Hemlock Bay f-6

by Catherine Coulter

Elcott Frasier walked to Sherlock and grabbed her hand, shook it hard. “Mrs. Savich, what a pleasure.” He looked ever so pleased to see her. She wondered how pleased he was to see Dillon, since she knew, right to her toes, that Mr. Elcott Frasier had little respect for women. It was in his eyes, in his very stance-condescending, patronizing.

  “Mr. Frasier,” she said and gave him her patented, guileless sunny smile. “I wish we could meet again under less trying circumstances.” Go ahead, she thought, believe I’m an idiot, worth less than nothing in brainpower.

  “Your poor husband is very upset by all this,” Mr. Frasier said. “Given all that’s happened, I can’t say I blame him.”

  Sherlock said, “Certainly he’s upset. It’s good to see you again, Tennyson.” She went directly to sit on the side of Lily’s bed. She lightly stroked her pale hair that was getting oily now. Thick, lank strands framed her face. Sherlock saw the pain in her eyes, how stiffly she was holding her body. She wanted to cry. “Dillon will be back in just a moment, Lily. You shouldn’t have to suffer like this.”

  “It is about time for a bit more pain medication,” a nurse said as she came through the door, Savich at her heels. No one said a word as she injected the painkiller into Lily’s IV. She leaned over, checked Lily’s pulse, smoothed the thin blanket to her shoulders, then straightened. “The pain will lessen almost immediately. Call if you have too much more discomfort, Mrs. Frasier.”

  Lily closed her eyes. After a few minutes, she said quietly, “Thank you, Dillon. It was pretty bad, but not now. Thank you.” Then, without another word, she was asleep.

  “Good,” said Savich and motioned for them all to leave. “Let’s go to the waiting room. Last time I looked, it was empty.”

  “My wife and I are grateful to you for being here,” Elcott Frasier said. “Tennyson needs all the support he can get. The past seven months have been very hard on him.”

  “That’s just what I was thinking,” Savich said. “Lily hitting that redwood gave us just the excuse we needed to come here and support Tennyson.”

  “My father didn’t mean it the way it sounded, Dillon,” Tennyson said. “It’s just been difficult-for all of us.” He looked down at his watch. “I’m afraid I have patients to see. I will be back to check on Lily in about four hours.”

  He left them with Elcott Frasier, who asked a passing nurse to fetch him a cup of coffee. She did without hesitation because, Sherlock knew, she wasn’t stupid. She recognized the Big Man on the hospital board of directors when she saw him. Sherlock wanted to punch his lights out.

  Savich leaned down, kissed Sherlock on the mouth, and said low, “No, don’t belt him. Now, I’ve got all sorts of warning whistles going off in my head. I’m going to look at that car. Grill our brother-in-law’s father, okay?”

  “No problem,” Sherlock said.

  When Dillon found Sherlock two hours later, she was in the hospital cafeteria eating a Caesar salad and speaking to Dr. Theodore Larch.

  “So do you think she was so depressed that she decided to end it? Again?”

  “I’m a surgeon, Mrs. Savich, not a psychiatrist. I can’t speculate.”

  “Yeah, but you see lots of people in distress, Dr. Larch. What do you think of Lily Frasier’s state of mind?”

  “I think the surgical pain is masking a lot of her symptoms right now-that is, if she has any symptoms. I haven’t seen any myself. But what do I know?”

  “What do you think of Dr. Rossetti?”

  Dr. Larch wouldn’t quite meet her eyes. “He’s, ah, rather new here. I don’t know him all that well. Dr. Frasier, however, knows him very well. They went to medical school together, I understand. Columbia Presbyterian Medical School, in New York City.”

  “I didn’t know that,” Sherlock said and tucked it away. She wanted to meet this Dr. Rossetti, the pompous man Lily didn’t like and whom Tennyson appeared to be pushing very hard on his wife.

  She smiled at Dr. Larch, took a bite of her salad, which was surprisingly good, and said, “Well, you know, Dr. Larch, if Lily didn’t try to kill herself, then that means that just perhaps someone is up to no good. What do you think?”

  Dr. Ted Larch nearly swallowed the ice cube he was rolling around in his mouth.

  “I can’t imagine, no, surely not-that’s crazy. If she didn’t do it on purpose, then it’s more likely that something just went wrong with the car, an accident, nothing more than a tragic accident.”

  “Yes, you’re probably right. Since I’m a cop, I always leap to the sinister first. Occupational hazard. Hey, I know. She just lost control of the car-maybe a raccoon ran in front of the Explorer and she tried not to hit it-and ended up smacking the redwood.”

  “That sounds more likely than someone trying to kill her, Mrs. Savich.”

  “Yes, the raccoon theory is always preferable, isn’t it?”

  Sherlock saw Dillon out of the corner of her eye. She rose, patted Dr. Larch on his shoulder, and said, “Take good care of Lily, Doctor.” At least now, she thought, walking quickly toward Dillon, Dr. Larch would keep a very close eye on Lily because he wouldn’t forget what she’d said. He would want to dismiss it as nonsense, but he wouldn’t be able to, not entirely.

  Savich nodded across the cafeteria to Dr. Larch, then smiled down at his wife. Her light blue eyes seemed brighter than when he’d left her, and he knew why. She was up to something. And she was very pleased with herself.

  “What about the car?”

  “Nothing at all. It’s been compacted.”

  “That was awfully fast, wasn’t it?”

  “Yeah, sort of like cremating a body before the autopsy could be done.”

  “Exactly. Dr. Larch thinks Lily is just fine, mentally, thank you very much. Actually, I think he has a crush on her. It’s Dr. Rossetti he doesn’t like, but who knows why? Did you know that Dr. Rossetti and Tennyson went to medical school together? Columbia Presbyterian?”

  “No. That’s interesting. Okay, Sherlock. I know that look. You either want me to haul you to the nearest hot tub and have my way with you, or you’ve done something. No hot tub? Too bad. All right, then. What have you done?”

  “I planted a small bug just inside the slat on Lily’s hospital bed. I already heard some interesting stuff. Come along and I’ll play it back for you. Hmmm. About that hot tub, Dillon…”

  They went to Lily’s room, saw that she was still asleep and no one else was there, and Sherlock shut the door. She walked to the window, fiddled with the tiny receiver and recorder, turned on rewind, then play.

  “Dammit, she needs more pain medication.”

  Savich said, “Who’s that?”

  “Dr. Larch.”

  “I cut it back, just like you ordered, but it was too much. Listen, there’s no need to make her suffer like this.”

  “She doesn’t react well to pain meds, I’ve told you that several times. It makes her even crazier than she already is. Keep the pain meds way down. I don’t want her hurt anymore.”

  Sherlock pressed the stop button and said, “That was Tennyson Frasier. What do you think it means?”

  Sherlock slipped the tiny recorder back into her jacket pocket.

  “It could be perfectly innocent,” Savich said. “On the other hand, the Explorer has been compacted. The guy at the junked car yard told me that Dr. Frasier told him to haul the Explorer in and compact it immediately. Will this thing click on whenever someone’s speaking?”

  “Yes, it’s voice-activated. It turns off when there’s more than six seconds of silence. I got it from Dickie in Personnel. He’s a gadget freak, owed me one after I busted his sister’s boyfriend-you know, the macho drug dealer who was slapping her around.”

  “Sherlock, have I ever told you that you never cease to amaze and thrill me?”

  “Not recently. Well, not since last night, and I don’t think you had the same sort of intent then.”

  He laughed, pulled her against him and kissed her. Her curly hair tickled his cheek. “Let’s ca
ll Mom and talk to Sean.”

  5

  Eureka, California

  Clark Hoyt, SAC of the new Eureka FBI field office, which had opened less than a year before, handed Savich the bottle of pills. “Sorry, Agent Savich. What we’ve got here is a really common antidepressant, name of Elavil.”

  “Not good,” Savich said and looked out the window toward the small park just to the left of downtown. The trees were bright with fall colors. If he turned his head a bit to the right, he’d see the Old Town section on the waterfront. A beautiful town, Humboldt’s county seat, Eureka was filled with countless fine Victorian homes and buildings.

  “Something I can help you with, Agent Savich? Sounds like something’s happening you don’t like.”

  Savich shook his head. “I wish there was something, but the pills are exactly what they should be. I guess it would have been really easy if they were something different. I told you that the Explorer my sister totaled has been compacted. I was really holding out big hopes for those pills. Oh yeah, call me Savich.”

  “Okay, Hoyt here. Now, the Explorer-that was done awfully fast.”

  “Yes, maybe too fast, but then again, my life’s work is to be suspicious. Maybe it was just very straightforward. As of right now, it’s all a dead end. However, I think it’s time I did a bit of digging on my brother-in-law, Dr. Tennyson Frasier.”

  Clark Hoyt, who had heard of some of the exploits of Sherlock, Savich, and MAX, Savich’s transvestite laptop, said, “Don’t tell me that you didn’t do a background search on this guy before he married your sister? Seems to me a brother would have checked out the fillings in his teeth.”

  “Well, yeah, sure I did. But not a really deep one. Just that he didn’t have a record, hadn’t ever been in rehab for drugs or alcohol, stuff like that.”

  “And that he wasn’t a bigamist?”

  “No, I didn’t check on that. Lily told me he’d been right up front about the fact that he’d been married before and that his wife had died. You know something, Hoyt? I wonder now what the first wife died of. I wonder how long they were married before she died.” His eyes brightened.

  “Savich, you don’t really think he’s trying to kill his wife? The pills were just what they were supposed to be.”

  “They were indeed, and I’m not sure. But you know, information is just about the most important thing any cop can have.” Savich rubbed his hands together. “MAX is going to love this.”

  “You know that the Frasiers are a really big deal down in Hemlock Bay and the environs. Daddy Frasier has dealings all over the state, I understand.”

  “Yeah. Before, I didn’t see the need to check into Papa’s finances and dealings, but now it’s time to be thorough.”

  “Is your sister going to be all right?”

  “Yes, she’ll be just fine.”

  “I’ve got the names of some excellent psychiatrists in the area-all women, just like you wanted. I hope one of them will be able to help your sister.”

  “Yeah, me too. But you know-no matter there’s no proof of any funny stuff, that it really does look like she just drove the Explorer into that redwood on purpose-I simply can’t believe that Lily tried to kill herself. No matter what anyone says, I find myself coming back again and again to the fact that it just doesn’t fit.”

  “People change, Savich. Even people we love dearly. Sometimes we can’t see the change because we’re just too close.”

  Savich took another look at that lovely park and said, “When Lily was thirteen, she was running a gambling operation in the neighborhood. She would take bets on anything from the point spread in college football games to who could shoot the most three-point baskets in any pro game. Drove my parents nuts. Since my dad was an FBI agent, the local cops didn’t do anything, just snickered a lot. I think they all admired her moxie, but they gave my dad lots of grief about it, called her a chip off the old block.

  “When she hit eighteen, she suddenly realized that she liked to draw and she was very good at it. She’s an artist, you know, very talented.”

  “No, I hadn’t heard.”

  “Actually, her talent comes from our grandmother, Sarah Elliott.”

  “Sarah Elliott? Good grief, the Sarah Elliott, the artist whose paintings are in all the museums?”

  “Yep. Lily’s talents lie in a different direction-she’s an excellent cartoonist, lots of humor and irony. Have you ever heard of the cartoon strip No Wrinkles Remus?”

  Agent Hoyt shook his head.

  “That’s all right. It’s political satire and shenanigans, I guess you could say. She hasn’t done much for the past seven months, since the death of her daughter. But she will, and once she gets herself back together again, I’m sure she’s going to be syndicated in lots of papers across the country.”

  “She’s that good?”

  “I think so. Now, given her talent, her background, can you really believe that she would try to kill herself seven months after her daughter was killed?”

  “A girl who was the neighborhood bookie, then a cartoon strip artist?” Hoyt sighed. “I’d like to say no, I can’t imagine it, Savich, but who knows? Aren’t artists supposed to be high-strung? Temperamental? You said she still can’t remember a thing about the accident?”

  “Not yet.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “After MAX checks everything out, we’ll see. No matter what, I’m taking Lily back to Washington with my wife and me. I think it’s been proved that Hemlock Bay isn’t healthy for her.”

  “Everything could be perfectly innocent,” Clark Hoyt said. “She could have simply lost control of the car.”

  “Yeah, but you know something? I saw my brother-in-law differently this time. I saw him through Lily’s eyes, maybe. It’s not a pretty sight. I want to strangle him. Actually, I wanted to throw his daddy through the hospital window.”

  Clark Hoyt laughed. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

  “I will, thank you, Hoyt. Count on it. Thanks for the names of the shrinks.”

  Hemlock Bay, California

  On the following Sunday afternoon, four days after her surgery, Lily was pronounced well enough to leave the hospital. She suffered only mild discomfort, because Dr. Larch had stopped by her room, looking determined, and given her some pills to keep the worst of the pain at bay. She still walked bent over like an old person, but her eyes were clear, her mood upbeat.

  Sherlock had wanted to ask Dr. Larch about lowering Lily’s meds temporarily on Dr. Frasier’s orders, but Savich said, “Nope, let’s just hold off on that for a while.”

  “Nothing else good on the tape,” Sherlock said in some disgust as she removed the small bug from beneath Lily’s hospital bed while Lily was in the small bathroom bathing. “Not even doctors or nurses gossiping.”

  Ten minutes later Savich said to his sister as he pushed her wheelchair toward the elevator, “I told Tennyson that Sherlock and I are taking you to see your new shrink. He wasn’t happy about that, said he didn’t know anything about this woman. She could be a rank charlatan and he’d lose all sorts of money, maybe even get you more depressed. I just let him talk on, then gave him my patented smile.”

  “That smile,” Sherlock said, “translates into ‘You mess with me, buddy, and even your toenails are gonna hurt.’ ”

  “In any case, at the end of all his ranting, there was nothing he could do about it. He tried to get me to convince you to see Dr. Rossetti. I do wonder why he thinks the guy is so great.”

  “He’s not,” Lily said. “He’s horrible.” She actually shuddered. “He came back again this morning. The nurse had just washed my hair for me, so I looked human and felt well enough to take him on.”

  “What happened?” Sherlock asked. She was carrying Lily’s small overnight bag. Savich pushed her wheelchair onto the elevator, punched the button. No one else was on board.

  Lily shuddered yet again. “I think he’d talked to Tennyson some more. He tried to change hi
s tactics. He actually attempted to be ingratiating, at least at first. When he slithered into my room-yes, that’s it exactly, he slithered-Nurse Carla Brunswick had just finished blow-drying my hair.”

  Nurse Brunswick turned toward him and said, “Doctor.”

  “Leave us alone for a bit, Nurse. Thank you.”

  Lily said, “I don’t want Nurse Brunswick to leave, Dr. Rossetti. I want you to leave.”

  “Please, Mrs. Frasier, just a moment of your time. I fear we got off on the wrong foot when I was here before. You were just out of surgery; it was simply too soon for you to want to hear about anything. Please, just a few minutes of your time.”

  Nurse Brunswick smiled at Lily, patted her hand, then left the hospital room.

  “I see that I have little choice here, Russell. What do you want?”

  If he was angered at her use of his first name, he didn’t let on. He kept smiling, walked to her bed, and stood there, towering over her. She looked at his hands; his plump hands sported a ring this time-a huge diamond on his pinkie. She wished she could throw him out of her room.

  “I just wanted to speak to you, Mrs. Frasier-Lily. See if perhaps we could deal better with each other, perhaps you could come to trust me, to let me help you.”

  “No.”

  “Are you in pain, Lily?”

  “Yes, Russell, I am.”

  “Would you like me to give you a mild antidepressant?”

  “My pain is from my ribs and my missing spleen.”

  “Yes, well, that pain will likely suppress the other, deeper pain for a while longer.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Mrs. Frasier-Lily-won’t you come to my office, perhaps next Monday? That will give you another week to recuperate.”

  “No, Russell. Ah, here’s Dr. Larch. Hello. Do come in. Dr. Rossetti was just leaving.”

  Savich looked ready to spit by the time Lily finished, but she just laughed. “No need to go pound him, Dillon. He left, didn’t say another word, just walked out. Dr. Larch didn’t move until he was gone.”

  “What I don’t understand,” Sherlock said thoughtfully, “is why both Tennyson and Dr. Rossetti want you as his patient so very much. Isn’t that strange? You give Rossetti grief and he still wants you?”