by Liz Bradbury
I relayed all this information to Kathryn who listened with her chin propped on her arm on the back of the couch. “Where was she?” she asked.
“On the east side of College Street, not far from Washington.”
“Can she speak? What was she doing out in the middle of the night?”
“Rowlina was very upset and not very coherent. I have to go. I’m so sorry... and just when you were about to...”
“I’ll hold the thought,” she smiled the half smile. We moved together for a lingering goodbye kiss, which made me even less eager to leave.
As I drove my van to the hospital, I had a very bad feeling about this latest incident. It wasn’t just that another person had been hurt. It was something else I couldn’t name. It was there though, bubbling in my stomach, a nasty sensation that was much scarier than Rowlina being used for target practice. But I couldn’t put it all together. Not yet.
*********
The hospital lobby was hushed by the night. Dr. Rowlina Roth-Holtzmann was in room 410, barely awake. Max Bouchet and the security guard who’d found her were waiting with her.
“Maggie, it’s good you’re here,” said Max in an impossibly loud whisper.
“Max, I’ll talk to her and look at her coat with the bullet hole, but we have to call the police, it doesn’t matter that she wasn’t seriously hurt. I’m obligated to report it,” I said this all very quietly so the other people in the room couldn’t overhear. Bouchet nodded.
I went over to the bed where Rowlina lay under the covers in a hospital gown, “Dr. Roth-Holtzmann, I must ask you some questions and you must answer as fully as possible.”
She stared up at me fearfully. She nodded but it hurt her head. She closed her eyes against the pain.
“Tell me what happened?”
She opened her eyes again and slowly began, “I was coming out of the building when I heard a shot. I turned around quickly and stumbled...” she said in a papery voice.
“Did you see or hear anyone?”
“No.”
“What were you doing on campus so late?”
Rowlina glanced nervously at Max Bouchet and remained silent. I said, “Max, would you step out of the room and make that call? Oh, and would you take the guard with you? ”
He wasn’t happy about it, but he did it.
“Why were you on Campus so late?”
She closed her eyes for a moment, took a breath and said haltingly, “I had wanted... to speak to... someone... about a problem... a personal problem and from my car on College Street, the light of Kathryn Anthony, I had seen.”
Kathryn’s office light, her car in the Language Arts parking lot, and her habit of burning the midnight oil would cause anyone to think she was in her office. Probably, over the years, many lesbian coeds had gazed with desire at Kathryn’s late night office lights. Had Rowlina hoped for a midnight tryst with Kathryn? I’ll admit to a certain smugness in knowing that Kathryn was resting her beautiful head in my lap, while Rowlina prowled the night looking for her.
“What did you want to see her about?”
“A serious problem I have with... government officials... and as she knows the Governor...” Rowlina touched the bandage on her head. She went on, “but that has nothing to do with this. I don’t know why...” she stopped again, “perhaps a robbery? There is no reason why anyone would want to shoot me. Perhaps it is that I merely imagined it?”
I opened the closet door. A dark gray suit and an acid green polyester blouse hung on hangers with her billowy dark wool coat and red shawl. Brown leather low-heeled shoes were on the floor. On a shelf was her ridiculous fox fur hat. One side of the hat was covered with blood, a grotesque wearable rendering of highway roadkill. Maybe she’d get rid of it now.
“What do you mean, you’re in trouble with the government?” I asked inspecting the coat with my back to her.
“It is the Immigration... they do not think... but it has nothing to do with me...” she sobbed.
Fear had seeped out of all the creepy little corners of her life and it had begun to push her over the edge. She was barreling toward a breakdown. I inspected her coat. Through the outer right side, at the top of a wide pocket, was a bullet hole. Another hole in the back on the right side, showed the exit path. I folded the material and could easily imagine how the bullet could have passed through without hitting her. We needed the cops to comb the area to find the bullet. If it matched the one in Skylar Carvelle’s wall, it would be an important piece of evidence.
“Tell me what you did, step by step, from the time you got in the area of the office building. Where had you come from?”
She said more alertly, “I parked my car at the Architecture Department in my regular space.”
“Why did you park so far from Dr. Anthony’s office?”
“I always park there. It is my spot, and it is not so very far away...” It was her parking place, she always parked there. Routine was part of her identity.
“I walked through the quad... and went into the... Language Arts Building through the quad side door. To the second floor offices, I went. But there was no answer when I knocked at the door of 208. Might Kathryn have been harmed in her office and that was why she did not...”
“No, she’s not been harmed.” Except when I bit her shoulder in the hot tub. I mentally slapped myself. Pay attention.
Rowlina slumped back against a pillow. “That is all right then. Ah, and so... I came down the front stairs of the building...”
“Why did you come down a different way?”
Her head moved sluggishly as she did her best to form an answer, “Because it... had been very dark in the quad. I had not been safe-feeling and so on the street with lights, I wanted to walk.”
She licked her lips. Finally she said, “So, then... when I came out, there was a shot and I turned around and fell... and then I woke when the guard was there.”
“Tell me about the shot... did you hear anything before that?”
“Before the shot. Before...?” she looked bewildered but tried to think, “Yes, yes, so... I heard a click and then another louder click... I turned a little toward it, like so.” Her eyes went to the left. “Aand then bang and then I think maybe running footsteps.”
“You turned toward Washington Street? Straight along College Street toward Washington Street?” I asked leaning over the bed with my face close to hers, forcing her to keep eye contact.
“Yes, but a little back... toward the quad.” She yawned fiercely. Her stale, smoke-tinged breath made me draw back sharply.
She was nearly asleep now. A nurse came in to check her vital signs. I went into the corridor to find Bouchet. He and the security guard were sitting on a couch down the hall. They both stood up expectantly. I spoke to the guard briefly who hadn’t actually seen or heard anything but a small scream from Rowlina. I told him he could go, but that the police might want to speak with him.
I said to Bouchet, “She didn’t see who shot her. The bullet holes in her coat are small. I’d say they’re from a twenty-two. No powder burns, so the shooter had to be a few feet away. That jives with her story. She says she wanted to talk to Kathryn about a personal problem.”
“What? I want to know. I won’t tell,” he said boyishly.
“Well, OK, Immigration may be after Rowlina because she married that guy on the West Coast to get him citizenship.” I felt a little sorry for her. She hadn’t married Holtzmann to break the law, just to close the closet door on herself. I wondered if she was being blackmailed on top of it all. Which of course made my mind flit to our resident blackmailer, Shel Druckenmacher. “Max, I need to go back to the College and see exactly where Rowlina was when this happened.”
Bouchet said the police were on their way and I’d better get going. “I didn’t mention you were here,” he assured me.
“Good, show them the bullet holes in Rowlina’s coat and suggest they go to the scene and search for the slug and spent shell. If it matches the bullet that ki
lled Skylar Carvelle, then we’ll have a clear link.
I left by the stairs, checking the lobby through the landing door window for police. I ducked when I caught sight of Ed O’Brien and two detectives striding across the lobby. They sped past the desk flashing their badges officially, on their way to the elevator.
When I heard the ding and swish of the elevator doors closing, I high-tailed it across the lobby to the exit.
*******
Was it just my imagination or did it seemed darker on College Street than usual? I parked next to Kathryn’s Mini Cooper and surveyed the entire scene though my windshield.
It was darker... the bulb over the Language Arts Building door had been smashed. I looked up. The light in Kathryn’s office was still on. The street was deserted. A cold gust of wind shook the van. I felt vulnerable sitting there in full view of anyone. I started the engine and drove to the Architectural Design Building, where Rowlina Roth-Holtzmann’s office was. Her car was in the spot with her nameplate.
I parked in a dark corner. Unlike Rowlina, I felt safer in the dark. I took out my gun, undid the safety and held it down at my side as I walked toward the Language Arts Building, following a path through the quad that had been kept clear of snow by the overhanging roofs. I took my time, somehow managing to keep my mind off Kathryn, who was waiting for me in my nice warm bed. Playing hide and seek with someone who might shoot you is not the time for your mind to wander.
When I finally got to the path that went around to the front of the Language Arts Building, I moved more slowly, sensing every noise, shadow and smell. There was an odor of something cloying. Just a whiff, then it was gone. I could see where the shooter probably waited. There were bushes to the left of the entrance, there was even a low window ledge where someone could sit and watch the door. Below it were footprint indentations. Nothing very clear, too much mulch around the bushes and too little snow because of the overhanging roof.
So, I figured the killer shot and missed, but he or she didn’t finish Rowlina off because when she fell, the killer probably thought she was dead, and then heard the guard coming. If Rowlina had been shot at by the killer, then the suspect list was down to just three... and the ever-possible wild card. It might also be possible that Rowlina set this whole thing up herself. It would divert suspicion from her and after all, she wasn’t hurt and nobody saw the shooter. Oh shit, this is so damn complicated. Why does there have to be all this intrigue? Give me a gang drive-by anytime. Those are a breeze to figure out. Hell, the perps brag all over the street about them.
I tried to imagine each suspect waiting here in the cold dark night to kill Rowlina. But why kill her? Why even try to scare her? She was scared enough already. Whoever it was would have had to follow her here, watch her go in and then wait for her to come out. It didn’t make sense. In the back of my mind parts of an idea were beginning to take form. If I could just get the outer edge done, maybe I could finish this jigsaw puzzle.
Chapter 35
When I got back to the loft, I managed to turn off the alarm before it even started its warning beep. I let myself in quietly. The door to the bedroom was ajar. I pushed it gently. Kathryn had fallen asleep while reading in bed, her book lay open on her lap. How nice it was to come home to her. Low dancing flames were alive in the fireplace grate. Kathryn’s fascinating face was relaxed, rapid eye movements under her lids hinted at her dreams.
I went back into the big room, got my laptop and a drawing pad, brought them back to the bedroom and sat in an easy chair. Propping my feet on the edge of the bed, I quietly entered some case notes about Rowlina’s attack. I scrolled through the other notes thinking about all the facts I had, then closed the computer and put it aside.
I opened the drawing pad and made a small overhead sketch of the Language Arts Building entrance. I added all the walkways that would ultimately lead to the place where I’d figured the attacker had been. I stared at the sketch and tried to image someone walking there, sitting on the window ledge, taking out a gun... No lightning flashes of insight hit me, just a deep nagging memory that wouldn’t surface.
I gazed at Kathryn. Flipping to a new page, I began a quick sketch of her. Just a gesture. The position of her head was particularly interesting. I did another fast sketch from a slightly different angle. I turned the page again and began a drawing with more detail, beginning with her hairline, her closed eyes, her nose, the shadows cast by her hair. I was just beginning to shade the contours of her mouth, when her eyes blinked open.
Without shifting her body her eyes swept the room, to the door, to the clock, to the fireplace. When she caught sight of me at the far corner of the bed in the shadows, her face broke into a radiant smile.
“There you are, I was just dreaming about you. How long have you been here? Why didn’t you wake me?”
“You were so lovely sleeping, I just wanted to look at you.”
She lifted welcoming arms toward me. I crawled across the bed, into her embrace.
“Take off your clothes and finish what you were doing before you left,” she demanded softly.
I did as I was told. Absence had certainly made the heart grow fonder; making her wait had also stoked her ardor. She watched me undress with fire in her eyes, then pressed me onto my back and slid on top of me, shrugging out of her robe in one fluid movement.
“I understand there are times you may have to leave me in the night, but I don’t like to be kept waiting, Maggie. I want you, now,” she whispered.
I pushed up gently and rolled on top of her, “Professor Anthony, I’ve learned how dangerous it is to keep you waiting.” I trailed lingering kisses down her body, “Now, I’m going to teach you that patience has it rewards. Are you paying attention?”
“Yes, yes,” she moaned as I began a lesson that went on for quite a while and ended very successfully.
Kathryn took a slow deep breath and said languidly, “That was worth waiting for.
“Don’t you have something you’d like to teach me?” I asked feeling the need for her keenly. She answered me with a searing look that made me ache. She took me slowly but with an intensity that made my head swim. When I was finally able to catch my breath I managed to murmur, “You certainly deserved that full professorship.”
After those delightful tasks had been tended to, we lay together comfortably in each other’s arms. Kathryn asked me what had happened at the hospital. I told her all the details.
“So the INS has caught up with Rowlina,” said Kathryn thoughtfully.
“Seems like it.”
“What does she think I could do about it?”
“Talk to the Governor?”
“That would be a stretch. INS cases are a federal issue, not state... but I don’t see what that has to do with this whole thing. Why would someone shoot her?”
“I don’t get it either... what would happen if she died... would Holtzmann still retain citizenship?” I wondered.
“Probably, but think of the investigation that would come up... and it was such a clumsy attempt.”
Yes... Kathryn was right, it was a clumsy attempt at Rowlina’s life. Far more like what happened at Skylar’s, than a professional hit.
Moments later Kathryn said, “We didn’t really finish our conversation before. I should have asked, is there anything I should know about you?”
I thought for a while, “I have nightmares sometimes. They can be very vivid.”
“Are they recurrent? Do you... are they frightening?”
“When I was a child I dreamed about my mother dying, or sometimes I dreamed about things suddenly disappearing, like my teddy bear, or my room, or our cat. I guess those were really about my mother too. Juana, my stepmother, always told me my dreams were very creative. Each dream is always different. I don’t have them as much as I used to. Now they tend to be about problems I’m trying to work out. The scary thing is that the ones I have now, sometimes they’re... portentous or prophetic. I don’t scream or anything like that. They wake me u
p, though.”
Kathryn reached for my hand and held it. “Prophetic? Really?”
“Sounds arrogant, doesn’t it.”
“No, just... well... interesting, and I can see why you’d feel that was scary.” She brought my hand to her lips, kissing my fingertips lightly, “You won’t be alone if you have a bad dream. Not tonight anyway.”
I hugged her to me, “You have to get up in about four hours, you should go to sleep,” I yawned.
I turned out the light and we both drifted off. It seemed as if the alarm went off two minutes later, but it was really 5:00 AM. Kathryn slipped out of bed and went into the bathroom. I fell asleep again, vaguely aware of the sound of the shower. Soon she was kissing me goodbye, and telling me she’d see me later. The scent of her drifted into my senses through my sleep soggy brain.
“Maggie, please be careful,” she said gently.
“I will,” I murmured more than half asleep, “I love you.”
She leaned in very close and whispered something in my ear and then she was gone.
Moments later my eyes opened with a start. Had I really said, I love you? Or had that been part of a dream? And had I dreamed her reply? What was her reply? I thought carefully and remembered her warm breath in my ear saying something that felt good, but I couldn’t remember exactly what it was. Hm. I burrowed back down under the warm covers, pulling her pillow to me. Hmmm. I smiled as I drifted off again.
I woke at 7:45 AM. I figured I’d skipped real workouts for too many days. Making love with Kathryn could be energetic, which might take care of aerobics, but I needed more weight bearing efforts to stay in shape to fight bad guys. I went upstairs and worked out for an hour, then came down and took a shower. I dressed in dark gray pants, a gray turtleneck and a black blazer. It was a funeral after all, and I needed the blazer to hide my holster.
