214 Palmer Street(62)
“Sarah,” he whispered, his lower lip trembling. “I love you.”
“I know, babe, I know. Save your strength.” She quickly pulled her T-shirt over her head and flattened it to the gaping hole oozing blood. “Can you hold this here while I go for help?” She set his hand on top of the makeshift compress. “I’ll be right back.”
Kirk’s mouth moved, and he grasped her hair with his free hand, pulling her closer. His words were labored. “Tell Jeremy’s mom I’m sorry.”
“You can tell her yourself,” Sarah said, kissing his forehead. “I’m going to call for help. I’ll be right back. Promise.”
She reached down to scoop up the gun as she left, veering around Gavin’s silent body, and praying that help would get there in time to save her husband.
FORTY-ONE
Initially I was confused. Had Sarah found something in the bomb shelter and called Kirk and Gavin to the site? It seemed like the most likely possibility, but when I saw Gavin’s gun and witnessed him push Kirk down the stairs it changed my thinking. Hearing his furious shouting twisted a knot in my stomach. So much anger. Someone was going to die.
Despite my own fears, I ventured out from behind the bushes then, making my way to the opening. I wasn’t concerned about Kirk and Gavin. Those two could go to hell for all I cared, but Sarah seemed like a decent human being. I could never go down those steps again, but I thought that if I called out, and they knew someone else was there on the property, it might defuse the situation.
I heard a popping noise and a scuffle, then a muffled thump. No sooner had I gotten to the bomb shelter and opened my mouth than Sarah came frantically running up the stairs, wearing a sports bra and jeans splattered with blood. When she saw me standing there, she squeezed my arm with the fierceness of a drowning victim grabbing hold of a lifeguard.
For me, it was the beginning of the end.
FORTY-TWO
When Sarah caught sight of the woman outside the shelter, her shock was immediately eclipsed by relief. She frantically grasped the woman’s arm. “I need help!” she said, the words coming out rapid fire. “My husband’s been shot.”
“I already called 911.” The young woman held up her phone. Her voice was surprisingly calm. “They’re on their way.” As if on cue, a siren sounded, wailing in the distance.
Sarah dropped Gavin’s gun at the woman’s feet, then said, “When they get here, send them down right away. Tell them to hurry!”
She rushed back down the stairs, again bypassing Gavin’s still form and heading straight to Kirk. Kneeling beside him, she said, “Kirk, I’m here, babe.” She pressed down on the blood-soaked T-shirt. “Hang in there. Help is on the way.” And even though his eyes were open and unseeing, and he didn’t move or respond to her words in any way, she kept talking to him, begging him to stay with her. “We’ll get through this. It’s going to be fine, you’ll see.” Her eyes brimmed with tears. “Please, Kirk, say something.”
A fleeting thought crossed her mind, one that told her checking for a pulse would be the true test, but she really didn’t want an answer to that question. Not knowing meant there was still hope.
She heard their arrival first, a commotion of voices outside, and then saw a strong light shining down from above, so bright that she had to shield her eyes. When two uniformed cops came down, guns drawn, she held up her hands in surrender and called out to them. “Over here! You have to help my husband. He’s been shot!”
And then the tiny bomb shelter, smaller than her entryway at home, was suddenly filled with the buzzing of police followed by EMTs, one of whom gently took her by the elbow and said, “Ma’am, you need to come with me and wait outside. Let them do their job.”
Mutely, she let him lead her back up the stairs and into the yard where another EMT draped a blanket around her shoulders and began to assess her. “I’m fine,” she said waving him away. “This isn’t my blood. It’s my husband’s.”
A petite woman in a neatly pressed police uniform and a tight bun guided her away from the scene and toward the house. Everything about her said professionalism, but she had the soothing voice of a mother comforting a child. “My name is Hannah. Can you tell me what happened?”
Sarah found herself telling the whole story, frantically spitting out the words, as if making this woman understand would fix everything. She began with her initial descent into the bomb shelter and finding Clarice’s body, and what happened soon after.
“I was horrified when I realized who it was—she was my friend. Just so awful. I was about to get my phone and report it when my husband and Gavin Kramer showed up.” She choked back a sob, explaining how Gavin had made her kneel on the floor, while his gun was aimed at Kirk. “I knew he was going to kill both of us so I picked up the crowbar and hit him over the head. I had to do it. There was no other way.” She stopped and took in a deep breath and then began to weep.
Hannah gave a sympathetic nod. “You don’t need to worry. You’re safe now.”
“Can you find out about my husband?” she asked, craning her neck to see past Hannah. “He was in a really bad way. They should be rushing him to the hospital.”