Time of Death

by Lucy Kerr

  “Laura . . .”

  “Thank you for the use of your apartment,” she said stiffly. “We’re coming home tomorrow, and I am finally going to bury my father. Congratulations on keeping your license, Frankie. Enjoy getting back to your real life.”

  And then all I heard was dead air.

  * * *

  “Was that CJ?” piped a small voice from the stairwell.

  I turned. “Hey, Riley. Who brought you over from school?”

  “Daddy. He was going to the hospital, so he said Grandma was in charge.” She rolled her eyes and popped one of our complementary donut holes in her mouth.

  “Good,” I said. “I don’t want to be in charge.”

  She sat down at the table, heels kicking the rungs of the ancient dining room chair. “Was that CJ?” she repeated, spraying powdered sugar across a pile of invoices.

  “CJ’s mom,” I said.

  She finished chewing, then said, “We were supposed to go fishing. He promised he would show me the best spots.”

  “Sorry, kiddo. I think they’re coming home soon.” Not that Laura would allow her kid anywhere near me or my family. “Maybe I could take you instead. How hard can it be? A couple of worms, a couple of fishing poles . . .”

  “CJ doesn’t use worms,” she said loftily. “They use flies.”

  “Riley, I will dig worms with you, but I’m not collecting a bunch of dead flies. There are limits.”

  She laughed with the delight of a child who has bested an adult. “Not fly flies,” she clarified. “Fishing flies. CJ and his grandpa made them out of, like, feathers and stuff. He said they took a lot of work.”

  “Did he?” I said absently, scrolling back through the autopsy report. Where would the killer have gotten vecuronium? That kind of substance was tightly managed in a hospital. I couldn’t see Nestor handing it over without a good reason, but I wasn’t going to be able to get back in and ask him about it. Maybe Garima . . .

  “. . . in their treasure box,” Riley said, looking at me expectantly.

  I refocused on her. “In their . . . what? What kind of box? What treasure?”

  She huffed and popped another donut hole in her mouth. “That’s what CJ and his grandpa called the box they kept their flies in. The treasure box. Because they’re so valuable. CJ said he puts cool rocks in there, too, sometimes.”

  Something tingled at the base of my spine. “I see. Where do they keep this box? At CJ’s house? At his grandpa’s cabin?”

  Her gaze slid away. “It’s a secret. You can’t just tell people where a treasure box is, Aunt Frankie. They’d take your treasure.”

  “This is true. That’s very wise. You could give me a hint, though. Like a treasure hunt. We could even bring the box to CJ when he comes home. That might make him feel good, don’t you think? It would be like having his grandpa nearby, even though his grandpa’s gone.”

  Of all the things I’d ever done in the name of helping patients, manipulating an eight-year-old in order to uncover a blackmail scheme and catch a murderer was a new personal low. But I hadn’t lied. I could examine the treasure box before passing it along to CJ. I wouldn’t be breaking my word, only bending it.

  Riley considered this. “I promised I wouldn’t tell,” she announced, and my shoulders sagged. “But if you guessed it, that would be okay. Then I’d be keeping my promise.”

  I was in no position to fault her logic.

  The box wouldn’t be at CJ’s, or Riley wouldn’t be excited about bringing it over. “Is it . . . in Clem’s cabin?”

  She shook her head.

  “In Clem’s barn?”

  She hesitated, but shook her head again. Warmer, then.

  “His van?”

  “You don’t use a van to fish,” she said, wrinkling her nose in disdain. “It’s no fun if you don’t really try.”

  I was not finding this fun at all. “Fine. His boat.”

  “Yes!” she shrieked, clapping her hands together like a demented fairy. “Can we go get it now?”

  “You’re not going anywhere until homework is done,” my mom called from the stairwell.

  I peered downstairs. “Were you eavesdropping?”

  She sniffed. “I was checking on Riley. Homework, young lady.”

  “But Aunt Frankie said . . .”

  I thought about the last time I’d gone to the cabin—the sensation we were being watched, the swapped medication. Charlie’s accusation that I’d put Riley in danger.

  “Grandma’s right,” I said, ignoring Riley’s look of wounded outrage. “I’ll bring it right back here, and we’ll take it to CJ as soon as he’s home.”

  Assuming his mother would let us in the door.

  TWENTY-NINE

  I might be reckless, but I’m not stupid. I waited until morning to drive to Clem’s cabin. Laura wouldn’t answer her phone, so I left her a message asking for permission and headed out, checking my rearview mirror over and over again to make sure I wasn’t followed. The road was clear, no one behind me, and I felt my lungs ease.

  I turned into Clem’s driveway, teeth clacking as I navigated the bumps and ruts. It was a beautiful day—deep-blue sky, puffy white clouds, the autumn colors of the trees brighter than I’d seen in ages.

  A beautiful day to catch a killer.

  I parked the car and made my way toward the river. I heard the current before I saw it, smelled damp earth and decaying leaves before I spotted the rush of cold, clear water. It didn’t just look different from the murky waters of the Chicago River, it smelled different—bracing and clean and alive.

  I walked along the banks of the river for another twenty minutes, stepping over fallen branches and avoiding marshy spots, looking for a boat. Somehow, I’d pictured a little white sailboat, bobbing serenely in the open water. What I found instead was a battered green canoe, tugged up onto a sandy bit of riverbank, almost hidden beneath a willow tree. Tucked under one of the wooden bench seats was a scraped and dented tackle box.

  “Hello, treasure,” I said softly, pulling it out. “What have you got for me?”

  I flicked open the latches. The first tray held nothing but intricately tied flies, bits of wire and feather and thread meant to entice fish. Gently, I lifted each one out of the box, marveling at the precision. You could tell which ones CJ had tied—the knots weren’t as tidy, the feathers slightly crumpled—but there were two of each. Clem had walked him through every single one, the same way my dad had taught me how to tie every knot in the Boy Scout Handbook.

  Treasures, indeed.

  The second tray held supplies and, as Riley had mentioned, a few rocks and arrowheads and old coins. Unlike the top tray, this one was wedged securely inside the box. As if something was jammed beneath, holding it in place.

  Happily, no girl raised in a hardware store goes without a Swiss Army knife. It’s surprising how often I used mine, from opening bottles to picking out splinters. I unfolded the pry bar, slid it along the inside wall of the box, and levered out the tray, mindful that CJ would not appreciate me damaging this connection to Clem.

  The tray came free with a popping sound and the crinkle of heavy paper. A manila envelope lay on the bottom of the box. I snatched it up, tore it open, and shook the contents onto my lap.

  Pictures.

  A neat set of glossy-finish 4 × 6 prints, the kind you might make at a do-it-yourself kiosk at the drugstore. The first few were pictures of Piney Woods Motel—areas that needed sanding and priming, window frames that needed repair, all the details that make a simple paint job more expensive. They were the kind of pictures a repairman took when he was putting together a bid for a job. Clem must have printed everything on his camera’s memory card.

  Next was a shot of the parking lot, and two expensive-looking cars, and a couple on their way into a room.

  The shot was taken from high up and far away, as if Clem was on a ladder. I squinted at the picture, tilting it to reduce the glare off the water. The man looked vaguely familiar, something
in the angular way he held himself, but it was too distant and blurry to be certain.

  I looked at the next picture, and suddenly it all made sense.

  Clem had figured out how to use the zoom. The lanky figure was Alexander Hardy. In this shot, he was leaving the room. Behind him was a slim blonde in a navy-blue business suit, one hand clutching a briefcase and the other smoothing her hair. Ashley Ritter. She and Hardy were smiling at each other, Hardy with an arrogant tilt to his head, Ashley preening and smug.

  I flipped back to the previous shot—according to the timestamp, the pictures had been taken two hours apart.

  More shots followed, tracing them to their separate cars, glancing around as if making sure nobody was watching. I wondered, cynically, how much of Ashley and Hardy’s affair had to do with her buttering up the doctor who would give their drug a passing grade.

  Clem would have known that Hardy was married. He’d been turned down for Hardy’s drug trial, and he’d spent plenty of time at the hospital. He would’ve seen the formal portraits of the hospital board members in the entrance—including the one of Hardy’s wife.

  Regardless, Clem must have realized the opportunity this presented. Hardy flaunted his wealth, with his custom suits and luxury cars and taste in fine wine. It might not have been noble, but compared to adultery, a little bit of blackmail to help his grandson would have seemed like the far lesser of two evils.

  Except that Hardy would have grown tired of it. I knew men like him—their arrogance, their sense of entitlement, their belief that they were somehow above the unwashed masses. Hardy and Clem both worked with their hands, but Hardy would never have seen the similarities. He would have loathed the fact that anyone, especially a “mere” handyman, had bested him.

  Not to mention, Hardy had plenty to lose. If Mrs. Hardy was the vengeful type, she might demand a divorce and alimony. She might demand his resignation. No matter how gifted a surgeon he was, if the board wouldn’t write him a recommendation, it would be hard to find a position like this one, his own personal fiefdom.

  Hardy could have easily swapped Clem’s medication; he had access to a variety of pills and would have known how to alter the meds to resemble Clem’s prescriptions. He could have accessed Clem’s medical records in the hospital’s computer system, so he could time the swap properly—making sure the change in drugs wouldn’t show up in Clem’s routine blood work. Most importantly, he would have plenty of opportunities to administer the vecuronium and alter the monitors.

  I sprang up with a whoop, startling birds out of trees, rocking the canoe. Between the autopsy results and these pictures, I finally had the proof I needed.

  THIRTY

  Before heading to the hospital, I made a few stops—one to the local drugstore, one at the sheriff’s department to leave a message for Noah, and one to Stapleton and Sons to drop off the tackle box with my mother. She wrinkled her nose. “It smells of fish. Much like the cat that keeps hanging around outside the store.”

  “Riley and I will return it to Laura tonight, I promise.”

  She snorted. “What about the cat? I know you’re the one who’s been feeding him, Francesca. You’re a soft touch.”

  “Not that soft,” I assured her, and headed for the hospital.

  Technically, I was banned from Stillwater Gen, and I didn’t doubt that Strack had circulated my picture to the security staff.

  They would be looking for a civilian. I grabbed the spare set of scrubs I had stashed in my trunk and changed clothes at the store. Now I looped my stethoscope around my neck and followed the advice of one of my college professors, who’d been blunt about what it took for a newbie nurse to get respect from a ward full of doctors.

  “Walk like you own the place,” she’d told us. “It’s your floor, too. Don’t ever let them convince you otherwise.”

  So I walked into Stillwater Gen like I owned the place, and nobody glanced at me twice.

  Until I arrived at Walter Strack’s office, that is.

  The secretary looked at me over her reading glasses, eyebrows shooting up, mouth forming soundless words.

  “I know,” I said. “And yet here I am. Could you please call Dr. Hardy? Tell him I’ve got something he should see.”

  Not taking her eyes from me, she picked up the phone and pressed speed-dial.

  “Thanks. I’ll see myself in.”

  Strack’s face turned a mottled, murky shade of red when he spotted me. “Miss Stapleton. I thought I made myself understood. You are no longer welcome in this facility.”

  I sat down in the steel-and-leather chair facing his desk. “Your security is terrible, Strack. A killer could waltz right in.”

  “Get out,” he sputtered. When I didn’t move, he shouted, “Nancy, call the sheriff’s department. Inform them we have a trespasser, and we want to press charges.”

  “I already asked Deputy MacLean to join us,” I said, wondering if Noah had gotten my message yet. “Not sure when he’ll get here, though. All these murders are keeping him pretty busy.”

  “I’ll have security throw you out,” he said, eyes flicking to a folder on his desk.

  I nodded at the folder, neatly labeled with Clem’s name. “You’ve read the autopsy, haven’t you? You won’t be able to cover it up much longer.”

  “Cover up . . . what, exactly?”

  I sat up straight now, feet on the floor, and leaned in. “Clem Jensen’s murder. I know, I know. You’re offended that I would suggest such a thing. Dosing Clem with vecuronium was a tragic error. Even if that was the case—which it isn’t—your buyer’s going to develop very cold feet when the news gets out.” I paused. “Especially considering the damages Laura Madigan could be awarded.”

  Strack’s color had faded to a queasy puce.

  “Walter, what’s this about?” Alexander Hardy stood in the doorway, and I spun to face him. He held himself rigidly, refusing to look in my direction. “I have an offsite meeting in thirty minutes.”

  “Pharmagen?” Strack waved him off. “Go, go. I’ll handle Miss Stapleton.”

  “I think Dr. Hardy will want to stay for this,” I said. “I mean, what’s the going rate at Piney Woods? Surely you can afford another hour or two.”

  His hand tightened on the doorknob. “I beg your pardon?”

  “That is where you’re meeting her, I assume?”

  “Her?”

  “Ashley Ritter. From Pharmagen? Do you two have a special room? Does that make it not tawdry? Or do you like it tawdry?” I shrugged. “Some guys do.”

  Hardy wasn’t looking good, I noticed. The bow tie was crooked, the collar of his shirt looser than usual, as if he’d lost weight, and his white coat had lost its crispness. Overwork or a guilty conscience?

  “Miss Stapleton, I don’t know what you think you know . . .”

  “I know a lot,” I said. “Fortunately, I’m in the mood to share.”

  “Alexander?” asked Strack, his gaze darting between us. “Do we have a situation?”

  “That’s one word for it.” I pulled the pictures from my backpack, tossed them onto Strack’s desk one at a time like I was dealing cards. “Dr. Hardy. Ashley Ritter. Piney Woods Motel. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what was going on.”

  Hardy’s face was a mask of outrage, but I could have sworn that, for a split-second, relief had broken through.

  Strack bent closer to peer at the images, then glanced up at Hardy. “Really, Alexander? With so much on the line? I mean, she’s quite fetching, but . . .”

  Hardy bowed his head, seemingly unable to speak. Finally, he said, “I’m sorry, Walter. I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Clearly,” Strack said with a dour expression. “Miss Stapleton, I assume you have a point?”

  “Your wife’s on the board of trustees, isn’t she, Dr. Hardy? I have to imagine she’d make your life miserable if she saw these pictures—personally and professionally.”

  A curt nod.

  I turned back to Strack. “Clem Jensen to
ok those pictures. He used them to blackmail Dr. Hardy into supplying his grandson’s epilepsy medicine for free. But Hardy didn’t like paying, and he really didn’t like letting someone else run the show. So he teamed up with Jimmy Madigan—I’m guessing you knew him from when he’d worked at the hospital—and convinced him to swap Clem’s medication with clot-promoting drugs, knowing they’d induce a heart attack. Jimmy hated Clem, so it probably didn’t take much convincing. When that didn’t work, the good doctor tampered with the cardiac monitors, pumped Clem full of vecuronium, and let him suffocate to death.”

  Strack sank back into his chair. “That’s quite an accusation.”

  I shrugged. “The proof’s all there. The autopsy showed vecuronium, the monitor tapes show the alarms were compromised; your own pharmacist identified the placebos. Hardy knew there’d be an investigation, so he made sure his report painted Clem as a noncompliant patient, and the coroner had no reason to disagree.” I turned to Hardy. “The lawsuit was your idea, wasn’t it? Give Jimmy a reason to stay quiet, give the hospital an incentive to wrap up the investigation quickly.”

  Hardy’s eyes glittered with malice. “You’re grasping at straws, Miss Stapleton.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “Was Hardy the person who told you I was in Clem’s room that night?”

  Strack nodded before he could stop himself.

  “He saw me the first time he went to kill Clem, and he had to change the plan, try again later. Then Laura Madigan told him I was looking into Clem’s death, and he realized I might cause some real trouble. He encouraged you to go after me. Misdirection, so you wouldn’t realize what he’d done.”

  “When did I commit this murder?” Hardy sneered.

  I paused. Hardy was like so many surgeons I’d met—their veins ran with arrogance instead of blood. But rather than weaken in the face of so much evidence, Hardy seemed to be gaining confidence. I ignored the twinge of doubt and pushed on. “Sunday morning. Based on the monitors, I’d guess just after seven, to take advantage of the shift change.”