Page 55 of Elliot

“Right here.” Silas was on one side of him, and Rob was on the other. They grabbed Maya’s arms, and Elliot rolled off her legs. He pushed himself up and onto his knees.

Silas was checking her pulse. “She’s unconscious but breathing. Her heartbeat is strong.”

Rob ran back toward the elevator. Silas glanced at him as he worked to clean the blood off Maya’s cheek. “Flesh wound to the face. Nasty cut.” He glanced at Elliot. “She’s got a contusion to the head. Shit, massive swelling around her temple.”

Elliot nodded and took her hand in his. Panting, he said, “She was slurring her words.”

Con spoke, “I have an ambulance three blocks away. NYPD is on scene.”

“The undercover cop?” Elliot adjusted his legs and landed on his ass beside Maya.

“He wants a cigarette,” Silas said. “Needless to say, we didn’t stop.”

Elliot heard the ambulance's siren, and Rob ran back to them. “The elevator is up. Is she mobile?”

Elliot stood up. “I’ve got her.”

“Man, we can?—”

“No! I’ve got her,” Elliot spat out between clenched teeth.

Silas and Rob both backed off as Elliot bent down and picked her up. He carefully adjusted her and walked back through the building's skeleton to where the service elevator was waiting to take them downstairs.

“You know I’m going to reflect in my report that Guardian was heartless and didn’t give me a cigarette,” the man said as the three men walked up behind him. When he saw Elliot carrying Maya, he hissed a cuss word and then asked, “Is she okay?”

“She will be,” all three men said at one time. There was not an alternative Elliot would accept; that was for fucking sure.

“What about the boss’s woman?”

Elliot didn’t turn around but said, “Dead. I’ll need all the information you have on the boss.”

The NYPD cop was quiet for a moment, then he called after them, “You’ve got it. Just don’t forget about me up here.”

Elliot reluctantly released Maya to the EMTs when the elevator hit the ground floor, but he didn’t let her out of his sight.

“Can I take a look at you?” a medic asked him.

Elliot frowned at the woman. “Why?”

“You’re bleeding.” The lady motioned to his shoulder. Elliot looked down and saw the blood. He lifted his t-shirt and saw the flaming red channel at the top of his shoulder. He didn’t think Jessica had gotten a shot off.

“Rob, did they recover Jessica’s gun?”

“Hold on.” Rob jogged over to where the on-scene command post was being established.

“So, sir, are you okay with me cleaning you up? That could need stitches.” The medic held a pad of white gauze in one hand and what looked like sterilized water in the other.

Elliot shook his head. “Later.” He stood up and looked to the open space where he’d pulled Maya back from certain death.

“Con, do you have a film on Jessica’s last minute?”

“I do. What do you need?”

“Did she fire her weapon?”

“Hold on, backing up the weather camera. And there you are. Going forward. Hold on, let me play it back in slow motion. She points the gun at you. You shoot twice. She falls into Maya, and you’ve already launched. No, I don’t see any shot from her. Why?”

“Explain to me how I have a bullet burn on my shoulder.” Elliot looked to the building across from where he’d been playing out a life-and-death struggle.

---