“Come on. We’ll follow to the hospital.” He put his arm around her and started to lead her toward the road. “Did they check you out? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. All those guys did was tie me up and…say awful things. They didn’t hurt me though. Just Mom. Have you heard anything about Mom?”
“Not yet. Let’s find Royal. He’ll drive us to the hospital. We’ll see everybody. It’s all right now.”
Gard wanted to believe it, but he wasn’t sure he’d breathe until he saw Dani and Lia again. Safe and sound.
He searched the crowd for Royal, but before he could get anywhere, Laurel approached.
“Fairhurst.” Her expression was calm, and she smiled reassuringly at Sammy. “I know you’d like to get to the hospital, but I’d really like to hear Sammy’s side of things before I let you guys go. It’ll help us deal with charges quicker if we can get it down now.”
Frustrated with the holdup, but knowing this was best, Gard nodded. He squeezed Sammy to his side, and reminded himself Lia might have been bleeding, but she’d walked out of that house on her own two feet.
She was okay. They were all going to be okay. And they were going to put these assholes behind bars.
“Tell Detective Delaney-Carson everything you know, and then we’ll go to the hospital. Okay? Just start from the beginning. Your mom texted you when you were at the movie?”
Sammy nodded, leaning into him. “Yeah. I knew she’d keep hounding me if I didn’t go out there, or worse. Maybe she’d come in and make a scene. I knew she’d want me to go somewhere, but I didn’t… I didn’twantto. So I gave my purse to Izzy and said I had to go to the bathroom. I figured if Mom tried to get me to gosomewhere with her, I’d tell her I left my purse and phone inside and I’d go get it and call you.”
“That was smart, Sammy,” Laurel said reassuringly. “It definitely helped us find you quicker. So you went out to the back of the movie theater?”
Sammy nodded. “I didn’t see Mom, but this guy came up and grabbed me. I was fighting him—I totally kneed him in the crotch and he swore. I know I hurt him, but… He pointed to a car, and I could see Mom was in the back. They…they…” Her voice broke. “They were hurting her.”
Gard held her even tighter. She was crying, but she got the rest of the story out. How she’d gone with them, so they’d stop hurting her mom. How they’d brought them both here. Tied Sammy up, beat Dani when she tried to stop them, then pretended like everything was fine and she was just invited to this party while they left Dani unconscious in the backyard.
“I kept crying, asking for Mom, but they just laughed and took me inside. I think he liked that I was crying, that I was scared. So I tried to stop…being that on the outside.”
“That’s brave, Sammy,” Gard managed to croak out through a throat so tight it was a wonder he could breathe. “Very brave.”
“They took me inside and mostly that guy would just say…gross stuff to me, but he didn’tdoanything. He said stuff about drugs, but he didn’t make me take anything or drink anything. He was going to…hurt me or do something. I know he was going to, but…he wanted to mess with me first. But then Lia came.”
Tears were streaming down her face. She looked up at Gard. “She set the fire so I could get out. She saved me.”
Gard nodded. He had to clear his throat to speak. “That should be enough, Laurel. We’re going to the hospital. Now.”
Laurel nodded. “Go with Morris. She’ll run code to get you there ASAP.”
Lia felt woozy. She didn’t think she’d done a very good job of answering the doctor’s questions, and now she was waiting in a hospital gown, a big bandage fastened to her side.
Someone would come stitch her up soon. They’d already put some local anesthesia on the spot—after painfully disinfecting the hell out of it—and now they were just giving the anesthesia time to work.
Apparently, she had a bruised windpipe, but no serious damage that couldn’t heal on its own there. The smoke inhalation was negligent. The stab wound had been deep and would require some serious babying, but it hadn’t hit anything important enough to require surgery.
Which was all great and good, but she couldn’t just sit around here, bored out of her mind, waiting. She needed information and she didn’t know where her phone had gone to in the fray.
She needed to see Sammy or talk to Gard, or she’d even settle for Royal if someone could tell her what was goingon. SheknewSammy got out, but was Dani okay? Was Gard beating himself up?
She needed to know.
Carefully, she sat up in bed. Still woozy, definitely dizzy, but she could totally walk if she could hold onto something. She pushed to her feet.
It didn’t hurt so much—the pain seemed to float under a cloud of something else, the painkillers—but she wasn’t steady at all and her vision kind of wavered. She sat back down on the edge of the bed with a thud, and then a wince as some pain jolted past the cloud.
She sucked in a breath, let one out. She willed herself to find some equilibrium. On a careful breath she got to her feet again—just as the door moved and someone slipped inside, quickly closing it behind them.
Sammy.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she demanded of Lia, storming over to the bed. “You shouldn’t stand up. Get right back into that bed.” She fisted one hand on one hip and pointed the other at the bed.
