Doctor's Orders

by Jessica Andersen

  Knowing her best bet was to sleep it off, she headed upstairs, scrounged aspirin out of the medicine cabinet and used the anemic guest shower rather than braving the master suite. She set the alarm clock on the bedside table for 6:00 a.m. so she’d be wide-awake by the time she had to face him again. It wasn’t until she stripped off her sweater and jeans and a small object fell to the carpet that memory flashed and she realized she’d made a potentially big mistake.

  “Oh, crap.” She picked the minidisk up off the floor and stared at it, seeing once again the initials ID, and now a new scratch added to the one on the back, no doubt from the disk having spent half a day in her back pocket.

  She’d forgotten all about it. She should’ve given it to Stankowski hours ago. Now it was in even worse shape than it had been before, maybe even unreadable.

  Staring at the disk, Mandy considered her options. She could go downstairs and interrupt Parker’s workout, but she wasn’t sure what sort of device they’d need to read the minidisk—if it was even readable—and couldn’t imagine he’d wake Stankowski at this hour of the night. And maybe it was cowardly, but she didn’t really want to face either of them again until morning, so she set the minidisk on the night table next to the clock and lay down, expecting her racing mind to keep her awake.

  She was asleep within minutes.

  THE NEXT MORNING, Parker was on his third cup of coffee before Mandy put in an appearance, but it wasn’t the burn of acid or caffeine that had him scowling as she came down the stairs. It wasn’t even the exhaustion that pulled at him, courtesy of a restless night spent thinking of her, and what would’ve happened to her if he’d been a few minutes later to reach the alley the day before.

  No, what disturbed him was the way his heart bumped in his chest when he saw her, the way his eyes locked on to her and wouldn’t let go and the way it clicked inside him, a sense of there you are, as if he’d been looking for her a long time now and hadn’t even realized it.

  He didn’t like the feelings, didn’t trust them. He liked who he was, liked his life just fine.

  At least he had until he’d seen Mandy’s name in the pile of résumés submitted for an opening in his department. Since then he’d been looking at his life differently, and he didn’t like that. He didn’t like change, didn’t like being unsettled, but that was exactly what he was feeling as she hit the bottom step, turned the corner and paused when she found him standing in the kitchen archway, staring at her.

  Or maybe “glaring” was a better description, he acknowledged inwardly. Instead of being warned by his expression and treading carefully, as anyone else in his life would have with the possible exception of Stankowski, she scowled right back at him.

  “I can see five hours of bunktime did nothing to improve your mood,” she said. “Can we wait on the fight until I’ve had coffee, or do you want to just throw down here in the living room?”

  The lurid images that sprang to mind at her offer had nothing to do with fighting, which only deepened his scowl.

  Seeing that she was holding an envelope, he gestured. “What’s that?”

  She flushed. “I have a confession. I picked this up off the ground in the alley right before the attack. I must’ve shoved it in my pocket, I don’t really remember. Honestly, I didn’t remember about the disk at all until I found it last night while I was getting undressed.” She passed him the envelope. “It’s a disk of some sort, labeled ‘ID.’ That might not mean anything, but then again maybe it means something. I was thinking it might’ve fallen out of Irene’s bag during the struggle.”

  “That’s just great. I can only imagine what the fabric of your pocket did to any prints.” He looked inside the envelope and saw two big scratches marring the disk. “I think it’s trashed, but we should run this over to Stankowski first thing.” He held out his own mug of coffee, knowing they liked it exactly the same. “You can drink it in the cab. I figured you’d want to stop at your place on the way in, get a change of clothes, that sort of thing, so I called Stank. He said his team didn’t see any suspicious activity on their drive-bys, and we’re clear to go in.”

  The detective had also told Parker to wear his gun and keep Mandy in sight at all times, but he didn’t figure she needed to know that before she’d had her morning caffeine hit.

  Gratitude flashed in her eyes and she nodded. “Thanks.” She took the coffee, her fingers brushing lightly against his. “Thanks for this, too.”

  He merely jerked his chin at the door. “Grab your coat and let’s go.”

  When they got in the cab he flagged down, she gave an address several blocks south of Boston General. Then she borrowed his cell phone and called the manager of her apartment building, who agreed to meet them and give her the spare key to her place.

  Parker frowned when they neared their destination. “Pretty sketchy neighborhood.”

  The tall brick apartment buildings that lined either side of the road were indistinguishable from one another, pushed up close to the cracked sidewalks. Garbage cans sat willy-nilly, some having rolled into the road, and a scattering of paper and empties gave the area an abandoned, unloved feeling. Parked cars were jammed hood-to-trunk, and represented an odd mix of junkers, muscle cars and late model pickups and SUVs. The latter had Parker’s cynical side thinking the illegals market was alive and well in Mandy’s neighborhood.

  “Don’t be a snob,” she said tartly. “We can’t all live in mansions in Beverly Hills or million-dollar town houses on Beacon Street. In fact, some of us wouldn’t want to.” When he opened his mouth to respond, she steamrollered right over him, saying, “It’s not fancy, but the neighbors look out for each other. It’s as safe as anything else I could afford. I need to save as much as I can so I’ll have enough to see me through two years in China. The fellowship pays travel and housing, but the luxuries—like food—will be up to me.”

  “You could’ve gotten a nicer place and shared it with a roommate,” he said as they climbed out of the cab and he paid the driver.

  “Please. I’m twenty-nine years old. I think I’ve outgrown the roommate thing.” She headed for the front door of her building, calling over her shoulder, “Besides, I didn’t figure I’d be here much. Rumor has it that my boss is a slave driver.”

  “Somebody should talk to him about that.” He grinned because she seemed to need the humor. What had she called it? A coping mechanism.

  Well, she seemed to be coping, but he had to wonder for how long. She was tough and stubborn, but the murders had to be hitting close to home after what had happened to her mother. She’d never told him the entire story, but from what he’d gathered, the experience had pretty much destroyed her relationship with her father, who had remarried quickly and gotten on with his life while teenage Mandy had still needed to grieve, and was still searching for the closure that had never come.

  Parker could only hope that need wouldn’t drive her to do something foolish—and dangerous—now.

  THE TRIP to Mandy’s apartment was uneventful, and the stopover at the police station wasn’t much different. Stankowski hadn’t blasted her for forgetting about the disk; in fact, he hadn’t seemed all that interested in it, simply passing it off to a tech with instructions to see what he could get off the thing.

  Then he’d turned back to the medical files, and Mandy was forced to admit she hadn’t had a light-bulb moment on what toxin had killed the victims. Although she planned on making some calls and maybe ordering an additional test or two, she really hadn’t been able to add anything to what Parker had already told the detective.

  Because of that, she expected that Detective Stankowski would thank her for her interest and tell her to get lost. She’d been surprised when he’d told her to keep digging, but Parker’s reaction hadn’t been at all unexpected. He’d snapped and snarled, and all but ordered her to keep her nose out of police business. When she’d pointed out he wasn’t a cop, either, he’d lapsed into cool silence, broken only when they reached Boston General and he
loaded her down with a dozen charts and told her to get the hell to work.

  She did exactly that, because she was a healer first and foremost, but that didn’t stop her from making a couple of calls in between cases. As far as she was concerned, there were a few strings the men hadn’t thought to pull because, well, they were men. She wasn’t hampered by that problem.

  It wasn’t until three hours later, when she was finishing up the stitches on six-year-old Tommy McGregor, who had tied a bed sheet around his neck as a cape and tried to “fly” off the family’s raised front porch, that the intercom pinged and one of the front desk staffers told her she had a call.

  Mandy took a few minutes to go over Tommy’s aftercare instructions with his frazzled mother and sent them off with a lollipop each before she grabbed the wall phone.

  “Hello, Mrs. Stone? This is Dr. Sparks over at Boston General. Thank you so much for returning my call. I got your name and number from Steve Dulbecco, and I was wondering if we could meet?”

  Five minutes later, Mandy headed out the door. She stopped by the front desk, where a faintly ditzy and hugely pregnant staffer named Aimee was manning the phones. “I’m going to grab a cup of coffee in the Atrium. Be back in ten minutes. I’m on the beeper if anyone needs me, but the load’s pretty light. You should be fine.”

  She was out the door before the startled woman could respond. Mandy knew she should call over to Parker’s office and ask him to come along on the interview, but she didn’t because she didn’t want to argue over the calls she’d made, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to spend any more time than necessary with him.

  Besides, Irene’s best friend might be more open to talking about intimate details with another woman than with a man.

  Chapter Six

  Down in the Atrium, Mandy saw a middle-aged woman in a puffy red parka waiting near the café entrance where they’d arranged to meet. Crossing to meet her, Mandy extended her hand. “Mrs. Stone?”

  The woman nodded. “Call me Millie, please.”

  Her handshake was tentative, her knuckles large and gnarled, suggesting advanced arthritis, though she was only in her forties. She was as short and round as Irene had been tall and lean. Her hair was curly brown and her face was open and probably cheerful under normal circumstances. As she and Mandy ordered their coffees and slid into a booth, though, she carried heavy circles under her eyes, and her lips were turned down in grief.

  Mandy took the bench opposite her. “Thank you for agreeing to meet me. Steve Dulbecco said you and Irene were friends a long time.”

  A faint sheen of tears filmed the other woman’s eyes, and her voice trembled slightly when she said, “Since junior high. We met in the marching band, and stayed in touch ever since. We always said we’d be friends until the end.” She sniffled. “Neither of us thought that’d happen anytime soon, though.”

  Mandy stifled the urge to touch the other woman’s hand, fearing she might break down at the small kindness. Instead, she sipped her coffee and kept her tone matter-of-fact. “I’m sorry to have to ask you this, but can you tell me about the night Irene was mugged?”

  That brought Millie’s head up. “Excuse me?”

  “Steve said she called you the next day. I need to know what she told you about the attack.”

  “Whatever for?” Millie’s confusion morphed to the beginnings of anger. “Need I remind you that Irene is dead? That she died in this very hospital? What does that have to do with her being mugged?”

  Aware that the other woman’s raised voice was starting to attract attention, Mandy said, “Please, I’m not trying to upset you. I’m just trying to—”

  “Did she die because of the mugging?” Millie’s volume climbed and she half-rose from her chair. “Did that bastard do something to her, something she didn’t tell me about? Did he—”

  “Sorry I’m late,” a new voice said, loudly enough to interrupt.

  Mandy gaped as Radcliff slid into the booth next to her, crowding her with his big body until she was forced to make room for him. He held a hand across the narrow café table. “Dr. Parker Radcliff, ma’am. I’m a member of the hospital staff on loan to the Boston Police, looking into a rash of recent muggings in this area. Thank you for meeting with us.”

  His air of authority and dark good looks derailed Millie in an instant.

  In all honesty, Mandy couldn’t blame her.

  He was wearing his doctor’s whites, with that stupid nickname on the breast pocket, but for the first time since her return to Boston General, Mandy didn’t find it off-putting. Instead her mind overlaid his image with that from the night before, when he’d been barefoot in worn jeans and an old sweatshirt. She might not have admitted it to herself at the time, but her fingers had itched to touch, and she’d had the mad urge to slide her hands beneath that sweatshirt to find the man beneath. Only the circumstances—and the man himself—had prevented her from making the mistake. Now, as he sat beside her and his warmth reached her, along with that special scent that was uniquely his, her stomach sent up little flares of nervous excitement, and her hormones nearly sat up and begged.

  Instead of closing her eyes and inhaling him whole, though, Mandy pulled herself together and forced a glare. “I didn’t think you were going to make it.” Translation: You weren’t invited.

  He lifted one shoulder in an easy shrug. “I didn’t want you to have to go it alone.” Translation: Don’t even think of shutting me out or going off on your own.

  A low gutter of irritation took up residence beside the flare of attraction in Mandy’s belly. She did have to give him some credit, though. His arrival had derailed Millie’s building hysteria, which was a definite plus.

  “Now.” Parker glanced from Mandy to the older woman and back again. “Where were we?”

  Figuring her only alternative was to cause a bigger scene than the one they’d just avoided, Mandy sighed and gave in with ill grace. “I was just asking Millie what Irene had told her about the mugging. Specifically, I was wondering if there was something she might’ve told her best friend that she wouldn’t have told her husband or me.”

  When Mandy had reached Steve Dulbecco on the phone, he hadn’t remembered anything more than what she already knew, but he’d admitted that he and his wife hadn’t talked at length about the attack.

  Mandy might’ve found that odd if it hadn’t been for growing up with her father and stepmother, who’d lived very separate lives and often went for days without speaking more than a few words to each other. That’s why she’d asked about a friend. Her stepmother’s cronies had known far more about her life than her husband had cared to know.

  Millie thought for a minute, then said, “Well, there was something…” She paused and colored faintly. “I’m sure Irene wouldn’t want me talking to strangers about it, and under any other circumstances I wouldn’t.”

  Figuring it was a female issue, Mandy almost asked Radcliff to take a walk. She didn’t, though, partly because she knew he’d refuse and partly because she had a sneaking suspicion that he was the only reason Millie hadn’t gotten up and walked out in a huff.

  “Go on,” she prodded gently. “We’re trying to collect all the information we possibly can.”

  Millie considered that for a long minute before nodding. She leaned across the table and whispered, “She started going through the change early…you know what I mean?”

  Radcliff nodded. “She was perimenopausal.”

  His matter-of-fact tone seemed to settle the other woman. She sat back on the padded bench and exhaled. “Yes. Well, she said that the morning after the mugging she felt nauseous. Like morning sickness, you know? She didn’t want to tell Steve, because they’d wanted another baby. She wanted to keep it a surprise until she was sure.” Voice soft, she said, “Was she pregnant?”

  It was borderline in terms of confidentiality, but Mandy shook her head. “No, she wasn’t. But thank you for telling us. The nausea was probably a reaction to the stress.”

  Or
maybe it was a symptom, Mandy thought. There were a number of both herbal and traditional drugs that could have multiple effects, depending on the dosage and method of preparation.

  “Did she tell you anything else unusual?” Radcliff pressed.

  Millie thought, then shook her head. “Nothing she wouldn’t have told her husband or the police.” Her expression clouded. “I don’t suppose I helped you much, did I?” She directed her question at Radcliff in a clear bid for reassurance, for attention.

  It suddenly occurred to Mandy that if Millie had gone to school with Irene, she and Radcliff were almost the same age. A quick glance confirmed the lack of a wedding band, and the gleam of interest in the other woman’s eyes.

  A sudden flare of a hot irritation that could only be jealousy surprised Mandy, and her voice was cool when she said, “Thank you for your time, Millie. We’ll be in touch if we have any other questions.” Translation: Here’s your hat, what’s your hurry?

  Millie took the hint and stood, simpering at Radcliff. “I was on my way to Downtown Crossing, to do a little shopping. It wasn’t far to come, especially if talking to you might help.”

  “It just might.” Radcliff stood and pulled a business card holder out of the breast pocket of his lab coat, selected a card and held it out to her. “Call me anytime.”

  Millie’s eyes gleamed. “I will.” She turned and headed out of the café, and Mandy knew damn well that wiggle hadn’t been in her walk when she’d arrived.

  “So much for the grieving friend,” she muttered. “The woman’s a damned predator.”

  Before she could slip out of the booth Parker sat back down, trapping her. He didn’t respond to her comment, instead saying, “You should thank me that we got that much out of her. More importantly, you should hope to hell I don’t put you on double shifts and tell the board you’ve been contacting patients’ families outside of hospital business.”

  Turning her back to the wall so she was facing him with one leg crooked up on the bench seat, holding him at a distance, she narrowed her eyes at him. “You told Aimee to page you if I went anywhere, didn’t you?”