Page 112 of Charlie
Liv, and I walked with the children to Lumi, who sat in an ambulance where a paramedic was looking at her ankle.
“What happened to you?” Liv asked and crawled up to sit next to her.
“I’m afraid it was my fault.” One of the ERU guards stood on the ground in front of the ambulance. He had removed his vest and taken off his helmet. “I landed on her ankle when I fell on top of her. That’s why I carried her out here.”
“Damian?” Liv’s voice was full of disbelief. “I didn’t recognize you with all your equipment on.”
“Nah, ye would nae but I recognized ye.” He turned his attention to the paramedic who was wrapping Lumi’s ankle. “How is she?”
“Minor injury. She’ll be fine.”
“Good.” Looking back at Liv, he sighed. “Ye and Kit were serious about that guy being a lunatic, eh?”
“Where’s Kit?” I looked around for her and pulled out my phone to call her. “Last time I saw her, she was behind the house.”
Kit came running a few minutes later. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. I was so scared that ye’d all been killed.”
“It was close.” Damian picked up his vest and studied where the bullet had hit him.
“Ye took a bullet?” Kit leaned in to see.
“I just saw him swingin’ a gun in the direction of the girl so I threw myself on top of her.” Damian, whose hair was wet from sweat, nodded to Lumi, who sat in the ambulance with Liv next to her.
Lumi turned to look at Damian and there was such sorrow and pain in her large brown eyes that it tore at my heart.
“Thank you for saving Lumi’s life.” I reached out my hand to shake his. “You’re a true hero.”
“Nah, it’s what I’m trained to do. Do not worry about it. It’s my pleasure.”
“Let me see where the bullet hit ye.” Kit pulled at Damian’s uniform shirt and he took it off and turned his back on her. The man was ripped.
“Bloody hell, I see a mark.” Kit’s hand touched his back. “Yer goin’ to be well purple, I reckon.”
“It’s not too bad.” He shrugged and gave Lumi a small smile. “For ye, my love, I’d take a bullet any day.”
His kind words only made Lumi tear up, but River tugged at his sleeve.
“What about me? Would you take a bullet for me?” River asked with large eyes.
Damian looked down at the blond girl and tousled her hair. “Of course. Any of us men here would. It’s why we go to work. To stop the bad guys from hurting innocent people like yerself.”
“But what happened?” River looked back at the house. “That man over there covered my eyes and carried me outside. He said that we didn’t need to see it.”
We all turned to look at the guard in question and when he saw us watching him, he came to join us and placed a hand on Damian’s shoulder. He was in his early forties and looked weathered, with wrinkles and dark circles under his eyes.
I reached out my hand to shake his, just as I’d done with Damian, and I lowered my voice, “Thank you for not letting the kids see the bodies. It’s enough that the rest of us will have that image haunt us forever.”
“I’ve been with the Gardai for almost twenty years and I’ve never seen anything like it. Being a father myself, I reckoned that I wouldn’t want my kids to see something that gruesome.” Turning to Damian, the older guard patted his shoulder hard. “Ye did good rookie, but I wonder if maybe ye should have become a bodyguard instead. Throwin’ yerself in front of flyin’ bullets and all.” He shook his head.
“I acted on instinct.”
“Aye, I could tell.”
A stern-looking man came over. “We would like to interview the witnesses. Are you done here?”
Damian picked up his vest and helmet and leaned in to give Kit a kiss on her cheek. “I’ll talk to ye later, sis.” When he walked away, he looked back over his shoulder, and then turned to walk backward. “Hey, Lumi.”
The girl gave a nod to show she had heard him.
