Marcia Clark - Guilt By Degrees

“Teresa, I so appreciate your help,” I said.

“I take it this is what you were looking for?” she asked, gesturing to the canvas bag.

“It’s everything we were looking for,” I replied. “And more than we ever expected to find. I can’t thank you enough. But it would be best if you didn’t mention this to anyone for a while.”

“I understand. I wish you the best of luck,” she said warmly.

We stepped out onto the porch and I waved to Gary, the bag tucked under my arm. He took another look up and down the street, then moved up the sidewalk toward us. When he saw my ear-to-ear grin, he smiled.

“It’s been pretty quiet, so I let Stephen take an early lunch,” he said. “What’d you get? From the looks of you, it must be pretty good.”

I gave him the bag, and he peered inside. I watched Gary’s eyes grow big as he inhaled sharply. He looked from Bailey to me, and I nodded. We had the gold.

“You know, I was starting to doubt whether there was anything to find.” He shook his head with a rueful smile. “Congratulations, you two. Why don’t we meet the guys for lunch and give them the news? They’re all going to Joe’s.”

It did feel like some kind of celebration was in order. Joe’s, a no-frills-looking box that served top-notch food, had been around for twenty years, but I’d never had the chance to check it out. “Great idea,” I said.

“You know how to get there?” Gary asked.

“Yep,” Bailey said.

“Okay, then you lead, I’ll follow.”

As we turned to head for Bailey’s car, Teresa walked out onto the porch with the young woman who’d been in the waiting room. Teresa waved to us, and we waved back. We got to the car just as Gary pulled up. We moved out in front, heading down the narrow street toward Abbot Kinney Boulevard.

“We might just have found the linchpin that’ll nail Lilah for the hit-and-run and as an aider and abettor in Simon’s murder,” I said. I was jubilant.

“Seems so,” Bailey said.

I started to tell her to unwind and enjoy our big score, but it was slow, careful going on the narrow street that was made more so by the parked cars that lined both sides, and I could see she was focused on the road. But when she stopped at an intersection and peered around me to look for oncoming traffic, I saw that she was grinning like a kid with an ice-cream cone.

As Bailey pulled forward, I chuckled. “I don’t think I’ve seen you smile like that since-”

But my next words were cut off by the high-pitched screech of tires behind us. I turned and saw an old-model Chevy roar out of the narrow street we’d just crossed and slam into the front passenger side of Gary’s car. It spun on impact, and over the sounds of shattering glass and crumpling metal came the thunderous noise of gunfire, many shots in rapid succession: bang, bang, bang, bang!

The blasts were still ringing in my ears when I saw the Chevy’s passenger window slide down and the muzzle of a handgun turn toward our car. “Get down!” I screamed. Shots exploded through the trunk and back window. The whine of bullets whizzed right past my ear. I reached down for the gun in my purse, and I’d just wrapped my hand around the grip when Bailey suddenly threw the car into reverse and floored it. We flew backward and crashed into the side of the old Chevy, driving it into Gary’s car. The force of the impact threw me forward against my seat belt and knocked the air out of me, but I had to get out, get to Gary. I managed to unbuckle and throw myself out of the car just in time to see the Chevy wrench itself out from between our cars and turn toward us. I took a steadying breath and, using our car as a shield, emptied my clip into the Chevy as it squeezed past us and then sped off.

I leaned into the car to tell Bailey. And the world shattered into a million jagged shards.

Bailey was slumped over the steering wheel, her face covered in blood.

My mindshut down, refusing to believe what I saw. I reached out and took her hand off the steering wheel and felt for a pulse. Nothing. My heart gave a slow, heavy thump. Afraid to move her, I looked for the source of the bleeding, praying I wouldn’t find a bullet hole.

As I studied her head, her neck, her shoulders, whatever I could see, I found myself gripping her wrist, as though I could squeeze her back to life. “Bailey,” I said softly. “Bailey. Come on, come on.” Unshed tears closed my throat and my words came out in a strangled sob.

I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Then, a sound. A low moan. The sweetest sound in the world. Bailey’s eyelids fluttered and opened. Without moving her head, she looked at me, then down at my hand, which was still wrapped like a vise around her wrist.

A croak. I leaned in closer. “Let go,” she said.

I released her wrist and she slowly sat up, groaning as she lifted her head.

“I was trying to take your pulse. I couldn’t find it.”

“’Cause you don’t know how, fool.” Bailey shook her head, then lowered it to the steering wheel with another groan.

I’d get even with her for that crack later. “Don’t move, okay, smart-ass?”

I could hear distant sirens approaching, but just in case they weren’t for us, I pulled out my cell phone and called for paramedics as I ran toward Gary’s car. It was now a crumpled mess of twisted metal, steam spewing from the hood, fluids leaking out everywhere. Bullet holes had cracked the passenger window and penetrated the door. I went around to the driver’s side and saw that the window was shattered and the car riddled with bullet holes. The air bags had deployed and filled the front seat.

“Gary!” I shouted. “Gary!”

No answer. I reached through the driver’s window and found the door handle. Underneath the air bag, I saw Gary’s face.

His eyes, wide open, stared vacantly upward. Desperate to give him air, I shoved back the air bag, but the moment I did, the blood it had been holding in streamed down the side of his neck. The source: a neat, round hole just under his jaw. I sank to the ground, too numb to scream.

I don’t know how long I sat there. I only know that at some point later, I heard the whoop of sirens and the slamming doors of ambulances and squad cars behind me. Suddenly arms were pulling me away and paramedics swarmed the car. My head swimming, I grabbed a uniformed arm, pointed to Bailey’s car, and tried to speak. The officer told me they were taking care of her and led me to a paramedic.

“Take a look at her,” he ordered.

“I’m fine,” I said, and tried to pull away. But the paramedic wasn’t having any. He sat me down and insisted on taking my vitals. Suddenly, too exhausted to argue, I submitted. When he’d removed the blood-pressure cuff, I asked, “Who’s taking care of Gary?” Then, without warning, I started to shake uncontrollably.

The paramedic abruptly pulled me into the ambulance and made me lie down on a gurney. “Tell me, how’s Gary? You’ve got to tell me!” I said as a surge of fear flooded my stomach with acid, making me want to retch. The paramedic wrapped a blanket around me, and I heard the crinkling of a wrapper. I felt something cold on my arm, then a swift pinch. “Gary…,” I mumbled.

The next thing I knew, I was in a bed in the emergency room and Bailey was in the bed next to me. Her head and shoulder were bandaged and she had an IV, but they’d cleaned her up and her color looked pretty good. The monitors over her bed told me her systems were in working order.

I tried to sit up, but my head began to spin. A young dark-haired doctor with a warm, sexy smile came striding in and went over to Bailey’s bed. He spoke to me over his shoulder as he examined her chart and her monitor readings.