Up and Away to Murder: A Comic Book Store Mystery

Chapter Three - Part 2

I arrived at the emergency room after the Copeland clan with dread tearing at my heart. The delay being Delilah's inability to pass through hospital security unnoticed. I'd had to drop her off at my apartment which meant approximately forty minutes without knowing Dee's status. Scott texted me details, so at least I knew Dee had bypassed the emergency room and now took up a room in intensive care at St. Joseph's. A nurse stopped me at the fourth floor at the nurses' station and asked my relation to the patient.

"She's family." Scott answered in a terse voice from behind me. His usually grim face held a good degree of worry, but for someone who knew him, it was the relief that shone through the brightest.

I followed him to the small waiting area. "They're only allowing one family member in at a time, and we can't get Mom to come out. So we're stuck here waiting."

"Has a doctor been out?"

"We've been updated with the basics," Tom cut in. "She was hit on the head pretty hard and they've put her in a medically induced coma to help bring down the very small amount of brain swelling."

Brain swelling. I lifted my hand to my throat. "How did this happen?"

"She interrupted a crime in progress at a private residence. That's all we know until the detective assigned to the case arrives." Scott thumped his solid form down in a vinyl chair. "I never should've let her think she could do this on her own. She's a trouble magnet."

The heat rose with a slow build until it erupted from my voice box. "Some wacko hits Dee and you're saying it's her fault? Are you cracked out? Maybe if you weren't such a micro-managing, insensitive, dream-killing, overprotective brother she wouldn't have been out there by herself in the first place."

Scott leveled a heated gaze in my direction, but didn't defend himself. My words were mean and childish but I'd become incapable of rational thought. The last words Dee and I had shared skipped like a dirty CD through my mind. She'd needed me, and I'd been worried about how she affected my bottom line.

Rebekah looped an arm through mine and walked me to the other side of the room. "We're all worried. It won't do any good to assign blame."

A tear I'd been trying to hold back rushed down my face. A few more followed before I got them under control.

Our attention turned to clipped footsteps coming in our direction. A man in a suit walked to Scott and Tom and shook their hands.

"Scott. Tom."

"Jim-bo."

"I saw your sister's name come across the blotter, so I asked to be assigned as junior. The lead is Detective Harmon and he's downstairs with the other victim's significant other. The victim didn't survive her head trauma and they're transporting her to the coroner's office. And, that's about all I can give you guys for now. I have some questions if we can sit for a few minutes."

Tom motioned toward Rebekah and introduced us before he took his seat next to Scott. "This is my wife, Rebekah, and you may remember Odie. Ladies, this is Detective Reinhardt. We played high school football together."

The detective nodded in our direction. I could tell he didn't remember me, but his was a face I couldn't forget. Dee had practically stalked him his senior year. He'd been a whole year behind Scott and Tom, so they'd gone off to college and had never known about her obsession. To say he was still a looker would be putting it mildly.

Detective Reinhardt or "Jimmy Stole My Heart" as our fourteen year old selves dubbed him pulled a digital recorder from the breast pocket of his suit. "If you don't mind, I do better recording informal Q&As. Do any of you know of Dee's relation to the victim, Lucille Malone?"