“She was thrilled with her fine English lady from Pretoria. The second weekend back, at her party, I came up and started to…twist off its head.” A pause; his voice was weaker and they had to lean closer. “She caught me. Figured it out, didn’t know what to do. That’s when she…really started hating me.” Arender’s lips curled into a miserable smirk. “People think…ow…my head.”
“What do you mean, she didn’t know what to do?” Jill bored in. “She could have called the cops, told us.”
“You would have told her…to tell the cops.” The whisper grew ragged. The blood from his head wound streamed. “She didn’t want to embarrass…the firm. After Wylie…didn’t want more trouble. Felt torn…blamed me.”
“So you killed her,” David pressed furiously. Sirens sounded outside. “But Celie came and you couldn’t get to the doll so you’re back now-”
“Didn’t kill her.” The whisper was almost pleading. “Didn’t…my head hurts.” Arender’s eyes opened wide in sudden fright, blinking at shadows. “My head…the pain… I can’t…see.”
Jill and David traded glances. Uniforms pounded up the stairs, burst in with lights sweeping like giant crazed fireflies. “You okay?”… “How’d he get in?”… “Crowbar over here, pried the plywood.”
Lamps turned on, and the overhead light in the hall. Uniforms knelt over Arender, their radios squawking, and then Ted Connor and Ray Zienuc were there. The small room was crowded. Forget the dolls. They’d gotten trampled and were still getting trampled. It was clear why Jody had left them.
Jill and David got to their feet, filled in the detectives, and gave them the diamonds.
“So he’s our killer,” Zienuc said with relief, crouching to Arender, leaving room for an EMS woman checking the assailant’s vitals.
“Maybe not.” Jill shrugged uncertainly, and got looks from both detectives. They switched their frowns to David, who leaned on a near wall rubbing his sore shoulder. His expression mirrored Jill’s. She went to him; leaned into him on the side that didn’t hurt.
“There was no forced entry,” David said, putting his arm around Jill. “Jody hated Arender; wouldn’t have let him in.”
Connor and Zienuc both rose from the bloodied assailant, looking frustrated. They had their murderer! The media would ease off! They could catch up on sleep!
“Maybe he wheedled, sweet-talked his way in,” Zienuc insisted. “Maybe promised, ‘So we’ll give the diamonds to charity,’ or something.”
Connor unhappily met the eyes of the OB pair. “If she was feeling sick, she may have been glad to see anyone.”
“She had her phone,” Jill reminded him. “Until she didn’t, and her visitor snatched it away.”
“Her visitor was someone she trusted,” David added tightly.
Connor’s face sagged with fatigue. He scrubbed his face and lightly toed Arender. “There’s no certainty this piece-of-work wasn’t the visitor. I still like him for this. Hell, at least we can hold him, charge him with break and entry, assault…”
He knelt to read Arender his Miranda. “You are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say…”
When he finished, he was met with silence. Arender lay bloodied and limp, with his eyes closed.
“Do you understand?”
Barely a whisper: “Yes.”
Arender’s head fell to one side. He lost consciousness.
They all stepped out to make more room for the EMS.
“He might have a subdural,” David told them as they maneuvered in their gurney; and Connor said, “Take him to Madison Memorial. We can question him there.”
In the hall, David bent to his sports bag and showed the detectives the connector pipe. “From under the sink past the trap,” he said, turning the pipe in his hands. “Have its interior checked for penicillin, which could have stayed in solution, swished through the trap and then dropped sediment.”
He held the pipe up. Explained his suspicion that Jody was trying to comfort herself with the glass of chocolate milk and someone was with her, pretending to comfort. “She was upset and crying. She wouldn’t have rinsed that glass and wiped it down. Someone else did – why? The answer may be in this pipe.”
Connor took it, his lips bunched unhappily, and Zienuc gave him a plastic bag for it.
“CSU never goes past the trap,” Connor complained, holding the pipe up and glaring at it. “Okay, we’ll get this to the lab.”
“Hell, it’s night and they’re short staffed,” Zienuc groaned. He threw a hand up, and started to pace and bitch to no one in particular. “Forty-eight hours, dammit! If a case isn’t solved in the first forty-eight it can take weeks, months, forever! Jeez, you hear of cops who are haunted their whole lives by an unsolved…”
“You said you’re going to the hospital?” Jill asked Connor quietly, inhaling and zipping up her parka.
“Yeah, to question Arender.”
“He may need surgery. We suspect a blood clot on his brain.”
“So when can we interview him?”
“Maybe tomorrow,” David said, picking up his sports bag. “If the clot’s small and they evacuate it and his neuro findings are okay, you can talk to him then. Save yourselves a trip. Get some sleep.”
They had moved to the top of the stairs and stood, overlooking the living room where it all happened, and the kitchen just beyond. Uniforms had turned on a couple of small lamps, but the room still moved with dark shadows. Chill drafts gusted. The Spanish moss swayed.
Jill realized with sorrow that this was probably the last time she’d be here. Images rushed at her of Jody, her head bent and sobbing, pathetically trusting a fake friend and a glass of chocolate milk. Nooo, Jody, don’t… Fury raged at the dark, faceless shape standing over her…
On a stair, Jill turned for one last look at Jody’s bedroom door, the room inside ruined under its dark, ghostly pall. She felt her eyes sting with tears.
David, a step below, took her arm gently. “We gotta get back.”
Edna barely woke…a second time.
The first time had been because of Misty’s barking. She didn’t hear the clamor above, and called the dog back to bed. Whispered and patted with her eyes barely open… “There, there, sweetheart”…then dropped back to sleep.
The second time, it was her dream that woke her. Jolted her into a frightened, foggy state where the room tilted like a boat deck and she was sure she’d seen that man again. He was there, running down the stairs, almost bursting into her room – “Misty, no!” she cried feebly – and then he wasn’t there. He just disappeared halfway down, and she realized, with her eyes struggling to stay open, that it was the dream, the same dream again. Except that she hadn’t seen him well, not as well as she had in her first dream.
Maybe because of the pills…
She tossed. A thud somewhere above threatened to wake her further, which would be bad. In her fuzzy awareness, she remembered that nice police lady who wanted her to remember the man better, and call Jody’s lady doctor to tell her… But how could she remember if she didn’t catch up on her sleep?
Her mind just didn’t work without sleep, and lately there’d been so many sleepless nights…
That’s why she had gotten out her old sleeping pills. The red ones. How old were they? She hadn’t been able to remember, squinting into her crammed medicine cabinet. She hadn’t even been able to read the label, but remembered the red ones because, years ago, she’d been afraid of them. The doctor had told her to use them very, very sparingly. But now sleep was important. She had to sleep to help Jody.
Another thud sounded above. Misty raised her head and woofed. Her ears were up, oh dear. Edna feared more barking, so she patted and sweetly shushed her dog, who crept closer and lay her head down again.
Then Edna reached for more pills. Got her bony hand to her bedside table, shakily tumbled out one, got her glass of water to her lips, and swallowed it down. Then lay her head back down and closed her eyes, waiting for
sleep.
Then opened her eyes and thought, Did I take my pill?
She couldn’t remember. She tossed, feeling fuzzy and floaty, not hearing another thud upstairs. She feared that she was going to disappoint everyone. Jill, her name was, Jody’s lady doctor. She was waiting to hear about the dream, and Edna so wanted to tell her.
Did I take my pill? she thought again. And started to fear that she hadn’t.
She turned on her pillow, and reached again for the bottle. The pills, those scary red pills…
Her fingers hunted for them in the dimness…
30
“Forty-eight hours, forty-eight hours…” On the speeding ride back in a patrol car, David was wired and sounding like Zienuc.
“You’re making me more nervous,” Jill complained. The siren blared and traffic was wildly shifting out of their way.
“Sorry. But forty-eight hours, dammit - we’re past that.”
“If you don’t stop, I’ll get out and walk.”
“Okay, I’ve stopped.”
“Too late. I can’t think. My head hurts.”
They thanked the rookie who drove them and ran in through Emergency, David eyeing his sports bag and muttering next about the police lab being short staffed. Impatiently he jabbed the elevator button as Jill checked her phone’s baby monitor.
“Jesse sleeping?” he asked.
“Yes. Snug and hugging Fawzie under his blue blankie.”
“Don’t talk baby talk.”
“It’s an antidote. My nerves are screaming.”
“Okay, okay. Don’t yell.”
“Who’s yelling?”
A nurse and two interns were waiting with them and looking slightly uncomfortable, but Jill was past embarrassment. “Still want to do this yourself?”
“Yep. Beats the speed of government.”
The elevator arrived on Ten. They hurried through the busy pathology lab to the adjacent chem lab where three technicians were working. It was only 8:55. They’d been gone less than two hours, and the chem lab was humming.
“Sure,” said technician Mary Brown as David gave her the swabs he’d taken from Jody’s sink’s pipe connector. “We get lots of requests for this test - so many people allergic.” She was talkative, and they were in a hurry. “Would you believe penicillin still shows up in cheese?” she chimed, rolling her eyes. “They give it to the cows. Penicillin even shows up in potato chips, other junk foods containing cheese. One woman was brought in really sick from some bacon cheddar appetizer. Nobody tells you this stuff, do they?”
“How long to test the swabs?” Jill asked tensely.
“Four to six hours.” Mary read their expressions and gave them a double take. Oh. They were that OB pair, in the news a lot. “This police business?” she asked.
They said yes, gave her their cards, explained only that they were looking for penicillin in a plumbing connector pipe. Also asked if the test could be speeded up.
“Oh, you bet. See this?” Mary zoomed on her stool down the counter, reached for a vial, uncapped it, and popped out a dime-sized, dark blue disc onto a glass plate.
She poked at the blue disc. “Pretty color, huh? It’s called the Nitro Blue test, just the coolest thing. First I make a mush of your swab material, then I mash it into a Petri dish with this disc that contains blue dye and special bacteria that’s sensitive to penicillin - plus sucrose, natch, to feed the bacteria.”
Mary’s hands moved and pointed. “If the disk stays dark blue, it means this bacteria – it’s called B. subtilis – is happy, feeding and alive - that is, no penicillin there to kill it. But if the disc dye turns lighter blue it means penicillin is there, killing the bacteria. Cool, huh?” she said again.
“What’s the absolute fastest you can test this?” David asked, flicking a glance to a clock on the wall.
“Maybe less than four hours.” Mary smiled, not seeing Jill chewing her lip, scowling at her watch. “A gonzo little trick we have? We stick the Petri dish into an incubator and heat it. That makes the water evaporate faster and the bacteria multiply faster, which accelerates the test. Neat, huh? We get a lot of requests for faster. Penicillin for some folks, no time to fool around.”
“Please call us?” Jill asked as they thanked and turned to leave.
“It may be one or two in the morning,” Mary called after them. “Or three. I’m on all night.”
They said anytime was fine and left.
In the hall David’s phone buzzed: a neurosurgery intern calling to tell him a trephination was underway on Jay Arender. A CT scan had revealed a small blood clot on his brain, and they were evacuating it. “Doesn’t look like much damage, he should be okay,” the intern said.
David thanked him, and asked for an update.
“Roger that,” the intern said. “What hit that guy? A wrecking ball?”
In the elevator, stressed and fatigued, they argued. Jill felt a crying need for a few hours of normalcy, their family together. She even wanted to cook.
“Cook?” David smirked.
“Yes. Just a few hours to try to heal, re-charge the batteries. I have a desperate-screaming-crazy need for that.”
He almost smiled, and stared at the numbers dinging above them. It was only 9:20. “I guess I do too,” he said.
Jesse was fast asleep. It was precious, just gazing down at him, so sweet in his little eighteen-months-old dream world, wherever that took him.
From behind them came, “You’re gonna take him home?”
It was George Mackey, another OB resident leaning on his daughter’s crib. George was overweight, not a bad guy if you didn’t count his crankiness and his avoidance of switching coverage with others. “Nice if you can,” he said wistfully. “Karen’s away, has to travel a lot. She’s been making noises about wanting a nanny.”
David shook his head. “Jesse would be lonely. He likes playing with the other kids.”
“Ditto Jenna here. Hey, you’re off tonight. Why aren’t you already home? Or out in some great restaurant eating pasta, enjoying some Cabernet?”
Jill smiled as she lifted Jesse from his crib. “We will be soon.”
“With the babe? Ha! Where?”
“A really good place,” she said softly as she wrapped Jesse in a bigger blanket.
He woke up. “Ma?” His eyes were sleepy. His little hand went to her face.
“We’re going home, slugger,” David said, kissing Jesse’s hand, adjusting the blanket over his head. It was chilly out. His hair was sweaty.
“Hooome,” Jesse said in a tiny whisper, nestling in the blanket against Jill’s chest. She looked at David, surprised. Jesse had never said ‘home’ before.
“Another new word,” he said wonderingly, tucking in Fawzie as Jesse clutched it, hugged it to him.
On their way out they passed an orthopedic resident trying to get her fussy son to sleep. She shot them a grin. “The nurses say he’s learning their names. When’s he going to start leaping over buildings?”
“Bed first,” David said, giving a little wave.
31
From one crib to the other, without so much as a peep. Jesse squirmed, pulled Fawzie close, tucked his thumb in his mouth, and resumed his happy sleep. Their hospital to home and back to hospital routine had actually made him more adaptable. He’d stayed asleep once in a cab with its driver yelling in Farsi to his dispatcher. He’d also stayed asleep in an elevator crowded with staff making a fuss over him.
Jill started heating some pasta and tomato sauce, and found herself stirring the sauce too fast. Being home wasn’t helping her unwind as she’d hoped. She scowled at the pasta, boiling away and taking too long.
“You can hurry the Nitro Blue test, but you can’t hurry linguini,” she fretted, looking at David. He was setting plates on their counter. “When did I become so permanently uptight?”
“You’re not permanently uptight,” he reassured, peering into the silverware drawer.
“I fear I am,” she moaned in an emotio
nal torrent, stirring and stirring. “I’ve gotten impatient with the microwave. Three minutes never used to take so long! I’m worse than usual, aren’t I? I should be trying to keep an even keel - oh damn, it’s splashing.” She fiddled with a dial, tossed her spoon down, and threw up her hands.
“Hey…” He turned and hugged her. “You’re just tense. We’re both tense.”
Oh, it felt so good. What is more comforting than a hug? Jill threw her arms around David’s neck and squeezed him, melting into his warm shoulder. She felt tears of brief relief. “This has been such a nightmare,” she whispered, and took a deep breath, deeper than she’d been able to breathe for days.
David held her and reached with one hand; stirred the sauce, turned the heat lower.
The hug’s good feeling evaporated, like that steam rising from the reddened pot. The tomato sauce, don’t think of Celie…don’t…don’t… Jill pulled away from David, seeing the horrid dagger. Seeing, too, the kaleidoscope burst of images from these past terrible days.
She frowned suddenly and stilled, staring ahead at nothing.
“What?” David raised a brow. How well he knew when she had new wheels spinning.
Jill peered through their long, thin kitchen to their living room window, and the glowing towers of the hospital a block away.
“Deborah Wylie,” she said abruptly. “She can’t know about Arender, and I said we’d, uh, keep her posted, and the cops want us to work – awful word – the Wylies.”
David turned and started uncorking a wine bottle. “So…” he said. “Call her.”
Jill got out Deborah’s card and punched numbers. Listened.
“Voice mail,” she said, frowning slightly. David held the bottle in one hand, watching her.
She left a quick message. Sorry to say Jay Arender arrested. Found breaking and entering Jody’s apartment. Injured. Undergoing surgery at Madison. “Sounds like he’ll be okay. Can possibly be visited tomorrow.”
EMBRYO 5: SILVER GIRL (EMBRYO: A Raney & Levine Thriller) Page 15
