Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 69794 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69794 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
She squeezed my hand, oh so lightly, letting me know that she heard and understood the assignment.
I heard Black and Gentry talking quietly behind me about scene control and setting up a landing zone for the helicopter but kept up my quiet diatribe of nonsensical things until the first medic showed up.
The helicopter landed in the middle of the road, and two medics made their way over to the door just as volunteer firefighters appeared. I acknowledged them all with a nod of my head as I backed away to relinquish my charge.
Black’s hand squeezed my shoulder, and I didn’t realize until right then how rigid I’d been holding myself until he squeezed.
Angrily, I turned to the two people handcuffed sitting on the ground with their backs against Black’s cruiser.
They were talking quietly, as if they didn’t have a care in the world.
“Don’t,” Black warned.
Anger, resentment, pain and disgust vied for a prime spot in my heart as I stared at the woman who was supposed to be my sister.
Doors slammed behind me, and the engine of the helicopter air lifting my friend to a hospital sounded behind me as my hair whipped in the wind.
It was when I saw Seraphina smile that I snapped.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I boomed the moment that the medicvac lifted off and banked hard to the left as it raced back toward town. “Do you have something missing in your brain that keeps you from making logical choices? Do you get off on hurting others? What is it?”
Seraphina rolled her eyes. “You’re so dramatic.”
And the slur in her voice made me want to kick her face into the fender of the cruiser.
Gentry stepped in front of me, blocking me from taking any threatening steps in her direction.
“Ma’am, we had reports that you were in a traffic stop with the cops in Tarrot County,” Gentry said. “You were driving and the sheriff’s deputy let your friend drive you home. You failed to mention that you were both drunk.”
Seraphina shrugged, as if that was someone else’s problem, not hers.
“Get them to the hospital. Get a blood alcohol drawn on them immediately,” he ordered.
Gentry walked toward the two and lifted them up by their shirts. “In you go.”
Gentry had them both inside the cruiser before he walked back over to the crushed truck where our friend’s body lay.
“Fuck.”
I couldn’t stop myself from glancing over and seeing the same thing he did.
Koen wasn’t Koen anymore.
And my sister had everything to do with it.
TWENTY-FOUR
Some people are cut from the same cloth that I wouldn’t scrub my ass with.
—Beau to Magnolia
MAGNOLIA
I was laughing, tears literally falling from my eyes as Lysander told a story about a man coming in with a foreign body stuffed up his rectum, when I saw the medivac fly low over the house.
“Whoa, that was close,” Merrill said.
“Ten bucks says I get called into the hospital in the next ten minutes,” Lysander groaned.
I fully understood.
A small-town hospital like the one we were now working at would only have so many people that the hospital could afford. They wouldn’t have an unending supply of radiologists.
What I never expected was to get the same call myself.
“Hello?” I answered my phone after the third ring.
“Magnolia Baker?”
I paused. “That’s me.”
“This is Rainey Tubbs from the hospital. Your new boss?” she said. “I know that you’re not scheduled to work until after the first of the year, but we have a bit of an emergency. We had three traumas come in at once, and we need your help.”
I was already rushing to the bedroom to get changed. “Of course. I can get there…”
“We have officers set to arrive at your house now,” she said. “They were already on the way here and can swing by and pick you up.”
“Don’t send them to my house. Send them to Beau Vanerbilt’s house. That’s where I’ll be,” I said as I shoved my feet into my Crocs and ripped off my t-shirt to put on a bra and the same t-shirt.
By the time I got outside, Merrill was waving Lysander out with a wave of her hand.
“I have both kids,” she said as she saw me head to the door, too. “Love you.”
I blew her a kiss over my shoulder and got into the cruiser that was waiting practically at Beau’s front door.
“Hey,” I said to Gentry as I got inside. “What’s going…”
He took off before I could finish my sentence, but that wasn’t why my voice trailed off. It went quiet due to the two people in the back seat of his cruiser, handcuffed and looking worse for wear.
“What’s going on?” I asked shakily. “Is Beau okay?”
“Beau’s fine,” Gentry silently seethed beside me. “Koen’s not.”
My stomach sank. “Is that who I’m going to the hospital to…”
“No,” he growled. “Koen’s dead. It’s Ida Bell.”