And there was another reason, one he had not shared with Sean King or Michelle. People who attempted to end their lives, no matter how amateurishly they might do so at first, often got better at it, with the result that on the third, fourth or sixth try, they ended up on a slab with a coroner poking around their remains. He could not allow that to happen to Michelle Maxwell. He had a week’s vacation coming up. He’d planned on flying to California to go abalone diving with some friends. Instead, he went online and bought a plane ticket to Nashville.
Chapter 22
Michelle heard the footsteps again, exactly at one A.M.
She rose and slipped out the door. Now she had added incentive to find out what Barry the Peeping Tom was up to. She prayed it was at least a felony. She headed down the darkened hall, gauging the pace of the steps echoing lightly in front of her. She reached the end of the corridor and peered around the corner. There was a light on at the end of the hall. She edged forward until she could see its source. It was the pharmacy. There was someone in there. As the man moved in front of the glass window in the door, she saw that it wasn’t Barry. It was the little man she’d seen in the pharmacy earlier. Pretty late to be dispensing drugs, she thought.
As she stood there another figure appeared near the door to the pharmacy. Barry looked around cautiously and then went inside, closing the door behind him. Michelle slipped forward as much as she dared for a better look. And then it hit her. Why would Barry be here at this hour in the first place? He’d been on the day shift. During her stay here Michelle had noted that the personnel pulled twelve-hour shifts, turning over in the morning and evening right at eight o’clock. Barry had been off-duty for five hours. Was he putting in a little personal overtime?
Michelle heard it before she saw anything; it was the slight squeak of rubber on linoleum. At first she thought it was the sneakers that the nurses here wore. But then she saw the wheelchair come into view. Sandy was fully dressed, her hands efficiently propelling her down the hall. Then she stopped and took up watch, her gaze on the pharmacy door. Michelle quickly drew back as Sandy suddenly whipped her head around and looked in her direction. A minute later when Michelle dared look back around the corner, Sandy was gone. A few minutes after that Barry and the other man left the pharmacy, the latter closing and locking the door. Fortunately, they walked down the hall away from Michelle.
As soon as their footsteps had faded, she stepped forward and made her way cautiously down to the pharmacy. What surprised her was that both men had left the pharmacy empty-handed. What was going on here?
Then she turned her attention down the other hall, toward Sandy’s room. She edged along the corridor, taking small, near-silent steps and hugging the wall. She reached Sandy’s room. It was dark. She peered in the glass and could just make out Sandy lying on the bed. The woman was obviously pretending to be asleep. But what had she been doing watching the pharmacy? Was she part of whatever Barry was up to? Michelle didn’t want to believe that but she couldn’t discount the possibility.
Michelle slipped back to her room where sleep didn’t come easily. She tossed for several hours, her mind racing with possible theories that would explain what she had seen, each one more unlikely than the last.
She woke early and went down to breakfast. After that she attended another group session that Horatio had arranged for her. Then she had a one-on-one with a therapist. After it was over, Michelle made a beeline for Sandy’s room and found her there. With other people.
“What’s wrong?” Michelle said. A doctor, two nurses and a security guard were gathered around Sandy’s bed. The woman was lying there thrashing around and moaning.
One nurse turned to her. “Please return to your room, right now.”
The guard stepped toward her, his hands out. “Right now,” he said.
Michelle turned and left, but she didn’t go far.
A few minutes later her vigil was rewarded when the group left Sandy’s room and passed her. Sandy was strapped to a gurney and there was an IV in her arm. She appeared to be sleeping now. Her Secret Service training kicking in, Michelle continued to run her gaze down the woman’s arm to her hands. What she saw puzzled her deeply. Sandy had always been so meticulous about her appearance.
Michelle waited until they were out of sight and then she hustled to Sandy’s room and closed the door behind her. She felt a bit guilty about taking advantage of Sandy’s illness to search her room. But only a bit.
It didn’t take long because the woman had brought few personal possessions with her. One thing that she wasn’t seeing puzzled Michelle. No pictures of family or friends. Then again, Michelle hadn’t brought any of those with her either. But from the loving way Sandy had talked about her late husband, Michelle would have thought she’d have at least one picture of the man. Yet with the horrific way it had ended, maybe she didn’t want a reminder.
She looked around the room and her gaze settled on the bouquet of flowers. She examined the table the bouquet was on, tracing her finger across the veneer of fine dirt particles. Her gaze went to the floor, where she could see a few bits of dirt as well. That’s what had puzzled her about Sandy’s hands. There was dirt on them. As though she’d—
Michelle raced across the room and flattened herself against the wall next to the door. Someone was out there. The door opened slowly. Michelle ducked down away from the glass opening so the person couldn’t see her through it.
As the person came in and walked toward the bed, Michelle silently slipped around the door and through it. She glanced back and saw Barry advancing toward Sandy’s bed. She raced down the hall and to the nurse’s station.
“I just saw someone sneak into Sandy’s room, I don’t think he’s supposed to be there since Sandy’s sick,” she said to the nurse on duty there. The woman rose immediately and walked quickly down the hall.
Michelle fled back to her room and almost collided with Cheryl, who was coming out sucking on her straw. Michelle didn’t want to be alone right now in case Barry came to give her a little payback for ratting him out. Michelle clearly couldn’t count on the nurse she’d told keeping her identity confidential. In fact she might be mad at Michelle for making her rush to Sandy’s room only to find Barry there. As the bastard had said, he could come and go pretty much as he pleased.
“Hey, Cheryl, you want to talk or something?”
Cheryl stopped sucking momentarily and looked at Michelle as though she was seeing her for the very first time.
Michelle started speaking quickly, “I mean we’re roommates and all and we really haven’t gotten to know each other. And I think it says somewhere in the patient handbook that we all ought to try and relate to each other as a form of therapy. You know, a little girl-to-girl soul searching.”
Michelle’s invitation was so obviously insincere that Cheryl simply walked past her after giving her straw an extra loud slurp. Michelle slipped inside the room and pressed herself against the door.
Twenty minutes passed and Barry didn’t come for her. She wasn’t physically afraid of the man. She had already sized him up as a bully who would turn and run the first time he was struck back harder than the blow he’d delivered. But he could hurt her in another way, by making allegations against her. Or he might slip some stolen drugs in her bed. If people believed him over her, what would happen? Would she be stuck in this place against her will? Would she go to prison? Her chin sank to her chest as a horrible depression dropped solidly on her shoulders. Sean, come and rescue me from this place. Please. Then the obvious occurred to her. She was here voluntarily. She had checked herself in, she could check herself out. She could leave right now. She could go to the apartment Sean had gotten for them, chill out for a day and then go down and join him. He would probably need her help right about now anyway.
He always needed her at some point on a case.
She burst out the door and almost ran into the nurse standing there.
Michelle blinked and stepped back. “Yeah?”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s stabilized. And she wants to talk to you.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“I’m afraid I can’t discuss that.”
Of course you can’t, Michelle grumbled under her breath as she followed the woman down the hallway. But then her pace quickened. She did want to see Sandy. She wanted to see her very much.
Chapter 23
Horatio Barnes drove his rental car out of the Nashville airport. An hour later he was in rural Tennessee looking for the small town where Michelle Maxwell had lived when she was six years old. He found it after several wrong turns and some time-consuming backtracking. He reached the small, crumbling town center, stopped and asked for directions at the hardware store and drove out of town heading southwest. He was sweating because apparently his rental fee didn’t cover a car with functioning air-conditioning.
The neighborhood where Michelle had lived clearly had seen better days. The homes were old and dilapidated, the yards ill-nourished. He checked house numbers on the mailboxes until he found it. The Maxwell house was set off the street. It had a large front yard with a dying oak anchoring it. On one limb was a tire hanging from a rotting rope. In the side yard was a 1960s-era Ford pickup up on cinder blocks. He saw the jagged dead stumps of what looked to be the remains of a privacy hedge that had run across the front of the house.
The paint on the clapboard siding was peeling away and the screen on the front door had fallen off and was lying on the steps. Horatio couldn’t tell if the place was inhabited or not. From its piecemeal look he reasoned it was an old farmhouse. Presumably the original owners had sold the bulk of the land to a developer and the neighborhood had sprung up around their homestead.
He wondered what it would have been like for the young girl to grow up here with just her parents, the beloved sons having moved on to manhood. Horatio also wondered again if Michelle’s conception had been an accident. Would that have influenced how her parents treated it? From experience Horatio knew that one could cut both ways. Which way had it cut with you, Michelle?
He pulled his rental to the edge of the graveled shoulder, got out and looked around, wiping the sweat off his face with his handkerchief. Apparently there wasn’t an active neighborhood watch program because no one seemed to be paying any attention to him. Probably there was nothing here worth stealing.
Horatio walked up the gravel drive. Part of him was waiting for an old hound to lumber around the corner of the structure with teeth bared just looking for a plump leg to bite. However, no animal or person came forward to greet or attack him. He reached the porch and peered inside the busted front door. The place seemed abandoned, or if not, the current inhabitants were setting a new standard for minimalism.
“Can I help you?” a firm voice said.
Horatio swung around and saw a woman standing there at the end of the drive. She was young, short and chubby, wore a faded sundress and had a fat baby riding on her left hip. Her hair was dark and curly and in the humidity it clung to her head like a skullcap. He walked toward her. “I sure hope so. I’m trying to find out about the people who used to live in this house.”
She stared over his shoulder. “You mean the bums, druggies or whores?”
He followed her gaze. “Oh, is that what it’s used for these days?”
“I pray to the Lord to strike the sinners dead.”
“I presume the sinners don’t come by in the daylight, just at night.”
“Well ain’t no law says we got to hide in bed when it gets dark. So we see the evil and evil it is.”
“Well, I’m really sorry about that. But I wasn’t talking about the, um, evil. I was talking about a family named the Maxwells; they lived here about thirty years ago?”
“We’ve only been here five, so I wouldn’t know, would I?”
“Anyone else here who might?”
She pointed a thick finger at the farmhouse. “Because of that evil, ain’t nobody want to stay too long.” Her baby gave a hiccup and spittle ran down its mouth. She wiped him up with a rag she pulled from her pocket.
Horatio handed her a business card. “Well, if you think of anyone who might be able to help me, you can reach me at that number.”
She studied the card. “You a shrink?”
“Something like that.”
“From Wash-ing-ton?” She said the word with a pronounced sneer. “This here’s Tennessee.”
“I have a big practice.”
“Why you want to know about these Maxwell folks?”
“It’s confidential, but I can tell you that it’s to try to help a patient of mine.”
“What’s it worth to you?”
“I thought you didn’t know them.”
“I know somebody who might. My granny. She gave us this house when she went in the nursing home. She lived there, oh, must’ve been forty years or so at least. Hell, Gramps is buried in the backyard.”
“That’s nice.”
“Grass grows real well over that spot, I tell you that.”
“I’m sure. So your grandmother’s at a nursing home. Near here?”
“State place, about an hour away. She couldn’t afford nothing fancy. That’s why she give us her house, so’s she could get help from the government. You know, so they wouldn’t know she had stuff.”
“Like assets to be used to pay for her care?”
“That’s right. Government screws everybody six ways from Sunday. We got to fight to get our fair share. Give it a few years and the Mexicans will run the whole damn place.” She looked to the sky. “Lord, strike me dead before that happens.”
“Be careful what you wish for. Do you think she might talk to me?”
“Maybe. She got good days and bad days. I try to go up to see her, but what with the baby and more kids in school, and gas ain’t exactly cheap is it?” She studied him. “So how much is it worth to you?” she asked again.
“Well, that depends on what she tells me.” Horatio took a moment to scrutinize her. “Let’s say if the information is good I’ll pay her a hundred dollars.”
“Pay her! She ain’t got no use for the money. I meant pay me.”
Horatio smiled. “Okay, I’ll pay you. Can you arrange for me to see her?”
“Well, seeing as how we got us a business arrangement I’ll go with you. Don’t want you leaving town without remembering the deal.”
“When can we go?”
“My man gets home at six. We can head out then. That way we get there after dinner. Old folks don’t like people interrupting their chow time.”
“Okay. What’s your grandmother’s name and the name of the nursing home?”
“Do I look stupid? You can follow me up in your car. I’ll take you to her room.”
“Fine. You say she has good and bad days. What does that mean exactly?”
“That exactly means that she’s losing her marbles. She’s got that demon stuff.”
Horatio cocked his head at this remark, worried that the young woman was totally nuts. Then he guessed what she meant. “You’re referring to dementia?”
“That’s it. So you got to roll the dice and see what comes up.”
“Well, thank you for your help, uh…”
“Linda Sue Buchanan. My friends call me Lindy, but you ain’t my friend so you just stick to Linda Sue for now.”
“You can call me Horatio.”
“That’s one weird-ass name.”
“Well, I’m one weird-ass guy. I’ll see you here at six o’clock. And by the way, Linda Sue, the little bundle of joy just puked on your shoe.” He left her cursing and dragging her foot across the grass.
Chapter 24
Sandy was sitting up in bed looking much better. The nurse left them alone and Michelle drew next to the bed and took the older woman’s hand in hers.
“Okay, what the hell happened to you?” Michelle demanded.
Sandy smiled and gave
a casual wave of her other hand, although the one holding Michelle’s tightened at the same time. “Oh, honey, it happens to me from time to time. Nothing to worry about. My old butt just hits a wall and everything sort of pops. They give me a little happy juice and I’m right as rain.”
“You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Absolutely.”
“I thought you’d had a seizure or something.”
“Now you see why I can’t hold down a job. And I think I would’ve made a hell of an airline pilot, don’t you?” She pantomimed using a PA system. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We’re about to begin our initial descent into hell and the person flying the plane, namely me, is about to freak out on you! So just hold on tight, you little bastards, while I try to lay this baby on the ground.” She gave a weak laugh and let go of Michelle’s hand.
“I’m sorry, Sandy. I really am.”
“Comes with the territory and I’m comfortable with that.”
Michelle hesitated. “I went into your room after they took you. I don’t know why, I guess I was just stunned. I heard someone else coming. I ducked behind the door and Barry came in.”
On this, Sandy sat up a little straighter. “Did he see you?”
“No, I ducked out. But I ratted on him to the head nurse, for all the good it’ll do me. He’s probably plotting his revenge as we speak.”
Sandy sat back. “What could he want in my room?”
Michelle shrugged. “Probably just wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Or he might’ve been looking to take anything of value that wasn’t nailed down.”
Sandy made a snorting noise. “Well, I hope he can dig all the way to my bank because that’s where my good jewelry is. I never bring any of that with me to one of these places because it won’t be there when you leave.”
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