Board Stiff (Mattie Winston Mysteries)

by Ryan, Annelise

  “They are looking into the other areas of your investigative efforts,” Trisha says in vague lawyer-speak.

  Since I’m pretty sure Trisha isn’t going to elaborate any more than that, I shrug it off and do the basic introductions. “This is Regan Simmons, the evening charge nurse. Regan, this is Detective Steve Hurley with the Sorenson Police Department and Trisha Collins, one of the Twilight Home lawyers.”

  “Regan, please have a seat,” Hurley says, gesturing to a chair across the table from him. “I would like to ask you a few questions regarding your boss’s murder.”

  Trisha jumps in with her own set of instructions. “Ms. Simmons, you should understand that my presence here is to represent the facility. I am not your personal lawyer, nor am I here to protect your individual rights or interests. If you desire to have counsel present for yourself you will need to let Detective Hurley know that and obtain a lawyer. If you opt to move ahead at this time with any questions the detective might have, I would ask that any questions regarding the administrative aspects of the hospital be answered only by myself, one of my colleagues, or one of the board members. You may address questions about day-to-day functions you perform in the course of your duties. And of course, patient confidentiality is to be maintained at all times. Do you understand?”

  Regan nods and then looks at Hurley. “Do I need a lawyer?”

  “That’s up to you. You are not under arrest and I’m not doing any sort of official interrogation at this point. We intend to speak to all the staff members as part of a general information gathering and you are the first. If you aren’t guilty, you don’t have anything to be concerned about. If at some point you reveal information that I think makes you a suspect, I will read you your rights.”

  “Why did you pick me first?” Regan asks. She looks nervous, and at the moment, I’m the only one in the room who fully understands why.

  “No particular reason,” Hurley says. “We had to wait for the lawyers to arrive, and when they did, I decided to start with the person or persons currently in charge and work my way down the pecking order. That’s all.”

  “So I’m not a suspect at this point?” she asks.

  “That’s correct,” Hurley says. “It’s my understanding that you work the evening shift from four to midnight and that you are typically the person in charge of the facility once the administrative people have left for the day. Is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are there any other nurses on duty with you?”

  “Nurses? You mean registered nurses or LPNs?”

  “Yes.”

  “I typically work with a staff of just nursing assistants.”

  “Who in the building has access to the patients’ medications?”

  “Once the administrative people leave, I’m the only one who has that access. Our medications are kept in a locked room at the nurse’s station and there is one set of keys that is passed from nurse to nurse at the change of shift.”

  “I see,” Hurley says. “Do any of the patients ever have access to, or administer their own medications?”

  “They’re not supposed to, but it’s happened from time to time. Well-meaning family members sometimes bring things in, or the patients themselves will visit an urgent care clinic outside of their regular one during a day leave and get a doctor to prescribe something that they then fill and bring back with them. For some, it’s a matter of wanting to maintain a level of control over their own health management, for others, it’s a fear of embarrassment, or a desire to be secretive about their true health condition. It’s a dangerous practice because even simple over-the-counter medications like acetaminophen can cause problems serious enough to be life threatening if we don’t know someone is taking them.”

  “How well did you know Mr. Chase?” Hurley asks, switching gears.

  I watch Regan closely as she answers. Her face remains impassive, but I notice she is fiddling with her wedding ring.

  “I knew him to say hello to him when I saw him.” There is the faintest quaver to her voice, so subtle that it could just be her normal manner of speech. “Our hours tend to run opposite one another so I didn’t see him that often. Usually it was at the start of my shift, when he was leaving for the day.”

  “So he was a basic Monday through Friday, nine-to-five kind of guy?”

  Regan shrugs. “I guess so.”

  “You never saw him here in the evenings or on the weekends?”

  “Maybe once in a while. Several of the administrative people have come in during off hours at times. It may be more often than I’m aware of because that administrative wing is locked in the evenings and on weekends. I imagine anyone coming in during those hours would use the back outside entrance since it’s closer to the employee parking lot.”

  “Are you aware of anyone who had a grudge against Mr. Chase?” Hurley continues.

  Regan lets out a nervous little giggle. “Well, there is that silly rumor the patients bounce around from time to time.”

  “What rumor is that?”

  “Some of them seem to think that certain patient deaths have been suspicious.”

  “I’m sorry,” Trisha jumps in, “but I’m not comfortable with that line of questioning.”

  Hurley gives her a ticked-off look and then says to Regan, “Without stating what the rumor is, tell me if you think there is any credence to it.”

  Trisha objects again with a frantic, “Detective!” but she’s a hair too late. Even though Regan doesn’t say anything, she shakes her head almost immediately.

  Not one to be deterred, Hurley asks Regan, “Are you aware of any patients who believe this rumor strongly enough to want to exact revenge on Mr. Chase?”

  Surprisingly, Trisha doesn’t object this time.

  “Not really,” Regan says. “I mean, I’ve heard lots of them discuss it, but only in a speculative manner. I don’t think anyone seriously believes it, at least not enough to act on it in a manner such as this.”

  “Okay,” Hurley says. “I think that’s all I need to ask for now. Is there anything you want to add?”

  Regan shakes her head quickly and starts to rise from her chair, but I have a question that stops her cold.

  “Is it okay if we fingerprint you and get a sample of your DNA?”

  Hurley gives me a puzzled look. I’m guessing because of the DNA question.

  Regan gives me a panicked look. “Why do you need those things?”

  “Well, we’re dusting Mr. Chase’s office for fingerprints and if you rarely saw him and had little to no contact with him, we wouldn’t expect to find your fingerprints in there.”

  Regan looks to the side for a heartbeat and I can tell her wheels are spinning. “I’ve been in his office,” she says. “As the shift supervisor, I have keys to the administrative offices when I work. Our admission files on all the patients are in those offices, as are certain other papers we need to access from time to time.”

  “What papers would those be?” I ask.

  “Um . . . you know . . . licenses and stuff like that.”

  “Those are kept in Mr. Chase’s office, not in Dorothy Granger’s office?”

  “The facility licenses are in Mr. Chase’s office,” Regan says quickly. “Nursing licenses are kept in Ms. Granger’s office.”

  “When is the last time you had to access the facility licenses?” I ask her.

  “I don’t know. It was some time ago. I’d have to look at the records. But the point is, you might find my fingerprints in that office.” She flashes a nervous little smile, apparently relieved that she has dodged my bullet.

  But she hasn’t. I’m far from done.

  Chapter 19

  “Tell me, Regan,” I say, “would we find your fingerprints on the couch in Bernie’s office? Oh, heck, forget about the fingerprints, what about your DNA? Would we find that on the couch? Because somebody’s DNA was all over that thing and we’ve got samples of it.”

  Hurley shoots me a surprised but adm
iring look.

  Regan shoots me one that is lethal. “What are you implying?” she says, all indignant.

  “Come on, Regan. I know you and Bernie Chase were having an affair.”

  “I’m a married woman and I love my husband.”

  “Maybe it was your husband who killed Bernie,” I suggest.

  “No,” Regan shoots back in a tone that suggests I’m being ridiculous.

  “He seems like a good suspect to me,” I say, prodding her a little harder. “Does he know about the affair?”

  “Of course not,” Regan snaps. Then, realizing what she’s just said, she tries to fix it. “What I mean is there is nothing for him to know about.”

  Hurley and I stare at Regan, waiting patiently. We have her and she knows it. It’s just a matter of how long it’s going to take her to cave.

  Regan glances at Trisha, who doesn’t say a word. “I have nothing to admit to,” Regan maintains. “And if you insist on perpetuating this misinformation about an affair, I will have no choice but to sue you for libel.”

  She’s good; her vehement denial is quite convincing.

  I decide to prod a little harder. “Technically you would have to sue us for slander.”

  “What?” Regan snaps, looking at me like I’m a tick on her dog’s ass.

  “Mattie is correct,” Trisha says. “If someone says something that damages your reputation, it’s considered slander not libel, assuming you can prove actual damages. Libel has to be in writing. In either case, it’s only a problem if what is said or written can’t be backed up by the truth.”

  Regan glares at us, her eyes moving from me to Trisha to Hurley and back to me again. Her lips are tight with anger and she’s twisting her wedding ring so hard I wouldn’t be surprised to see her finger come off. Her next words come out clear and taut. “I will not discuss or tolerate any suggestion that Bernie and I had a romantic relationship. If you would like to discuss other matters, that’s fine. Otherwise I need to get back to work.” Her complexion is flushed and I can tell we have her rattled. That and the fact that she slipped by using the more familiar name for Chase.

  “Think very carefully, Regan,” I say. “This is a small town. People see things, people talk. So if you and Bernie were having an affair, people will know. Odds are we will be able to prove it, if through no other means than through that DNA sampling I mentioned. Believe me, I know. I’ve been there.”

  “Mattie is absolutely right,” Hurley says, leaning forward and closing the gap between him and Regan. “Let me ask you one more time, and please think very carefully before you answer. Were you and Bernard Chase having an affair?”

  Regan’s eyes dart back and forth and tears are starting to well in them. I can tell she’s hesitant to admit the truth. She’s gauging the veracity of what we just said, weighing her options.

  “Yes,” she says finally with a little sigh of resignation. Her entire body sags. “Bernie and I were having an affair.”

  Everyone sits back in their seats and now that the truth is out, it’s as if someone opened a window and let all the tension rush out of the room.

  “How long has it been going on?” Hurley asks.

  Regan drops her gaze to her lap, and I sense she’s no longer willing to look us straight in the eye now that we’ve caught her in a lie. “Six, maybe seven months. Dorothy hired me a little over a year ago. I met Bernard during the interview process and the attraction has been there from the beginning, but it took a while before we acted on it. Both of our marriages were falling apart, and we commiserated about it over lunch a few times. Then we went to a conference together and met up in the bar after the sessions were over. One thing led to another and here we are.”

  “Did you kill Bernard?” Hurley asks her.

  “Of course not,” she says in a tone of disbelief. She shakes her head in misery and the tears are free-falling now. “I genuinely cared for Bernie. I had no reason to kill him.”

  “Do you think your husband might have?” Hurley asks.

  “N-no, of course not,” she stammers. “I’m sure he doesn’t know.” But there is a fearful look on her face, a hint of doubt that tells me she believes it’s a possibility. The revelation about Regan and Bernie’s little affair has widened our suspect list considerably. We now have Regan herself if Bernie decided to break things off and Regan didn’t like it, and Regan’s husband if he knew about the affair and flew into a jealous rage. This also adds motive for Bernie’s wife Vonda, though I somehow think she wouldn’t have cared that he was having an affair.

  “Who do you think killed him?” Hurley asks Regan.

  “How would I know? Maybe it was his wife, or a patient. Some of them can get pretty crazy, particularly the ones with the mental disorders.”

  “I thought you said none of the patients really believed that rumor,” Hurley says.

  “Well, how can I know for sure? No one jumps out to me as a suspect, but who knows what secrets these patients may be hiding?” No one says anything so Regan jumps in to fill the void. “How did he die? Was he beaten? Stabbed? Maybe I could give you a more educated guess if I knew.”

  Hurley and I look at each other and smile. Regan Simmons is no dummy and I don’t believe for one minute that she hasn’t heard all the gossip going around about where and how Bernie was found. Too many people knew about it, including Irene and whoever else might have peeked in that men’s room before I got there. And I know everyone in the building has been talking all day long.

  “Let’s switch from who and how to why,” Hurley says, avoiding Regan’s question. “What do you think about this rumor that Bernard was killing off his more expensive patients?”

  “Detective!” Trisha interrupts.

  “It’s absurd,” Regan says at the same time. Then, ignoring Trisha’s objection, she turns to me and says, “Mattie, you just met two of our most disabled patients. Both of them have been here for several years, so if Bernie was trying to get rid of the patients who were costing him money, those two should have been at the top of the list.”

  “I respectfully ask that you change the subject,” Trisha says.

  Hurley ignores her. “So you don’t believe the rumors?” he asks Regan.

  “Of course not,” Regan snaps. “It’s an utterly ridiculous idea. But that doesn’t mean some of those patients out there don’t believe it. And if they do, who’s to say one or more of them didn’t decide to kill Bernard?”

  Regan’s tune is changing pretty quickly now that she’s trying to shift our focus away from her lies, as well as her own and her husband’s motives.

  “When is the last time you saw Bernie?” I ask her.

  “Last night after my shift finished. Bernie often came by here at night and he and I would meet up in his office at the end of my shift. He’d let himself in through the back door to the administration wing and wait for me. I’d call him when I was done and he would let me in through the same door.”

  “Were you supposed to meet with him tonight?”

  She shakes her head. “This afternoon. Before my shift started. Obviously that didn’t happen.”

  Hurley switches gears and asks about some of the day-to-day operations of the facility. “When does the administration wing get locked up?”

  “Between five and six PM on most weekdays,” Regan says. “On the weekends it’s locked all the time. We open it up again at seven on Monday morning.”

  “Whose responsibility is it to make sure it’s locked?”

  “The on-duty nurse supervisor is responsible for making sure the inside entrance is locked. The rear exit door is locked at all times. Anyone can go out, but no one is supposed to be able to get in without a key.”

  “Who has keys to these doors?”

  “Each of the board members has a set of keys that opens pretty much every door here. I believe the medical director, Dr. Zimmerman, has a key to the front and back doors since he sometimes has to come here during off hours, but I don’t know that he has keys to
anywhere else. There is a master key set that we on-duty nurse supervisors hand off at shift change.”

  “There are two parking lots here?”

  “Yes,” Regan says, and now that the questions have veered away from her personally, she has relaxed considerably. “The side parking lot is for all employees and board members except for the night shift. They can park out front. Other than that, the lot out front is reserved for visitors and vendors.”

  “Vendors?”

  “Salesmen and such.”

  “Do you get a lot of those?”

  “Not on my shift, but I’ve heard the day nurses say they see some occasionally.”

  “Is the front desk with the sign-in book manned twenty-four-seven?”

  “No, we have someone there during our open hours, which are from six in the morning until ten at night. Between ten PM and six AM the entire facility is locked. The evening nurse supervisor on duty has to man the front door to let the night shift staff in between eleven-thirty and midnight.” Regan makes a pointed look at her watch. “In fact, I need to be heading that way soon.”

  “Okay. I have just one more question for you,” Hurley says, and she smiles with relief. “How free are the patients here to come and go?”

  “Well, with the exception of the ones who wear ankle monitors, they are all basically free to come and go as they please during the open hours. It’s expected that everyone will be here by the time we lock up at night, although some of our patients have had overnight furloughs, especially around the holidays. Those have to be arranged ahead of time, though. It’s rare for anyone to leave during the day for anything other than church, or a doctor’s appointment, or an occasional family event because most of them don’t have the means to go anywhere. They’re dependent upon a friend or family member to come and take them somewhere.”

  “Okay, Regan, I think that wraps it up for now, but I would like you to go to the dayroom and get fingerprinted before you leave for the night. I would also like to search your employee locker.”

  I expect Regan to object, but she doesn’t. She nods and then asks, “Are you going to talk to my husband?”