River’s End

murder in a man’s eye before. It wasn’t a look you forgot. “The last time I checked in, Mike’s vitals were stable. His tests have been good.” She punched the elevator button. “He’s critical, but he’s also young and healthy.”
    “He’s been in a coma for a day and a half.”
    She nudged him into the elevator with her. “Sometimes a coma is just the body’s way of focusing in on healing. And he did come around once in the ambulance on the way here. It was brief, but I think he recognized me, and that’s a very positive sign.”
    “You? You were with him?”
    She stepped out on the main lobby, took his arm to lead him to the doors. “We had a date. I was meeting him at your place. I was running late. We had a double suicide attempt come in. Lost one, saved the other. It was nearly ten by the time I got there.”
    Outside she turned her face up to the sun, rolled her shoulders. “God, it feels good out here. In any case, the door was open. Mike was on the kitchen floor, facedown. Glass all over the place. Wine bottle. It’s probably what he was hit with. I went to work on him. I had my bag in the car. I called it in, did what I could on the scene. We had him in ER within thirty minutes.”
    “Is he going to die?”
    She didn’t answer right away, but sat down on the curb, waited for Noah to join her.
    “I don’t know. Medically, he’s got an even chance, maybe even a little better than even. There were no bone fragments in his brain, and that was a big one. Still, medicine has limits, and it’s up to him now. I’m half crazy about him.”
    “No kidding?”
    “Yeah. I know he started off that night with this thing for Steph. And actually, I had the same kind of focus on you.” She tilted her face toward him and smiled. “You were a little too distracted to notice, so I went back and sulked a little.”
    “Yeah?”
    She had to smile. “Just a little. Mike and Steph went through the moves and motions. They sort of ran out of steam, and I felt sorry for Mike because he was worried about you and didn’t know what to do about it. We started talking and had this big click happen. We started going out. Then we started staying in.”
    “That was you the other night on the phone.”
    “Yeah.”
    “Mike Elmo and the sexy doctor.” Absurdly pleased, Noah shook his head. “That’s just terrific.” He grabbed her face in his hand and kissed her noisily. “That’s just great.”
    She laughed and gave him a friendly pat on the knee. “He thinks you walk on water. I didn’t say that to make you sad,” she hurried on when the light went out of Noah’s eyes. “I said it because I think he’s a pretty great guy, and he thinks you’re a pretty great guy. So, I figure he’s right. And I figure that when I ran into you upstairs you’d had about enough and were going to go find that lunatic Caryn and ... I was going to say do something you’d regret, but I don’t think you’d regret it. Something that wouldn’t help, that wouldn’t solve anything, and that in the end would put you in the kind of jam Mike wouldn’t like.”
    “She wanted to hurt me. She didn’t give a damn about Mike.”
    “Noah, she did hurt you. She hurt you where it matters the most. Let’s go back up. I only have a few more minutes left, and I want to see him.”
    He nodded, got to his feet, then held down a hand for hers. “I guess it’s lucky I ran into you.”
    “Why don’t you buy me a beer after shift?” She grinned as they went back inside. “You can tell me all kinds of embarrassing Mike stories.”
    “What kind of friend would that make me?”
    “He told me you got piss-faced the spring of your senior year in high school, and he dared you to run around the track bare-assed naked. And when you did, he took videos and showed them at your graduation party. He still has a copy, by the way.”
    Her smile brightened as they moved onto the elevator. “You had very nice form at eighteen.”
    “Oh yeah. Well, that’s nothing. I’ve got much better stories on Mike. What time do you get off shift?”
    “Seven, please God.”
    “It’s a date.” His mood almost light, he stepped off the elevator. Then his heart crashed to his feet as he saw Maggie sobbing in his mother’s arms.
    “No.” The roar inside his head was so loud he couldn’t hear his own voice as he repeated the denial over and over, as he raced down the corridor, yanking free of Dory’s restraining hand.
    “Noah, wait!” Celia