Page 80 of The 1 Lawyer

Under the bright light, Jenny squeezed her eyes shut. She winced when I stroked the hair away from her face. Blood came from both her nostrils; it was smeared across her face, had spilled down her neck. Her clothes were stained with it. Her nose was broken, that was certain, but it didn’t seem like that could be the source of so much blood. And then I found the head injury. I ripped off my T-shirt and pressed it firmly against the wound.

She was barely conscious, but I needed information. I grasped her arm. When I shook it, her eyes opened wide and she let out a ragged scream.

Rue was shouting into her phone. “A woman’s been attacked, she’s bleeding! We need an ambulance!”

Jenny’s lips moved. I bent my head close to hear her.

“My shoulder.”

My hand moved to her shoulder. This time, I barely grazed it with my fingers. I could tell what the problem was. Someone had wrenched her arm so violently that he’d dislocated her shoulder. Rage made my head pound, but I held my anger back. Jenny needed my help, not my fury.

Rue’s voice was loud in the doorway. “I don’t know who attacked her! Somebody dumped the woman on the front porch!”

Jenny was making unintelligible sounds, trying to communicate something. Her face became frantic, and she turned her head back and forth.

I wanted to hold her, give her comfort, but I was afraid to do anything that would cause her more pain. If I made any move that hurt her, it would gut me. So I just clasped her hand, not too tightly, and said, trying to sound reassuring, “We’ve got an ambulance coming, Jenny. We’re gonna get you to the hospital. You’re gonna be fine.”

Her head stopped moving, and she made eye contact with me. I wasn’t certain if she could understand what I was saying, but I had to know. “Who did this to you?”

She shook her head once but didn’t respond otherwise. I shouldn’t have pressed her, but I needed to, because I wanted to find him.

Then take the baseball bat and beat the shit out of him.

“Tell me,” I whispered. As I waited for a name, one thought ran through my head: Anyone who’d do this to Jenny ought to be dead.

She finally said, in a broken voice, “I don’t know.”

After that, she began crying in great, gasping sobs. Kneeling beside her, I felt so helpless, I wanted to howl myself. There was nothing I could do to relieve her suffering.

I shouted into the house, “Rue! Where are the EMTs?”

“They’re coming!” she called back.

With an effort, I lowered my voice and said, “Hear that, Jenny? They’re on their way.” I tried to sound calm, upbeat. Like I wasn’t about to fly apart.

Jenny blinked as she looked up at me. “How long?” she whispered.

At that point, I’d gladly have let someone dislocate my own shoulder in exchange for the sound of a siren nearing the house. But the night was almost silent. I could just make out the distant rumble of traffic from the highway.

So I lied. I smoothed her hair away from her face and said, “I hear the ambulance. Not much longer now. Everything’s gonna be all right, Jenny, I promise. You’ll be fine.”

CHAPTER 62

WHEN I walked into my house just before noon, I was beat. I’d pulled an all-nighter at the hospital, pacing the waiting room while I waited for news about Jenny.

Rue called from the kitchen, “Stafford Lee! You want coffee? There’s half a pot left.”

It sounded good. I trudged in and pulled a mug out of the cabinet. Rue sat at the kitchen table wearing her white housekeeping uniform. Her hands were wrapped around her own coffee cup. Looking worried, she asked, “So she’s going to be all right?”

I dropped into the chair beside her and nodded. “They got her shoulder back in its socket, and they don’t think she’ll need surgery on it. Sewed up her head.”

Her eyes widened. “Wow.”

“They did a CT scan to make sure she didn’t have any bleeding or bruising in her brain, but I don’t know what the results were.”

“So they’re keeping her in the hospital?”

“They’ll keep her overnight. I’ll go back this afternoon. Visiting hours start at three o’clock.”

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