I screamed. People all around us at the parade started screaming and running.
“Kate, get down and stay down!” DJ yelled at me. “Down to the floorboards, now!” He grabbed his radio while I scooted off the seat and onto the floorboard. DJ pushed Officer DeWeise onto the seat and then dove on top of him. “This is Officer Kirkpatrick! DeWeise has been shot. Repeat, DeWeise has been shot!”
The governor was still driving erratically. Patricia kept on screaming, covering her head with her hands.
I looked up at the pain-filled face of Officer DeWeise directly above me, one cheek smashed on the seat. “Are you okay?” I yelled. “Get to a hospital!”
The governor seemed stunned, scared, and started fumbling around, mashing the brake instead of the gas, and Officer DeWeise nearly fell on top of me. DJ braced himself against Patricia’s headrest, so he didn’t crush DeWeise.
“We need a driver!” DJ shouted into the radio.
The radio cracked something back and half a second later, someone was pushing the governor into the middle seat and was slamming the accelerator to the floor. The air whooshed around us, sirens blared, and I kept my hands knit together and my face down on the carpeted floorboards.
My heart was racing like crazy. I couldn’t get a full breath in. Someone had been shot, and they’d been shot because I wasn’t sitting where I was supposed to be sitting.
“No, no, no, no,” I mumbled. “Oh no!”
“It’s okay, Kate. It’s okay,” DJ said from where he was kneeling on the seat behind the prostrate Officer DeWeise. “Talk to me, DeWeise.”
“Kid …” he huffed, his eyes tightly closed in pain. “Are … augh, are you okay?”
I was hyperventilating. “I’m okay,” I managed.
“Kate, breathe. Breathe, Kate. In through the nose …” DJ instructed. He scraped his knuckles down his cheek and just looked helplessly at me.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to concentrate on the breaths I was taking. But really, all I could see when I closed my eyes was John X standing in the crowd aiming for me and shooting the funny Officer DeWeise instead.
“He’s supposed to be in jail,” I mumbled.
“He is,” DJ said.
“Who did this then?” I looked up past DeWeise’s tortured face and saw DJ’s face get very hard.
He didn’t answer me. We pulled to a stop and DJ hopped out over the window, and a second later they were helping Officer DeWeise out. He was gasping and moaning with every movement. Once he got out, I sat up on the floorboards.
There was bright red blood all over the shiny, velvet-white interior. It dripped down from the lid of trunk and was smeared on the backseat.
It should have been my blood.
Would have been, if I hadn’t reached for my sunglasses right at that moment.
I couldn’t help it.
I lurched out of the car.
And threw up.
Chapter Eleven
TWO HOURS LATER AND I WAS SITTING IN ONE OF THE hospital waiting rooms, clutching a crumpled Styrofoam cup that used to contain water in it.
Dad was pacing the floor in front of me, Mom was sitting beside me, arm around my shoulder.
I was staring at the crumpled cup.
What was Styrofoam anyway? Who made it? And was it really one of those materials that never decomposes and will be around after a nuclear explosion?
DJ and Detective Masterson were behind the big number 237 written on the door in front of us. That was Officer DeWeise’s room. And last I’d heard, he was fine. The bullet had bounced off of his bulletproof vest but not before nicking him on the right side of his chest.
The doctor said he couldn’t tell us any more because we weren’t family or even friends. I told him that I was the person he took the bullet for, but the doctor didn’t seem to care. And about thirty minutes ago, a sobbing woman ran down the hallway and burst into his room.
I was assuming a wife.
The press conference had been canceled. Now all the reporters were gathered outside the hospital. I was scared to leave.
Finally, DJ came out of the room.
“What happened? Is he okay?” I immediately asked.
DJ rubbed his face, looking ten years older this afternoon than he did this morning. “He’s fine. His wife is here now. He got twenty-two stitches, but he should be back to normal within a couple of weeks. The doctor said that the force of the bullet cracked two of his ribs.”
Detective Masterson came out then too. “We should let them be alone,” he told DJ. Then he looked at me and my parents. “Come on, guys. We’re taking you guys to the station,” he said wearily.
I looked back down at the Styrofoam. Officer DeWeise had twenty-two stitches, two cracked ribs, and a sobbing wife.
Because of me.
Me and my dumb dream of being an artist.
I felt tears pooling in the corners of my eyes, but I tried my best to blink them away. Kate Carter never cried. That would be a sign of weakness, and Carters weren’t weak.
Or so Dad said. Mom claimed that crying was good for the soul.
Dad nodded at the policeman. “Fine,” he said crisply. I knew he was mad. He’d barely said a word after making sure I was okay when they got to the hospital. Just paced.
We stood and I gathered myself as I threw the crumpled cup away and followed DJ down the hospital corridor and to the front door.
Then I got scared. Someone had already tried to shoot at me once. What if he was out there waiting for me now? What if he was just around the other side of the huge grove of trees on the other side of the parking lot?
A throng of reporters were gathered outside the doors. Most were wearing suits, but there were a few who were dressed in jeans from the waist down and a collared shirt, tie, and sport coat from the waist up, like they’d been enjoying a nice day off before the parade happened.
DJ looked over at me. “Wait here with Detective Masterson,” he said. Then he made his way through the crowd of yelling reporters, jogged out to the parking lot, and pulled up right in front of the door in the familiar black Tahoe.
We got inside as quickly as we could, pushing past a few reporters who kept yelling at me, asking me what I knew.
“Did you know he’d get shot, Kate?”
“Kate, why did you duck? Did you know the shooter was out there?”
I wanted to tell them I wasn’t ducking, I was trying to prevent another squinty-eyed picture of me from showing up in the newspaper. But Detective Masterson didn’t give me any time to respond. He half shoved me into the backseat of the Tahoe.
Everyone else clambered inside. My heart was racing.
Detective Masterson was sitting on one side of me, Mom on the other. Dad rode in front with DJ.
The detective glanced over at me. “Kate?”
I took a deep breath and looked up at him. “Yeah?”
“Welcome to the life of a forensic sketch artist.”
“Being shot at is part of the life of a forensic sketch artist?” I asked.
He shrugged. “It can be. You’re a member of the police force. Police have to be prepared for anything.”
“Apparently that’s true even in a place like South Woodhaven Falls,” I said softly.
“Even in South Woodhaven Falls,” the detective nodded.
We pulled up to the police station and DJ pushed me through the doors and into the busy hum of the police station.
Deputy Slalom greeted us at the door and quickly ushered us into his office.
He turned to us after the door closed, looking tired, old, and defeated. He was wearing another business suit, but he now had the jacket on the back of his chair, his sleeves rolled to his elbows and his tie loose and hanging to one side.
“Well,” he said, taking a deep breath. He looked at DJ and Detective Masterson. “What’s the latest on DeWeise?”
“Doctor said two weeks recovery for the wound. Twenty-two stitches and two cracked ribs. He won’t be in the field
for a while, sir,” Detective Masterson said.
“Especially if Mrs. DeWeise has anything to say about it,” DJ said.
“Police work is hardest on the wife,” Deputy Slalom said quietly, looking down at a picture frame on his desk. He shook his head slightly and looked up at Mom, Dad, and me.
“Kate, Mr. and Mrs. Carter, I’m very sorry you had to endure this today.”
“Obviously, we now know what kind of danger Kate is in,” Dad said darkly.
“Yes, sir. And preventative measures are going to be strictly enforced. Kate, when you go to school —”
“I’m sorry, what?” Dad interrupted loudly.
“— we will now have four officers around you at all times. Officer Kirkpatrick will continue to be your primary bodyguard.”
“She is not going to school!” Dad burst, standing. “My daughter will not be going anywhere! She will stay home and will be constantly surrounded until we find whoever just fired a gun at her! Do you hear me?”
Deputy Slalom looked at Dad for a long moment. “Then John X just won.”
“What?” Dad shouted.
“John X just won. Kate is no longer a free citizen of the United States and in a sense he put her in jail just like him. Oh, she might have a cushier couch to lounge on, but mark my words, Mr. Carter. John X will be thrilled to know that he has succeeded in stripping Kate of everything she took from him.”
Dad sat down and covered his face with his hands. “She’s my daughter,” he said, quietly.
I’d never heard that tone in my dad’s voice before. Particularly as it related to me.
More tears pooling in the corners of my eyes.
“I know that, sir. Believe me, I know that. I have a daughter too. And I don’t envy the position you are in.”
“So,” Mom said, “you are saying that we should just continue on like today never happened.”
“Absolutely not,” Deputy Slalom said. “I’m saying that we should continue on as if today definitely happened. John X is mad. And because he’s mad, one of his friends came out of the woodwork to the parade today. We weren’t aware that John X had friends and I fear that if we don’t find these people, we’re looking at many more graveyard plots to be dug in the near future.”
I really didn’t like the term graveyard plots used in the same conversation that involved me.
It made me start thinking.
What did come after life? Was it really just a long nap like my dad thought? And if you never woke up again, was it technically considered a nap?
I’d asked my parents about heaven once. I was ten and the dog we had before Lolly had just died. So I’d asked if the dog had gone to heaven.
Dad told me heaven didn’t exist. “It’s a figment of some ancient writer’s imagination,” he’d told me. “And a nice idea. But honestly, I’d rather be sleeping than playing some little harp on a puffy white cloud for forever.”
Mom had said that she thought heaven was more a state of mind than an eternal destiny. “I think that everyone goes to some kind of ‘heaven,’ if that’s what you want to call it,” she’d said, using her fingers for quotation marks. “But really I think you just remember your life after you die.”
I’d always liked Mom’s theory of heaven better than Dad’s, because it was nice to think of our old dog just remembering all the fun days we’d had, but now I was wondering again.
Deputy Slalom was still talking. “It’s your decision, Mr. Carter, but I would ask you to reconsider allowing Kate to attend school. Like I said, we will have four officers there at all times, plus Officer Kirkpatrick. I’m going to increase the amount of security at your house as well.”
I raised my hand. “Does this mean I don’t have to give a press release?” I asked.
The slightest hint of a smile crossed Deputy Slalom’s mouth. “No, Kate,” he said. “You don’t have to give a press release.”
“Good.”
He looked back at Dad. “What do you think, Mr. Carter?”
Dad rubbed his face. “Your men protected her once already,” he said, quietly. Which was Dad-speak for “I guess it’s okay.”
Deputy Slalom nodded. “Good.” He looked at Detective Masterson. “I want you to be one of the ones constantly by Kate. And get Porter, Starr, and Klein. The four of you can be at the school too.”
The detective nodded. “Will do, sir.”
“Good.” Deputy Slalom then looked at DJ. “Are you still up to this?” he asked him.
DJ nodded, chin set. “Yes, sir.”
Deputy Slalom nodded. “Please rest assured that we have people working night and day on this case,” he told us. “We will find out what’s going on. Actually, there’s a team from St. Louis coming up today to start working on this as well.”
We finished talking and DJ stood. “Let’s get you home,” he said to me, but I think he was talking to my parents as well.
We rode home in silence. Dad was staring out the passenger window, Mom had her head leaned back against the headrest with her eyes closed, and Detective Masterson alternated looking out the window and looking at me.
A few reporters were outside my house when we pulled up, but DJ and the detective got us inside without too much trouble.
“Kate!” one lady kept yelling. “Kate!”
“No questions!” DJ snapped at her.
Lolly was wagging for us when we got inside.
“Hi, Lolly,” I said, rubbing her silky black head. She wagged even harder and leaned against my leg, begging for more attention.
So I sat down on the sofa. Lolly put her drooly head in my lap and for once I didn’t care. I turned on the TV and leaned back, trying to make myself relax.
The TV was tuned to the news channel, and they were showing footage of the parade that someone had caught on a personal camera. I watched it for a minute. There was me reaching for my sunglasses, there was Officer DeWeise clutching his chest and sagging sideways, and there was DJ yelling and pushing DeWeise on the backseat.
I shook my head slightly and changed the channel to something brainless. Ryan Seacrest was going on about Miley’s new hairstyle and I left it on that channel, rubbing Lolly’s head.
Someone had shot at me.
I closed my eyes, but all I could see was the blood dripping down the trunk of the governor’s car and smearing on the pristinely white seat.
I kept my eyes open.
DJ sat down on the couch beside me. “Well,” he said, looking at the TV. “This is definitely going to make me rethink getting those highlights I was thinking about.”
I managed a smile at him.
He smiled back at me. “You have to stop thinking about it, Kate.”
“Easier said than done, DJ.”
He nodded. “Let’s talk about something else then.”
“Like what?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. We can talk about Miley’s new hair color, but I’d kind of prefer if it was something other than that.”
The detective came in from the kitchen then and sat on the rocker. “Long, long day,” he said, stretching out, putting his feet on the ottoman. “What are you watching?”
“Miley’s thinking of going blonde again,” DJ told him.
“Oh,” Detective Masterson hummed. “I think if I were her, I’d stay brunette. But then, what do I know about the fashions of dim-witted, psychologically stunted multibillionaires?”
“They brought in a renowned makeup artist to talk about it,” DJ told him. “They think her skin tone isn’t right for blonde. Apparently, you know more than you think you do.”
The detective smiled proudly. “What can I say? I know lots about lots of things.”
I knew they were bantering to get me to stop thinking about today.
It wasn’t working very well.
“Does Officer DeWeise have any kids?” I asked.
DJ sighed and Detective Masterson answered me. “Yes, Kate. He’s got two girls.”
I nodded, picking at my
cuticles, trying to swallow despite the huge gaping hole in my gut. “How old are they?” I asked quietly, trying to imagine what I would be thinking if my dad had been shot and was in the hospital.
“Nine and six.” Then the detective straightened. “Kate, look at me.”
I bit my lip and looked up at him.
“It’s not your fault, Kate. Do you hear me?”
I nodded, but we both knew it was my fault. If I hadn’t drawn John X, then those two girls wouldn’t be scared for their dad tonight.
“Now,” Detective Masterson said, “I want you to stop thinking about it and try to focus on something else.”
“Do you believe in heaven?” I asked.
The detective didn’t hesitate. “Yes, Kate, I do.”
“What do you think it’s like?” I remembered what Detective Masterson told my dad about God. I was willing to bet that his view of heaven was a lot different than my parents’.
He took a deep breath. “I believe that heaven is where God resides, and it’s where people who have trusted Jesus as their savior go after death.”
Good solid churchy answer. “Do you think there are harps there?” I asked.
Detective Masterson grinned. “As in, are we playing them? No, I don’t think we spend eternity playing harps. Or sitting on clouds. Or wearing diapers.”
I wrinkled my nose at the last one. “What?”
“All those little angels sitting on a cloud playing harps and wearing a cloth diaper? Yeah, that’s not a good view of heaven.”
DJ had been very quiet through this whole conversation, so I turned and looked at him. “What do you think?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “I’m still trying to figure that out.” Then he stopped talking and just watched the TV, where Ryan was now informing America that Usher was planning a new tour involving a few stops in Dallas, Austin, and Memphis.
“My mom thinks it’s a subconscious thing and after we die, we just sort of remember and relive our previous life,” I said.
Detective Masterson nodded. “I’ve heard that one before. So when does that end?”
“When does what end?”
“The remembering. When do you just stop having things to remember?”
I hadn’t thought about that before. “I don’t know.”