Do No Harm

by Christina McDonald

  The other worry was how I was going to make money now. Without Violeta, I had no one to sell the prescriptions to.

  I squeezed Gabe’s hand. “We’re in this together now, okay?”

  Gabe snatched his hand away from mine, stricken. “It’s not like I have a choice, do I?”

  “No. That’s true. Neither of us has a choice now.”

  “She has a kid, you know.”

  I rubbed my temples, which were thudding. “Shit. Okay. Does she have any relatives? We can call anonymously—”

  “Her kid is with Ben. Your brother, Ben. Do you have any idea what he’s going to do when he finds out? Oh shit…” Gabe thrust his hands into his hair, pulling the ponytail holder out and bending over the table, his sweaty blond hair falling in front of his face as he breathed rapidly.

  I gaped at him. “Are you kidding? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Gabe laughed, but not a ha-ha laugh; no, a mean laugh, his dimples creasing around a twisted mouth, somehow looking ominous and cruel. “Ben didn’t want you to know he was involved. He doesn’t want to see you, sweetheart.”

  That stung. I’d spent most of my life chasing my brother’s shadow, just wanting his love, to belong in his life, but he’d always turned away from me. “Why not?”

  He stood and started pacing, his boots echoing on the aging wooden floors. “I don’t know. You know he’s never been the easiest to be around.”

  “Why did you go to Ben? Of all the people in the world!”

  “He was the only one I knew to ask about selling drugs. I told you. I’ve been out of that game for years! He said Vi could help.”

  “You should’ve told me!”

  Gabe slapped both hands on the table and leaned over, glaring at me. “At which point exactly was I supposed to stop everything and tell you that the woman you wanted to sell drugs with was your brother’s girlfriend!”

  “At any point!” I snapped. “Maybe when she OD’d or when we were dragging her body up to the water or—”

  “I guess maybe I wasn’t thinking clearly, okay?”

  I opened my mouth, then snapped it shut. This wasn’t getting us anywhere. I took a deep breath.

  “I thought Ben was in jail.”

  “He was. He owed some money to this gang he’d been dealing for. He got caught and went to jail. When he got out last year, he moved out this way. He met Violeta and they started up this thing buying prescriptions and taking the girls around to get them filled.”

  “Who do they sell the pills to? Who distributes them?”

  “I don’t know! Ben’s my friend, but he’s into some shady shit and I didn’t want anything to do with it. I only got in touch with him about all this because of Josh.”

  “Let’s stick to the plan,” I said. “Deposit the money and pay it into that GoFundMe account. Is it Ben who drives the girls around to fill the prescriptions?”

  Gabe sighed. “Yes.”

  “Meet him at the Crescent Lake Costco on Thursday and give him these.” I handed him a stack of prescriptions I’d signed. “I’ll meet you there.”

  “And what do I say to Ben when he calls me asking where Violeta is?”

  “Say you dropped her off at her car, and that was the last time you saw her. Don’t say any more than that. The less we say right now, the better. We’ll try to partner with Ben instead of Violeta. And don’t worry. Whatever we make, I’ll split with you.”

  “I don’t want it. I already told you, I’m not doing it for the money.”

  I gathered my purse and the canvas bag with the prescription pads and stood. Gabe stopped me, his hand like a shackle around my wrist.

  “Just be careful you don’t get addicted.”

  I snatched my hand away. “I’ve never done drugs in my life! That was you and Ben, remember?”

  Gabe shook his head. “There’s more than one thing to be addicted to. If you don’t get addicted to the drugs, you get addicted to the money. And trust me, some things there’s no coming back from.”

  CHAPTER 15

  NATE WAS DREAMING ABOUT Robbie Sadler when the ringing of his phone woke him. Robbie was glaring at Nate, his face red with fury.

  You’re gonna be sorry, man.

  Nate fumbled for the phone on his bedside table, just as it stopped ringing. He scrubbed a hand down his face and thought about ignoring it. This was the first night his whole family had been under one roof in a week. Emma and Josh were both asleep in the bed next to him; Charlie sprawled on his back, paws in the air, at their feet.

  Nate looked longingly at his sleeping wife and son. He wished he could just lie back and wrap them in his arms and stay that way for the next few hours.

  And then he thought of the four days of chemo Josh needed before getting the CAR T-cell infusion. And the hospital bills already piling up. And what it would cost to save Josh’s life. It was like a goddamn elephant was sitting on his chest.

  He felt like he was already failing his son.

  Providing for Josh meant getting that promotion, and that meant solving this case. The only way to do that was to answer the damn phone.

  Nate gently pressed his lips to Emma’s forehead.

  I’ll get this promotion, he told her silently.

  He grabbed the phone just as it started ringing again.

  “You’re gonna want to get to the morgue,” Kia said when he answered. “We found Violeta Williams.”

  * * *

  NATE RUSHED to get ready, shoveling down a bowl of Rice Krispies and slugging a cup of instant coffee. He grabbed a banana from the fridge to eat in the car and noticed Emma had written I’m bananas for you in black ink across the peel. He smiled. It was something she’d done when they first moved in together, and a tradition they both did occasionally.

  He pulled the regular coffee from the refrigerator and scooped a spoonful into the automatic coffeemaker, setting the timer so it would be ready when Emma got up. As he moved to put the coffee back in the fridge, his hip knocked Emma’s purse off the kitchen island, spilling the contents across the floor.

  He cursed and gathered up her phone, her wallet, a piece of gum, a few scraps of paper, shoving it all back in her purse. He caught sight of one of the receipts in his hand: for an Americano, a mocha, and a blueberry muffin at the hospital’s café.

  At first he was confused. Emma didn’t allow herself sugar. He scanned the date. Last week, the day Josh had gotten his blood drawn for the first phase of treatment.

  Who had Emma been having coffee with while their son was in the hospital?

  A terrible thought entered Nate’s mind, dread leaching through his core.

  Was Emma cheating on him?

  He immediately dismissed it. She could’ve met one of her colleagues for coffee. It was her workplace, after all. Or maybe she’d had coffee with his mother. He dismissed that thought too. He couldn’t imagine Emma and his mom sitting down for coffee together.

  He shoved the receipt back in Emma’s purse and hurried to his car, but he couldn’t get it out of his head. He remembered how he’d felt like she was lying to him when her phone rang the other day. And now this receipt.

  But their son was sick. They were struggling to figure out a plan for how they would pay for his treatments. Of course she was bound to act a little bizarre. They were under unimaginable stress right now.

  Emma wasn’t the type to cheat. He knew her. He knew her.

  Didn’t he?

  * * *

  NATE WALKED through the front door of the hospital, smiling warmly at the woman on reception. He recognized her from high school but couldn’t remember her name. She fluttered her fingertips at him.

  Nate took the elevator downstairs to the morgue. He hated the morgue. The antiseptic smell never quite covered the stench of death. The harsh lights and gleaming metal surfaces couldn’t distract from the blue-tinged bodies.

  Here, death was on display.

  In Nate’s job, he’d seen a lot of death, but he focused more on the good he did
—solving the case and sending the bad guy to jail—and less on the horrors of death itself. Honestly, he didn’t know how Emma did it, working with sick people every day, people who could die at any moment.

  He turned into the clinical, white-tiled basement room that served as the morgue.

  “Excuse me.” A man wheeling a body bag down the hall nudged past him.

  Nate apologized and stepped aside. He pulled up the collar of his jacket. The air was frigid down here, although it couldn’t hide the sting of formaldehyde. The smell reminded him of Robbie’s funeral. It had been open casket, Robbie lying in repose at the front of the church. His eyes were closed, but Nate could still see the tiny black stitches holding them that way.

  Nate had wanted to turn and run and keep running. He didn’t want to face Robbie’s parents, whom he’d known forever, or his brother, Tommy, who’d come back from college for the funeral. He was sure they’d see the shame on his face.

  You’re a bad person.

  You’re cowardly. Weak.

  Nobody can trust you.

  Nate’s self-hatred expanded in his chest. It would serve him right if Emma cheated on him. He didn’t deserve her.

  He watched the retreating body bag and reached in his pocket for his tin of toothpicks. Guilt, he knew, was a slippery slope. He was an honorable, law-abiding detective now, working to keep his community safe, to build a good world for his son, for his family. But he couldn’t help it: he shoved the sharp tip of the toothpick under his thumbnail, grunting as pain hit him.

  “Detective Sweeney?”

  Nate whirled around, dropping the toothpick into his pocket.

  The forensic pathologist, Dr. Kathi Morris, reached a hand out to shake his. She was a small, mousy woman, quiet, more like a librarian than a pathologist, and known for her respectful manner and detailed approach.

  “Oh dear! You’re bleeding!” She pointed at blood that had smeared onto her knuckles.

  “I’m so sorry!” he said, horrified.

  “No worries. Here.” She withdrew a large black leather bag from under a cabinet, rummaged around in it, and pulled out a Band-Aid. She smiled. “You’re in luck, I just stocked up.”

  “Thank you.” Nate pressed the Band-Aid to his throbbing thumb, his cheeks flushed.

  He followed Dr. Morris down a long corridor to the autopsy suite at the end. The room was large, holding three metal gurneys, each with a deep sink at the top and an organ bucket lined with a red biohazard bag at the bottom. Kia was already waiting beside one gurney.

  “This is Violeta Williams. Fingerprints matched those in the system.” Dr. Morris flashed Kia and Nate a bright smile, but her eyes remained flat and dark. Another faker, like himself, Nate decided.

  Violeta Williams’s body was swollen and blue, her face frozen in a bloated grimace, her skin loose and wrinkled. One eyelid had been torn off, exposing a bulging eyeball with a milky brown iris staring accusingly at the ceiling.

  “Can you tell time of death?” Kia asked.

  Dr. Morris carefully brushed a strand of dark hair off Violeta Williams’s forehead and straightened the white sheet draped over her chest. The action was so intensely compassionate and humane that Nate almost wanted to look away. “Hard to know for certain, as her body’s been submerged. But based on the temperature of the water and skin condition, I’d estimate anywhere from six to eight days. She had markedly heavy lung weight and frothy fluid in the lungs.”

  “She drowned?” Nate asked.

  Dr. Morris held up a finger. “Not exactly, no. She also had cerebral edema, fluid in the brain, and bladder distension. I’ve collected blood and urine specimens and I’m sending them out for toxicology testing. I need to corroborate with clinical evidence, but based on my findings, and the fact that I’m seeing this more frequently lately, I’d wager an educated guess on a drug overdose, before she went in the water.”

  Nate’s mind flashed to Santiago Martinez’s neck. “Were there puncture marks anywhere on her body?”

  “Unfortunately, the skin’s been compromised from being submerged for so long. It’s impossible to say.”

  Nate looked at Kia. “We have two people, possibly linked, possibly both drug dealers, who’ve died in the last couple of weeks from overdoses. Santiago Martinez’s wasn’t an accident. What are the chances this one wasn’t either?”

  Kia raised a dark eyebrow. “You think someone’s killing off drug dealers?”

  “Possibly.”

  Kia pointed to the bruising along Violeta Williams’s face. “Was she beaten?”

  “No, that occurred after death,” Dr. Morris said.

  “Her body must’ve been carried over the waterfall,” Kia said to Nate. “If there’s a crime scene, it’s up there.”

  “There’s miles of river where she could’ve gone in. Or she could’ve been dumped.”

  Kia’s phone buzzed, and she moved away to answer it.

  “Any personal belongings?” Nate asked Dr. Morris.

  She handed him a large plastic bag from under the gurney and turned away to jot some notes on a form. Nate rifled through a set of keys, a waterlogged wallet with a few credit cards, an empty baggie, what looked like a business card. He turned it over. The ink had been washed away from being in the water, but he could see the indentations of where the logo had been embossed.

  It looked like a set of wings with a circle of some sort in the middle. He knew that logo.

  “Where’d you get this?” he asked Dr. Morris.

  She looked up. “In the back pocket of her jeans.”

  Kia spoke from behind him. “That was Dyson.”

  Nate sealed the plastic bag and handed it back to Dr. Morris.

  “Santiago Martinez’s girlfriend just showed up at the station.”

  * * *

  NATE CHARGED out of the side entrance of the hospital too fast, knocking abruptly into Dr. Palmer, who was rolling a coin of some sort slowly and methodically over his knuckles. The coin dropped to the ground, and Dr. Palmer picked it up, slipping it into his pocket. He smiled a greeting, looking crisp and capable in a navy suit, the pink-and-white-striped shirt matching his rosy cheeks.

  “Sorry about that!” Nate said.

  “No problem. Actually, I’m glad to see you. I wanted to check how Emma’s coping. Her son being so sick, after what she went through…” His voice trailed off.

  “It’s nice of you to think of her. She seems… determined, actually.” Nate smiled. Emma’s strength and courage were among the things he loved most about her. “She’s a fighter. That’s where Josh gets it from. We’re both optimistic.”

  “Good. You should be. This treatment has a tremendous success rate. I’m glad you went for it in the end. I know it’s expensive, but I think Josh will come out the other side a healthy, happy boy. My success rate with it in Seattle is why Cascade Regional brought me here. You won’t regret it.”

  Nate was surprised by the flash of arrogance. He hadn’t pegged Dr. Palmer for that type at all.

  “Thank you for everything you’re doing for Josh.”

  “I took an oath to help the injured and heal the sick. I’m only too glad to be of service.”

  Nate leaned against the side of the hospital. “So, you found Emma the night her parents died?”

  Dr. Palmer nodded. “Yes. But I’m sure she already told you all about that.”

  “Not the details,” Nate admitted. “Emma bottles things up a lot.”

  Dr. Palmer lifted his bushy white eyebrows and made a sound at the back of his throat like he agreed with him.

  “I read the accident report. You found Emma at three a.m. How long was she alone with her father’s body before you arrived?”

  Dr. Palmer scratched his head. “It’s been a long time. I’m not sure I remember what the autopsy said, but when I arrived he was cold. A few hours, I’d say.”

  “Poor Emma,” Nate murmured. “Well, I need to get to the station.”

  “Certainly. Let me know if there’s an
ything I can do for Josh.”

  Nate turned to leave, then stopped and turned back. “Why were you driving around at three in the morning?”

  Dr. Palmer looked embarrassed. “My wife and I were going through a messy divorce and custody battle at the time. I suffered horrible insomnia, so a lot of nights I’d drive around aimlessly. It was good I did that night.” He smiled, not the expression of a doctor maintaining a professional distance, but a warm, grandfatherly smile. “Perhaps more doctors should wander the streets at night.”

  Nate laughed and shook his head. “Maybe leave wandering the streets at night to the police. That’s what we’re there for.”

  Dr. Palmer chuckled and clapped Nate on the shoulder. “You’re a good man, Detective Sweeney.”

  Nate thanked him and said good-bye. In his car, he dialed Emma’s number to see how Josh was doing. The line rang out, kicking to voice mail. He hung up and called the house phone, but no joy, so he tried Emma’s cell again.

  She finally answered, sounding out of breath.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “I’m putting laundry away. I had to run for my phone,” she replied tetchily. Laundry was her least favorite chore.

  He asked her how Josh was, and she asked what he wanted for dinner.

  “I’m really sorry, babe. I doubt I’ll be able to get home for dinner tonight.”

  “What? Why not!”

  “I have a million things to do and they all have to be done today.”

  He was surprised at how defensive he sounded. He’d never needed to explain his work to Emma before.

  She released an irritated huff. “How late will you be? Josh will want to see you before he goes to bed.”

  Guilt stabbed at him, forcing him to mentally rearrange his day.

  “I’ll try to get off at five. I just have to make one stop by your clinic to grab the surveillance footage after work. I’ll come home after that.”

  “I didn’t know you were on that case,” she said, surprised. “Is there video footage of Julia, then?”