Page 67 of Beware of Dog (Lean Dogs Legacy #6)

“We go straight to Maria Salazar on the Upper West Side. Maria, what can you tell us?”

“Police are investigating a deadly altercation at the home of Carson and Deborah Blackmon, a scene that authorities are calling a ‘bloodbath.’ Twenty deceased were found inside the home, with signs of forcible entry at the front and rear doors. Several of the men have already been identified as members of the dangerous street gang the Tres Diablos. Carson Blackmon and his son, Sigmund – who was expected to be in court this week for his alleged rape trial – are also among the deceased. Carson’s wife, Deborah, was not at home at the time.

“Police have found multiple weapons and a variety of illegal substances. So far, the chief of police is calling this a drug deal gone wrong.”

~*~

They made her use a wheelchair. Cass didn’t like it, the helplessness of it, the way everyone they passed in the hallway glanced down at her, their eyes assessing, trying to figure out what was wrong with her.

She wore a baggy t-shirt and sweats, and even with soft clothes, and even with the chair, the pain lanced through her.

She should have still been in bed, and the doctors in Albany hadn’t wanted to release her, but they’d agreed to transferring her to the care of a Manhattan doctor when Raven threatened to sign her out AMA.

The car ride had sucked . She had an OxyContin prescription, but she’d made do, or suffered, rather, with Tylenol, because she wanted to be awake and alert when they arrived at Cedars Sinai.

And now here they were, and though she’d yelped with pain getting out of the Rover, her pain receded as Walsh pushed her chair along in Raven’s wake as she marched down the bright white halls, a woman on a mission in her gift shop sweatsuit.

“Excuse me,” she called as they approached the nurse’s station. “We’re looking for—”

“Raven.” It was Devin who’d called to them, from the mouth of an intersecting hallway. “This way, love.”

Walsh spun the chair, and when she caught sight of Devin, standing there in his plain white t-shirt and his own pair of gift shop sweatpants, his hair damp at the ends like he’d washed it, and likely his face, in a hospital sink, the enormity of what had occurred tonight slammed into her like a rugby tackle.

She sucked in a breath, and regretted it, pain spiking out from her bandaged wounds, the bandages themselves cutting into her ribs and clavicles.

Her hands fluttered on the arms of the chair, and Walsh pushed her forward, toward Devin.

She swallowed with difficulty. “Dad, is he—?”

Devin smiled, terribly tender. “He’s resting. Toly’s with him.”

“He’s not…”

He bent down, and swiped the fresh tears off her cheeks. “He’s fine. Docs said the knife missed all the important bits. He’ll be sore, and on meds for a bit, and we’ll have to watch for infection, same as with you.” He booped the end of her nose like a button. “You’ll match, Mr. and Mrs., eh?”

Her throat was too tight to respond, so she nodded and dashed at her cheeks with her sleeve.

Walsh pushed her down to the room that Devin indicated, and Devin stepped forward to get the door.

It was a room much like the one she’d left in Albany. White, and sterile, with one blinds-covered window, and hard plastic chairs, one of which held Toly, who sat with arms folded and head tipped down, face turned toward the bed.

He glanced around at the sound of their entrance, and then shot to his feet, gaze searching over the chair, past Walsh, for Raven.

Walsh kept pushing the chair, until he could park it right up next to the bed, and the others’ voices faded to soothing background white noise.

Shep wasn’t Mercy big, but he’d always seemed big to her: tall, and broad-shouldered, and strong. He was crazy strong, all muscle, and he could pick her up and toss her on the bed, grinning when she laughed with delight at being manhandled.

He looked small, now, in his white gown with its blue squiggles, and his white sheets and blue waffle weave blanket tucked up under his arms. IV lines snaked from his right elbow; he wore of those little pulsometers on his index finger, and the heart monitor beeped steadily, a reassuringly slow rhythm.

He had a cut high on his cheekbone, but was otherwise untouched. Hair flat and greasy, skin waxy and pale. But she could see the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.

Shakily, teeth gritted against the pain of sitting forward in the chair, she gathered his big hand up in both of hers and said, “You idiot. You absolute wanker.”

And then she curled down and pressed her forehead to the back of his hand, fresh tears spilling down her cheeks.

Dry and rough from surgery, from the meds, Shep’s voice rumbled above her. “I don’t look that shitty, do I?”

She jerked upright, and saw spots. Whoa.

Bad idea. For one sightless moment, she thought the pain would render her unconscious.

She clutched tight to his hand, blinked hard – someone touched her back, right at the base of her neck, steadying her – and her vision settled, and the pain settled, and there was Shep, haggard and exhausted, but with his eyes slitted open, and a smile tugging at the near corner of his mouth.

“Hi, babydoll,” he croaked. “Should you be outta bed?”

“No,” Raven said, up close, clearly the one supporting her, hand gentle at the top of her spine. “But she’s as stubborn as you.” Her voice caught a moment, but didn’t break, and there was an audible smile in it when she said, “You’re a good match that way, the two of you.”

~*~

“Thanks, John. I’m here in front of One Police Plaza where I’ve just spoken to the lead detectives on the case.

They tell me that based on forensic evidence, young Sigmund Blackmon shot his father in the back, most likely as he was attempted to flee the house through the front door, and then turned the gun on himself.

He died by suicide. Both of the Blackmon men bore signs of restraint, and duct tape was found at the scene. ”

~*~

Dr. Leslie Lawrence, trauma surgeon, and Melissa’s best friend, had been the one to operate on Shep.

When she’d walked into the room during her rounds, and found Cass slumped in a wheelchair beside the bed, stroking his strong, square knuckles, her brows had jumped and she’d exhaled in a long, slow rush.

“Ah. So you’re my transferred patient. Lucky for you, we’ve got an empty bed.

” Shep’s room was a double-occupancy, and they got Cass set up in the second bed, and Leslie checked her bandages and stood watchful and stern while she swallowed down some morphine tabs.

She fell asleep to the steady beep of Shep’s heart monitor, and woke to find two men in suits with badges on their belts standing just inside the door. Detectives.

Still swimmy from the drugs, Cass hitched herself up carefully against the pillows, trying to keep her movements slow. The pain was still a dull throb under her skin, but she knew it would sharpen as alertness returned.

A turn of her head revealed that Shep was awake, head of his bed elevated, and he was frowning at the detectives.

Raven stood in front of them, hands on her cocked hips, and her voice was the crisp, officious one that powered her through the fashion industry.

“They’re resting. You’ll have to come back later.

Both of them have been through an ordeal, and I won’t have you setting their recovery back for the sake of dead men. ”

The older of the two, handsome in a square-faced, Central Casting sort of way, frowned. “Ma’am, it’s important that we—”

“It’s okay.” Cass’s voice was weak and unsteady, but loud enough that everyone at the door turned.

The detective’s gaze flicked up and over Raven’s head, and Raven turned, brows notched with concern, face lined with fatigue. “Darling,” she began.

“I can talk to them.” Cass wriggled up a little higher, grateful the dregs of the morphine kept the sensation in her shoulder tamped down to a slight twinge. “Might as well get it over with.”

“Cass,” Shep cautioned from the neighboring bed. He looked and sounded much more awake than the last time she’d seen him, and she wondered how long she’d been asleep.

She glanced at him, and she saw in his gaze that he wanted to take up the mantle of protector, even with a gut wound. He wanted to handle the cops, to be her man, even if he was laid up in a bed.

But Cass thought that this was a case where her femininity would work better. She looked like death warmed over, small and injured, eyes doubtless red from all the crying. Shep was a terrible liar. But Cass was Devin Green’s daughter.

When she glanced back toward the door, Raven’s brows lifted. Are you sure?

Cass said, “Detectives, please come in.”

~*~

The story played at the top of the hour on all the local news stations, and then hit the national primetime shows later that night.

The shot was a tight one, the backdrop a window in an alcove of a hallway in Cedars Sinai, the subject at the center Cassandra Shepherd, young, her face pale and her eyes sunken from pain and exhaustion.

She wore a baggy sweatshirt that slipped off one shoulder, the edges of white bandages visible.

Her hair was greasy and unwashed, tied back in a haphazard ponytail, but her blue eyes were clear, and her voice was steady when she spoke.

“I was set to testify at Sig’s trial,” she began, expression heavy with what looked like remorse.

“I was an outcry witness for my friend, Jamie. She told me back in February that he took her to his family’s house, and when she said no, he forced himself on her.

I wasn’t there, obviously, but I believed my friend, and wanted to support her.

“I don’t know what sorts of business dealings Sig and his father had going,” she continued.

“But I know that my friend Jamie called me and said that she wanted to drop the charges because there were men, in her words, who looked like gang members, casing her house, parked on her street, frightening her and her parents.

“It’s always upsetting to hear about something like this, but I’m not surprised that Sig and his father were killed.

The scene at their townhouse was found just one day after my husband and I were shot.

” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed, and her eyes turned glassy.

She blinked and pressed on. “It was our wedding night, and we walked away from the party and up to the cabin where we were going to spend the night. We paused…” And so did she, reaching to adjust the collar of her sweatshirt, wincing.

“I was wearing heels, and the path was steep. We stopped for a minute and I heard the shots, before I felt them.”

She blinked rapidly as more tears brightened her eyes. “I don’t remember what happened next. I was in a lot of pain, and I lost consciousness. My husband ended up grappling with one of our attackers. He was stabbed. Um…” She bit her lip, gaze falling to her lap, and was silent a long moment.

Then she dragged in a shuddering breath and said, “The police have told me they found shell casings at the scene where we were attacked. At my family’s farmhouse in Albany.

Obviously, no one has told me for certain, but it wouldn’t surprise me if those shell casings matched some of those found at the Blackmons’ townhouse. ”

The scene cut back to the studio, where a serious-faced reporter said, “Mrs. Shepherd’s guess about the shell casings is of course just that: a guess. We’ll wait for official word from the NYPD…”