3 Executive Sick Days

by Maria E. Schneider

  Enough light came from outside that flashlights weren't necessary; not that we would have risked it in the open anyway. The long reception desk was elevated a bit, directly centered so that the hallway and offices branched to both the left and right. It would be more difficult for someone to see us once we were behind the desk and under the cover of the overlook from the second floor. Having been on the second floor, I knew the railing area above allowed people to look down over our current position.

  We hadn't taken two steps forward when a clicking noise, much like a door closing softly, broke the quiet. Both of us froze.

  Listening hard, we heard it again; a door opened and closed. I tried to figure out where it came from, but only had a vague impression that it was to our left. The lovely atrium caused echoes.

  Mark reached for my hand. Silently, we moved behind a group of tall potted plants. "Stay here," he murmured against my ear. He took the x-ray cassette from me and set it down in the potted plant. Our backs were against the window, making me feel as though we could easily be spotted from the outside.

  Mark closed my fingers around the butt of cold steel. I moved my other hand up to help hold the gun. "Okay?" he whispered.

  I nodded without looking directly at him. My eyes were too busy hunting the darkness. Someone was out there.

  It was too easy to hear things; the wind, the creaking building, my own breathing. The sound of hissing air from the heat vents was relentless. The more I tried to filter it out, the less I could hear.

  Mark disappeared down the hallway without making a sound. The obvious place to check was the x-ray room. There were no lights on upstairs. There were offices on the other side of the hallway and offices downstairs, but I couldn't tell whether any of those lights might be on. Whoever was in the building was too quiet to be a legitimate presence.

  I stayed behind the potted plant, watched the entrance hall and listened myself into a symphony of false alarms.

  The gun was getting slippery in my sweating palm. In order to shoot another human being, even in self-defense, a person has to delve deep down to where beast meets human, where there were no emotions, only survival. Could I do it? I didn't know. I was afraid, but I'd been in danger before, and I hadn't pulled the trigger.

  Thankfully, no one appeared. And even if someone had, I couldn't shoot into the hallway. It could be Mark coming back.

  But what if someone crept up on Mark?

  He had another gun. He'd be okay. And I knew to stay put so that Mark didn't accidentally shoot me.

  I needed to remain calm, ready. I braced myself, pushing down into that place where the hissing of air and the errant creaking of the building didn't exist. I didn't want to be distracted, think of consequences, regret or anyone else's pain. I was Mark's best protection. If anyone came through the front door or chased after him, I had to stop them or he could die.

  The seconds were interminable. Time ticked by, not providing any answers to my fears, but adding to them.

  The scattered moonlight broke into a dark shape on the second floor. It was soundless, but human.

  Was it Mark?

  The ghostly presence drifted across the second level atrium, hovering at the railing. He stopped, but reached over the railing to the area below. In the milky light I saw the gun. It was aimed down, but not at me.

  My focus shifted back to the hallway. Mark, his stride already familiar and dear to me, appeared behind the desk from the left side of the hallway. Before I could open my mouth to warn him, he moved confidently into the open, approaching my hiding place.

  There was no time.

  My arms moved up. The guy must have known Mark was going to walk out. He already had his gun aimed.

  I fired.

  I kept right on firing without any regard to whether or not I hit him. I stayed down, down where the beast lived and punched holes through the railing partition. The partition shattered as I fired.

  After four shots, maybe five, I paused. The survivor in me knew I might need more bullets.

  Chapter 33

  Mark was furious. I never heard the side door to the building slam, although later, Mark said he had heard the gunman run down the stairs and slam the door on the way out.

  Though my eyes were glued to the second floor, I never saw the gunman move. I was dimly aware of Mark reaching my side. I heard nothing except the ringing in my ears. There was no movement on the second floor.

  We must have retreated quickly, but I didn't remember going back to Mark's SUV. There were no other vehicles in the parking lot, but there hadn't been any there when we arrived either.

  By the time we got home, Mark was almost capable of yelling, but he didn't get out of the truck. His jaw clenched so tight it hurt mine to look at him. He finally broke the silence. "I should have made you go back in the truck."

  I didn't point out that he would likely be dead if he had. "Did you check upstairs?" When he didn't answer, I understood anyway. "I guess you were coming back to have me wait in the truck."

  "Or leave." His voice was as tight as his jaw.

  "I think I hit the guy at least once." My hands were still shaking, but it wasn't constant. Little tremors ran through me every time an unexpected noise cut through my concentration. Maybe the echo in my head was the sound of bullets. My ears hadn't stopped ringing either. "It wasn't Holly. Or Dr. Evans. It was definitely a man. He had on dark clothes. But that's it. I couldn't see anything else." It wasn't likely Dr. Burns, because he was bald and round from all the food that he tended to nab, but whoever it was had been wearing a jacket. That added enough bulk that it could have been anyone.

  Mark got out and was at the passenger door before I did more than open it. He slammed it shut behind me and took my arm. I knew he wasn't trying to propel me forward, but he wanted me inside, behind a locked door with the illusion of safety.

  When the front door was behind us, he didn't let go of my arm. He grabbed the other one and just held on. He started to say something, changed his mind and tried again. "You--"

  My hand shook when I rested it against his chest. He pulled me to him at the same time that I burrowed my head in his shoulder. He held me for a long time before he kissed me.

  I slid backwards toward the couch while he unzipped my jacket. His hands didn't wander; they were on a more systematic mission to check every inch to make certain I was intact.

  I don't know how we ended up in the bedroom because the walls, the floor, and the entire house disappeared.

  If Mark's intent was to tell me that I belonged to him, to brand me with memories instead of gunshots, he succeeded. I had a few messages of my own, and I'm pretty sure he got the point. Both of us had a lot to say, and we said it more than a few times without ever uttering a word.

  Chapter 34

  Going into work the next morning was pretty much the last thing I wanted to do, but since Mark left very, very early, there was no good excuse to sleep in. Maybe it was the ringing in my ears and the adrenaline left over from the midnight excursion that made me feel like I was plugged into a light socket, but honestly, I think it was Mark.

  On top of the crazy emotions running through me, I was afraid of the hospital. There would be no avoiding the doctors, suspect or no. Whoever had been in The Pavilion may have seen more of me than I saw of him. Both Dr. Staple and Dr. Burns' offices were on the second floor of The Pavilion. They had legitimate reasons to be there. Of course, the x-ray equipment was on the first floor, so that didn't really implicate either one of them, and whoever had been in the building had been sneaking around, not doing paperwork upstairs in an office.

  I was afraid of Holly, Attila, cats, dogs and definitely snakes. At least I was off the official schedule. That allowed me to show up after ten when Holly's shift started.

  X-ray was already busy. It was easy to slide into the dark room and stay there, safe and sound. I steadily developed x-rays without interruption, until someone knocked at the door. I closed the drawers, made sure the films were all p
roperly covered and opened it.

  "Do you know where the storage room is?" Holly asked breathlessly. "Sally, the head nurse on three, called down and said Crissa isn't answering her page. She needs some older x-rays for Dr. Staple. I'm too backed up to go." She tilted her head toward Dr. Burns and Dr. Fox. Burns was lost in an x-ray, staring at it like a bowl of candy.

  Dr. Fox said, "Let's do an MRI first."

  It had to be bad news when more than one doctor was consulted.

  "Yes," I said, "I know where the storage files are kept."

  "Great. Finish this last set I'm about to put in and then run down and look for them, okay? I'll leave the key to the storage room on my desk along with the patient name and info."

  "Sure, no problem." I ducked back in, did the development and after letting Holly check them to make sure they were okay, I grabbed the key and piece of paper with the patient info off of her desk. The doctors were either gone or in the other room with the patient. I was glad I wasn't the patient.

  Normally I would have stopped in to give Radar an update, but Holly wouldn't have sent me unless there was a rush, so I skipped the visit.

  The storage room light was on, but since I hated walking into dark rooms I was glad--at least until the door clanged shut behind me.

  As soon as it did, the adrenaline from the previous night returned. Long rows of files towered over me. All I could think of was how easy it would be for Dr. Staple to wait behind any one of them.

  I fidgeted first on one foot, then the other. The fluorescent lights hummed. They weren't ticking though. I think that meant they had been on a while. Or maybe it meant they had just been turned on.

  I had no idea how common it was to retrieve x-rays. Did Dr. Staple really need them?

  I looked down at the patient name and year. The first thing I noticed was that it was the same year of the other patient records Mark and I had pulled.

  Coincidence. Had to be. I took a deep breath and looked back at the aisles going off in either direction. How much trouble would I get in if I didn't return with the file? What if it was one of the files we had already taken anyway? Maybe I should get Radar to help me look.

  I took a step forward, but then backed right up, keeping my eyes on the rows. There was no sound of breathing so there was no way anyone was down here with me. Then again, with the ringing in my ears, I probably couldn't hear a car come through the concrete wall.

  My hand was on the doorknob when I heard it; the sound of something brushing against the files.

  I turned the knob, not making any noise at all.

  If Dr. Fox hadn't had a scalpel in his hand, that shiny surface that cuts into a person's flesh, I might have said hello and walked away. Even with the knife, I momentarily tried to convince myself that he was just down here on his own innocent file-finding mission.

  Nope. That scalpel was definitely bad news. He held it like a prized diamond, letting the light glint of the very sharp surface.

  "Looking for these?" He waved a folder full of x-rays. "I heard you were coming down this way. I pulled them for you."

  I looked down at the patient name, but it was pointless. A lot of things crashed into my head at the same time, but the biggest questions of all were still unanswered. "Why did you order extra x-rays to pad your earnings? And how did you get the money from them?" We had been confused all along because we couldn't figure out how someone was making money on the x-rays. And Dr. Fox? He was a surgeon. He only made money if he performed surgery.

  "You're not as smart as you think, are you? Neither was Dr. Hernandez." He laughed. "All I needed was a few tests to show surgery was necessary to back up my billing records. I can't believe Hernandez didn't think of that until I was standing in front of him. I thought he'd already guessed."

  My mouth formed a little round oh. "You did surgeries based on faked x-rays showing a fake problem?" Even though the files had appeared to indicate different procedures and possibly different doctors’ expertise, surgeons stood to make money from most or all of the procedures.

  He smirked, his chest swelled with pride. "I only needed to show a surgery was necessary in order to bill for it. Why would I bother to perform unnecessary surgeries? But this next surgery," he purred, "This one is entirely necessary Don't worry. I won't be billing you for it. It's on me." His green eyes looked pleased, but not generous.

  "You can't cut me up! You can't leave body parts strewn about down here like…" I didn't want to think what it was like. "Everyone will know it was you!'

  "You really are stupid. What's one more body in the morgue? They'll pick you up from the back room, like any other body. The hospital won't have the right paperwork, and you'll lie there until someone decides you're a worthless homeless derelict. Then they'll shove you in the ground like the nosy bitch you are."

  He swung the scalpel with hypnotic appeal. When he moved left, I went right. We danced back and forth, but he was getting closer.

  I swallowed. "That looks sharp." My attention was focused on the scalpel with an intensity that would have greatly disappointed my karate teacher. We had been told to watch the eyes. When the knife was a rubber toy in a practice session that hadn't been a problem.

  "It's going to be hard for you in this profession if you don't get used to a little blood and gore," he said soothingly.

  I managed to tear my eyes away from the knife long enough to notice that his grin wasn't nearly so handsome now that he wielded a knife. His green eyes were like stones, cold and dead. What was it was like to be on the operating table and go under while those emotionless eyes looked down? Did patients struggle? Did they shout out at the last minute that they didn't trust this guy?

  "Can't save every patient. It's really too late."

  "But," I yanked on the door. It was entirely too heavy, which was why it slammed shut so easily. In karate, that lovely class I so often skipped, we were told not to turn our backs on the enemy. The lesson seemed irrelevant, and since I couldn't get the door opened without turning and pulling harder, I turned my back.

  Dr. Fox rushed at me with the knife raised over his head.

  That wasn't the way we were taught to attack with a knife in karate either, but I wasn't about to correct him.

  I screamed. The silver blade flashed down.

  I tried to duck under it toward Dr. Fox. I couldn't remember which leg had to go to the outside. If I didn't get the leg right, I wouldn't be able to twist around and get away.

  I stuck my arm out in a blind panic. Dr. Fox plunged at me, but I only felt pressure, no pain, at least not right away. Leaned over, I moved forward, forgetting to twist and diving into Dr. Fox's stomach instead of turning neatly and pushing away.

  Dr. Fox stumbled backwards.

  I sucked in oxygen and screamed again, only it came out in a pathetic grunt because I had used all my air to fight. I dove for the door again, this time keeping my head turned so I could see him.

  Blood dripped down my arm. I couldn't get the door open. My hand was slippery, and he was coming at me again.

  I had nowhere to go.

  When he slashed again, I slid away along the wall, one hand still on the doorknob.

  I kicked.

  It didn't work. Given the man's flirtatious tendencies, his divorce and now his criminal tendencies, he had probably been hit below the belt before. He kept coming, crouched, livid and not really breathing.

  I blocked the scalpel, but had no strength in my arms. He pressed forward. Like two giant timbers, we swayed against the wall. I slid sideways a couple of steps, but I couldn't remain standing with his weight bearing down on me. He tried to hold onto me with one hand and stab me with the other.

  Gravity won, bearing against me. I crashed to the ground, almost hitting my head against the nearest wheeled ladder. I pushed with my legs, gaining perhaps a foot. Rolling was out of the question because the first row of shelving blocked me. My head was now between the shelves and the ladder. That didn't stop me from trying to get away.

>   Dr. Fox must have dropped the scalpel because he used both arms to grab me. He scrabbled forward, sitting on my legs and stretching up to pin my arms.

  I threw files at him, yanking them out of the shelf above me and stuffing them in his face while I tried to free my legs by kicking and wiggling. Panting, I screamed again. "Help!"

  Too late, I realized I should have leaned forward and screamed in his ear. He was the only one likely to hear me. The air ducts that had brought Radar to my rescue the last time were on the other side of the hallway.

  Dr. Fox let out a giant sneeze and lunged further forward. Gasping for air, I tried to roll, but was firmly trapped between the ladder and the shelf.

  He saw the scalpel at the same time I did. There was a thin line of blood marring the shiny surface. He was still heavy on my knees, but he reached for the knife, exposing his head.

  Had he just tried to stop me, he probably would have succeeded.

  I rammed the ladder towards him with every ounce of strength I had. The wheels screamed in protest, but connected with his head, making a satisfying crack.

  I pushed against the ladder as leverage to free my legs. Undaunted, Dr. Fox never stopped reaching for the knife. Talk about concentration.

  I slammed the ladder into him again, catching his shoulder. Without bothering to stand, I made my legs run. I kept my attention on the door, and this time, I made it out before he could catch me.

  My respite didn't last long. He followed, an angry animal, his head down, snarling and growling.

  I stumbled away, a desperate fool, screaming my head off. "Help! Police!Ambulance!" Reaching the elevator in time was out of the question. The stairwell was as poor a place to die as the x-ray storage room. I might be able to reach the computer lab, but was it fair to put Radar in danger?

  Radar was my only hope. He was the only one down here. Whimpering, I yanked the door opened.

  It immediately yielded a mop, a bucket and Crissa locked in an embrace with Dr. Staple. Dr. Staple must have been leaning against the door because he fell backward into me.