The birders whispered and pointed in our direction. I bit my tongue to stop it from popping out. Immature? Yeah, but I was having a craptastic day. I folded my hands to keep the rude gestures at bay.
“Why? Why? Why? Why?” His voice lowered to a growl and carried on the wind. He moved into my personal space in long, steady strides, looking like a madman. “Why would you not tell me this?”
More swearing and pacing.
“What kind of research are you up to that prompted this kind of message?” He shook the evidence baggies at me. “Or this!” He yelled and kicked sand at the cooler. “I can’t keep you safe if you continue putting yourself in danger every time I take my eyes off you.”
Oh, no he did not just yell at me. Fire burned through my veins. I forced my gaze on him, refusing to count the number of spectators to that scolding.
An ambulance and two white cars with the hospital logo rolled into the sand beside Fargas’s cruiser. The team climbing out looked like they’d come to collect nuclear fallout instead of a cooler. Giant plastic outfits covered their clothes.
“Overkill much?” I mumbled.
“No. Not much. How many people have to die, Patience? This whole beach is a crime scene.”
“Special Agent Clark?” The group dressed in hazardous material suits approached single file, and I took my leave.
Fargas motioned me over when he saw me making time across the sand to my cart. I pretended not to notice. He had a line of birders giving statements. He knew where to find me when he finished.
I slid behind the wheel of my Pony cart and did a seated dance as my thighs protested the hot leather. I gunned the engine to life and made a reckless turn in the sandy grass. I didn’t have time for Sebastian’s obsessive hero complex. People were dying and someone needed to ask the right questions.
* * *
The hospital elevator moved slower than my great-grandmother. My foot tapped wildly as I waited to reach the morgue level. When the doors cracked open, I popped into the hallway without waiting for them to finish. Opposite the window wall, Jennie dithered around her desk, her cell phone pressed to her ear.
I knocked on the door as I pushed it open, hoping to catch a few words of the conversation keeping her on her feet.
Jennie spotted me and frowned. “I’ll call you back.” She tossed the phone onto her immaculate desk and forced a smile. “Patience, how are you feeling?” She shifted her weight from foot to foot and glanced at the degrees on her wall, avoiding eye contact.
“Great. Hey, why aren’t you at the beach? A crew went to recover the cooler, but you stayed here this time.” I pushed the door shut behind me and leaned against it.
“I’m heading there now.” Her words vibrated. “I had an emergency, so I sent the team ahead.” She grabbed her coat and keys. “I’m sorry. Can we talk later?” Her gaze darted to the wall, the desk and the floor.
“Sure.”
She motioned for me to move and opened the door. We stood at the elevator together and climbed aboard when the door opened. I pushed the lobby button and leaned my sore body against the back wall. Jennie jumped out a second later. “I forgot my phone.” She shrugged and disappeared behind closing silver doors.
“Hey!” I pressed the open door button 700 times on the way up, but when the doors finally opened, the elevator dumped me in the lobby without her. “Gah!”
Fine. Change of plans. What did I tell my clients? Be adaptable. I rushed through the sliding ER doors and dove into the Pony cart. Five minutes later I curbed the cart and climbed into my shiny new Range Rover. The leather seats were supple, not stiff and offensive like the cart. My fingers massaged the steering wheel and I nearly moaned from the sweet scent of new car and Sebastian saturating everything around me. I pushed oversized sunglasses on my nose and pulled away from the curb. The Range Rover drove like a dream. Bumps that would nail my head into the Pony cart’s roof, barely jostled me. I turned on the stereo and relaxed into bluesy jazz spilling from Sebastian’s speakers. This ride was a stakeout paradise.
I parked on the street behind the hospital, across from Employee Parking, and dialed Jennie’s desk.
“Jennie McIntyre.” Her voice quivered. I hung up. Good, she didn’t get away while I swapped cars. I wiggled deeper into my comfy seat and shut down the engine. With the sunroof open, I enjoyed the breeze. Sebastian’s over-the-top illegal window tint concealed me from the road.
“Nah nan a nan a nah nah,” I hummed to the smooth tempo, resting my head against the headrest.
Jennie speed walked through the hospital’s back door and climbed into a blue Jetta. Bingo! I started the Range Rover and followed her over the mainland bridge. Leaving town in the middle of the day, Ms. McIntyre? I smiled all the way into the next town. She’d lied to me. She said her next stop was the beach. I clucked my tongue. Shame, shame.
Jennie pulled into an apartment complex in the busiest part of the city, and I stayed at the curb. Ten minutes later she emerged with a gym bag. I followed her as she turned back in the direction of the island. Maybe she needed something from home before heading to the beach? She stopped at a crowded bank. Traffic whizzed past as I waited.
I dialed Sebastian. “She’s making a getaway.” I didn’t give him time to say hello or make small talk. Time was imperative. “Jennie McIntyre went to her apartment, retrieved a duffle bag and then stopped at the bank. She’s inside now.” I assumed that building had been her apartment. I couldn’t say for sure. “You need to get someone over here before she’s gone for good.”
“You tailed the pathologist to the mainland?”
Uh-oh. He didn’t sound excited. “A little.”
Jennie emerged and I started the engine.
“She’s on the move again. Traffic’s bad. I need help out here before I lose her.”
“That didn’t sound like a golf cart.”
“I couldn’t tail a suspect in the Pony cart.”
“Patience Peace Price, get your ass back here before you get hurt.” His exasperated breath huffed into the receiver like a prank caller.
“I’m helping.”
“After three direct threats on your life, I’m supposed to sit here and let you dig into this further? Are you kidding me? Absolutely not. Get back here. I have this under control.”
“One: I disagree. Two: You’re supposed to support me.”
Jennie darted into traffic and two hundred taillights closed in behind her.
“Crap!” So much for surveillance.
I pounded my feet against his floorboards. When I got back to town, I’d make three attempts on his life.
Chapter Twelve
A moment later, the phone buzzed in my palm and I squeezed it. Hard. My fingertips turned white as I counted to ten. When I uncoiled them, “007” lit the screen. Adrian. Thank goodness. He’d see sense. Jennie had fled the island and Sebastian didn’t care. Completely insane.
“Who’s the most dashing former college football star currently running for town mayor?” he asked.
I rolled my eyes. Yes, he played ball in college and yes, his body reflected those years nicely, but the first part was years ago and the second part was completely unfair. Especially since my body didn’t reflect the years I spent running track or swimming in college. Heck, my body didn’t reflect the running or swimming I did last week.
“Need another hint? He’s charming and funny. He’s your favorite ex-boyfriend and possibly your one true regret in life.”
“Now I know who you mean.”
“Touché.”
I smiled. “What do you want?” Traffic raged around me, racing up to a standstill at the light. Hoards of pedestrians littered the curbs, waiting for the little silver man to appear and signal them to cross.
“Remember the blonde paramedic from the beach?”
>
“Yeah.” She’d helped me in the ER too. Young, perky and not especially gentle with women in car crashes.
“Well, she remembered me from earlier on the beach,” he hinted.
I had a good idea where this story was going. Unsure if I wanted to hear the rest, I sank into the soft leather seat and turned off my blinker. I wasn’t pulling into traffic anytime soon. “And?”
“I took her to lunch and did my thing.”
“I don’t want to hear about that.”
“No. My other thing.” He laughed.
The gloat in his voice was obnoxious. I imagined him finger combing his hair in the mirror while flexing his pectorals.
“Right. You charmed her and she did what? Be careful how you answer. I’m having a tough afternoon.”
“She looked up a couple records for me in the hospital database.”
I sat taller. “You got her to look at hospital files for you? Whose?” Suddenly I was back on the case. I’d lost one lead in traffic, but gained another on the phone. Adrian rocked. All those abs and pearly white teeth were good for something useful. I bounced in my seat a little. “What’d she find?”
“Let me start from the beginning. I went to see Jennie McIntyre today, but I didn’t go through with my visit, which was fine because aside from flirting, I didn’t have a solid plan. Anyway, I came down the hospital stairs and found her hustling into her office. I hung back and watched. She made a few calls and paced around her desk. When she dipped into the morgue and pulled the door shut, I slipped into her office and looked at the files on her desk, the papers in the fax machine and the open windows on her computer screen.”
“I went to see her today too.” My heel bobbed against the floor mat.
“What’d you find out?”
“No. You go. Finish.”
“I found a list of names for the people parts found on the beach. Four of them were named, but the list had several more blanks. We’re looking at eight different people cut up and tossed into the ocean. Becky—that’s the lady I had lunch with—thought this was fascinating. Girls like a bad guy, so it wasn’t hard to talk her into helping. She looked up the names I wrote down for her and found out all four from the list on Jennie McIntyre’s desk died at Chincoteague Community Hospital. Recently. Jennie handled their processing.”
“I knew she was hiding something. Crap! I tailed her out of town and lost her in traffic.” My head fell against the steering wheel. “Did they all die the same way?”
“Oh. I didn’t think to ask about how they died. Meet me at my office and we’ll figure out what to do next.”
“Give me an hour. I’m stuck in traffic on the mainland.”
* * *
By the time I pulled up to the curb outside my apartment and Adrian’s office, my blood pressure was high enough to shoot my head off. Traffic had been relentless and people drove with a death wish, either weaving in and out of lanes or doing half the speed limit so I couldn’t get around them. Birders blocked my space at the curb and covered the sidewalk outside my place. I honked long and loud until they reluctantly repositioned themselves to make room for the Range Rover. I hated being rude, but jeez.
Adrian shooed the group down the sidewalk. “Move along. Go on. Move it. Nothing to see here.” They puttered forward, shuffling their feet and staring through binoculars into the sky.
“Must be nice to be clueless something awful is going on around here,” I mumbled. This bird happy group had no idea how much danger they could be in wandering in the forest and on the beach. I rounded the hood and met Adrian on the sidewalk. His bright blue dress shirt matched his eyes, already twinkling in the sunlight. I’d kill for his long black lashes. Sephora had nothing on him. The crisp white T-shirt he wore beneath the blue added the perfect touch. Dress shirt, no tie. Dress pants, sandals. Island chic. No wonder everyone loved him. He got us. Them. They loved him.
“There’s a saying like that—something about ignorance and bliss. I’m sure you’ve heard it.” He took my hand and led me to the rockers outside his office door.
“Do you think they’d go somewhere else if they knew a serial killer lurked among us?”
Adrian tossed his head back and barked a short, engaging laugh. “No. All they care about is spotting birds and marking them in their little books. If you haven’t noticed, they aren’t real concerned with people right now.”
“You think they have regular lives wherever they’re from? Families? Normal stuff? Or do they mindlessly roam the earth in search of birds?”
“I think they have normal stuff like everybody else. Birding is their hobby. Like football or investigating.” His smile widened.
I crossed my legs in the rocker and laid my head back. The Tylenol I swallowed in traffic worked overtime, easing the ache of my muscles. Scents of greasy burgers and fresh-baked waffle cones reached out to me. My tummy growled in acknowledgement. A hot fudge brownie sundae with whipped cream, crushed walnuts and a cherry on top floated in my mind. I swiped my mouth in case of accidental drool.
The Tasty Cream across the street seemed surreal. For the past few days, my life had seemed surreal. How was it possible I’d landed in the middle of a multiple homicide investigation while the rest of the island, Adrian aside, went on as if nothing horrible had happened? In college I wrote a paper about loss with parallel themes. My thesis statement was “The worst thing about losing someone integral to your life is the way life goes on without them.” As if they never existed to anyone else. No matter how important they were to you, they meant nothing to the rest of planet Earth. I hadn’t lost anyone, personally, to the person who cut up those people, but I was devastated, and the rest of my island family seemed fine with it, or at least oblivious.
“You okay?” Adrian leaned across the space between our rockers and laid a warm hand on my shoulder. He pressed and kneaded the muscles with careful fingertips. I craved touches like those. Touches from hands strong enough to flatten a grown man but gentle enough to sooth me.
“I had Jennie in my sights and she got away. I followed her to an apartment in the city and then to a bank. I called Sebastian and he told me to come home, to leave it alone. He said he had it under control. Why?”
“Maybe he knows something we don’t. He didn’t become a special agent by accident.”
“Four people died at Chincoteague Community Hospital, all four bodies were processed by Jennie McIntyre and all four washed up on the shore in pieces. On top of that, James Trent and Minnie Peters floated ashore this week. Something very bad is going on. I’m afraid of who might wash ashore next.”
I rocked on slow concentrated efforts, processing what I knew. “Hey, you know what I didn’t think of before?”
“Tell me.” Adrian slid from his seat and stood beside my rocker, reaching both hands onto my shoulders and working the muscles in my neck until I couldn’t speak. “Playing football had its benefits. Lots of minor injuries. I took a class in sports medicine and learned this is how you treat over-burdened muscles, not by squeezing them, by caressing them, easing their grip.”
“That’s nice.” My head rolled forward.
“Relax,” he whispered into my hair.
Already done.
“You should rest, maybe soak in a hot tub. You’ll feel better in a few days. Becky said you were lucky. Aside from a few bruises and sore muscles, you’re perfect. Did you know I have a hot tub?”
I moaned shamelessly. He laughed.
“What were you saying? I interrupted you.”
I had no idea. My mind slid over a few things, unable to find purchase. Something about Jennie. “Oh, she signed the paperwork as the pathologist on duty at the hospital. Meaning they were already pronounced dead, right? Otherwise they wouldn’t have made a trip to the morgue.”
“Ah.” His fingers stilled. “You think if the
y each died in the hospital, there isn’t a serial killer.”
“Maybe, or the killer might work at the hospital.”
Adrian made a sour face. “What does that mean about Jennie?”
“My dad says you can make a lot of money selling your organs on eBay. What if Jennie was broke and needed the money, so she did a little organ harvesting for profit and ditched the bodies afterward to cover it up? It’s a perfect crime, almost. We need a way to check her financials.”
“That’s good. You don’t think anyone else had access to the bodies?” His forehead creased. “Wouldn’t their families wonder what happened to the bodies?”
Sheriff Fargas’s old deputy cruiser crawled down the street. Sebastian glared through the driver’s side window. I returned the gesture.
“Uh-oh.” Adrian dropped his hands to his sides.
Mark Mathers sat in the backseat of the cruiser, looking devastated.
“Someone else did have access to the bodies,” I said, remembering that they had all probably gone to Flick’s Funeral Home. Flick’s was the only funeral home on the island. I blinked. “Mark couldn’t have done this, could he?”
Adrian sat on the edge of his rocker, elbows on knees, fingers steepled. “People do all sorts of things for money. I don’t want to think he could, but clearly Sebastian disagrees. It makes sense that Jennie would have needed help. She’s a toothpick. Even in pieces, minus a few key organs, bodies are heavy.”
“If they split the profits, Jennie stood to gain a lot from his arrest. Assuming he doesn’t turn on her.”
“So, all the bodies are connected, even the ones not cut up. James Trent probably saw them dumping in the ocean after he moved onto the rig.” Adrian turned to face me.
My mind whirled with possibilities. The pieces snapped together. “And Minnie’s the best florist in town. She made trips to the hospital and funeral homes every day. What if she overheard something?”
“You’re good at this, Patience. You get people. Why didn’t you become an investigator? Why counseling? Don’t tell me you chose counseling over investigation because you don’t condone violence,” he teased. “You’re tough and I know better. You’d use any means available to stop someone from getting hurt or hurting another person. Remember the time you kicked Beau Thompson in the gonads for taunting that chubby kid with crossed eyes? I knew I loved you the minute Beau puked up his peanut butter and jelly on the hopscotch court.”
Murder Comes Ashore Page 14