Imperfect Contract

by Brickman, Gregg E.

  The living room looked tidy. Van had arranged the meager furnishings to their best advantage. She'd been replacing her old furniture with things she liked, taking time to acquire good pieces at low prices.

  Seeing nothing wrong, I decided to check out the bedroom. I knew if she came home and found me snooping around, she'd be pissed.

  "Van," I called.

  That's when I heard a moan and a rubbing sound. I hurried into the bedroom and didn't see anything at first except the king-sized bed centered on the wall to the right and the usual furnishings. The duffle had disappeared from the floor near the dresser. I glanced into the bathroom. Empty. The signs of a man in residence gone.

  Still searching, I hurried around the bed, not seeing see her at first.

  Van lay crumbled in the corner. Nursing intuition told me she hadn't been there long. Blood seeped from her wounds, but little soaked her clothing or the carpet—yet. I missed the assault by, perhaps, ten minutes—the time it had taken me to stop for soda.

  She wore a swimming suit under an ankle length cover-up. Had her intent to go to the beach enraged her attacker?

  I knelt next to her and touched her face in the only spot that didn't look battered and swollen. She withdrew even further into the corner. A long gash next to her right eye dripped blood. Her left arm bent at about thirty-degrees between the elbow and the wrist, and her left leg lay at an unnatural angle as well. Several smaller wounds required stitches.

  "What happened?"

  "Craig." A murmur.

  "Craig did this to you?"

  She didn't respond.

  That was why she covered the mouthpiece and why she whispered. Craig had prompted her conversation. I had given her an excuse to deny his presence by suggesting she had a sore throat.

  "Van, I'm going to call 911. Don't move."

  She opened her left eye and looked at me. Recognition flickered.

  "He's not here. The car is gone. It looks like all his stuff is gone, too."

  "Craig did it."

  "I know."

  "Craig did it," she said again, her voice almost inaudible. She shivered.

  I held her cool, damp right hand a moment as she went into shock. Time to get moving.

  First, I called 9-1-1. Then, supporting her neck, I eased her down so her head lie on the same level as her chest, pulled the quilt off the bed to cover her, and raised her good leg on a couple of pillows. It was as close to a shock position as possible under the circumstances. I didn't know about other injuries, and I didn't want to risk moving her. I'd keep her warm and wait with her.

  I called Ray.

  He said, "I'm on my way, but it'll take a few minutes. You're out of my jurisdiction. I'll call Tamarac while en route."

  I sat next to Vanessa on the floor to wait for help to arrive. I squeezed her hand. "Sweetie, help is on the way. Hang in there."

  The paramedics arrived first. I heard the male voices outside the door and saw Van shudder and pull closer to the wall. She looked terrified. This appeared to be the worst beating he'd ever given her. So much for faith, I thought, going out to meet the medics.

  I watched from a distance as they applied a neck collar, coaxed her from the corner, and fitted splints to her broken limbs. With the use of a slim board, they lifted her onto a stretcher, then paused to inspect her for other obvious injuries. Healing bruises covered her arms and legs, and a huge swollen, purple mark distorted her abdomen. Her belly went rigid when they touched her.

  "Internal injuries." The taller of the two paramedics said. "Let's get moving."

  From bits of overheard conversation, I surmised her blood pressure was low. They needed to hurry.

  As Ray pulled into the parking lot with two Tamarac patrol cars following, the medics whisked her out the door. When I leaned over the balcony and waved, he signaled me to stay put. He'd talk to the paramedics and get a look at Van before coming upstairs.

  I hung around the apartment while the cops talked and added the small amount of information I could. At noon, I grabbed her keys and locked the door, following Tamarac's finest to the parking lot.

  Ray and I headed toward the hospital in our separate vehicles. The Tamarac detectives would be there, attempting to get a statement from Vanessa. I decided to stop by my house and change clothes. Van was safe, and I didn't want to arrive at the hospital in my swimwear and skimpy cover-up. The side trip wouldn't take long.

  30

  The tiny hairs on the back of my neck stood up when I climbed out of my Mini in the driveway. Even with the windows and front door closed, I heard Sunshine barking. Odd. As far as I knew, there was no reason to bark. Maybe he saw a cat in the backyard, but that would be a stretch from his crate. The cat would have to be in the right spot, intent on staying put.

  I moved my car across the cul-de-sac and into the neighbor's garage. I knew the code for the door since I watched their cat when they were on vacation. I exchanged my sandals for a pair of tennis shoes from the trunk and decided to work my way around to the back of the house to see if there was anything there to alarm the dog—or me for that matter.

  My immediate neighbor's fence extended to the lake. Thanks to the drought, I walked around the end, avoiding both water and mud in the process. I proceeded around the bushes and into the cul-de-sac south of mine. From there, I traversed the neighbor's property and claimed a good view of my empty back and side yards without being visible myself. With some difficulty from cramping in my right hip, I climbed the fence in the corner of my yard, behind the allamandas.

  All for nothing.

  I didn't hear Sunshine yapping. Maybe his tormentor was the neighbor's cat.

  I peeked into the back bedroom window. Ray's clothes hung over a chair. As I focused on the closet, I noticed a hint of movement. Shadows. I moved a bit more to the side, out of view, and stood on my tiptoes waiting for more action. Muffled footsteps signaled someone's presence behind me.

  ***

  I felt someone shaking my shoulder.

  "Sophi," Ray's deep voice penetrated my foggy brain, "Sophi."

  "Huh? What happened?" I opened my eyes to his perplexed smile.

  "That's what I'd like to know." He helped me to a sitting position.

  My head pounded with the worst headache of my life. It felt as if my eyeballs were popping out of my ears. I put my hands over my eyes, blocking the light, lessening the throbbing.

  Ray ran his hands through my thick hair.

  "Ouch," I yelled when he hit a tender spot.

  "You, my dear, were hit on the head. Huge bump."

  "No shit, Dick Tracy." I rubbed the spot, then looked up at him. "Look in my eyes. Are my pupils the same size?"

  "Seems like it to me."

  "Good. Help me up." I struggled to my feet.

  "Now, wait a minute. Don't you think we should take you to the hospital? You probably have a concussion."

  "I'm not about to spend the rest of the day in the damn emergency room. I have things to do." I felt dizzy and grabbed for his arm. After steadying myself, I said, "Just give me a minute to get my bearings."

  "What were you doing out here anyway? Where is your car?"

  I told him about the episode, ending with the shadow in the closet. "Somebody was looking for something. There must have been more than one, because I was spying on a moving shadow when I was hit."

  "Let's go inside. You can rest while I look around."

  I swallowed two Tylenol, then sat on the sofa with an ice bag on my bump while Ray went from room to room. He didn't find anything out of place. When I recovered a little and checked the rooms, there wasn't anything missing that I could tell.

  "It wasn't the same guys as last time Sophi," Ray said, sitting on one of the kitchen stools. "They’re in lockup."

  "At least not those two. We don't know for sure how many were here the last time. You said so yourself."

  "You neighbor saw two. Logic would have it that the same two guys who killed together and were arrested together, bro
ke in together."

  I snapped, "If they were logical, they'd have jobs instead of leading a life of crime."

  "Let's see if anyone in the neighborhood saw anything."

  We went from door to door. No one was home. "Can you dust for prints?" I asked, stepping onto the walk leading to my front door.

  "We will, just to be sure. I don't expect we'll come up with much," Ray replied. "Stay here a minute. I need evidence bags from my car."

  I watched as he popped the trunk on the S2000, then used his pen to hook two pairs of disposable gloves from my bushes. He dropped them into the brown paper bags and wrote identifying information on the labels. "We'll have the crime scene tech check these. You don't dispose of your gloves in the front bushes do you?"

  "No, just used condoms." I giggled in response to his frown. "Saves money on trash pick-up."

  I keyed in the code for the garage door opener. "We haven't checked here." The cluttered space held long-term storage and yard equipment, with room in the middle to park a small car or two. I pointed to the suitcases stored on the freezer on the back wall. "Did you move those?"

  "No, why?"

  "Nothing really. They don't look right."

  Ray inspected each suitcase inside and out, then returned them to their place, aligning the edges. "They look fine."

  I shook my sore head. "I guess I'm just looking for monsters." I felt my bump. "I'm going to take some more Tylenol and change clothes. I want to go to the hospital and give Vanessa moral support."

  "Maybe you'll have a doctor check your head while you're there?" he asked, his tone hopeful. He followed me into the house and toward the bedroom.

  "Nah. I wouldn't think of it." I closed the door behind me, leaving him to wait.

  I heard Ray talking to Sunshine, who made growling noises in his throat. Without looking, I knew the dog lay on his back, and Ray sat on the floor next to him rubbing his tummy. Ray is Sunshine's second favorite person, next to me.

  When I reappeared, dressed in light gray slacks and a gray and mauve print blouse, Ray was sitting on the living room sofa with Sunshine in his arms. "I'd rather be holding you, you know." He smiled, his eyes awash with suggestion.

  My head hurts, I thought, picking up my purse. "Ready? Put him in his crate, please."

  He bent over, allowing the dog to step out of his arms onto the floor. "Crate up," he said, then followed the dog across the room. I heard the treat jar open and close, and the gate click into place.

  "You going back to the hospital?" I asked when he met me at the door.

  "No. I'm going to talk to Wiley again. He's pretty much off my list of suspects. He had slim motive, and he apparently wasn't all that anxious to take over Hutchinson's book of business."

  "Why do you think that?"

  "There didn't seem to be anything in it for him. We think Hutchinson planned to dump the business anyway, and Wiley knew it. There would be no reason for him to do anything drastic since Hutchinson's departure would hand him all the walk-in trade. Several of his employees substantiated the frequent meetings between Hutchinson and Wiley, and they overheard the conversation about closing the agency and taking on Amelia. No motive."

  "Then why the special trip to talk to Wiley?"

  "I need to see if he remembered anything else Barry Hutchinson might have said and if he decided to hire Amelia Hutchinson. And I want to firm up the timeline of his hospital visit, where he went after, who might have seen him. I'm covering the bases, closing the holes."

  "It sounds like only Amelia and Jamel have motive. No other active suspects." We walked across the cul-de-sac to my neighbor's garage.

  "That's about it, except a couple of people at the hospital who had the opportunity to disconnect the ventilator—nursing staff, your friend, Connie, and Vanessa."

  "Vanessa met me for lunch. We responded to the code together, and I talked to Connie. I can't believe she stepped over the line." I paused. "I have a thought, though. I'll check it out when I get the opportunity."

  "Let me know what you find out." He touched my arm. "Word has it Jamel Hutchinson is back in town. I'm going to bring him and his mother in for questioning again. I figure that'll about wrap things up."

  "Something still doesn't sit right with me." I punched in the code, and we stood back as the door opened, revealing my Mini. I'd brought my tennis shoes with me, so I opened the trunk and returned them to my bag.

  "What's that?" he asked with an obvious lack of interest.

  "If the family decided to finish him off, why didn't they do it in ICU when fewer questions would be asked? Amelia's an LPN. She'd know how to make it look natural."

  "Maybe they hoped he would die without further assistance, or maybe they couldn't get a chance to do it unobserved. There are staff and nurses everywhere down there."

  "There's always an opportunity to do a little something, pinch a tube, slip in some extra morphine, something. If he died in the unit, no one would have questioned it. He was close to death. It would have been easy."

  "I think you're chasing shadows. Motive, money and revenge. Method, contract. Then they finished the job. Cut and dried."

  I slammed the trunk and turned to him. "I'm going to the hospital. Will I see you later?"

  "Without a doubt. I don't intend to let you stay alone until this thing is settled. You're at risk, though I can't guess why. You're no threat to anyone."

  "Time will tell."

  He pointed. "Why do you have a suitcase in your trunk?"

  "Vanessa's. I forgot to put it in the house. I'll need to take it to the hospital for her when she's discharged, so I might as well leave it where it is. She'll need to go into hiding again."

  ***

  At the hospital, I found Vanessa in the emergency room. Neat gauze dressings covered her wound's—I presumed the physician has stitched several of them. She had a cast on her arm, and the cervical collar was gone. Craig sat next to her stretcher.

  I stepped back out of sight, taking a moment to regroup. Craig's presence came as a shock. I'd expected him to be in jail. Either Van refused to press charges, or Craig slipped in after the Tamarac officers left.

  "Hello," I said, stepping into the cubicle. "Van, you're looking better."

  "Yes, she is, isn't she?" Craig answered for her.

  I hadn't seen him in a while, and his appearance reminded me of what attracted her to him—not handsome, but strong features with a lean, sinewy body. A lock of blond hair fell over his brow, making him look innocent and approachable. He moved with the grace of an athlete. I remembered her giving me a recitation of the various sports he excelled in over the years. Once a successful upper level manager at a local electronics firm, he'd hung Van on his arm as his trophy wife.

  "Vanessa, are they going to keep you in the hospital for a few days?"

  "I don't think so. Do you Van?" Craig said. "I can take her back to her apartment and keep an eye on her."

  "Yes, I'm sure you can." I stared into his eyes, daring him to continue. "Craig, let Van answer. Please."

  "Fine. I'm just being helpful."

  "So helpful you beat her to within an inch of her life."

  "Listen lady, I didn't beat her up. I don't know who did, but I didn't do it. I moved out two days ago. She asked me to leave, and I did."

  I looked at Vanessa for confirmation. She nodded her head in agreement, but she crossed the fingers protruding from her cast. Juvenile, but effective.

  "What about your leg?" I said, pointing.

  "It's only bruised, not broken," Craig said.

  I frowned at him. "I'll be back." I opened the curtain, denying them privacy, then went to the dictation room.

  I found Dr. Shulman busy with Van's chart. He listened to my explanation of the circumstances.

  "Their behavior is typical of an abusive relationship. I've seen it a lot," he explained. "The abuser beats the victim, then stays with her in the hospital, being very attentive and making sure she doesn't tell the truth. Later he's remorseful,
promising it won't happen again, but it does. If we keep the victim in the hospital and manage to get her talking, we can find out what happened and maybe intervene and break the cycle of abuse." He tapped his pen on the table. "I'll tell the ex-husband we saw a shadow on the CAT scan, a possible bleed, and she needs careful watching."

  I called the admitting department and arranged for a private room across from the nurses' station on Five Northeast. I planned to take Vanessa as part of my assignment when I came to work the next day. I'd have an opportunity to talk to her in private at some time during the shift, and we'd be able to keep her out of harm's way.

  31

  On Thursday, the last day of May, I arrived at work early, intending to request Vanessa as part of my assignment. With every bed occupied, it was the only way to spend time with her. Then I organized myself for the shift. I had Vanessa, but I also had an overload of work. I needed to be at my sharpest to take care of my patients and my friend.

  As luck would have it—mine, not my patients'—the surgeons rushed Juan Salazar, the man with a hot appendix in room five-eighteen, to surgery, and Edith Kramer, an ancient woman with a severe heart problem, crashed and earned a ride to ICU, leaving me with a few extra minutes. I headed in to help Vanessa with her morning care.

  "Mornin'," I said, pushing back the curtain. "You alone?"

  "Yes. Craig left."

  "When?"

  "Hours ago. Thank God." She kept her eyes closed. Tears glistened under her lashes.

  "I'll help you get freshened up. There's a lot of dried blood stuck to your skin." I retrieved a basin from her bedside table and went into the bathroom to fill it. I wanted to sponge her face and bruised arms. It would give me a chance to inspect the wounds, and the physical closeness might encourage her to talk.

  After pulling on gloves, I dabbed at her forehead, soaking off traces of crusted blood, revealing tiny scratches and a huge bruise. "What happened here?"

  "I'm not sure. I think he hit me with the pewter lamp in my bedroom." She ran her fingers over the wounds. "It hurts."