Mean Streak

At first she’d been too dumbfounded to react. Now she did, frantically pulling against his grip on her arm. “What are you doing?”

“Breaking and entering.”

“Why?”

“To steal what’s inside.”

“Are you insane?”

“No.”

“You’re about to commit a felony!”

“Uh-huh.”

His reasonableness astonished her. It terrified her. Crazy people often appeared perfectly sane until they…weren’t. She wet her lips, took quick shallow breaths. “Listen, I’ll give you money. You know, you said I had gobs. I…I’ll give you all you want, just—”

“You think I’m after money? Jesus.”

The man who’d taken a tire iron to a locked door for the purpose of breaking in and stealing actually looked affronted.

“Then why in God’s name—”

“This is a doctor’s office.”

A new light dawned. “Drugs? You want drugs?”

He sighed and propelled her toward the door. “We haven’t got time for this bullshit.”

She dug her heels in. “I won’t be any part of this.” She swung at him with her free fist, but he dodged it. “Let go of me!”

“Quiet!” Gripping both her arms now, he looked around to see if her raised voice had roused anyone, but the alley remained dark except for a lone street light at the end of the alley, and somehow, impossibly, it beamed into his eyes as they bored into hers. “The girl in the pickup?”

“The F-Floyds’ sister?”

“She’s in a bad way and needs your help.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

“I’ll explain on the way back.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“We’re going back to help her.”

“I’m not going back.” She tried to push away from him and began struggling again.

“Emory.”

What stilled her wasn’t so much the little shake he gave her but the use of her name and the authority with which he spoke it. “We can stand here arguing and risk getting caught and going to jail, or—”

“You’d go to jail. Not me.”

“Or you can hold to your Hippocratic oath, get in there, and gather up what you’ll need to treat her.”

“I won’t commit a crime.”

“Not even for a good reason?”