A Cry for Help (Eva Rae Thomas FBI Mystery #21)
Chapter 1
Diane Mercer's fingers hovered over her keyboard, a half-empty cup of coffee cooling at her elbow.
Four hours into her shift, and the familiar weight of other people's emergencies pressed against her temples.
She adjusted her headset, the cushioned ear pads worn thin from years of use, and took the next call with the practiced calm that had become as much a part of her as her prematurely gray hair.
"My mom shot me."
The words landed like ice in Diane's stomach. Her fingers froze above the keyboard for precisely one second before muscle memory took over. She clicked the priority alert button, watched it flash red on her screen, and kept her voice steady.
"I'm here to help you.”
She typed furiously as she spoke, already triangulating the call's origin point.
"Sweetie. You're doing great. Can you tell me your address?" Her voice remained level, betraying nothing of the dread coiling through her chest. On her second monitor, blue dots represented available patrol units. Two were less than three minutes from the caller's approximate location.
"I don't—" The child’s voice cracked. "It’s in the forest. We’re in a cabin somewhere."
“Ocala Forest?”
“Y-yes, that’s it. Please hurry.”
Diane's training clicked into place like tumblers in a lock.
She knew that area very well and knew exactly where the cabins were.
She and her husband often hiked there, and their children loved swimming in the springs.
Her supervisor, alerted by the priority signal, appeared behind her chair, a silent presence watching the information populate the screen.
"Are you somewhere safe right now? Away from the shooter, away from… your mother?" She signaled to her supervisor, pointing at the dispatch status. The woman nodded and stepped away to coordinate the emergency response.
"I'm in the bathroom." His breathing sounded wrong—shallow and liquid. "The door doesn't lock good."
Diane felt the frantic flutter of her heart against her ribs, a caged bird beating against her professional detachment.
Her eyes locked on the screen where dispatch had confirmed two units en route, ETA two minutes.
She noted how her own hand remained steady as she typed additional notes: JUVENILE GUNSHOT VICTIM, SHOOTER IN HOME, BATHROOM DOOR COMPROMISED.
"You're very brave, honey. Help is coming right now. Can you tell me where you're hurt?" Her voice took on the gentle cadence she reserved for the youngest callers—warm but clear, each word precisely enunciated.
A sound escaped him—half sob, half something worse. "My stomach. It's all wet."
Diane swallowed, her throat suddenly dry as sand. The call center around her continued its constant hum of activity, but it seemed to recede, as if she and this young child existed in a bubble of shared crisis.
"Listen to me. I need you to find something—a towel or shirt—and press it against where you're hurt. Can you do that for me?"
Rustling sounds came through the line. Something clattered to the floor.
"It hurts," he whispered.
"I know it does." Diane's free hand clenched into a fist, nails digging half-moons into her palm.
"But you're doing so well. The police and an ambulance are almost there.
" On her screen, the blue dots moved with agonizing slowness through the digital streets.
"Can you hear any sounds? Where is your mother now? "
The silence stretched for three eternal seconds. When the boy spoke again, his voice had dropped to a whisper. "She's coming. I can hear her."
Diane's heart rate spiked, sending a cold rush through her veins. "Try to stay very quiet. Help is almost there." She checked the dispatch timer: one minute, twenty seconds until arrival. Too long. "Is there anywhere you can hide in the bathroom?"
The boy's breathing had grown more labored, each inhale a struggle. "She's outside the door."
The words hit Diane like a physical blow.
"Stay with me. The police are almost—"
A new sound came through the line—a woman's voice, distant but clear enough. "Baby, open the door. Open the door, sweetie."
Diane's skin prickled with goosebumps. "Don’t open the door. The police will be there in less than a minute." Her voice remained steady, but sweat beaded along her hairline, a cold trickle running down her spine.
Scraping sounds—the bathroom door being forced open. The boy’s breath came faster.
"She's coming in," he whispered.
"You need to hide. Now." Diane abandoned protocol, the urgency breaking through her professional veneer.
She heard movement, a whimper of pain. The sound of the door slamming against the wall.
"Oh, baby." The woman's voice was closer now, saturated with an emotion Diane couldn't name—something between grief and rage. "Why did you call them? Why would you do that?"
Diane pressed her headset tighter against her ear, as if she could physically reach through the connection to shield the boy. "Units arriving now," her screen informed her, but too late, too late.
The gunshot came without warning—a deafening crack that sent Diane's headset tumbling from her hands. It dangled from its cord, swinging like a hanged man as she stared at it in shock. The line went dead, leaving nothing but the hiss of an empty connection.
For one suspended moment, Diane remained perfectly still, her body frozen while her mind processed the unthinkable.
Then reality crashed back—the fluorescent lights suddenly too harsh, the murmur of the call center too loud.
Her hands trembled violently as she reached for her headset, fumbling it back into place with clumsy fingers.
"Hello?" Her voice cracked. "Are you there?"
Nothing.
Cold sweat broke across her forehead. The screen before her blurred as her eyes widened, focusing on everything and nothing. Her stomach heaved once, threatening rebellion. Someone was speaking—her supervisor, hand on her shoulder, asking questions Diane couldn't process.
"I lost him," she said, her voice unnaturally flat. "The mother… There was another shot."
The supervisor was saying something about the responding officers, about protocol, about taking a break, but Diane barely heard her. All she could hear was the young boy’s voice—"My mom shot me"—and the final gunshot that had severed their connection.
She reached for her coffee, knocking it over with trembling fingers. The brown liquid spread across her desk, soaking into her notepad. She stared at the expanding stain, watching it blur the words like tears.
In her twenty-three years as a 911 operator, Diane Mercer had heard gunshots before.
She had listened to the last breaths of strangers, had guided callers through the worst moments of their lives.
But as she sat in her ergonomic chair, with coffee dripping onto her sensible shoes and her headset buzzing with a new incoming call, she knew with terrible certainty that this boy’s voice would join the few that still visited her in the dark hours before dawn.