Drue managed a smug smile. “Wasn’t Jazmin. It was Neesa. Wearing Jazmin’s hat and keeping her head down.”
“You said something on the phone about Zee being involved?” he prompted.
“Yeah. Zee, he saw the same videos as me. But he never…” She yawned.
“Have you told Brice about any of this?” he asked.
“Hmm?” Her eyelids felt like lead and she was feeling light-headed and nauseous.
“Does Brice know about any of this?” Ben repeated.
“Not yet. Zee’s his friend…”
She managed, with difficulty, to stand up. She stumbled slightly as she headed toward her bedroom.
“Are you okay?” Ben asked, scrambling to his feet and following behind.
“Sleep,” she mumbled. “I gotta sleep. Call me later. Okay? Bye.”
“Yeah, I’ll give you a call,” Ben said. “Sweet dreams.”
Drue heard the front door closing just about the time her stomach began to cramp. She staggered to the bathroom and retched violently.
She was still clinging to the commode, five minutes later, when she heard the front door open and footsteps going down the hall, rapidly, toward the kitchen. She opened her mouth to cry out but she was too weak and too sick. A moment later, she heard the door close again. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her breaths were coming in shallow gasps.
Come back, Ben, she whimpered silently.
What was happening to her? She was cold. So very cold. Her hands felt like ice.
At some point, she either passed out or fell asleep. When she came to, she had no concept of time. Her face was pressed against the cold tile of the bathroom floor. Something was very wrong. She had to get to the phone, had to call for help.
She grasped the edge of the bathtub and tried to pull up to a sitting position. Her arms and legs felt like spaghetti, and her head was throbbing. She sank back onto the floor, sobbing with frustration. Minutes passed, or maybe hours. She wasn’t sure.
Her stomach cramped again and she clung to the commode, hanging her head over the side. She reached for a towel and mopped her face with it. She heard the faint ringing of her phone from the other room. Where was it? The kitchen? Living room? Her head was so fuzzy.
She sat up slowly and tried again to pull herself up. This time, she made it, although the stabbing pain in her knee reminded her of the ordeal she’d recently put it through. She clung to the towel bar and lurched forward, grasping the edge of the doorway for stability. Then, slowly, down the narrow hallway, stopping every few inches, until she reached the living room.
By the time she flopped down onto the sofa, the ringing had stopped, and she had no idea where the phone actually was. Her stomach cramped again and she prayed that the feeling would subside, because she had no strength to make it back to the bathroom.
She was lying on the sofa when the doorbell rang. She tried to sit up but was too weak. It rang a second time, and then a third. “Help,” she whispered, her breaths coming in short, shallow bursts.
A man’s voice called out, impatient. “Drue? You home? Drue? It’s Jonah.”
“I’m here,” she tried to call. But the words came out as little more than a whimper.
“Okay, damnit,” he called. “I can take a hint. But you could have at least let me know you changed your mind about going out before I drove out here tonight.”
She heard a second voice now, another man.
“Hey Drue?” He knocked on the door. “Hey Drue, it’s Corey. You home?” She heard the two men conversing in low tones, but was still too weak to get to the door. She heard the doorknob turn and then rattle. It was locked!
More muffled conversation. And then nothing. Drue rolled onto her side. She couldn’t catch her breath, couldn’t speak.
And then she heard the sliding-glass door, catching in the track, then slowly, agonizingly slow, someone shoved it open.
“Drue!” Corey and Jonah looked down at her.
“My God, what happened?” Corey asked, kneeling on the floor beside the sofa.
“Sick,” she croaked. “Can’t … can’t…”
He pressed his fingertips to her neck, near her jaw, then bent his head to her chest and listened. He looked back at Jonah. “Her pulse is weak and her heartbeat is faint and her skin is clammy. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear she’s overdosed. Call nine-one-one.”
She passed out.
* * *
“Drue? Drue? Come on, friend. Time to wake up.” Hands patted her face.
She opened her eyes slowly. A woman in green surgical scrubs sat on the bed beside her. She was in some sort of curtained-off cubicle, with harsh overhead lighting. An IV tree stood beside her bed and plastic tubing snaked to an IV line attached to her arm.
She blinked and took a breath. She was better. Hell, she was better than better, she was alive.
“You gave us a scare tonight,” the woman said. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”
“Happened?”
“You overdosed alone, at your home today,” the woman said. “If your friends hadn’t gotten there when they did, you would have died.”
“Overdosed on what?” Drue asked, confused. “I don’t do drugs.”
The woman sighed. “Honey, you can lie to your friends and family, but denial doesn’t work in here. We found the bottle of pills in your purse.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Drue protested. “I swear, I don’t do drugs.”
“We found a bottle of OxyContin in your purse,” the doctor said. “When your blood work comes back, I’m pretty sure we’ll find it was laced with fentanyl. Which could have killed you.”
Drue bristled. “Who are you?”
“I’m Judy Trew, and I’m the attending physician here.”
“Where’s here?” Drue asked.
“You’re in the emergency room at St. Anthony’s. You’re a lucky girl, you know. If that hunky friend of yours hadn’t recognized the signs and told the EMTs to administer Narcan when they did, you’d be just another sad opioid statistic.”
“Dr. Trew,” Drue said, choosing her words slowly. “I did not intentionally take Oxy. You can believe me or not, but I can’t take any kind of codeine. I’m deathly allergic. It gives me a horrible reaction.”
“Nausea, vomiting, like that?” the doctor asked.
“Exactly. I had knee surgery back in January and the strongest thing I could take was Advil. If you don’t believe me, you can check with the surgeon who treated me. Or you can check with the company that drug-tested me when I started my new job last month.”
“Okay, calm down,” the doctor said. “Morphine allergies are pretty rare, but what you have is called a pseudo-allergy, and the effects are just about the same. In your case, the other reason you’re probably alive is because you puked up most of the fentanyl before it could kill you.”
“Lucky me,” Drue said bitterly.
“I’m going to take this IV out now,” Dr. Trew said, donning gloves.
Drue looked away, she felt the tape being ripped from her skin, and a moment later, the deed was done.
“So how did that Oxy get in your system, and where did that bottle of pills come from?” Dr. Trew asked.
“A gift from a friend,” Drue said grimly. “Former friend, that is.”
55
Drue was perched on the edge of the bed when the curtain of the treatment room parted and Brice Campbell’s formidable presence filled the tiny, claustrophobic space.
Wordlessly, he folded her into his arms, crushing her to his chest, stroking her hair, rocking back and forth, crooning something over and over again, but she couldn’t quite make out the muffled words. Finally, he held her at arm’s length, searching her face for … something.
“You’re all right,” he repeated. “Thank God, you’re all right.”
She managed a weary smile. “Well, thank God plus Corey and Jonah.” Now she was blinking back tears. “Dad, I’m okay. Really. I’m okay.”
/> He let out a long, exasperated sigh, running his hand through his hair. “Tell me the truth,” he said sternly. “Are you just saying that to get me off your back?”
“No!” she exclaimed.
His eyes held hers. “Drue, the doctor told us. You overdosed. On OxyContin. Honey, talk to me. Seriously, I’m not going to judge, but if you have a problem, you need to be honest with me, so I can get you help.”
“Dad! I swear. I promise you, I am not a pill head! It was Ben. He tried to kill me.”
“Ben? Our Ben? Ben Fentress?” Brice looked stricken. “That’s just nuts. It must be the pills talking.”
“It is not the damned Oxy!” she cried. “Ben came over this afternoon. He brought me a kale smoothie that he’d spiked with Oxy, which the doctor just told me was itself spiked with fentanyl. Only he didn’t know that I’m allergic, sort of, to drugs with codeine. It makes me violently ill. So I puked up most of it—before the fentanyl could kill me.”
Brice shook his head sadly. “Why would Ben do something like that? You’re friends. You’re colleagues, for God’s sake!”
Drue slid off the examining table, hurriedly pulling the hospital gown closed. She swayed slightly, grasping the edge of the table for balance.
“I figured it all out today. When Neesa came to my house, she admitted most of what we’d already guessed. That Byars made her help him after he killed Jazmin. And Dad, it was just like what I thought. He called Jazmin, just as she was going off shift, to tell her to come to that room. And when she got there, he was waiting. And there’s more—”
“I don’t care about that,” Brice interrupted. “Talk to me about Ben Fentress and why you think he would try to kill you.”
“I am so stupid,” Drue said, smacking her forehead. “Such a freakin’ idiot. I basically called Ben this afternoon and practically invited him over to try and kill me.”
She walked unsteadily over to a narrow locker in the corner of the room.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for my damned clothes.” She flung open the door of the locker and found a large plastic baggie containing her belongings. She opened the bag and fished out her cut-off yoga pants, sliding them up beneath the gown. The T-shirt was next, but it was spattered with still-damp vomit.
“Eew. Gross.” She dropped the shirt onto the floor of the locker. When she glanced over at her father, he was staring at her, momentarily speechless.
“Shoes, Dad!” she said, impatiently snapping her fingers. “Where are my shoes?”
“You’re not leaving here,” Brice said. “The doctor said they’ll probably admit you, as soon as a bed opens up.”
“Nope.” She fished her bra out of the bag, turned her back to her father and proceeded to don it.
“I’m not checking in, I’m checking out,” she announced.
“To do what, exactly?” he asked. “You can’t even stand up straight. You came here by ambulance, Drue. Five hours ago you were found unconscious in a pool of your own vomit. You practically flat-lined.”
“I’m not near death. I’m a little groggy, is all.” She pushed past him and poked her head out of the curtain. “I know Corey and Jonah are the ones who found me and called nine-one-one. Where are they?”
“I sent them home,” Brice said. “They wanted to stay, but I convinced them to go. Frankly, I think they were relieved because they didn’t want to be here when I confronted you about your drug use.”
He paused. “They found the pill bottle in your purse, Drue. Your friend Corey went looking, so he could tell the EMTs what you’d overdosed on.”
Drue was so angry she was shaking. “Why is it so damned hard for you to believe that I am not a pill freak? I already told you, I don’t do drugs. Didn’t I pass your stupid drug test? As for that pill bottle, I’m sure Ben planted that in my purse so that when you found my body, you’d come to the conclusion you are so eager to reach.”
Brice looked stricken. “I want to believe you, but this story of yours is just not credible. Listen to yourself, Drue. You’re telling me that Ben tried to kill you with a smoothie? Where’s the smoothie?”
She closed her eyes and tried to find an elusive sense of calm.
“He came back,” she said, remembering one of the last moments before she passed out the first time. “I started getting really woozy after I’d drunk about half the smoothie. He didn’t have the balls to hang around and watch me die. I’d crawled into the bathroom, and I heard the front door open, and then footsteps. I tried to call out to him for help. I didn’t realize he’d deliberately poisoned me. I bet he came back to collect the evidence—the smoothie.”
She snapped her fingers again. “My files. The files and all my index cards. I bet he took them too.”
“You’re still not making sense,” Brice repeated. “What does Ben have to do with Neesa Vincent or Jazmin Mayes?”
“He figured it out. All of it. Somehow, he tracked Neesa down after Jimmy Zee couldn’t. She claimed she didn’t tell him anything, but he figured it out. I think he went to the hotel’s insurance company and convinced them to pay him to keep what he knew quiet.”
“That doesn’t sound like Ben,” Brice argued. “He’s a computer geek. Not a blackmailer. Certainly not a killer.”
“Just get me out of here, okay?” Drue pleaded. “Sign the discharge papers, do whatever it takes, but get me out, and I’ll explain everything. And then we’ve gotta call Rae Hernandez and let her know what happened.” She grasped his arm. “Please, Dad? You have to trust me. We can’t let Ben get away with this.”
Brice nodded reluctantly. “Stay here, okay? I’ll see what I can do.”
When he’d gone, Drue slumped back down on the examining table. She’d almost dozed off when the curtain parted again.
Brice stepped inside the cubicle and tossed her a set of green surgical scrubs. He set a pair of purple plastic Crocs on the table beside them.
“Okay, you’re sprung.”
“Sweet. Turn around, will you?”
He did as she asked and she quickly discarded the cut-offs and the hospital gown and dressed in the scrubs, which were two sizes too big.
“All done,” she announced. “Let’s go.”
“Take my arm,” he said gruffly, as they moved down the hallway toward the exit. The Crocs squeaked loudly on the linoleum tile with every step she took.
“Where’d you get the clothes and shoes?” she asked, as the automatic doors slid open.
“Money talks,” he said. He steered her gently toward the Mercedes, which was parked under the emergency room portico, with the flashers blinking. As they approached, a hospital security guard who’d been lounging nearby stepped closer.
“All set?” he asked.
Brice reached out and shook the guard’s hands, obviously passing him some currency.
“All set, thanks.”
56
“Hey, you guys.” They turned to see Jonah Kelleher emerge from the shadows at the edge of the portico. He was still dressed for the date that Drue had forgotten about, although his necktie was long gone and his blue dress shirt was stained and wrinkled.
“Jonah!” Drue exclaimed. “I thought Dad sent you home.”
He shrugged. “I couldn’t just leave, not knowing if you’d be okay.”
She touched his arm. “That’s so sweet. I’m good. Thanks to you and Corey.”
His dark blue eyes took in her bedraggled appearance, skunk hair, oversize scrubs and all. “You don’t look so hot.”
“Flatterer.”
Jonah nodded at Brice. “It’s pretty late. If you want, I can take her home. I mean, we did have a date tonight.”
“You did?” Brice looked at Drue. “Really?”
“Really,” Drue replied. “But we’re not going home. We’re going after the guy who did this to me.”
“Huh?”
“It’s a long story, and I don’t have the energy to tell it twice,” she said. “You might as well hear it at t
he same time as Dad.”
Brice opened the back door of the Mercedes with a flourish. “Get in, son.”
As soon as everybody was in the car, Drue turned to her father and put out her hand. “I need your phone.”
He handed it over without comment. She gazed down at it and swore softly. “I don’t have Rae’s cell number. It’s on my phone, which I don’t have.”
Jonah snaked his hand over the headrests. “Here. I brought it with me.”
She turned around and flashed him a grateful smile, then scrolled through the recent calls on her phone until she found the detective’s number, grimacing when she noticed the time.
“She’s gonna kill me for calling her at one-thirty in the morning.”
* * *
Drue put the phone on loudspeaker. Rae Hernandez’s voice sounded distinctly pissy. “What?”
“Rae?” Drue said meekly. “I’m sorry, but this really is urgent. I’m just leaving the emergency room with my dad. Ben Fentress tried to kill me earlier tonight.”
“Wait. Who? Is this connected to the Jazmin Mayes thing?”
“Yes, it’s all about Jazmin. Ben works with me, at the law firm, on the Justice Line, but he also does some of the firm’s IT work. He somehow saw the security videos from the hotel and figured out what was going on. He tracked Neesa down and somehow, he put it all together. I think he must have gone to the hotel’s insurance company and shared what he knew, for a payoff.”
“Okay…” Hernandez’s voice trailed off. “You’ve lost me now.”
“Ben was my friend. I confided in him that I thought there was something shady about the way my dad’s law firm handled the case.” Her face flushed with embarrassment. “I even told him that at first, I thought my dad had taken a payoff.”
Drue shot her father an apologetic look. “Ben knew I was looking into Gulf Vista. I even called him Friday night to tell him I was going over there and needed a wingman. He didn’t answer his phone, so I left him a message. And then, after we got the goods on Neesa today, I mean yesterday, I called him again, to tell him about the arrest.”
She took a deep breath. “I told him Neesa mentioned that she’d talked to ‘some dude.’ I just assumed it was Jimmy Zee, our investigator. The next thing I know, he was standing on my doorstep, with a kale smoothie, pumping me for all the details.”
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