6. Doc
DOC
The gunshot comes from Wolf’s office.
I reach the stairs with Mara directly behind me. The tavern below is completely dark, but I know the layout.
Bar to the left.
Fireplace to the right.
Wolf’s office at the end of the short hallway behind the kitchen.
A table crashes.
Someone grunts.
Then Trigger shouts, “I’ll check out back!”
I take the last three steps in one jump and land behind the bar. Mara drops beside me, her weapon already raised.
“Where’s Sheriff Tate?” she asks.
“Outside checking the roadblocks,” Wolf answers.
“Trigger went after the shooter.”
“Who fired?” I ask.
“Parker.”
A strained moan comes from the hallway.
Every instinct inside me locks onto the sound.
Wounded.
I leave cover.
Mara catches my arm.
“Doc.”
“Deputy’s down.”
“We don’t know whether the shooter is gone.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters if you get shot trying to reach him.”
Her grip tightens.
For a second, I’m back in Afghanistan with Grant’s hand wrapped around my vest while gunfire tears into the dirt around us.
Don’t come out here, Doc.
I went anyway.
A medic who waits for the bullets to stop isn’t much use to the men bleeding beneath them.
“Cover me.”
She releases my arm.
“I’m coming with you.”
Before I can argue, she moves ahead of me.
Mara stays low, using the wall and overturned tables for protection as we cross the tavern. Her pistol remains steady. She checks each blind corner before motioning me forward.
Grant taught her some of that.
The rest came from years behind a badge.
We reach the hallway.
Deputy Parker lies on the floor outside the Last Stand’s office, one hand pressed against his upper thigh. Blood covers his fingers and spreads across the leg of his uniform.
His pistol is several feet away.
“Shooter?” Mara asks.
“Back door,” he gasps. “Black clothes. Mask.”
“Did you see a weapon?”
“Handgun. Suppressor.”
“Was he alone?”
“I only saw one.”
“Wolf,” Mara calls, “stay with Doc.”
“I’m going after Trigger.”
I grab the back of her sweatshirt before she takes two steps.
She spins toward me.
“Let go.”
“You don’t know what’s outside.”
“Trigger went alone.”
“Wolf can back him up.”
“I’m a deputy.”
“And Parker is bleeding.”
“That’s why he needs you.”
“So do you.”
The admission escapes before I can stop it.
Mara stares at me.
Even in the darkness, I see the surprise in her face.
I release her sweatshirt.
“Clear the kitchen. Don’t go outside until Sheriff Tate arrives.”
“You can’t order?—”
“Please.”
The word silences her.
Maybe she hears what it costs me.
Her expression changes.
“I’ll clear the kitchen. I won’t leave the building.”
I nod once.
It’s the closest thing to trust we’ve managed.
Mara moves down the hallway, keeping her weapon trained ahead of her. Wolf follows several feet behind with the shotgun.
I kneel beside Parker and turn on the small flashlight attached to my keychain.
“How bad?” he asks.
“I’ll tell you when I know.”
“That usually means bad.”
“It means stop talking and let me work.”
The bullet entered the outside of his left thigh. Blood pulses through his fingers, but not with the bright, forceful rhythm of a severed artery.
I move his hand.
He cries out.
“Sorry.”
“You don’t sound sorry.”
“I’m not. That was a warning.”
I cut his pant leg open with the pocketknife I always carry. The bullet passed through muscle and exited lower on the inside of his thigh.
No obvious bone involvement.
No arterial spray.
Lucky.
“You’re going to keep the leg.”
His head falls back against the floor.
“That’s good.”
“You’ll be even happier after the pain medication.”
“You carry that?”
“Not anymore.”
“You’re a terrible doctor.”
“I’m a medic.”
Footsteps pound across the kitchen.
I reach for my weapon.
“It’s Mara,” she calls before entering the hallway. “Kitchen is clear.”
“Call an ambulance.”
“Already done. Four minutes out.”
She kneels on Parker’s other side. Her gaze moves over the wound without flinching.
“What do you need?”
“Pressure dressing from the medical kit.”
She finds it and tears open the package.
“Hold here.”
Mara places both hands exactly where I show her and applies pressure.
Parker clenches his teeth.
“Sorry,” she says.
“She isn’t either,” I tell him.
He groans. “You two are perfect for each other.”
Mara presses harder.
Parker makes a strangled sound.
“I take it back.”
Despite the situation, I almost smile.
I wrap the pressure bandage around his thigh and secure it. Mara keeps one hand near his hip, steadying him.
“What happened?” she asks.
“I was covering the rear of the building,” Parker says. “Heard glass break in Wolf’s office. By the time I got to the window, some guy in black was climbing back out with a metal case.”
My attention snaps toward the office.
“The case.”
Parker nods. “I ordered him to stop. He turned toward me with a gun.”
“Who fired first?” Mara asks.
“He did. I fired back.”
“Did you hit him?”
“I think so. Saw him stumble before he ran.”
“Then Trigger spotted him,” Wolf says.
“Yeah.” Parker grimaces as I tighten the bandage. “Trigger came around the corner just as the guy took off.”
Mara looks toward Wolf’s office.
“How long could he have been inside?”
“Less than a minute,” Parker says. “I heard the window break almost as soon as it happened.”
That makes more sense.
The tavern was locked.
Deputies covered the exits.
The intruder never came through either one.
He went directly through Wolf’s office window, grabbed what he wanted, and tried to leave the same way.
Which means he knew exactly where the case was.
I finish securing Parker’s bandage.
“Stay with him.”
Mara stands when I do. “He’s stable.”
“Mara.”
“We’re not starting this again.”
We enter Wolf’s office together.
The window behind the desk has been forced inward. Broken glass covers the floor beneath it, and rain blows through the opening.
Wolf moves past us.
“Son of a bitch.”
The bottom desk drawer hangs open.
A bent piece of metal protrudes from the lock.
“That’s where you put the case?” Mara asks.
Wolf nods. “Locked it in there before we went upstairs.”
I crouch beside the drawer.
The lock has been forced.
Nothing sophisticated.
Nothing quiet either.
“He didn’t care whether anyone heard him,” Mara says.
“He knew he only needed seconds.”
Wolf looks toward the broken window. “How did he know which drawer?”
That’s the question.
Someone watched us bring the case inside.
Or someone already knew what I carried.
Mara shines her flashlight across the sill.
A dark smear marks the lower edge.
“Blood.”
“Parker hit him.”
“Looks that way.”
Drops continue across the exterior ledge.
Not many.
The shooter is wounded, but he’s still moving.
“The wound may slow him down,” Mara says. “Trigger could catch him.”
I head toward the window.
Mara blocks me.
“You’re staying with Parker.”
“He’s stable.”
“Those were your exact words when I tried to go outside.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
“It was you.”
Her eyebrows lift.
I don’t have time to explain what I meant.
I’m not sure I could.
Sheriff Tate rushes into the office with two deputies behind him.
“Report.”
“Parker took a through-and-through gunshot to his left thigh,” I say. “No obvious arterial involvement. He’s stable and waiting for transport.”
“Shooter?”
“Entered and exited through this window,” Mara says. “He forced the desk drawer and took Doc’s metal case. Parker confronted him outside and exchanged fire. Trigger went after him.”
Tate speaks into his radio.
“All units, armed suspect on foot near the Last Stand. Black clothing and possible gunshot wound. Do not approach alone.”
A deputy appears in the doorway.
“Sheriff, we found a motorcycle behind the feed store. Engine is still warm.”
“Secure it. Check every building between here and the highway.”
“What about Trigger?” Wolf asks.
“I’ve been trying to reach him.”
The answer chills the room.
Wolf pulls out his phone and calls.
We hear ringing from somewhere outside.
Not through the phone.
Close.
Wolf runs toward the back door.
Sheriff Tate follows him.
Mara and I are directly behind them.
The rain has almost stopped. Portable lights cast long shadows across the alley. One of the deputies aims his flashlight toward the Dumpster.
A phone lies in a puddle beside it.
Trigger’s phone.
Wolf picks it up.
The screen is shattered, but the call is still connected.
“Trigger!”
No answer.
We spread out, searching the alley.
A dark drop glistens on the pavement near the rear corner of the tavern.
Then another.
Blood.
The trail crosses behind the feed store and continues toward an abandoned hardware building.
Mara raises her weapon.
Sheriff Tate catches her shoulder.
“You stay behind me.”
“He took Trigger.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Then where is he?”
Wolf moves ahead, his shotgun pressed tight against his shoulder.
“Trigger wouldn’t leave his phone unless someone made him.”
I follow the blood trail.
The drops become farther apart and smaller near the hardware store.
Either the bleeding is slowing or the shooter has done something to control it.
We reach the building.
Its front windows are covered with plywood. The old delivery door at the rear hangs partly open, moving in the wind.
Sheriff Tate signals for the deputies to surround the structure.
Mara positions herself beside the door.
I take the opposite side.
She glances at me.
“You’re supposed to be with Parker.”
“The ambulance arrived.”
“You aren’t law enforcement.”
“No.”
“You’re also not armed backup.”
“I’m armed.”
“That isn’t the same.”
“I’ll explain the difference later.”
Her mouth tightens.
“You’re starting to assume there will be a lot of laters.”
Before I can answer, something strikes the floor inside the building.
We both turn toward the sound.
Sheriff Tate joins us. Wolf stands behind him.
“Eagle River Sheriff’s Department!” Tate shouts. “Come out with your hands visible!”
Silence.
Then a low groan.
Wolf reaches for the door.
Tate stops him.
“Wait.”
“That’s Trigger.”
“We clear the building first.”
The deputies enter from the front while we move through the rear. The hardware store smells of dust, mildew, and old lumber. Empty shelves form narrow aisles through the darkness.
Sheriff Tate goes left.