I glanced at my watch as we rushed the gurney down the main hall of offices. It was after one already, and it was just research. On a weekend. “We’re having a bit of a public emergency down here, Jill,” I told her. I knew she wouldn’t like it. She didn’t like me. She liked men and didn’t think women ought to be attorneys—or near her favorite judge. But I needed this job. “Can this wait until tomorrow?”
“I’m not coming in on a Sunday,” she said acidly. “And you don’t have clearance for office keys. If you want this job, you’ll be here by two.”
She cut me off. I generously refrained from damning her to hell, but for a minute there, she hung on the precipice.
One more stressor added to my day. You can do it, Clancy.
A couple of security goons in uniform were coming at us, looking mean. Since they hadn’t hurt anybody, I couldn’t wish them to Hades or anywhere else any more than I could Jill. Apparently, my attempts at anger management were working. A pity, that.
I kept talking loudly into my phone as if it hadn’t gone dead. “Yes, Senator. Of course, Senator. Is the ambulance outside yet? Your cousin is in good hands, I assure you. We’ll let you know as soon as we arrive.”
I stalked past the guards as if they weren’t there. Schwartz stoically propelled the gurney. If anyone could read my pulse, they’d know I was running on terrified and pushing a heart attack, but I’d had a lifetime’s practice faking it.
“Wait a minute!” one of the guards shouted as we passed.
I held my purple badge over my shoulder, waggled it, and kept on walking, talking to my imaginary friend.
Behind us, I heard them consulting some authority on their phones. Schwartz muttered incomprehensible curses and pushed faster. Getting arrested wouldn’t do either of us any favors.
We burst into the reception area at a full run. The receptionist glanced up in surprise. I shouted, “Emergency!” and hurried ahead to open the doors.
The clowns in uniforms spilled into the lobby just as we hightailed it out. Without a word, Schwartz hoisted our patient over his shoulder, abandoned the gurney, and raced for his car.
Whatever worked.
The worst of the pink and green cloud had dissipated, leaving a thin film of pink confetti particles everywhere it had touched. Schwartz’s cop car had been parked elsewhere before the explosion, so it was relatively unscathed in comparison to the parking lot and streets. I opened the back door, Leo practically flung Sarah across the backseat, and we both dived for the front just as the guards tottered after us. They were on the brink of corpulent, not joggers by any stretch of the imagination, and they were struggling with gas masks as they ran.
No way was I letting them have Sarah. Thank Saturn, our Zone cop apparently felt the same.
Schwartz gunned his engine, backed up, swung the car around, and hit sixty before he reached the gate. The guard didn’t dare close it, especially after Leo turned on the siren. I do love a siren.
The police barricade allowed one of their own to pass but blocked the path of the Keystone Cops rattling after us in their security truck.
“Win one for the Duke!” I crowed, pumping my fist in the air. We rocked!
Leo sent me a strange look. Obviously, he didn’t watch old westerns. Taking my triumph where I could find it, I checked on our patient. Despite all the commotion, Sarah lay still as death. That worried me, but I was no doctor. I’d done all I could do. Except rescue Bill. That burned. Triumph was fleeting.
I glanced out the back window, but the gates had closed. There wouldn’t be any going back in. Telling myself I wasn’t responsible for anyone but myself, and that I had to focus on keeping my job, I clenched my teeth and plotted how to reach the judge’s office by two.
Leo took a right off Edgewater away from the harbor, as if we really were heading for a hospital. Once out of the Zone, he switched off the siren, swung down a garbage-strewn alley only a policeman would dare drive, and maneuvered us back to the hill and Andre’s warehouse.
I glanced at my watch. One thirty. The judge’s office was almost half an hour away, depending on traffic. Sarah needed help I couldn’t give her. I had to let others save the day.
“I love and adore you, Leo,” I said appreciatively, “but I have to run or get canned. If I bake you a cake, can you take it from here?”
“I can take it from here without the cake,” he said grumpily, parking behind the warehouse. “And if anyone took my license number and I get called to the carpet, you better bring out the big guns.”
Meaning Dane/Max. I didn’t want to ask favors of a man I could barely talk to, but I nodded. “You got it, big boy.” I leaned over, smooched his bristly cheek, and scooted out before he could react. He hadn’t had time to shave or shower this morning, and he smelled like hot male—not a bad scent, all things considered. I tried not to think what I smelled like after a night of partying and a morning of running on terrified. I needed superhero deodorant.
Dashing for my Harley across the street, I ran through a mental checklist: Milo safe upstairs, messenger bag over my shoulder, blazer and khakis okay for a weekend, ditch lab coat . . . keep computer tablet!
I’d apparently shoved the pretty toy in my pocket while running. Ooooh, cool. Who needed the devil to reward me? I’d rewarded myself for keeping my head on straight.
I flung the lab coat into the shed my Harley leaned against, stuffed the tablet in my messenger bag, and roared off to the office.
Riding from the blacktopped industrial wasteland of the Zone, north on the interstate, and into the leafy suburbs of Towson was like leaving the Sahara for an oasis. They had trees here. Even in September there were buckets of flowers around lampposts and on doorsteps. Businesses thrived. Traffic clogged every major artery. I took a few stone-fence-lined back roads, then zipped my bike down the yellow stripes of the main thoroughfare until I reached the county court building.
I dashed up the stairs and, out of courtesy to my associates, stopped in a washroom. My reflection over the sinks glittered with pink. Damn.
It was already two. I didn’t have time to do much. I doused my armpits, buttoned up, and hit the office at two after two.
Judge Snootypants and his secretary, Miss Goody Two-shoes, glanced up at my entrance. Both donned identical frowns.
“Industrial accident,” I said casually. “You’ll hear about it on the news. What’s the case and where would you like me to start?”
“Reginald is already in the library. Bring us some coffee and file the briefs in my office, will you?”
Okay, here’s where anger management is a good thing. I didn’t visualize the old fart leaping off tall buildings—that’s pretty good, right?
I’d been filing briefs and carrying coffee for weeks. The only time I’d been allowed in the library was to return books. I was damned good, and they were underutilizing my services, not to mention pissing me off big-time by getting me down here under false pretenses.
I practically saluted and marched off to the break room. I’d spent twenty-six years working toward this goal, and I refused to blow it. I was going to be the best damned lawyer in Maryland, at the very least. I just had to prove myself.
Proving that I could pour coffee was not a good starting place. I noted the books on the library table when I delivered the cups, glanced at the names on the file folders, and suggested another case file they might want to check out. Reginald all but snarled at me. Reginald was a Yalie who’d worked for the judge for the past year. He wore a tie even on Saturday and had his hair styled once a week. Jill adored him. I had despised him on sight.
His Honor nodded at my suggestion and told me to pull the book.