by Peg Brantley
“Two men offered Sanchez two thousand dollars for one of his kidneys about two months ago. Maria Sanchez never met them but she saw them talking to her husband once. She’s meeting with Dobson this afternoon to try and come up with a couple of sketches.”
Chase took a sip of coffee. “Can’t we get Carol Myers? She builds a much stronger bond with people than Dobson. We get better sketches.”
“Carol is on assignment in Colorado Springs until next week. I didn’t think you’d want to wait.”
“You’re right. I don’t.”
“How did you get to Maria again?” Terri asked.
Daniel blushed. “Elizabeth Benavides introduced us.”
Terri smiled.
“Anyway, when Sanchez balked at giving up one of his kidneys they sweetened the pot. Said they had a source to get them legal papers. Not just Sanchez, but his wife as well. For a price.”
“Let me guess,” Chase said. “Two thousand dollars.”
“That’s right. And Maria Sanchez said they added another little threat to the mix.”
Chase and Terri waited.
Daniel quit writing on the whiteboard and turned to look directly at them. Put his hands on the table and leaned down. “Maria Sanchez said the two men made it clear that if her husband didn’t accept their generous offer, they would still get what they needed from him.”
Chase pushed back from the table and paced the room. “So they went along with the plan and Sanchez sold a kidney for two grand. Did he try and buy some papers?”
“Maria says yes. Of course they never saw anything.”
“We should get his autopsy results back tomorrow. We know he had a nephrectomy but we don’t know if that had anything to do with why he died.”
“His wife said he hadn’t been feeling well. Thought a walk would help. Guess the guy liked to hike in the hills.” Daniel finished changing the header for DB #4 to read José Sanchez.
“Terri, you go back to your contact at the ER,” Chase said. “What’s her name again?”
“Leslie James.”
“Yeah. Can you trust her?”
“She’s never given me any reason not to.”
“Someone in the ER has either been poorly trained or else that individual is involved in this somehow. The ER is a link, and I think James is more likely to talk to you than me.”
“You got that right, after the way you threatened her the first time you met.”
“What’s that?” Daniel asked, a smile tugging at his face.
“Never mind.” Chase checked out the board. “Is there any way you and Elizabeth can find out the name of the guy they found in the dumpster? See if there’s any kind of connection to her sister?”
Terri’s cell phone rang and she dug it out of a pocket. Without a word to either Chase or Daniel she stepped out of the room. Both detectives opted to pretend they’d seen nothing.
Daniel tossed the marker on the table. “I’ll call Elizabeth and set something up.” He shook his head. “She’s kind of hard to control.”
“She might be hard to control but at least we can keep her safe. And her contacts within the Hispanic community have already proven invaluable to us. Without her we may never have heard from Maria Sanchez.”
Daniel didn’t say anything.
“Am I right?”
Daniel took a deep breath. When he exhaled, Chase heard a “Yeah,” but would have sworn there were some other words included.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Aspen Falls Memorial Hospital
Monday, September 24
Chase was standing in the drab waiting room for the administrative wing of the hospital when a strange woman seemed to come out of nowhere. He extended his hand, fighting the sudden surrealism she stirred up.
“Thanks for meeting with me on such short notice, uh”—Chase glanced at the business card in his hand and took special care to pronounce the name—“Ms. Berdichevsky.”
“Call me Birdie.” The woman smiled and bounced on her feet while she shook his hand. Short and dressed in green from head to toe, she made him think of the forest fairies in his kids’ story books. She could as easily have her free arm crooked around a tree trunk as the bunch of manila folders she carried. Birdie’s reddish-brown hair reminded Chase of one of those weed and stick arrangements Bond kept experimenting with in their foyer. He guessed the green scarf clamped around the odd woman’s head served a greater purpose than accessorizing her outfit. A musky, spicy scent filled the air around her, as if set off by undulating exotic plants. He thought it smelled interesting and was grateful it didn’t make him sneeze.
Birdie worked as the organ procurement liaison with the hospital. She’d agreed to give Chase a crash course in the business side of organ donation if he would agree to actually meet a few of the people behind the statistics. He made it clear that while he wanted to get as much background information as possible, he didn’t have the luxury of spending hours in the hospital.
Without divulging any connection to a current case, he let her know time was of the essence.
Chase did his best to keep up with her bounce-hop gait as they moved down the brightly lit corridor.
Birdie waved him on. “Leslie James tells me you need some more information on transplanted people.” Her English was heavily accented. She twisted toward him and he half expected her to leap in the air. This woman broadcast an undeniable high level of energy. Exhausting almost. She grinned. “I am your girl and I will have you out of here in less than an hour with your questions filled.”
Chase always tried to build a broad spectrum of knowledge related to his cases. Little pieces of information had helped close more than one in the past. Ever since David’s death, he’d wanted to understand more about organ donation. The visit to this particular floor of Aspen Falls Memorial made all kinds of sense—both personal and professional. He had asked Leslie James not to tell anyone the reason for his visit. As far as anyone else was to know, he was there for a quick VIP tour.
They stopped in front of a bank of elevators. Three other people joined them while they waited. Conversation stilled but Birdie kept up a steady pulse with her feet—heels and toes, heels and toes.
Polite elevator conversation ended when they exited on the fifth floor. And Birdie’s high energy gave way to quiet dedication. If Chase hadn’t seen it for himself, he wouldn’t have believed the transformation. The woman who almost drove him to distraction in less than three minutes paused, took a deep breath, and gazed into his eyes. “I am going to show you a few people who are waiting for miracles. If they say no to talking to you, it’s no all the way.”
Her manner calm and focused, even as her English proved more of a grasp and a grin, she opened the first folder and glanced quickly at its contents. File closed, she glided in slow motion ahead of Chase, but just beneath the surface he could sense a tiger continued to pace. And bounce.
They entered a lobby area void of people. An older woman sat behind the nurse’s station with a phone pressed against her ear. She waved distractedly at Birdie and motioned toward a set of automatic doors. They walked through them in silence.
This room had several people in it. Most sat in comfortable chairs reading books and magazines. One gentleman lay on a bed, eyes closed. Every one of them in their own world and every one of them hooked up to a machine.
Birdie turned to him. “This is one of the more or minus twenty dialysis centers in Colorado and the only local to give a patient the choice between home and a center for life needs.” She spoke in the low voice of an art museum docent. “Each one of these people breathes because they go through this workout several times a week. Each one of them will die sooner than they were made for if they do not get a kidney. Each one of them is on the waiting list. Each one of them hopes to be transplanted.”
Birdie angled across the room toward a middle-aged man who sat in a reading chair, soft light spilling over his head and broad shoulders. Chase saw the book cover. A Harry Potter but he w
asn’t sure which one. By the size of the tome, he guessed it was one of the earlier ones.
As they neared, the man looked up and a smile split his face. “Bir-die.” His voice resonated a deep bass as he spun her name like a song. Warm and welcoming, he radiated hospitality. “What a pleasure to see you.”
“Mitchell, I’d like you to meet Chase Waters Detective. I am giving him a bit of a trip this morning and you are one of the spotlights.”
Mitchell laughed, deep and sonorous, and Chase knew he’d like to spend more time in this man’s company. A sense of humor when his life depended on a machine? When his days no longer belonged to him but to this room? He must be an amazing person.
“Well, Chase Waters Detective, if Birdie vouches for you, then I’m at your disposal.” His eyes shone with an inner light.
They spent the next ten minutes talking. And to Chase’s surprise—laughing. Mitchell, or Mitch, had just celebrated his sixty-second birthday. Traveling had once been high on his agenda and he hoped it would be again. He and his wife had set foot in many countries, and most continents.
A father of two and grandfather to one, Mitchell loved to play golf, the saxophone, and cards—particularly whist—in that order.
Chase and Mitch shared some musical favorites—from Sarah Vaughn to Charlie Parker—and their conversation never lulled. And yes, with that voice of his, he’d been a professional announcer—on both radio and television. But kidney failure had forced him into early retirement. He missed his life but determined to make the most of each day where he focused on his friends and whatever small joys he could find.
Chase found himself wishing for a little more time with Mitchell, and at his new friend’s invitation, planned to have some follow-up visits where they could talk some more.
“You two hit each other off. I knew this.” Birdie seemed pleased but subdued.
Her flip-side persona still rattled him, yet somehow it worked. Her intense animation transformed into huge compassion when dealing with people whose lives had been stolen, and her hard edges smoothed out when she sucked some of their tragedy into her own body by being near them. Like some weird reactive chameleon, she had an innate sense of the best way to approach people without being phony.
“So, what’s the story? When will Mitchell get his kidney?”
She nodded. Swallowed. Started walking down the hallway. Without looking in his direction she said, “Twenty people die today in this great country waiting to be transplanted. Twenty. Today twenty and tomorrow twenty. And most of those twenty wait for kidney kind of miracle.” She stopped and stared at Chase dead-on. “Mitchell will never have old life. He here to live two more years. Bottoms.”
“But surely in two years—”
“There are larger people up the waiting list than Mitch. People who might die tomorrow. And then there is the problem to match. It happens, but most days for most people it does not. People are more than one hundred fifteen thousand on the waiting list right now. Facebook helped but not enough. New adds to be transplanted rise twice faster than what people choose to give. Mitch does not look good to live.”
Chase wondered what he’d do in Mitch’s place. He thought about the dark pit he’d fallen into after David’s death. About the rubble and destruction he’d carefully walked around—in an attempt to avoid dealing with any feelings. There were differences between what he’d gone through and Mitch’s situation, sure. An uncomfortable awareness settled over him as suspicion grew about where his attitude would fall. He knew he’d be back to visit Mitch at his earliest opportunity—after this case wrapped up. He had a lot to learn.
Birdie took Chase to visit two more people in the hospital. On the way, she filled him in on statistics, ins-and-outs, and details of organ donation, including ethical conflicts that exist even in legitimate operations. All of it in her off-key, but sometimes better than good, English.
Chase watched her, looking for a sign that she might be involved with illegal organ procurement. She certainly had the knowledge and background, but did she have the callousness required? Maybe she was inadvertently assisting somehow.
The next patient they saw, a middle-aged man named Simon, was waiting for a lung. Simon seemed bitter, and although he acknowledged Birdie and forced a kind of politeness at Chase, he didn’t go out of his way to welcome them the way Mitchell had.
While Mitch’s days held soft slow dances, Simon’s were all sharp battles. Chase hated how easily he identified with the surly man. Simon’s angry eyes indicated he had given his life over to energy-draining, negative poisons. Chase saw an image in his mind, of Simon feasting on a venomous plague. The man devoured it. Chase thanked God he’d found his way out of that hopeless realm, but he knew in his heart how quickly he could find himself there again.
Simon would change places with him in an instant—with no regret. Chase understood Simon’s hardened heart, and that scared him more than any article on Santeria ever would.
His cell phone rang. Terri. “What’s up?” He listened for a minute. “Okay, go ahead. Do what you’ve gotta do. An hour isn’t gonna kill us. I’ll contact you if something important comes up.” Terri’s involved in something. So far, not a problem. So far.
The last patient, Juliette, they didn’t talk to. She resembled his Stephanie as she slept. Nine years old. Chase looked at the small form under the covers in her hospital bed and trapped a groan. Juliette needed a heart. She ranked very near the top of the infamous, magical list. Simplifying it a great deal, if a heart became available, and it wasn’t a match for one of the two people higher on the list than Juliette but did match her, she’d automatically move to first place for that organ. A woman slept in a cot next to her bed. Her disheveled appearance marked her as the mother. A plate of picked-over food sat on a tray next to the cot. Hopelessness permeated the air, fused with brutal anger around its edges.
Balloons, wall posters and stuffed animals did little to disguise the institutional purpose of the room. Soft yellows and pink attempted to counter the stainless gray and beige without success. The end result sent the message of a little girl trapped in a nightmare.
Chase felt his own heart quake at the memory of David and all they had lost. He wondered what he would have done if they’d known David needed a new heart, with none readily available. Would he have turned to the black market? Would he have hocked everything to save his son’s life? Even if it meant some stranger—someone he didn’t know or love—might have needlessly died? Been murdered? Chase felt spiders crawl over his conscience and forced the thoughts aside.
He and Birdie moved on to the elevator in silence. When they arrived at the ground floor, Birdie moved as if to slough off a cloak. She waved her arms, still carrying the folders in one, and shook her head, twig-stick hair flapping. A couple of quick kicks with her legs and the energetic, exhausting Birdie re-emerged. Watching her, Chase stalled somewhere between alarm and relief.
“They are all my people, you know. My family. I laugh with them, cry with them, fold my hands to God with them, and sometimes I hold them while they die. It is not easy, but it is my happiness. My gift.”
Chase wondered who had it hardest—Birdie or her “people.”
“Tell me about your experience, Birdie, if it’s not too personal.”
“It is all personal. If not personal, it would not matter.” She peeled off with her skip-step down a hallway leading to the hospital cafeteria. “Do not you worry. We are not eating here—I need to put my eye on a lady for a slice.”
He waited while she veered behind the counter almost bowling over an elderly woman who checked food trays and took the money of hospital diners. Birdie flung the files down by the cash register and wrapped her skinny arms around the woman who did a good job of covering up her surprise—and her smile.
“What in the world?” The old woman’s accent filled the air as she swatted Birdie’s arms away. “Can not you let me do my job the way it is supposed to be done?”
Swinging around, o
ne arm gently guiding her victim, Birdie faced Chase. “Irina, I’d like you to meet Chase Waters Detective. I am gifting him my people today. Chase, this is the amazing woman, Mrs. Irina Kostakov.”
The woman’s eyes flicked to meet his for a moment, then fell away. Chase nodded in acknowledgement as a faint blush stained her wrinkled cheeks. “I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs. Kostakov.
Birdie released her arm and planted a kiss on Irina’s cheek. The wrinkled woman reached up and cupped Birdie’s face in her hands, murmuring something to her in Russian. Eyes welling, Birdie gave one last hug and began flip-flopping back the way they’d come before Chase could react. A smile and another nod toward Mrs. Kostakov, then he hurried to catch up to the dashing woman. He decided Birdie was aptly named—always taking off in flight.
“Irina had a son. I am transplanted because of his bone. He and friends fly into Aspen to play golf and crash plane into Aspen Mountain. Irina live in state of New Jersey, but push herself here to be to the end place her son breathed.” Birdie did a hop-dance and turned to face him. “And be near me, I think. I am filled with life and alive and sticking my feet down today because of her Alexi.”
Stunned, Chase asked, “How did you find out the name of your donor?” Had they missed something when David died? There were so many forms.
“Both the transplanted people must agree to have their name said. Or, in the case of Alexi, his next of line. She did, I did, so we did.”
Chase looked at his watch. He’d been here almost thirty minutes, and although he’d become aware of the life-or-death urgency for organ donations, he had a couple more questions. “Are all of the transplant surgeries done here at Memorial?”
“For regular money people.”
“What do you mean?”
“People who are transplanted by insurance visit Memorial.”
“Where else is there?”
“High money people go to here or the clinic.”
“A clinic?”
“Private. Preston Clinic.”