Fatal Fall

by Diane Capri

  Jess resisted the urge to glare at him on the way out, but Charlene was less cautious. “We’ll be back, Dr. Nepovim.” Charlene’s words were a definite threat. “If there’s any irregularities with these records, you’ll be answering not only to a judge but also to the licensing board and your malpractice carrier.”

  “You do what you have to do, Officer Mackie.” Nepovim’s tone was smarmy.

  Jess shoved her hands into her pockets, tempted to slap that smug smile off his face. Before she had the chance to commit battery, he closed the door firmly behind them.

  Charlene walked swiftly across the large open room toward the door. The edges of her mouth curled down. “We didn’t get much.”

  “What a jerk.” Jess followed along two steps behind. “What is Nepovim hiding?”

  “Hard to say. He’s right about releasing the original hospital records. We do need consent or a court order.” Charlene swiped a hand through her hair. “I was hoping he’d be a decent human being, willing to help us, and let us take a quick look if we were standing right here in front of him. I should have known better.”

  They’d reached Oscar Platte’s desk, and he overheard. An almost involuntary bark of laughter escaped his lips.

  Jess stopped walking. “Mr. Platte?”

  “Oscar,” he replied, shaking his head. “Sorry you made the trip for nothing, Miss Kimball. I don’t know where you got your background information, but no one around here would ever accuse Nepovim of being a decent human being.”

  “Yeah. We kind of got that vibe.” Jess frowned. She’d coaxed information from many witnesses who’d offered such a slim opening. Maybe the trip could be salvaged after all. “Hard to believe he’d be like that with us, though, Oscar. We’re trying to identify the parents of an injured boy who’s lying in a medically induced coma over in Randolph. Nepovim says he can’t show us the original records. He says they’re in storage somewhere or something.”

  “That so? Maybe I can help.” Oscar grinned in the way of all rebels seeking to stick it to the man and clicked a few keys on his keyboard. “Today’s my last day. What’s Nepovim going to do to me? What’s the boy’s name?”

  “That’s part of our problem,” Jess shrugged, figuring maybe Oscar had looked her up while they were in with Nepovim. Anyone who knew her work and was on what she considered the right side of justice was usually willing to help her. “We think his name is Peter David Whiting.”

  Oscar pulled up a blank screen and typed the name. “Date of birth?”

  “We’re not sure. As I said, he’s unconscious, and we can’t get anything directly from him,” Charlene said, biting her lip.

  Oscar looked up and nodded. “Got a general idea of the birth date, at least?”

  Jess said, “We think it’s June fifteen.”

  He clicked the keys. “Year?”

  “Not sure.” Charlene shrugged. “Between thirteen and fifteen years ago, the docs estimated.”

  “I can use a date range.” Oscar nodded again and clicked more keys. He pushed the search key and looked up as the system did its thing. “Nepovim didn’t exactly lie. Computerizing the old records is an ongoing project. But even if we don’t have everything online yet, we should have some records as far back as twenty years scanned into the system already.”

  Jess’s heart skipped a couple of beats and then pounded too fast. She might be one computer search away from finding out the truth. Peter David Whiting could be her son. Or not. She held her breath while she struggled to prepare herself for the outcome, either way.

  She glanced at Charlene. Her face had blanched completely white. She looked like she might faint.

  “Uh-oh,” Oscar said when his computer completed its search. “Looks like we could have a problem.”

  “What kind of problem?” Jess asked, feeling like she’d been given a small reprieve.

  “We’ve got a lot of births during that time frame. We could have one for your patient. But,” he paused to run his tongue over his lips. “There’s a flag on all of these babies.”

  “A flag? What does that mean?” Charlene squeaked out.

  “I wasn’t working here back then.” Oscar cleared his throat and lowered his voice when he spoke again. “During those three years, and for about ten years after that, Norah Fender was one of our most active delivery room nurses.”

  “Norah Fender?” Charlene shook her head.

  Oscar looked up from his screen. He glanced from Charlene to Jess and back again. “You don’t know who she is?”

  “I guess we don’t,” Jess said. “Why don’t you fill us in?”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Blackstake sat in the Kid’s Own Medical Center parking lot and watched the two women walk in through the main entrance. After an appropriate interval, he followed them inside, breaking to the right when he reached the atrium. He grabbed a leaflet and stood as if he was reading.

  The space was filled with children. The noise drowned out the reporter’s words. He watched them circle around the reception desk and head for the elevators.

  The stairs were to his right. He took them fast, up two floors, and looked into the corridor. He dashed up two more flights and emerged on the fourth floor. The elevator doors were closing behind the two women, and he glimpsed Mackie’s black uniform as she disappeared into an interior office.

  As he walked down the corridor, he passed the door the Mackie woman had used. The words “Records Office” were printed on a plaque on the door.

  He reached the end of the corridor. Could mean anything, but with Mackie involved and that reporter in tow, his senses were on high alert. Mackie’s meddling heightened his concern about this trip from tedious curiosity to serious worry.

  The medical world was foolishly steeped in myriad privacy concerns. Any hacker worth his salt could hack any health record anywhere. Why they insisted on making life harder for legitimate information seekers while criminals ran amok in their records was only one of health care’s absurdities.

  The misplaced secrecy might work in his favor today. Whatever Mackie and Kimball were looking for, the hospital might refuse. Plenty of legal mumbo-jumbo they could hide behind if they wanted to. Even if Kimball was pushy. He’d let Meisner know, there would be time to thwart them if they kept digging.

  But only if Blackstake learned what, exactly, Mackie and Kimball were trying to find.

  He walked back to the Records Office, pushed open the door and stepped inside. Desks were lined up on either side of a walkway. At the far end was an office enclosed by frosted glass walls.

  “Help you?” asked a clean-cut young man with a well-trimmed goatee at the first desk.

  Blackstake ignored him and stared at the back office. The overhead strip lights glared off the frosted glass. He saw movement, but little else. He took a step closer. There were figures inside the frosted glass room. Three figures. He glimpsed blond hair. The reporter.

  The young man stood up. “Sir, can I help you?”

  Occupants at the other desks looked up and began to stare. Blackstake wanted to punch him. Hard. He wanted to shove his holier-than-thou look right down his throat until he choked on it, no matter how much attention it attracted.

  He flexed his fingers at his sides. For a moment, his professional cool battled his desire to maim the nosey young pest for life. He regained control and breathed out. “Sorry. Wrong room, I think.”

  Blackstake turned and strode past the cretin before he had a chance to speak, clicking the door closed behind him.

  He walked to his car, cursing under his breath.

  He was done with this nonsense.

  He used his regular phone to dial the boss’s burner, answered to open the connection, and placed the burner’s speaker on mute. He turned up the burner’s microphone to the max.

  He tested the open line to be sure he could hear normal voice tones through his cell.

  From the glove box of the Chrysler, he pulled out the roll of duct tape he’d stashed there.
He never traveled anywhere without it.

  He wound a gray strip around the plastic phone, doubling the tape back on itself to leave a section of the adhesive free.

  He opened the Chrysler’s trunk and found the spare tire under the cheap carpet flooring. In the middle of the wheel was what the manufacturer laughably called a toolkit. But it would serve his purposes.

  He grabbed the heavy, eight-inch steel jack handle.

  The parking lot was relatively quiet. No pedestrians or arriving or departing vehicles in the immediate vicinity. He ambled through the rows of parked cars, the metal bar in his pocket and the duct-taped phone in his hand. He knelt at the rear of Mackie’s Crown Vic, fussing over his shoe, pretending to tie his laces.

  He slid the jack handle from his pocket and rammed it into the gap between the Crown Vic’s trunk and the body. Right by the lock. He levered up and down, leaning forward, his weight grinding the steel jack handle into the gradually expanding gap.

  When he had two inches of the handle inside the trunk, he levered downward, pressing the trunk lid out and bending the body inward. The Ford’s metal creaked and squealed.

  With a half-inch of deflection, the lock no longer reached the retaining striker. The trunk lid began to rise. He had grabbed the lid before the springs lifted it more than a few inches.

  He ducked his head down, his arm outstretched, and leaned into the Crown Vic’s trunk, slapping the taped burner phone against the rear parcel shelf, near a gap that opened into the body of the cabin. He ran his hand along the tape, fixing the phone to the shelf as tightly as the tape would allow.

  He backed out of the trunk, gave the lid a good wrench and pushed it closed. The latch clicked. Not a firm click. He pulled on the lid. It didn’t open. He’d just have to hope it didn’t spring up with the stresses and strains of Mackie’s driving all the way back to Randolph.

  If the trunk lid popped open while she was driving, she’d find the burner. He shrugged. He’d handle that problem when and if it arose.

  He returned to his rental, dropped heavily into the driver’s seat, and clicked the door closed. He’d learned nothing useful inside the hospital. Mackie and Kimball were seeking some sort of records, but which records and, more importantly, why, remained to be discovered.

  He smirked. Mackie talked too much. He remembered that from the few encounters he’d had with her over time. Whatever they were doing inside, she’d talk about it in the Crown Vic on the long return trip to Randolph.

  As long as his connection stayed open, he’d hear every word. He picked up his cell phone and waited.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Oscar Platte continued searching through his computer files even as he glanced over his shoulder to be sure Dr. Nepovim wasn’t on his way to throw them all out or call security or something worse.

  “Dr. Nepovim showed us a computer printout. It listed Peter Whiting’s attending physician, Dr. Melise Youree. The labor and delivery nurse’s initials were N.F.” Jess sensed that Oscar was more than willing to answer questions, but she didn’t know what to ask. “So that must have been Norah Fender? What should we know about her, Oscar?”

  “You can look her up online. Get more details.” He glanced over his shoulder again.

  Jess looked toward Nepovim’s office. He was seated behind his desk, busy with his own computer keyboard.

  “Give me the broad strokes. So I know what to look for.” Jess was good at cajoling witnesses.

  “Dr. Youree was only here for her residency. She returned to her home country. Somewhere in Asia, I think?” Oscar lowered his voice and glanced over his shoulder again before he continued. “A few years ago, Wollenstone General Hospital caught a nurse selling babies.”

  “Norah Fender?”

  Oscar nodded. “She was arrested and tried and convicted. Served only a couple of years, I think.”

  “Really? I’d have thought she’d get a tougher sentence.” Jess frowned.

  “It wasn’t like that, I guess.” Oscar shook his head and returned his eyes to the screen. “The judge gave her maybe five years. Revoked her nursing license. Some of the jail time was suspended and then she got out early because of good behavior or something.”

  “Was she selling babies from here at Kid’s Own, too?” Charlene’s tone was too hard, too cop-like. Oscar shrugged again and returned to his searching.

  “I’ve run across this kind of thing before. Finding homes for unwanted babies is not as sordid as people sometimes think, Charlene.” Jess put some sympathy into her tone. She moved closer to Oscar’s desk and leaned in as if to engage in confidential conversation. Her heart was pounding wildly, and her legs felt weak. “The birth mother needs the money to get back on her feet. She can’t take care of the baby. The families who want to adopt the baby have the financial resources to help out.”

  Charlene seemed skeptical, but she didn’t argue.

  “Norah Fender was selling unwanted babies to families who wanted to adopt them.” Jess tried to sound sympathetic. “She wasn’t a bad person. She was trying to help everyone involved, wasn’t she Oscar?”

  “Maybe. I didn’t know her. That’s what I heard.” Oscar ducked his head briefly. He pointed to his screen. “But look, I found Peter David Whiting.”

  “What records do you have there?”

  “It’s like Nepovim said. The full hospital record is still in hard copy and in storage.” Oscar scanned the information on his screen. “His mother was our patient. Barbara Whiting. On the system, we only have scanned and searchable copies of the admission record, a summary of the delivery record, and the birth record.”

  “Would you be able to print those for us?” Jess asked as if her request wasn’t completely outrageous.

  Oscar shook his head. “The printer is close to Nepovim’s office. If I did that, he’d call security in a hot second.”

  “We really need to find this boy’s parents, Oscar.” Jess took a deep breath. “Before it’s too late.”

  Oscar gazed directly at Jess and nodded. “I have to run to the men’s room. Watch my desk for me while I’m gone, will you?” He stood and walked out into the corridor.

  Jess quickly pulled her phone out of her pocket and moved to an unobstructed view of Oscar’s screen. The overhead fluorescent light cast a glare on the monitor. She turned it to the left slightly before she opened the camera on her phone and shot a photo of the screen. She hit the “next” button and shot a photo of the second screen. Again, for the third screen. She slipped the phone back into her pocket.

  Charlene stood behind her and read over her shoulder. Jess flipped back to the first screen. A hospital admission form. John and Barbara Whiting’s names were typed on the form along with their address on Vashon Island. The bottom of the page was signed in John Whiting’s familiar script as the guarantor of the bill.

  The second page was the delivery summary, a series of notes about the birth. Attending physician, date and time of birth, hospital room number, length of stay. Norah Fender’s name was listed as the attending labor and delivery nurse.

  The last page was the birth record. Peter’s full name, his weight, length, sex, and other vital information was listed. And prints of his tiny feet.

  At the bottom of the birth record were two typed names and above the typewriting, two signatures, John Whiting and Barbara Whiting. The signatures were witnessed by Norah Fender.

  Jess had studied Peter’s official birth certificate until the image was practically seared on her retinas. She looked hard at the handwriting on the scanned images on Oscar’s screen.

  John Whiting’s signature looked identical to the one on the official birth certificate.

  But Barbara Whiting’s signature on the hospital record didn’t match the official birth certificate. Not even close.

  Charlene had seen the discrepancy, too. She gripped Jess’s arm. Wrinkles crept across her forehead. Her eyes glistened. Her lips curled down. Her hand shook.

  “Charlene?” Jess turned to l
ook at her. “Are you okay?”

  But Charlene didn’t answer. She dissolved into tears. Great gulping sobs.

  Charlene’s reaction drew attention. People were starting to look up from their desks. It was only a matter of time before Nepovim would notice and call security.

  Jess grabbed Charlene’s arm. “Come on. We need to go. Right now.”

  She led Charlene toward the door and grabbed a box of tissues off one of the desks on the way out. In the corridor, she stuffed the tissue box into Charlene’s hand and pushed her toward the elevator. Charlene continued to sob all the way down in the elevator after they reached the lobby and walked outside.

  Charlene wiped her nose on another tissue and threw the wad into the trash barrel by the door. She took a few breaths, fighting for control. “Barbara Whiting’s signature,” she wiped her nose on another tissue, “It’s Crystal’s handwriting.”

  Jess bit her lip. She looked at the ground and blinked away the glassy tears that had sprung to her eyes. If Charlene was right about the handwriting, it meant Peter Whiting was not Jess’s missing son. She’d never allowed herself to believe this boy was her Peter. Not really. She hoped. Dear God, she’d hoped this boy was her child. She’d allowed herself to think it was possible. That he could be hers. And it could still be true. The DNA wasn’t back yet. Charlene could be wrong. This boy could be hers. But the visceral reality had never settled into her heart.

  In her dreams, when she found Peter, he was as she’d last seen him, still a toddler. She was outside, in a park. He came running, laughing, brown eyes flashing, a tussle of blonde curls and plump legs and soft roundness, bounding into her arms and hugging her in a fit of sweet giggles. She wasn’t prepared to give up that dream.

  She wanted to find her son. Desperately. But she wanted him to be alive and healthy. She wanted a joyous reunion. And she would have that. But maybe not this time.