Today’s excerpt is from How
‘bout Both, the third of three Elmer Bader books. Elmer, after being battered in a car bomb
explosion, is rescued and taken to a hospital.
The terrorist blast had damaged several buildings, but Elmer and other
cops saved hundreds. In the hospital,
Elmer immediately starts negotiating his release with the attending doctor. Enjoy and have a great day.
m.j.
Back at the
original scene, where the two officers had been killed, everyone there heard
the explosion. Reggie yelled to Alan,
“You’re in charge here, until any of the brass shows up. I’m heading over to where Elmer went.”
Even as Reggie
was pulling out in his car, other unmarked cars were pulling up to the
site. Some of them were senior
officers. After a fast conversation with
Alan, most left for the blast site. The
one senior officer who remained behind told Alan to carry on with what he’d
been doing, while he, the senior officer, would take over handling traffic and
whatnot, to free Alan up to interview witnesses.
Alan did his
best while worrying about his brother-in-law (they were married to sisters),
while Helen and the uniformed officer had found Elmer’s foot. Helen was sure it was Elmer. While the officer was less sure, he helped
her pull fallen material off him. Other
officers were flooding other blast zone sites, looking for any possible
survivors. They found a few from the
medical facility because with only one small door to go through, several people
hadn’t made it out. They also found
bodies of those who had been at the end of the long line of people trying to
escape through the back door.
By the time
Helen and the uniformed officer had managed to free Elmer, several ambulances
had arrived. The uniformed officer ran
to get an EMT team to come for Elmer. As
he was being loaded up, the uniformed officer went back in to look for anyone
else he could find, while Helen staggered back to her sound truck. There, one of the cameramen had been doing
his best to describe to those tuned in what was going on. When Helen reached him, he sighed. “Now here is our hero reporter, Helen
Bledsoe.”
Helen gave him a
faint smile, then took over. “One of the
courageous LAPD officers who have no doubt saved hundreds of lives here today,
Lieutenant Bader, was buried in the rubble of a real estate office. He has been pulled free, and is now on the
way to a hospital. Knowing Elmer Bader
as I do, he’ll pull through…but the cowardly idiot who did this foul deed can
rest assured he will not get away with it.
Lieutenant Bader will track you down.
I will be there to watch the needle go into your stinking arm.”
Ruth, with her
daughter Lizzie sitting next to her, asking more questions about her Daddy than
Ruth could possibly answer, pumped her fist.
“You tell ‘em, Helen. Way to go.”
·
Much later, at
the hospital where he’d been taken, Elmer slowly came to. He looked around his hospital room,
immediately saw Ruth and Lizzie, and tried to smile. He also saw the Chief of Police, Chief of
Detectives Gordon Bergmann, Maine, and Helen in his room, too.
Ruth bent over
the bed to kiss him, then helped the not yet four-year-old Lizzie do so as
well. The Chief of Police puffed out his
chest. “Lieutenant Bader, you are a
credit to our profession. By a
preliminary count, your actions saved over four hundred people today. Thank you.”
Elmer nodded,
and groaned, “Any time, Chief.”
After a few
chuckles, Elmer looked at Gordon. “How
many?”
Gordon knew
immediately what Elmer meant. “Twelve
dead—four more who might not make it.
About another twenty injured in some fashion or another…not counting
Maine there, with her arm in a sling, and Helen, who got cut up a bit digging
you out.”
Elmer closed his
eyes, then opened them. “Thanks,
Helen. Guess I owe you.”
Helen laughed,
“Yeah, but I can’t collect what I want in return, because you’re married to
such a wonderful lady. But I’ll think of
something.”
Elmer smiled,
“What happened to your arm, Maine?”
“Broke it. Force of the blast tossed me around a
bit. I didn’t land too well.”
Elmer looked at
Gordon. “Reggie, Alan, and Bert working
the case, I hope?”
Gordon nodded,
“Yeah, figured you’d either die or not, so they were better off doing their
jobs than babysitting you here while you were unconscious.”
Just then a
doctor walked in. “It seems to me I said
only two or three in here at once.
Lieutenant Bader needs his rest.”
The Chief
glanced at Gordon, and nodded toward him.
“We’re just leaving.”
Helen sighed,
“Yeah, me too, I guess.”
Elmer joked,
“Yeah, me too.” But, when he tried to
sit up, he groaned before adding, “well, maybe I better re-think that a bit.”
The doctor
nodded, “You’re not going anywhere, Lieutenant.
You’re here for observation for at least three days. You took a good knock on your noggin. I know that doesn’t sound doctor-like, but
you get the message. You almost surely
have a concussion. You are not leaving
here until I’m sure you’re out of the woods.”
Elmer grumbled,
“Never been in the woods in my life.
I’ll make you a deal, doc. I’ll
wait until morning, then I’m gone—with or without your blessing.”
Ruth shook her
head. “That’s my husband, the idiot,
speaking.”
Just as the
doctor started to say something, Helen’s cell phone rang. She saw it was her station calling. She answered, “Make it quick…I’m in Lieutenant
Bader’s room at the hospital. The doctor
is trying to run us all out of here, as it is.”
Helen listened
for a few moments, then nodded, “Get the information to Captain Wilcox at LAPD
Homicide…pronto.”
She listened a
bit more. “Know just who to get for the
job. I’ll handle it—the station paying?”
She listened a
bit more, and smiled, “Good. Get it to
Captain Wilcox.”
Off the call,
she looked around the room.
“Someone—probably the killer, from the message he left—called. Told the operator at my station to tell me he
had only begun. Also said my ‘boyfriend’
was on his short list of cops he was going to kill. Mentioned he might just kill me, too…after my
comments on the air earlier. I’m
assuming he meant you, Elmer. In case
you missed it—being knocked out and all—I had a few pointed words for this
jackass, and also said nice things about you.”
Elmer looked
hard at the doctor. “Ten in the morning,
I’m outta here. Or do you want to risk
this guy blowing up your hospital to get me?”
The doctor, now
white as a sheet, nodded, “We’ll see how you are.”
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