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She laughed and immediately regretted it, as the movement sent stabs of pain radiating from her bandaged side.
“Sorry,” said a contrite Plummer, who spoiled the apology by smiling.
“So, tell me! What’s the news about Balfour? Did somebody catch that asshole?”
James’s grin morphed into a satisfied expression. “He’s dead.”
“Dead? How’d he die? I think I may have nicked him, but I saw him walk away.”
“He was hit twice. Once was just a graze on his shoulder, but the other hit an artery in his thigh. He bled to death. We found his body about two hundred yards from where you fought him. The medical examiner speculates he didn’t realize how bad he was bleeding. His clothes were soaked with seawater, so he might not have noticed the blood. I was out with others examining the beach down to where you must have fought him. His tracks meandered the last thirty or forty yards, as if he was getting faint.”
“Christ! I must have gone right by him,” Greta murmured.
“Looks like maybe fifteen or twenty feet. However, in the condition you were in, and with the fog, even if you’d noticed him, the body might have passed for a clump of seaweed or some driftwood.”
At eleven o’clock, the doctors let people in to question her: Wallace, the local State Police commander, the Tillamook City Police chief Perry Hopen, one of the techs from the city police operating a recorder, and a couple of people she didn’t know. They spent half an hour trying to nail down the details before the doctors ordered them out. Plummer lingered at her bedside.
He had filled everyone in on the latest information about Balfour. A combined Tillamook City Police and County Sheriff force had raided the church, and the disarray at his house behind the church spoke of a hurriedly planned departure if necessary.
Plummer was the last to leave. “We’ll let you get some rest. I’ll be back tomorrow. Let me know if there’s anything you need.”
“I need a vacation. Someplace warm where I can lie on a beach and no one tries to filet me.”
Plummer chuckled. “We’ll see what we can do.” He started to leave, then stopped at the door and looked back with a rueful expression. “You can probably guess at the firestorm that’s arisen. ‘Community religious pillar an attempted murderer, suspect in another murder, and suspected larcenist.’ The media picked it up immediately. It’s Oregon-wide so far, and they think it might go national. There are plenty of locals, including you-know-who in our office, who won’t be pleased with you.”
“Fuck ’em,” she deadpanned.
Plummer smiled. “Yes, I heard what Boylan said when they picked you up. He also said, ‘That’s our Greta.’”
He left, and she let herself float away to sleep from the medication and exhaustion. She slept for two hours before they woke her again for more meds and to eat something of questionable origin. She momentarily regretted not having her Glock so she could defend herself against the hospital staff.
The next two days, she watched the rain out her window and browsed the TV. Early on the afternoon of the second day, Robert Simpson came to visit.
She perked up when he appeared in the doorway and then cursed him for not calling ahead so she could comb her hair. Emily Sievers had retrieved a comb, a brush, and some other essentials from her house.
Simpson gazed at her sympathetically. “You look terrible.”
She laughed. This time the wounds only twinged, not enough for her to hold back the laughs. “Thank you for those kind words. Run over any schoolchildren lately?”
“I had a chance on the way here. I swerved so as not to delay my visit.”
“Very thoughtful. I take it you were away on your business? I tried calling several times to tell you I got that email about the pictures. The information was useful.”
“Do I take it the usefulness is related to your current condition?”
“That’s the way it looks to me.”
His bantering faded, as he took on a more serious expression. “I heard the news reports last night when I flew in. It was on the Portland news channels. ‘Heroic woman deputy sheriff fights off dangerous felon and con man posing as a preacher. More details at ten.’”
“Oh, God. I’d better call my family. I didn’t even think about that. Do you think it’ll make the national news?”
“It might.”
“Oh, shit.” Greta reached for the phone by the bed and picked it up, then looked at him apologetically. “Can you hold on a minute while I call them?”
“No problem. I’ll walk around and be back in twenty minutes.”
It took her almost fifteen minutes to get the hospital to put the long-distance call through. She finally convinced them it was Sheriff’s Department business and to charge the call to the department.
