to the orchard with my family.

Nurse Carol, an overly cheery woman with red hair pointed the way. Lisa apparently had not been released with Jade and me. “She’s still with the doctor,” Nurse Carol said. She had those round buggy eyes that made you think it hurt just to blink, hair that looked as if it wouldn’t move in a tornado, and the sweetest disposition I’d ever encountered in someone who worked the ER.

“Just follow me, girls,” Nurse Carol instructed. “These kinds of things can be scary and your friend probably needs all the reassurance she can get.”

Jade and I followed her along a row of drawn curtains. Voices rose up all around us: a child wailed, a man yelled about his injured foot, and an elderly voice asked, “How much time do I have left?”

My heart was racing the entire time as my mind conjured up horrible scenarios, not the least of which was that Lisa had lapsed into a coma or worse. Perhaps she had internal injuries like Uncle Ray had said and I had foolishly thought she’d passed out from seeing her own blood.

By the time the curtain was pulled back, I expected to see Lisa lying on the bed, completely comatose. The doctor would tell me that my best friend didn’t merely faint, she had actually suffered a head trauma and needed immediate surgery. I’d have to call her nearest relative to sign the paperwork. The thought of having to deal with Lisa’s mother was more frightening than having to deal with a comatose friend.

I shuddered at the very idea of it.

Luckily, Lisa was sitting up on the edge of the bed, looking all fresh and clean in her little blue gown, watching as an Indian male doctor pulled stitches through her right thumb. She could handle the stitches as long as there wasn’t any of her own blood involved.

“But you don’t understand. I’m on a deadline. I have to be able to type.”

“But I never said you could not type, Miss. I simply said you should not use your thumb for five days. It is badly bruised and combined with these stitches it will need time to heal. I will put your arm in a sling to remind you.”

“I don’t want a sling, thank you.”

He finished stitching, cut the threads and began bandaging her thumb. “I will give you a sling anyway. It is what I recommend.”

She started to disagree but I interrupted. “I’ll make sure she wears it.”

He looked over at me. “It is for her own good, Miss. I will give her a prescription for pain medication as well. This is going to be one heck of a thumb-ache.”

“I can handle it,” Lisa said.

“Ah, you are like your books then?”

Her face lit up. “You’re familiar with my work?”

“I have five daughters, a wife, a mother and a mother-in-law. How could I not know? They have memorized parts of your books and discuss them over dinner. My mother-in-law used your foul-smell method to make my nephew vomit when he ate her pet goldfish, Stan. It was too late for Stan, but my mother-in-law was impressed that your technique worked so effectively. She used her husband’s jar of pickled herring. I have to say, that smell would make anyone toss their cookies.”

Lisa chuckled. “I’ll have to remember that.”

“These women practice your survival skills religiously just in case they might need them. My middle daughter has jumped out of a second story window into a garbage container with her hands tied loosely behind her back. I did not approve of this, of course, but she worked up to it, and by the time she jumped, she knew what to do. She was able to find something sharp to cut the rope on her wrists and get out of the container on her own.

Regrettably, she also managed to cut her baby toe when she jumped . . . she wore flip flops, not the best. I cleaned up the cut and gave her three stitches. She refused the pain medication as well. She said she needed to have all her pistons running on full speed just in case she needed to survive something else.”

“I’ll send you a few autographed copies of my latest book,” Lisa told him.

“My family will be so pleased, Miss. Thank you.”

“It’s the least I can do.”

“Ah, the least you can do is to wear the sling for five days,” he said. “This will make my family very happy because you will assure them that your thumb will heal properly so you can write more books.”

She laughed. “Okay, I agree. Bring it on.”

He patted her shoulder. “You are a very intelligent woman. My family will be happy to learn this.”

As soon as he left the room, Jade said. “Wow! You’re that Lisa Lin? I’m a total fan. I’ve read all your books. You have to be the coolest chick ever. This is, like, way cool, ya know? To actually meet you and you’re so normal. And short. I mean, not that you’re short, short, but you’re tiny and yet you’re a real kick-ass, ya know?”

Lisa smiled. “Thanks. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten such a cool compliment.”

“I passed a coffee stand on the way in here. I, like, so need a latte,” Jade said. “Can I get you guys anything?”

Both Lisa and I jumped on the opportunity to be alone. We gave her complicated drink orders that would keep her and the barista busy for at least fifteen minutes.

As soon as she left, Lisa turned to me. “I think one of the goombahs tried to kill us, or at the very least give us a warning.”

“If that was a warning, I’d hate to think what it would be like if one of them really came after us.”

“We wouldn’t be having this conversation, that’s for damn sure. That guy knew his shit.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to assume it was one of the ex-cons.” I was thinking about that disappearing mustache. “You were pretty incredible out there.”

“Of course I was. I just wrote about it, Chapter Six, How to Survive a Car Chase. I did extensive research with an adorable wannabe NASCAR driver who taught me all about driving defensively, and how to keep control of your car after a rear or side bump, along with some other, more personal moves that still give me a rush.”

She threw me a sly smirk.

“Spare me the details.”

“I’ll put them in a book someday, an erotica. I could make a killing in that field.”

“But where would you get the time for the research?”

She gave me a wry look. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Of course I am,” I said, but I really wasn’t. Okay, so up until last night sex had been put on a high shelf in my life. So high it had required a ladder to retrieve it, but her life seemed to be so full I couldn’t imagine when she possibly had the time for anything, much less an active sex life.

But then Lisa never did have a problem juggling several things at once. Sobriety does that.

“Did you see who it was?” Lisa asked.

“Kind of, but I couldn’t get a good look at the idiot’s face under that cowboy hat, and Chanel shades. Although, I think I saw a mustache, but when I looked again, it was gone.”

“Okay, so whoever the idiot is uses cheap glue, but buys expensive sunglasses, and has the whole Western monster truck thing going on. I’m betting it’s your cousin Jimmy or a friend from his bar in North Beach. Lot’s of testosterone coming from that truck.”

“Wearing Chanel sunglasses?”

“You have a point, but the women in your family don’t drive. How about Maryann?”

I shook my head. “She’s into saving the planet and only drives eco-friendly.”

“Any other little clue?”

“Well, the idiot didn’t have a double chin or any gray hair that I could see, but the windows were heavily tinted, so I can’t be sure of anything.”

She sighed.

“Here’s the thing,” Lisa said. “I don’t get why anyone would come after me. I was all for the family burying Dickey in the grove.”

I sat down on a gray plastic chair, my head spinning with possibilities. “Nobody knows that but me.”

“Shouldn’t you tell someone? I’ve got a life to live, deadlines to keep, a mother who looks forward to retiring in my guesthouse.”

“You live in a condo in the city. You don’t own a guesthouse.”

“And I won’t ever own a guesthouse if your family keeps trying to run me off the road. The odds aren’t in my favor with this group. Eventually they’ll succeed. Dickey being the prime example.”

“Does this mean you’re completely over the idea of allowing my family to cover up Dickey’s death?”

“No offense sweetie, I love your family but we need to figure out who this idiot is and turn his sorry ass over to the police before he gets any more ideas about sending us body parts or running us off the road. I have no intention of becoming his second victim. Maybe we need to find that ring first and give it back. That way we can smoke this killer out in the open.”