Fan Mail

by Daryl Wood Gerber

  “Miss,” the nurse said.

  Unwilling to incite her to full-throated anger, I headed out.

  At the door, I turned to wish Tom a speedy recovery but held my tongue, stunned by what he was doing. While the nurse jotted notes in his chart, Tom removed the medicated drip tube from his arm and dumped the contents into the open end of his cast.

  Chapter 42

  Headlights strafed the windshield as I drove to my aunt’s house. Doing my best to focus on the road and not the glare, I tried to figure out why Tom would pour medication down his cast. I wasn’t a doctor, but I was certain it wasn’t supposed to be applied topically. Was he too drugged out to notice, or was he trying to dump the stuff so he could remain clear-headed enough to fool an interrogator? Had he incurred the accident in order to establish an alibi for the time Camille was murdered? Purposely breaking his arm and injuring his knee seemed drastic. And what about Laila? He could not have killed her. However, if I believed Vaughn could have a co-conspirator, then Tom could, too.

  Candace was bubbling with extra energy when I fetched Cinder and her. She’d had so much fun with Max’s granddaughter that she wanted to become a kindergarten teacher. And Friends was her new favorite television show. Cinder, the poor guy, was a blob. The granddaughter had worn him out.

  Minutes after we arrived home, I checked messages. Gloria had left a voice mail. She was fine but sad about Camille and crying way too much. She signed off saying she’d ring me in the morning.

  Desperate for sleep myself, I crashed into bed.

  • • •

  Tuesday morning, I took Cinder for a long run. When I returned, Candace was in the kitchen, the landline telephone pressed to her ear, its cord coiled around her hand. Tears pooled in her eyes.

  Who is it? I mouthed, praying someone else hadn’t died.

  Candace mouthed, Mom.

  What does she want? My sister rarely woke before noon.

  Candace covered the mouthpiece. “She’s mad that you hung up on her. She says if I don’t go see her, she’s coming here to see me. I don’t want her to. She’ll take me back with her.”

  I held out my hand. With a heavy sigh, Candace released the telephone cord. It uncurled like a maniacal snake. After giving me the phone, she tore down the hall sobbing.

  Mustering a firm tone, I said, “Hey, Rosie, what’s up?”

  “I want to see Candy.” Rosie thought naming her daughter the slang version of her habit had been funny. “I’m coming up tomorrow.” She sounded clear. Not strung out.

  “How about next week? I’m working a case.”

  “Then she’s free to hang out with me.”

  “Actually, she has plans with friends.”

  Rosie snuffled. “What’s the deal? Why are you giving me the runaround? Am I not good enough for you?”

  “C’mon, don’t go there. She really does have plans. Lots of them. She’s got a life. What about you? Have you found a job?”

  “I did. On a pot farm.”

  Perfect, I thought snidely. Just what she didn’t need to do, hang around drugs, legal or not. On the other hand, a job was a job. If she could stay straight . . .

  “Let’s discuss this next Sunday,” I said. By then, she would have forgotten she’d called.

  “Sunday,” she said and ended the call.

  I stared at the telephone for a long moment wondering how the two of us had grown up in the same household. I followed rules; she broke them. I liked order; she preferred chaos.

  I hurried down the hall to Candace. She was slumped on the bed, hands in her lap, chin lowered, hair hanging like a curtain around her face.

  “I don’t want her to get custody of me.” She sniffed.

  I sat beside her and stroked her hair. “She won’t. She has some hoops to jump through before she could ever regain custody. However”—I lifted her chin with my fingertip—“if she found out that I ran off in the middle of the night to save Camille and left you home alone, she could wield it over me.”

  “But I wasn’t alone. I was with Opal.”

  “Even so.”

  “You want me to keep your secret.”

  “For now.”

  She crisscrossed her heart and offered her pinky. I looped mine around hers.

  • • •

  I was halfway dressed, eager to meet the second doctor Heather had referred, when the telephone rang again.

  Candace shouted, “Got it.”

  When I was tucking my plaid shirt into my chinos, I poked my head into Candace’s room and asked who’d called. Candace said Waverly’s mother wanted to take the girls to the Summit, a mall in Reno. They’d be gone all day. I said yes, but felt guilty about it, concerned by how difficult it was to keep a teen that didn’t want to go to day camp occupied during the summer. I had to make a better plan. For now, I was more than happy to have her join Waverly again. I would buy Waverly’s mother a huge present of thanks. Opal, too. And Gwen. And Max. My extended family.

  A half hour later, after dropping Cinder at the neighbor’s, I stood by the front door, peeking through the sidelight. Candace hovered beside me, looking adorable in cut-off jeans, a hot pink tank top, and pink-striped cross-body purse. She’d attached the friendship cat charm Waverly had given her as a graduation present to one of the purse’s O-rings.

  “You’re sure Waverly’s mom said she was minutes away?” I asked. I did not want to miss the appointment. I needed answers.

  Candace said, “Go.”

  “If she doesn’t show up for any reason—”

  “I’ll call you. Leave.” She pushed me toward the door.

  “Do you have enough money?”

  “I’ve been saving my allowance.” She kissed my cheek.

  Reluctantly, I left the house.

  When I arrived at the doctor’s office, I noticed a text from Candace: All is well. In the car. I breathed easier.

  An hour later, after a positive appointment with the new doctor, I had answers. Good answers. Answers Gwen would like to hear.

  While soldiering through tourist traffic to Gwen’s house—phoning her to deliver my momentous news was something she would never forgive—I called Candace to check in. My message went to voice mail. I asked her to text me when she arrived at the mall.

  Next, I touched base with Nick. He sounded better. He said he must have had the twenty-four-hour flu. Quickly, he brought me up to speed on his investigation. King was following leads regarding Laila, and Hernandez had obtained the search warrant. Nick was meeting him at Ambrose Alley in less than an hour. I told him my news. He was thrilled for me. We ended the call with a kiss.

  Gwen’s house, like mine, was a cabin at the end of a lane. No view of the lake, but she didn’t mind. She had a view of it at work.

  She answered the door, no makeup, her unruly hair secured by a clasp. Even though the temperature was in the eighties, she was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. “Come in.” She clutched my elbow and tugged me inside. “I heard about the murder of that girl in the cave. Is it related to the others?”

  “Seems so. I’d interviewed her. She was sweet.”

  Gwen growled. “What is going on around here lately?”

  “Bad karma.”

  “Bad people with bad karma.”

  I gestured to her getup. “Why the warm clothing?”

  “Owen and I are going ballooning.”

  A year ago, Gwen and I made bucket lists of things we wanted to do in our lifetimes. On mine, I’d written parachuting out of a plane, bungee jumping off a cliff in South America, and sailing around the world in a sailboat. Gwen’s had included hot-air ballooning, eating on the banks of the Seine River, and climbing Mount Everest. Today, she was crossing off one, and I would bet her honeymoon trip would land her in Paris. I was jealous.

  “After the balloon ride, which only lasts forty-five minutes, we’re getting our blood tests and hitting up all my doctors and dentists for files. I haven’t had a physical in years. I’ll bet my reports are stow
ed off-site gathering cobwebs.” She glowed with excitement. “Then I’m closing out all my bank accounts and we’ll be—”

  “Off to the wedding planner.” Owen, in jeans and long-sleeved shirt, emerged around the corner and handed Gwen a down jacket. “Better get a move on, my love, or we might get rained out.”

  “No way.”

  “Way.”

  The ring of mountains that surrounded Lake Tahoe could keep a summer storm at bay only so long.

  Gwen eyed me. “Why are you here?”

  “I’ve got some good news.” I told her about the positive results of my ultrasound. “No cancer. No need for surgery.”

  “Oh, darlin’, yay! Why didn’t you lead with that? You and Nick need to celebrate. With a vacation. A big-time vacation.”

  “After these murders are solved.”

  “You are a righteous mess. A dedicated righteous mess.” Gwen grabbed me in a hug. “But I adore you and your devotion to a cause.”

  • • •

  I drove to the detective agency haunted by memories of good vacations, all of which had taken place before my divorce. None since. I tried to convince myself that living in Lake Tahoe was like having a full-time vacation, but my battered body told me otherwise. Lake Tahoe was beautiful, but it was not always serene. I pondered what I’d done for fun lately other than taking Candace and Waverly hiking and came up with nothing.

  Candace. Why hadn’t she checked in with me by now? It was nearly noon. I texted: What’s up?

  And then I remembered Gloria. She’d said she was going to ring me in the morning.

  I tried her cell phone. The call went to voice mail. I hung up and called KINC. The receptionist said Gloria had phoned in sick. She asked if I wanted to talk to Beau. I said no and shook off the worrisome feelings. Gloria had a right to privacy. Gwen was right. I was a mess. I—

  Gwen. Something she’d said niggled at the back of my mind.

  Near the Brockway Theater, her words came to me, not about needing a vacation but about her medical records. She’d joked that it had been so long since her last physical that her files were likely stowed off-site and gathering cobwebs.

  Were Dr. Fisher’s office files incomplete? Could information that linked Tom Regent or Finn Ambrose to Dr. Fisher be housed somewhere other than the Tahoe City office?

  Chapter 43

  I scrambled through my purse, found the scrap of paper Heather had handed me when she’d visited me at the hospital, and dialed her cell phone. On the third ring she answered, sounding quite chipper. I explained my reason for calling.

  On her end, a siren wailed and then a dog began to bark. Hysterically.

  Heather said, “Just a sec.” She yelled something away from the phone and a man hollered back. Seconds later, a door slammed.

  “Heather, are you still there?” I asked.

  “Um, yes, sorry. My boyfriend is taking my dog—my mother’s dog—to the park. She gets very excited when a fire truck zooms past. You were asking about old files. Let’s see. All the records for Tahoe City patients are in the Tahoe City office, I’m certain of that, but my mom’s practice was in Reno before she moved here two years ago, and she stowed those files in a warehouse.”

  She had practiced in Reno? The Vittorios and Ambroses had lived and worked in Reno before moving to Tahoe. Tom and Camille had worked at a ritzy spa there.

  I said, “Did you mention this to the detectives?”

  “They didn’t ask.”

  “Would you know the name of the facility?”

  “Let me get Mom’s address book from my bedroom.”

  The receiver clunked on something hard. I heard Heather clip-clopping through the house. She picked up the telephone. “Reno Store and Lock. Guess I could’ve figured that out without the address book, huh? It’s on California Street. If you want it, I found a key on her key chain with that name on it.”

  Of course I wanted it.

  • • •

  Reno Store and Lock, an imposing string of gray buildings with metal pull-down doors, occupied a full city block. Sun gleamed on the window of the facility’s office. Unlike Nevada or Bust, the place didn’t have air-conditioning. It was sweltering inside. To add insult to injury, the rank odor of cigarette butts permeated the air.

  A dumpy manager with a weary gait approached the service desk. “Hiya, honey.” He rubbed his globular nose. An unlit cigarette waggled from his mouth. “What can I do for you?”

  “Can you guide me to unit 176?” I showed him my key. “I’ve forgotten the way, it’s been so long.”

  The guy led me around the back of the building and jerked his thumb to the right. “Hope there’s nothing not kosher in there, get my drift?”

  Although that sounded like the guy’s standard line, I shivered. Five deaths in a little over a week was making me jumpy. Was there a body stored inside? I hoped not.

  I strode to the unit, unlocked the padlock, and pushed up the grooved metal door. An overhead fluorescent light went on automatically. The space was about the size of a walk-in closet and filled with file cabinets. Each drawer had been labeled by year, dating back twenty years—the commencement of Dr. Fisher’s practice.

  I surveyed the topmost drawer of the first cabinet on the left. The date of a patient’s initial visit was marked on the folder. Subsequent visits were noted on a chart stapled to the inside left cover. An adjustable bracket on the right secured detailed handwritten notes, with the most recent on top. Many of the patients had lived in Reno and nearby towns. I would wager that most hadn’t wanted to travel to Tahoe City when Dr. Fisher relocated.

  Minutes turned into hours. My fingers ached from rummaging through more than a thousand files. I didn’t find any for Beau’s sister or persons related to Tom Regent or the Vittorios, and there wasn’t a file for Ambrose, either.

  Ready to pack it in, I paused when I discovered a folder in the U–Z cabinet with the name Lana Vogel on it. I paused. When we’d first met, Tripp had made a comment about his mother being one of the Virginia City Vogels. Was it possible Lana Vogel was Tripp’s mother?

  I flipped open the file and read the left-hand data sheet. Eighteen years ago, Lana Vogel had been a patient of Dr. Fisher’s. Attached were a picture of her holding a brown-haired baby and a thank-you note from Lana, Finn, and Tripp. Lana looked familiar. I studied the photo until the realization hit me. She was nearly the spitting image of Gloria—brunette hair, Cupid’s bow mouth, and big doe eyes. No wonder Finn Ambrose had been attracted to her.

  The last page of Lana’s history, dated a little over two years ago, was blotchy and puckered. Had Dr. Fisher been crying when filling out the page? I scanned it quickly and gagged.

  Patient, divorced, entered office 7:00 a.m., unaccompanied.

  Pregnant 28 weeks.

  Inseminated; no father.

  Patient was suffering acute contractions.

  Tenderness to palpation in the region.

  Patient claimed stomach pains, possible flu.

  Patient admitted to heavy dose of OTC pain medication.

  Patient maintained she stumbled. Bruises found on back and hipbones support theory of fall. Patient denied additional abuse.

  Massive hemorrhaging occurred 7:07 a.m.

  Lana Vogel died with complications, 7:15 a.m.

  Infant, male, stillborn, extracted at 7:16 a.m.

  A note scrawled down the margin said:

  Ambrose doesn’t seem the type. Don’t jump to conclusions.

  Chapter 44

  With the file resting on the passenger seat, I dodged semis and RVs that hogged the road and mentally prepared a case against Finn Ambrose. His wife got pregnant by insemination. Finn found out. He hit her, which resulted in her death and the death of the child, but the doctor couldn’t prove it. Even so, he worried that she might find a way to prove his guilt, so he killed her.

  I paused. Why not kill her then? Why wait two years? Because the doctor had moved. Except surely her office would have provided a forwar
ding address.

  Then it dawned on me what had triggered it. Finn met Gloria in May and became obsessed with her because she reminded him of his wife. Faithfully, he watched her show. When he saw her interview the doctor, all the history, all the betrayal, came rushing back to him. The doctor had to be executed. The next morning, he went to her office.

  Why kill Tony Vittorio? I tapped the steering wheel. Maybe killing Dr. Fisher lit a fire under Finn. He felt the need to exact more vengeance, so he murdered Tony because of their rivalry. He dedicated the murder to Gloria because his love for her was blossoming.

  As for Tejeda, Finn slayed her because, now in full-on obsession mode for Gloria, he worried about her career. Tejeda’s hijinks outside the studio had jeopardized that.

  Why bump off Camille? Perhaps, when he’d gone into her office at KINC, he’d seen the memo that Camille was getting ready to end Gloria’s career. Or maybe Camille, who had figured out that Finn, after accessing her office on the day of his interview, had not only used her credit card to order flowers but had also used her printer paper to write one of the notes to Gloria, blackmailed him. KINC was in dire financial straits. She could use the money. I imagined the scenario. She summoned Finn to her house on Sunday night, but Finn opted not to pay.

  The motive for Laila Walton’s murder was the easiest to explain. Laila knew the identity of the person who’d asked her to deliver the note. She must have seen Finn that morning on her way to the caves. Driving by? In a grocery store? It didn’t matter where. He followed her to the cave and ended her life.

  • • •

  I sped to Ambrose Alley and parked in the general parking lot. I was pleased to see Nick’s Wrangler and a host of other official vehicles crowding the casino’s valet parking.

  Racing through the entrance with Lana Vogel’s file in hand, I cut through the banks of one-armed bandits, past the jackpots packed with customers, and sprinted to the penthouse-only elevator. A young man who looked as stoic as a Buckingham Palace guard was standing beside it.