John pulls his car into a space near the front of the Palace restaurant – right between two parked squad cars. Apparently he isn’t the only one of Llanview’s finest to have responded to the call of shots fired.

He very quickly shifts the gear into “Park” and turns off the engine. He gets out of the car, his eyes glued to the scene – shards of various sizes and fragments of broken glass littering the sidewalk out front, the buzz of activity in and around the place, the sight of blue uniformed personnel darting in and out.

The cop’s voice in his head wonders who was the perp, what was the motive, was it random or was there an intended victim – the usual set of questions that spring to a cop’s mind when something like this happens. But that voice is being drowned out by the voice of John McBain the man, who wants to know one thing and one thing only.

In the midst of all this chaos, where is Evangeline?

He looks up, spotting an officer on the scene.

“McGreevy!” John calls. “What’s the status?”

“Still pretty sketchy, Lieutenant. Eyewitnesses say that the shooter or shooters came into the dining room and started lighting the place up.”

“Shooter or shooters? Which is it?”

“Can’t get a straight story yet. Robinson is in the manager’s office, taking statements.”

“Anybody hurt?” he asks, an uneasy feeling settling over him.

“Initial reports are that a few people were hit, a couple of people are down. Paramedics are on the way. One of the people down is Robert Castor.”

“Why does that name sound familiar?”

“He’s the guy that’s been in the papers for the last few days. He turned state’s evidence in the case against that politician who got caught with his hands in the cookie jar - Krackauer, remember?”

“Right. I remember reading something about it. That might explain who they were after…”

“It might. Sure looks like a hit.”

“You uh…You seen Evangeline around?”

“Miss Williamson? No. Haven’t seen her but I just got here about a minute ago. Rainey’s inside. Maybe he’s seen her.”

“Yeah,” he responds. “Yeah maybe…Keep me posted.”

“Will do, Lieutenant.”

“Ericson here yet?” John asks, affixing his badge to his belt. Standard operating procedure at a crime scene dictates that all police personnel be instantly identifiable.

“On his way.”

John steps over the broken glass fragments and into the restaurant, his pulse pounding in his ears. He tried to reach Evangeline again and again in the car on the way over and she never answered. Every instinct he has is telling him that something’s wrong – terribly wrong. But his mind is fighting against it, not even wanting to imagine that something may have happened to her – that she might have been injured.

Or worse.

He pushes it out of his mind, his eyes surveying the Palace dining room as he moves through it. The host station is overturned. So are many tables and chairs throughout the dining room. There are what seems to be hundreds of nicks and scratches scattered across the walls – likely from the bullets that sprayed the place earlier. People not seriously injured are seated wherever there’s a spot available, looking stunned and shaken. At one of the booths is a middle-aged, balding, slightly overweight man holding his arm and bleeding, apparently having been wounded. Officers on the scene are standing nearby – listening and taking notes on everything said, trying to piece together the how and what of everything that happened here this evening.

Still no sign of Evangeline.

He glances up, spotting the once elegant now bullet-riddled patio doors in back of the dining room – the same patio where he’d given Evangeline his mother’s pearl necklace for her birthday, the same patio where she’d written his birthday note on a napkin – a note that said simply “I love you. E.” – the note he keeps in his desk drawer at work. Immediately he knows where Evangeline must have been when the gunfire erupted – where she must have sat waiting for him to join her for dinner.

He heads toward the patio.

Just then, Officer Rainey appears in his path.

“Lieutenant…”

John sees the hesitation in Rainey’s demeanor and knows what he’s having trouble with.

“Where is she?”

“Out on the patio.”

“Out on the patio?” John questions on his way, Officer Rainey close behind. “What the hell is she doing out on the patio?”

“Both this guy Castor and Miss Williamson were out there. Castor’s dead. Lieutenant!” he yells, needing John’s complete attention before he sees it for himself.

John stops, turning to face him.

“What?”

Rainey takes a deep breath.

“Miss Williamson’s been hit – twice.”

‘No!’

“You call an ambulance?” John manages in an even tone – in spite of the complete sense of panic he feels.

“On its way. She is conscious, though.”

John hurries through what’s left of the patio doors, panes of glass broken and missing, barely still on their hinges after absorbing so many bullets. He sees a bloody, motionless body to his left – probably this Castor that’s been in the papers – but it hardly registers.

What does register is what he sees in front of him.

Somewhere in between the overturned table, the chair on its side here and the chair on its side there, he sees Evangeline.

She’s seated on the ground, obviously in a great deal of pain. She’s propped against the wall, her hand to her abdomen. Even from where he’s standing, he can see the blood on her dress – the blood oozing between the fingers of her hand as it presses against her wound.

“Hey?” he manages softly as he approaches, trying as hard as he can to remain calm. He kneels down next to her.

“Hey,” she responds, her breathing clearly labored.

He quickly notes the widening bloodstain on the right shoulder of her dress. He gently lifts her left hand, removing it from the wound at her middle. At a glance, he can see that she’s lost a great deal of blood.

“You know what?” he tells her. “I know it hurts like hell but…it’s not that bad. I’ve seen worse – a lot worse.”

“It does hurt…”

He tenderly strokes her cheek.

“I know…”

“The um…” she begins breathlessly, trying hard to concentrate. “They came in through the dining room together – at least two of them did…”

“Don’t worry about it,” John interrupts. “We’ll take care of that. You just save your strength.”

“But John - ”

“I mean it, Evangeline.”

“I’m getting foggy but…I want to give you my statement while it’s fresh in my mind. I’m trying to remember all the things you taught me to notice.”

He takes off his jacket, bunches it up, and uses it to apply pressure to her stomach wound, which sends a searing pain through her. He’s a bit startled when she cries out, her body convulsing involuntarily as a result.

“I’m sorry, hon…I know it hurts but…I gotta try and slow this bleeding down…”

“I know, I know,” she quickly says. “Keep going…” Unable to take deep breaths, she instead takes shallow ones, trying to get through the pain from the pressure on her wound. “John?”

“You really don’t know how to shut up, do you?”

Evangeline suppresses a giggle at the reminder of something he always teases her about.

“Don’t make me laugh, McBain. It hurts when I laugh…”

“I know,” he tells her. “Sorry…Where the hell is that ambulance?”

“I’ll radio and get their ETA,” Rainey says, raising the radio to his mouth.

“John, please,” she asks. “Listen to me.”

“Okay. I’m listening.”

“I saw them come in when I was on my way back from the ladies room. One was about your height - stocky, short dark hair. The other one was blond, I think – shorter. They were wearing the red Palace uniforms…”

“Stocky, dark, blond, shorter, Palace uniforms,” he repeats quickly. “Got it. Now can you please stop talking?”

“I wouldn’t have noticed except that the stocky one was wearing sneakers. Robert Castor came out here to talk to me about representing him…and the next thing I know there’s all this shooting and screaming coming from inside and before I knew what was happening, they just came through the doorway and started shooting out here, too. I felt a sharp pain in my right arm and I remember losing my balance and the chair falling over. That’s when I felt the one in my side…”

She finds herself feeling weaker and weaker with each moment that passes. She watches John, imagining what’s going through his head – thoughts of Caitlin, the memory of her being shot to death right before his eyes. She knows that he must be in hell at this very moment, wondering if he’s about to relive his worst nightmare.

“The dark one looked right at me,” she continues. “I think that I might be able to identify him if I ever saw him again…”

“Fine. I got it, okay? I really need you to stop talking now.”

“Okay…”

Very slowly it dawns on her that the pain she felt at John’s touch to her stomach just a moment ago has become less intense – much less. Does that mean she’s dying? Does it mean that she’s about to pass out? She doesn’t know. All she knows is that there’s a sudden urgency in the air. She can feel it. Suddenly every single word has to count – has to really mean something.

Just in case.

“I need you to do something for me,” she manages weakly.

“Name it. Where the hell is that ambulance, Rainey?”

“There was an accident on one of the cross streets,” Rainey explains. “They say two minutes.”

“If anything goes wrong -”

“Nothing’s gonna go wrong,” he quickly interrupts. “I don’t want you even thinking like that. You’re gonna be alright.”

“John, please…” She feels her strength slipping away, even the effort to keep her eyes open becoming more than she can manage. “If anything goes wrong, call my Mom, okay? She’ll take care of everything.”

“Whatever. Look, I don’t even know why you’re saying this stuff. Nothing’s gonna happen.”

No matter how steady and reassuring his voice sounds, she can still hear the tension behind the words. But he’s trying to be strong for her – like always. It’s who he is – a nurturer, always trying to take care of the people he cares about - regardless of what it does to him.

“I love you so much.”

He looks into her eyes, tears beginning to well in his.

“Evangeline…”

“No matter what’s happened between us – the ups and downs, the fights about Natalie – whatever…” she continues almost in a whisper, “I’m so happy that we found each other...”

Before he can say anything, he sees her eyelids fluttering – fighting to stay open but losing the battle.

“No - don’t!” he blurts, knowing that there’s a real chance he may never look into those beautiful expressive brown eyes again. “Evangeline, don’t…”

And then her eyes close.

Immediately his hand goes to her neck, his experienced fingers desperately feeling for signs of a pulse – any pulse at all. After a few seconds, he finally locates one – and it’s racing but it’s there.

That’s when he lets himself breathe again.

He feels a tear fall from his eye as he holds her to him.

“Don’t you leave me,” he whispers, rocking her gently - his lips close to her ear. He tenderly kisses her forehead. “I need you. Stay with me…”

“Out here!” comes the booming voice of Officer Rainey as he directs the paramedics out onto the patio.

“About time you got here!” John barks. He gently sets her back against the wall, not wanting to but forcing himself to stand and move aside so that the paramedics can work on her – so that they can keep her alive.

So that he won’t lose her.

“How long has she been unconscious?” one of the paramedics asks, putting his case of supplies on the ground nearby and kneeling down next to her. He lifts her wrist and takes her pulse as the first step in accessing the victim’s condition.

“Since just now,” he answers, his eyes glued to her. “She kept on talking and I could tell she was getting weaker…and then she passed out…She lost a lot of blood.”

“Yes, she has. Looks like one gunshot wound to the upper right arm that went straight through and one to the abdomen…Looks like a bad one…Rapid pulse…”

“This one’s dead…” a second paramedic pronounces about Mr. Castor the state’s witness, turning his attention to the victim that’s still alive.

“Doesn’t she need an IV or a transfusion or something?” John insists. “She lost all that blood…”

“Lieutenant McBain,” the second paramedic begins calmly, noting the blood on John’s clothing. “You’ve done everything you can, okay? Let us do our job here.”

“Lieutenant,” Rainey adds. “Sergeant Ericson just arrived. “

“I’ll talk to him later,” he answers disinterestedly, his eyes still glued to Evangeline.

“What about the details Miss Williamson gave about the shooters?”

“Believe it or not, Rainey,” John tells him, “at that particular moment, I wasn’t really listening all that hard.”

“Lieutenant -”

“Look,” he blurts, “she said she saw two of them, okay – one about six-one, short dark hair, stocky, wearing sneakers. The other one was blond, shorter – both wearing Palace uniforms. She said that Castor was out here talking to her and that there were shots fired inside first and then these guys came out here and started shooting. That’s it. Now you go tell that to Ericson or you go get him and bring him out here to me and I’ll tell him myself. Either way, I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here.”

“Sir -”

“Hey!” John begins angrily. Then he stops, takes a deep breath and exhales before continuing in a more rational tone of voice. “I can’t work this case right now…”

Rainey considers what the Lieutenant is telling him. It’s been common knowledge for months that the Lieutenant and the beautiful Miss Williamson have been seeing each other. Back during the Stephen Haver case – back when McBain was with the FBI, it came out that Haver had murdered McBain’s fiancée. The news rocked him that she hadn’t been murdered in a random robbery as he originally believed – that serial killer Haver deliberately shot her to death right in front of him.

But instead of falling apart, McBain took the hit, channeled it, and dug in to work the case - getting Haver once and for all. Rainey and so many of the other cops on the LPD – the ones who’d worked that case with him for all those months, watching how he’d held himself together and kept his focus - came to respect John McBain. As Feds go, he seemed to be a pretty stand-up guy.

And a good cop.

Only now, here it is a year later. This time it’s Miss Williamson who’s been shot.

“Whatever you say, Lieutenant,” Rainey relents. “I’ll pass along what you said to the Sarge.”

“Tell him…Tell him if he needs to talk to me, he can try calling me or leave a message. I’ll be at the hospital with her when they take her in so…if he wants to talk to me, it’s gonna have to be later…”

“Got it,” Rainey says and then slowly makes his way back into the Palace dining room.

John stands there, transfixed by the sight of Evangeline lying so still on the ground where the paramedics have positioned her while they work - inserting an IV, putting an oxygen mask in place, elevating her feet. It occurs to him that the dress she’s wearing is one of his favorites. She always looks so pretty in it. Only now it’s been ruined – ripped into by bullets and hopelessly stained with her blood.

His eyes catch sight of her pocketbook laying a couple of feet away, no doubt where her cell phone is – the one she never answered, the one she couldn’t answer because she was too busy being shot at – too busy going through this terrifying ordeal all alone. Then he spots his jacket on the ground next to her – blood all over it.

He looks down at his hands and sees her blood there, too – on his pants, his shirt - everywhere.

’This can’t be happening…I can’t lose you, too…’

He pushes the thought from his mind. Evangeline is strong, he tells himself. She can handle just about anything. She can handle this, too.

’I don’t think I even know how to be without you anymore…’

John takes a deep breath, exhales, and shakes it off once and for all. Evangeline will come through this.

Because she has to.

“You can do this,” he whispers as he watches and waits. And worries. “Just don’t give up…”