"Don't go. He needs us here." Her voice was calm despite the tears running down her face.
Jessie turned back, seeing that the paramedics were about to free the other hand. She quickly glanced away. "He doesn't even know we're here, Lily."
Lily's chin quivered in an instant of uncertainty before her resolve returned and she squared her shoulders. Her grip tightened on Jessie's arm. "I'm going closer."
Before Jessie could reply, Mark cried out again and this time, he began flailing his right arm at the paramedics, catching one on the jaw and leaving a bloody trail. Lily stopped in her tracks.
"Mark! It's okay, we're trying to help you!" Luke grabbed the flailing arm and tried to wrestle it back down, but was having a hard time of it. Despite Mark's injuries and weakened condition, his fear and desperation lent him extraordinary strength.
The other paramedics tried to help, but they literally had their own hands full. One man had been trying to start an IV on Mark's free hand, and was now leaning back, bloody IV needle held out of the way of the other paramedics; a thin stream of blood flowed from the attempted IV site. Two other firemen maintained their grip on Mark's legs, trying in vain to hold them completely immobile and the man who had been hit by Mark was swiping his jaw on his shoulder.
"Hold still, buddy!" Luke sounded frustrated and Jessie stepped forward, pulling Lily along with her. She nudged the man holding the needle out of the way.
"Let me through. I have his friend here. She might be able to calm him." She ached to be the one to calm Mark, but worried she might do more harm than good. They hadn't parted under the best circumstances.
The paramedic nodded and scooted back. "Go for it."
Lily sank to her knees and touched Mark's shoulder then moved her hand up to rest on his brow. "Mark? It's me. You're safe now." She stroked his hair back and he stilled. "Shh…that's it. Relax."
His head turned, and Jim saw him struggling to open his eyes. "Lily?" The hope in his voice tore at Jessie's heart.
"Yes, it's me. And Jessie and Jim too. Whoever did this is gone, okay?" Lily continued the rhythmic motion of feathering his hair back and Jessie could see the tension in Mark's body begin to ease. "There's a whole lot of people here trying to help you. Let them help you, Mark."
He blinked and his eyes roamed, seeking but unfocused, his brows knit in confusion. "Jessie's here?"
Jessie knelt beside Lily and put her hand lightly on his shoulder, surprised at how cold and clammy his skin felt. "Yeah, Mark, I'm right here. Hold still now and they'll have you…free… in just another minute. Got it?"
He nodded obediently. " 'kay". Mark sighed and his body went limp as he gave in to his exhaustion.
Jessie nudged Lily and motioned for them to step back to allow the medics more room to work. In a matter of minutes, his feet had been freed, but the medics taped them together, opting to allow the doctors to remove the long nail. They moved him to a gurney, hung bags of fluid and placed an oxygen mask over Mark's face.
He never stirred throughout the rest of the treatment and Jessie didn't know if that was a good sign or bad. She heard a blood pressure number tossed out by one paramedic and saw another quickly adjust an IV bag until what had been a slow, steady drip of fluid into the the line became a fast stream.
Luke swore and tossed a blanket over Mark, tucking it around him; the paramedic's hands a blur as he secured Mark to the gurney. "Let's wrap and run, guys!"
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The ambulance sped away leaving a spray of slush in its wake. The scene inside the warehouse had been so surreal…so bizarre that Jessie felt like she needed to re-orient herself. She leaned against the wall of the building, aware of Lily's impatient pacing. She was sympathetic to the other woman's desire to rush to the hospital, but she needed just a a minute to process everything that had happened. Jim was still inside talking on his cell phone to someone so they had to wait anyway.
She let her head fall back, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She let it out slowly. After repeating the exercise five times, she opened her eyes. Above her, the sun glinted off icicles forming on the downspouts and eaves of the building. Last night’s snow was already beginning to melt as the early spring warmth battled with the retreating winter over which season would hold Chicago in its grip for the day.
Excited chatter and the idling of engines caught her attention. A half-dozen reporters and photographers milled at one end of the alley along with a network news van.
Jessie pushed away from the wall and glared at the offending van. She saw the disgust that she felt mirrored on Lily's face.
"Can you believe those vultures?" Lily moved a step ahead of Jessie and stepped towards the crowd, but Jessie took her arm.
"Listen to me Lily. The last thing you should do is talk to them."
"I don't care. I need to rip them a-"
"I get it. I do. But they'll start grilling you about what happened to Mark, and in the emotional state you're in now, you are easy pickings."
Lily's chin came up. "I don't think so, but you're right. It would piss them off if I don't talk to them at all."
"There you go." Jessie steered her towards Jim's car. "Why don't you wait in the car, and I'll go see what's keeping Jim. Then we can head to the hospital."
Lily nodded, her eyes still reflecting her anger, but she agreed. "Try to hurry."
As Jessie returned to the warehouse, a television reporter called out to her and tried to flag her down.
“Detective! Will you come and talk to us for just a minute?”
Jessie wondered how they knew her, but in her experience, reporters seemed to have even more sources than cops. She ignored the reporter and practically ran back into the warehouse.
She spotted Jim in a group with a couple of uniformed officers. As she approached, she noted the remains of the fire still glowing faintly and had a vision of what the scene must have looked like to Mark. It stopped her in her tracks. Medea’s description of her similar ordeal filled in some of the details in her mind and Jessie’s imagination completed the picture.
The cult circling and swaying in time to their Satanic chants would have been eerie and frightening. In the scene she created in her head, the red glowing fire crackled and popped, the sounds echoing in the far reaches of the warehouse. Mark must have been terrified. Her stomach rebelled at the images and she bent; her hand to her mouth, afraid she was going to vomit.
“Jessie? Are you okay?"
She turned to find Dan approaching her.
Not sure if she was or not, she didn’t answer him at first and had to swallow several times before she felt it was safe to speak. She straightened. “Yeah. I think so. I thought I was going to be sick there for a minute.”
Dan nodded. “Well, you wouldn’t be the first.”
Jessie glanced sharply at him. “You too?”
It was hard to see in the dimness, but Jessie was pretty sure the man’s face had a tint of red staining his cheeks. He cleared his throat and looked down, his hands buried in his pockets. “Just don’t go over to the far corner. I’ve already investigated that spot.”
Jessie glanced in that direction and wrinkled her nose. “Right.” Looking back at Dan, she said, “I didn't know you were here."
"You were pretty preoccupied, but I arrived about the time they put Taylor on the gurney."
She shivered. "It was horrible, Dan."
"I know. As soon as I heard it come over the radio, I headed over."
Jessie sighed. "I came back in to find Jim. Have you seen him?"
"He was over there a minute ago." Dan pointed to a door behind the spot where the cross had stood. "There's evidence the cult left through that door, probably only minutes before you guys got here. We think they had someone monitoring a police scanner."