She turned and saw several men and women looking out their windows from the apartment building across the street. She was still holding her breath when a man staggered around the corner. His shirt was covered in blood, and there was even more blood streaming down his right leg, soaking his pants. He had a gun in his hand and a badge clipped to his waist. Before she could react, he lurched forward, reaching out to her. He was trying to say something, but she couldn’t make out the words.
His voice was a tortured whisper. He was mumbling the same word, over and over again. She was so shocked, she froze. Throwing himself into her arms, he clawed at her jacket. She wrapped her arms around his waist, stumbled back, then went down to her knees, trying desperately to protect him from crashing to the ground.
He was such a big man and so heavy. She tried to ease him to the pavement, but his weight pulled her forward. He hit his head before landing on his back. She landed full length on top of him. He still had a death grip on her jacket and was pushing his gun between them. Did he want her to hold on to it for him? He kept thrusting the gun at her until it was firmly in her hand.
The weapon was sticky with blood. She gripped it tightly with her finger on the trigger. She was lifting up when out of the corner of her eye she saw a man running toward her, coming fast. She didn’t see his gun until he fired at her. Two shots. The first bullet went wild, but the second bullet grazed her upper arm and burned like the blazes. She reacted without thinking.
She shot him between the eyes.
He fell backward and landed with a loud smack on the street. Still holding the gun with her arms out straight, her left hand balancing her right, she braced herself, waiting to see if there were any more shooters out there.
Keeping her attention on the corner, she carefully moved off the injured man and laid the gun next to her. When she dared to look down, she saw he wasn’t moving. She put her hand on his chest to find out if he was still breathing. Frantic, she spun in all directions looking for help, but the street was eerily quiet.
The wound on the man’s shoulder was seeping blood in an even trickle, but his pant leg was completely saturated now. Oh God, there was so much blood. She had to do something. The bullet must have nicked an artery. Blood was coming so fast it was pooling on the sidewalk and streaming
across the curb into the street. She pressed the palm of her hand against the opening, one palm on top of the other, hoping she could stem the flow. She glanced up, and that’s when she saw a man standing at the corner a block away. He was big and had shocking red hair. She started to call out to him to come help her, but he suddenly disappeared. Had she imagined him? Oh God, she needed someone to help her.
Time stood still, and then suddenly chaos exploded around her in a blur. Everything was happening with lightning speed, and she didn’t have time to react. People were screaming; sirens were blaring, and men and women were rushing toward her. Police cars and an ambulance arrived at the same time. Three police cars blocked the street and the ambulance was right behind them. She didn’t know how many policemen there were, but it seemed as though a whole squadron was running at her. A very young officer had his gun drawn and was shouting at her. There was so much noise she couldn’t understand what he was saying. A wave of nausea hit her. The metallic smell of blood was making her sick. She closed her eyes, continued to press against the wound, and took deep gasping breaths to keep from throwing up.
Just as the paramedics reached the injured man, the young policeman holstered his gun and shouted something. Was he reading her her rights? There were so many people yelling she couldn’t really be sure.
One of the paramedics put his hand on top of Isabel’s. “Okay, good job,” he said. “You can let up now. We’ve got this.” As she pulled away, he looked her over. “Are you injured?”
She shook her head.
“You’re covered in blood.”
“It’s his blood.” The words echoed in her head as though they were coming from a deep tunnel.
“Do you know this man?”
She shook her head again.
“He’s with the police,” she told him, shocked her voice was so weak. She knew no one had heard her, and so she tried again. “He has a badge.”
The young officer, jumping to a false conclusion, grabbed Isabel’s upper arm and jerked her up.
His grip was tight and painful. Then he pulled out handcuffs, and all hell broke loose.
A crowd poured out of the apartment building across the street, and they were incensed. They shouted at the policeman to leave her alone as they pushed forward to try to protect her. The sound of their voices became a deafening roar.
“That girl saved that man,” a woman yelled.
“Get away from her,” another demanded.
“She saved him. Now leave her alone.”
“She could have run, but she didn’t. She stayed to protect him.”
“Take your hands off her,” an angry man in the back of the growing throng bellowed.
A riot was brewing. Within a minute, two at the most, the crowd had grown to three times the number. Men and women were rushing toward her from every direction, and all of them were fighting mad.
The shouting was getting angrier, and Isabel, in a daze, tried to focus on the poor injured man, but the instinct to panic was nearly overwhelming.
“Let go of her, Officer Morris,” an older policeman shouted, clearly exasperated. He had to repeat the order more forcefully before the young officer obeyed the command. Isabel staggered back and suddenly found herself in the middle of a thick circle of strangers at least five deep. Several patted her shoulder and her back. Confused and disoriented at first, Isabel suddenly realized the group was trying to shield her.
A heavyset woman wearing a brightly colored muumuu and a matching bandanna handed her phone to the older policeman and said, “I got all of it on my phone. Watch it and you’ll see this girl wasn’t doing nothing wrong unless saving someone is a crime.”
“He’s wearing a badge. He’s a cop,” a policeman called out as he moved closer to the paramedics preparing their patient for the gurney.
Someone had finally noticed the badge, Isabel thought. She glanced at her watch and blinked. It didn’t seem that any time had passed. It was crazy. Or she was crazy. At this point she couldn’t tell.
A woman with long blond hair nudged her, asked her for her cell phone number, and then sent her a video. “Send this to as many people as you know before the police have it. You’ll have your own proof of what happened.”
The woman obviously had trust issues with the police. Isabel didn’t argue. She pulled her phone from her pocket, but her hands were so bloody, and she was shaking almost violently now. Texting was impossible. The only thing she would accomplish would be getting blood all over her phone. She decided to wait until later to send the video.
Now that the trauma was sinking in, her shaking increased. Was she a criminal now? Morris, the policeman who had shouted her rights at her, thought she was . . . and she had killed a man.
“What happens now?” she asked the person standing closest to her, a middle-aged man wearing a T-shirt with a faded Marine insignia across the front.