Tumbledown (12 page)

“I had to do CPR,” she said, shuddering at the memory. “The blade was in the way.”

He studied her face just long enough to make her feel uncomfortable, before releasing her hand. The wail of approaching sirens interrupted whatever else he might have asked, and he stood to guide the vehicles away from the immediate crime scene. Several of the responding officers activated auxiliary lighting on the patrol units, and the brightness of the halogen beams brought everything back into horrifying clarity. One of the paramedics approached Lyssa’s SUV and immediately lurched away again out of the light. Sarah heard him retching violently and clamped her mouth shut as her own stomach threatened to rebel once more.

After a few minutes, his colleague walked across to her.

“Hey.” He looked pale and there was sweat trickling down from his temples. “Officer Tobin told me you have some cuts to your hands.”

She nodded but glanced back toward the SUV, where Bill Quinn was shaking his head, his expression halfway between astounded and furious.

“I’m fine,” she whispered. “Is Lyssa―?” Her voice broke on the name.

“I’m afraid there was nothing we could do for her.” The paramedic offered her his hand. “C’mon, honey, you need to let me check you over.”

She allowed him to help her stand and then clutched at him as a combination of stress and gravity threatened to put her back on the ground. He sat her on the gurney and swapped Tobin’s jacket for a thick blanket. She didn’t make a sound when he began to clean the lacerations with a saline-soaked swab.

“Some of these will need sutures,” he said, frowning at the crisscross pattern of wounds that continued to bleed sluggishly as he wiped them. “Keep pressure here for a minute.” He positioned her fingers to hold a wad of gauze and left her alone in the ambulance. She leaned back against the pillow, wondering where Alex was and watching the paramedic confer rapidly with Quinn. When he returned, Quinn came with him.

“Hi, Sarah.” Quinn crouched down beside the gurney and smiled at her. “Tim here says you’re going to be just fine. Now, we’ll need a statement from you, and we need to do a couple of things down at the station. If you’re feeling up to that, we’ll take you straight over there now.”

It wasn’t really phrased as a question, but she murmured her consent regardless.

“I’ve spoken to Alex,” he continued. “She’s going to meet us there.”

Relief hit her so hard that she had to hang on to the sides of the gurney for support.

“Okay,” she said, unable to process anything except that final detail. “Okay, I’ll come with you.”

*

“Can you just…?” The CSI moved Sarah’s arm a fraction and readied her camera. “Stay real still now.”

Sarah did as she asked, staring at the blood trickling onto the scale-marker that the woman had set by her arm. “I think it needs stitches,” she said, but the woman didn’t appear to be listening to her. “The paramedic told me it needed stitches.”

The coverall Sarah had been given to wear rustled as the CSI brought her other arm forward. Quinn had requested her blood-spattered clothing and asked for permission to document her injuries. He had also given her forms to sign to allow the collection of a DNA sample and fingerprints: to rule her out of the inquiry, he had assured her. The entire process seemed to have taken hours; she sat numb and compliant with exhaustion, watching herself bleed onto the metal table.

“Okay, Sarah, I’m all done. I’ll let Sergeant Emerson know you’re ready to give your statement.”

Sarah’s pulse rate sped up at the unexpected mention of Emerson’s name, and she realized that Quinn must have reinstated him while Alex was away. She still had no idea whether she could trust him—for all she knew he could just have murdered Lyssa—which meant she certainly didn’t want to be interviewed by him. Her head started to ache and she closed her eyes miserably; there was no way she could request a different officer without causing herself even more problems.

She folded her arms across her chest, wishing she had never agreed to come to the station. She wanted a shower to clean away the streaks of Lyssa’s blood, and she wanted something to make her sleep and keep her from having nightmares, but more than anything else she wanted Alex, who wouldn’t talk to her like a victim while treating her like a suspect.

“Sarah?”

She looked around to see a dark-haired man standing in the doorway with a steaming mug in one hand and a glass of water in the other.

“I wasn’t sure if you wanted water or coffee, so I brought one of each.” He set the drinks in front of her. “Go ahead, I’m good with either.”

She took the water as he sat, and found that it settled her stomach somewhat. He let her take a few sips before introducing himself.

“I’m Sergeant Emerson.” He clicked two buttons on a small tape recorder. “I need to ask you some questions about what happened this evening, if that’s okay?”

She nodded and he prompted her to speak for the benefit of the tape.

“Yes, that’s okay,” she said.

“I want to make it clear that you are not under arrest and that you can ask for the interview to be terminated at any point.” He spoke slowly, as if to ensure that she understood her rights, but his friendly nature set alarm bells ringing.

“I understand,” she said. She couldn’t decide which would make matters worse: walking out of the interview and requesting legal counsel, or providing a statement to prove she had nothing to hide.

He cut into her confusion by asking his first question. “Can you tell me why Lyssa Mardell was at your house today?”

He unfastened the top button of his shirt, making Sarah aware how warm the small room was. Despite the water, her throat was parched, and she had to swallow twice before answering.

“She was there to help me study for my EMT course. She came round for lunch.”

“Was this a regular date?”

His choice of phrasing gave Sarah pause and she worded her response cautiously. “It was a regular arrangement, yes.”

“Ongoing for how long?”

“For about four months now. I met her on a call and we got talking afterward.”

“You volunteer as a first responder?” He made a note, swirling his pen to leave an asterisk beside the detail.

“Yes, that’s right.”

There was a smart rap on the door. Emerson announced that he was pausing the interview, and he stopped the tape as Quinn entered the room. Quinn took a seat just behind him, motioning as he did so that Emerson should restart the tape.

Emerson’s initial questions were basic, covering the time leading up to Lyssa’s death, and Sarah tried to answer them as thoroughly as possible.

“So you heard your dog barking?” he said. He had filled three pages with notes, even though the tape and a video camera were recording everything.

“I heard her howling,” she corrected him. “I was trying to call Alex and I heard Tilly howling.”

“Why were you calling Alex?”

She licked her lips uneasily. She couldn’t tell them the real reason, not without speaking to Alex and Castillo first. “To ask what time she would be home,” she said, but she couldn’t make the lie convincing, and she saw Emerson write something in capitals and underline it.

“We might need to look at your cell phone,” he told her.

She nodded helplessly.

“What happened after you heard your dog?”

“I followed the noise down the track and found Lyssa’s SUV.” She reached for the glass of water and her hand shook as she sipped from it. “I knew something was wrong. I could see her collapsed at the side of the door. I started to run.”

“Did you move her at all?”

“No,” she said, but then faltered, struggling to recall exactly what she had done. “I turned her onto her back. I knew she was dead, but I had to do some—”

“How did you know she was dead?”

“I just did,” she whispered. Tears filled her eyes. “But she was still warm when I touched her.”

“Where exactly did you touch her?”

“I tilted her chin.” She used her sleeve to wipe her eyes, but more tears trickled free.

“You didn’t check for a pulse?” Emerson placed two fingers on his own carotid to demonstrate.

She shook her head. “No, I could see she wasn’t breathing, so I started CPR.”

“Explain how you did that.”

Behind Emerson, Quinn leaned forward in his seat.

“I gave her two breaths and then I…” Her voice trailed off and she clenched her fists at her own stupidity. “I tried to move the knife.”

“You tried to move the knife?” Emerson repeated carefully, as if afraid that anyone transcribing the tape might overlook the significance of the admission.

“Yes,” Sarah said. “To do CPR, but it was stuck.” For a second, she thought she might be sick again, and something in her expression must have worried Emerson because she dimly heard him urge her to take a deep breath.

“Okay to continue now?”

She swallowed the last of her water and nodded.

“Good. Did you manage to perform CPR?”

“Yes, but not very well. There wasn’t much room and the blade was in the way.”

“How did you cut your hands?” It seemed like a stupid question, but she knew that he needed her to spell it out.

“On the blade as I did chest compressions.”

“And how long did you perform CPR for?”

“I don’t know.”

“You didn’t think to call for help?”

“I wasn’t thinking of much,” she said, trying to keep her tone civil. “I’d just found my friend stabbed to death.”

“So, do I have this right?” Quinn’s interjection startled her; it was the first time he had spoken. “You found Lyssa Mardell with the remains of a knife lodged in her chest, you attempted to resuscitate her despite being aware that it would be futile and despite the knife cutting your hands to ribbons, and you only phoned for help after all this had occurred?”

“Yes,” she replied calmly, refusing to allow him to provoke her.

“Yes, what?” he snapped.

“Yes,” she said, sitting up straighter. “You have it exactly right.”

Any reply he might have made was interrupted by someone hammering on the door. Through the reinforced glass window, Sarah could clearly hear Alex shouting and someone attempting to placate her. Emerson turned to Quinn for guidance and then stated that he was stopping the tape. The door flew open seconds later.

“Oh God.” All the anger had vanished from Alex’s voice. She knelt by Sarah’s side, taking Sarah’s hands in her own. That touch, and seeing Alex safe, almost destroyed the shred of composure Sarah was clinging to and she had to bite through her lip to stop herself from crying.

“It’s okay, sweetheart, you’re okay.” Alex ran a finger between the oozing lacerations, her face aghast. “Jesus Christ, Quinn, what the hell were you thinking?”

“I was thinking that your wife is the only witness in the murder of a young paramedic,” he said, not sounding in the least repentant.

“You were so eager to question her that you just left her to bleed?”

Emerson had the grace to look ashamed, but Quinn held Alex’s gaze and said nothing.

“Is she under arrest?”

“No,” Emerson replied quickly.

“Okay.” Sarah heard Alex take a breath and suspected she was counting to ten. “I’m going to take her to the hospital. Then I’m going to take her home.”

“Your home is a potential crime scene, Alex,” Quinn warned her, but then added in a softer tone, “Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”

Sarah felt the tension in the set of Alex’s body and gave her hand as tight a squeeze as she could. “Leave them to it,” she said quietly. “I can’t face going back there tonight.” She didn’t want to say that it wasn’t safe for them to go home, that someone obviously knew where they lived. The fact that Alex chose not to argue indicated she had read between the lines.

Sarah looked across at Quinn. “The chooks, the cats, and Tilly will need feeding.”

For the first time since he had entered the room, Quinn smiled at her. Remembering the way he had spoken to her not minutes ago, she didn’t smile back.

“I’ll pass word to an officer,” he said. “You go on with Alex now. We can finish this tomorrow.”

She stood and Alex put an arm around her, subtly ensuring that she stayed up.

“Let me know where you’ll be spending the night,” Quinn told them as a parting salvo.

Alex led her from the room without replying, and Sarah suspected it was only out of deference to her that she didn’t slam the door in Quinn’s face.

*

The motel on the outskirts of Cary was small but clean and, unlike the first that Alex inquired at, didn’t display a rate for renting by the hour. On the way to the hospital she had phoned the only hotel in Avery, to be told—upon giving her name—that there were no vacancies. She had hung up without comment, but she saw Sarah peer into the hotel parking lot as they passed. There were only three vehicles in it, and one of those belonged to the owner.

She unlocked their motel room and steered Sarah to sit on the bed. “I’m going to get my bag but I’ll be right back,” she said. Sarah, half-stupefied with painkillers, murmured what sounded like agreement.

The small overnight bag Alex had taken on her course didn’t hold much in the way of clean clothes, but it was better than nothing. She clicked the lock on her key fob and then paused with her hand on the truck door. The parking lot was dark and deserted, with no visible closed-circuit cameras. Crouching out of sight of the motel’s concrete balcony, she finally allowed herself to give in to the fear and sorrow she had kept bottled up while she took care of Sarah. She wept silently, covering her face and rocking with the force necessary to smother her sobs.

She knew everything now. While they were waiting at the hospital, Sarah had told her about the photograph in the newspaper and the repeated efforts she had made to contact Alex and warn her. Then, in stilted sentences, she had described what she found when she followed Tilly down the track.

“I didn’t kill her. I didn’t do it,” she had insisted, desperate to reassure one of the few people who would never have believed it possible in the first place.

The doctor who eventually stitched and dressed her wounds had offered her counseling and given her a pamphlet aimed at patients with a tendency to self-harm. Neither she nor Alex had attempted to explain how the injuries had actually occurred.