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Of course, Elly with her soft heart would have some sympathy for the woman.
She was a better person than he was, that was for sure.
“Where is Ashton James now?” Steele demanded. “Where can we find him?”
“I—don’t know. He mentioned staying at a trailer park, but I was never there.” Eloise sounded subdued, as if the magnitude of her situation was finally hitting home. As it should. The public would not be happy to know there was a killer on the loose for almost three days because Eloise had kept her mouth shut.
Maybe the charges against her wouldn’t stick, but that was the least of his worries. They still had to find this guy. And fast.
“Okay, we need to spread out and check all the trailer parks.” He had no idea how many there were. “Call dispatch, have someone run them through the system.”
“There’s a trailer park about three miles from here,” Raelyn said. “I know where it is, and it’s close enough for him to use it as a hiding place. We need to get there ASAP.”
“Go. Take several team members with you.” Joe wanted to ride along, but when he glanced at Elly, he noticed the pained expression on her face. And the way she had one hand braced against the side of the SUV.
“Elly?” He rushed toward her. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine.” She didn’t sound fine, just the opposite. From here, she appeared pale and fragile. “Just short of breath. Must be all the excitement and the rush of adrenaline.”
“Are you sure you’re not hit?” He ran his gaze over her, kicking himself for not examining her more closely.
“I didn’t see any blood,” Grayson said with a hint of defensiveness. “I checked.”
Joe ignored him, still irrationally angry that Elly had been the one to jump on him, protecting a cop rather than the other way around. Then again, he knew Elly had amazing instincts. She’d saved his life, too, that fateful night.
Grayson didn’t look happy at being caught off guard either.
“Hold still.” He ran his fingers along the front of her vest but didn’t find anything concerning.
Then he turned her around to check her back. Along her left side there was a gouge in the vest that had been made by a bullet.
“You were hit!” He hadn’t meant to sound accusing, so he did his best to soften his tone. “I’m sorry, but you should have told me, you were struck by a bullet. You might have internal bleeding.”
“I was?” She looked confused. “I didn’t feel anything. Other than hitting the ground with Grayson.”
Adrenaline could mask pain, so he believed her. “Okay, but what about now? Where do you hurt?”
“I, uh, maybe my ribs.” She tried to reach over but froze and grimaced. “Um, yeah. That hurts.”
Grayson looked upset. “I didn’t realize. I’m sorry.”
He managed to let his teammate off the hook. “She’s talking, which is a good sign. Might have a couple of cracked or broken ribs from the impact of the slug. Call an ambulance, we need to get her to the hospital.”
“Roger that.” Grayson made the call as other officers converged on the area.
“I screwed up, Joe,” Elly said in a low voice. “I should have considered that Kyle might have been the shooter’s target. I thought Kyle wanted me to tell his wife he loved her.”
“It’s not your fault,” he hastened to reassure her. “We all went down the path of believing the skaters had been the real targets.”
“I think Kyle tried to warn me about Eloise,” she continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “Do you think he knew about her affair? About Ashton James? Maybe he even saw him?”
“I don’t know.” He wished Kyle had mentioned it to him.
“I keep running through those last few seconds in my mind. Kyle’s expression was urgent, as if he really wanted to tell me something.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “It never occurred to me that he’d been hit on purpose.”
“I didn’t go there either, and I’m a trained cop.” He wrapped his arm around her shoulder, offering his support. She gratefully leaned against him. “Don’t beat yourself up, Elly. We’ll get him.”
“I wonder if Ash kept coming after me because he assumed Kyle had told me his name,” she said half to herself. “I never could figure out why I was a threat.”
