Woman in Love

This story is part of an ongoing series.

The chronological order of my stories is listed in WifeWatchman's biography.

Feedback and

constructive

criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, language and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racism, racial language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

***

Part 20 - Objects In Motion...

11:40am, Friday, May 22d. Nextdoor County Police Chief Molly Evans was driving west on the University-City Highway, which is what everyone else but Town & County residents call it. She'd heard the APB go out for Callie Carrington's vehicle, and was traveling along the road looking for it when she came upon the scene of the crime.

"All units!" she called into her Police radio. 'Situation on the U-C Highway, near AGC Trucking. Need all Police cars to the scene!"

She hit the lightbar and pulled over so that her vehicle blocked eastbound traffic from getting close to the two collided cars and the two people, one of them down and bleeding. As she got out of her vehicle, she saw Detective German driving up.

"What happened?" she asked as she knelt by Callie, who was sobbing as she held pressure on Tim Jenkins's neck wound.

"He was shot. They shot him." Callie sobbed. "He's an FBI Agent."

Molly ripped open Tim's shirt and saw the small entry wound to his right side. "Sucking chest wound." she said, getting out an evidence bag from her pocket and turning it inside out. "Commander Troy taught me this. He had to do this on me, and he saved my life." (

Author's note: 'Schools And The Second', Ch.

) She applied the plastic of the bag to the wound, and taped it down with tape that was in the first aid kit German had brought up.

As two more Police vehicles arrived, Molly said "Let's get him in my car. I'll get him to the Hospital by the time an ambo (ambulance) gets here." German and one of the Patrolmen picked up Jenkins and slid him into the back seat. Callie also got in, continuing to apply pressure to his neck wound. Molly told German to take charge of the scene, then put her radio on the TCPD frequency before driving off.

"Break! Break! Break!" Molly said into the radio. "This is Chief Evans of the NCPD. I have a Federal Agent with multiple gunshot wounds, one to the neck, and one sucking chest wound.. Advise University Hospital that I am

en route

with the victim!"

"Commander Troy to Chief Evans." I said in reply as I stood in my office, holding my Police radio. "We copy. All units, clear all roads and hold traffic to allow Chief Evans to get to the Hospital unimpeded. Troy out."

And then the Iron Crowbar began doing Iron Crowbar things: I was in charge, so I took charge.

"Croyle!" I yelled as Teresa came running out of her office. "Go across the street and get Dr. Cordell, and transport him to University Hospital,

pronto.

He may be needed to help with emergency surgery." Teresa took off.

As Tanya came out of her office, I said to her "I need you to contact the NCPD, tell them we're sending CSIs to the scene, and we'll provide them with any other help they need. Send two MCD Detectives, but make sure our guys know they're there to assist, not to take over."

"After that," I continued, "make damn sure every Officer on this Police Force has armor on at all times. We're on high alert. And third, contact the Feds and tell them what happened, if they don't already know. And take charge here. I'm going to take Cindy to the Hospital."

I saw Tanya's eyes shift, which told me the Green Crowbar was coming up behind me. "Cindy, go get your armor and I'll drive you to the hospital."

"Do you... know who it is?" Cindy asked, her voice quivering.

"Not yet. Let's go find out..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Molly's Police vehicle hurtled up the drive and to the E.R. entrance to University Hospital. E.R. technicians rushed out and expertly got Tim Jenkins onto a gurney and wheeled him into the E.R., where Dr. Morgan was waiting to examine him. Meanwhile, a nurse helped Callie and Molly clean the blood off their hands. An instant later, Dr. Laura Fredricson appeared, and escorted them to the E.R. waiting room.

"What happened?---" Molly began but was interrupted by the Green Crowbar hurtling into the room, followed by the Red Crowbar.

"Thank God you're okay!" Cindy gasped, all but pulling Callie out of her chair and hugging her tightly, a hug Callie returned. "When we first heard, I was so scared it was you."

"It's... I'm sorry, it's Tim Jenkins." Callie said. Cindy nodded, trying not to cry more than she already was.

"Is he... still alive?" Cindy asked.

"He was when they took him into the E.R." Molly said. "So what happened?"

"Hold on." I said, taking out my Police iPhone. "Let's save some time and make this a formal statement." I turned on the video, and said "This is Commander Donald Troy, TCPD, interviewing witness Callie Carrington regarding the shooting of Federal Agent Tim Jenkins. With us are Nextdoor County Police Chief Molly Evans, TCPD Commander Cindy Ross, and Auxiliary Officer and Police Psychologist Dr. Laura Fredricson."

I asked Callie to describe what happened. She said "I was driving on the Nextdoor County Highway, going to City Airport..." I noticed Cindy bow her head at that, then turned my attention back to Callie, who continued: "... when this black car came around me and cut me off. Two men got out of the car, and they had short-barreled, semi-auto rifles. I've taken defensive driving school, so I put the car into reverse to get out of there, and ran into the car behind me. It was Tim Jenkins's car."

Callie: "He got out and got in front of me and faced off with the perps. They opened fire on us, and Tim was hit, but he was shooting back at them. They ran back to their car and took off, going east.'

I said "Can you describe the two men?"

Callie: "They had on ski masks covering their faces, but they were white males, wearing all black, including military boots. Both average height... medium height... and they appeared to be fit."

"Did they say anything? Yell anything at you?" I asked.

"No, not that I heard." Callie said.

"What about the car they were driving?"

"Black Buick." said Callie. "Pretty big car, but not an SUV. The license plate was funny... like a car dealer tag, maybe. It wasn't normal. And I couldn't make out the numbers on it."

"You did very well, especially in the chaos of the moment.' I said. I concluded the formal interview, then said "Okay, I'm going to get this out there." I left the room.

"I'll go check in with the NCPD." said Molly. She also left the room.

"I'll go see if I can get an update on Tim." Laura said. She also left the room, leaving Cindy and Callie alone. And Callie broke down.

"I'm sorry!" she wailed, collapsing into Cindy. "I'm so sorry! This was my fault!..."

"Nooooo, nooooo." Cindy said as she wrapped her arms around her fiancée.

"If I hadn't have been acting like such a shit," Callie sobbed, "and hadn't made you so angry with me, this wouldn't have happened!"

"I'm not angry with you." Cindy said. "And you're where you're supposed to be... in my arms, and I'm never letting you go." Callie said nothing. She just cried. Cindy just let her, and held on to her.

Part 21 - Knocking on Heaven's Door

12:15pm, Friday, May 22nd. Jack and Tanya Muscone came to the O.R. waiting room, to which we'd all reassembled. "Any news?" Jack said, his face ashen.

Laura said "One of the E.R. nurses said his carotid artery was not damaged, but his jugular vein was nicked. Callie saved his life by keeping pressure on it. The nurse didn't know how bad the chest wound was."

"He's still in surgery." I said. "Commander Croyle went and got Dr. Cordell and rushed him to the Hospital here, and Dr. Cordell is doing the surgery himself, so I'm told."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

1:10pm, Friday, May 22d. Detective Julia Rodriguez came into the waiting room. "Ma'am, sir," she said to Tanya and me, "I have a report of the crime scene."

"Sit here between us," I said, "and give us both the report at the same time." Julia sat down and opened her tablet. Tanya was opening the email she'd just received on her own tablet.

Julia said as she showed us photographs: "We got some tire impressions from the edge of the road here, where the NCPD Officer is standing. This is where we believe the perps car was when they cut off Callie Carrington's car. We've sent the tire impressions to Lieutenant Myron Milton and to the State Crime Lab for analysis."

Julia: "Callie attempted to back her car away from the perps and execute a 180-degree turn, but she only made it about 10 feet when she ran into Agent Jenkins's car as he came up behind her. I'm afraid his car was totaled with engine damage, and the back of her car is pretty messed up, too." She showed photos of the collided cars. Tim's car's driver-side door was still open, as was the driver door to Callie's car.

Julia: "You can see by the blood on the ground where Agent Jenkins fell. It looks like he was going to use his car door as a shield, but stepped out far enough to shield Callie when she ran by him, and that's when he was hit."

I said "Did you find any shell casings?"

Julia: "From Agent Jenkins's firearm, yes. But none at all from where the perps were, and we did a wide area search. They may have been using firearms similar to the ones used to shoot up Toddler's Team the other night."

"A very solid hypothesis." I said. "I would not be surprised at all to find that they are the very same weapons... if we can ever find those weapons, that is, and if there are any bullet fragments recovered from Agent Jenkins."

After Julia wrapped up and left with instructions from Tanya and me on what to do next, I settled back into my chair. Jack Muscone came and sat beside me. "Anything, Dog?" he asked.

"Not right now." I said, staring forward. "Give me a few minutes. I need to think." And with that, I was unaware of anything but what was going on inside my Mind Palace for a long, long time. Everyone else left me to my full-blown reverie...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Tim Jenkins opened his eyes to see a bright Light overhead. In front of him was a pastel-colored bridge over a stream, its rushing water cool and inviting. On the other side of the stream was a beautiful meadow, and he thought he could hear faint music. On the near side of the stream, to the left of the path leading to the bridge, was a bench. And seated on the bench was Tim's late mother.

"Mom?" he said. "Where's Dad?"

"Hello, son." Mrs. Jenkins said happily. "Your dad's on the Other Side. We've been waiting for you. You've fulfilled your purpose in Life... you are leaving behind a son, who will do wonderful things. You can choose to cross the Stream now, and be with all of us, or you can stay behind. Are you ready to cross the Stream?"

"No." Tim said, suddenly very certain. "I... I want to see my son. I want to be there for him." He looked up at the Light...

When he opened his eyes again, he was looking up at the bright Operating Room lights. "Doctor, the patient is awake." he heard a nurse say.

"So I see." said the old doctor that was working on him. "Hello, Tim. I'm Dr. Cordell. We've just about finished patching you up, so just relax..." Tim relaxed, and his eyes closed, seemingly just for a second...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

An hour later, FBI EAD Owen Lange came into the room. "Any news on Jenkins?" he asked in his gruff, scratchy voice.

"No sir." said Jack Muscone. "But Dr. Cordell is leading the surgery, so I'm optimistic."

"Thank God." said EAD Owen Lange. "That man is the best trauma surgeon in the world. Tim will make it, if Dr. Cordell has anything to say about it."

"And he does." said the aforementioned Dr. Leonard R. Cordell, coming into the room. "I appreciate the sentiment, and I'm just glad I'm able to help put people's bodies back together again." Teresa Croyle nodded vigorously in agreement.

"Agent Jenkins is out of surgery." said Dr. Cordell. "The bullets did not expand, and went right through him, so the damage wasn't as bad as it could have been. The jugular vein was nicked, but we were able to get that repaired pretty well. He'll be fed from a tube for a few days, so he won't have to eat hospital food."

I could tell who had been in the hospital as patients before by the fact that those of us who had been patients laughed the most at the joke. Then Dr. Cordell said: "Actually, the food here has improved a lot, thanks to your new Hospital Administrator. Anyway... all-in-all, if there is no infection, Agent Jenkins should make a full recovery."

"Yayyyy." said Tanya Muscone, and not a bit too loudly.

"Commander Troy, can I see you for a moment, outside?" asked Dr. Cordell.

"Sure." I said. We went out of the waiting room and down the hall a bit. Teresa came with us, at my hand-gesture bidding.

Cordell said: "What I want you to know in

your

professional capacity is that it could've been worse. A lot worse. The bullets went through his body and we found no fragments. But I could tell that they were small-caliber and very fast; they went through him before they really had chance to expand. My guess is that they were cop-killer bullets, and Agent Jenkins was actually fortunate that he wasn't wearing the standard FBI light armor... or we'd have been cleaning out a mess and potentially burying that man."

I nodded. "Thanks, Doctor. And thanks for coming in to operate on him."

Dr. Cordell grinned a bit as he said "I was running to Police Headquarters through the employees parking lot when Teresa drove up to me. I was going to ask one of your guys to drive me over there. Glad you and I had the same idea." I nodded vigorously in agreement.

As Dr. Cordell went to do post-op and paperwork things, Teresa said to me "Combined with the lack of shell casings by the perps at the scene, can we safely guess that the same guys that did the wiping out of Toddler's crew did this also?"

"Well," I said, "If not the very same ones, it's at least perps from the same team..."

Part 22 - Hypotheses

Hospital Administrator Seth Warner had made available their Hospital Board Conference Room, so Teresa led most of us up to it. I swept for bugs, finding none. Laura swept the room again, and found the microphones that recorded the Board meetings, but they were inoperative. She found nothing else wrong, either.

Other Federal Agents had arrived: ASAC Karina White, SSA Melina Allgood, and DEA SSA Dwight Stevens. Police Chief Sean Moynahan had also come in with NCPD Police Chief Molly Evans.

Cindy and Callie stayed behind in the waiting room, fortified by the arrival of Cindy and Molly's mother Maggie, who brought Betsy with her. Sheriff Griswold stayed with them, as well.

EAD Owen Lange sat down in the chair the Hospital Board Chairman usually sat in, in the center of the long table. I was directly across from him at his direct request, and others found seats around us.

"This is a very serious situation." said Owen Lange, with the prodigious power of understatement. "A Federal Agent was shot, and apparently defending another Federal Agent. And we feel about attacks on good Federal Agents the same way you TCPD guys feel about attacks on your own." We all nodded in understanding.

"So," said Owen Lange, "we are going to be peeling off of all this other stuff, and work exclusively on finding out who shot Special Agent Jenkins, and bringing those perps to Justice."

"If they're the same people that shot those four guys behind the Quick Stop," said Teresa Croyle "then we're working on the same thing anyway, aren't we?"

"I understand that." said Owen Lange, sounding a bit peeved. "What I'm saying is, is that we're---"

"We know what you're saying, Mr. EAD." I said. "Excuse me for interrupting, but Commander Croyle is right: while one Federal Agent was wounded in the interdiction of the attempted kidnapping of another Federal Agent, the reasons for it are personal to us, the TCPD... and to me, and my family."

"Kidnapping?" asked Dwight Stevens. "They came out with guns and started shooting. Why would you think it was a kidnapping?"

"Because it was. Isn't that obvious?" I fired back.

"No, it's not." said Dwight Stevens. "In fact, there's nothing to suggest that it

was

a kidnapping!"

"Don, maybe you can explain why you think it's a kidnapping attempt?" asked Karina White, her voice connoting her desire to defuse the tension. But I was exasperated past the point, and very tired of Dwight Stevens at that moment. I lit into him.

"No, since DEA Agent Stevens seems to know everything that's going on," I said, my voice thundering through the room, "why don't we let

him

explain what happened. And while you're at it, Agent Stevens, why don't

you

explain why the perps didn't shoot Callie once Tim went down?"

I ranted on: "Why don't

you

explain why, if they wanted her dead, they didn't shoot her coming out of the Psychology Building on Campus? Or at her home? Or going into or out of the Federal Building? Why don't

you

explain why that Rogue Team is here, in this County, in the first place? Why don't

you

explain what they're doing?"

It grew 'awkwardly' silent in the room as Stevens and I stared each other down, and it became clear I wasn't going to say anything until Stevens did. Owen Lange stepped in.

"Dwight, why don't you go back to the Federal Building and check with our colleagues in the City, Midtown, and Southport?" Owen Lange said. "Warn them about the attack here, and tell them to be on high alert. Also have them check around and see if there's any other Federal Agents being followed in those places."

Stevens clearly was unhappy about his dismissal, but he got up and left the room. All eyes went to me.

"I believe you were telling us that this was a kidnapping attempt, Commander Troy?" Owen Lange said, perhaps a bit drily.

"Yes sir." I said, trying to calm down and drop some of the tremendous tension and anger I was feeling inside me. "There are some things we know that Agent Stevens clearly doesn't know. However, some of this information was gathered in ways that will not stand up to scrutiny in Courts of Law. So I will indulge you to allow me to make a 'hypothetical' statement, and remember the adage to not ask questions that you might not want the answers to."

The tension still in the room could be felt as no one chuckled at the joke, but got comfortable as they waited to hear my story.

I began: "I think we all know that Trent Ridge and Quint Starr were part of the Rogue SEAL Team, and were behind the BOW Enterprises attack, the murder of LCDR Waring, the Fitch case, and other crimes. Quint Starr is dead for sure, as are William Drew and Mort Springer. Trent Ridge escaped from our custody, and we believe he was aided and abetted in his escape by someone in the Town & County area. Trent is officially listed as still at large, but likely is dead." (

Author's note: 'A Death in the Family', Ch. 04.

)

Your Iron Crowbar: "We also know that Amber Harris had her baby in mid-January. We know Trent Ridge was in the area nine months earlier, So let me give you a 'hypothetical' idea...

what if DNA evidence could prove that Amber Harris's second child was fathered by Trent Ridge?

" Murmurs began cropping up in the room.

Your Iron Crowbar: "If DNA tests were done on Amber's child, and it turned out to be Trent's, that would be enough to show that Amber knew where Trent was while he was at large as a fugitive from justice. And in an anything-but-ironic mirror image of Amber's desire to use Betty Morelli's baby to prove I had a 'liaison' with her,

proof of Amber's child's parentage could be enough to revoke her parole, put her in prison for years, and get her babies taken away from her and put in DFACS.

"