by A W Hartoin
“What else? There’s something else,” said Oz.
“I don’t think it’s Donatella, but there’s somebody in the mix. He wasn’t completely alone in the shooting. Someone was involved somehow.”
“Are you having one of your father’s famous feelings?”
“I guess so.”
“Good. Someone else being involved is good for Donatella. I’ll put some feelers out and see what I can come up with.”
I yanked my hands away. “You said you wouldn’t involve your family. They’re going to know about me.”
“Not necessarily. Tulio is my aunt’s favorite restaurant. We’ve known the owners for fifty years. My family will want to help. They don’t need to hear your name,” said Oz.
“You’ll tell me what you find out?”
“And you can filter the information through your father. Everybody wins.”
Usually when someone says that, I’m the one who loses. But I nodded anyway. “Can I go now?”
Oz stepped aside and then looked up. “Check it out.”
I peered through the window of my truck and there, at the top of the stairs, was Aunt Miriam. No coat. No expression. The increasing snow half obscured her. If it weren’t for the wind whipping her veil around, I would’ve thought she was an illusion.
“Oh, no.”
“That woman is scary,” said Oz. “She reminds me of Sister Constance at school. She hit me. A lot.”
“You have no idea. Quick. Go before she writes down your plate number,” I said.
“Do you think she will?”
I jumped in my truck. “Count on it. Go.”
Oz walked to his car like he didn’t care that the world’s scariest nun was giving him the stink eye. His car turned over on the first try and he drove away before my ancient truck even thought about starting. The engine finally revved and I looked back up, praying she wasn’t coming down for ‘a talk.’ The top stair was empty. Aunt Miriam had vanished into the swirling snow. If only her memories of Oz would vanish as well. But they wouldn’t and, when I least expected it, Aunt Miriam would happen to remember a handsome member of the Fibonacci family in a wintry parking lot. Eventually, this meeting would come back to bite me in the butt.
Chapter Five
MY NIGHT IN the ER was as nutty as a Watts family reunion, but without the drunk uncles and lectures on the importance of being Irish. A guy zipped his penis up in his jeans. Another guy got amorous with a lightbulb. Radiology will keep those films forever. A fight broke out at a Furry convention. You haven’t lived until you’ve treated cuts and bruises on six guys in fox costumes. On the normal side, there were a few accidents involving people who didn’t understand the concept of black ice. I managed to stay awake with the help of burnt coffee and stacks of charts that needed to be updated.
I finally walked out into the icy morning air at 7:30am. My truck was more enthused about starting, and I was about to pull out when Dad’s ringtone started in my purse.
“No. I’m not answering.” I put my truck in reverse.
Dad hung up and then my phone started again. This time with the Wicked Witch of the West ringtone. Come on. Who was next? Uncle Morty?
I sighed and dug out my phone. “Hello.”
“Hi, honey,” said Mom. “Here’s Dad.”
Damnit.
“Mercy, what are you doing?”
“Is this a trick question? I just got off work,” I said, rubbing my eyes and smearing the remains of my mascara on my fingers.
“Excellent. Head over to Children’s. Donatella is expecting you. The kids are in the PICU,” said Dad.
“It’s the crack of dawn. It can wait.”
“Remember Ameche.”
“Like you’d let me forget,” I said. “I’ll go over after I sleep. Seriously. It was a busy night.”
“It was not. I have a scanner, girl. You caught five MVAs. None of them over thirty-five miles an hour. You were bored senseless. Get over to Children’s.”
“What’s the rush?”
“I’ll let the doc explain that.” Dad hung up like there was no chance I wouldn’t disobey. The odds were actually in favor of disobeying, but somehow I turned right when I should’ve turned left. Damn my curiosity. Dad always knew how to get to me.
St. Louis Children’s Hospital was surprisingly busy, especially for a weekday morning before eight o’clock. Children got sick, too. Sometimes I forgot that. I wanted to forget that very much. Not that Children’s was an unpleasant hospital. It was the only hospital that didn’t make me somber. There were colors, real colors. Not just soothing earth tones, but primary colors. I trotted past a red sculpture of an elephant and dashed in under a pretty portico that an artist designed to be welcoming, not an apology for having to be there.
I rode the elevator to the kangaroo floor and was just starting to feel chipper when the door opened. There was Chuck, hunched over like someone recently kicked him in the groin. Sidney Wick stood beside him, looking the way Dad described him, not beautiful.
We all stayed put until the elevator doors started to close. Chuck’s long arm shot out and stopped it. “Fancy meeting you here.”
“You should be totally shocked. I know I am,” I said, stepping out onto the animal print carpeting.
Sidney shook his head. “You’re not going to cause me any problems, are you, Miss Watts?”
“Who me?” I asked. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Why are you here then?”
Chuck stayed silent. He clearly already knew.
“Ameche’s my friend and I’m a nurse. I can deal with the medical stuff. Explain things. It helps to have an expert when the family’s under so much stress,” I said.
Sidney’s heavy rounded shoulders relaxed. “Ameche didn’t mention that you were helping out.”
“Why would he? Medical explanations have nothing to do with what happened at Tulio.”
“Let’s hope not.” Sidney went onto the elevator. “You coming, Watts?”
Chuck let go of the elevator door. “Be down in a minute.”
Sidney raised an eyebrow at us, but the door cut him off before he could insinuate something I’d rather not have insinuated.
I spun around and headed for the PICU doors, but Chuck grabbed my arm. “Hold it right there, Missy.”
“Missy? Are you high?” I asked, shaking him off.
“I don’t know where that came from. I’m so damn tired, I’m not sure what your real name is.”
“Carolina.”
“Oh, yeah,” he said with a wan smile, and then he sniffed me. I hate when men sniff me and it happens more than you’d think. “Is that Aunt Miriam’s meatloaf?”
“You don’t know my name, but you can recognize the meatloaf smell.”
“It’s distinctive,” he said.
“I’ll give you that.” I shoved him toward the elevator. “Go to bed.”
Chuck grinned and the sleaze came roaring through the exhaustion. “I will, if you come with me.”
“Gross.”
“No, it’s not. Everyone says so.”
I wrinkled my nose. “That’s why it’s gross.”
“That didn’t come out right,” said Chuck.
And yet it’s true. Slut.
“See ya. Gotta go.”
Chuck snagged my arm and steered me to a cushy bench done in orange. “So you caught this case?”
“I didn’t catch it. It hit me in the head at Dad’s insistence.”
“Maybe you can calm the Berrys down. They want someone to blame for Tulio.”
“Do you think it was random?” I asked.
“Blankenship says it was and Sidney believes him. He wanted to ruin the restaurant after they fired him. He didn’t know the Berrys.”
“That sounds so stupid when you say it out loud. All those people. Children. Over getting fired.”
“Agreed. What did he say?” asked Chuck.
I grimaced and crossed my arms.
“Come on. Tommy told
me that he was sending you out to Hunt.” There was a sharpness in his voice that surprised me. Chuck was Dad’s protégé and I’d never heard an ounce of criticism come out of his mouth before.
“You got a problem with me going out there?” I asked.
Chuck’s lean form bent over me and he whispered, “You bet I do. I told Tommy not to send you. It wasn’t right to ask that of you.”
I was so surprised. I couldn’t say anything. Chuck was more protective of me than my own father. Come to think of it, it wasn’t so surprising. Dad had sent me to places nobody should go. It was a no-brainer to think I shouldn’t go to Hunt.
“How bad was it?” asked Chuck.
I shrugged. I didn’t really know what to say.
“That bad?”
“Not really. Blankenship was…”
Chuck’s face went hard. “Did he threaten you?”
“No. Nothing like that. It was just weird, being in that place and looking at him, knowing what he did.”
“You’re sure you’re okay?” he asked.
“Of course. You must think I’m a serious wimp.”
“Not at all. Did you get anything from Blankenship?”
“Not really.” I didn’t want to say anything about Blankenship having a partner, in case Dad wanted that information close hold.
“Good. Promise me you won’t go out there again,” said Chuck.
I had absolutely no intention of even driving by Hunt’s gate, but I didn’t say that because I could do whatever the hell I wanted, “I will not. I’ll do whatever I have to do to help out Ameche and Donatella. You should know that.”
“I do. I wish I didn’t.” He grinned and was still charming, despite the dark circles under his eyes. “Missed a spot.” He kissed my cheek and I caught the scent of good whiskey underneath coffee and a mint.
“A spot of what?” I wiped his nonexistent spit off my cheek.
“Whatever.” Another winning grin.
But I was not won over. “Save it for Philippa.”
“We broke up. Didn’t she tell you?”
My hands went to my hips. “I hope you didn’t break her heart.”
“That’s not what I do. She knew it would never get serious anyway.”
I didn’t ask why. Philippa was great and Chuck was obviously an idiot.
He let go of my arm and I headed for the PICU doors. I could feel him watching me walk away. Maybe Philippa was lucky after all.
I pressed the button next to the PICU doors, identified myself, and was buzzed in. The PICU was just as cheerful as the rest of Children’s, but it was very quiet. I walked down to the desk and saw Clementine Collier going through a stack of charts with her back to me. Her waist-length steel-grey dreadlocks were held back by a purple bandana and she wore a pair of black cat ears and a tail. That was so Clementine. I met her when I was fourteen when my friend, Ashton, fell off the top of our cheerleading pyramid, shattering her pelvis and puncturing her lung. Clementine made a huge impression on me and was the reason I started thinking about a career in nursing. Dad blamed her for keeping me from my true vocation which was, of course, law enforcement. But I was never going to be a cop, even if Ashton had better balance. The smell of Dad when he came home from the morgue, when Mom didn’t catch him before he got into the house, cinched it for me. I didn’t want to shower in the basement or smell like that on a regular basis.
“Hey Clem,” I said.
She spun around, and her hair beat a drum solo on the cabinetry. “Ah, shit. Are you on the schedule? I can’t remember a damn thing.”
“I’m here about the Berry kids. It’s a friend thing.”
Clem leaned on the desk and cocked an ear at me. “You can tell me. I won’t tell any complete strangers. The entire staff will have to know, my husband, Channel 5, CNN, just my regulars. Why are you really here? Big investigation, huh? Case of the decade. Your hotty cousin was just here. He was up to no good, but that’s normal for Chuck. You know, he’s dated half my staff. Looking for love in all the wrong places, if you know what I mean.”
“How much coffee have you had?” I asked.
“The shift’s barely begun. One pot…maybe two.”
I was grinning like an idiot. “You’re going to give yourself an ulcer.”
“Got it covered. It’s been a rough month.” Clem came around the desk and hugged me so hard she realigned my spine, then hooked her arm through mine. “Let me introduce you to my crew.”
Our first stop was Payton Stills, a thirteen-year-old burn victim. I was touted as a nurse/detective and forced to tell the story about how I once captured a bigamist with the help of a giant black poodle. I must’ve told it well, because I made Payton laugh. Next was leukemia patient James Laird. Clem told him how I was once clobbered at a funeral home and stuffed in a red casket. I was never stuffed in a casket, but James declared that it was awesome. There were three more patients in the PICU and I was trotted out for all of them, me and my various mishaps. By the time we got to the Berry kids’ rooms, I wasn’t tired anymore. Not a bit. You forget how easy your life is until you meet Clem’s crew.
Clem stopped in front of Abrielle Berry’s room. The curtain was drawn across the glass panel, so I couldn’t see who was in there. She reached for the door handle, but I touched her shoulder. “Wait.”
“I knew it,” said Clem. “This isn’t a social call.”
“I know Joey Ameche, the uncle, but you’re right as always. My dad wants me to look into the medical stuff as a favor to Ameche to help his sister.”
“I figured it was something like that.”
“What exactly do they have?” I asked.
“Exactly? We don’t know. It’s a form of bacterial meningitis, listeriosis. Unbelievably bad. Colton coded in the ER. They got him back, but it was tight. Keep in mind that this was one hour and forty-two minutes after the first signs that the kids were ill. Freaking crazy. They were both in a coma for over a day.”
“Will they recover fully?” I asked.
“They’re coming around. Abrielle’s healing faster, but she wasn’t as bad. Colton’s out of the woods, but he’s going to have some problems. Speech, motor control. It’ll be a long haul. You want to go in?”
“Not necessary. It’s a terrible time for them. I don’t want to disturb the family. Who’s the doc?” I asked.
“Elise Lydia. You know her?”
“I might. Young, pretty?”
“That’s her. Damn good, too,” said Clem. “She’s in with Colton. You go to the family waiting area and I’ll get her.”
It took a while and I was nearly crashed out when Dr. Lydia came in and I could see why Clem liked her. Lydia looked about twenty. She wore enormous fuzzy boots with claws on the toes, plenty of sparkly jewelry, and her fingernails were painted with orchids. Lydia wasn’t your typical doctor. I liked her instantly.
“So you’re the famous Mercy Watts.” She shook my hand and plopped down on a green beanbag. “What can I do for you? You’re involved with the Berry case.”
“As a friend of Joey Ameche, I’m looking into the medical stuff,” I said. “Any idea where they picked up the listeriosis?”
“That’s the big mystery,” said Dr. Lydia. “There are no reported cases in New Orleans or even the state of Louisiana. The CDC is looking into it. But until we have the strain pegged, there’s not much to do except treat the kids and get them well.”
“Any idea what food was tainted?”
“None. But they ate something that no one else ate.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. Coincidences happened, but, seriously, that was some pretty bad luck to come down with a mysterious form of meningitis on the day, the very day, half your family is massacred.
“What did the kids say?” I asked. “Have they given you anything to go on?”
Dr. Lydia shook her head and her dangly earrings made a tinkling sound. “I wish. Colton isn’t completely aware of his surroundings yet and Abrielle doesn’t remember anything
but eating cereal for breakfast. Their school verified that they ate lunch at the cafeteria with a hundred other kids. None of them are sick. None of the school employees have so much as a cold. This is isolated.”
“A little too isolated.” I rubbed my eyes and shifted in my bean bag.
“What are you getting at?” asked Dr. Lydia.
I was too tired to dance around the subject. “I’m supposed to make sure that Donatella didn’t poison the children in order to save them from the shooting that killed their father and the rest of the Berrys.”
She stared at me and I could see she wasn’t getting it.
I yawned and said, “The remaining Berrys think she arranged the murders at Tulio to get rid of her husband’s family and him, of course.”
Dr. Lydia’s mouth fell open and she closed it with a snap. “I hadn’t heard that. I admit it was pure luck that the children lived. Did you hear about how Donatella got standby slots?”
“I did.”
She shook her head hard and her earrings went crazy, banging into her cheeks. “Donatella loves those kids. I don’t think any decent parent would take the chance, even if she desperately hated the husband, which I doubt.”
“Why do you doubt that?” I asked. Parents weren’t always rational and sometimes their kids got dead because of it. The thought was abhorrent, but it happened.
“Because I was in the room when Donatella got the news that her husband was dead. I’ve given a lot of horrible news, but none so bad as that. She wasn’t faking. I’d stake my license on it.”
“What did she do?”
“She didn’t believe it. She thought it was a mistake. Kept calling her husband’s phone. Wanted to go to Tulio. She wouldn’t answer any questions, because she just didn’t believe it. She was hysterical. Finally, Clem turned on the TV in the break room and took her in there. Then she went into absolute shock. Her pressure dropped into the basement and her lips turned blue. She couldn’t fake that. It’s not possible. I’m telling you. Donatella had nothing to do with Tulio or with the listeriosis.”