Page 47 of Operation: Discovery

“Dispatch, this is Officer 317 off-duty. I’ve got a woman here at First and Aspen 10-52.”

“317, copy that.”

Dee took a step back. Ten codes were another language. She knew exactly two of them, 10-20, as in ‘what’s your 20?’, meaning location, and 10-04, meaning the transmission was understood. Mostly, she understood that from television shows and movies. But was 10-52 going to get her arrested? Had she done anything? “You’re a cop?”

He slowly nodded his head. “My daughter was born this morning in a rush delivery.” He laughed. “I was coming home because my wife was suddenly worried the house wasn’t ready for the baby. I was just walking down to the gas station to grab a pizza for supper when I saw you. I called for an ambulance to check you out.”

He was a cop. No wonder he’d known how to handle her anxiety after almost getting run over. “I’m fine. I scraped my knee when I was running after a woman I thought I recognized. A wanted woman,” she amended, so he didn’t think she was just chasing after people.

“A wanted woman?” His demeanor changed immediately. “And was she down this alley where you were headed?” He pulled a small flashlight from a pocket of his dark cargo pants.

“She was, but I suspect she left her car parked down there, and then used it as a weapon to make sure I couldn’t follow her or tell what she was driving.”

“I thought it was an accident and I was focused on you, not the car. All I could say with certainty is that it was a dark, probably black, car with some dust on it. Not very helpful.”

“317, rescue 5 is leaving the hatch now.”

The officer smiled. “10-04.” He looked at her. “Rescue 5 is the volunteer firefighters here in town. Good group. They’ll check you over.”

His phone rang with an incoming call, and he hung up on Dispatch to take it. “This is Mike.”

Dee recognized Officer Blake’s voice over the speakerphone. “Mike, who’s the ambulance for? I thought you were off-duty and at the hospital?”

He glanced at her and waited for her to fill in the information needed.

She leaned closer. “Nixon, it’s Dee Heather Rose. I think I’m probably fine, but I’m a little tossed around after tripping once and jumping out of the way of a car.”

“Where are you? Hold your position, and I’ll be right there.”

Mike gave the address, and then waited with her. The ambulance arrived first, and they began checking out her cuts as a police cruiser pulled to a stop at the curb behind the ambulance. She’d gone from racing through town after a suspect to being surrounded by officers and firefighters.

Officer Blake got out of his cruiser while he was still on his phone with someone else. He hung up, then came over to where she was lying. “What happened? I have half the story from Moira, but I need to hear the rest from you.”

She tried to remember the order of how everything happened, then laid it out for him as quickly as she could without forgetting pieces. If the woman was innocent, then she would have no reason to flee or to practically run Dee over.

“Oh, and before I forget, she left her coat on a bush over in a neighborhood by the school.”

Nixon listened to her, but his brow was furrowed as he jotted down the information. “I can’t figure out this lady’s MO. Why would she go to the school without a car to get away quickly? Why run? I hate to say it, but if she was a trafficker and you were running down all these streets where no one was watching, she’d have just shot you for the trouble.”

Dee swallowed the bile in her throat as one of the firefighters cleaned the grit from her knee. At least what Nixon was saying was a good distraction from the sharp pain. “So you don’t think she was the nurse we saw at the clinic? I was sure. I wouldn’t have chased her if I thought she was innocent.”

He shook his head. “I’m not saying that at all. Judging by the description you gave today, she matches the woman you saw at the garage. What I can’t see are the pieces that will make this puzzle fit together. She is acting atypical, which makes tracking her or predicting her next move more difficult.”

Mike snorted. “Maybe you should just keep Dee and Brendon around. She seems to show up wherever they are.”

Dee wildly shook her head, gripping the edges of the gurney for stability. “No. She’s after Adam, and Adam is staying with us. Last time, we found her because we were looking for signs like the blood drive. The church sign stood out. I couldn’t predict her next move any more than you can.”

Mike held up his hands. “I didn’t mean to insinuate you had knowledge of her whereabouts. However, you do seem to meet up with this woman more often than any of us. She’s very good at avoiding police cruisers.”

Which was exactly why she felt safe now. The only thing that could make her feel safer would be if Brendon was there. She wanted her strong, former Army Ranger there to wrap his arms around her and tell her she was all right now. If she’d told him what she was going to do, he probably would’ve insisted he go too or he would’ve asked her to bring one of the other guys if she didn’t want him. She’d been so focused on getting the task done that it seemed silly to interrupt others from their work to do the job. She wouldn’t make that mistake again.

A truck turned onto the street from the gas station, its bright lights spilling down the street. Her heart pinched tightly, but she couldn’t explain why. It was too far away to know who might be in it. She knew so few people in town, it was likely she wouldn’t know them at all. Still, she was sitting on a gurney outside the ambulance, and it left her feeling vulnerable to prying eyes.

One of the firefighters had said she wouldn’t need a transport unless she wanted one. Since that would be an expensive ride to Cheyenne and this rescue vehicle might be needed for something more important than split up knees, she declined. Just then, the pickup pulled across the street and parked the wrong way next to the sidewalk.

Connor got out but didn’t even look her way as he jogged around the back of his pickup, threw a blanket to the side, and lifted Brendon’s chair from the back. Excitement flushed through her as she watched through Connor’s window. Brendon flexed his arm muscles to lift himself out of the seat and lowered himself to his chair. He was only out of sight for a few seconds before he appeared in front of the truck, found a crosswalk, and sped across the street.

His face was hard with purpose, and he had eyes only for her. His stare didn’t waver from her to the officers or firefighters. In fact, he shoved forward, seemingly expecting them to move out of his way since he didn’t slow or veer to either side.

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