Goldie screeched a few times (appropriately) and toasted again. As he held his glass up, a knock sounded on the door.

“Enter!” Goldie yelled and looked at me, “Hope to hell it’s not Bosshole again.”

“Would he knock?” I asked, causing Goldie to spit out a sip of his drink.

I kept laughing, until Goldie’s face grew serious as he looked behind me. I swung around.

“Goldie. Sherlock,” Jagger said, looking oh-so delicious, I took a sip of my diet Coke and thought it was jam-packed with sugar.

Thankful that I didn’t spill my drink, I said, “Hey.” Jagger helped himself to the beer Goldie offered and then sat opposite me on a stool resembling an elephant leg.

“Where’d you go?” he asked.

None of your business sat on the tip of my tongue, but then I remembered we were working a case.

Together.

Go figure.

“Well,” I hesitated, knowing I’d have to face the fallout of Jagger’s possible wrath when I said Lilla and I had sneaked into the hospital to see Pansy. Oh, well, I decided to go for it, and what could Jagger do to me anyway?

Once I finished my story, I found out. At first he took a very long, slow sip of his beer. Occasionally he looked from Goldie to me and back.

Poor Goldie looked as if he’d seen a spider-and everyone knew that gay guys couldn’t really handle spiders very well, as evidenced by Miles and Goldie found up on a chair in the kitchen when one ventured in when Spanky stepped out last summer.

I could take Jagger, but it wasn’t fair to upset Goldie, so I said, “Come on. Get it over with. Give me your two cents’ lecture so we can move on.”

Goldie gasped. I think he wanted to jump up to protect me, but this was Goldie. Poor guy didn’t do too well with brute force or anything that might break a nail.

Still in no hurry, Jagger sipped even more slowly.

“Stop that before Goldie has a stroke!”

Jagger smiled at Goldie. “Why would he?”

I set my glass down on the desktop with a thump and a splash. “Because you are going to chastise me, and he’s my friend and you nearly have him suffering apoplexy!”

Goldie said, “Apo-”

“Spitting mad, Gold. Give it up, Jagger. You’ve held us in suspense all along. What about my investigating without you?”

He set his beer down next to mine without a sound or a splash. “Excellent.”

My jaw did its “amazed at Jagger” routine, landing wide open and nearly at chest level. Excellent? Was there really such a word in Jagger’s vocabulary? I was ready to say, “Says you, Jag.” Then I’d follow it with, “And I think I did a great job,” but I no longer needed those words, and I didn’t have any backup ones ready.

Goldie and I exchanged glances and smiled.

Since Jagger and I needed to get back to TLC and explain our “absence,” we drove from the office parking lot to TLC in record time. When I parked, I noticed Buzz Lightyear walking toward the building.

His shift wasn’t over yet, so I wondered what he was doing there. I followed him to the entrance, and had to bite my tongue when I was tempted to say, “Didn’t Pansy look pale?”

Instead I shifted my thoughts. “Hey, Jeremy, have you heard any news about how Pansy is doing?”

His hand tightened on the door handle. Poor kid. He’d had a rough day and I was making him relive it.

“I hear she’s still in a coma,” he said and walked briskly into the building.

You heard? You saw, Buzz. You saw her today and why would you keep that a secret?

I shook my head. I likened him to one of my younger brothers. If he told me about being there with three women, and him being the one who looked even paler than the patient, he’d look bad in front of a girl. I smiled to myself. Yeah, poor kid.

As I was headed into the lounge to see who was there, I was paged over the intercom. “Pauline Sokol, to the helipad.”

Oh, great. Another dizzying helicopter ride to make my day.

Proud of myself for not getting nauseous and for stabilizing an unstable patient midair, I sat next to Sky on the ride back to Hope Valley, mentally patting myself on the back.

Only thing was, it was damn difficult not to ask about him and Pansy.

I managed to make small talk and learned Sky was an only child who had grown up in an orphanage. How sad, yet he seemed to think it was an okay upbringing.

“Well, look where it got you,” I said. “Great job and a great guy.”

He chuckled in the earphones of my helmet and asked me to tell him more about myself. Yikes. I had to give him the edited version, leaving out that I was an investigator.

Trust no one, I could hear Jagger whisper in my ear. Okay, due to the noise of this flying tin can, it was more a shout than a whisper.

But it was in Jagger’s voice and helped to keep me calm.

“How’d you come to work for TLC?” Sky asked.

Whoops. Hadn’t ever planned out a lie for that one. Never really expected someone would ask. I paused for a few seconds and looked out the window.

The TLC helipad was in view. If I bought myself time I wouldn’t have to lie, since I sucked at that. So, I looked around as if I hadn’t heard Sky’s question.

“Hey, Pauline. I asked how you came to work at TLC. Someone recommend it to you?”

Hmm. That would have been a good answer unless he asked me who had. I pretended to be interested in the terrain below.

I was contemplating why Sky would ask me that question. Small talk? Or trying to find out who knew about him being a possible suspect?

Sky leaned toward me and tapped my helmet. “You hear me?”

“What?”

“Your system out?”

“If you are talking to me, I think my system is out.” Damn. I should have used another term, but he didn’t seem suspicious as he gently set the helicopter down.

“Nice landing,” I said as I took off my helmet and got out before, Mario, who’d been riding with us and taking a nap like Nicky had, stepped out. I handed him the helmet.

“Have the system on that thing checked out, Mar,” Sky said.

Whoops. Oh well, if need be, I could say I had wax in my ears.

Back in the lounge, while several of the other staff busied themselves I poured milk into my cup of hot tea and started to plan out my evening. Evening? Geez. It seemed ages since I’d come on duty here today. This job was as demanding as most nursing positions were. Proud of my accomplishments on my two helicopter runs, I took a sip of tea and decided I needed the down time.

“Four five six, possible Eighty-four at 333 Oak Street, third floor,” came over the intercom.

Buzz flew from his seat. “Let’s go, Pauline!”

“Pauline?” I said, tea sloshing around in my mug as I set it down on the table.

“Yeah, didn’t you hear your name called? ER Dano is already in the ambulance. Let’s go!” Buzz adjusted his crisp white shirt as if that would make him look more professional to a patient suffering an Eighty-four, whatever that was.

In my relaxed mood I hadn’t, in fact, heard my name being called, but I trusted Buzz (and decided he was more a Buzz than a Jeremy since disturbing my down time) so I rushed out behind him.

ER Dano was at the wheel. “Shotgun for you this time, Sparkie. Sokol, you got the back.”

The experienced paramedics-well ER Dano anyway-called the overeager EMTs who always wanted to drive “Sparkie.”

Neither Buzz nor I argued, since a person’s life might be on the line-even though I hated riding in the back. Jagger wasn’t on this call; he must have been used on another run where a paramedic was needed.

I sat in the back while ER zoomed the ambulance out of the driveway with the lights and sirens going.

Adrenaline was a powerful hormone, I thought as it surged throughout me, waking me up so I’d be ready for anything.

But when we reached 333 Oak Street, I really wasn’t ready.