Day of the Dead bw-3

by J. A. Jance

  I’m not dead, Delia told herself. I just wish I was.

  Kneeling between the Invicta’s front and back seats, Lani tried to keep her face in front of Delia’s. “Breathe,” she urged. “Pant like a dog. It’ll help you deal with the contractions.”

  If Delia had ever heard of Lamaze, none of it was accessible. The contractions were coming too hard and fast. By the time Kath slowed for the intersection with Highway 86, Lani knew they’d never make it to the hospital in Sells in time. “We’ll have to stop,” Lani called to Kath. “Soon!”

  Wanda had offered to let them use her pickup, but Lani had nixed that idea. Putting a woman in labor in the bed of a pickup seemed like a bad idea, but the backseat of Diana’s Invicta was only marginally better.

  “Should we put the top up?” Kath had asked once Delia was lying in the backseat.

  Lani shook her head. “No time,” she said. “Let’s go.”

  Now, as Kath put the Buick in park along the shoulder of the road, she asked, “Have you ever delivered a baby before?”

  “No,” Lani returned. “But it’s probably pretty self-explanatory.”

  Seconds after they parked, Wanda pulled her Dodge Ram pickup up beside them. She jockeyed it around until her headlights blazed in through the Buick’s back door, lighting the scene. In the brilliant glare of Wanda’s high beams, Lani saw the unmistakably wet and shiny glow of a baby’s emerging head.

  Steeling herself for the task, she reached out and grabbed the baby’s head, easing it forward. “Do you have anything sharp?” she asked. “We’re going to need to cut the cord, and we’ll need a string to tie it with.”

  “There’s a Leatherman in my purse,” Kath replied.

  “Bring it.”

  Moments later Lani Walker held a squalling, slippery infant in her arms. Wanda Ortiz was there, too, holding a handful of clean towels-extras she’d brought along just in case they needed them at the feast house. While Wanda wiped off the baby boy, Lani’s fumbling fingers tied the rubbery umbilical cord with a piece of hem snipped from one of Wanda’s towels. Then she cut it with Kath’s Leatherman. Lani had just finished that when Wanda handed the baby back to her. Quiet now, he lay in her arms wrapped in the soft folds of an immense flannel shirt.

  Lani looked down at him. In that moment she understood why Fat Crack and Nana Dahd had so patiently answered all her questions. It was so she-Lani-would have those same answers to pass along to someone else.

  Did you ever teach Baby or Leo the things you teach me?” she had asked Fat Crack once as he showed her how to collect and dry wiw-the wild tobacco used in the Peace Smoke.

  He shook his head. “No,” he said after a while. “They’re not interested.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe if I had been a medicine man the whole time they were growing up, it might have been different. By the time Looks at Nothing showed up and started teaching me, Baby and Leo were already too old and didn’t want to learn.”

  “Weren’t you too old then, too?”

  “That’s what I thought,” Fat Crack chuckled. “But not according to Looks at Nothing. I guess he was right.”

  “What about me? Am I too old?”

  “No, Kulani O’oks,” Fat Crack said softly. “You’re just right. Aunt Rita knew the moment she saw you that you were special-that she could pass along whatever she knew to you for safekeeping. I’ve learned the same thing, but the gifts we’ve given you aren’t yours alone, Little One. They are treasures for you to know and keep and then pass along when you find someone who’s worthy.”

  Looking down at that tiny baby-his fists clenched, his eyes pinched shut against the glaring headlights-Lani Walker knew who this child was. Leo and Baby hadn’t been interested in learning the lore and traditions their father had wanted to teach his sons, but this child-this baby boy-would be, and Lani would be there to pass it along.

  “Is he all right?” Delia asked.

  In reply, Lani turned to her and smiled. “He’s perfect,” she said, handing the baby to his mother. “Beautiful and perfect. What are you going to name him?”

  “Gabriel Manuel,” Delia Ortiz said. “After his two grandfathers.”

  Lani heard a strange whirring sound. “Get out of the way,” Kath ordered. “I’m raising the top. We’ll need to turn up the heat long enough to take this mother and baby to the hospital, where they belong.”

  Time dragged by moment by moment as a worried Brandon Walker tried to concentrate on the pages of faxed material.

  Ralph Ames’s researchers had been incredibly thorough in finding out all there was to know about Lawrence Stryker and his wife as well. The material detailed their respective childhoods-Larry’s growing up in impoverished circumstances in L.A. to Gayle’s high-society, old-money background both in Tucson and on her father’s family ranch northeast of Marana. There were old articles detailing Lawrence’s fourth-place standing in his graduating class at Emory University Medical School and newer ones about him and Gayle being named Tucson’s Man and Woman of the Year. There were literally dozens of articles that told about the founding of Medicos for Mexico and about Larry’s and Gayle’s unstinting and heroic efforts to make life better for those less fortunate. There was even a copy of Bill Forsythe’s public disclosure forms-the same forms Brandon had seen years earlier-with their names front and center on the campaign donor list.

  With all that mound of material, it wasn’t until well after midnight that Brandon found the needle-the one thing he’d been looking for. It was there in the form of a tiny article culled from a congressional committee doing oversight on the BIA’s Indian Health Service. It spoke about the appallingly large number of poorly trained and /or unethical physicians who for years had been allowed to practice nonstandard medicine on Indian reservations all over the country. Only a few physicians were mentioned by name. Dr. Lawrence Stryker’s name was listed in a group of doctors who had been dismissed following allegations of sexual impropriety.

  There were no further details-no discussion of who had lodged the charges or when the events took place, but now Brandon Walker had a pretty clear suspicion of why Larry Stryker had left his position at Sells. Neither Emma Orozco nor Andrea Tashquinth had mentioned Larry Stryker’s name in that connection. They might have had their suspicions but very little reason to bring them up. Stryker was Mil-gahn; they were Indians. Based on past experience, they would have had no expectation that people in authority would listen. In fact, no one had been listening back then. But Brandon Walker was listening now. He was hearing them loud and clear.

  It was all strictly circumstantial. Still, Brandon was convinced Larry Stryker had molested Roseanne Orozco. When the girl turned up pregnant, Stryker got rid of her. What could be simpler than that? Blame it on Roseanne’s poor father. Blame it on anybody. Meanwhile the good doctor went off to live his exemplary do-gooder life. Supposing Brandon’s suspicions were correct, what the hell was he going to do about it?

  The DNA sample collection kit would arrive in Tucson tomorrow morning. Once the material had been collected and sent back to Washington State, Brandon had no idea how long it would take for Genelex to get results, or even if results were possible. What Brandon did know was that, if DNA testing yielded results, he would need something for a match.

  “I guess I’ll be going back to see Dr. Stryker first thing tomorrow morning, Damsel girl,” Brandon said, speaking to the dog, who had remained in the knee-well of his desk the entire time.

  Having once been spoken to, Damsel stood up and stretched. “Out?” Brandon asked. Obligingly, Damsel headed for the door.

  He had let the dog back in and had apprehensively checked the yard one last time when the phone rang. The sound of it electrified him. Late-night calls were usually bad news. Fighting a wave of panic, he leaped to answer. “Hello!”

  “Dad?” Lani asked.

  “Where are you?” he demanded, his voice fueled now by a rush of relief. “Are you all right?”

&nbs
p; “I’m at the hospital in Sells, and yes, I’m fine.”

  “Are you hurt? Is anyone else hurt?”

  “Nobody’s hurt,” Lani answered, “but there’s a slight problem.”

  “Don’t tell me! You wrecked your mother’s Buick!”

  “It’s not wrecked,” Lani corrected. “But there’s a problem. Delia’s water broke while we were still at Ban Thak. Kath and I tried to get her to the hospital in time, but we didn’t make it. Gabriel Ortiz was born in the backseat. The car will have to be cleaned. It’s a mess.”

  “What is it, Brandon?” Diana Ladd asked from behind her husband’s shoulder. “Is it Lani? Is she all right?”

  Brandon Walker suddenly felt like laughing out loud. “She’s fine,” he said, handing her the phone. “Perfectly fine, but you may want to talk to her. It sounds like our daughter has been practicing medicine without a license and playing midwife-in the backseat of your Invicta.”

  A phalanx of media people were ranged around the entrance of St. Mary’s Hospital when Brian arrived there. He had to shoulder his way through them in order to get inside. When he reached the ICU waiting room, PeeWee Segura was there.

  “How’s it look?” Brian asked.

  PeeWee shook his head. “Not good. From what I hear, the guy’s brain-dead. They’ll probably end up pulling the plug.”

  “Shit!” Brian muttered. “Why wasn’t he on a suicide watch?”

  “Not our job, Brian baby. Not our job.”

  Brian glanced around the room. There were several different groups of people, each of them huddled in its own private hell of shared misery. “Anybody else here for LaGrange?”

  “Nope. When it comes to next of kin, you and I are about it,” PeeWee said.

  “What about Gayle Stryker? If Erik and Gayle Stryker were as close as he claimed, why isn’t she here?”

  “Funny you should mention her,” PeeWee said. “She was on the news a little while ago.”

  “Doing what?” Brian asked.

  “Throwing poor old Erik to the wolves, saying how sorry she and Doc Stryker are that their employee could do such a terrible thing, blah, blah, blah, blah.”

  “In other words, she’s doing damage control to pull Medicos’ reputation out of the fire.”

  “You got it.”

  The door at the far end of the waiting room opened. A bull-necked man in a T-shirt, cutoffs, and sandals burst into the room. He spoke briefly to the clerk at the reception desk, who nodded toward Brian and PeeWee. Leaving her, he hurried over to the two detectives.

  “My name’s Ryan Doyle,” he said, holding out his hand. “Erik and I have been friends since grade school. Who are you?”

  PeeWee and Brian produced their respective IDs. When he realized who they were, Ryan Doyle’s whole body was transformed. His fists knotted. His muscled neck bulged. His face reddened with anger. “Jesus Christ!” he exclaimed furiously. “You must be the ones who arrested him!”

  “That’s right,” Brian said mildly. “We are.”

  “Well, you’re dead wrong about Erik. Him hurt a little girl? Not ever. He wouldn’t do such a thing, never in a million years. I just heard about it tonight, on the news. We didn’t know anything about it-that he’d been arrested, nothing. Why the hell didn’t he call us? Brianna and I would have tried to help. We would have been there for him.”

  Suddenly, all the fight went out of the man. Ryan Doyle slumped heavily onto a nearby couch and buried his face in his hands.

  Brian sat down next to him. “I’m sorry, Mr. Doyle. I’m sure all this is a terrible shock to you…”

  Ryan raised his head and looked around the room. “And where’s she?” he demanded. “Where’s the bitch?”

  “Who?” Brian asked.

  “Gayle Stryker,” Ryan muttered bitterly. “Who do you think?”

  “You knew about Erik’s relationship with Mrs. Stryker?”

  “Relationship? Bullshit! The word relationship implies a two-way street, something that goes in both directions. Gayle was playing with him, using him, leading him along. Bree and I both tried to warn him about her. Bree said when Gayle was done with him, she’d drop him like a hot potato. Erik didn’t believe it. For the longest time-for years, even-he was convinced that someday, somehow, Gayle would leave her husband for him.”

  “Was convinced?” Brian put in. “You mean he wasn’t anymore?”

  Ryan sighed and shook his head. “I’m not sure. Bree and I just had a baby-a boy. Erik and I talked on the phone. He was congratulating me, saying how lucky I was to have a wife and baby. It’s not that he said anything specific, but I could tell it really got to him. I told him, ‘You know, Erik, you could have this, too,’ and he said, ‘I know. Maybe I will.’ ”

  “When was this?” Brian asked. “When did you have this conversation?”

  “I don’t know. A couple of weeks ago. Why?”

  Brian was thinking about what Erik had told them. He had claimed that he had done nothing, that someone was framing him for murder. Brian had heard similar stories for years from punks complaining they were being framed, but maybe this time it was true.

  A doctor entered the waiting room through the swinging doors and made straight for where the three men were sitting. “Has the sheriff’s department had any luck locating next of kin?” he asked.

  The question was addressed to PeeWee Segura, and he was the one who answered. “We’re still working on it, but I haven’t heard if we’ve made any progress.”

  “Erik doesn’t have any next of kin,” Ryan Doyle interjected. “His mother died when he was a baby. His father walked out and left him to be raised by his grandmother. She’s been dead for years. Why?”

  The doctor peered down at Ryan Doyle over the top of a pair of reading glasses. “And you are?”

  “My name’s Doyle, Ryan Doyle. Erik and I have been friends since grade school. I came as soon as I heard.”

  The doctor held out his hand. His name was on the badge he wore, but he introduced himself nonetheless. “I’m Mr. LaGrange’s physician, Fred Ransom. You’re fairly certain he has no relatives-no brothers, no sisters, no aunts or uncles?”

  Ryan shook his head. “There’s no one, no one at all, but you still haven’t told us why you need to know.”

  The doctor took a step back and considered before he answered. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Mr. Doyle,” he said at last. “It doesn’t look good for your friend. His brain was denied oxygen for too long.”

  “You mean Erik is going to die?”

  “He’s on life support,” the doctor said. “That’s what’s keeping him alive. If he had relatives, I’d need to consult with them before…well, before doing what’s necessary.”

  Ryan Doyle closed his eyes for a moment, as if processing that information. Brian thought briefly that he might break down. Instead, he stiffened his massive shoulders and straightened his back. “What about his organs?” he asked.

  “Excuse me?” the doctor said.

  “Erik signed up to be an organ donor,” Ryan said. “We both did it when we first started driving. It should be on his driver’s license.”

  “I’m afraid Mr. LaGrange’s driver’s license wasn’t made available to us when he was admitted…”

  Ryan Doyle wheeled back on Brian. “His license isn’t here because he was in jail, right?”

  Brian nodded. “Yes, but-”

  Ryan took a deep breath. “Look,” he said. “When we were in high school, Pueblo High School, one of our pals needed a kidney. Robby Martin was on dialysis and waiting for a kidney to become available when he caught an infection and died. Erik and I made a pact at Robby’s funeral that we would always be organ donors. We thought if we died, maybe some other kid might be saved. If you check in his wallet, you’ll find it there. I swear to you, Erik would want to donate his organs. At least let him have that shred of dignity. Please.”

  Dr. Ransom looked from Ryan to the two detectives. PeeWee was the one who broke formation. “I
’m not sure if it’s possible,” he said, “but hold on. I’ll go outside and make a few calls.”

  J. A. Jance

  Day of the Dead

  Twenty-Six

  When it came to the Ten O’Clock News, Larry Stryker preferred watching KVOA to KOLD. Erik LaGrange’s suicide attempt was the lead story on Channel 4, just as it had been on Channel 7. Larry was intrigued. If Erik actually succumbed to his injuries, it was possible the authorities would lay the blame for Saturday’s homicide at Erik’s door and that would be the end of it. Case closed. Larry and Gayle would be off the hook.

  Wanting to discuss the situation with his wife, Larry went so far as to pick up the phone and dial through to the house in Tucson. The call went straight to voice mail, however. By the time Gayle’s voice-mail greeting ended, Larry had reconsidered. Yes, Gayle had said she was setting Erik LaGrange up for this latest death. Yes, she was pissed that Erik had given her her walking papers, but that didn’t mean she’d be pleased that he was dead.

  No, Larry decided, ending the call without leaving a message. Better to let sleeping dogs lie.

  Larry Stryker turned off the television set before Jay Leno ever came on and he missed his wife’s solo end-of-news performance on the other channel. Feeling incredibly relieved, Larry toddled off to bed and slept better than he would have expected. Yes, Brandon Walker had come around asking questions about Roseanne Orozco, but Gayle was probably right about that, just as she was about everything else. There was no evidence left that would hold up in court as far as he could see. Difficult and challenging as his wife might be at times, Larry was lucky to have her.