LITMIR.BIZ

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a combination of the day he’d had and an involuntary defense mechanism against his attraction. Even with his nasty attitude, the doc had agreed to take care of Scout. He had to hand it to her. He didn’t think he would’ve been as magnanimous if their roles were reversed. He reached into his pocket to make sure the slip of paper with her cell phone number was there, then tried to block both Dr. Jessica Hansen and his daughter, Haley, out of his mind. Instead, he focused on the havoc around them.

      Although Cal was a seasoned police officer, a ten-year veteran of the Narcotics Unit of the Lincoln Police Department in Nebraska, he was relatively new to the San Diego Police Department. In his short time with the SDPD, he and Scout had successfully concluded a variety of searches involving missing children, lost hikers and wandering hospital patients. They enjoyed what they did and worked well together, but he hadn’t expected to deal with a catastrophe of this magnitude. What should have been a relatively quick drive to Ocean Crest was taking quite a while because of the damage from the earthquake and resulting traffic jams. With time on his hands, he let his mind wander back to what had brought him here to begin with.

      Cal had a beautiful five-year-old daughter, Haley, and he’d been happily married—or so he’d thought. He’d been thrown for a loop—stunned, really—when Anna had announced over a year ago that she could no longer tolerate being the wife of a cop. Maybe the trigger had made sense, since her declaration was prompted by the ransacking of their home by an associate of a drug dealer Cal had been instrumental in apprehending. Fortunately, Haley and Anna weren’t home at the time, but the occurrence had pushed Anna over the edge. She wanted out of the marriage. Even so, Cal could never have foreseen the sequence of events that resulted in an internal police investigation of his conduct—and all ties with his little girl severed. Anna had not just taken Haley, but had turned their daughter against him.

      He’d felt angry, bitter and alone, and that hadn’t changed in the time since. The last thing he’d wanted during the year that had passed was another relationship. No wonder he’d reacted the way he had to the doctor after feeling that treacherous pull of attraction.

      The messy split from his ex-wife had left Cal swearing off relationships. And the internal police investigation into his conduct caused him anger and disillusionment with his job. So he’d resigned from the Lincoln Police Department and relocated to San Diego, for no other reason than this was where his brother, Andrew, a schoolteacher, lived. He hadn’t much cared where he went. With no hope of seeing Haley in the near term, he just wanted to start a new and solitary life.

      With Cal’s experience and solid references, the San Diego Police Department offered him the position of sergeant in their Narcotics Unit, but Cal had had enough of that area of policing. He’d worked closely with the narcotics dogs in Lincoln and he’d actually started his career in search and rescue; because of that, he accepted a lower-ranking position as a search-and-rescue officer in the department’s K-9 Unit. The role suited him well, he mused. With his recent experiences he’d come to prefer animals to people.

      The morose thinking had him in a nasty mood again by the time they reached the hospital.

      The paramedic got him settled in a wheelchair and turned him over to the emergency room staff. Based on his condition and the site doc’s assessment, he was fast-tracked.

      Since the medical staff had cut off what had been left of his jeans, a nurse was kind enough to give him a pair of scrubs. Lavender might not have been his color of choice, but it was better than parading around in his underwear.

      When they were done with him, he gingerly pulled on the scrubs. Loose though they were, he still winced when the light cotton brushed across his bandaged right thigh. He toyed with the crutches before leaving the treatment room. On his way out the front door he halted, remembering he didn’t have his truck. It was still at the scene of the earthquake.

      He mumbled an expletive and hobbled back to the information counter. The young blonde gave him a big smile as he approached. He didn’t have the time or the inclination for her flirting. He asked her, in a less than pleasant manner, to call him a cab. Her smile faded and, perhaps not surprisingly, she seemed to get some satisfaction out of telling him that because of the earthquake, it might take up to forty minutes for the taxi to arrive. With a brittle smirk, she suggested he have a seat in the waiting area, and pointed to a grouping of uncomfortable-looking plastic chairs. He was about to move away when he pivoted back.

      “One more thing.”

      “Yes?” the receptionist asked without enthusiasm.

      “A little girl was brought here from the earthquake site. Shortly before I was.”

      “You’ll have to be a bit more specific.”

      “Her name’s Kayla.” He lapsed into cop mode. “She’s approximately three feet five inches, near-black hair, dark brown eyes. Probably four or five years old.”

      The woman had turned to her computer but looked at him expectantly. “May I have her last name?”

      “Oh.” He searched his memory. He hadn’t asked, but thought back to when he was waiting in the triage area. “Ah... Rodrigues? No, that was the nurse. Hernandez? Yes, it’s Hernandez.”

      “Are you family?”

      “No.”

      “Then I’m sorry, but—”

      “I’m a cop,” he interrupted. “I brought her out of the building that collapsed on her.” His explanation seemed to mollify the woman. “I just want to make sure she’s okay.”

      “Let me check...yes, she’s here. She’s been admitted...oh...”

      “Is there a problem?”

      “I was just checking family...” She looked up at Cal with a woeful expression.

      “Are you saying they haven’t located any?”

      The woman nodded.

      “Can you tell me which room she’s in?” He gave her a brief smile. “It seems I have some time on my hands.”

      Her smile wavered. “Pediatric ward. Room 4-235. The elevators are down the hall and to your left.”

      As Cal shuffled in the direction the blonde had indicated, he felt discomfort in his chest and, with every step, a sharp pain in his shoulder.

      He realized he must have sustained injuries beyond the obvious. Soft-tissue damage to his shoulder, probably when he’d hit the parapet wall on the rooftop, and maybe a cracked rib or two. Not much could be done about either, he mused as he adjusted his crutch to ease the pain.

      He took the elevator to the fourth floor and found room 235. It contained four beds; three were occupied. The one closest to the door had a curtain drawn around it and Cal heard the murmur of voices. A girl, with her head, face and left arm bandaged, lay in the bed adjacent to it, her eyes closed. A man and woman clustered in chairs close to the bed, the woman holding the child’s hand. The man looked up at Cal, his face ravaged and grief-stricken, before turning to his daughter again.

      On the farthest bed, next to the window, was Kayla. She had tubes and monitors attached to her. Other than that, she looked healthy and uninjured. Someone must have brushed the dust out of her hair, which was spread out, glistening, across her pillow. She wore a pink hospital gown with a teddy-bear print. Her head was turned away from him, toward the window. He could see her small chest rise rhythmically with her breathing.

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