Andrew Gross - Don’t Look Twice

Now Hauck fixed on Jessie and ran over to her across the glass-strewn floor.

His daughter lay motionless, crimson matted on her sweatshirt. He lifted her by the shoulders. Blood spatter was all over her cheeks and chest. Frantically, Hauck searched her limp body for a wound.

Oh, Jesus, Jessie, no . He peeled back his daughter’s matted brown hair. This can’t be happening again!

Like an answer to his prayers, he felt her stir.

Just the slightest murmur. She blinked and slit open her dazed brown eyes.

“ Daddy? ”

“ Yes, baby, yes…! ” Hauck’s chest exploded in a spasm of joyful relief. “Oh yes, honey. Jessie, it’s me.”

Fright flared up in her. “Are they gone?”

“Yes, honey, they’re gone! It’s over. It’s going to be okay.” Hauck shut his eyes and felt tears stinging. Every bone in his body seemed to rattle in a joyful exhale. He drew his daughter up to him, squeezing her. He brushed the specks of blood off her cheek. “They’re gone.”

Behind him, Sunil slowly rose from behind the counter.

Hauck looked up at him. “Are you okay?”

The manager nodded, his dark brown skin blanched almost pale. “I think so.” Sweat glistened on his forehead.

“Call 911. Tell them there’s been a shooting. Tell them I’m here and we need immediate medical support.”

“Yes, Lieutenant, okay.” With eyes as white as moons, he scanned around the store. “Gracious God in heaven…”

Hauck lowered Jessie back down. “You just lay there, honey…let me look. Where are you hurt?” He carefully checked over her clothing but couldn’t find any wound. No signs of fresh blood seeping out.

“I don’t know, Daddy.”

“It doesn’t matter. You just stay there. Help will be here soon.”

He flipped open his cell phone and punched in the 431 line to the station that signaled Emergency .

The duty officer answered.

“This is Lieutenant Hauck. I’m at the Exxon station on Putnam and Holden. There’s been a shooting. The manager here just called in a 911. We have wounded. We need immediate medical response. Cars on the scene, EMTs, everything…”

“This is Reyes, sir. We’re already on it. We should have cars there any second…”

“Listen to me, Sergeant, I want you to put out an interagency APB on a red F250 pickup, Connecticut plates, ADJ…9…That’s all I could make out. Raised chassis, chrome rims. Shooter may be Hispanic and may be wearing a red bandana. When it left here it was headed south on Putnam. You get that out immediately, Sergeant, you hear?”

“I’m all on it, sir.”

Hauck hung up. He yanked off his fleece pullover and bunched it like a pillow underneath Jessie’s head. “You just sit tight, baby. Help’ll be here soon.”

She nodded hazily. “Okay…”

He checked her again. Miraculously, he couldn’t locate any direct wounds. Where the hell was all the blood coming from? Slowly, he felt his heart crawl back into his chest.

As a droplet of blood fell onto her sweatshirt.

Scared, Jessie looked up. “Daddy, you’re bleeding!”

Hauck felt for his neck, which was suddenly throbbing. A sticky red ooze came off in his hand. He felt his stomach turn.

“Daddy, you’re hurt!” Jessie said, lifting onto her elbows.

“Don’t worry,” Hauck said. But suddenly he wasn’t sure. “ Sunil …”

The manager, who was now on the phone with his family, ran around the counter. “Yes, Lieutenant?”

“Go and see if anyone needs medical assistance out there…Tell them ambulances should be here in a second…”

“Yes, sir.” Sunil was about to run out, making a last broad sweep around the store. Suddenly he stopped. “ Merciful God …” he muttered, gazing over Hauck’s shoulder.

Hauck stood up, following the manager’s crestfallen gaze. “ Oh no …”

Suddenly it became clear where all the blood on Jessie had originated from. The man in the green down vest—who had smiled at them by the cooler and stepped up behind them in line…

He was on the floor, covered by toppled racks of magazines and candy, eyes like glass, his tortoiseshell frames thrown to the side.

In the center of his chest, dotting his brown Shetland sweater, were two dark red holes.

CHAPTER FOUR

It took just minutes—frantic minutes—for Freddy Munoz and two other detectives from Hauck’s Violent Crimes Unit to make it to the scene.

A phalanx of local blue-and-whites had blocked off lower Putnam from Weaver all the way down to the car dealerships, lights flashing and sirens wailing like a war zone. An EMT van had already arrived from Greenwich Hospital and was tending to Jessie, as well as to a couple of the other bystanders.

A med tech kneeled over the guy in the green vest, confirming what Hauck already knew.

Freddy Munoz hopped out of his car, took in a long, disbelieving sweep of the shot-up storefront, the dozens of holes in its facade. “Jesus, Lieutenant, are you alright?”

Freddy had been one of Hauck’s first hires on the Violent Crimes team when Hauck had taken the position heading up the staff in Greenwich. Hauck was fond of the young detective, grooming him, in the back of his mind, for his own job one day. Looking over the scene, Hauck suddenly realized just how close that promotion had almost come.

“Yeah.” Hauck rubbed the gash on his neck. “I’m okay.”

“ Jessie? ” Munoz pressed with concern. “I heard she was here.”

“She’ll be alright.” Hauck pointed toward the EMT van. “Just a little shock…” As he looked at her there, reliving those initial moments, a queasiness rose back up in Hauck’s gut. “At first I just saw her there, all covered in blood. Not moving…”

Munoz squinted. “ Whose blood, Lieutenant?”

Hauck turned his gaze back inside. “The guy over there…We were heading out to the boat, stopped to pick up a few things. He was right behind us in line.”

Spotting the body through the open storefront, the detective issued a short, grim whistle of disgust. “Oh, man…Anyone else hit, LT?”

“No.” Hauck placed a hand up to his neck.

“You better get that checked out, okay? You get a chance to ID the vic?”

“Not yet. I’ve been with Jess.”

“Where you ought to be, Lieutenant. You just let us handle it, okay? Go be with your daughter. I’m glad she’s okay…And get them to take a look at that gash. Damn, LT, you know how lucky you are?”

A sobering exhale accompanied Hauck’s nod. “The sonovabitch shot right at me, Freddy…I just stood there, the window rolling down. Stared right at him. Froze.”

“Don’t beat yourself up, Lieutenant. Anyone would freeze.”

Hauck nodded, eyes fixed on the body, unconvinced. “That could be Jessie.”

“Yeah, it could be, Lieutenant, but it’s not. You said you caught a glimpse of the shooter?”

Hauck nodded. “Twenties. Hispanic. Wearing a red bandana across his head. I put an APB out on a red Ford pickup, CT plates. ADJ9 or something…Couldn’t get more of a read. Listen, Freddy, I want you to get an ID on the guy inside. Have Stevie and Ed start in with the witnesses.”

“Will do.”

“And, listen, Freddy…”

“Yeah, Lieutenant?”

“I’m okay, got that? It’s business as usual here.”

“You bet your ass you’re okay, sir.” Munoz tapped Hauck on the shoulder, grinning. “Like my mother would say, LT, you had an angel riding on your shoulder today.”

“Yeah.” Hauck looked at the caved-in storefront, the man in the green vest’s legs visible through the shattered door. “Been meaning to talk to you about your mom’s take on angels, Freddy.”