“I’m free to go. No X rays, no casts, no permanent injuries. They tried to lay an abuse rap on me, can you imagine? And we need to stop for a prescription on the way home.”
Matt glanced at the white slip in her hand and nodded, then picked up Temple’s tote bag. He let it ease back to the floor again as Lieutenant Molina approached them.
She suddenly squatted on her heels in front of Temple, her piercing eyes and serious face impossible to avoid.
“I know you don’t listen to officials much, but no matter how your injuries happened, you’re a victim of a crime. You need to deal with that. Here’s the number of a self-help group. Give them a call. You’ll have a lot of rage. Your self-esteem has taken a body blow, too. Don’t be dumb. Talk to someone else who’s been through it.”
Temple sat in silence.
“She’s right,” Matt said.
Temple glanced at the number. Heck, maybe they needed a freebie PR person. “Okay.”
Molina patted Temple’s knee—Molina!—and rose. She flashed Matt a smile Temple had never seen, approving. “Thanks for the sensible support.”
“I have to give it. I’m a hotline counselor.”
Molina’s expressive eyebrows lifted before she nodded. “Then you’ll see that she does it.”
“I’ll see that she’s encouraged to do it. Temple will do what’s she thinks is best for her.”
“What’s best for her is what I suggested.”
“Grrrr,” Temple remarked softly as Molina walked away. “What an insufferable woman.”
Matt grinned as he watched Molina’s iron-straight navy-blue back disappear. “Insufferably right. Tacky of her. Reminds me of a mother superior. Come on, I’ll drive you home.”
Home. A nice word. And nice to have someone to go there with.
18
A Roommate to Die For
Temple felt about two hundred years old when she and Matt once again stood before her condo door. He unlocked it smoothly this time. She entered first, startled to find lights blazing. Electra Lark sat at her kitchen cafe table painting her fingernails black.
The moment she saw Temple, Electra bounded upright and whirled over in a blaze of highly colored Hawaiian flora. Her welcoming embrace—arms wide and fingers splayed to protect her wet polish and Temple’s bruised frame—ended up as a gentle cheek-brush, during which Temple whiffed an unmistakable trace of Emeraude. Oh, no....
Matt beamed like a Boy Scout. “I called Electra when you were seeing the doctor.”
Electra’s ear cuffs rang. “I used the passkey to get your gel packs,” she told Matt. “They’re already on ice. I bet you two kids are starved! I could order a pizza.”
“I’m not really hungry.” Temple toddled gingerly toward the living room.
“Oh!” Her huge cocktail table stood by the French doors because her sleep-sofa had been opened and made up.
“We’re not going to let you stay alone after what happened.” Electra’s tone brooked no disobedience.
“We?” Temple asked.
“Well, I made up the bed,” Electra said modestly, implying that she didn’t often stoop to such domestic make-work. “Matt said he’d stay tonight.”
“Oh.” Temple turned to her new roommate. “What about your job?”
“I called the hotline from the hospital, too.”
“I’m all right. I don’t need baby-sitting.”
Electra bustled between them. “Maybe we need to do it. Now, are these your pills? Hmm. Tylenol Three. You’ll sleep tonight. I’ll get you to bed, and then I’ll get the ice packs. Then maybe we can tempt you with—I know, ice cream.”
“Why ice cream?” Temple asked in amazement. “That’s what I always let myself eat when I’m sick.”
“And it doesn’t require chewing,” Matt added. “I’ll be right back. I need some things from upstairs!”
“Fine,” Temple managed to say over her—ouch—shoulder. “The guest bath is to the left off the office.”
“Now, what can I help with?” Electra waved her morbid fingernails again as she followed Temple into the bedroom, her thong sandals vigorously slapping parquet.
Temple felt as if she were being trailed by an oversolicitous seal. “Forget the ice cream. What I really need is help getting out of these clothes.” Temple plucked at her knit top and turned her back to the landlady.
“You poor little thing,” Electra clucked warmly while she undid the zipper and bra. Temple gritted her teeth against pain both physical and psychic. Electra was only trying to help. “Where’s your nightdress?”
“That’s it.”
“The Garfield T-shirt on the hook? Oh, cute.”
Temple regarded the image of the self-satisfied tiger-striped cartoon feline regarding himself in a mirror under text that announced, “Gemini: Your double-edged nature means there’s more for everybody, but you can never get enough of yourself.” Cute didn’t seem to describe it.
Lifting both arms to don the shirt was harder than it looked. “Electra, you’re a Florence Nightingale to help me out. I’m sorry to be such a bother.”
“I’ve been called a rare old bird before, but never a nightingale.” Still, she blushed.
Temple plodded in slow motion into the tiled bathroom and glimpsed herself in the mirror. Not flattering, but at least she didn’t look like Dracula’s daughter with dried blood clinging to her lips. In fact, she looked remarkably normal, except for a subtle swelling in her face and an overall smudging of her makeup. No wonder so many battered women managed to conceal the ugly secret.
She ran the hot water tap, waiting for the warmth to rise up the elderly pipes, and finally dampened a washcloth. Wringing it out defeated her right arm, and she turned. Electra hovered behind her like a hotel maid.
“I can do that, dear!”
“Thanks.” Temple waited for the cloth, then wiped her face one-handed. When she turned again, Electra was poised right there with the vintage blue aluminum tumbler and the pharmacy bag.
“Run a little cold water in this glass, and you can take your first pill.”
The tiny bathroom, exquisitely tiled in a white and silver-gray pattern, was not up to a bumbling owner and a bustling landlady. They do-si-doed around each other and the pedestal sink, until Temple swallowed the pill and headed for the bed. Electra turned the ceiling fan on low and tucked her in.
Just in time. A knock on the ajar door announced the return of Matt, bearing an armful of plastic packs loaded with blue goo. In moments he and Electra had mounded bath towels along Temple’s right side. Her arm and shoulder soon were growing numb against a long, lumpy ski jump of frozen packs.
After installing her and turning off the lights, the pair decamped to the living room, from which Temple heard soft conversational tones—discussing her disaster, no doubt.
Alone at last.
Everything throbbed when nothing distracted her from the pain. She was supposed to sleep, but she didn’t feel like it.
A soft thump bounded atop the bed.
“Louie! Where did you come from?”
He stalked across the bed linens, wallowing over the swells of sheet and coverlet, and padded along her left side, stopping only when he would have to walk on her shoulder to continue.
Louie’s big, furry feline face extended as he brought his jet black nose to hers, sniffing cautiously.
“You smell hospital.” Or was it blood he noticed?
Louie turned his attention—and his head—to her body and arm, which he also honored with a thorough sniffing. Then he bent to paw the sheets and settled beside her, curling up like a kitten in the vee of her arm and body.
Midnight Louie had never permitted such a cozy position in their association. Temple gingerly patted the glossy back dome of his head, at which he laid his nose on his curled paws, seemed to sigh, and closed his eyes.