Unseen

by Nancy Bush

  He also ended up in a relationship with Dylan’s ex-girlfriend, Shari, which was detrimental to both of them. It only took six months for Will to realize it was a huge mistake; it took eight years to convince Shari of the same. To this day she sometimes showed up unexpectedly at his small, ranch-style house on the outskirts of Laurelton, to throw a scene and collapse into racking sobs. Neither Shari nor his mother had moved past Dylan’s death. For years, Will had unknowingly enabled their behavior. These days, he avoided Shari at all costs, and his mom’s descent into dementia had necessitated hiring a live-in caretaker for her. In some ways it felt to Will like he was slowly waking from a long sleep. He liked his job but he was itching to move on.

  He needed something to happen. Something.

  His cell buzzed and he glanced at the LCD: Barb Gillette, his partner, a transfer from Clackamas County. Will grimaced as he answered. She had a thing for him. He knew it; she didn’t try to hide it. And yes, they’d even spent a few nights out together, though not recently. It was a fine balance for Will as he wanted to keep their working relationship on an even keel, while Barb constantly fought to take it to another level.

  It was all probably going to come to a head. Some ugly, future, unavoidable scene. Ah, well.

  “Tanninger,” he answered shortly.

  “Hey, handsome. What’s the verdict? She the mad pedophile-rammer?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Don’t tell me. She stares at you with big doe eyes and swears she’s innocent.”

  He grunted.

  “Seriously, do you think she did it?” Barb asked.

  “Too early to tell. Definitely a lot of signs point to that direction, but she doesn’t remember the accident.”

  “Convenient.”

  Will thought about Gemma LaPorte and wondered. There was a lot more going on with her than she was letting him see. He finished his call with Barb, clicked off, then pulled a small notebook from his pocket. Flipping it open, he entered the gray-and-green-striped ER waiting room, with its club chairs backed against the walls and nestled in front of the windows to the parking lot. Billy Mendes was the EMT who had seen Gemma LaPorte walk unaided into the ER area. Will had left word that he wanted to speak to anyone who might have witnessed that inauspicious event and Billy had finally gotten the message and let the hospital know.

  “I”m looking for Billy Mendes,” Will said to a rather doubtful looking aide holding a clipboard. “He’s an EMT who has information for the sheriff’s department.”

  “Oh.” She chewed on her lip, furrowed her brow and gazed down at her clipboard. “I don’t think he’s here.”

  “I was just told he was waiting for me.”

  “Really? Huh…” She glanced behind her to an officious-looking woman in hospital garb. “Lorraine, is Billy still here?”

  “He left.”

  “Um…there’s a policeman…er…sheriff’s guy here for him…?”

  Lorraine looked up. Her hair was dyed black and her lipstick was orange. She looked like every nightmare school-nurse depicted in film and television. “Well, he left. He’s got a job, you know. Crash at the four corners. Bicycler involved.” She sniffed, as if they were all just asking to be run down by motorists.

  “Uh…okay…” The girl gave Will a look from the top of her eyes. “Do you wanna wait?”

  “I’ll be back.”

  Will fought back his annoyance. He’d been trying to connect with Mendes for several days, but they’d been unable to meet for one reason or another. A multiple-car accident was certainly a good enough reason. Will was just anxious to get some solid information on the woman in 434 who may, or may not, be some kind of killing avenger.

  He retraced his steps, taking the stairs toward her room. Passing by it, he hazarded a glance inside but the lights were dimmed. He imagined she was sleeping.

  He headed on toward the end of the hall, took another flight of stairs to the top floor, then walked the hallway directly above Gemma’s room. Outside the bank of windows facing north was a wall of black cloud. Rain was about to return and deluge them after a few days’ respite. Maybe it would finally penetrate the packed earth that was hard as stone, a result of a parched summer and dry early fall.

  He came to a closed door with an empty chair outside. Ralph Smithson had been sent over by the sheriff’s department to guard Edward Letton, but he apparently wasn’t taking his job seriously, which was no surprise. Will knew the guy well and was sure Smithson felt playing babysitter wasn’t up to his level of expertise. Smithson was big and loud and could complain like it was an Olympic sport. He would consider keeping watch over Letton to be beneath him, yet he wouldn’t be happy with a job that required him to expend any energy either. He was one of those guys that needed to be shit-canned like yesterday, but he toadied up to Sheriff Nunce on a regular basis, so Will was stuck with him for now. And Laurelton General was outside the city limits and therefore the county’s problem, so good old Ralph was going to have to suck it up and play bodyguard.

  Except he was missing in action from his post.

  Silently cursing the man, Will placed a palm against the light oak door and pushed, taking a few quiet steps inside the room. Letton lay beneath the glow of a light attached to the headboard of his bed. His right leg had been broken in three places and he was skinned up like he’d been scraped over a cheese grater. But it was the injury to his skull that had placed him in a coma. Smithson probably figured there was no way the guy was leaving this place on his own power and had decided to check out the lunchroom. Nevertheless, Will didn’t plan on leaving till the guard returned.

  Seven minutes later Ralph came hustling down the hall carrying a tray. He’d raided both the cafeteria and some vending machines, as he balanced a heaping helping of some kind of stroganoff with mystery meat, and several bright, plastic bags of Fritos, Doritos, and other Lay’s and Ruffles products.

  He jerked as if caught in a nefarious act upon seeing Will. “What’re you doing here?”

  “Looking for you,” Will said mildly. “What’s the status on our patient?”

  Ralph hesitated, quickly reviewing his options. Will could practically read the questions running behind his bullish forehead: Should I play it safe? Be contrite? Come up with an excuse? Should I bluff my way out? In the end he regarded Will balefully, choosing to go on the attack. “Do I look like a doctor?” he sneered. “The fucker ain’t no patient. He’s a fucking pedophile.”

  “I’d ask you where you’ve been but it would be a redundant question.”

  “Yeah?” Ralph’s jaw clenched pugnaciously.

  “I’d just like you to stick by the door.”

  “That’s what I’m doin’, Kemosabe.”

  “I want Letton to wake up and explain about that gear in his van.” Will carefully tucked his annoyance behind a stoic facade.

  “He’s a sick fucker,” Ralph said, ripping open a bag of Fritos and stuffing a fistful into his mouth. “Hope he dies. Not that I’d do anything to help him along, but if he made a run for it, I’d drop him, man.”

  “He’s not going to be running anywhere,” Will pointed out.

  “He’s going straight to hell, that’s where. You tell that girl in room 434 she did the world a favor. Almost, anyway. If this fucker lives…” He shook his head and reached in the bag for another hammy fistful.

  Will left him to his food and retraced his steps toward the ER. At Gemma’s room, he gave up all pretense of disinterest and peeked inside.

  There was no one in the bed.

  No one in the room.

  Climbing out of bed had been all fine and good, but the dizziness that overwhelmed Gemma made her realize she wasn’t going to be able to hightail it to freedom with any real speed. She was injured, and her body wasn’t eager to move.

  “Damn,” she whispered, swaying as she headed toward the bifold closet doors which, when opened, revealed a small, built-in chest of drawers and little else.

  She found her clothes in a plast
ic bag in the top drawer of the chest. They were identified by the number 434 written on the bag in black felt pen. Gemma pulled the items out carefully and gazed in a kind of awe at the blood-soaked T-shirt and ripped jeans. The fabric over one thigh was sliced as if by a knife and Gemma looked down at the thin, superficial wound that ran down her corresponding leg.

  Another wave of wooziness grabbed her and she stumbled back to the bed, her clothes squeezed inside her fists. Her head throbbed. It took a lot longer than it should have to remove her hospital nightgown, and when she was undressed her eyes automatically moved to her left hip, where the hipbone did not flare out in the same way as it did on her right. An old injury, with a scar that was shaped somewhat like a dagger. She tried to remember what had happened there but her mind shied away. She sensed she knew, or almost knew, but her mind was locked down.

  There was no underwear. No panties. No bra.

  Girding her loins, she stuck one leg through the blood-spattered jeans and felt a wave of nausea that almost made her throw up. She slid the other leg inside with more care. When she’d gotten the pants on, she zipped them up and buttoned them, then paused a moment, gathering strength. A rip ran down one leg from thigh to just below the knee. She had more of a mental struggle with herself than a physical one as she dragged the T-shirt over her bandaged head. Dressed, she cautiously moved to the bathroom and, propping herself up against the sink, examined her reflection in the mirror. Her breath whooshed out in a rush of distaste. She turned away from the staring eye and bruised skin and white bandage.

  Her insides quivered. God, she looked horrible.

  And then she had a flash of the man she’d been chasing. The bastard with his putrid lust for children. But she couldn’t quite remember. Couldn’t quite put it together. She’d wanted to kill him. That, she could recall.

  It took her long, long minutes to find her shoes: a pair of sneakers, also blood-spattered, and she put them on over her bare feet. There were no socks in evidence anywhere. By the time she’d accomplished these tasks she was exhausted, and with a sort of miserable dawning realized she had no purse. It wasn’t anywhere in the room, and for the life of her she could not recall what it even looked like.

  Which led her to the next unwelcome discovery: she didn’t remember where she lived. She thought hard for a moment, begging her memory to come through, and suddenly it did. She was from Quarry. Quarry, Oregon. And she’d been making herself breakfast…some kind of…oatmeal? Her heart banged against her chest. She couldn’t remember, but she’d just told that detective what she’d eaten. What was it? What was it? Oatmeal and maybe some fruit?

  Gemma lifted a shaking hand to her forehead and closed her eye. Her head throbbed. She shouldn’t leave the hospital. She wasn’t well enough. But something told her she had to go. Had to.

  A memory shot like a streak behind her eyes:

  She was looking out the window and chrysanthemums were getting beaten by a killing rain, their spiky orange heads pressed against the packed dirt.

  It hasn’t rained in three days.

  She tried to concentrate hard, yet not tax her brain too much. She’d been eating oatmeal with cinnamon. That was right. That’s what she’d told the detective. Slowly bits came back to her…

  I’m from Quarry, Oregon. My name is Gemma LaPorte. I’m twenty-seven years old. Or maybe twenty-eight? Or am I older? Gemma took several deep breaths and willed herself to relax. I live…on a farm? My parents’ farm? My father is a farmer…but he’s gone now…my mother, too. No, wait. My parents had a diner. The PickAxe. No…no…That’s a different place. A bar, mostly. My parents had…LuLu’s…and I waited tables when I was younger.

  Gemma’s eyes flew open, though she could still only see out of one. She recalled wearing the LuLu’s uniform, a typical old-time diner dress that came in varying colors—hers had been yellow—with pockets and a wide, white collar. Tourists loved LuLu’s, as much for the ambiance as the food.

  “I inherited the diner,” she said aloud. But there appeared to be a block to that thinking. A dark wall. There was something more that she couldn’t quite reach.

  “My mother worked at the diner.”

  Your mother was a liar.

  Gemma inhaled and glanced around, half expecting to find the source of that comment, but the words had been inside her head. She felt more pain but was determined to work her way through it. Carefully, she shuffled her way to the door. Would she be able to just walk out? Would they let her leave? She knew there was enough bureaucracy and paperwork waiting for her at hospital administration to make a stronger person weep, but she needed her identification, the name of her insurance company, the address of her home before she could settle her bill.

  She wasn’t even sure she had the money to make that happen.

  But she had to get out. She had to…find the man she’d been after and finish what she’d started. It was imperative. She could feel a clock ticking inside her head. Time was running short.

  What if someone saw her? She looked like she’d barely survived a war. But then this was a hospital. She wouldn’t be the only one bandaged and bloody, would she?

  And how the hell would she get to Quarry when she had no money? Did she have a car? The good-looking detective had asked how she’d gotten to the hospital. If only she knew. Had she driven herself and left her car in the lot? Even if she had, it was a moot point because she had no keys! And she had no idea what kind of vehicle she drove.

  Nor could she come up with the name of a single friend.

  Her heart squeezed. What if my name’s not Gemma LaPorte? There was something about it that sounded wrong. Like it was an alias. An identity trotted out when she didn’t want to give out her real name.

  She moved as fast as she dared given her painful head and unsure stomach. She almost slipped right past the stairs, but then saw the sign above the door—an icon of a man in a running position over a jagged line meant to represent the stairs—and chose them with relief as the best way to escape.

  She worked her way down the flight with an effort, her head jarring. On the next level down—identified as street level—she hesitated inside the stairwell, afraid to open the door. How long was the hallway between this door and the outside parking lot? How many people around? How many chances for someone to look her way and wonder about the bruise-faced patient with the head bandage?

  Cautiously, Gemma pushed the bar on the door and cracked it open, just a bit. In her sliver of sight she could see a carpeted hallway and a row of windows that looked out toward freedom. She didn’t know what she’d do when she got there. But she just wanted out of the hospital.

  There was, however, no exterior door visible, just rows of floor-to-ceiling windows.

  Squaring her shoulders, she stepped into the hallway and walked unhurriedly to her left, keeping the windows and parking lot at her right shoulder. Surely there would be an exit soon.

  The hallway angled even farther left and Gemma rounded the corner. EMERGENCY was written in bold letters above a sliding-glass interior door and beyond was a large room with chairs, and even farther, another set of glass doors which led to a portico where an ambulance sat and EMTs were standing by, waiting for a call. No way she was going there. Quickly, she turned on her heel and retraced her steps.

  “Hey,” a male voice called from behind her.

  Her pulse leapt. She pretended to be deaf. Maybe they didn’t mean her. Maybe—

  “Are you leaving the hospital, Ms. LaPorte?” the voice asked calmly.

  Gemma looked up reluctantly, gritting her teeth at the familiar tone of the detective’s voice. Of course he was still here. Of course he would be the one to discover her. She had to slide her gaze away from his probing stare and taut physique. “I don’t have a purse,” she said. “My clothes were in the room, but I don’t have a purse.”

  “Did you come by car?”

  “I don’t remember.” Did he think he was going to surprise her into telling him something she didn’t
know?

  “Do you know where you’re going?”

  “Home. To Quarry.”

  “By…foot?”

  “Detective…Tanninger,” she said, reading his name tag. She couldn’t remember his first name. “I need to leave. Whatever this is costing, I can’t afford it. I need to find my identification. I need to go home.” Her voice quavered a bit and though she didn’t feel quite as weak as she sounded, she let him think what he wanted. And yeah, she felt bad and it was a simple matter to show it.

  “You look like you could use a wheelchair.”

  “I know what I look like,” she said wryly.

  “Have you talked to the doctor about being released?”

  She met his eyes again and didn’t change expression.

  His lips twitched, but despite the lines at the corners of his eyes, Gemma didn’t trust that he possessed much of a sense of humor. She hadn’t known many people in law enforcement, but those she had—though she could not for the life of her call them up at this moment—had been notoriously lacking in humor and self-awareness. Their officiousness had left her with the vague sense that police officers were not on her side. Better to handle your own battles than call in the cavalry. Bad things lurked beneath the surface of those supposedly sent to serve and protect.

  “You should probably be back in your room,” he said. “But if you want to go to administration and give over your address, name, and social, I can lead you there.”

  He was afraid she intended to scam on the bill. That’s what he meant. She was outraged, yet wasn’t that what she’d planned to do? At least in the interim until she could figure out the missing pieces of her life?

  Gemma didn’t want to go anywhere with Detective Tanninger. But she sure as hell didn’t want to go back to her room, either.

  Yet…she sensed the weariness that was taking hold of her, a dark, descending gloom with strong tentacles. There was an urgency inside her. A need to finish some half-forgotten task, but she also had no means to get to that task and no reserve strength to make that happen. She was bound by her own lack of identification and funds, a weary, beaten body, and a sputtering memory that seemed to blink on and off like a traffic light.