Unnatural Causes

by Dawn Eastman

  The hallways were dim and quiet. She glanced into each exam room, flicked on every light, and finally convinced herself she was the only one in the building.

  In the records room, there was one shelving unit that contained the files for deceased patients. Emmett didn’t have to hang on to these records, but he said he would keep them as long as he had the room. Katie doubted he would still have records from forty years ago, but the man did save everything.

  She had decided to look for the charts for the Rileys, Christopher’s parents. If any of them had been alive, she would have felt more like she was intruding on their privacy. But under the circumstances, she felt that she was justified. Ellen’s research into color-blindness had given Katie an idea. Mrs. Riley had died about two years earlier, and Katie found her chart easily. Flipping through the pages revealed no surprises. When she died, she had been seventy-eight and suffering from diabetes and hypertension. The two factors combined to cause a fatal heart attack.

  She was less lucky with Jack Riley. His chart was nowhere to be found. Katie doubted that he’d gone to a different doctor. Maybe that was a chart that had been shredded? Katie pulled a chart at random that looked old. This patient had died in 1975, so there were charts at least forty years old in this section. She couldn’t remember when Christopher’s father had died. She thought she remembered hearing that Christopher took over the business when he was quite young.

  Katie doubted that Emmett ever purged files of people who had moved away or left the practice. If he didn’t pay attention, Angie would. She looked under the Ss to see if Noah Swanson’s chart was there.

  It was. A slim file showing only a few visits for illnesses and one for a broken finger. There was very little information and not even an intake history.

  Katie sighed and leaned against the wall. This was hopeless. Digging through old files was not going to help her solve Ellen’s murder. She wasn’t sure at this point what would help. She slipped the file back into its spot and turned out the light. She had one foot in the hallway when she heard a noise. Someone else was in the building.

  “Hello?” Emmett’s voice cracked.

  Katie let out the breath she’d been holding.

  “It’s me, Emmett. I’m in the records room.”

  She heard his footsteps turn and head in her direction.

  “Katie, what are you doing here?”

  “Just catching up on some paperwork.”

  “I’m glad it’s you,” Emmett said. “When the alert came through on my phone, I didn’t know whether to call the police or just come check it out myself.”

  “What alert?”

  “Angie added this app to my phone.” He held it up for Katie to see. “It lets me know whenever the alarm is shut off or reset.”

  “I didn’t know you had that.” So much for sneaking into the office.

  “She just added it last week,” he said. “It seemed like a good idea with everything going on . . .”

  “You mean Nick?”

  “When the alarm went off, I thought it might be him. The police released him on Friday night just like you said they would. They didn’t have enough evidence. I rushed over here to see if I could confront him and figure out a way to help him. I’m sure being arrested hasn’t helped his mental state.”

  “Do you think he’s been taking the drugs for his personal use?”

  “Not necessarily,” Emmett said. “I think he’s been selling some of them to finance his own habit. We found some charts that don’t seem to belong to any patient in our computer. A bill is never generated, and insurance isn’t used. Most of them are patients with back pain or some other chronic pain, and he gives them Vicodin or OxyContin. I suspect he pays them to fill the prescriptions for him, in either cash or drugs. The medications themselves aren’t expensive, but he’d need to involve others to fill them for him. He’s too well known around here to do it himself. And if he wrote narcotic scripts for himself, it would trigger an investigation by the licensing board.”

  So Nick had been selling medications and probably trading prescriptions in order to get people to fill prescriptions for him. Katie wondered if that made him more of a suspect in Ellen’s murder or less. Matt’s comment to follow the money came back to her. Maybe she and Beth were wrong. What if Nick killed Ellen because she found out about his scheme?

  29

  Katie was just drifting off to sleep when her phone buzzed on the nightstand. She sighed and picked it up, the glow from the screen illuminating the bed and casting weird shadows on the walls.

  The readout said, “ER.” Katie sat up and answered the call.

  “Dr. LeClair,” she said.

  “Doctor, one of your patients is here in the ER. He is the assumed victim of a hit-and-run,” a businesslike voice told her. “Doctor Gregor wanted me to let you know he’s going to transfer him to the U of M trauma center.”

  “Who is the patient?”

  “It’s Christopher Riley.”

  Katie was out of bed immediately. She fought the dizziness from standing up so fast and pulled on the clothes that she had left draped over a chair.

  “I’m on my way,” she said.

  “I don’t think—”

  But Katie didn’t wait to hear what the nurse was going to say. She ended the call, grabbed her keys, and let herself out the side door. It was only a three-minute drive to the hospital. Katie hoped she’d get there before Christopher was transferred. There was no telling whether she’d be able to talk to him once he was in the trauma unit. She wasn’t even sure if he would be able to talk. But at least she could get the full story from Matt.

  The waiting room was empty again, just as it had been when she had come in a week and a half ago to see Ellen Riley. Now Ellen’s husband had been the victim of a hit-and-run?

  “Katie, I see you got my message,” Matt said when she entered the patient area. “I figured you’d want to know.”

  “What happened?”

  Matt led her off to one side away from the activity surrounding Christopher’s gurney.

  “He hasn’t said much, but there was a witness who said a dark pickup truck swerved to hit him. He was walking to his car after leaving the restaurant. No one else saw anything.”

  “Is he stable?”

  “For now. Vitals are stable, and he’s breathing on his own, but he has several fractures and a severe concussion.”

  “You don’t think we can keep him here?”

  “University Hospital has a dedicated trauma unit with highly trained nurses. I think the ICU here could handle it, if we weren’t nearly full and understaffed.”

  “Can I see him?”

  Matt gestured for her to follow him, and they entered the cubicle where Christopher seemed to be resting. His face had multiple contusions and lacerations. His left eye was swollen, and he wore a neck brace. Katie assumed they’d dosed him with narcotics to help with the pain and to be sure he could be transferred without undue discomfort.

  “Do you think it was an accident?” Katie whispered to Matt.

  “The witness doesn’t think so. She claims the truck drove right up on the curb to hit him.”

  “Drunk?”

  “Maybe, but she claims it drove off just fine. Of course she didn’t get a license plate number or a good look at the truck. It all happened so fast, and she was definitely shocked by it all.”

  “Who was the witness?”

  “Mrs. Peterson. She was working late at the Purple Parrot. She happened to be looking out at the street when the accident happened,” Matt said. “It’s a good thing too. The ambulance was able to get there within a couple of minutes to stabilize him.”

  “Who would want both Ellen and Christopher dead?”

  “So you think this is related to his wife’s death?”

  “I think that if they aren’t related, it’s a huge coincidence—maybe too big,” Katie said. “I can’t help thinking of it like a medical diagnosis. You try to find the one thing that will fit all the
symptoms. It’s more likely than a patient having two major illnesses.”

  “Listen to you, going all forensic on me.”

  Katie smiled at him and felt the ice melt a bit.

  “Katie, I’m sorry about the other night. I overreacted.”

  Katie was already shaking her head. “No, I shouldn’t have read the file without talking to you. I just got so caught up in trying to figure out who killed Ellen that nothing else mattered.”

  “Well, seeing Christopher tonight made me realize that this person needs to be stopped, and soon.”

  Katie stepped out of the cubicle and saw John Carlson standing there looking grim.

  “Who do you think did this?” Katie asked.

  Carlson shook his head. “I don’t know. I’m going to go talk to a couple of people now. I broke up a fight between Christopher and Todd Talbot earlier tonight. I wish I’d arrested them both for disturbing the peace. At least Chris would have been safe.”

  “What were they fighting about?” Katie asked.

  “They wouldn’t say. And since all the damage was to the restaurant, I just gave them a warning and left it at that.”

  “There was damage to the restaurant?” Matt asked.

  “Just a few tables turned over and dishes broken. It happened earlier in the evening before they opened. One of the kitchen staff called us when the argument got physical.”

  Beth must have told Todd about Marilyn’s paternity situation. If he had confronted Christopher, it may have sparked the conflict.

  “Doc, Linda told me you’re still looking into Ellen’s death,” Carlson said. “I don’t want to get a call that you’re here in the ER as a patient.”

  Katie started to respond, but he put up his hand.

  “This is serious. Trying to follow in Ellen’s footsteps to see what she knew is dangerous. Whoever killed Ellen Riley apparently thought Christopher was a threat. Don’t give that person an opportunity to feel threatened by you as well.”

  Thinking she could trick a reporter—even one that mostly worked on births, deaths, and weddings—was a mistake. Linda must have seen right through them and talked to John about it.

  “You think Katie is in danger?” Matt asked. He moved closer to Katie.

  “I don’t know,” John said, “but I have to assume that this is the same person. Which means I don’t want to see anyone else hurt for digging where they don’t belong.”

  Matt looked at Katie with a worried expression. He seemed about to say something when the nurse called him away to talk to the transfer team.

  The two EMTs from the university transferred Christopher to their wheeled gurney. The nurse took the details from Matt, and the team swooped back out to the ambulance.

  30

  Katie drove slowly home. The streets were deserted, and only the occasional barking dog broke the silence. Her brain felt overwhelmed by all the information she had gathered in the last week. She didn’t know how it all fit together or even if it all fit.

  Ellen had been researching something and arguing with Christopher. Katie had convinced herself that Christopher had killed his wife to cover up his relationship to Marilyn. According to Beth, there was a lot of money at stake if Jack Riley had more heirs.

  But Christopher’s attack had her rethinking all her assumptions. Could it have been Dan, Christopher’s son? Had he found out what Ellen was up to and tried to silence her? Maybe Christopher had decided to come clean about his sister and nephews. If Ellen’s death and Christopher’s injuries were connected, it seemed even less likely that Nick or his wife had anything to do with it. They had no reason to attack Christopher.

  She climbed under the covers even though she knew she wouldn’t sleep for a long time. Just as she felt herself relaxing, she heard the train in the distance. According to Matt, that meant nothing bad would happen tonight. Maybe it only worked for Matt.

  An hour later, Katie got out of bed. Her brain was running in circles, and she needed to do something else to distract it from the perpetual loop it was on.

  She padded into the dining room and flipped open her laptop. Even though she’d looked at everything that Caleb had found on Ellen’s laptop, she felt she needed to go through it all again. If only to assure herself that she had considered everything. Why didn’t Ellen have a file of notes where she spelled everything out? Or a list? If anyone looked at Katie’s laptop, they would know exactly what she was working on.

  She had to look at everything again from the point of view of someone who might want to get rid of both Ellen and Christopher. Katie had to admit that the first time through, she had been seeing these files from Ellen’s point of view and considering why the contents had sparked a fight with Christopher. Since discovering his sister, she’d decided Christopher was guilty, so all the notes were filtered through that lens. It was an intern’s mistake to make a snap diagnosis and force the symptoms to fit the illness. It was the way things got missed.

  So this time, she would read through everything with an objective view. Rather than thinking “Christopher would have thought this” or “He would have wanted that kept a secret,” she had to determine how the pieces might all fit together.

  She clicked on the first file.

  * * *

  Two hours and three cups of coffee later, Katie was no closer to solving her mystery. She was jittery from the caffeine but also exhausted. She snapped the computer shut and rested her head on top.

  She may have fallen asleep because the next thing she knew, she was sitting up straight in her chair. She’d heard something outside. Footsteps on the porch? She glanced at her watch: three thirty. She got up, went to the front window, and peeked outside. The streetlight had burned out. Her house and her neighbors on both sides and across the street all sat in darkness. Down the road, lights glowed dimly through the mist.

  She was about to put the shade back when a shadow pulled away from the side of her house and melted into the neighbor’s shrubbery.

  Without thinking, Katie ran to the front door and pulled it open. She was almost off the porch before she realized how stupid this was. She had no idea who was out there, no way to protect herself, and no one knew where she was.

  She backed slowly toward the door, scanning the yard and the street for any sign of movement. She stepped onto the welcome mat and felt a crumpled piece of paper under her foot. She picked it up by the corner and let it fall open.

  “YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED IN ANN ARBOR.”

  A shiver of cold went up her spine. She stepped inside, closed the door, and bolted it.

  “What’s going on?”

  Katie screamed and spun around. Caleb.

  She held out the paper with a shaky hand.

  He took it, and she saw his jaw clench as he read.

  “We’d better call Carlson,” he said.

  “No, he has enough to deal with tonight,” Katie said. “I’ll call him in the morning.”

  “What were you doing outside?”

  Katie explained that she couldn’t sleep after returning from the ER, her work on the computer, and then hearing the noise outside.

  “Will Christopher be okay?”

  “I think so,” she said. “He’s lucky, really.”

  “Hard to consider him lucky when he’s been run over by a maniac.”

  “I just meant, it could have been worse.” Katie walked into the living room and sat on the couch. “Whoever did this is getting desperate. To try to run him down in the middle of town doesn’t seem like the action of a stone-cold killer. Ellen’s death was so planned out, so careful. This was . . . I don’t know . . . reactive?”

  “Did you figure anything out by looking over the notes again?”

  “Not really. I just wanted to look at them all without thinking that Christopher was guilty. I figure he didn’t run himself down, so maybe he also didn’t kill his wife.”

  31

  Katie woke up late Monday morning and rushed out of the house, grabbing a granola bar on her way th
rough the kitchen. She planned to drive out to Ann Arbor to see Christopher. He was technically her patient after all.

  The drive to Ann Arbor took less time than finding a parking spot near University Hospital. Katie bemoaned her lack of a staff parking pass since she didn’t see patients there anymore. She looped through the visitor parking garage and finally began stalking the door that exited from the hospital. She followed a stout balding man to his car and waited with her blinker on while he adjusted his seat belt, fiddled with his radio, and checked his mirrors three times.

  She was certain that steam was coming out of her ears by the time she finally pulled into the spot and switched off the ignition. She sat for a moment taking deep breaths.

  Katie exited her car, locked it, and went in through the visitor door.

  Katie knew certain areas of the hospital like they were her own home, while others were a complete mystery. The hospital complex was vast, and she had only spent time in patient care areas. The ICU was one place she knew very well. She hit the metal plate outside the doors and walked inside as they whooshed open.

  There was a different sort of air in an ICU. Katie could never put her finger on it, but the softly beeping machines, the quiet squeak of shoes on linoleum, and the sleeping patients who were fighting epic battles while unconscious always felt like an alien world to Katie.

  She identified herself to the nurse behind the central desk, who pointed to a cubicle at the far end of the room. This was a good sign for Christopher. The nurses tried to position the sickest patients near the nurse’s station.

  “We just gave him his pain meds; you’d better hurry if you want to talk to him.”

  Katie walked toward the bed and was surprised to see that Christopher was awake. His right eye was swollen, with bruising on his cheek. His leg was in a cast, and he had gauze wrapped around his arm. She could tell by the way he breathed that he probably also had a fractured rib or two.