this was clearly something they hadn’t seen before.
With a stunned expression, Rhonda Sutton, Andrea’s partner in the ambulance they operated, lifted her eyes to Andrea’s and slowly shook her head, her dark gaze filling with tears. A tall brunette with six men always at her feet, Rhonda had a reputation for being tough, but Andrea had seen underneath the facade. Rhonda cared deeply about their patients…and even more so for her friends.
Alex put the team into action, Andrea alerting them to Kevin’s location as they planned how best to lift the broken cabinet. It seemed to take forever but in reality, only a few moments passed before they uncovered the little boy. He stared at the faces peering over him, his frightened eyes darting from the men to Andrea, then back again.
Finally able to get close, Andrea took Kevin’s fingers in hers and started to reassure him, but then she found herself distracted. One of the men had brought in a blanket to cover Vicki. When he placed it gently over the still form of her sister, Andrea had to force her gaze back to Kevin’s.
“It’s okay, baby. These…these are the firemen who work in Courage Bay,” she said. “They’re here to help us.”
Tightly gripping her hand, Kevin maintained his silence while they collared his neck and slipped the plastic backboard underneath him.
“You’re very brave.” Andrea walked beside the boy as they carried him out the front door. “I’m proud of you, Kevin. You’re doing a great job!”
With smooth movements they’d made a thousand times, the men loaded the six-year-old into the ambulance and secured the stretcher. Andrea climbed inside and kneeled down. “I’ll be right behind you in my truck, okay? When you get to the hospital, I’ll help them take you out. You aren’t scared, are you?”
He blinked then slowly shook his head. Brushing back a lock of his hair, she kissed his forehead, her throat stinging with tears she quickly swallowed. “That’s great because you have nothing to be afraid of, nothing at all. Five minutes and we’ll be there, all right?” She jumped out and started to close the double doors. A heartbeat before they slammed shut, she thought she heard him say a single word, but she hoped she was mistaken.
She had no idea how to answer when a child cried out for his mother.
GRANT PEELED HIMSELF off the leather seat of his white Impala and kicked the door shut behind him. Crossing the steaming street toward Hollenbeck Park, he lifted his sunglasses and blew his hair off his forehead. The heat was suffocating and had been for days. Demanding his attention like a dog that wouldn’t stop barking, the sun beat insistently down against his neck, making it impossible to ignore. The jacket he’d had on was long gone, shed in the car somewhere between Highway 101 and South Soto.
He took a quick glance around the park as he stepped over the curb. He hadn’t thought to ask Parker where to meet him, but he realized now directions would have been superfluous. A crowd had already gathered at the South Boyle Avenue end of the green area, the usual mixture of old ladies, out-of-work men and kids who had nothing better to do. Grant named them derisively under his breath. They were ghouls, each and every one of them.
If there was a body around, they always showed up.
Having been warned more than once, Grant kept his insensitive label to himself and silently approached the group, removing his notepad and pencil as he walked. A sheet was over the body but the medical examiner lifted it as Grant reached his side. The face beneath the plastic was young. Too young to be so dead.
Standing nearby, Parker wiped his forehead. In his younger years, he’d been a full-back at UCLA. Now he was just plain fat, two-fifty if not more. The crazy heat wave they were having was about to do him in. He waved his hand toward the body. “You know him?”
Grant started to say no, then he kneeled and looked closer. “Yeah,” he said. “I do know him. That’s Tasha McKindrick’s boy. I think they call him Poppy.”
Parker yelled for one of the uniforms while Grant continued to stare. The boy couldn’t have been over ten because his mother was only twenty-four. Grant had arrested her last year for selling drugs. They lived in one of the nearby projects with two younger children but no dad. Grant pulled the cover back over the boy’s face and stood.
His stare lingering on the draped form at his feet, he thought of Kevin.
“What are we doing to our kids?” he muttered under his breath. “For God’s sake, what in the hell are we doing?”
“What are you doing talking to yourself again? You promised me you’d given that up.”
Grant raised his eyes to the woman who’d walked up beside him, her husky voice penetrating the gloomy fog of his thoughts. He hadn’t heard her approach, but that’s how Holly Hitchens did things. She snuck up on you, then pounced. They’d dated before he’d married Vicki and he had the scars to prove it. She was a hell of a cop, though.
“I make a lot of promises I don’t keep.” His eyes met hers and he shrugged. “You know how that goes….”
“I’m afraid I do. You always were lousy in that department, Corbin.” Her answer was pure Holly but her voice sounded strained. Then he realized she wasn’t looking him in the eye. Her gaze was usually so direct it hurt.
“What’s up?” He made his voice casual and ignored the warning bells going off inside his head.
She took a deep breath and met his eyes. For a second he thought he saw pity in her gaze but that didn’t make sense.
“I have some bad news, Grant.”
Her use of his first name threw him even more. She’d always called him Corbin, even when they’d been lovers.
He tensed and she spoke again.
“Division just called looking for you and I told them you were here. They gave me a message to pass on. It’s not good.”
“What is it?” he asked levelly.
“Something’s happened to Vicki. She…had some kind of accident down in Courage Bay.”
“A car wreck?”
“No, it happened at her home, but I don’t have any more details.”
“But she didn’t live in Courage Bay—”
“That’s all they said. That she’d been there, in her house, and something fell on her.”
“Is she okay?”
“No, Grant, she’s not okay.” Holly put her fingers on his sleeve. “I’m sorry, but she’s dead.”
Grant stared dumbly at the redhead, her words incomprehensible. Then something snapped in his hand. He looked down and opened his fist. The pencil he’d been holding was in two pieces.
Holly squeezed his arm. “There’s more.”
As a cop, he’d seen things that would test the strongest stomach but Grant had never been affected. When Holly spoke, though, the ground beneath him shifted.
“Kevin?” he managed to get out.
“He
