by LS Sygnet
“So we’re looking at a window of seven to eight o’clock for the trip from Darkwater to Montgomery,” Crevan said. “Which assumes that whoever took the baby went directly from the hospital to Montgomery.”
“It’s conceivable that whoever delivered the child was already at the house, waiting for Mrs. Sherman before Gillette began surveillance,” I said.
“Where you goin’ with this, Doc?”
“Who else do we know for certain was part of this scheme?”
“For certain?” Zack echoed. “A lot of this is far from certain, Helen.”
Johnny, bless his heart, knew exactly which dots I connected. “That would be the man who conveniently got Sherman off the hook for kidnapping before he died.”
Crevan snapped his fingers. “Which could explain why he didn’t show up to investigate a child abduction until after the fact. If he travelled from Darkwater Bay to Montgomery, had to wait for Sherman to get back from her social function before driving back here, it sure as hell explains why Chris wasn’t keeping him off our tails until we were already closing the case.”
“It’s a stretch,” I said. “But I think if we can get Florence Payette to work with a sketch artist and the rendering looks anything like Alfred Preston, we’ll have more than enough to make sure the kidnapping charge sticks. If nothing else, it’ll make Preston’s dying declaration very suspect.”
“What’s to prevent this guy from arguing that Payette isn’t competent to describe someone?” Zack asked. “He’s already made some pretty disparaging comments about her.”
“She’s worked at Saint Mary’s Hospital for a very long time. While she may not be the coolest witness in the world,” I said, “she was certainly competent enough on the job to be recognized as employee of the month and quarter more than one time. I think it’s our best shot.”
Zack nodded. “Let’s do it.”
Chapter 21
My paranoia spiked when Zack told Johnny he’d wait for us in the car.
“Us?”
“We’ve got to make a statement about Danny’s murder, Helen.”
“That’s got absolutely nothing to do with me,” I said. “I’m not a cop anymore. Remember?”
Crevan slithered out of the office before the argument became spectacular.
“You’re consulting – officially – and you were present at the jail when he was murdered. You shot the FBI agent who killed him, Helen. Like it or not, you’re in the thick of this. Now I’m not making you speak to the press about what happened, but we all think it would be a good idea if you’re seen working with us, that the public understands that we sought your expertise because of the number of child abduction cases you worked in the course of your career.”
“You’re spinning this so we don’t look bad because an FBI agent died.”
“Do you think that’s the wrong approach?”
“I think you don’t need to be sarcastic about it. He shouldn’t have died from that shoulder wound, Johnny. I realize I might be a little rusty after a couple of months away from the action, but my aim was dead on for the brachial nerve. It should’ve hurt like hell, made him drop his weapon and incapacitated him. He shouldn’t have died.”
“Maya says she’s got preliminary cause of death on Datello, Preston and the microbiology report on Villanueva.”
“That culture shouldn’t be done for several more hours.”
“Preliminary. Did you miss that part?” Johnny frowned and peered at me intently. “What’s with this mood all of a sudden? Did I piss you off again?”
“Maya could call me –”
“I think she wants to explain her results in person. I don’t know, Doc. She sounded pretty psyched about whatever it is she’s got. The way you two speak the same language, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to have you there to dumb all of this science stuff down for the rest of us. Winslow is clearly challenged in that regard.”
“Don’t insult my friend,” I muttered.
“I promise I’ll get you back home as soon as possible. How’s your stomach feeling now?”
“I’m not sick,” I snapped. “Just the sight of you men gorging on disgusting food this morning made me nauseous.”
He held up two hands in supplication. “Sorry. I only asked because I’m concerned, sweetheart.”
For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what he said that made me so irritated. Maybe it was the fact that he seemed to dislike the notion that I was fully justified in my distrust over his chivalrous escort home for Melissa Sherman.
“I’m not dressed for a press conference,” I muttered. In fact, I was still wearing my comfortable sweat suit cum pajamas. I hadn’t showered yet or put on makeup. I’m sure my hair was a stunning example of bed-head.
Johnny stepped close cautiously. He rubbed a lock of hair between thumb and index finger. “You look beautiful, Helen. Put on a suit and you’re good to go.”
The mirror told a different story. Of all my issues, the hair was easiest to salvage. I pulled into a tight bun at the nape of my neck. Dark half moons bled under both eyes. I looked like my DNA was devolving into something in the Procyon genus. That aside, my color was still tinged with a greenish hue. One wrong culinary misstep in my presence might result in more violent protest from a stomach that seemed to be hell bent on producing more acid than ten people require for digestion.
Johnny’s image appeared behind me in the mirror. He held up a gray suit – because that color would so make me look healthy – and kissed my now bare shoulder. A jolt of electricity shot through my body. I moaned, head rolled back and to the side. I bared my neck with the clear intent of his lips wandering at will.
His soft chuckle tickled bumps all over my skin. “Now?” he murmured.
“Bad timing.”
Johnny’s fingers gripped my waist. “Tell me.”
“Your kisses make me crazy,” I whispered. “Don’t we have a little time?”
He nibbled and nipped his way up the side of my neck. “We really don’t, but if I promise to make it up to you later, will that suffice?”
“How am I supposed to concentrate on anything now that you’ve got me all worked up?”
Johnny grinned against my neck. “Who knew it was so easy to get you desperate for me? If I’d known this months ago, there wouldn’t have been a separation at all, sweetheart.” He patted my backside in another tease that wrung a belly-deep moan out of me. “C’mon, baby. Get dressed. The sooner we get this done, the quicker we can come home and take care of you.”
The urge to stomp my feet and pout soured my mood until I came out of the bathroom and Johnny threaded our fingers together.
“I love you,” he said.
Bastard. He played me like a master tickling the ivories of the grand piano in the living room. Still, the promise of what would come later kept my bitter frustration inside. He kept up the sensory stimulation all the way to Central Division. I wasn’t sure if my legs knew how to walk after all that stroking of his thumb across the palm of my hand.
Maya was waiting for us in the lobby, bouncing on the balls of her feet. Excitement in her eyes transformed into concern the second she saw me. “Jesus Christ and General Jackson, honey, but you really look like you should be home in bed!”
“Give it a rest. Johnny said you’ve got preliminary results on Preston’s autopsy.”
“Well,” she said, “I’ll go over the easy info first.” Maya’s eyes roved around the half circle audience, me, Johnny, Zack and Crevan.
“Do you know how Preston died from being shot in the knee and shoulder?” Johnny asked
Maya grinned. “It took some sleuthing on my part. I couldn’t figure out how that happened either, because based on estimated blood loss, this guy didn’t gush enough to even warrant a small transfusion. It got me thinking about clotting factors and such. You’ll never guess what I diagnosed.”
“Please don’t make me try, Maya. Remember, I look like shit and need to go home and get to bed.” For sex,
not rest. She didn’t need to know that.
“Our Agent Preston was a very poor specimen of physical health,” she said. “His arteries were pumping sludge. He had the body mass index of a committed couch potato. As such, with all that sitting, he was prone to thrombosis.”
“Shit,” I rasped.
“English,” Johnny said.
“He had a blood clot,” I explained briefly. “Let me guess. Right leg.”
“Bingo,” Maya grinned. “Totally unforeseeable consequence was that when you shot him in the leg, the clot dislodged and went straight to his lung.”
“He died of a pulmonary embolism.”
“A whatsits?”
“A blood clot in his lung, Johnny” I clarified. “I shot his damn leg, and it dislodged a clot that might well have killed him anyway. Son of a bitch.”
“Well, I thought you’d be glad to know this guy was a ticking time bomb without your intervention, Helen. He was in serious need of a filter and anticoagulation, not to mention, a healthier lifestyle. So the FBI can scream until the stars fall. It won’t change the facts. He probably would’ve been dead inside a week without treatment.”
“And he had no idea that this was a problem?” Johnny asked.
“He probably experienced some dull pain in his leg. Think heart attack symptom in the left arm, Johnny, only he felt it in his right leg. It’s usually not something that would give anyone too much pause without the fact that the medical profession has hammered it home that you pay attention to that kind of arm pain.”
“And you’re sure the clot came from his leg?” I asked.
“Honey, his femoral vein was very sludgy. Let’s just say he could’ve thrown an ocean of clots instead of the big one that killed him.”
“You’ve got some sort of inkling what specific bacteria caused Analynn Villanueva’s pneumonia too?” I asked. “What did you find?”
“Vibrio parahaemolyticus pneumonia.”
“Parahaemolyticus? Wait a minute. Vibrio? Isn’t that what causes cholera?”
“You’re good sweetheart. It is in fact the pathogen that causes cholera.”
“But cholera causes gastroenteritis, not pneumonia. I’ve never heard of parahaemolyticus before. What is it?”
“It’s a lactose-positive, gram negative bacillus found in seawater.”
“She was alive when she went into the water? Wait a minute – I thought she died of pneumonia.”
“Oh she did. My bet is that this little girl had some moxie, Helen. Let me explain. Back in the late 1970’s a man was found face down in the water off the coast of Galveston Island. He was successfully resuscitated and seemed to be recovering well until he spiked a high temperature. Treatment was initiated but ultimately failed. Guess what his cause of death was?”
“Vibrio parahaemolyticus pneumonia.”
“When you’re good you’re good, and yes, I’m that good.” Maya’s inappropriate glibness never failed to make an appearance.
“She tried to escape and aspirated water into her lungs, developed pneumonia and died.”
“Yep. Time of death was roughly three to six hours before we found her on shore. She was probably febrile like crazy at the time of death, so it could increase the time a bit. However she was nowhere near rigor when we found her. Three to six is a good estimate. Her liver temp was barely below normal – hers was 36.4 degrees Celsius. Normal is 37 degrees Celsius. We’ve got a couple of factors here that probably slowed rigor – her high internal body temperature coupled with the cold water in Darkwater Bay. Cold atmospheric temperature tends to slow the onset of rigor mortis, and a febrile condition can retard it or make it barely detectable at all. Three to six hours, Helen. I’m confident.”
“I trust you implicitly. Did you send Billy or Hector out to the bay for samples?”
“It’s gonna take two days to grow them, but here’s the thing, Helen. I already searched, and Riley Storm’s incompetence notwithstanding, there has never been a reported case of Vibrio parahaemolyticus pneumonia reported in Darkwater Bay. I just got off the phone with the health department before I called you. I don’t think our little bay is where she got infected.”
“We’ve gotta rule it out anyway. It’s a great lead, Maya. It tells me two important things. One, I should be looking for an area where this bug is known in seawater. Two, she arrived in Darkwater Bay on a ship.”
Maya’s eyes raked over me critically. “So that’s the crux of my big news. I expect some forthright answers from you, princess.”
“Don’t call me –”
“Princess,” she grinned. “Yeah, you’ve used that line before. Did the soda crackers and ginger ale help settle your stomach? Johnny mentioned that you’ve been barfing up your shoelaces all week. What gives, and if you continue to refuse to see a doctor who diagnoses living patients, does that mean you’ll be coming back to me?”
I felt Johnny wilt next to me.
“Was this some sort of secret conversation?” she asked when I impaled him with a glare. “God, honey, it’s not like I can’t tell by looking at you that the gills are greener than a three-day-old dead fish.”
“Thank you so much, Maya.” For some hysterically irrational reason, my eyes started burning, and before I realized what it meant, the world blurred behind a curtain of heavy dew.
“Oh honey,” Maya’s sarcasm quickly fled to make room for contrition. “I was only teasing you. I didn’t mean to make you –”
Before the rest of her apology registered, Johnny folded me into his chest and started murmuring soothing nonsense. I felt the subtext playing between this man I love and my best friend. I was too mortified to dissect it or give a damn. Two thoughts raced around my head. One, I wanted to crawl inside Johnny and hide until I felt like me again. Whoever me was these days. And two, there was no way in hell I could stand up on a podium in front of the press congregated outside Central Division and present a united front between OSI and Darkwater Bay PD.
I couldn’t see the eyes moving away, but the sensation of being shredded to bits by them abated.
“Hey,” Johnny murmured. “It’s all right, Helen. You haven’t felt well all week. This case has been emotionally wrenching. You’re not getting enough rest. Plus, that stupid fight we –”
“Enough excuses already.” I sniffled softly, tried to bury the riot going on inside my body. “Maybe you’re right. It’s a lot of unpleasantness for one week.”
“You want to wait here while we do this thing with the press?”
Ordinarily, the patronizing tone would’ve made my blood boil and resulted in a spectacular lesson involving jujitsu. Today, I cowered against his body and nodded. To make matters worse, foreign words fell out of my mouth. “Hurry back.”
Hurry back? I wondered if Maya performed a culture of my blood, if she’d find some alien species of bacteria. Extraterrestrial variety.
The flip side of this sudden affliction with damsel-in-distress-infection, it sparked a look in Johnny’s eyes that sent the butterfly battalion flapping through my stomach in a particularly enjoyable fashion. It was all I could do to keep my hands from ripping his clothes off, climbing astride and riding him for all I was worth.
He must’ve read where my dirty mind flew. His thumb stroked over my lower lip. “Soon,” he murmured. “When we get home, all right?”
Dammit, why was he still standing here talking to me? “Get out there and talk to them. I can’t wait much longer,” I rasped.
I’m pretty sure that Johnny’s confusion dwarfed mine.
Chapter 22
I ignored the whispers between Zack, Johnny and Crevan after the press conference. Nobody said where Maya disappeared, and I was still too mortified to ask. Instead, I cradled my head in my hand and pretended a blinding headache.
Maybe that was my problem. Brain tumor. Some lethal and inoperable glioblastoma affecting the emotional center of my brain.
Johnny gripped my hand and tugged me out of my morbid thoughts. “It went better than
I would’ve expected,” he said. “Everyone is mollified that your actions were heroic.”
The pendulum swung the other direction. “Are you implying that I’m glad Preston murdered –”
He silenced me with an exasperated glance. “You saved the baby and killed the man who murdered someone that a whole lot of people wanted brought to justice, Helen.” Johnny paused and pressed the backs of his fingers against my forehead. “I wonder if I should take you to the hospital instead of home.”
“Please don’t. I’m just so tired, Johnny. I promise I’ll feel better tomorrow. Let’s go home.”
Sucker. He caved. If the tables were turned and he started acting like Sybil, I’d have had his brain inside a scanner so fast he wouldn’t have known what hit him. Not Johnny.
“All right, but I’m giving you fair notice. If you’re not feeling any better tomorrow, we’re finding out what the hell is wrong with you.”
I made an X over my heart and vowed to chew off my own tongue tomorrow if it meant avoiding the intrusive pokes and prods of a doctor.
On the drive home, my ire melted back into the sizzle of unsatisfied lust. He drove into the garage and barely had the car parked when I tried to climb into his lap. “How much time do we have before everybody else gets here?”
Johnny chuckled. “Jesus, Helen. I don’t know. Does it really matter?”
Pretty sure in hindsight, he was joking, or having a little bit of playful sarcasm at my expense. Instead, I took a path toward a literal calculation in my head. Maybe they wouldn’t get suspicious if they were ten minutes behind us, and it took Johnny five minutes to open the front gate. He could claim that I was – how did Maya put it? – barfing up my shoelaces in the bathroom.
“Doc, let me get out of the car.”
I clawed for purchase over the center console.
“In the house. C’mon, baby. I don’t wanna do this in the garage.”
Fair enough. I let him slide out the door before bounding out the driver’s door behind him. My arms slithered around his neck, lips attached at the pounding pulse at the hollow of his throat. I stood on tiptoe and tried to climb to a more readily accessible position.
