to disturb evidence any more than the medical staff had destroyed earlier. While Kate watched from the hallway, the younger man pried what appeared to be two bullets from the wall beside the doorway and dropped them into plastic bags.
The detective turned his attention to a blood stain on the corner of a storage cabinet. Kate suspected it was where Adam had struck his head in the fall, the reason for the gaping wound above his temple.
They worked with speed, measuring and taking notes. When they finished, one officer closed the door and cordoned off the room.
Kate gaped at the closed door blocking their medical supplies. Somewhere in her addled mind, she thought of the people who depended on the clinic for their health-care needs. Sadness turned to anger and the emotions mingled with the fear and bewilderment that already overwhelmed her.
Outside the dispensary, the detective pointed to the delivery door. “Do you keep this locked?”
Carmen, lingering on the sidelines, translated. “Yes, always.”
He opened the door and Kate followed. Outside she could see the body on the ground while officers huddled around. The detective shooed her away, but she peeked at the doorjamb anyway, wondering if it had been pried open. She saw nothing—no marks or dents. She looked closer, but the irate man ordered her away for a second time.
Kate moved inside and hurried toward the operating room. She had nothing to do now but follow orders and prepare to leave. Her breath came in gasps as she neared the surgeon. Would Adam make it back to Colorado Springs alive?
She couldn’t bear to think otherwise.
Kate’s body trembled with exhaustion as she willed her eyes to stay focused. She looked around the surgical waiting room at Vance Memorial Hospital, with its drab yellow walls and unimpressive framed prints. She shifted on the plastic upholstery and eyed her rumpled blouse and pants she’d worn for the past twenty hours.
The chaos of those past hours filled her mind. The surgery at the clinic, the fear, the questioning, the packing, the waiting.
She had flown back in the Medevac with Adam clinging to life with his falling blood pressure and faltering pulse. The problem had been what she feared—internal bleeding. Now she waited with Adam’s parents for his second surgery.
Kate eyed her watch. Nearly two hours. She’d told his folks everything she knew about the horrible incident. The details lay muddled in her overtaxed mind, and she was glad they’d accepted her patchy description.
“Rats.” Adam’s father slammed his fist on the table beside his chair and sent the lamp teetering before it settled in place. “What are they doing?”
“Frank,” Liza Montgomery said to her husband, her voice calm and hushed, “be patient.”
“Patient! I’ve been more than patient. I don’t understand what’s keeping them.” He rose, unfolding his tall, stocky frame, and paced in front of them.
Kate scrutinized the Montgomerys and wondered if she should infringe on their privacy. Her nurse’s persona took over, and she leaned forward. “Adam has internal bleeding, Mr. Montgomery. That may take time to repair…depending on where they find the problem and how extensive the damage is.”
She glanced at her watch again, realizing only a minute had passed since she’d last looked. “The doctor should be in soon, I’m sure.”
Frank ran his thick hand through his bushy white hair and gazed at her with vivid blue eyes canopied by shaggy white brows.
His eyes unnerved her; they were the same shade of blue as Adam’s.
He gave her a subdued nod, then settled back into the chair and folded his hands in front of him while he stared at the floor.
Kate wondered if he were praying. Though he was arrogant as a peacock, Adam, she knew, was a Christian. Kate guessed his father was, too.
“So tell us about yourself, Katherine,” Liza said, gazing at her with amazing green eyes and a kindly smile.
Kate froze at the suggestion. Talking about herself fell somewhere in her list of favorite activities between cleaning the toilet and scrubbing out the trash cans.
“Not much to tell,” she said, hoping to dissuade the woman without being rude.
“Tell us about your work at Doctors Without Borders. Adam tells us so little.”
Kate relaxed. She could talk about the clinic. “It’s challenging. We deal with poverty, primitive conditions and a language barrier. We all speak a little Spanish—very little in some cases.” She gave them a halfhearted grin, the first she’d displayed in many hours. “But despite the problems, we feel blessed to provide care to people who would have none if we weren’t there.”
Liza shifted her rounded frame to face Kate more directly while she pushed back a graying blond curl from her rosy cheek. “I’m sure it’s rewarding, and you’re serving people just as our dear Lord has told us to do.”
“Yes. We’re making a difference,” Kate agreed, filling the time by sharing stories of their living facilities, the patients they’d treated, the long hours they worked. “But it’s beautiful, too,” Kate said. “In spring the trumpet trees blossom with flowers. Mauve, rose, white. So lovely. The coconut palms get heavy with fruit. And the lagoon with the thick mangrove islands. And birds of every color. It glorifies the Lord’s handiwork.”
Liza’s smile brightened. “You’re a Christian.”
“Yes. My mother depended on the Lord to get us through…” Kate let the words slide. “Get us through” was more than Kate meant to share about the past. Without prayer and God’s presence, her childhood would have been devastating.
“Does your mother live nearby?”
Kate tried to cover her sadness. “No, she died of cancer when I was eighteen.”
Liza’s face skewed with sympathy. “Oh, dear, I’m so sorry.”
“That was fifteen years ago. I’ve learned to accept it. I like to think God has a purpose for everything.” Her words sounded correct, but so often Kate wished her mother had lived so today she could provide her mother with the home and security she’d never had.
“You’re so right. And she must have been a wonderful mother to give you such a good upbringing…and look at you. You’re a nurse. I’m sure she would be proud.”
Kate gave her a nod. “Yes, she would have been. I wish she knew.”
“Perhaps she does, dear. We just never know.”
Frank’s patience had reached its limit. He bounded from the chair and strutted across the room to the volunteer’s desk. Kate watched him pointing to his watch and to the telephone. She was sure the poor woman felt intimidated. He was a powerful, impressive man, and being the mayor of Colorado Springs, he was a man who expected action. Today he wasn’t getting it.
The attendant held firm, and soon Adam’s father turned away, grabbed a cup of coffee from the dispenser and carried it back to the chair. “Anyone want any of this stuff? It’s so strong, it could stand alone without a cup.”
Kate
