“You have to heal,” the doctor said firmly as she started for the door. “I’m sure someone can take care of your pets.”
“No, you don’t understand—”
But Dr. Zollner was already gone, leaving Shannon alone with the nurse.
“Great,” Shannon muttered.
“I’ll see what I can do,” the nurse said with a wink. “Dr. Zollner’s very busy. In the meantime talk to the detectives, and I’ll tell your family that you’re awake and they can see you soon. Maybe after you’ve had something to eat.”
The mention of food caused immediate hunger pangs. “I’d like that,” Shannon said.
“A good sign.” The nurse exited and the painkillers began to kick in.
Within minutes two detectives, Cleo Janowitz and Ray Rossi, slipped through the partially opened door. Janowitz was model-thin and nearly as tall as her partner, somewhere close to six feet. Glossy, straight black hair fell to her shoulders and her gold, almond-shaped eyes were sharp and intense. She was pretty, but there was nothing soft or warm about her. The smile on her face was thin.
Rossi could have been a young Kojak: large nose, big brown eyes, shaved head…His soul patch and apple cheeks took something away from the image.
“Ms. Flannery,” Janowitz, obviously the lead detective, began, “I know that you’re not feeling all that great and so we’ll try to be brief, but we’d like to ask you a few questions about the other night.”
“Go ahead.” Lying on the bed, with an IV drip pumping into her arm and her bandages restricting her, Shannon pushed the button to raise the head of the electric bed a little higher. It was a weird feeling to be interviewed here, in the hospital, with the door to the room ajar, the nurses’ station visible through the opening.
“You know that arson is suspected in the fire?” Janowitz asked as she delved into a small black shoulder bag. She retrieved a pen and small tablet with a spiral binding and pages covered in a bold scrawl. Rossi pulled a recorder from his pocket and set it on a table near her bed.
“I figured,” she said, her worst fears confirmed. Since she’d already found the burned birth certificate on her porch and been attacked in the horse barn, she’d known someone was out to do her harm. She just didn’t know who, or why.
“The crime scene investigators are still evaluating the evidence, and, I think, so is the fire investigator for the department, Shea Flannery. He’s your brother, right?”
“Yes.”
“He’s out in the waiting room, but we wanted to talk to you first.”
She began to feel a bit of relief in knowing that at least one of her brothers was nearby. Though they often drove her crazy, she had to admit it was reassuring to have a family to rely on. “What do you want to know?”
Janowitz was staring at her with those intense gold eyes. “We assume from your injuries that you were attacked by an assailant. We found a pitchfork with blood on the handle, boot prints, some with blood on them as well. And all the injuries you sustained can’t be explained by a horse striking or trampling you as we first suspected.”
Shannon inhaled slowly. “Someone was waiting for me in the stable.” She remembered the overwhelming sense of panic as the flames snapped and glass shattered. The frenzy of the horses and the wild barking of the dogs. The fear that heightened as the man struck. “He jumped me.”
“Can you describe him?” Janowitz asked.
“A little, but it was dark and I thought, I had the sense that he had on a mask of some kind. I think he was around six feet tall and muscular—athletic, I’d say, but again, that’s more of an impression than anything. As I said, it was dark and it all happened so fast…”
“Did you see what he was wearing?”
“No…” She slowly shook her head. “Dark, maybe black clothes? I don’t know…”
“Jeans?” Rossi asked, prodding her.
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
Rossi said, “Long-sleeved shirt? Jacket? Gloves?”
“I…I
can’t say, not for certain.”
“Did you have any other impressions of the assailant? Was he wearing cologne, or did he smell like gasoline?”
“No—just sweat. He smelled of sweat, I think, maybe, but mostly what I smelled was smoke from the fire.”