Lethal Legacy Read Online Free Page A

regulations. I gotta put something in this
box.”
    “No, it wasn’t the city. It was private. It’s
over.”
    The driver made the turn onto Madison Avenue and
we headed north. Vasquez put his clipboard on his lap, took Tina’s pressure,
and recorded the numbers.
    “You mind if I check your eyes?”
    The young woman shook her head from side to side
and Vasquez leaned in, studying her pupils and making a note, I guessed, about
how dilated they were.
    “You want to start with what happened to you,
miss?”
    “I’m not really sure. I know I was drugged, but
that’s all I can tell you,” Tina said. “And I’ve got a terrible headache now.”
    “Any idea what kind of drug?”
    “Like I told Ms. Cooper, I don’t know. But I’m
really thirsty,” she said, licking her lips.
    “Sorry. You’re dehydrated, but the triage nurse
will see you in a few minutes. No point giving you anything before that. She
may want to start an IV.”
    We were at the hospital in less than five minutes.
It was background information about Tina Barr that I wanted—something to lead
me to why she was victimized this way—but Jorge Vasquez had as much pedigree as
he needed.
    When he opened the rear doors of the ambulance at
the hospital receiving bay, Mercer was waiting for me. I stepped around the
gurney and jumped down, holding on to his hand.
    “I think we’re better off keeping Ms. Barr right
here till she’s called in for triage. It’s kind of zooey in there,” Mercer
said.
    “We can hold,” Vasquez said. “I could use the
break.”
    “They got a gunshot wound in the chest.
Fifteen-year-old kid caught in the crossfire of two dealers. A bad car crash on
the FDR Drive—three passengers with head trauma—and the typical assortment of
fractures and bellyaches. You know a possible rape won’t be seen till daybreak
unless you can pull some strings, Alexandra.”
    Most victims of sexual assault presented to
treating physicians without any external physical injury. To an emergency
specialist, the trauma had occurred when the crime was committed. The survivor
who presented at the hospital was not in need of life-saving treatment like the
other medical patients, but rather was there for evidence collection and
psychological counseling. Without advocates or forensic examiners on call,
these women were often the most neglected emergency room visitors, waiting
hours to be evaluated.
    “We’ll try to get you in as quickly as we can,” I
said to Tina, leaving her in the care of Vasquez and his partner as I turned to
follow Mercer into the ER.
    The security guard stood back as Mercer flashed
his gold shield and the automatic double doors swung open to admit us. A dozen
curtained cubicles—all seemingly occupied—formed a semicircle around the
nurses’ station, where Mike had settled in with his feet on the counter, eating
chocolates from a box on the desk.
    “Have you spoken to the head nurse?”
    “Yeah, we’re somewhere between the heart attack in
that corner and the domestic dispute racheted up till the missus settled it by
hurling a meat cleaver at the bum’s neck,” Mike said.
    One of the nurses emerged from behind the thin
curtains of the first treatment area, and Mike waved him over. “This is Ms.
Cooper, Joe. You any good at splinter removal? She’s had a stick up her ass for
the last couple of months, and I was hoping—”
    “We’re waiting for one of the SAVI volunteers, Ms.
Cooper,” Joe said, stripping his bloodied gloves off and dropping them in the
hazardous-waste bin along with the syringe in his hand. He was the size of a
fullback, a black man with skin as dark as Mercer’s, and not in the mood for
Mike’s humor. “Get you in here as soon as we can. I’ve got one going up to
X-ray and another for admission, just waiting on a room.”
    “This may not have seemed urgent when the
detectives first called,” I said, knowing that it might take half an hour for a
sexual assault violence intervention program