Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep: A Helen Bradley Mystery (Helen Bradley Mysteries Book 2)

by Patricia H. Rushford

  "I am definitely moving south." Sammi brushed at her wind-blown hair with her fingers, then shrugged out of her lightweight green jacket and hung it over a chair by an empty table. "I've been in hurricanes with less force than this."

  "At least it isn't cold." Helen unbuttoned her jacket but left it on.

  They made their way to the front of the deli to place their orders. About half a dozen customers sat at small round tables, while others were browsing through the attached gift shop. The waitress, who looked to be about eighteen, greeted them with a gum-snapping, "I'll be with you in just a sec." She set a breakfast platter of biscuits and gravy on the table in front of a young man with a swatch of wiry orange hair. The striped shirt and tie and absence of a coat suggested he might be a clerk in one of the eclectic assortment of stores nearby.

  Wendy, according to her name pin, bopped back behind the counter. "Okay, ladies, what can I get for you?"

  "I'll have a regular coffee." Sammi dug into her handbag and retrieved a wallet.

  "I'll get it," Helen insisted. "It's the least I can do for having you drive me around in this weather." Helen glanced at the handwritten menu items behind the counter. "I'll have an almond latte, single, tall."

  "Thanks." Sammi dropped her wallet into her bag, turned around, and leaned back against the counter.

  "Ooo… it looks just awful out there," Wendy exclaimed as she poured Sammi's coffee and set it on the counter, then began preparing Helen's drink on the espresso machine.

  "It is," Helen told her. "Which is why we're in…"

  An earsplitting explosion cut her off. The windows bowed and shattered, spraying shards of glass into the store. Helen's cry of alarm joined those of Sammi, the waitress, and the other customers.

  Chapter Sixteen

  A deadly calm followed the explosion. Splinters of glass began to drip from the ceiling, making an almost musical sound as they pinged against the glass-littered floor. For several eternal seconds, Helen lay on her stomach, too stunned to think. It was hot. The stench of burning rubber and fuel rolled in with clouds of black smoke and stung her nostrils.

  The deli's piercing fire alarm shattered the stillness. Sprinkler heads in the ceiling spurted out cold water, then picked up momentum. Within seconds Helen was drenched and cold. From outside she could hear people shouting. A cacophony of frantic voices competed with the bleating fire alarm.

  "My daughter is in there! I need to get her out!"

  "Stay back, lady!"

  "Someone call 9-1-1!"

  "They're on the way."

  A whimpering sound from behind the counter brought Helen's attention back inside. From another part of the store someone moaned. A child was crying. Helen got to her knees. Her arm hurt from the fall. Other than a burning pain on the back of her head, she was okay. She touched the throbbing area and winced when she felt shards of glass in her hair. A patch of hair on the back of her head was matted and damp. She glanced down at her blood-streaked palm.

  Sammi moaned. "My face…"

  Helen whipped around and knelt beside her friend. "It's okay, Sammi, I'm here." Sammi was sitting, back against the counter like a lifeless rag doll. A mixture of blood and water streamed from multiple cuts on her cheeks, nose, and forehead. Helen brushed Sammi's bangs aside to get a better view of the head wound and the chunk of glass still imbedded there.

  She searched her scrambled brain for advice. Did she leave it in or pull it out? Removing it might create a bigger problem, as she had no idea how deep the piece was imbedded. She left it in. Reaching for a napkin dispenser that had fallen to the floor, Helen grabbed a handful and began dabbing at the blood on Sammi's face.

  "How bad is it?" Sammi raised her hand to her left temple.

  Helen stopped her. "Don't touch it. There's a piece of glass still in there. Are you hurt anywhere else?" Helen gently patted her arms and legs and did a quick check for other injuries.

  "I… I don't think so. What about you?"

  "I'm all right. Just lie still. I'll see to the others."

  "No, I'm okay. Let me help triage." Glass crunched as Sammi struggled to her feet.

  "Wh-what happened?" Wendy crept out from behind the counter, her hair a drenched mess clinging to the sides of her face. Aside from the look of sheer terror, Wendy appeared to have escaped the blast without a scrape. Others were not so lucky.

  Helen scanned the room, not knowing who to assist first. One woman lay on her stomach, legs pinned by a toppled shelf. She started toward the woman when she spotted the boy with the orange hair. He had been sitting too close to the window. He now lay in a pool of blood under the table.

  Wendy screamed when she saw him. "Tommy! Oh, please, no!"

  Helen held the girl back while Sammi knelt beside him.

  She came away a moment later, face whiter than it should have been. "He's dead." Sammi closed her eyes and slumped to the floor.

  Helen released the frantic waitress and hurried to Sammi's side. Her pulse was thready, weak. She'd probably collapsed from shock or loss of blood, or maybe from an injury neither of them had detected. Helen rolled Sammi onto her back and wiped the water from her face. "Come on, stay with me, Sammi." Taking her jacket off, Helen balled it up and placed it under Sammi's feet. "Wendy, can you turn off the sprinklers?"

  Wendy didn't move.

  Seconds later the water stopped spraying. Someone from the fire department must have taken care of it.

  Sammi moaned, "Sorry, I…"

  "Shh. Don't try to talk. I shouldn't have let you get up."

  It had taken the fire department only four minutes to respond to the call, but to Helen it had seemed far longer. Half a dozen EMTs swarmed in carrying medical supplies and boards. Two of them paused to check the dead boy, then moved over to the woman pinned under the shelving.

  One of the technicians drew Helen away from Sammi's side and directed her to a chair while two others concentrated on Sammi. "Looks like you did okay." He quickly checked her head wounds. "Bleeding's stopped. Doesn't look like you'll need stitches, but with all that glass, better have a doc look at it." He checked her pupils and pulse. "How are you feeling otherwise?"

  "A little shaky, but okay." Helen fought off an onslaught of dizziness. "I think." Reality, along with her cold wet clothing, seeped into her bones and set her limbs to trembling. She took a deep breath of smoke-filled air to dispel her body's reaction to the trauma. Her lungs rebelled in a fit of coughing.

  The EMT grabbed her as she went down and settled her on the floor. "We'll be taking you in. Gotta get your friend in the wagon first, though. Got some more rigs on the way." After instructing Helen to lie still and not move, he summoned for help.

  She glanced toward Sammi. The EMTs had already hooked up an IV and were placing her on a stretcher. "Could I ride with her?"

  He shook his head. "Better if we take you in separately in case there's trouble. You can catch up to her in the hospital."

  To her left rescuers had managed to pull the woman from under the shelf. They immobilized her and took her out on a board, the wind and rain hampering their efforts to reach the ambulance.

  "What are you doing?" Helen asked when two technicians laid her out on a stretcher and put her in a neck brace.

  "Need to make sure you don't have a spinal cord injury," one explained.

  Outside the black smoke was clearing, but the rain continued to pour. Sirens howled and lights flashed as more official vehicles arrived. Police and sheriff s deputies were taping off the area to secure the crime scene and keep the gathering onlookers at bay. There would be a full-scale investigation, of course. A forensics team would be streaming into the deli, gathering evidence and taking photographs, trying to gain some understanding of what had happened.

  Helen finally closed her eyes, not to sleep, but to wonder. What had caused the blast? A gas line? An act of terrorism?

  An hour later Helen had been treated and released with minor cuts and bruises. Sammi had been taken into surgery. While she w
aited for an opportunity to see her friend, Helen hunted down a pay phone and called Susan. When no one answered, she left a message on the answering machine outlining what had happened and assuring them she was okay. She then called Jason, but he'd already gotten word and was on his way to the hospital.

  When she arrived back in the waiting room, she was accosted by news teams from what must have been every television and radio station in Oregon. Lights flashed and popped, cameras whirred. Melody James, a reporter Helen recognized from a local television station, shoved a microphone in Helen's face. "I understand you were inside the building when the car exploded. Can you tell us what it was like?"

  Helen raised her arm to protect her eyes from the bright lights. "Car? I don't…"

  A deputy sheriff stepped in front of the mike and camera. "Not right now, folks. You'll have time for questions later."

  He hurriedly escorted Helen through a set of double doors and into an office. "Have a seat in here, ma'am. We'd like to ask you a few questions. Someone will be with you in a minute."

  Helen stared at the cold murky brown liquid in the Styrofoam cup. She didn't care much for industrial coffee and had taken it mostly to warm her hands. It hadn't worked. She set the cup aside. The local police had already questioned her. Unfortunately, they hadn't been willing to pass along any of their information to her. She heard the door open but didn't bother turning around.

  "Helen?"

  "Tom!" Helen turned toward the familiar voice. "What are you doing out here?"

  He closed the door. "Are you kidding? We're all out here, state, city, county, federal. Probably every law enforcement agency in the Portland area. Not every day you get a bombing." He shook his head. "Anyway, I should be asking you that. You trying to get yourself killed or something? First the shooting, now your car blows up? What gives?"

  "My car?" Helen rubbed her forehead, trying to dispel her confusion.

  "You didn't know?"

  "A reporter said something about a car exploding. It wasn’t my car. Sammi's?"

  "Witnesses said it was a black Cadillac. A newer model. Described you and another woman getting out of it just a few minutes before it blew."

  "Are you sure it was a bomb? I mean…maybe the car was defective or someone rammed the gas tank."

  Tom shook his head. "Oh, it was a bomb all right. That much we know. It'll take a while to figure out what kind or who did it and why. None of the witnesses remembers seeing anyone around the car or tampering with it after you went in, which may mean one of two things. Either they aren't very observant or the bomb was already on the car when you pulled in. I'd lay odds on the second."

  "But that means Sammi and I were the targets." Helen paused as the realization hit.

  "What?"

  "If it hadn't been for that storm, Sammi and I wouldn't have stopped there." Helen took a drink of the bitter brew and grimaced. "We'd have been on the highway when the bomb went off. And… we'd have both been killed."

  Chapter Seventeen

  Tom ran a hand through what little hair he had left. "You stepped on anyone's toes lately?"

  Stunned, Helen ran back through recent events, trying to come up with a motive for hers and Sammi's murder. "A few." Paul Kincaid came to mind, as did several prison inmates she'd helped put away.

  Tom pulled a cigar out of his pocket and fingered it. "Better start making a list of possibles."

  Helen glanced at her watch. Eleven-thirty a.m. Had it not been for the storm and the explosion, she'd have been at Edgewood at that very moment, speaking with David Chang and getting ready to tour the facilities. Was someone at Edgewood wanting to keep her away permanently?

  Tossing Helen a determined look, Tom asked, "So, who wants you dead?"

  "Hard to say. Like you, I've managed to accumulate a few enemies over the years."

  "Comes with the territory. Start with the most recent."

  Helen brought him up to date on Irene's death and Paul Kincaid's reaction to her being at Edgewood.

  "So you think this Kincaid guy might have wanted you out of the way?"

  "Out of the way, yes, but a bombing? Killing me while I'm on my way to Edgewood would only fuel interest in the case. Kincaid wouldn't want that. If he were going to kill me, he would choose a more subtle method than a car bomb." She shook her head. "It's too high profile."

  "No kidding. It's probably already being reported on the national news."

  "I doubt Kincaid would want to run the risk of Edgewood getting any more bad press."

  "Sounds like we're dead-ending here. Maybe we ought to look back a ways. Who else have you antagonized?"

  "Your guess is as good as mine. The last case I worked on in an official capacity was with the DEA. A drug ring was operating as a travel agency up in Canada. Unofficially, I recently tripped up a fellow officer who got greedy. As far as I know he's still in prison."

  "Well, make a list for me. I'll check them out. In the meantime, watch your back." He glanced out the office window, then back at Helen. "What about your friend? What is her name?"

  "Sammi Fergeson."

  "Right. I understand she's a deputy medical examiner."

  "Yes." Helen frowned, remembering something Sammi had told her this morning. "She was scheduled to testify in a murder trial this afternoon"

  "So she could just as easily have been the target."

  "It makes more sense. As a forensic pathologist, she's called in as an expert witness in dozens of murder cases a year. She's undoubtedly made a few enemies." Helen frowned. "And there's another consideration. If someone were after me, how would they know I'd be in Sammi's car?"

  "If she didn't tell anyone she was picking you up, the bomb may well have been meant for her." Tom pulled a small spiral notebook and pen from his breast pocket and made a notation. "I'll ask her about it. In fact, I think I know which trial she was talking about. Jim Perry. The guy's smoother than satin sheets."

  "Hmm. I've been following the case. Perry is in jail, but he could easily have hired a hit."

  Tom tucked the notebook away. "Looks like we've got a lot of angles to pursue here. Complications like this I don't need."

  Helen smiled. Despite his grumbling, Tom thrived on complex cases. She felt relieved knowing he'd be involved. Before he left, Helen supplied him with a detailed list of possible suspects and in the end decided to include Paul Kincaid.

  Jason walked in shortly after Tom left. He stared at her for a moment, his gaze mingled with fear, anger, and relief. "You could have called me," he accused.

  "I did. As soon as I was released." Helen wrapped her arms around him and rested a head on his shoulder. "You were already on your way."

  Jason held her tight. "Is it always going to be like this for us? Knowing that at any moment one of us might be blown to kingdom come?"

  Helen felt his Adam's apple move up and down against her head as he struggled for control. "First Dad and now you. Maybe Susan is right. I’m asking too much of her to marry someone like me. They may all be better off if I just left."

  Helen stepped back. "Jason McGrady. I can't believe you said that."

  He sighed. "I've been giving it some serious thought. But never mind that. I think we'd better talk about what happened here."

  "How did you find out about it so quickly?" Helen stepped back.

  "Tom radioed me when he found out you were one of the victims."

  "If it's any consolation, I don't believe the bomb was meant for me."

  "That's what Tom said." Jason nodded toward the door. "We talked before I came in."

  "Good, then I won't have to repeat myself." Helen sank into the chair behind the desk. "Jason, I know you're busy, but would you mind driving me out to Edgewood?"

  "Now?" He frowned. "You still want to go out there?"

  "More than ever."

  Jason looked like he wanted to argue but didn't.

  They fought their way past reporters and managed to check in on Sammi, who had just come out of surgery. She was sti
ll out cold from the anesthesia, but her condition had stabilized.

  After stopping at a convenience store for snacks and drinks, Jason and Helen were on their way. The wind had died down to a gentle breeze. Sunlight and patches of blue sky penetrated layers of gray.

  For the first few minutes they continued to speculate on the bombing. When they exited the freeway at Corbett, the conversation drifted back to the Kincaids.

  "You'll be happy to know I'm not closing the case yet. There are some loose ends, like the break-in prior to the mugging." Jason took a sip of root beer and set the can in a drink holder on the console. "Like you, I feel uncomfortable with the coincidences." He smiled. "Besides, I've been getting a lot of pressure from some VIPs telling me to archive it."

  "Really?"

  "Apparently Kincaid has some friends in high places. “Course, that's a red flag for me. The chief isn't too happy with me, but he's willing to give me a few more days to come up with some solid evidence. Fortunately, he doesn't like being pressured either."

  "I must say I'm relieved."

  "Mother, there's something else we need to discuss."

  "I'm not sure I like the sound of that."

  "It's got to do with you and Jennie. I honestly don't know what to do with you two…”

  "What do you mean?"

  "For starters, I find it awkward having my mother and daughter trying to solve my cases for me. Normally I'd order you to stop getting involved. Thing is, you're not normal."

  Helen chuckled. "Thanks a lot."

  "What I mean is, you were a great homicide detective and you're a terrific agent. And Jennie, what can I say? She's got the makings of a top-notch lawyer or cop or whatever she decides to be."

  "But?"

  "You're coming out here to rehabilitate, and Jennie says she's coming here to work. I know perfectly well you're both here to snoop. I could forbid Jennie to take the job, but what good would it do? She'd end up resenting me. And I know better than to try to dissuade you."