Tribute

sat beside her and held her hand.
    When the door flew open, they lurched to their feet together. “What is it? Where are you taking him? Steve.”
    “Miss.” One of the ER nurses put herself in Cilla’s path. “They’re taking your friend up to surgery.”
    “Surgery for what? For what?”
    “He has bleeding in his brain from the head injury. They need to operate. I’m going to take you up to the surgical waiting area. One of the doctors can explain the procedure to you.”
    “How bad? You can tell me that. How bad?”
    “We’re doing everything we can. We have a good surgical team prepping for the procedure.” She gestured them to an elevator. “Do you know if Mr. Chensky was in some sort of fight?”
    “No. Why?”
    “The injury to the back of his head. It looks as though he’s been struck. It’s just not consistent with a fall. Of course, if he was driving without his helmet . . .”
    “It didn’t happen when he was driving. It didn’t happen on the road.”
    “So you said.”
    “Cilla.” Ford laid a hand on hers before she could get into the elevator. “We need to call the cops.”
    HOW WAS SHE supposed to think? How could she sit in this room while somewhere else strangers operated on Steve? An operating room. Operating theater. They called it a theater sometimes, didn’t they? Would the patient and doctor be costars? Who got top billing?
    “Miss McGowan?”
    “What?” She stared into the blank eyes of the cop. What was his name? She’d already forgotten it. “I’m sorry.” She groped through the chaos of her mind for the question he’d asked. “I’m not sure what time he got back. I went to bed about midnight, and he wasn’t back. Shanna said he left her before two. Just before two, she said.”
    “Do you have Shanna’s full name?”
    “Shanna Stiles,” Ford supplied. “She works for Brian Morrow. Morrow Landscape and Design.”
    “You found Mr. Chensky at approximately seven-thirty this morning?”
    “I said that. Didn’t I say that?” Cilla pushed at her hair. “He wasn’t in the house, so I checked the barn for his bike. And I found him.”
    “You and Mr. Chensky live together?”
    “He’s visiting. He’s helping me out for a few weeks.”
    “Visiting from?”
    “Los Angeles. New York. I mean, he was in New York, and he’s going back to L.A.” Whatever churned in her belly wanted to rise up to her throat. “What difference does it make?”
    “Officer Taney.” Ford put a hand over Cilla’s, squeezed. “Here’s the thing. A few nights ago, I saw someone walking around, going into Cilla’s barn. It was late. I was working late, and I looked out the window on the way to bed and saw someone, saw a flashlight. I thought it was Steve, and didn’t think anything of it.”
    “But it wasn’t.” Remembering, Cilla shut her eyes. “I was supposed to buy a padlock, but I didn’t. I forgot about it, didn’t think about it, and now—”
    “What do you keep in the barn?” Taney asked her.
    “I cleaned out the attic and stored things there. A lot of things I have to sort through. And there’s other stuff. Old tack, tools, equipment.”
    “Valuables?”
    “For some, anything connected to my grandmother is valuable. Stupid, stupid to think I could turn it all around, make it new.” Make it mine, she thought. Stupid.
    “Was anything taken?”
    “I don’t know. I just don’t know.”
    “Mr. Chensky went out at approximately eight last evening, to a bar. You don’t have the name of the bar—”
    “No, I don’t have the name of the bar. You can ask Shanna Stiles. And if you’re thinking he was drunk and somehow bashed himself on the back of the head, smashed his face into the concrete and knocked his bike on top of him, you’re wrong. Steve wouldn’t get on his bike drunk. You can ask Shanna or anyone else who was in the bar last night about that.”
    “I’m going to do that, Miss McGowan, and if it’s all right with you, I’ll go over and have a look at your barn.”
    “Yes, go ahead.”
    “I hope your friend comes through okay. I’ll be in touch,” he added as he rose.
    Ford watched him cross to the nurses’ station, take out a card.
    “He thinks it was drunken clumsiness, or that Steve was stoned and stupid.”
    “Maybe he does.” Ford turned back to Cilla. “Maybe. But he’s still going to look at things, talk to people. And Steve can fill in the blanks when he’s able.”
    “He could die. They don’t have to tell me that