Hess shivered as he kicked back in his seat. The skin on his bare forearms was all goose bumps. The air-conditioning was actually a little too fierce, but he wasn’t going to move anytime soon, because soon Nurse Abraham was going to turn round and answer a burning question: Would a pair of erect nipples show through the white uniform of a Detroit Receiving Hospital nurse?

He sipped his latte. Anytime Batiste asked him to do a little surveilling, and that’s all the guy ever seemed to ask for, he was going to be right there. He checked his watch. Another hour and Batiste should rock up with his questions. Another hour of thinking about nurse Abraham riding him. Another hour of bleep hiss, bleep hiss. He’d have her on top first, facing away, so he could watch that ass. He was starting to get a hard-on.

Nurse Abraham checked Rosso’s trach tube. His mouth and jaw had taken such a hit—no safety belt apparently—the ERs had had to run his air through a hole in his neck. At least he could talk and for that he’d be grateful, because he was going to be at the DRH for a while.

The door opened suddenly. Hess barely had time to register a big guy in a white coat and a guy in a lumber shirt and longshoreman’s beanie, both wearing shades, before taking a fist from the big guy right in the throat. Instantly the fight was out of him. He dropped to his knees and didn’t even feel the hit to the back of his neck that put his lights out.

Nurse Abraham saw it all though. She saw the big guy close the door and drag Hess’s limp body across to barricade it. She saw the way he did this—calmly, efficiently. Abraham didn’t make a sound. She wanted to live. She’d known the cop had been there for a reason. She hadn’t asked him any questions, but he’d made her feel safe enough just by being there, even if the guy was a horndog. That had all changed in a moment and right now she was focused solely on the gun aimed at her face by the guy in the lumber shirt. She was too shocked to even raise her hands.