Dead Again: A Romantic Thriller

by Cooper-Posey, Tracy

  She was staring at the ground, weighing things up, the bony wrist cocked on her hip. Finally, she lifted her head. “I’ll make a bargain with you, then.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I’ll cool things off in Chicago. I have a couple of favours I can pull and my secretary will draw up that piece of paper you were talking about. What you do in return is have the operation. If you come out of it, I’ll wrap her up in a carpet and smuggle her up here myself.”

  “Some bargain. If I don’t come out of it, you get your way anyway.”

  “If you do come out of it, then we both get what we want.”

  “We could have it that way now and not wait.”

  “No. I want you going into the OR with every reason to hang in there and defy the odds.”

  “You’ve changed your tune, Izzy. A moment ago you were suggesting I don’t do this.”

  She shrugged. “I’m catering to my client’s wishes.”

  “Then I’ve two more conditions before I accept.”

  “And they are…”

  “Have you got your notebook here?” The question was rhetorical. Isobel’s computer was never more than a few feet from her side. Neither was her cell phone. Even now, she jerked her thumb over her shoulder and Jack saw the soft leather satchel the computer lived in resting against the wall in the corner of the room.

  “I know you’ve got boilerplate contracts galore in the guts of that thing. I want you to pull together a power of attorney for me.”

  “Now?” She seemed a little startled.

  “Now. I want to sign it before I go under.”

  “Really, Jack, that’s not the most important thing you should be worrying about right now—”

  “No, I want it done right. There’s something else you’re going to have to do for me because I’m not going to be around to do it myself and you’ll need that power of attorney to do it.”

  “And this is the second condition?” She was already leaning down to pick up the computer. “What’s it to be?”

  Jack told her.

  Chapter Seven

  The painkillers they’d given her had twice the firepower of the stuff Jack had been feeding her. Sophie knew she was totally out of her gourd. So did the nursing staff dealing with her. That was the whole stinking problem right there. They weren’t taking anything she said with any seriousness at all.

  Sophie lay propped up on her borrowed bed, her head rolling floppily because her neck seemed to have lost the ability to hold her head up straight. It was ridiculous. Her leg was encased in a metal splint and plaster and was so damn heavy that Arnold Schwarzenegger couldn’t budge it even on a good day but her head was flopping around like a fish out of water.

  Even her lips were numb, like she’d just taken Novocain.

  Talking was an effort and trying to push any sort of insistence into her tone was beyond her abilities right now.

  She had the munchies, big time.

  She fumbled for the call box, which had got itself wrapped around the sheet, intending to ask for something, anything, to eat but then remembered that she’d eaten just a while ago. It had been a tiny portion of Cornflakes and a tub of yogurt with cherries in the bottom. She’d turned down the coffee because it hadn’t smelt like Jack’s—

  Jack.

  She let her head fall back into the pillow, let the call box drop back beside her hip. Jack. That was what she was trying to do. She was trying to get a nurse to tell her what had happened to Jack.

  She had been trying to get a straight answer from someone for the last forty-eight hours, whenever they weren’t poking or prodding her. Well, no, she hadn’t been actively pursuing it for all of the forty-eight hours since they’d landed on the roof of the hospital, because the first time around, she’d been dumb enough to believe the nurse with the go-baby sixties sideburns when he told her “I’ll look into it for you.”

  That was the last she’d seen of him. He’d probably gone off shift and not given her another thought.

  After eight hours she’d finally tumbled to the fact that he wasn’t coming back with an answer for her. Since then she’d asked everyone she came into contact with but so far all of them had looked puzzled and a little surprised. “Oooh, let me see. Well, I don’t know. I’d have to find out.”

  One of the more senior nurses she’d met, a woman with iron-gray hair cut screamingly short and deprived of anything even remotely feminine—even her shoes had been mannish—had answered with a wonderful smile; “What an interesting question!”As if she was a student. Sophie could almost feel the pat on her head.

  She pummelled the mattress with both fists, making the call box bounce, wanting to scream aloud her frustration. Her foggy mind was keeping her from Jack. She knew, she just knew that if she could somehow communicate how much she needed to find him, that if she could convince someone, then he would be magically found. He was in the same building. For god’s sake, think, Sophie. People found their way around hospitals all the time.

  Time. She needed a little time. Time to come down from the high, to pull herself together.

  Then she remembered. She didn’t have any time left. They were transferring her to Los Angeles County General tomorrow. Apex Airlines were picking up the tab for the medical flight, laying on a full service crew and one of their private jets, just for her. It was a gracious gesture of goodwill that would go completely unnoticed in the media focus on the crash. That’s all anyone would remember—an Apex Airlines flight had crashed. The pilots Jack had applauded would be investigated and perhaps even found wanting and it was completely unfair. They’d saved two lives, although they would never know it and the public wouldn’t care.

  She knew her mind was wandering again and brought it back to focus on Jack. How could she find him? Or even find out about him, as there seemed to be a conspiracy of silence around him. The second doctor who had come to talk to her had seemed to know little about his condition even when Sophie had asked him flat out, although he was the first person to admit that there was a Jack Laubreaux in the hospital.

  She wasn’t sure why he had spoken to her, as he wasn’t interested in her leg. He checked out the cuts on her head as they’d talked but it was a cursory examination—the cuts had already been treated, although they declined to stitch them after so long a time had passed since she got them.

  She finally pinned him as a psychiatrist, monitoring a patient who was a candidate for posttraumatic shock disorder. Radchuk. That was his name on the pocket of his coat. He’d gone away after thirty minutes or so, leaving Sophie no wiser about Jack and with the impression she had just been debriefed by an expert—she’d felt empty, all her thoughts, opinions and emotions scooped out clean.

  Early this morning, just after her breakfast, the doctor who’d treated her had informed her she was being transferred to L.A. General and what the Apex people were doing for her.

  “When?” Sophie asked, her gut tightening.

  “Tomorrow morning, very early.”

  Aware of the ticking clock, Sophie had tried another tactic and run her nose straight into the wall of the conspiracy. She waited until business hours, then used the phone by her bed to contact the hospital switchboard. Then, she simply asked to be put through to Jack’s room.

  “Who, ma’am?”

  “Jack Laubreaux. He’s a patient here.”

  “He might be but if he doesn’t have a telephone in his room, I won’t have him listed here.”

  “Then how does anyone contact patients who don’t have a telephone?”

  “There’s a general phone in each ward, for the patients’ use. I could put you through to that.” Even the operator sounded happier at the glimpse of a solution.

  “Great!”

  “What ward do you want?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “What ward do you want me to put you through to?”

  “How would I know? I was asking you. Can’t you just look him up and put me through to that one?”

  “
Ma’am, I’m sorry but unless he has a phone in his room, then I don’t have a record of him.”

  “Then who would?”

  “The Bursar’s office, for sure. They’re the ones that bill him.”

  “Would they know where he is in the hospital?”

  “Probably not, not the actual room.”

  “What about Administration, or a front office or something? Someone has to have a list of patients somewhere.” She grabbed at her forehead, rubbing it.

  “Admitting,” the operator said promptly.

  “Yes. Let me talk to them.”

  She’d been put through promptly, to listen to the phone ring and ring. Finally it had been picked up and the voice at the other end said sharply, “Admitting.” Behind the voice, Sophie could hear multiple voices talking. A printer chattering away.

  “I’m trying to locate Jack Laubreaux’s room in the hospital.”

  “Are you a member of the family, ma’am?”

  Just say yes!

  But it was too late, she’d hesitated too long. The voice became cooler. “I can’t give you that information unless you’re a member of the patient’s immediate family.”

  Sophie clutched the phone, feeling herself start to shake. “Can’t anyone in this fucking hospital answer a simple, straight question?” she screamed into the phone.

  Her answer was the click of the phone being hung up.

  “Goddamn it to hell!” And she slammed the phone back onto the base. That didn’t feel satisfying enough, so she picked it up and smashed it back down again. And again.

  The iron-gray nurse was suddenly at her side, detaching her hand from the phone, helping her to sit back on the heaped-up pillows. Sophie started crying, big hiccupping sobs that hurt her throat and scalded their way down her face. The nurse patted her shoulder, handed her a tissue and straightened the bedcovers over her unhurt leg and around her waist.

  When Sophie was done, the nurse handed her another tissue, along with a tablet in a little plastic cup and a second bigger cup filled with lukewarm water. “It’ll help,” the nurse told her.

  It had helped Sophie fly as high as a kite. What seemed like endless hours had passed and the free-association derby day wasn’t showing any signs of ending. Her time was getting short.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw movement at the door to the ward and rolled her head to the left to look. It was the food trolley. Lunch had arrived.

  “Thank god,” she muttered. She was starving.

  By dinnertime—dinner being just before five, so the kitchen staff could go home at a reasonable hour—Sophie was straight again, although she’d come no closer to a solution. It would have been simplicity itself to get up and go look for Jack and she longed to take that direct route but she had no idea how to get about while she was dragging a small satellite’s weight in plaster and metal superstructure.

  Iron-gray nurse came by then, possibly checking her ward before clocking off for the day. She had the appearance of a dedicated career woman and Sophie hadn’t forgotten the warm pat she’d given her on the shoulder while she calmly straightened out the mess and waited for the storm to pass. Dedicated to her career and caring enough to swing by one last time before going home.

  She surprised Sophie by coming right up to her bedside and laying her hand on her forehead, testing her temperature the old fashioned way. “You’re looking pale, sweetheart.” Her voice was low, with a rough burr to it, making it sound like she’d been straining it lately. It was an interesting voice, Sophie decided.

  “You’re worrying too much,” the nurse added.

  “That’s because I’m stuck in this stupid bed and can’t do a goddamn thing for myself.”

  The hand on her forehead lifted away. “You could try asking for help,” the nurse suggested.

  “I have been asking. I’ve been asking for two days. All I get is the run-around. It’s like the whole hospital knows I’m not allowed to see him but don’t want to tell me. Even you did it.”

  She smiled a little. “I hadn’t forgotten your question, Sophie. But I did put it to one side. A hospital has a way of dictating your priorities for you. I just haven’t had time.”

  Sophie felt shame. It hadn’t occurred to her that people might simply be too damn busy to drop everything and chase up a trivial request. They didn’t know what it meant to her.

  “It’s important to me,” Sophie said and could feel her throat getting choked.

  “I got that impression,” the nurse said gravely. “Do you want to tell me why it’s so important?”

  “I’m being transferred tomorrow.”

  “Yes, I know. I just finished putting together the paperwork for you.”

  “Well, there you are, then.”

  She tilted her head a little. “I don’t understand,” she admitted. “Why is it a problem? They have telephones in L.A. I know, I’ve seen them. When you get settled in tomorrow, you can phone him.”

  “He doesn’t have a phone here.”

  “Well, then, when he gets home. Or pass a message to him via one of his friends.”

  “How? By asking the great big directory in the sky? I don’t have his number. I have no idea how to contact him.” Sophie shook her head. “I don’t even know what city he lives in, or if he does live in a city.”

  The nurse frowned. “How did you meet him, then?”

  And Sophie found herself telling the nurse about the crash and the aftermath. The nurse was a good listener, asking questions that took Sophie further and further into the story. In the end, she told her everything. It was the first time she’d related to anyone the events on the ledge and the telling drained her of energy. It also brought back to her the black despair of her last few hours, holding Jack and wondering if she would die on that ledge along with him.

  Ruby—“You’d better call me Ruby, honey,” she’d said halfway through the telling—straightened up when she’d finished and smiled a little. “Well, now I understand,” she said gently. “Didn’t it occur to you to tell anyone anything of this before? It might have got you some answers sooner if you had.”

  “No, I didn’t. I thought…”

  “They’d figure it out, or something?” Ruby shook her head. “You’re one of the independent ones who have such a tough time with hospitals. You just can’t break down and let people help you. It goes against the grain. Which drives you crazy, because mostly, the only way you’re going to get anything done around here is if someone else does it for you.” She looked at her watch. “I really can’t do anything right now and besides, the office is closed for the night. But I always come in early in the mornings—it lets me get a jumpstart on traffic. I’ll see what I can do in the morning, okay?”

  “They said I was being transferred very early.”

  Ruby smiled a little. “And I’m the one who pushes you out the door. Relax, Sophie. I’ll look into it before I give you your marching papers.”

  “Thank you,” Sophie said. The formality wasn’t nearly enough to express the relief and gratitude flooding through her.

  “De nada,” Ruby replied. She reached for the bed controls and lowered the upper half of the bed a little. “Now will you try to get some sleep for me?”

  “Sure.” Sleep was possible, at least.

  “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  This time, Sophie believed her and it allowed her to pass the evening and slip into sleep that night.

  Breakfast had come and gone by the time Ruby showed up again. Sophie, keyed up for her arrival, jumped when Ruby appeared in the door.

  She was wearing dark green scrubs today, instead of dark blue. She had a woman with her. The woman was short, painfully thin and had a mass of blonde-on-blonde hair that stuck up everywhere. The blonde wore a black suit that looked like she’d slept in it.

  Ruby brought her over to Sophie’s bedside.

  “Thank god,” Sophie breathed as she got closer. “I’d about given up. They’re going to want to move me any tick of the
clock…”

  “Not without my permission,” Ruby said. “This is Isobel, Sophie. She can tell you about Jack.” She patted her hand before she left and gave her a half smile that did nothing to reassure her.

  Up close, the impression that Isobel had slept in her clothes was even stronger. Her shirt was creased around the middle with the sort of ironed-in wrinkles that developed from long wear, and she looked tired. Her eyes were bloodshot.

  “You know Jack?” Sophie asked. “Are you related to him?”

  “I’m his lawyer,” Isobel replied.

  Lawyer. Sophie had trouble absorbing that. If you landed in hospital, the necessity for having your lawyer close to hand seemed remote. “You flew all the way from…wherever you come from, just to see Jack? He must be one of your best clients.”

  “Only one of my most troublesome,” Isobel said. She held out her hand, forestalling any more questions. “You wanted to know about Jack.”

  “No one here will tell me anything. You can?”

  “Jack gave me his power of attorney last night before…well, before other things developed. I can speak for him and I know he wanted to see you. It was one of the things we discussed. He was going to arrange to speak to you when he recovered.” She pursed her lips together for a second. “Okay…” she muttered, then cleared her throat.

  Sophie’s stomach tightened and her heart speeded up. She braced herself instinctively although she deliberately did not try to anticipate what Isobel’s hesitant speech meant.

  “Jack had a second operation last night. The prognosis going in was not good but the alternative was worse. His doctor…said it was the only chance he had.” Isobel finally looked her in the eye. “He didn’t come through, Sophie. I’m sorry.”

  “He’s dead?” she whispered.

  “He died on the operating table. The damage…was too extensive.”

  Her whole body went numb, except for a white-hot mass of pain where her heart had been. Drawing breath hurt. Despite bracing herself, despite anticipating the worst, the confirmation shocked her.

  Ruby stood at the doorway, one shoulder against the frame, watching. Her sad expression told Sophie that she already knew.