Russell growled uncertainly from his post beneath the coffee table.

“Lie still, miss,” the younger cop said. “You’ve been stabbed. There’s an ambulance on the way.”

Stabbed? I didn’t remember being stabbed. I hadn’t felt anything, during the whole tussle with Heather, besides stark, undiluted fear.

“It was only a pair of nail scissors,” I said, in what I thought was a sensible tone.

“Well, you’re bleeding a lot,” said the second cop.

“I’m not going to the hospital.”

“Excuse me?” asked the first cop. I focused on his name tag. Rodriguez.

“I will not leave the dog,” I said. “He’s been traumatized.”

Rodriguez and his partner exchanged looks.

“I mean it,” I insisted, trying to sit up. I was woozy.

“We’ll see,” said Rodriguez, pushing me gently back down. “Just lie still.”

The EMTs arrived.

I was examined, disinfected, bandaged and propped on the couch for questioning by Andy Crowley, who arrived late. I think he liked to make an entrance.

He spared me a concerned smile. “Now what?” he asked.

I filled him in, but grudgingly. I thought he could have been a little more sympathetic, given that the whole universe seemed to be out to get me.

“Have the nutcase picked up,” he told Rodriguez and the partner. I’d tried to get a look at the other cop’s name tag, but the light always blanked it out.

Twenty minutes later, Crowley took a call on his cell phone. Heather was in police custody.

I breathed a little easier, except now that I knew my stab wounds were stab wounds, I was hurting.

“You really ought to check in at the emergency room,” Crowley said. “You probably need antibiotics, not to mention something for the pain.”

I shook my head. “I’ll be okay until tomorrow,” I said, wondering if I would. I planned on heading for Sunset Villa at first light, with or without Greer and Jolie. I wanted to see for myself that Lillian was really on the mend. Stopping off at my HMO for a long stint in the waiting room and a handful of drug samples was not my primary objective.

It was the middle of the night when the cops trailed out, and by that time I was so tired I couldn’t sleep.

Plus, I kept remembering what Heather had said, about a man letting her into my apartment and essentially telling her that if she killed me, she’d save him the trouble.

He wouldn’t have to get his hands bloody.

I coaxed Russell out from under the coffee table with a piece of lunch meat, only a little curled on the edges, and took him downstairs for a poop tour of the parking lot. Back in the apartment, I wedged a chair under the knob on the outside door, double-checked that all the windows were locked and fired up my computer.