He’d been hired to kill Avi once but he didn’t waste good guys. And even though he was sleeping with Kissy, Avi was definitely a good guy. A goody two shoes if you got right down to it. He had even shaved his head to play Daddy Warbucks to Kissy’s Orphan Annie.
The song ended with Avi on a low note, of course, and everyone sighed before they started applauding. Tim smelled caramel popcorn as he half-heartedly put his hands together. His stomach growled again. He turned to find a good looking woman in a red and white striped uniform holding a tray. The candy striper offered him a selection of orange and black popcorn balls on sticks.
“Happy Halloween.” She held the tray out.
“Thanks.” Tim picked popcorn ball from her tray and asked, “are you a real candy striper?”
“No.” She shook her head. “The costume is confusing because I’m not a ‘sexy candy striper.’”
“Or candy stripper, so to speak.”
The woman rolled her eyes.
“Sorry,” Tim laughed.
“I should have seen it coming,” she said. “This was my mother’s uniform when she was sentenced to community service here back in the sixties.”
“Well, I think you’re very sexy.” Tim swapped his popcorn ball out for a larger one.
“Thank you.” She looked him over as he took a bite. “Are you Freddy or Where’s Waldo?”
Tim pulled the striped hat out of his back pocket and stuck it atop his short blond hair.
“Ah. Waldo.” She took his hand and rubbed a thumb over his long black pinkie nail. “This would go very well with my son’s goth costume.”
Tim looked over the crowd for a goth kid, trying not to pull his hand away. “It’s just something I wear to remember a teacher I lost too early. I never thought about it before but she could be pretty goth.”
“You’re with the punk Tinkerbell and vaguely Asian Annie?” The candy striper finally released his hand and nodded towards Julia and Kissy in the front row.
“Easiest roadie gig ever. If the quintet used instruments, I’d carry them.”
“Well thank you for coming. I’m Danny’s mom, Carol.” She put her hand out and Tim had to swap his stick to the other hand to shake it.
“Nice to meet you. Danny’s pretty cool, making this party happen.”
“Yeah.” Carol’s eyes welled up a little. “It was another fan online who suggested he ask. The2ndKC.”
“The internet is an amazing thing,” Tim observed. “Sounds like your kid is too.”
“Danny’s a fighter. He’s gonna live as much as he can for as long as he can.”
She pasted a smile back on her face and moved off to pass out the caramel corn treats. Tim watched her go and thought about the job he had to do today. The client hadn’t given him a deadline but with an angel of mercy as his target, the sooner he fulfilled the contract, the less innocents the creep could kill.
Tim took another bite of the popcorn and pulled his phone out of his pocket. The client wanted to remain anonymous so Tim had been instructed to retrieve his payment and the target details from an empty room on the third floor. He finished the Halloween treat and turned to toss the stick in the trash on his way out the door.
But then Kissy got up with her red ukulele and he had to stay.
Three
“Come in! Come in and make yourselves comfortable,” Kissy hollered at the group of people peeking in the doors to the lounge. “Danny said everyone’s welcome. Don’t be afraid. It’s safe in here.”
She grabbed Kevin, the vocal percussionist of GinNtonix and pulled him center stage. “What do you think? This guy’s pretty good huh?”
A few people clapped lightly. Kevin, a lanky mixed-European type dressed as a snazzy Buster Keaton shook his head of curly brown hair and headed back to his seat. Then Julia and Danny whooped and hollered and the more alert patients and staff joined them. Kissy tap danced around Kevin, driving him back on stage.
She scanned the room as she danced. There were some really sick people here. And some hospital workers who looked like they’d prefer a lullaby. Tim had been hovering in the back, but as she harangued the crowd he came forward and sat himself down next to an old woman wearing a white gown with a clothes-hanger halo on her head. She had a pair of wings coming off the back of her purple wheelchair. Kissy watched for a moment as Tim leaned over and made the woman laugh.
Then she tapped a complicated eight bar sequence and challenged Kevin to match it. He did. Easily. The little crowd loved it. The two of them traded eights for a while, Kissy tapping and Kevin beatboxing.
The room was never still. In addition to the small crowd watching from chairs and couches around the room, several people circulated through the audience. Danny’s mother Carol circulated through the room with a tray of homemade treats. A witch in a horrible rubber mask distributed fancy candy necklaces strung with glittering gems that reminded Kissy of the drug ring she’d helped Tim and Avi shut down. Of course, a nurse strode from patient to patient checking their IV drips and oxygen tanks. His only nod to the holiday was a red clown nose which Danny squeezed as the man knelt by him adjusting the pillows at his back.
The mixed smells of hospital antiseptic, caramel corn, and sour candy made Kissy a little nauseous. She took a breath and turned her focus back to Kevin. He attempted some tap steps in his dress shoes. She snapped his suspenders and drummed a paradiddle on his chest. They each executed some Lord of the Dance maneuvers and then chatting back and forth as if they were alone in a rehearsal hall, spun and dropped to a knee for the big finish.
Kissy stood for a bow and Kevin spun her into a spontaneous hug. She buried her nose in his neck, inhaling his musky scent. The audience loved it. They were laughing and enjoying the applause when a gasp and crash cut through the joy.
Kissy pulled away and looked over toward the sound. Danny’s mother Carol had dropped her tray. Caramel balls rolled around the wheels of her son’s chair. Julia was slipping to her knees to gather them. But Carol stood with her hands over her mouth, her eyes pinned to her son’s pale, motionless face.
A doctor gently pushed Julia away and crouched at Danny’s side, slipping his fingers under remnants of the sparkly candy necklace to feel for a pulse. He held back the boy’s eyelids and flashed a penlight in them. Then he looked up at the boy’s parents holding each other in a scene of pure terror. The doctor shook his head. Danny was dead.
Four
When Carol screamed and threw herself at the doctor, Tim stood to help but a cold, wrinkled hand took hold of his arm. He looked down to see Ella, the angel he’d chosen to sit with, urging him to stay.
“Dear.” She tugged weakly on him and he sat again. “Danny had a degenerative disease. They knew he was going to die soon. There’s really nothing you can do.”
Carol hadn’t sounded like she expected him to die any minute. But Ella was right. Tim was an expert in ending life. He knew very little about extending life. And he certainly couldn’t do anything to ease the parents’ grief.
“It’s been a rough month for the nurses in the hospice wing. We’ve lost seven terminal patients.” Ella spoke quietly, watching the staff console Danny’s parents and escort them all from the room.
Danny’s father broke away at the door and went back to speak with Julia, Kissy, and the GinNtonix. After a small conference, the dad left and the singers huddled. Julia held Kissy’s hand while they stepped to the edge of the little stage.
“Danny wanted everyone here to have a fun Halloween.” Kissy paused to catch her breath. “His dad wants the concert to go on. So we’re gonna take a short break but we’ll be back.”
Beside Tim, Ella yelled out in her creaky voice, “Free Bird!”
Heads whipped around to gasp at the spunky old lady and laughter broke the tension. Looking relieved, the red-headed tenor of GinNtonix started singing. After a startled moment, the soprano and baritone joined in. Then Avi laid down a bass line and Kevin layered in the percussion. Nearly everyone was enthral
led as GinNtonix did in fact sing “Free Bird.”
Tim applauded with everyone else and then straightened Ella’s halo.
“Is seven a lot?” he asked her as the group sang.
“Oh my, yes” she confirmed. “The administrators are beginning to wonder if one of the staff is playing the angel of mercy.”
Tim didn’t wonder. He knew. He’d been told.
“I’m gonna go see if my friends are okay.” He stood. “I’ll come back to sit with you later.”
“Don’t take too long. I might be next.” Ella looked distracted for a second. Then she grabbed his arm again and Tim could see tears in her eyes. “I don’t want to be next. I’m not ready to die yet.”
He crouched down at her side. “Are you scared, Ella?”
“No, dear.” She smiled gently. “Aren’t you sweet? I did want to meet the angel. But my nephews came for my birthday last week and I changed my mind. They were all my friends you know.”
“The other seven?”
“All eight.”
“You said seven patients died.” Tim looked over where Julia stood hugging Kissy in the spot a wheelchair had occupied moments before. “Oh. Was Danny your friend too?”
Ella looked confused. She searched his face until she reached a decision and nodded. “Yes. Yes, seven.” She looked down at her hands for another lost moment and then turned a bright smile up at Tim.
He smiled back at her. “What day was your birthday?”
“October twenty-first,” she reported proudly.
“Happy birthday.” He glanced up to see Julia rushing out of the room. Kissy stayed in the front row seats. Distracted, he asked Ella, “How old are you now?”
She shook her head sadly at him. “It’s not the years that count, Waldo. It’s the moments.”
“You want more moments?” he asked.
“I want a million more moments,” she confirmed.
He kissed her hand and stood. “I’ll see what I can do.”
Ella blinked and adjusted in her chair for a better view of the stage. “That’s a good boy.”
Five
Tim wound his way around the chairs and couches to where Danny’s wheelchair had been parked. Kissy was sitting by herself, holding Julia’s little green purse. Her ukulele was laying forgotten on the floor a few feet away. There was some spilled liquid on the floor at her feet and pieces of candied gems. The liquid was trailing toward her instrument so Tim picked it up and set it on the chair beside Kissy’s abandoned Annie wig.
“What happened?” he asked, pulling a bandana from his bag to wipe his hand.
She turned, surprised. “The kid who invited us died.”
“Yes, I saw that.” Tim carefully slid an arm around her shoulders. “But he wasn’t supposed to die today, was he?”
“Oh. So you didn’t kill him, KC?”
“What’s the C stand for?”
She turned back to watch the singers. “The Killer with a Conscience doesn’t kill kids?”
“Not good kids.”
She punched him half-heartedly.
He looked around the room at the staff moving in and out, at the patients holding hands with their families. Poor Carol with her popcorn balls was gone, off somewhere mourning her dead son. The witch and her necklaces had disappeared as well. But a nurse still moved among the patients, checking their vitals. He was spending a lot of time with the older patients, listening to their hearts. His clown nose was draped around his neck now. It clashed with the candy necklace beneath it.
Kissy sighed and leaned into Tim. He looked down and smelled the lavender of her shampoo.
“I’m glad you’re not working today,” she murmured.
Tim looked out the window at the lake. “Actually.”
She hit him for real. “What the hell, Timothy?”
“I don’t have any details yet. The client claims there’s an angel of mercy in the hospital and wants me to take them out.”
Kissy sat up, nearly whacking Tim’s nose with her head. She glanced over at the GinNtonix and then back to Tim. He was surprised at how appalled she looked.
“So Danny may have been murdered and we could have stopped it?” She stood and dragged him down the far aisle, away from the stage. “Let’s go get those details.”
“We?”
She stopped. “Yeah. This one I’m in on.”
“What about your boyfriend?” Tim looked at the stage where Avi was directing the quintet to a close.
“Danny dressed up as a cop. Avi’s totally in.”
She turned and led him to the door before Tim could explain that wasn’t exactly what he meant.
“Hi.” Julia limped in the door just as they reached it. “Is the concert cancelled?”
Kissy pulled her friend into a hug. “No. I’m just taking a little break. Gonna get some fresh air with Tim.”
“I can go—“
“You should stay and support the group.” Tim forestalled Julia’s offer to join them. “We’ll be right back.”
Julia grabbed his hand. “Hey, your black pinkie nail is bright fuchsia. Wouldn’t red make more sense with your Waldo costume?”
Tim glanced down at his long nail. His sister was right. It was hot pink. Looking around the room, he tried to remember everything he’d touched in the last twenty minutes.
“Come on, Weird Waldo.” Kissy bussed Julia on the cheek and pressed her purse into her hands. “Tell Avi I’ll be back. And don’t blow your diet on a sugared ruby.”
Tim’s eyes focused on the candy necklace Julia had in her mouth. But then Kissy pulled him out of the room.
Six
Kissy dragged Tim into the relative privacy of the hospital’s lobby. She looked around to see if anyone was watching them.
“Where are you supposed to meet your client?”
Tim smirked at Kissy’s eagerness.
“Let’s clarify. I don’t need your help. I didn’t ask for,” he began.
Kissy cut him off. “Oh chill out, Ronan. I don’t want your money. I want to know who killed Danny.”
“He was here because he was dying, Kissy. We don’t know that he was murdered.”
“You’re wasting time.”
“I’m not meeting the client. We set up a drop off. Come on.” Tim led her to a stairwell.
They climbed up to the third floor. Kissy hugged his heels as he led her into the hallway. She stutter stepped to keep up with his deliberate pace, frantically looking around at everything until he told her to stop it. He smiled and chatted with the nursing staff behind the floor desk as they passed. None of them argued when he pulled a white coat from the back of a chair and an aluminum clipboard off a hook on the wall. He gave the clipboard to Kissy and slipped on the lab coat as they continued down the hall.
At room 314, Tim pulled a chart from the file holder on the door and handed it to Kissy. “Read this. Intently.”
“Wait,” she argued. “I want to come.”
“No.”
Tim walked across the hall and stepped into room 316, leaving her standing there. She saw a door open just a little way down the hall and then shut again quickly when she looked up. She tried to focus on the chart in her hands, but couldn’t understand any of the shorthand written there. So she flipped a few pages and examined the X-ray of what she thought could be either a lung or a uterus.
After a minute, she gave up on the subterfuge and stuck the chart back in the plastic holder on the door. As she reached for the knob on room 316, the door opened and Tim knocked her over coming out. He grabbed her and pulled her to her feet almost before her butt hit the hard cold floor of the hallway. She ignored his laughter and followed as he led her over to the nearest stairwell.
After shutting the door and looking up and down the stairs, he pulled a folded x-ray envelope out of his satchel. “I got the money, a name, and a room number.”
“What’s his name?”
“Edward.” Tim continued, “I’m gonna go interview this guy and decide i
f I want the job. You should—“
Kissy blew up at him as quietly as she could. “He killed Danny. Take him out!”
Tim stared at her until she quieted. “K.C. Remember? I’m not gonna kill a person just because a stranger with money says he’s a bad guy. If that’s how I worked,” he reminded her, “Avi would be dead.”
Kissy took a deep breath. She was a little disturbed at her own viciousness. And surprised at how methodical Tim could be about this knowing his target was a murderer. Then it sank in. They had no more proof Edward was a murderer than Tim had when he was told Avi was a heartless drug dealer.
She met Tim’s eyes. “You don’t want me to come.”
“I promise I will get you or Avi if I need help.”
She acquiesced. “Okay. I’ll go sing something.”
“Good plan.”
She started down the stairs and then turned back. “If he’s not the one, you’ll let us know so we can find the real killer?”
Tim chuckled. “People with fatal diseases die, Kiersten. All the time.”
“There might be no murderer?”
“Don’t sound so disappointed. If Edward is innocent, that makes my client an attempted murderer.” He smiled. “Feel better?”
“And we’ll find him? And give him to Avi?”
“It’s a deal. If we find a bad guy I haven’t been paid to kill, Officer Kee gets him.”
Kissy took the two steps back up to her high school friend. She kissed his cheek. “Thanks.”
Then she turned and headed down the stairwell.
Until she heard the door close again. As soon as it clicked, she crept back up and peeked out to see Tim disappearing into a patient’s room. Looking down the length of the hall for any staff, she slipped down and checked the number on the door. Room 323. Good to know.
Seven
Tim ducked as a shoe flew at his head.
“Get out! You won’t kill me you devil of mercy!” The old white haired man in the bed grabbed at a glass of water on the bedside table. He missed and knocked a remote control off the table.
“Whoa! Sir. What makes you think I’m here to kill you?” Tim sank to the floor against the door, keeping his distance.
Killer on Call 6 Book Bundle (Books 1-6) Page 13
