Treating Murder: Book One of the Veronica Lane, M.D. series (medical thriller)

by Gabrielle Black

  ***

  In the jail, the cops fingerprinted me roughly, and barked turn orders as they took mug shots. People around the room all seemed to be staring at me. Most were there doing nothing but waiting. One man, wearing a blue and gold rep tie that looked oddly out of place in this zoo, stood up and snapped a picture of me before quickly walking out of the building. How humiliating. This shouldn’t be happening to me. Another man with several rings in his left eyebrow, and wearing a black, leather coat eyed me hungrily, and licked his lips with his pierced tongue to make sure I knew just what he was thinking.

  The guards took me to a room with a phone. I looked around for a seat, but the chairs were on the opposite side of the table. I hesitated. Maybe the guard didn’t want me to wander around that far. I didn’t want to get into any further trouble. Was there such a thing as jail etiquette? I remained standing, and called Jacqueline first. My voice was shakier than I expected. “Jacqueline, this is Nic. I’m in jail.”

  “What? Already?”

  “I guess that they were in a hurry to get me locked up before the weekend.”

  “I’ll be right down. I’ll cancel all of my meetings. Have you called Hal Keats?”

  “No, I think that they will let me use the phone again, but call him for me just in case.”

  “What happened?”

  “A detective named Chapman came to the restaurant today to talk. I thought he was just fact-finding like when he came by my house the other day. He let me talk for a few minutes, and then he arrested me. Just like that. Suddenly he was reading me my rights. Like he was reciting them from TV.”

  “You spoke to Chapman? Twice?” asked Jacqueline.

  “Or three times.” I mumbled.

  “Omigod. Really, haven’t I taught you anything? Don’t say anything else, just hold on. I’ll be right there.”

  The guard walked in as I hung up and said, “Time’s up.”

  I said, “I’m almost done.” I depressed the hook and started to dial Keats office.

  The guard snatched the phone back. “I said, time’s up.”

  I looked up shocked. “But, I have to call my lawyer.”

  “You should have done that first,” she said in an authoritative tone.

  Something snapped inside. All of the fears and surprises and pain of the past few days exploded out. I whirled, my throat was tight, and my words came out in a high, hysterical squeak, “I’m not a criminal. I have not been convicted. I am innocent! You cannot just strip me of my rights just because I am suspected of a crime. This is not a police state, and you cannot just snatch people off of the street away from their lunches based on a theory, and then withdraw all of their rights. I have a right to speak with my attorney.” I shook with nerves and defiance.

  The guard looked a little surprised, but her face relaxed, impressed by my self-righteous tirade, I guessed. She relented slightly, “Well you don’t look like much of a lawbreaker either. Five minutes. But don’t you be calling any more of your buddies.”

  I dialed the number on the card. “Law offices of Keats, Keats, and Scherer. How can I help you?” asked an unfamiliar voice.

  “This is Dr. Lane. I need to speak with Mr. Keats please.”

  “Which Mr. Keats?”

  “Hal Keats.”

  “Hold please. Let me see if he is in.”

  She put me on hold for what seemed like an eternity as I watched the second hand sweep around the clock on the wall for nearly five minutes. Eventually Keats came on the line. I was almost surprised that I hadn’t been rebuffed by the secretary once again.

  “Dr. Lane, how nice to hear from you. I spoke with Jacqueline Greene about you just last night. We need to get together and discuss the events. I believe you are going to be the prime suspect. How’s this Wednesday sound?”

  “Mr. Keats. I’m calling you from the jail.”

  “Already? My God! Who arrested you?”

  “Detective Chapman.”

  “Ah, yes. My good friend, Detective Chapman. He thinks that his job is a race against time. I’ve seen him make the wrong arrest before, and so have the judges. That will work in our favor.”

  “Great, so can you get me out of here?”

  “Of course I can, but the weekend is starting. I don’t know how soon it will be.”

  “What?” I looked up at the clock. Panic seized me.

  “I’ll have somebody down there today," said Keats.

  “A lawyer, Mr. Keats?”

  “Dr. Lane,” he said in a soothing tone. “We’ll take good care of you.” The guard returned and looked at her watch.

  “So you are sending me a lawyer?” I reiterated.

  “Our associates are very good. I’ll follow along.”

  I sighed and blew my bangs up off of my forehead. “Thank-you for sending somebody.”

  I hung up and was escorted to my cell by the guard. Fortunately the census on the women’s side was low, and I shared the cell with only one other inmate. She was a bleached blonde in a tiny black miniskirt, and she was staring at the TV when I walked in bewildered. The girl looked up when the door slammed. Her lip curled at my tweed slacks and peach blouse.

  “First time? What’d you do? Double-park?”

  I drew a shuddering breath and said, “I didn’t do anything.” I sat down on the side of the lower bunk.

  “That’s funny. Neither did I.” The girl got up and slung her hips forward as she walked across the cell.

  “Really? What did they say you did?” I wasn’t in the least bit curious at this point, but polite conversational habits took over.

  “Those pigs say I’m a prostitute, and underage. They want to send me to juvie, but I’m a woman. I’ve got a kid,” she said with some pride.

  I was stunned. “Really? How old?”

  “He’s almost two.”

  “Where is he now?” I asked.

  “The court gave him to my mother the first time I wound up in here,” she said.

  “How old are you?”

  “Fifteen.”

  “My God. Has anyone ever tried to help you?” I recalled suddenly all of the teenagers I had seen as obstetric patients, and wondered if some of them were out walking the streets as well. Had I really done enough for those girls in my care?

  “No way. I can take care of myself, besides what they do out there’s no different from what my momma’s shitty boyfriend’s been doing for years. Now at least it’s ‘cause I said they could, and I get paid.”

  “That’s awful.” I felt sick. I’d seen the same thing many times in my training, but it never ceased to turn my stomach.

  The girl turned from me with a smack of her gum, and lost herself in the TV show.

  “What’s your name?” The girl didn’t blink. I nodded at the back of her head, “Okay. I’m sorry.”

  I lay down on the bottom bunk with a rough, dark blue blanket in my hands. I knew that I was giving in to self-pity, but I didn’t believe that I still had the strength to resist it. I didn’t even want to. I wanted to wallow. Silent tears rolled down my face until finally I fell into an exhausted sleep. It seemed to be only a few seconds later when the door opened and I thought I had a new cell-mate. When I looked up, it was Jacqueline with a man I didn't recognize.

  Jacqueline apologized, “I’m sorry that we’re so late. It took a while to get away. I met him at the front desk.” She snuffed hard at the overwhelming odor of old dirt and stale urine that permeated the room.

  “So what time is it?” I groaned.

  “Five-thirty. You’ve missed dinner.”

  I was still groggy. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

  “Maybe they thought that you were better off asleep,” replied the man.

  “So what next?” I rose from the bunk and spoke in my calm, professional voice. The one that had handled crises just after awakening for years of medical emergencies.

  “How are you doing?” asked Jacqueline.

  “I’m a wreck.” My new, calm façade nearly brok
e immediately.

  “I know sweetie.” Jacqueline hugged me, carefully, so as not to smear her painstakingly applied make-up. We need to discuss the case.” Jacqueline straightened back up.

  “Now?” I asked. I didn’t feel up for any discussion at the moment.

  “Yes, now is the best time. Before they ask you any more questions.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, I’m sorry. You need strategy, and all of the available evidence,” said Jacqueline.

  I looked up at the man that Jacqueline had brought in with her. He had dark, nearly black hair, cut short and parted to the side. He had on a dark grey, very expensive appearing suit that fit perfectly. He had a slight tan, and tiny wrinkles were just beginning to form at the corners of his eyes above his high cheekbones. He appeared calm and professional, and young.

  As I stared, he reached out his right hand and said, “Hello, I’m James Stone of Keats, Keats, and Scherer.”

  The blonde cut her eyes to us and away from the TV for a moment, and then she was reabsorbed into it.

  I smiled thinly and said, “How do you do?”

  “I’m well, Doctor Lane.”

  “Call me Nic, please. I could stand to be better.”

  He smiled sympathetically, and said, “I know.”

  His little smile made my heart jump.

  “We’ll do the best that we can. I have just one more piece of bad news. I spoke with the people up front, and your pretrial hearing is in about ten days. That’s Monday week. We will try to post bail for you this Monday, but I couldn’t get to the judge early enough this afternoon. I’m afraid you’ll have to spend the weekend here. I apologize for that. Judges almost never consider cases over the weekend. If I can track one down who will, I’ll do so.”

  My face fell a little bit further. I looked over at my cell-mate, and sighed, “Okay.” I hugged my arms around myself and gritted my teeth. “That’s just icing on the cake.”

  I looked around my squalid surroundings in resignation. The cinder block walls had been painted pale yellow once, but they were grimy, and the paint had been chipped away everywhere within reach. Words, mostly obscenities, dominated the walls.

  The bunk bed that I had just occupied crowded one corner, with mattresses that felt to be about two inches thick. A bent metal frame caused the midsection of the lower bed to dip toward the floor, and the upper bunk hardly looked more inviting. My head itched at the thought of bedbugs and other parasites likely to be hidden in the folds. The room was set on an angle, and the back corner was narrow, making me feel like the cell was collapsing in on itself.

  Mr. Stone turned to Jacqueline and said, “Do you mind if we have a few minutes to talk?”

  Jacqueline shook her head, and turned to me, “Try to get some sleep, and I’ll be back to straighten out the details with you tomorrow.”

  “Okay,” I smiled a little although I felt like my insides were being torn apart.

  Mr. Stone sat down on the bench along the wall. “Call me Jamie, okay?”

  I nodded.

  “Tomorrow we’ll go into more detail, and we’ll get a separate room to work in.”

  “So you do work on Saturdays?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said. “I’ve thought about the information Jacqueline gave to Keats and what she told me here outside. It’s in your best interest never to go to trial, so we have only ten days to come up with such a watertight defense that the judge will throw you out. The time factor involved in a full out court trial will eat your practice away.”

  “I see,” I said.

  Jamie gave me another comforting smile. “Remember, they can’t get a conviction for Murder One unless they have some hard evidence to go on, like a confession. Don’t give them any. Also, they have to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, which is unlikely in your case. A trial would most likely drag on for many months. We need to get you thrown out at the preliminary stage.

  The preliminary merely has to prove that you could have done it. Not all of the facts will be in, so it will be much harder for us to prove that you could not possibly have done it.”

  “How about, ‘I didn’t do it’?” I retorted sitting down on the side of the bunk.

  “Sorry, not good enough.” He squatted down and looked up into my face.

  “But it’s good enough for Chapman to say ‘she did it’ and get me locked up and destroy my practice? It doesn’t seem fair.”

  “That’s part of the justice system.”

  “I see, one accusation, and you may never claw your way back to complete innocence.” I looked bitterly at the corner of the room, and it narrowed even further.

  “You have it all wrong. The court system works to protect the innocent. If the prosecution can’t prove that you committed the murder, then you’re free.” The girl glanced up at him from across the room.

  “One more thing. Did he do anything wrong by coming to see me after I said that I wanted to wait for my lawyer? That seems wrong to me.”

  “Technically, since he didn’t ask for a confession before reading you your rights, and he never interrogated you, he was in bounds, but it wasn’t exactly by the books.”

  The blonde was now watching with interest. Jamie took my hand and squeezed it. “Tomorrow, when you’ve rested some, we’ll use a separate room, and we’ll go into greater detail. Will you be okay until then? Can I get you anything?”

  “No, I’ll be fine.” I shook my head and smiled grimly. It was more a baring of teeth and Jamie looked mildly dismayed.

  “Don’t worry; I’ll take care of everything. You’re going to be all right.”

  I nodded.

  After he left, I thought about Jamie Stone. He seemed very young to be doing this job, younger than me, but he was very serious. And his manner inspired trust. I sat on my bunk, and stared at the girl.

  The girl looked at me with a new respect as she chewed her gum. “Murder, huh? I’m Missy. I’ve been here a zillion times. It’s not so bad. Look.” She pointed to a carving on the wall. “That’s my mark.”

  “Hi, Missy, I’m Nic. “I extended my tired hand and the girl looked at me with surprise.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Nobody ever tries to shake my hand,” said Missy.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “I guess they don’t care who I am.”

  “Who are you?”

  “What do you think? You think I’m dressing this way to keep cool?” She laughed a loud, harsh laugh like she had just made a great joke.

  I winced at the sound and the joke. “How long have you been on the streets?”

  “Dunno. Hey, how’d you get a lawyer like him? He’s sooo hot,” she giggled.

  “He’s too old for you, I think.” I wanted her to be quiet. I needed time to sort out the mess in my head.

  “You kidding? I’ve done guys twice his age. They always pay better anyway.”

  I cringed. I couldn’t ignore this girl, I’d never have a night’s peace again. “Missy, you don’t have to live like this. I’ll help you find whatever you need. You just find me when we get out of here.”

  “Yeah, right.” Missy slouched back to the TV, displaying a large tiger tattoo sprawled across from her side to her back, and halfway down her skirt.

  Jamie returned as promised at 8:00 the next morning. He was carrying a fresh, yellow legal pad in one hand, and a tray with two coffees in the other. As we were escorted to an interview room, he said. “Hi, did you get some sleep?”

  “I slept most of the night. I’ve learned to sleep under just about any conditions,” I said. I didn’t mention the retching in the next cell, which had awakened me earlier, or the roving lights and loud voices all through the night. I did feel slightly better than I had last night. Time was a miraculous drug.

  “That’s good. You need your strength. Most people can’t sleep and that’s the worst thing for them.”

  I looked around as we stepped through the doorway. The room held a wooden table and three cha
irs, it was lit like an office suite, and in the corner was a locked cabinet.

  “Are you ready to begin?” he asked.

  “Yes, I am.” I answered.

  Jamie sat down spread out his notes. “First off, we can’t have your friend involved in your case. Her position in the DA’s office compromises us.”

  “Can I talk to her?”

  “Limit it. She will have to sit out of the meetings at the DA’s office anyway, but her knowledge of the case compromises us.”

  I kept my face calm, and nodded, but inside my stomach flip-flopped. I couldn’t trust in my best friend? The one who had brought me this attorney?

  Jamie opened his notes. “Okay. So far we know that Sarah Summers died in the hospital at around 5:30 on Monday the 25th. We also know that the pathologist said that it was arsenic poisoning. The report says, and I quote, ‘Death by combination of acute on chronic arsenic poisoning. No evidence was found for detrimental effects attributable to chemotherapeutic regimen.’ I suppose that you can explain to me what that means.”

  “I can,” I said in my professional voice. “Do you want me to right now?”

  “Please.”

  “Arsenic has various effects on the body. In chronic ingestion, it causes fatigue, numbness of the extremities, and skin changes that are described in the literature as raindrops on a dusty road. It causes thickening of the skin on the extremities, and can also cause changes in the appearance of the nails and darkening of the stools.” I began as though I were addressing a lecture hall.

  “It's what historians say that Napoleon died of. They accused his doctors of killing him, too. In fact, his body was exhumed, and they found that no one killed him. He died of stomach cancer. He had been given some arsenic, but it was part of his treatment for his abdominal pain.” I continued.