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“Don’t know, trying to get in. I saw them through the window in the kitchen.” That sounded stalker-ish, and these calls were recorded. Maybe no one would notice.
“I’m sending Police and Fire. Stay on the line.”
I tried the front door. Locked. Reminding myself that it was only breaking and entering if you were caught, I pulled my lockpick set from my pocket and went to work, grateful this wasn’t an electronic lock. There was a keypad on the garage, but not on the door. With locks, I performed magic. Electronics? Not so much.
Twenty seconds later, voila. I had no one to impress but myself.
I was duly impressed.
Only after I stepped into the house did I consider that maybe walking into a building where the occupants were unconscious wasn’t the smartest move. But I had 9-1-1 on the line, and Police and Fire should have a quick response time at five on a Sunday afternoon.
“I’m in the house,” I told the operator. “I’m going to check their vitals.”
“Can you describe the individuals?”
“Male, Caucasian, mid-thirties, six foot one, one hundred and eighty pounds. Female, early to mid-twenties, Caucasian or Hispanic. Hold on.”
I pressed speaker and put the phone down so I could kneel and check each pulse.
“Both individuals are unconscious but each has a strong pulse. I’m going to open the doors and windows in case there’s a gas leak. I don’t think I should move them unless you think I should.”
“Do you smell gas?”
“No.”
But many gases had no odor, and I didn’t want to pass out.
Thanks to Uncle Sam, I had advanced first-aid skills, but unfortunately let my EMT certification expire years ago after I left the Army. Still, I wasn’t going to let anyone die if I could stop it.
I opened both sets of French doors, then spent too long searching for the panel that would open the family room blinds. Finally found it—a remote on the table. The doors were glass and they, too, slid open via the remote. Sweet.
The AC was on, but I switched the fan to high, which would help (I hoped) clear out any gas from the house.
I took a peek in the master bedroom—no sign that the bed was used. No luggage, no discarded clothing, no sexy lingerie, and no champagne on the nightstand.
By the time I returned to the kitchen, Logan was stirring. He groaned and struggled to get up.
“Don’t move, help is on the way.”
“Wha—?” he asked, groggy, as if he’d been woken from a deep sleep. “My head.”
“Stay still.”
The woman was smaller, maybe she absorbed more of the drug or poison or gas or whatever it was that had knocked out two healthy people in less than thirty minutes.
To the dispatcher on the phone I said, “The male is waking up, complaining of a headache. The woman is still unconscious. She’s approximately five foot three, maybe one hundred and ten, twenty pounds, tops.”
Now that I knew Logan Monroe wasn’t dying, I breathed deeply, trying to figure out what might have incapacitated these two. No smell, no physical reaction, no cough, nothing to suggest I had inhaled a toxic substance.
“Did you drink anything?” I asked Logan.
He stared blankly, as if trying to figure out what was going on. He leaned against the counter, still too weak to stand.
“Just...water.”
“Bottled? Did you open it yourself?”
He shrugged. Okay, he was still kind of out of it, but doing better than the woman.
