by Jaime Maddox
“I know what you’re saying, Ward. It may not be malpractice at all, but it seems to happen again and again when Hawk’s around. You remember the stories I told you? Moira has a dozen more. And he’s just so creepy he makes people’s skin crawl.”
“And so Moira blames me for this? Why?”
“Well, duh. You work for the same company.”
Now it made sense. “Guilt by association.”
“Exactly. It’s not you. As a matter of fact, I think she likes you.”
Ward rolled her eyes. “Not if she was the last woman on the planet!”
Erin’s smile grew wide. “Oh, so does that mean there’s hope for me? I’m only second to last?”
Ward closed her eyes and shook her head. Erin was relentless. Good thing she didn’t know about the breakup.
“But listen,” Erin said. “Chances are you’re going to run into her again, so you should just make peace. The last thing you want is an enemy on the medic unit.”
“Since I’m only going to be here for another month, I really don’t give a shit.”
The startled look on Erin’s face told Ward she’d said too much.
“What? You’re leaving? Where are you going?”
Ward had never told Erin the whole story about Jess. She’d simply said she was taking a few months off from her relationship. Erin knew Jess was the director at Garden, though, so it was only a matter of time before Erin realized they’d split up. Ward had to tell her the truth.
“I’m going back to Philly,” she said simply.
“What about Jess?”
Ward didn’t look at her and concentrated on the tune her fingers were tapping on the countertop. It was covered in plastic with a red-and-white checked pattern, and her fingers danced from color to color in time with a far-away musical tune. “She’s staying here.”
The world seemed suddenly still, and the chaos around her seemed to grow quiet as Erin touched her gently on the arm. “You’re better off without her.”
Ward didn’t know if that was true, but with so many people saying it, maybe it was. Unfortunately, she’d have a chance to find out.
Chapter Fourteen
Central Lines
Edward stood in the darkness, leaning against the door of the physician’s lounge. His breathing was ragged, and he needed the door to support his weak legs. Killing sometimes had that effect on him. When he felt he could walk again, he made his way to the bathroom and washed his face, careful to keep the water from his clothes. He hated dirty clothing. The CPR had been disgusting, and after only a few minutes, he’d been wet with sweat. He was tempted to change into hospital-issued scrubs, but who’d worn them before? His own sweat was far less foul than someone else’s.
Feeling better after the cool water on his face, Edward reflected on his kill. It was a child, a little girl with a femur fracture. She’d been seriously injured, and in the hands of an incompetent or inexperienced emergency physician, she might have died anyway. He had the knowledge and skills to save her, if he’d wished to. But he hadn’t. Even before she arrived in his ER, he’d been excited by the prospect of murdering her. The medic’s report detailed her injuries and unstable vital signs, and he knew she would be his from the moment he’d taken the call.
It was a tremendous pleasure in the end, the murder. She was a whiny little thing, crying for her parents from the moment she reached the hospital. In spite of her low blood pressure, she’d managed to punch him in the face when he unfastened the restraints holding her to the backboard, and she did worse damage to one of the nurses. When she’d stopped breathing, it had been a blessing for all of them.
Of course, the death of a small child was something he had to aggressively fight. He’d gone through the motions with more enthusiasm than was warranted, even under the circumstances. In the end, it was all futile, as he knew it would be. There was no bringing her back, and he had to admit, the thrill of her death was worth the cost of dry-cleaning his suit.
Reaching into his bag, Edward removed his toothbrush from its case and brushed his teeth. He straightened his tie and combed his hair. The reflection in the mirror smiled at him, and he realized he should be happy. His month in Factoryville, PA, had been very productive. God, he loved locum tenens work.
Chapter Fifteen
Arrhythmia
They’d told Ward she couldn’t miss it, and they hadn’t been lying. They were the entire ER staff. The entire hospital staff, really—at least the ones she’d met during her first three days of work at Endless Mountains Medical Center in the metropolis of Factoryville, Pennsylvania. It seemed they all knew and loved Dr. Judi Rosen, the energetic senior citizen who still practiced medicine-full time and served as the hospital’s chief of staff. The entire hospital work force had been invited to this annual Fourth of July celebration at her home, and from the number of cars parked along the stretch of country road leading to a mailbox marked with a dozen red, white, and blue balloons, all of them were at the party.
Ward had debated coming; she was tired after her third consecutive twelve-hour shift in a busy ER. The tourists had arrived in the mountains in record numbers, or so it seemed, and had discovered a variety of interesting ways to injure themselves. She’d cast arms and ankles, dressed burns, stitched wounds created by knives and bicycle pedals, and after more than forty hours of that nonsense in just three days, Ward was exhausted.
But.
There was always a but, she thought. No matter what the situation, she’d learned long ago that the answer to the question never came without a big fat but. She always had something or someone else to consider. For the past six years, Jess had caused her to think twice, and after all that had happened in the past six months, she was beginning to wonder if she should rethink her philosophy. Instead of going along and getting along, maybe it was time to just say no.
She’d been a loving, accommodating partner, sacrificing her own wants and needs to make Jess happy, and where had that gotten her? Jess was dating another woman, buying a house, and moving out of the one they’d shared. Ward didn’t know why, what she did or didn’t do, or what she should have done. She didn’t know what she might have said or when she should have kept her mouth shut. Was she too “out” for a small town like Garden, or should she have been more aggressive in demanding acceptance and respect from Zeke and all the others at the hospital who seemed to like her, but in the end weren’t unhappy to see her go?
She’d never flaunted her sexuality, but she didn’t have to. Everyone knew Sheriff Benson’s daughter Jessica’s friend Dr. Ward Thrasher. And they all knew the nature of their relationship. They’d seemed friendly to her, and supportive of her as the ER doctor, yet none had called after she left to see how she was doing, to ask if she was coming back, to wish her well.
If she’d walked away with the girl, she wouldn’t have really cared. Under the circumstances, though, she couldn’t help wondering what she’d done wrong. She wished she had the answers to all her questions. She would have liked nothing more than to crawl into the old claw-foot, porcelain bathtub and soak away her frustrations before returning to the hospital for yet another twelve-hour shift the next morning. Twelve that would likely become thirteen, as the others had.
But.
Dr. Judi Rosen, who seemed to not only run the medical staff but the county as well, had personally invited her. Twice. She’d stopped in at the ER two days earlier, fifteen minutes into Ward’s first shift at the hospital, offering an unofficial orientation to the ER protocols and to invite Ward to join her and the rest of the county at her home as they celebrated the country’s birth. Then today, as Ward was covered in sterile garb and inserting a needle into a dead man’s heart in an attempt to restart it, Judi had poked her head through the door and told her again about the shindig. “Doesn’t matter how late,” she’d said, and winked. “The fun doesn’t even start ’til after dark.”
It wasn’t wise to ignore such a request, at least if one had any political aspirations. It
wasn’t polite, either, and certainly no way to treat a colleague. And Dr. Rosen was quite an exceptional colleague. The first this and the first that, with a whole lot of letters after her name and awards on her resume. As a female, and a physician, Ward couldn’t help but admire her. And so, she’d sacrificed her bath and her sleep and now found herself wedging her car onto the shoulder of this country road so she could celebrate the holiday with hundreds of people she barely knew.
Ward chuckled as she locked the car. This was the middle of nowhere, and a thief would have had a grand time with all the cars deserted along the road for as far as she could see. No nosy neighbors or even a casual bystander were nearby to report a break-in. Industrious thieves could have brought a car carrier, loaded it, and driven away without raising an eyebrow.
Oh, well, she thought. If someone wanted her collection of Broadway show tunes in the CD changer, she could make more from her originals at home. And she wouldn’t miss the few dollars’ worth of change in the cup holder. Thinking it smarter than paying a five-hundred-dollar deductible to replace a broken window, Ward turned around and unlocked the car. It was just easier. At the hospital in Philly, some people placed signs in the windows saying the car was unlocked and had nothing valuable within. Although she’d never done it, she’d thought it a brilliant idea, until the day one of her colleagues found a vagrant sleeping in her backseat at the conclusion of her overnight shift.
Ward crossed the street, at least ten miles from the place she’d seen the balloons, and wandered back toward the house. A stone wall, three feet high and with a dusting of wildflowers at the base to add a splash of color, guarded the property along the front border. It curved gracefully at the drive, where the flowers were concentrated in a lovely, mulch-topped bed. In front of her loomed a house of wood and stone in palatial proportions, with accent lighting showing off still more landscaping. A dozen miniature trees dotted a front lawn that would have dwarfed a football field. She followed the wall for several hundred yards along the left edge of the property, noting that it disappeared into a mature forest near the mountain to the rear. Along the mountain’s base, more trees were scattered, each landscaped with flowerbeds and benches connected by stone pathways.
Directly behind the house, dozens of chairs and tables were set up, some beneath tents and others under the fading light in the early night sky. To the far right, in a clearing of appropriate size, a softball game was underway. Ward wondered how they could see the ball and hoped she wouldn’t be needed for any emergency services. Dozens of people sat on the sidelines cheering. And along the wall to her left, in what Ward assumed was normally a field of grass, still more cars were parked. Five rows of them, to be exact.
This gathering resembled the county fair more than a house party, and Ward hesitated, reconsidering her decision to attend the party. Was she really up for this much excitement? As the chief of staff, Judi would know how busy the ER had been and that Ward had left the hospital an hour late, and would forgive her bad manners. As she stood debating, she was spotted. Frankie, the ER nurse manager, began waving frantically at her. Resigned to staying, she waved and began walking again, toward the crowd rather than the road.
The quiet hum she’d detected from the front of the house grew steadily louder. She wove through statues and sculpted shrubs and, of course, dozens of folding tables set up on the lawn and on the patio beside an Olympic-size swimming pool, complete with a fountain and a sliding board. She grinned as she noticed the line for the slide on this warm evening. Most of the people queuing were adults. Twenty others were already in the pool, and hundreds of people had gathered around it, enjoying the fading warmth of the sun’s last rays. They all seemed to be having a good time.
Frankie approached and hugged her.
“Some party!” Ward said.
“You’re not kidding. Wait till you see the fireworks. I bet they don’t do it this well in Philly.”
Ward didn’t argue but turned to another voice. “Hey, Doc! Over here!” someone yelled, drawing her eyes to one of the many tables. This particular one was occupied by the people she’d spent most of today with, and clearly they’d been looking out for her. She made her way toward them.
“I’ll catch you later,” Frankie promised before he headed toward the portable restrooms tucked behind the trees.
She stopped at the table and greeted her colleagues, then proceeded toward the food tent, glancing as she walked, hoping to see a sign of her hostess in the crowd. If she could just find Judi, she could say hello, thank you, good-bye, and then make her exit. There were just too many people, though. But she did find the food, and her growling stomach reminded her that the peanut-butter sandwich she’d hastily swallowed at lunchtime had been digested long ago.
This was an All-American picnic, and the burgers and hot dogs were grilled while she waited. Ward made use of the time by filling a plate with a variety of salads cooling on a bed of mostly melted ice. Pasta, fruit, potato, and green beans were piled high on her plate before she chose a water from a large tub. Before she could take a sip, Judi Rosen patted her on the back.
“Thrasher! Glad you could make it!” Ward had noted Judi’s tendency to address everyone by their last names and wondered if she’d been in the military. She certainly carried herself like a commanding officer.
“It’s a pleasure to be here,” she replied. “Thanks for the invite.”
Judi waved a dismissive hand. “Everyone comes. I don’t even know some of these people. Since you’re new in town, I had to make sure you got a decent burger on the holiday. Lord knows you’ve been working up a good hunger in the ER the past few days.”
Ward chuckled before sipping her drink, then nodded. “This certainly isn’t the sleepy little country hospital I was expecting, that’s for sure.”
“Well, you’re doing a great job, and we’re all very pleased to have you here. Any chance you’d think of staying on? You know, Dick Rave isn’t recovering from his surgery as we’d hoped, and I’m not sure he’s ever going to come back. He has a sweet disability policy that pays full salary until the age of seventy-two. Why work?”
Ward had heard about the ER chief, who’d suffered a ruptured bowel from diverticulitis and had every complication known to man since then. She didn’t know him though, and had no comment about his disability, and certainly no designs on his job. In a month she’d be at the beach, on vacation, and in two months she’d be back to work in Philly. That was her home. She had a great job. And she loved it there. Still…there was something to be said for the type of medicine she was practicing now, and if Jess had asked her to stay in the mountains, it wouldn’t have been a hard decision.
Judi walked with her toward her table, and a dozen people nodded to her as she made her way there. Some faces were familiar, but most weren’t. Still, they all seemed to know her. The new ER doctor.
“They let you out!” someone said as Ward reached the staff table, and the man sitting on the end stood and offered Ward his seat. He took beverage orders before he walked away, and Ward had to decline half a dozen suggestions for alcoholic beverages. Since she’d been watching her alcohol intake, it amazed her how much everyone else drank.
She was introduced to the people around the table as she ate. Most of them were ER staff, but about every third face was unfamiliar and belonged to the spouses. Judi excused herself, and Ward made the usual small talk as she tried not to eat too quickly. Either she was really, really hungry or the food was exceptional, because she consumed about half her weight in a span of ten minutes, and could have kept eating if she hadn’t looked down and found her plate empty.
Deciding to give her stomach a break, she joined the conversation. Hundreds of patients had demanded their attention in the ER, and she hadn’t had much opportunity for small talk with the staff. Now, though, her coworkers began the interrogation. They asked the typical questions—where she was from, where she’d trained, did she know so-and-so, how she liked their town and their hospital. It was
always the “What are you doing here?” that caused her to pause. She’d been out since the age of six, when she announced at her aunt’s wedding her plans to marry her best friend from school, a girl, and not some disgusting boy. Zeke had pushed her toward the closet, though, and since January she’d found herself more cautious with her remarks than she’d ever been. After all, if you couldn’t trust your father-in-law, who could you trust?
So, for the fifth time in as many months she found herself talking about needing a change and taking to the mountains for some time in the outdoors. Natives every one, they all agreed with her decision and were full of suggestions about how she could fill her free time while in town. When someone mentioned the good fishing on the local river, Ward held up both hands defensively and told them her funniest fish tale. They all roared as she described Frieda emerging from the forest pointing a shotgun at her.
“I’m going to stick to the parks from now on!” Ward said, and everyone laughed.
The fading light brought an end to the ball game, and Ward recognized more faces as both fans and players came back, some moaning and others bragging about the contest. As they all moved to accommodate the new arrivals, Ward found herself squeezed uncomfortably close to a nurse anesthetist whom she’d met during the treatment of a cardiac-arrest victim. The woman, Gianna, had done everything short of tattooing her phone number on Ward’s body to let her know she was interested.
Ward wasn’t, though. She supposed she might be ready to date if she found the right woman, but it wasn’t Gianna. There was nothing unattractive about Gianna, but Ward was inexplicably not interested. Gianna’s sudden appearance, and the pressure her left hand was putting on Ward’s right thigh, changed the jovial atmosphere at the table to an uncomfortable one. It was time to leave.
