Nerves of Steel

by CJ Lyons

  "Now, you see boys, that's how a real gentleman treats a lady," Spanos observed loudly from the bar, trying to regain the upper hand. "Hey, Cassie. Ask him about what happened last summer. Ask him where his last girlfriend ended up."

  CHAPTER 17

  Drake ignored Spanos' jibes and joined Hart outside. Thick snowflakes swirled through the air, melting as soon as they hit the street. It would turn to sleet or rain soon enough.

  He had to jog to catch up with her. Damn, she moved fast for someone so short. Suddenly, she pivoted and stared at him. He was tempted to reach out and brush the melting snowflakes from her hair, but the look on her face stopped him.

  "What was that all about?" she asked.

  "Sorry 'bout that." No sense dragging her into this mess.

  "You're just like him, aren't you?"

  He winced at the tone of disappointment before realizing he'd similarly judged her after witnessing her encounter with her ex. Lumping her in with all the domestic violence calls he'd taken over the years. Not the same thing, he told himself. Not the same at all.

  "Hell, no," he said. "I'm much better looking, don't you think?" They stopped at the light on Aiken. Hart's glare could have drilled through diamonds. How could he tell her that he was worse than Spanos; that because of him a woman died last summer?

  "Is anything going to happen because of what he did?"

  Drake took a step closer to her. The light had changed, but neither of them moved from the curb. "Why? What did he do?"

  She frowned, looked away. "Nothing. He--nothing."

  He took her arm, but she shook him off. "What happened?"

  "Nothing. That's the point isn't it? Someone like Spanos, a cop for chrissake, doesn't need to do anything to intimidate someone, to make them feel..." Her face colored once more. "Damn, I hate bullies. He just made me so angry." She darted across the street, and he followed, ignoring the honking from a gray Olds.

  "Don't worry, Hart. After the way you walked out on him," Drake smiled at the thought of her exit from the Stone, head high, stride firm--regal, that was the word, "it's gonna get around that Spanos let a little woman get the best of him."

  "Damn it, don't you see? He shouldn't be allowed to treat anyone, man or woman, that way. How'd a Neanderthal like him get on the force anyway?"

  "Spanos is a good cop. You just caught him at a bad time."

  "Why's that?"

  "You were with me," he admitted.

  "I take it you two tangled over a woman."

  "You could say that." Now Drake was the uncomfortable one.

  They reached her car, a blue Subaru Impreza coupe. Drake liked the color for her, bright yet rich at the same time. Five speed, he noted as she opened the door and slid inside. It suited her need to control, to take responsibility for everything.

  "I'm going to nail whoever's stealing the FX," he told her, breaking one of his cardinal rules. Never make a promise you can't keep--it was written in stone, along with: always watch your partner's back, first call for backup.

  Her gaze was bleak as she looked past him at the towering medical center. "I only hope it's before I have to send more kids to the ICU. Or the morgue."

  "Nice to know I inspire such confidence."

  In response, she merely shrugged and closed the door. He watched her drive away. Every time he and Hart got together, he forgot about the case or being professional. Somehow he seemed destined to always piss her off.

  Drake hunched his shoulders against the wind, lowered his head as he trudged toward his Mustang. Probably safer that way. Otherwise things might end up like they had last summer with Pamela. With him suspended. And a woman dead.

  CHAPTER 18

  "Cassandra Rose Hart," Kwon addressed the task force members, sounding like a school teacher in front of a group of unruly students. Which was pretty much what they resembled. Drake, Kwon and Summers from Major Crimes, two guys from Narcotics, and one of the DA's investigators, the only one wearing a suit and tie, of course. And Dimeo, watching from the rear of the room, the school principal waiting to send someone to detention.

  "Age thirty, native of Pittsburgh, parents deceased, no other family that we've found. Residency at Three Rivers, been there as attending ER physician almost two years now."

  He stretched his legs, resting them on the back of Summers' chair. They had appropriated roll-call to meet and brainstorm new approaches to the investigation now that it was focused on Three Rivers Medical Center.

  Kwon continued, "No wants, no warrants, record's squeaky clean."

  The others raised their heads at that. Squeaky clean usually meant something dirty hidden somewhere. And money or influence to hide it with. Drake remembered Richard King's shoes that cost more than a month's salary and wondered about that.

  "Finances?" Lisa Dimeo asked from the back, echoing his thoughts. She was a thin, bony blonde who favored conservative suits and an even more conservative attitude to the concept of probable cause. Dimeo was not there to make a case, she was there to make a career. At every meeting, she would stand against the back wall as if afraid to contaminate herself by getting too close to the grunts who gathered her evidence.

  "Worked as a waitress and hotel maid to put herself through Duquesne, then Pitt Medical school," Kwon said.

  Drake could tell by the gleam in Kwon's eye that she was holding something back. Dimeo nodded in dismissal, her face resuming its bored expression. Hunters and gatherers, that was what they were to Dimeo.

  "Married and divorced Richard King," Kwon continued, her voice bland. "Divorce settlement sealed by King's attorney, his brother Alan."

  Summers sat up, jostling his chair and knocking Drake's feet from the back rung. "King? As in Asshole, Asswipe and Pee-U?"

  A snicker came from one of the Narcotic guys. Every cop knew the law firm of Arthur King, Alan King and Paul Ulrich. Knew and dreaded. The Kings were known for shredding cops on the witness stand, took pride in making Pittsburgh's finest look like idiots.

  Kwon smiled and nodded. "Richard is Alan's brother and Arthur's nephew."

  "Shit, we'll never nail this fucker."

  Dimeo strode forward, her heels clicking on the linoleum. The six detectives swiveled to look at her. Her face held the gleam of a predator scenting blood. "One of our principles is connected to the King family?"

  Drake groaned. He could see where this was going. A chance for a prosecutor to derail the powerful King family was worth more than a pair of Steeler season tickets. A solid gold chit to bigger and better things: State's Attorney office, judgeships, political office.

  "Hart divorced Richard King last year. The paperwork's sealed, but King recently returned to Pittsburgh after attending a drug and alcohol rehabilitation clinic. The State Board of Medicine restored his license, now he's back at Three Rivers." Kwon paused, her eyes gleaming as if she were ready to hit a home run. "King's brother, Alan, is Lester Young's attorney of record. And," the men all hunched forward in their seats, listening, "I found Richard King's name in two separate incident reports involving Young."

  "What kind of incidents?" Summers asked.

  "Routine witness statements surrounding two drug busts. One at the downtown Hilton, the other at Gateway Plaza. Both times King claimed he was just at the wrong place, wrong time, didn't see anything, didn't know anything. Fine upstanding citizen that he is, no one pursued it. Alan King was able to get the charges on Young thrown out on both occasions, so the investigations stopped before they went farther."

  "Until now," the DA investigator put in.

  "Either one, King or Hart, could be our source." Dimeo mulled this over, liking it. "Or both. Supplying Young with drugs they picked up at Three Rivers."

  "What about the new rave over at the West End Bridge?" Drake interjected, trying to deflect their attention from Hart. It was too early to be focusing on only one suspect. Especially when he was certain Hart had nothing to do with the FX thefts.

  "That might be where the teeny-boppers are buying, but
we need to get the actor behind all this. And now we know it has to be someone with a connection to Three Rivers Medical Center," Dimeo said. Kwon nodded her agreement. "We can't afford to let another high level source to slip through our fingers." They all looked at Drake, as if he was responsible for Lester's death.

  "So we focus on Three Rivers," Kwon said. "Especially Richard King."

  "If they're divorced, spousal privilege no longer applies," Dimeo said. "Nail Hart. Then we can use her to get King."

  CHAPTER 19

  One of the advantages of working nights was being always able to find a parking space when you drove home in the morning. Cassie pulled into an open spot halfway up Gettysburg Street's hill. Point Breeze was one of those Pittsburgh neighborhoods whose residents still sat out on their stoops in nice weather, and if you put a kitchen chair out to save a parking place, no one would dream of moving it. People who lived in the upscale condos Downtown or in chic Shadyside thought of Point Breeze as "quaint", but to Cassie it was just home, the only home she had ever known.

  She waved across the street to Mrs. Ferrara who, despite the flurries and the rain forecast for later that day, was washing the outside of her front parlor windows. Cassie noticed the streaky grime that coated her own windows and grimaced. Gram Rosa would have been mortified.

  She climbed the concrete steps to her front door, closed the solid oak door behind her, leaned against it, and the turbulence of the night's events faded from her mind. A few breaths later, and she felt the calmness of the house begin to envelope her. She looked around her living room with its comfortable familiarity. Her father's favorite chair still waited for him, his pipe and tobacco resting nearby. Rosa's silk shawl sprawled over the back of the sofa, its bright colors repeated in the pillows at either end.

  Cassie hung up her coat, kicked off her boots, and traced one finger over the fringe of the shawl. Hennessy, her fat tortoiseshell cat, head-butted her shin, pushing her into the kitchen. Cassie translated the accompanying meows as: feeding fat cats should come before everything else. Conceding the point, she measured a cup of the special diet cat food the vet charged outrageously for. Hennessy sat back on her haunches looking from the bowl with its meager offerings to Cassie.

  "Sorry, girl, that's all you're allowed." She scratched behind the cat's ears. Hennessy stiffened her tail in indignation and stalked from the room.

  Cassie sighed. Some days you just couldn't please anyone.

  After an hour in the basement with her weights and heavy bag, she finally exhausted herself enough to entertain sleep as an option. She fell asleep in her sweat soaked T-shirt and shorts, face down on her bed, Gram Rosa's heavy velvet patchwork quilt blanketing her.

  Sleep for Cassie was often elusive and never restful. How could it be with so many people clamoring for her attention? Patients she could have, should have saved. Her mother, who she'd never known and who had died because of her. Gram Rosa with her scent of lilac and lavender. Her father's face, gaunt and twisted by pain, silhouetted by broken glass glistening in winter sunlight.

  All the people who loved her--all gone now, except in her dreams.

  Today she dreamed of dancing on the deck of a ship, a man's arms holding her close. She closed her eyes, her body humming with anticipation, but then opened them as his grip on her waist tightened. Richard grinned down at her.

  "You'll always be mine, Ella," he said, holding her fast when she tried to run.

  She thrashed beneath the heavy quilt, fighting to escape Richard. The thick collection of satin and velvet had once saved Rosa's life, but it was powerless to protect Cassie from her nightmares.

  Finally, she left her dreams behind. As always, she woke alone in a silent house. The same dark gloom that had greeted her this morning shadowed the room even though her bedside clock said four-fifty pm. Cassie lay in bed a few minutes, fantasizing about sunlit beaches and ocean surf.

  Her grandparents had taken her to Wildwood every summer when she was a child. A month before he died, her grandfather, Padraic, had won the ceramic ballerina sitting on her dresser there, at a Boardwalk arcade. As the ancient furnace fired up, making the lace curtains ruffle, she tried to pretend the movement came from an ocean breeze.

  The February wind rattled the windows, its icy tendrils shattering her fantasy, and she gave up. She gathered enough energy to shower and feed herself while the cat watched, forever hopeful.

  Several messages had come in while she slept. The first was from Richard. "I'm sorry about what happened last night." His voice sounded sincere and earnest. "I'll see you tonight. I promise things will be different this time."

  Fran's voice came through the machine next, eager with excitement. "I've been playing around with this treatment failure idea and I think there's more going on. The fentephex is just the tip of the iceberg. I'm staying late at work, come talk to me before you start your shift. Bye."

  More to the FX thefts? Did Fran mean more than one person involved? Or had other drugs gone missing as well? Cassie tapped the edge of the buffet. Maybe she should call Drake. No, Fran would have already called him. Best just to get over to Three Rivers and see what Fran had found.

  Drake would probably already be there, huddled with Fran, both sharing a joke, the mystery solved by the time Cassie arrived.

  The roads were slick as she drove from Point Breeze to Three Rivers. Sleet flung itself at her windshield with the ferocity of a kamikaze. Cassie pulled her Impreza into the employee parking lot and raced across the blacktop, dodging raindrops.

  Fran would be waiting for her. It would be nice if she had solved the riddle of the FX source. Anything to put a stop to this epidemic of dead and dying children.

  Cassie hesitated at the stairwell, wanting to go up to the fourth floor and check on Brian Winston and Jane Doe, but there was no time. As she opened the door leading down to the Annex tunnel, her cell phone trilled. Probably Fran.

  "I'm on my way," she said into the receiver.

  "You'd better hurry," came a muffled voice.

  Cassie frowned, definitely not Fran. "I'm sorry, who is this?"

  "How fast can you run?" the voice continued. "Your friend is counting on you. Hurry or it will be too late."

  "Who is this? I think you have the wrong number." A clenching in her chest told her the caller had not misdialed.

  "Ask your friend."

  "Cassie." Fran's voice now, high pitched and strangled with fear. "Please hurry. He says he'll hurt me."

  "Fran?" Her voice reverberated from the concrete walls of the stairwell, echoing with the pounding of her heart. "Where are you? Are you all right?"

  "Head back to your car, Dr. Hart," the first voice returned. "Run. Run fast."

  Clutching the phone so tightly she feared it might slip from her sweaty grasp, she did as she was told and raced back the way she'd come. "Please, don't hurt her."

  She rushed past a security guard at the hospital entrance and beckoned for him to accompany her. The guard looked at her as if she was crazy, but heaved his bulk from his stool and plodded after her. She pushed through the doors, scanning the parking lot.

  "Where are you?" Fear slashed at her, as icy as the sleet. She turned towards her Subaru.

  "Who you talking to?" the guard asked her as he stumbled out into the rain, fumbling with a golf umbrella.

  "Too late, Doctor." The voice returned. "Maybe if you move fast you can still save your friend."

  The sound of a gunshot echoed in Cassie's ears. "Fran!" she screamed, but the wind devoured her voice. A dark form ran from the parking lot, quickly lost in the night.

  "Get a trauma team out here," she shouted at the guard as she sprinted toward her car.

  Fran lay beside the Impreza, blood bubbling from a jagged wound in her neck. Cassie knelt in the freezing rain, frantically applying pressure to the massive wound, ignoring the lurching in her stomach as she focused on Fran. Bright red blood sprayed between Cassie's fingers, showering her with crimson warmth. Fran's eyes were open, lif
e still in them, but she was unable to speak.

  "Sshh, it's all right," Cassie crooned. Fran's wrists were bound with strapping tape, but she somehow found the strength to reach up and clutch Cassie's arm. Blood gurgled around Cassie's fingers. Fran's lips formed words Cassie was powerless to translate.

  "Fran, I'm sorry. It's all my fault. I should have never gotten you mixed up in all this." She bent over Fran, trying to keep the rain out of her friend's face. There was little other comfort she could give and nothing more she could do until the trauma team arrived.

  She heard the sound of voices, glanced up to see the trauma team rushing a gurney stacked with equipment toward them. Thank God. "Help is on the way," she told Fran. "Hold on."

  Fran's eyes closed, her body fell limp. Cassie reached for a pulse. It was gone. No! She straddled her friend's body and began chest compressions, but each one forced more blood from the awful wound.

  The surgeon examined the damage and shook his head. "You can stop CPR."

  "No--we can get her up to the OR, repair the damage. Damn it, why isn't someone getting me a line, we need to push Oneg!"

  The team stared at her. The surgeon took her arm. "Look around you. She bled out, it's too late."

  Cassie blinked hard, finally looked down. Blood streamed off her clothes. Fran lay in a large puddle of dark red fluid so thick the pounding rain couldn't begin to wash it away.

  A silent scream tore through her, lodging in her throat before she could give it voice. She rocked back on her heels, raising her bloody hands from Fran's still chest.

  "She never had a chance," someone murmured.

  CHAPTER 20

  What everyone failed to understand, Cassie thought as wind and sleet and people swirled around her, was that Fran did have a chance. She would be alive if she hadn't been Cassie's friend, if she hadn't agreed to help her.

  If she hadn't trusted Cassie. The thought reverberated through her like a church bell tolling a call to worship as she was jostled by yet another uniformed policeman attempting to cordon off the crime scene.