The Redeemed (26 page)

She covered her face with the sheets and waited. To an outsider, it looked like a patient had tipped their wheelchair over, knocked their IV stand to the floor and grabbed for a nearby gurney in an attempt to arrest their fall, only getting bed sheets for their effort.

Footsteps approached the doors from the outside.

She waited.

The door opened.

Someone stepped inside. Two someones.

It was time.

Another door opened nearby.

A man gasped on her right.

Another man on her left said, “Hold up.”

Father Adams.

“But a patient has fallen.”

Then the sheets were ripped away and Sarah’s face was exposed.

Chapter 45

As the doors on the west side got closer, Hirst snuck a look back. Father Adams still had the gun out, but hidden at his waist.

Five feet from the entrance to the west side of the hospital and Hirst couldn’t figure out what he was forgetting. Sarah had told him to remember something specific. And with her waiting at the east wing with his gun, he was on his own. And what would happen when he took Adams up to her empty room?

He smiled as it came together for him. That had to be it. Sarah was at the east side of the building so she could escape unharmed. She was doing exactly what Hirst had asked her to do: leave. He would take Father Adams up to an empty room and it would all be over.

He couldn’t fault her for her decision. He had been pushing her to leave and now she was cleared for takeoff. In Sarah’s empty hospital room, he’d have no way of defending himself.

Hirst put his hand on the door. Slowly, so as not to startle his kidnapper, he pulled it open, walked through, and held it for Adams. The door squeaked as it closed behind them.

A patient had fallen off a wheelchair in the corridor.

A door on the left opened and a man in a white lab coat emerged. He gasped and turned toward the fallen patient.

Adams stepped close to Hirst, the tip of the gun touching the small of his back.

“Hold up,” Adams said to the doctor.

“But a patient has fallen,” the doctor responded. He lifted the sheet to expose Sarah’s face.

Then it dawned on Hirst. Sarah had told him to remember Janice, his wife. When the moment was right, it would come to him. The bombs strapped to Adams. They were fakes, just like the one strapped to Janice’s neck. Father Adams wasn’t going to kill himself. He just wanted Sarah.

“You!” Father Adams yelled.

Sarah grabbed the IV stand and swung it toward the two men as Adams pulled the weapon away from Hirst’s back. He brought it over Hirst’s shoulder and aimed at Sarah.

The IV stand wasn’t coming fast enough.

The doctor in the white lab coat stepped back, his hands raised, mumbling something.

“I finally get to end this,” Adams shouted.

Self-preservation kept Hirst paralyzed. What if Sarah was wrong about the bombs? But what if she was right?

I swore to never doubt her again.

Hirst shrugged his shoulders as the gun fired, enough of a bump to knock off the aim. The bullet chunked the tile floor behind Sarah’s head.

The IV stand came to a stop at Hirst’s feet, the grip of his weapon in view.

A crushing blow to the back of his head sent him crashing to the ground where he sprawled across Sarah’s legs.

“You were working together, I see,” Father Adams said.

“Now take it easy,” Aaron said from behind Sarah.

“What are you doing here?” Sarah asked.

“You told us to come after the first gunshot. You said bring doctors.”

“Shit. I did say that, didn’t I. Sorry. But now you have to leave again.”

“Ah, can’t do that.”

Father Adams raised his arms to expose the bombs strapped to his chest. “Stay right where you are.”

The doctor who had lifted Sarah’s sheet turned and ran.

Hirst squirmed off Sarah’s legs, edging toward the end of the IV stand to get to his gun. Sarah was defenseless and everyone thought the bombs were real.

“Let’s make a deal,” Aaron said.

“No deal.”

Hirst rolled, the back of his neck aching where Adams had hit him.

“The only deal any of you make is with God,” Adams said. He turned back to Sarah. “But no matter what happens, you die first.”

“Then do it, asshole,” Sarah said, her face pensive, as if death was an engaging thought, even welcoming. “What are you waiting for?”

Father Adams’ eyes bulged and a vein on his forehead stuck out. He brought his weapon to bear on Sarah.

“Shoot her and I kill you,” Aaron said, his voice cold.

“So brave,” Adams said. “Yet so stupid.”

Hirst had the IV stand in his grasp, but the end of it was still too far to reach without drawing attention his way.

Adams’ gun moved slightly, his aim now transferred to Aaron.

“No!” Sarah shouted.

Hirst reared up and swung the IV stand. It connected with Father Adams’ ankle with a crack. Adams bent at the waist and screeched. He raised his gun once more, this time not hesitating to fire.

Hirst spun and rolled with the impact of the bullet in his shoulder. At first there was no pain. Only the feeling that he had been punched with a sledgehammer. But he rolled with it, then rolled again, stopping at the base of the IV stand.

Adams’ gun fired once more, loud in the narrow corridor. Hirst had no idea where that bullet went. He had to focus on his gun, taped to the bottom of the IV stand.

He twisted into position, pushed the IV stand more to the left to achieve the angle needed, and grabbed the handle. His fingers wouldn’t wrap around the butt of the weapon. His fingers weren’t responding. He scanned his arm to examine the blood pouring out of his wound. The bullet must have damaged something that prevented him from using his hand. He was right handed. There was no way he could fire his weapon with his left, even if he wanted to.

The bottom of the IV stand was a silver disk that housed the wheels. In the way the IV stand lie on the floor, it would be virtually impossible for his left hand to get to the gun unless he flipped it all the way around.

Pain in his shoulder rolled in like a poisonous wave of red.

Suddenly someone was on him. Someone had dove on him, landing on his shoulder. The world wavered in and out, his vision fading. He snapped back at the sound of a gun firing.

Aaron.

He had jumped on Hirst. His hand was wrapped around the taped up gun at the base of the IV stand. It was Hirst’s gun that fired and the bullet had hit Father Adams in the center of the bombs strapped to his body.

Adams faltered back a step, looking down at the bloody mess seeping out of his chest.

Hospital security raced around the corner, weapons drawn.

“Put it down!” the first one yelled. “Put it down,” he shouted again.

Father Adams looked up at them, his face calmer. “I’m going to blow the place up,” he said.

When he reached for the bombs on his chest, Hirst shouted for the security guards to stand down. He shouted that the bombs were fakes.

But no one heard him over the sound of weapons fire.

Father Adams’ body jerked like a marionette puppet governed by an insane puppeteer, the gun falling harmlessly from his grasp. When the gunfire ceased, Father Adams stayed on his feet for a few more seconds.

Then he fell down in a heap of blood and torn flesh.

Hirst lowered his head, shut his eyes, and let the world swim away. It was warmer down there and more comfortable.

Asleep, the pain stopped too.

Chapter 46

When Detective David Hirst woke up in his own hospital bed, more than a dozen people surrounded him.

“What’s this?” he asked softly, his eyes half lidded.

“Welcome to the land of the living,” Parkman said.

“Yeah, great …”

Sarah stepped into view, a crutch under her arm. “You saved my life with your shoulder. I need to say thanks.”

He tried to shrug, to show her his shoulder action, but it failed miserably.

“What happened to my shoulder?” Hirst asked, still dazed.

A doctor said, “You took a bullet but we got it out. You’ll be just fine. Even back on the job with a couple of months.”

Hirst scanned the faces in the room. More than half of them were his colleagues from work.

“What are you guys all doing here?”

“We’re here to congratulate you on nailing the priest killer,” his old partner Paul said. “Who would’ve thought to strap a gun to the bottom of that IV stand in the belief that Adams would come for Sarah? Man, that was genius. Then to knock her over and out of the way. You saved her life and Aaron’s and Parkman’s. What I still can’t figure out is how you shot him left handed. You always sucked with your left hand.”

Hirst looked at Aaron who stood behind Sarah. Aaron offered him a subtle shake of his head. He turned to Parkman. His head moved in an almost imperceptible nod.

“Luck, I guess,” Hirst said.

“Well, the media has picked up the whole story. You’re a fucking hero, Hirsty.”

“Don’t call me that.” Hirst winced at a sudden sharp pain in his side.

“It’s been too long. We’ll always call you Hirsty after all the beer you knocked back in your twenties.”

“What else have the papers been saying?”

“How brilliant you were to call Parkman and Sarah in on this.” Paul glanced at them and smiled. “Sarah’s got quite the reputation and even though there were mixed feelings about her, she got front page for being the one that saved everyone in that church. She even allowed herself to be used as bait in the hospital to get the priest killer even though she almost died a few times. Congratulations to all of you.”

Everyone in the room clapped, the doctor included.

“We need to leave now,” Sarah said.

“Where are you going?” Hirst asked.

“Home for a rest.” She took Hirst’s hand, leaned down and whispered, “Thanks for listening to me. Because of you we all made it.” She met his eyes.

“The thanks goes to you,” Hirst said. “For my wife, and getting me out of that church and—”

“Shhh,” she said, shaking her head. “You asked for our help. We came. We helped. But now we have to leave.”

“Be well. Stay in touch.”

Sarah stepped away. Aaron followed her.

Parkman put a hand on Hirst’s good shoulder and moved a red toothpick to the other side of his mouth. “Take care of yourself.”

“What is it with you and your toothpicks?” Hirst asked.

“Call us if you ever need anything again,” Parkman said, ignoring Hirst’s question.

“You do the same. If I can ever return the favor …”

At the door, Sarah and Aaron waited. Minutes later, they were gone and Hirst was alone with his colleagues and his reality.

The case was closed. It was truly over. And he had been shot for the first time in his life. It wasn’t so bad. A little time off work. A long rest. Maybe a little vacation.

Maybe he would head up along the coast to Santa Rosa when he got out of the hospital.

There were a few people who live and work in Santa Rosa that he needed to buy dinner for.

Maybe a few dinners.

He could take Janice. They could make a holiday out of it.

The good Lord knew he needed a vacation.

Chapter 47

When they got to the car, Aaron helped Sarah in and stored her crutch in the back with him.

“Where to?” Parkman asked.

“Home.”

“Home as in Santa Rosa?”

Sarah nodded. “I need to heal. I need a break. I can’t keep this up on a crutch. When I’m trained better, running and active, I have a job to do.”

“What job?” Aaron asked.

“I want to locate that cop I once knew from my childhood. I have a score to settle.”

“That doesn’t sound good. You can’t run around settling scores with cops.”

“Cop or not, he has to be made accountable for what he did.”

Parkman started the car and drove out of the hospital parking lot.

“I wanted to ask you, Sarah,” Aaron said from the backseat. “How did you know how it was going to go down in the hospital? How did you know to tape the gun and to be at the west side?”

“Vivian.”