Garage Sale Diamonds (Garage Sale Mystery) (2 page)

The siren again, a little closer this time.

Only last week Replacements, Ltd, the magic source for discontinued china, silverware and crystal patterns, charged more for these eleven missing forks and spoons than she originally paid for a set for eight many years ago. And now ten place-settings glinted in the box beside her—fifty pieces for only $20! Even husband Jason should salute this fortuitous coup!

But that wasn’t all. She’d also found the 20-lb exercise weight he’d asked for only yesterday. She filled many requests from family, friends and neighbors who knew about her regular treks to weekend sales, but finding this improbable item so fast beat all odds. Maybe now he’d stop irreverent references to her “garage sale mania.”

The siren pierced the air again, triggering an automatic wish for the safety of her five grown children and their families. All lived within a two-hour drive of the McLean home she and Jason bought twenty-five years ago, their proximity to parents seeming a gift in today’s mobile society. This nearness allowed frequent family gatherings, which she cherished.

She marveled that a marriage of two such different personalities could last forty-one years, but in the process she and Jason had morphed into a team. At sixty-one, she enjoyed good health, a close family, a loving husband, many friends and a financially comfortable life in upscale McLean. With their child-rearing responsibilities largely behind them, these recent years seemed the best ever. Well, except for her major foible: succumbing to the irresistible weekend lure of garage and estate sales. If Jason grumbled, comparing her “sport” to his golf and tennis brought silence.

She drove into her cul-de-sac, pressed a button to open the iron driveway gates and another to lift the garage door. As she climbed out of her car, the siren whine wafted even closer. Fire? Police? Ambulance? Trouble for someone, she thought, but at least help’s on the way.

She shelved newly bought under-the-pillow gifts in a garage cupboard as later surprises for Grands who spent the night. Then she carried her remaining items into the house. As she loaded the sale silverware into the dishwasher to be sanitized, the siren sounded louder.  Must be on her side of Dolley Madison Boulevard, the major road cutting through the center of McLean from the George Washington Parkway through Tyson Corner and into Vienna where it became Maple Avenue.

As she pulled clothes from the laundry room dryer, the siren wailed insistently. Was the engine hurtling past her neighborhood?

She stacked the laundry to carry upstairs but the siren’s shriek stopped her. Looking out the front door’s glass sidelights, she checked for tell-tale smoke somewhere in the neighborhood.

Now deafening, the sound penetrated the walls of her house as it roared into her community and, screaming louder yet, arrived on her street!

Was her house on fire? With a gasp she jerked open the basement door, sniffing for burn odors. She dashed through the house, fearing the acrid smell or billow of smoke. Detecting neither, she rushed out the front door. Covering her ears at the siren’s shrillness, she stared open-mouthed at the sleek red-cream-and-silver fire truck and EMS ambulance circling the cul-de-sac in front of her house. They parked opposite her. The piercing siren stopped. Four firefighters poured from the big truck and two from the ambulance, disappearing around the other side of the engine.

After final anxious glance to assure her own home wasn’t in flames, she peered nervously at neighbors’ houses around the circle and as far down the road as she could see. No smoke or flames. What was going on? She ran outside and skirted around the truck to find out.

2

Thursday, 9:46 AM

The firefighters strode straight to the Donnegan house directly across the circle. She and Jason had known Kirsten and Tony Donnegan for at least twenty years. Their children grew up together, they shared family camping trips, the men went deer hunting each year and the two couples dined often at local restaurants. A practicing veterinarian, Tony was the kindly go-to person for neighborhood kids who found injured or orphaned animals.

What had happened here? Maybe a false alarm like the time their son burned microwave popcorn? The smoke had triggered their security system’s fire alarm, alerting the fire department. The big engine had pulled into the cul-de-sac that day just as now. Those fire fighters had insisted on coming inside to assure themselves popcorn was the only smoke issue. Bless ’em.

Jennifer paused on the sidewalk. Her police detective son-in-law had warned their family that bystanders and gawkers often interfered with police emergency work. But if her good friends had a problem, shouldn’t she offer help? She raced across the Donnegans’ yard to their front door.

Speaking to the first uniformed man she saw inside the doorway, she said, “I’m the Donnegans’ neighbor and good friend from across the street. May I…?”

The fire fighter hesitated, but Tony saw her and called, “Jennifer, thank God you’re here. Come in quick.” She rushed to his side and he gripped her in a desperate hug. “It’s Kirsten. She can’t breathe.” Jennifer’s eyes followed his pointing finger to her friend lying on the floor. Kirsten’s face looked ashen as several medics tried to revive her. One attached a heart monitor and took her blood pressure. Another listened to her lungs before starting an IV. Each reported aloud to a third man who stood aside, writing on a clipboard and giving periodic instructions.

Tony clutched Jennifer as the lead medic asked, “Sir, have you a list of her medications?” Tony’s bewildered expression showed he did not.

Jennifer answered. “Yes, in her wallet. She and I each keep a list there. Where’s her purse?”

Tony shrugged. He seemed confused. “I…I have no idea.”

“Then I’ll look.” Jennifer found the purse in the kitchen, hurried to the living room and gave it to Tony. He fumbled inside before handing it back to her.

“Jen, could you please find it for them?” he asked in a thin voice. He turned to answer more questions from the lead medic.

“Please describe her symptoms.”

“She felt tired the last few days and today woke up weak. When she finally came down for breakfast, she looked pale and said she felt clammy and cold. So I bundled her up here on the couch. When her chest hurt and she couldn’t breathe, I…” his voice caught, “I called 911.”

“Has she a history of heart trouble?”

“High blood pressure but controlled with medication. Isn’t it on the list Jen gave you?”

A medic kneeling beside Kirsten said to the lead provider. “Uh-oh, she’s going into V-fib.”

“Start CPR,” the lead medic directed, triggering a flurry of treatment activity. The one who identified ventricular fibrillation began CPR. A second medic applied two hand-sized stickers with wires attached to the heart monitor and injected epinephrine. “Prepare to shock.”

“Step away from the patient,” the lead medic warned. “The electric current could transfer the same cardiac shock to anyone touching the patient.”

Tony clutched Jennifer as the shock jolted his wife’s heart. The monitor recorded several audible beeps before the sound changed to an even tone.

“Asystole?” the lead medic asked and got a positive nod from the other techs. The lead radioed Dispatch. “This is now a CPR call.  We’re going to Fairfax ER.”

One technician continued administering CPR, stopping compressions for only a few seconds as they placed Kirsten on the collapsible stretcher.

Tony cried out, “Is she going to be all right?”

The lead medic touched his arm to calm him. “The hospital is equipped for the care she needs right now, so we’re taking her there.”

“Can I ride with her?”

“Sorry, Sir, we don’t have room. But we’ll give your wife our best professional care, and Fairfax Hospital’s ER is the only level-one trauma center in northern Virginia. She’ll be in good hands.”

“I can drive you to the emergency room, Tony,” Jennifer offered.

This quieted him as did the apparent reassurance of Jennifer holding his hand tightly. “All right.”

“By the way, I’m Lt. Sommer. A captain who’s the EMS Supervisor may come by later to talk with you or he may send a policeman to gather all the facts.”

Tony frowned, “Why…why police involvement?”

“Just routine, Sir. Don’t be surprised if you see one or both of them.”

Jennifer hurried across the circle to get her car as Tony watched the crew wheel the stretcher to the ambulance and collect their equipment. She stopped behind the ambulance. Tony climbed in.

The ambulance pulled out first, lights flashing, siren shrieking. The fire truck’s powerful motor revved to life, preparing to return to the McLean station house. Jennifer followed closely as the ambulance swept through the neighborhood, but when it hurtled through a red light at the first intersection, she knew she couldn’t keep up. Though she drove in the same direction as fast as she safely could, the shrill siren gradually faded and evaporated as if it hadn’t existed at all.

3

Thursday, 10:31 AM

In the Middle-East, before his arduous journey began, Ahmed remembered looking up sharply when a skinny, rifle-toting soldier rushed into his tent.

“The Great Leader wants you, now.” Such commands required instant response. Anxiety gripped Ahmed as he grabbed his weapon and hurried to the big tent. Little good could come from this.

“Permission to enter, Great Leader?”

“Come in, Ahmed.”

Complying, he stepped in upon the worn Persian carpet and stood at attention before a tall, thin bearded man with steely eyes.

“At ease, Ahmed,” the leader said as the soldier before him tried to imagine what rule he’d unintentionally broken. “How would you like to command a secret operation in the United States?

Ahmed hoped his jaw hadn’t dropped open in surprise. “It is an honor that you even consider me for such a mission, Great Leader.”

“Your excellent martial skills, quick mind, unquestioned devotion to our cause and obedient submission to Allah, peace be unto His name, have not gone unnoticed. I think these qualities qualify you as the operative for this critical assignment. I chose you among others similarly adept because of my faith in your abilities plus your allegiance to me personally. Don’t disappoint me.”

“I offer my energy and my life to you and our cause, Great Leader.”

“Well spoken, Ahmed. Facilitators along your journey will move you from this camp to a destination in the United States where you will lead a cell of men in an explosive event to terrorize the Great Satan’s world. You and those other men will sacrifice your bodies, but your martyred names will touch all Muslim lips and assure your direct path into Paradise.”

“I thank you and my ancestors thank you for this great honor to our humble name.”

“Besides my detailed instructions, you must prepare to improvise if rocks block your intended plans. You’ve demonstrated ability to invent new solutions while keeping your eye on the goal, leading us to believe you can handle this situation, however it unfolds. Life doesn’t always follow our plans and, in the end, the only one truly in charge of what happens is Allah, bless His name.

“As always, Great Leader, you speak truth and wisdom.”

“Good. Now here’s what you will do…”

4

Thursday, 10:41 AM

As the fire/rescue ambulance sped toward INOVA Fairfax Hospital, lead medic Lt. Nathan Sommer watched his team take turns administering CPR to an unresponsive Kirsten Donnegan. The EKG attached to her emitted a flat green line. Sommer knew bringing a patient back from this stage was next to impossible. He counted on CPR coaxing enough oxygenated blood to her brain to keep her alive until the hospital ER could attempt to restart her heart.

“Heads up,” the driver announced; “five minutes out. You might want to call the ER.”

“Thanks.” Sommer dialed the hospital ER on his cell phone. The five-out call gave ER staff three time-saving pieces of information: treatment thus far given by EMS, update of the patient’s current condition and their imminent arrival at the hospital.

When the ambulance raced up to the hospital’s emergency entrance, Sommer jumped out to accompany Kirsten as other professionals arrived to rush her gurney inside. While the rest of his team stayed in their vehicle parked close by, he wouldn’t give up, pumping her chest as the gurney rolled until ER personnel took over.

Inside the hospital he watched the Code Team take over and leap into action: intubation, IV drugs and continued CPR. A smile crossed Sommer’s face when he heard the heart monitor begin to beep. The beeps rallied, sounding as if she’d make it. But then the steady beeps straggled unevenly and soon evolved into a monotone buzz. This dreaded sound, indicating flat-line pulmonary activity, launched more frantic measures to activate her heart…but without success.

At last, the attending physician stood back. He sighed, dejected at losing this battle. “Note the time of death,” he said to a nurse in a barely audible exhale.

Sommer stood transfixed. Despite their training, modern equipment and his team’s heroic efforts, their patient was gone. He knew they weren’t to blame, but it always hurt and he was a poor loser.

He thought about what had transpired in this case. EMS never left a dying or newly deceased person at the incident location, in this case, Kirsten’s house. They transported the patient to the nearest hospital ER. Important reasons justified this. They saved their share, but when they didn’t, this action spared the family the traumatic moment of death. Also hospital staff could make the patient presentable before the family came to grieve. On-call grief counselors could assist, if needed.