Down River

by Karen Harper

  "Lisa," he shouted. "Lisa!"

  The stone-flagged patio stood empty, the hot tub quiet. He dashed inside by the same back entrance and went to find Christine, just as she was heading toward her room, which overlooked the patio. He hurried toward her and grabbed her elbow. "Have you seen Lisa? She's not upstairs or outside."

  "No. I was just going to bed. Mrs. Bonner's going to turn off the lights. What's wrong? Want me to help look for her?"

  "No--go ahead. We were going to take a walk. See you in the morning."

  He turned away and made for the back door again. "Mitch," Christine called after him, "I just remembered. I think she was going to use the sauna."

  He exhaled hard. That was it. That's why her clothes were on the bed. He should have checked to see if her robe was on the back of the bathroom door.

  He went back out without going through the large patio doors where everyone could see him. He could hear the sauna's motor now and her robe--stark white in the twilight--was hanging on the far side.

  He heaved another sigh of relief. He was tempted to join her, just strip down and go in to surprise her. His desire for her kicked up again. He assumed she'd be wearing a bathing suit since someone else could join her, but what if she wasn't? What if--

  He checked the temperature control and timer. The temperature was well within the comfort zone and the time had five minutes left. As tired as she was, he hoped she hadn't nodded off in there.

  He put his hand to the door and pulled. Steam swept out, making it impossible to see. "Lisa!" he called inside. "Hey, sweetheart, time's up, except with me."

  No reply. The steam began to clear. The first thing he saw inside was a limp arm and an open hand on the floor.

  Lisa heard a voice, a man's voice, calling her name. It echoed through the darkness until it found her. Someone was touching her, feeling her neck and wrist.

  "Lisa! Lisa, wake up! Lisa!"

  Time to get up. Was she late for school? Did she have a court case today? Yes, some kind of test, but she could not recall what it was for.

  She tried to open her eyes, but they were so heavy. Mitch! It was Mitch. He had pulled her from the river, and she was cold. No, that couldn't be. She was so thirsty, hot all over, so hot, but funny...floaty.

  Now she remembered. She was staring up at him through white water, too much water, drowned and dead, and she was dreaming this.

  He slapped her cheeks and kept saying her name, but she was swimming farther away, pulled under by the monster current. And then he left her, so she closed her eyes and floated farther away, downriver.

  Mitch ran toward the lodge, to the bedroom window that was Christine's, and pounded on it. She swept the curtains aside and cranked the window out.

  "Call the Talkeetna rescue squad and get them out here now!" he told her. "Lisa's unconscious in the sauna, and I don't know how long she's been there. I think she's burning up with fever, but her skin's dry, so she's dehydrated--tell them that. If I can do anything with her besides trying to lower her body temperature in the lake, send someone out to tell me. Get someone on the phone who knows what I should do."

  No hysterics or even wasted words from his Cu'paq. That was his girl. She simply nodded and turned away, letting the curtains swing closed. He ran back to the sauna and lifted Lisa into his arms. How could anyone survive this--nearly frozen in the river and steamed in the sauna. His insides lurched. Had she just fallen asleep inside and done this to herself, or had someone possibly set this up, attempted murder--again?

  Holding her close, he jogged to the lake. It was the fastest way to lower her temperature. She had dry, doughy skin. She looked like a ghost when she should have been sweating. He had to get her to drink some water. The lake was crystal clear, and this was no time to worry about water purity when she could die.

  He strode knee-deep into the lake. The bottom dropped off quickly, so he didn't go far out. This would do. The water was always chilly, but nothing like the snowmelt river. He knelt, lowering her carefully into the water, keeping only her head above the surface.

  She stirred in his arms. Maybe this could bring her back. To his amazement, she began to struggle feebly against him.

  "It's all right, sweetheart. I've got you. We have to lower your temperature. Here," he said, loosing her a bit to ladle a handful of water to her mouth. "Drink. Drink." He got some water in her and she tried to swallow, but most of it spilled back out.

  "I can't believe it!" Vanessa's voice echoed as she rushed to the edge of the water. "This is terrible. Listen, Christine says the medics are on their way but the 9-1-1 receptionist put her through to an E.R. doctor. The big scare is that Lisa's heart can go into atrial fib or something, and if she becomes unconscious her prognosis is not good. How is she?"

  "Go get me some water in a glass," Mitch ordered.

  "However did she manage to stay in that long so that--"

  "Vanessa, go!"

  She brought the water, even waded out with it, and he got Lisa to take some. The nightmare of the river rescue again, Mitch thought. Did she have some sort of death wish? No, he could not accept that. He knew better. It meant someone here had tried to kill her again in a way that made it look as if she could have caused it herself.

  Everyone, except Christine, who stayed on the phone and sent Vanessa back and forth, was gathered by the lake now. "Would someone go wait for the squad and someone bring her robe that's hanging outside the spa?" Mitch asked.

  When he glanced away from Lisa at his guests, he saw the moon had risen over the canopy of spruce trees. That and the twilight bathed Lisa and the rippling water in a golden glow. Suddenly, he wished his lodge was in the desert with no river, no lake, no need for a sauna. If he lost Lisa again, nothing would ever be the same.

  Jonas came hustling around the side of the lodge, shouting, "The EMR's here. They're here!"

  It had seemed to take forever. Graham escorted them to the lake, the two men jogging, one of them pulling a gurney on wheels. Graham was telling them what had happened. Mitch lifted Lisa out of the water, and they helped him lay her on the dock. Images of Ginger's soaked, drowned body on her own dock jumped at Mitch. As the two medics bent over Lisa, he dragged his eyes away from her to look at the faces of his gathered guests. All looked genuinely concerned and scared. Christine ran out and stood behind the others, wringing her hands.

  "Tympanic thermometer," one of the medics said. The younger man took an instrument and put it in Lisa's ear while the other took her pulse while pressing a stethoscope to her chest. "Tachycardia," he said. "IV fluids and transport. Let's go."

  Mitch knew that "cardia" meant something with the heart. "Can I go, too?" he asked. "Are you taking her to Talkeetna?"

  "No, sir," the younger man said. "We'll have to take her to Columbia Regional in Anchorage."

  "That's seventy miles."

  "Why don't you follow us in your vehicle if you're next of kin?"

  He wasn't next of kin, but he had almost been her husband. He helped them lift Lisa onto the gurney and they quickly moved it across the stone patio. The wheels rattled. Mitch dug his car keys out of his pocket and hurried behind them.

  "Mitchell, you're soaking wet," Ellie protested.

  He only nodded and kept walking.

  "I'll go with you," Graham said, keeping up. "She's my responsibility, too."

  "I may have to stay with her, and you're heading out tomorrow," Mitch argued, not breaking stride.

  "We'll postpone. I'll help with the payment, insurance she's covered with. You need someone there you can trust."

  Mitch didn't argue. But he wondered, considering what he and Lisa had deduced about the casino case so far, if Graham wasn't the last person on earth he could trust. And like so much else lately, that broke his heart.

  Mitch gripped the steering wheel and kept up with the ambulance. Its siren pierced his ears, and its pulsating lights burned deep into his brain. Surely Lisa had not just nodded off in the sauna, however exhausted she'd been. Sh
e would have woken when she got too hot. People could only take so much of that, and she was way past sweating. The temperature control had been set in a safe range--unless it had been adjusted. He should have looked to see if the door could have been jammed closed somehow.

  But, damn, what if she'd turned suicidal with all the pressure here--seeing him again, wanting the senior partnership, reliving her mother and sister's drowning by staring at the white-water river? Maybe all that had sent her over the edge. Her mother had killed herself. He'd read that tendency ran in families.

  On the other hand, he believed she'd been pushed into the river, didn't he? And Spike was adamant that Ginger had not slipped. Now this. But nothing fit. What motive called for murder?

  "Mitch, I said your teeth are chattering." Graham interrupted his agonizing. "I'm turning up your heat, and when we get to Anchorage I'm going to hire someone to go out and buy you dry clothes."

  "I didn't want to waste time. Faster to hang with the ambulance. Besides, I need to be with her in the emergency room whatever happens."

  "I understand. I also understand she's unstable at times."

  "That's what Jonas wants me to emphasize to you."

  "I figured he'd try to get you to stand up for him. And Vanessa--never met a man she didn't like when it came to getting what she wants."

  "Including you?"

  "She knew better, since Ellie was around and now sits on the advisory board."

  "I didn't know that."

  "I guess it slipped my mind. This trip has been one thing after the other, a tragedy of errors, in a way."

  "Errors?"

  "Accidents, people slipping and slipping up. You don't think something else, do you? The sheriff said events have been accidental."

  Mitch stopped talking as they made the switch from Route 3 to Route 1, which would take them into the city. Please, Lord, he prayed, in fragmented, frantic thoughts, don't let her die. Even if she did something to harm herself, please don't let her die.

  At the hospital, he pulled up right behind the squad. "I'll park for you," Graham told him. "Go ahead. And tell them I'll be in with all the insurance info ASAP."

  "Thanks, Graham. For everything."

  For everything? His own words echoed in his head. This man had been the older brother, almost the father figure he'd missed growing up, and he'd been suspecting him of murder over some old case? What a screwed-up world, especially with Lisa in danger again.

  He followed the medics pushing her gurney through doors that whooshed open for them. They had Lisa on an IV. The bag of fluids dangled from a metal pole. What else had they done for her during the ride in? Vanessa had said the prognosis could be bad if she was unconscious, but she looked groggy now, not out. His hopes soared. When they paused at the triage desk, he leaned over her and took her hand.

  "Lisa, I'm here with you at the hospital in Anchorage. You're going to have to fight to stay awake again, do everything they tell you."

  "The door..." she whispered, and he bent even closer.

  "It's all right. We're in the E.R., and the door just closed behind us."

  "To the sauna. Stuck."

  "No, I opened it to find you, but you'd fallen on the floor."

  "The door--locked."

  "It doesn't lock, just to be sure that you can't get caught inside--" he said before he realized she must be delirious. But then, he'd thought that when she told him she'd been pushed into the river. So had someone jammed the door shut? He had to call Christine. See if there was any sign of tampering with the door or the controls. Everyone's fingerprints would be on the dials, so that wouldn't help. But first he had to take care of Lisa.

  Graham rushed in and patted Lisa's shoulder. "You'll be all right, Lisa. Mitch and I will take care of everything."

  "Hit my head--just like Ginger."

  A primal fear made Mitch shudder. Graham pulled him a step away and whispered, "That explains this accident. Just like with the river, she slipped--hit her head and stayed in there too damn long. Insist they do a brain scan on her. She might be having fainting spells. Low blood sugar, stress, who knows?"

  A woman appeared to lead Graham to a cubicle to register Lisa and take care of the insurance paperwork. Before Mitch could say more to Lisa, two nurses wheeled her gurney away. He stood alone and bereft, shivering and scared to the bone, but damned if he wasn't going to get to the bottom of this.

  22

  "C

  hristine, it's Mitch." "How is she?"

  "They've just taken her away for treatment. I don't know yet. I'll talk to a doctor soon, I hope. She says she--"

  "She's conscious? She's talking?"

  "Yes, but not really making sense--I think. She says she hit her head and that the door wouldn't open."

  "Iah, that does make sense. Inside the sauna, it looks like she broke the handle, maybe trying to get out. Mitch, there are even scratch marks inside the door at the bottom, like she tried to claw it open."

  He was stunned, and yet he shouldn't be, he told himself. He had to face it--someone really did want her dead.

  "Mitch?"

  "Yeah, I'm here. But someone who wanted to harm her wouldn't risk standing out there to hold the door shut."

  "I can go back out and see if there are any marks from a stick being put through the outside handle or something being wedged against the door. What if the person turned the temperature and time way up?"

  "Yeah. Exactly," he said, holding himself up with one arm stiff against the wall by the pay phone and staring at the floor.

  "I'll get a flashlight and go out to look more carefully, so just hang on a sec."

  "Wait! Christine, no. If someone did that, you could be in danger if they see you checking."

  "I'm not afraid."

  "No, I want you to do it, but call Spike and have him come over to be with you. I think it helps him to keep busy right now. Besides, this could throw some light on what happened to Ginger, too."

  "But who would do such a thing--things--to either of them?"

  "That's the big question. As soon as I make sure Lisa will be all right, I'm going to find out. I've got to turn into a bodyguard for her right now--maybe get the sheriff's help, I'm not sure. One more thing. Our four guests who were playing Monopoly tonight--did you see any of them go out back for a while, go anywhere about the time Lisa could have been in the sauna?"

  "Who knows when she went to the sauna? I was in and out of the kitchen. But yes, I'm afraid at one time or another, each of them went to the john or somewhere. I'm not sure, but I think only Vanessa went out twice for any length of time."

  "So maybe once to jam the door closed, once to remove the jam so it would look as if Lisa was to blame for her own demise. Promise me you'll get Spike there. Don't tell anyone but Spike about any of this right now."

  "When it does come out--especially if we bring in the sheriff and he questions the Bonners again--we'll lose their support and business. Mrs. Bonner was talking tonight about how they want to come back, bring their daughter here for her graduation from law school gift and send others they know. Oh, and she called and cancelled their departure tomorrow. It's a good thing we don't have other guests scheduled until next week."

  "I know, but first things first, and that's Lisa's health. Gotta go. I see Graham looking for me. I'll call if I get news of how Lisa's doing. Thanks, Cu'paq, for everything."

  "You saved my sanity, Mitch, and I'm gonna help you save yours."

  The doctor's name tag on his white coat read Dr. Jason Kurtz. He was probably mid to late thirties, with dark hair and piercing blue eyes. Mitch, wearing pale green scrubs they had given him since his clothes were still damp, realized he was trembling as he shook the doctor's hand. Graham stood with him shoulder to shoulder. Once that would have encouraged him, but now it only made him more upset.

  "Friends of Ms. Vaughn, not family, is that correct?" the doctor asked as he shook hands with Graham, too.

  "That's right," Mitch said. "I'm her friend Mitch
Braxton and this is Graham Bonner, her employer at a Florida law firm."

  He nodded at Graham, but seemed to address Mitch. Was it so obvious how much Lisa meant to him?

  "We have her stabilized," the doctor informed them. "Her core body temperature is dropping with the help of a cooling blanket and some icing, but she's having heart palpitations--atrial fibrillation--which we will deal with. She's also lost some trace body minerals with her profuse sweating, but we hope to replace those after we run more tests."

  "Thank heavens," Graham said. "It sounds like she'll not only pull through but fully recover."

  "It's early to promise all that yet. After an EKG, she'll be on a heart monitor all night, then we'll reassess in the morning. She has a large contusion on the left temple above her hairline. No blood but edema. She also has a few black and blue marks on her body. I'm theorizing she fell and hit her head. Do either of you know if she's prone to fainting or blackouts?"

  Graham cleared his throat, but before he could speak, Mitch said, "Not that we're aware of, and she's quite athletic. As for most of her bruises--not the head injury--last week, she fell in a snowmelt river, and suffered from hypothermia, just the opposite of this."

  "Ah. But the shock to the body was no doubt considerable. Was she admitted for the hypothermia?"

  "No. I pulled her out of the river, and we had to hike back to the lodge, and, other than bruises and exhaustion, she recovered well."

  The doctor frowned. Was he just upset that she hadn't been hospitalized previously, or did he know something worse he wasn't saying?

  "It may be a long night," he said, indicating the waiting room with a wave of his clipboard. "There are inherent dangers with this besides the cardiac fluctuations--circulatory collapse, possible renal failure. We'll keep you apprised of her status and consult when we have her test results. She tells me she was alone in the sauna and hit her head, but the head blow and the excessive body temp could have caused her to be confused and disoriented."