Colorado Crime Scene

by Cindi Myers

  A buzzer sounded and Cramer pushed open the doors. A tall, broad-shouldered nurse in pink scrubs met them on the other side. “Mr. Cramer, what is the meaning—”

  “Agent Renfro, FBI,” Luke interrupted. “Where is Scott Westfield’s room?”

  The nurse stared at Luke’s badge and ID, but her expression only hardened. “You can’t see him without permission from his doctor, no matter who you are.”

  “Luke!” Morgan hurried past the nurse to join him. “It’s all right, Nurse Adkins,” she said. “Agent Renfro is here to help.”

  “I don’t care if he’s Santa Claus or Saint Francis. Morning visiting hours are over and both of you need to leave,” the nurse said.

  “You’ve had a security breach,” Luke said.

  “We’ve had no such thing,” the nurse said. She turned to Cramer. “Why did you bring him up here? It’s against the rules and it’s disrupting our schedule.”

  “He’s FBI!” Cramer’s expression grew as stubborn as hers. “I think that outranks either one of us.”

  “I’ll show you where Scott’s room is.” Morgan took Luke’s arm and pulled him down the hallway.

  “You can’t go in there,” the nurse protested, but Luke pushed past her.

  The room was a narrow cubicle with a chair, a rolling table and a hospital bed, where Scott slept on his back, his face slack. “He’s sedated.” Morgan smoothed the blanket over her brother’s arm. “I don’t know when he’ll wake up.”

  Luke moved to her side and put his arm around her. She leaned against him, and he felt her gratitude at his presence without her having to say a word. “Tell me what happened,” he said.

  “I left to go back to my hotel and I hadn’t even made it to my car when the nurse called to tell me Scott was freaking out. When I got here, they had him tied to the bed and were getting ready to sedate him. The aide said they’d passed an orderly in the hall and Scott freaked out. Scott told me the orderly was Danny, and that he made some kind of threat. And then the sedative took effect and he passed out.”

  “What did the aide say about the orderly?”

  “That his name was Rick or Ricky and that he worked for a temp agency that supplies workers to the hospital. If Danny used a temp agency to get the job at the hotel, maybe he used the same ploy to get a job here. It wouldn’t have been that hard to figure out that Scott was here, if he knew about the incident in the hotel kitchen and that this was where the city sends its psychiatric holds.”

  Luke squeezed her shoulder. “Give me a minute. I’m going to see what I can find out.”

  He left her and went to the nurses’ station.

  Nurse Adkins’s expression was stern but professional. “What do you need now, Agent Renfro?”

  “I need to talk to an orderly—Rick or Ricky.”

  Adkins looked over his shoulder and called to a passing aide. “Carlos, find Ricky and bring him here, please.”

  The intercom buzzed and the nurse answered the summons. “Who is it?”

  “FBI. Let us in, please.”

  Frowning at Luke, she pressed the button to release the door. A few seconds later, Travis and Gus joined Luke at the nurses’ station. “Agents Steadman and Mathers, Nurse Adkins.” Luke made the introductions.

  “You’re beginning to worry me, gentlemen,” she said. “What is going on that requires three federal agents on my floor?”

  “We need to question one of your orderlies in connection with a case we’re working on,” Luke said.

  “And we need to question Scott Westfield,” Travis added.

  “Mr. Westfield is sedated,” she said. “Even when he wakes up, I don’t know how much you’ll get out of him. He’s subject to delusions.”

  Carlos returned to the nurses’ station. “I can’t find Ricky,” he said.

  “I can page him.” Nurse Adkins reached for her phone.

  “Don’t do that,” Luke said. “We don’t want to alert him that we’re looking for him. We’ll spread out and search for him. Cramer, you stay here with Mr. Westfield.”

  “Yes, sir.” Cramer looked as if he was about to salute but thought better of it.

  “I’ll take the first three floors,” Travis said. “Luke, you search the next three. Gus, take the parking garage and the attached atrium.”

  They split up and Luke stopped by Scott’s room first. Morgan had pulled a chair up to the bedside and was holding her brother’s hand. “I’ve got a couple of other team members here and we’re searching the hospital for Danny,” he said. “Call me if you see anything suspicious while I’m gone, or if Scott wakes up.”

  “I will. And thank you.”

  “You don’t have to thank me for doing my job.”

  “No. But thank you for believing me, and for believing Scott, and for wanting to protect him from danger.”

  Nurse Adkins appeared in the doorway. “If you’re going to search patient rooms on this floor, I have to come with you,” she said.

  “Fine. Just don’t get in my way.”

  Luke had to admit that going room to room in the psychiatric ward was unnerving. Some patients stared at him blankly. Others smiled too brightly or glared or tried to start conversations. “Mr. Renfro is a hospital inspector,” Nurse Adkins explained, before he could say anything. “He’s verifying we’re meeting all the regulations for our certification.” Her eyes dared him to deny any of this.

  “That’s right,” he said. “Have any of you seen this man?” He showed the picture of Danny, taken from the surveillance video of the London bombing, to a group of patients gathered in the day room. “He may have been dressed as an orderly.”

  “I saw him this morning,” one young man volunteered. “He brought my breakfast.”

  “Why do you want to talk to him?” a woman asked. “Has he done something wrong?”

  “We need to check his vaccination records,” Nurse Adkins said.

  “Have any of you seen him this afternoon?” Luke asked.

  They all shook their heads or murmured no. He moved on to the next room. “Vaccination records?” he asked Adkins.

  “One of the state requirements is that all employees be up to date on their vaccinations and TB testing.”

  “Good thinking to allay suspicion,” he said.

  “One of my jobs is to keep everyone calm.”

  “Then I’d say you do a good job.” They moved from room to room, questioning anyone they encountered. Most of them didn’t remember any of the orderlies’ names or faces. The few who did hadn’t seen Ricky since breakfast.

  They were almost to the last room when Luke’s phone alerted him to a call from Travis. “What have you got?” Luke asked.

  “I found a set of scrubs and a name badge in a stall in the men’s room on the second floor,” he said. “The name on the badge is Ricky. My guess is he changed into civilian clothes and left the building.”

  Luke swore under his breath. “I’ll meet you in the security office, behind the reception desk in the ground floor lobby,” he said. “We’ll see if the security cameras show anything.” He ended the call and turned to Nurse Adkins. “Call Security and ask them to send someone up to guard Scott Westfield. I need Cramer to meet us in his office.”

  “Saying please wouldn’t undermine your authority, Agent Renfro.”

  He bit back a smile. “Point taken. Would you call Security, please?”

  “I’ll be happy to.”

  Travis met him outside the guard’s room. “What are the chances Danny boy is still on the premises?” Travis asked.

  “Slim to none,” Luke said. “But maybe we’ll get lucky and get video from the parking lot of his car or of him meeting someone.”

  “He hasn’t slipped up yet,” Travis said. “But anything can happen.”

  Cra
mer arrived and unlocked the door to the security office and led them inside. “Which cameras do you want to look at first?” he asked.

  “I found the scrubs and the name tag in the men’s room in the north wing of the second floor,” Travis said. “Let’s start there and see if we can pick him up.”

  “There’s a camera at the end of the hall by the stairs, and one in the elevators,” Cramer said.

  “Start with the stairs,” Luke said. “This guy is trying to keep a low profile.”

  Cramer sat at the desk and worked at the computer for a few moments. “How far back do you want me to go?” he asked.

  “According to Morgan, her brother reported seeing Danny on the ninth floor about ten thirty,” Luke said. “So go back to that time and roll forward from there.”

  A few moments later, a view of the door leading to the stairs on the second floor appeared on-screen. The timer on-screen showed that Cramer was fast-forwarding the video, but the view never changed. “Nothing on camera between ten thirty and now.”

  “Try the view of the elevator,” Luke said.

  A steady stream of people got on and off the elevator—hospital personnel in scrubs, men, women and children arriving and departing in groups as they visited patients, patients in wheelchairs leaving the hospital or being taken to other floors for treatments or testing. But there was no one who looked like their suspect.

  “Wait. Freeze it there.” Travis pointed to the screen and Cramer stopped the video. “That guy.”

  Luke leaned toward the screen and studied the solitary figure who waited for the elevator. A slight male, he wore jeans, sneakers and a gray hoodie with the hood pulled over his face. “That’s our man,” he agreed.

  “How can you tell?” Cramer asked.

  “His posture,” Travis said. “The set of his shoulders. It’s the same as the videos we have.”

  “Plus, the fact that he’s wearing the hoodie to hide his face. Most people don’t dress that way—not to visit a friend or family member in the hospital.”

  “Come on, turn around.” Travis spoke to the figure in the video.

  The elevator doors opened and the man in the hoodie got on. “I’ll switch to the feed inside the elevator,” Cramer said.

  The screen flickered, and then they were watching their quarry step onto the elevator. Before the doors had even finished closing behind him, the screen went white.

  “What happened?” Travis asked. “Did we lose the feed?”

  “The camera is still rolling.” Cramer tapped the screen, where the timer showed the seconds advancing. “I think he’s covered the camera with something.”

  “He stuck an index card over the lens,” Travis said. “Put double-stick tape on one side, tape a long straw to the back. Stick it up there and when you leave, pull it off. It’s easy to conceal in a pocket and as long as you’re alone in the car when you put it up and take it off, no one’s going to notice. If the car gets full, you can leave it in place and walk away.”

  “Clever,” Cramer said.

  “Too clever,” Luke said. “Why can’t we get one step ahead of this guy?”

  “Switch to the ground floor, outside the elevators,” Travis said. “He’s got to exit there.”

  Again the screen filled with snow, then cleared to show the lobby elevators. The doors to the left elevator opened and the man in the hoodie emerged. He moved quickly, head down, and, in less than five seconds, disappeared from view. “Give us the exit doors,” Luke said. “The ones leading to the parking lot.”

  “Right. That’s North Seventeen. Give me a sec. Here you go.”

  The screen showed the double doors leading to the parking lot as people of all ages and sizes entered and exited. But no man in a gray hoodie. “It’s like he disappeared,” Cramer said.

  Chapter Eight

  “He didn’t disappear.” Luke rubbed his chin and continued to study the screen. “Back up the video and run it again. Half speed.”

  Cramer did so and they watched the flow of people toward the doors. “Freeze it!” Luke commanded. He pointed at the screen. “Now zoom in, here.”

  The image of a man in a white T-shirt and jeans, a red ball cap pulled over his eyes, filled the screen. “He’s carrying the hoodie now,” Travis said. “He must have had the cap in his pocket.”

  “I don’t see how you recognize him as the same man,” Cramer said.

  “Would you recognize your mother if she walked across the screen?” Luke asked. “Even if she had her back to you and she’d changed clothes?”

  “Well, sure. She’s my mother.”

  “I know this guy’s image like I know my mother’s,” Luke said. He hadn’t asked for this particular talent, but he was going to use it to stop this guy from killing any more innocent people. “Zoom back out and let’s see where he goes.”

  Cramer did so, switching to the parking lot surveillance when Danny moved too far from the building. But a minute later, he had moved too far for even those cameras to see him.

  “He’s either parked down the street, or someone is going to swing by and pick him up,” Travis said.

  “What’s the time stamp on our last image of him?” Luke asked.

  “Ten forty-seven,” Cramer said.

  “He didn’t waste time getting out of here once Scott made him,” Luke said.

  “What was he doing here in the first place?” Travis asked.

  “Yeah,” Cramer said. “What was he doing here?”

  “He knows Scott saw him in the hotel kitchen Monday night,” Luke said. “It’s possible he wanted to find out how much he knew.”

  “Or, he wanted to make sure he didn’t tell anyone what he saw,” Luke said.

  “How did he get past our security?” Cramer asked. “Even the temp workers have to have a background check and special credentials to work on the ninth floor.”

  “Who checks those credentials?” Travis asked.

  Cramer looked puzzled. “I don’t know. Human Resources, I guess.”

  “So, if someone shows up on the ninth floor with an official-looking name badge and acts like he’s supposed to be there, everyone assumes he’s been cleared by HR,” Luke said.

  “I guess so,” Cramer said. “But he’d still have to have an ID. You have to scan it to get in.”

  “He probably stole it,” Travis said. “People get careless.”

  “Yeah, I guess enough people hate their jobs that they don’t see why anyone would want to go out of their way to be here,” Cramer said. “But you didn’t hear that from me.”

  “I’ll talk to Blessing, see if we can get someone over here to guard Scott Westfield and look out for Danny boy to come back.”

  “Danny?” Cramer asked. “I thought his name was Ricky.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” Luke put a hand on the guard’s shoulder. “You’ve been a big help to us. I’ll be sure to put in a good word with your bosses.”

  “Thanks. And maybe you could play up my role to Nurse Adkins.”

  “Adkins?” Luke tried to muffle his surprise.

  “Yeah.” Cramer grinned. “I’ve been trying to get her to go out with me. She’s amazing.”

  Not the word Luke would have used, but there was something to be said for a tough woman. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  He and Travis left the office and returned to the ninth floor. While Travis phoned Blessing, Luke slipped into Scott’s room. Morgan jumped up from the chair beside the bed. “Did you find him?”

  “No. But he’s definitely out of the building.” He moved to her side. “We’re going to guard Scott’s room until he’s discharged,” he said.

  “So you believe he’s in danger?”

  “We don’t want to take any chances. You should go to your hotel and try to get s
ome rest.”

  “I have work I need to do. I need to watch the results of today’s stage and write my blog entry for tomorrow.” She glanced at the bed. “Scott and I had planned to watch the race results together.”

  “Would you settle for me watching it with you instead?”

  She looked into his eyes, clearly pleased with the idea. “Don’t you have a lot of work to do?”

  “I need to write a report, and I have some other paperwork to review.” He also needed to interview neighbors around the vacant rental that may or may not have been occupied by suspected terrorists, but he could delegate some of that work to others and postpone the rest. He needed time to review the situation and ponder his next move. Chasing after Danny—pursuing without a plan every time he appeared on their radar—wasn’t bringing them any closer to stopping the terrorists. He wanted to analyze the guy’s behavior thus far and see if he could spot any patterns or weaknesses.

  And he wanted to spend more time with Morgan, especially when she needed him, as she seemed to now.

  “Then, do you want to come back to my hotel with me?” she asked. “We could order in some lunch.”

  “That’s a great idea,” he said. And he hoped that, for the next few hours at least, his suspect wouldn’t set off any bombs, commit any murders or generally cause trouble.

  * * *

  MORGAN HADN’T REALIZED how small her hotel room was until she was alone in it with Luke. Hanging out with him all afternoon while they both worked had seemed like a good idea at the hospital. He could distract her from her worries about Scott, and maybe she could even help him with his case.

  He distracted her, all right, but not necessarily in a good way. At least, not good if she was going to focus on her work. “I’ll just, um, let in some more light.” She crossed to the window and pulled open the drapes.

  Luke picked up the room service menu from the desk. “I’m starved. What do you want to order?”

  “The deli on the corner will deliver, too,” she said. “They have good sandwiches and salads. Their card is by the phone.”

  “Sounds good.” They settled on club sandwiches, fruit and bottled water. Luke ordered, while she looked for some place to set up her computer.