Checkmate_The Bowers Files

by Steven James

  The phone rang. I waited for Ralph to pick up.

  “What’s the fourth statue?” Lien-hua asked.

  Love stories—that’s what he tells.

  The tragic consequences of love.

  But also death.

  Love and death.

  “It’s the one representing the future: a woman holding up her baby.” I felt a harsh lump rise in my throat as I said the words.

  “Oh.” I could tell she was tracking right with me. “Brineesha and Tryphena. That’s the story. Tragedy. Love. Death.”

  “The future ends tonight.” I couldn’t keep the dread out of my voice. “A mother and her child. Dying to complete the tale.”

  I waited for my friend to answer.

  Pick up, Ralph. Come on!

  Mason’s story had unity and cohesion; it was everything he went for. It even had an ending that I hadn’t seen coming.

  Until now.

  Until too late—

  No, it wasn’t too late. Mason couldn’t have gotten up here by now.

  Unless he—

  The call went to voicemail.

  “Ralph,” I exclaimed, “it’s Pat. Get to the room with Brineesha and Tryphena. I think Mason’s coming after them.”

  I hung up and immediately called the hospital to have them get security over to Brineesha’s room.

  “How far to the hospital?” I asked Lien-hua.

  “Six minutes.” She punched the gas, swept past a car going ten miles over the speed limit, then whipped us back into our lane. “Make that five.”

  + + +

  Officer Desmond Smythe got the call to check in on someone named Brineesha Hawkins in the family birthing wing.

  Other end of the hospital.

  Great.

  He sighed.

  And, munching on his bag of chips, started ambling down the hall.

  + + +

  Ralph watched as the nurse talked him through giving his daughter a bath.

  “So, you already have one child?” she asked him.

  “A boy. Yeah. But he’s twelve. It’s been a while.”

  “Well.” She squeezed some water out of the sponge. “I’m sure it’ll all come back to you. Don’t be nervous. There’s nothing to worry about. Your little girl is going to be just fine.”

  88

  Kurt made sure that he had both the insulin and the sedative with him.

  He would either introduce the insulin into Brineesha’s IV, if she had one, or he would inject it into her arm.

  There were several advantages to insulin: common, easy to acquire, it could be delivered intravenously.

  When the nurses found that she was unresponsive, they wouldn’t know why and wouldn’t immediately think to check her blood-sugar levels. In the case of a woman who’d just given birth, they would probably think at first that she might have thrown a blood clot and they would send off for some blood work, stat.

  By the time they figured out what was wrong with the victim, it would be too late.

  The insulin would drop her blood sugar and, eventually, when it got low enough, she would slip into a coma that would ultimately prove fatal.

  It was a relatively quiet, painless way to go.

  He had something much different planned for the child.

  * * *

  He retrieved the pink CONGRATULATIONS! balloon he’d bought at the grocery store on the way up here from Charlotte. There was a stork on it with a baby in a sling that it carried in its beak.

  Perfect.

  Balloon in hand, he entered the hospital and headed to the family birthing wing.

  “I’m here to visit my sister-in-law,” he told the nurse at the work desk. “She just had a baby today.”

  She glanced at the balloon. “Name?”

  “Brineesha Hawkins.”

  “Room 114.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Tell her congratulations.”

  “I’ll be sure to do that.”

  He passed through the hall. He’d made it this far, but now he needed to get into her room unnoticed.

  From his research, he knew that new residents start at hospitals in July, so the nurses and doctors on duty would still not necessarily know everyone. Really, if there was ever a time of year to get in and out without raising suspicion, this was it.

  Once Kurt was out of sight down the hallway, he found a doctor who looked about his size. The man was entering a patient’s room and Kurt followed closely behind, flicking out his straight razor as he did.

  + + +

  Lien-hua wove us through traffic.

  Moments ago, I’d phoned the police dispatcher and told them what was going on. “There’s already an officer on-site at the hospital,” he assured me. “We’re having him look in on Ms. Hawkins.”

  I tried Brin’s room phone, but no one answered.

  After I hung up, I processed this.

  Was Mason working alone?

  Debra had discovered that the security archives had been accessed Sunday evening. But we still didn’t know who had accessed them.

  I had a thought.

  Maybe it was nothing.

  Maybe not.

  “You didn’t receive a text,” I said to Lien-hua.

  “When?”

  “Monday morning. Right before the attack.”

  “No, only the people there did.” Then she caught on to what I was thinking. “Ah, but how did Mason know?”

  “Right. You were supposed to be at the NCAVC with me and Ralph. Your physical therapy appointment was only set up a couple days before, remember? On Friday afternoon.”

  She caught on. “He had someone there. Someone who knew my schedule.” Her voice was hushed. “Did we ever check Cole’s phone to see incoming calls?”

  “Yes. Mason wouldn’t have used that phone . . .”

  I stared at the cell. Thought about what we knew, what we didn’t know.

  Who could have accessed those security archives? Jerome?

  No, no, no, the timing didn’t work.

  “Think motives, Lien-hua. Why would anyone help Mason? Why would anyone give him the security-camera locations or the cell numbers so he could text the staff?”

  “Fear.”

  “Of what?”

  “Losing something precious. Or someone precious.” Then she said, “So, what did Mason tell you exactly? About seven gods?”

  “He said, ‘Now seven gods use thirty-eight.’”

  “Why would seven gods use thirty-eight now? What happens now?”

  “He told me it’s not what I would think.”

  “Maybe it’s not gods like we typically think of them.”

  Don’t discount anything.

  Meck Dec.

  I am back.

  The alternate spelling of the name of that mine: Rudisil.

  All phone spellings—

  “You’re right,” I muttered. “It’s not. There was a photo at the apartment building, the address we were trying to track down: 669.”

  “But that hasn’t brought anything up.”

  “Seven gods use . . .” I muttered.

  No, wait—

  Oh.

  Who would have all the staff members’ cell numbers? Who would know who was on duty? Debra had checked on the—

  I stared at the number pad on the phone, the letters, the combinations:

  7-gods-use-38

  7-4637-873-38

  I called the number.

  Nothing.

  But it was never the numbers, always the message. Always what it spelled.

  I muttered aloud what I was thinking and right away Lien-hua suggested I plug the numbers into the site that calculates words from phone numbers. “Maybe it spells something else.”
<
br />   I’d already pulled up the site. I scrolled through the words and almost immediately found what we needed:

  7463-787338

  Pine-Street

  “That’s it,” I said. “Pine Street.”

  “That’s what it spells?”

  “Yes. It was never about phone numbers. It was always about the codes, about the spellings . . . It’s an address: 669 Pine Street.”

  “Why 669?”

  “Because it spells N-O-W on a phone.”

  “Everything matters,” she said.

  “Exactly. There’s a Pine Street over by the industrial district.”

  Debra didn’t find out who’d accessed the security archives.

  No.

  Of course she didn’t—

  “You mentioned yesterday that Debra’s been working on this nonstop?” I said.

  “Yes.”

  Her daughter Allie is nine . . . Debra said she was at camp, said she was at her dad’s . . .

  “I need to talk to her. You said she called earlier to check on Brin, so her number’s on your phone?”

  “Should be.”

  I scrolled through her contacts, found it. First, I called dispatch and told them to get a car to 669 Pine Street to search the place, then I gave them the number to text when they had.

  I tried Debra Guirret but she didn’t pick up. I left a voicemail for her to call me. Then I texted her as well.

  + + +

  Kurt was careful not to wake the patient while he dragged the doctor’s body into the bathroom.

  The arms of the lab coat were a little too short but he snugged them up his forearms so no one would notice.

  He snapped a photo of the dead doctor and then, bringing the man’s clipboard with him and leaving the balloon behind in the room, he passed into the hallway toward room 114.

  89

  Kurt entered Brineesha’s room, eased the door shut behind him, and approached the bed. She did have an IV, which made sense, considering she’d had a C-section that afternoon.

  “Good evening, Mrs. Hawkins.” He held the dead doctor’s clipboard in front of him and flipped through the papers as if he were consulting them.

  “Hello,” she said. “Who are you?”

  He tapped the name badge on the lab coat. “Dr. Preet.” Then he acted as if he were reading from the page. “It says here on your charts that I’m supposed to give you something to help you sleep.” He reached for her IV bag.

  “Where’s Dr. Harber?”

  “I’m doing rounds tonight. He asked me to check in on you.”

  Brineesha’s face grew pale and Kurt realized his mistake. “Oh. Dr. Harber isn’t a he, huh?”

  Brineesha Hawkins opened her mouth to cry out but he swiftly covered it with his hand.

  It didn’t look like he would be able to go with the IV idea after all. No, he needed to deliver the insulin right away. Well, the subcutaneous overdose was much faster anyway.

  But first he needed to calm her down.

  Administering the sedative one-handed wasn’t easy, but he managed to jam the needle into the base of her neck and depress the plunger.

  As she faded out, he removed his hand from her mouth and gave her the insulin.

  There, now—

  “Kurt.” It was a man’s voice. Someone behind him near the doorway. “Turn around slowly.”

  Kurt Mason knew that voice.

  He held his hands to the side and turned.

  Richard Basque stood before him, a scalpel in his hand.

  “I’m glad to see you, Richard,” Kurt said. “I was hoping you’d make it here for the climax.”

  + + +

  “So,” the nurse told Ralph, “we’re going to keep her here under the baby warmer for a few minutes. Make sure she keeps her temperature up.”

  “And you’ll bring her back to the room?”

  “Absolutely.” She slipped the pink hat onto Tryphena’s head.

  Ralph headed to the lobby to get a Mountain Dew and meet Pat and Lien-hua, who were on their way over from the airport.

  As he did, he passed a break room for the doctors on the birthing wing. The door was ajar.

  He stopped in his tracks.

  He recognized it even though he’d never been here before. He’d seen it in a photograph—in one of the pictures hanging up in the bedroom of the apartment Kurt Mason had rented in Charlotte.

  The photos were all of Mason’s research sites. Locations for—

  Ralph spun and sprinted down the hallway toward his wife’s room.

  + + +

  Officer Desmond Smythe was at the end of the hall when he saw a huge man barreling through the hall toward him. “Hey!” he yelled. “Stop right there!”

  But the man didn’t stop.

  He tossed open the door to room 114.

  Desmond drew his weapon and ran as fast as he could toward the room.

  + + +

  Ralph knelt at his wife’s side.

  No one else was in the room.

  He tried to wake her but she was unresponsive. He punched the nurse’s call button just as the door behind him banged open and a police officer burst into the room, gun drawn.

  “Step away from her!” the guy yelled.

  “I’m a federal agent,” Ralph shouted. “This is my wife. I’m reaching into my pocket. I’m going to show you my creds. Now lower your weapon.”

  + + +

  Lien-hua brought the car to a skidding stop in front of the family birthing center wing doors. I handed her cell phone to her and leapt out of the car—and saw Tessa and Beck Danner waiting nearby.

  “Hey, Dad,” Tessa said, “I—”

  “Not a good time.” I turned to Beck. “Go back to your car. Stay with her. I’ll explain everything later.”

  Neither argued. They could tell something big was up. “Yes, sir,” Beck said.

  The two of them left for the car while Lien-hua and I rushed inside the hospital, to get to Brin’s room.

  + + +

  Richard Basque led Mason down the stairwell toward the morgue.

  A fitting place for this man to meet his end.

  “You killed Corrine,” Richard said. “Why?”

  “Your story is part of mine and her story is part of yours. It wouldn’t have been complete if you weren’t here at the end. There’ll be a much bigger audience this way. Without you, the climax wouldn’t be nearly as memorable.”

  “Well, then, let’s make this memorable.”

  + + +

  By the time we got to Brin’s room, Ralph was outside the door shouting for doctors to get over there now!

  “Where’s Tryphena?” I asked him hurriedly.

  “End of the hall. Fourth room on the left. She’s in the warming room.”

  “Stay here with Brin,” I told him and Lien-hua. Then I took off to get Tryphena.

  I was halfway to the room when the fire alarms went off.

  90

  The doors in the wing began to close automatically to contain the fire, and emergency lighting went on, throbbing red lights set at regular intervals down the hall.

  Maybe there was a fire.

  Maybe not.

  When I arrived at the warming room, I found a nurse unconscious on the floor. Other than that, the room was empty.

  Tryphena was gone.

  I shook the nurse’s shoulder and was able to revive her. “What happened?” I asked urgently.

  “I don’t know. Someone hit me from behind.”

  “Where’s the baby that was in here? Tryphena Hawkins?”

  “I . . . She’s gone? Is she gone?”

  Another nurse appeared at the doorway and while she bent to help the woman who’d been attacked, I returned to the hall to sort things through
.

  Patients were already filing into the hallways.

  In a matter of moments these halls would be filled with doctors, nurses, patients.

  There was no smoke.

  In modern birthing wards there are plenty of measures in place to stop baby theft, including systems that give each child something that looks like a miniature GPS-tracking ankle bracelet.

  Crime prevention 101: If a child who’s wearing one is brought within a certain distance of an exterior door, an alarm will sound and the door will automatically lock. So to get the baby out of the ward you’d need to remove the device, or, if you couldn’t get it off, figure out a way to make sure the doors didn’t lock you in when you tried to leave.

  But a fire alarm would override that, of course, since you can’t lock people in a hospital during a fire.

  If I were trying to get a baby out of here, that’s what I would’ve done: pulled the fire alarm. It would also create confusion and everyone would be trying to leave the building—which is exactly what you would want.

  So where’s Tryphena?

  We could check the security footage, but that would take time.

  I studied the hall, thought of what I knew of the floor plan of the hospital from being here in the past.

  There weren’t many ways out of this wing. Just two intersecting hallways, a stairwell that led down to the morgue and up to the other floors, but—

  The morgue. There’s another exit through there—where they bring the bodies in. And the hall also leads to the parking garage.

  I saw Ralph hurrying my way. “Where’s Tryphena?”

  “She’s gone, but—”

  “Gone? What!”

  “Call security, have them review the footage. Whoever took her can’t have made it far.”

  “My phone’s in Brin’s room.”

  He shouted to a police officer who was close behind him, and the guy left immediately to contact security and check footage from this wing.

  Ralph was still coming toward me. I asked him how Brin was.

  “Unconscious. Docs are with her. Lien-hua too.” He was focused. Intense. Ready for action. “We need to find my daughter.”

  I ran to the stairwell. When I opened the door I saw it there on the floor: a hospital band had been slit through and discarded. I snatched it up. Tryphena’s name was on it.