Weak as a newborn, she pulled her head up and tried again. Her left hand answered with fiery jolts of pain, her skin so tight she thought it would burst. Local Woman Explodes in Hospital, Film at Eleven, Mac thought. She took a deep, gulping breath and made one last heave. The curved lower bar of the railing conked into her head as she arrived.
McKenzie clawed her way back onto her feet and fell into bed, as wet from perspiration as if she’d just come from the shower. One little hospital stay and I’m shot, she thought wearily. As she tried to pull the IV rack back into position, she bumped a button on the control panel. The TV roared into life and she was a captive, spent audience.
She got a spattering of local news, laid her head back on the cool taut sheets of the bed, and tried to concentrate on something.
The local morning news team looked incredibly informal.
Paper coffee cups from chain doughnut shops, bags of chips, and other scraps of breakfast adorned their consoles as they chatted together, introducing their clips of news. She blinked, drifting, closed her eyes, and listened.
“Yesterday’s Board of Education meeting broke up early as members once again failed to gain a majority vote to release additional funds to rebuild quake-damaged schools. Student and faculty safety and educational facility replacement are two factors which remain at the center of the financial crisis.”
At the talk of the quakes, she opened one eye. The TV screen showed an impeccably-dressed young man, coal-black hair a contrast to his light eyes, looking disdainfully at the camera lens. She decided automatically that she didn’t like him, whoever he was. The shot panned to the local anchor. “Stephen Hotchkiss denied rumors that his was one of the dissenting votes, but noted that the three hundred-million-dollar availability of funds was there only because of judicious handling in the past.” The smug, overdressed man had to be Hotchkiss. He looked tight enough to squeak. “He pointed out that forty million had already been released since the quake last year, and that replacing those spent moneys would not be possible without levying new taxes.”
As the voices droned on, McKenzie’s eyes began to feel incredibly heavy. Even the banter between segments did nothing to rouse her. She thought of children—all the children—wondering who would help them, who would protect them, keep them safe in the schools, everywhere. The heaviness seemed to overflow into her ears, and the TV became muffled, then far away, and finally it was gone altogether.
Dr. Susan Craig stepped out of the shower, toweling herself briskly, her gaze already fixed on the small, nine-inch color monitor visible through the half-open bathroom door. Her world consisted of information, constantly altering, and her home was full of the medium which transmitted that information continuously, if not always accurately. Every room in the house contained a screen of some kind. Her house would be stark if not for the pervasive televisions. She lived alone; no memento of husband or boyfriends or family adorned the walls or mantles. Her furniture was functional and attractive, yet oddly sterile. Her life was not really here, the home suggested, and she would have been the first to agree with that.
Miller’s call from the hospital to get testing authorization had awakened her early. She’d have test results from one new patient to review when she went in. The challenge of another day beckoned her.
The TV flickered its strobelike shadow over her face. The news today was not as good as the news had been yesterday. As she dried her legs, she showed her teeth at the TV screen as if considering biting it. Members of the Board of Education were shown leaving yesterday’s meeting. Young Stephen Hotchkiss loomed large before the interviewer’s mike. Pompous ass. She knew him well, through her biofeedback stress relieving seminars. He wouldn’t be under constant stress if he weren’t so anal, she thought, running a slim hand down her legs to assess whether she needed to shave before putting on nylons.
How could he treat children that way? Did he not know, did he not understand, that they were the future of the world? All the facilities, all the opportunities of education should blossom to them. That now was the time to put the ideas into their brains which would carry them through a triumphant lifetime—
Thinking she’d like to take Hotchkiss’ head in her hands and swivel it around a couple of times like a possession scene from The Exorcist, she moved to her bedroom and began to dress. This new monitor, gleaming from the mahogany depths of the built-in cabinet reflected other, more worldly scenes at her from CNN. Even you, she frowned at the set, aren’t as informed as you could be. As she withdrew a stocking from her lingerie drawer and held it in the air to ascertain if its delicate beige color matched that of the other stocking she’d already put on, Bernard Shaw announced the collapse of Los Angeles Councilman Ibrahim Walker, his medical condition thought to be the result of an attack during a break-in.
Susan dropped her hand to her knee. Near death, but not dead. The old coot deserved to be dead. She’d prayed for it on more than one occasion. He’d blocked every funding bill or grant she’d presented for her projects. Shortsighted, stubborn old coot. Someone ought to drop-kick him into the twenty-first century, if he lived. Ibie Walker was said to be recovering at Mount Mercy. A thin smile etched its way into Susan Craig’s early morning frown.
She ought to pay him a little visit.
Deftly, she pulled her stocking on, clipped it to the garter belt she’d bought from Victoria’s Secret just last weekend, and stood. She flung open her walk-in closet, examining the vast array of clothing awaiting her. Yes, now that Ibie was held captive by IVs and catheters and monitor leads and shunts, tied down like Gulliver in Lilliput, yes, now might be a good time to talk some sense into the old relic.
She had to try. Her projects were too important to let go, to lie fallow in the labs, for lack of funding or understanding. Hadn’t she proved her worth? It wasn’t the money she needed for herself. Hadn’t she given unstintingly at the shelters, the halfway houses, the hospital, helping whomever she touched? She paid for the van, for the equipment herself, but she needed more, and technicians for interpretation—she needed to be able to teach her methods, pass them on, research and write to justify them ... she couldn’t do it all alone. Couldn’t they see the potential in her work?
She plucked out a pair of linen trousers and a silk blouse, dressing quickly and efficiently, fingers flying at the silk-covered buttons on the blouse, her thoughts a million miles away.
She stopped at the bathroom a last time before leaving the house. She checked the pregnancy kit, her unlined face knotting over the negative results. Susan looked up, caught herself frowning in the mirror. She put her chin up, and stroked her too flat stomach. Why could she not achieve what other women, lesser women, did at the drop of a pair of pants? Why could she not have a tiny bundle to croon to, to diaper, to teach and mold, to watch as it took its first of many steps, to fall, to get up and try again?
Why not her?
She threw the test kit into the wastebasket. It was not her. She’d availed herself of the medical facilities open to her. She knew it could not be her. Nor did she think it could be the man she’d chosen, this time, to be the father.
Susan looked at her hair, and sleeked it into place. She was still young. She still had prospects, potential. She had other things to achieve as well.
She tightened her belt a notch and, with a last, lingering look at herself in the mirror, left for the hospital.
Chapter 9
McKenzie supposed she ought to have been grateful for the sponge bath and clean gown, but the friendliness Shannon had exuded in the early morning seemed to have been swapped for efficiency. Without talking directly to her, the nurse communicated her displeasure at having discovered that Mac had been out of bed.
“Like one of my kids,” Shannon muttered. “So who do you think came in and peed in the toilet without flushing while you say you were in bed—‘the invisible man’? When we say we want bed rest, that’s what we mean. You were under mild sedation, young lady. You could have fallen and hurt yoursel
f severely. Do you want yourself tied down again?” Without waiting for an answer, the nurse replied, “No, I didn’t think so. Now I want you clean and tidy and in one place until after the doctor sees you.”
Arm up, arm down, leg over, roll on side, there you go. New sheets being put on without McKenzie even being taken out of the way. Sheet and thin yellow blanket folded neatly into position, corners squared.
Shannon stepped back, her eyes harsh in her face, and dried her hands as McKenzie took the clean gown and tried to shrug into it. She helped only when the IV line became entangled in the sleeve. The nurse drew the plastic bag through and repositioned it above the gown, saying, “You should be off this later today. Ready for visitors? You have someone waiting to see you.”
McKenzie clawed at her hair, ends sopping from the hasty bath.
Shannon pulled a drawer open in the tray stand. “There’s a comb in here.” She drew out the courtesy pack and left it on the table.
McKenzie found the cheap plastic comb and was still dragging it through when the nurse paused in the doorway, saying, “She can see you now, Officer.”
She paused in mid-stroke, her arm in the air, bruises dappling the underflesh, as the policeman entered. His square, compact form amply filled out his uniform blues, even their laundry-creased corners, his dark hair swept back from his forehead, revealing a face to match his body type, squared and looking as though he had nothing to be happy about. The expression on his face made her abruptly drop the comb and brace herself.
“I’m Officer Moreno,” he said, as he hooked a foot about a chair leg and pulled it forward so he could sit, drawing his notebook from his shirt pocket as he did. “I’m hoping you’ll want to talk to me about the domestic dispute you were involved in last night.”
His voice was rich and slightly flavored, and she realized that was one of the things she had missed terribly, the diversity of the Los Angeles Basin. Beyond the sound of his words, however, was a sense of disapproval. What had the hospital told him about her?
Gathering herself, McKenzie asked, “You didn’t talk to me last night? Someone didn’t?”
“Not at the time.”
The hope of having found some sanctuary fled. “Oh, God. I thought I told you, told someone. You should have been looking for him.” She wasn’t safe from Jack, had never been safe from him.
“Who?”
“My husband.” The word was difficult to say. She found there was already an insurmountable chasm between them. Their marital status was already in the past.
Moreno frowned. His eyebrows, like his hair, was iron-colored, thick and luxurious, not gray but not raven black as it must have been once. “Let’s get our business done here,” he responded. “I need to take your statement.”
Puzzled and worried, McKenzie sat back. Too much interest in her. “All right.”
Moreno looked at his notebook. “Neighbors called in a domestic at about two a.m. last night, but they told us they had heard loud quarreling earlier, about ten-thirty. Would that be accurate?”
She wondered what Mrs. Ethelridge had told him.
“Miss Smith?”
“Ah.” She swallowed tightly. “That would be about right.”
“Your residence is 1026 East Anita?”
“My, my father’s residence. Yes.”
“And we’re told your relationship with Walton Smith is that of father, daughter. He’s your father?”
She thought she’d said that. “Yes.” She wet lips gone dry. “I know you have a report to write, but no one will tell me—how is he?”
Moreno had black coffee eyes and something unreadable flickered through them as he looked up from his notebook. He scratched a thick eyebrow. “Let’s stick to this first.”
“But—”
“Neighbors also tell me you’ve been gone from the residence nearly ten years, that you came home— unexpectedly—yesterday, late afternoon.”
McKenzie gave in. “Yes.”
“Your mother died several years ago. Why didn’t you return then?”
“I didn’t feel like it.”
His big square face twitched a little around the angle of his jaw and ears. “She was dying of cancer, and you didn’t feel like it?”
It wouldn’t sound right, and there was no way she could make it sound right, but she tried. “We’d talked over the phone. She knew how I felt, that I wouldn’t be welcome, that being there was something I didn’t think I could do. And she didn’t want me to come to the hospital. We’d already said good-bye.”
“Why didn’t you think you could be there?”
“My father drinks. Drank.” McKenzie looked away.
“Would it be accurate to say that you and your father have a combative relationship?”
“I don’t see—” McKenzie stopped. “We had a very loud argument last night after dinner, and I’m sure Mrs. Ethelridge heard a lot of it, but I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”
“You argued.”
“Yes.”
Moreno moved in his chair as if trying to become a bit more comfortable. His hands flexed around his notebook. “Words or anything more physical?”
“Yelling. We always yell at each other.” Her brow throbbed again.
“Do you remember shouting. ‘Leave me alone’?”
“Yes.” Her head ached and her vision blurred slightly, overlapping one intent Moreno next to another. She blinked rapidly several times. “What does this have to do with Jack?”
“Why don’t you tell me? Who’s Jack?”
“Jack Trebolt, my ex, my husband.”
Moreno paused, before answering carefully. “We have no information on that. Are you saying he’s involved?”
“I’m saying he’s the one who did all this. Didn’t anyone listen to me? You should be looking for him!”
Moreno sighed. “Miss Smith, I’m proceeding on the information we were able to gather earlier. I’m investigating an assault and battery, but from the marks on you, it could be you acted in self-defense.”
The blurring of her vision cleared, but now his words seemed to make no sense. “I don’t understand.”
“The neighbors aren’t sure who started the fight, and I haven’t been able to get a statement from your father, so I don’t know who picked up the bat and hit who first.”
“Jack started it.” McKenzie clenched her jaw against the flood of emotion rising in her.
“Miss, at this time, we have no report of a third party on the scene. As near as we can tell, this was strictly between you and your father.” Moreno sat rigidly, frowning at her.
McKenzie responded in stunned silence. Then, she forced each word out carefully. “You think I—you think Dad and I—you think I hit my father? You think we did this to each other?”
“That appears to be the case. It happens. It sounds to me like one of you just snapped.”
The words plunged into her chest like a knife. She had lost it. The furies had woken up. She had crossed over the edge.
She shook her head in denial. “You’ve got no clue.” It had to be Jack. She had to cling to that. Jack had been real, the bloody visions could not be. Jack could be anywhere. McKenzie pointed at Moreno. “You’ve got to find him!”
“This man you say is your husband.”
“Yes.” McKenzie peered around the hospital room. “My purse—if I had my purse, I could prove it to you. My driver’s license in my wallet—”
“The forged ID we found under the name of Fordham? The same name your vehicle is registered to?”
She found it hard to take a breath. “I had to do that— Jack wouldn’t let me have a car of my own. I had to hide it.”
“You forged documents in Washington.”
“Yes, but you don’t understand.”
Moreno lowered his notebook to his knee. “Why don’t you try explaining it to me, Miss Smith? Your neighbors don’t seem to remember you getting married, but they do remember the argument you had with your parents on the day y
ou left. So why don’t you talk to me? I’d like to straighten this out.”
“My father—”
“Your father is in no condition to give us a statement right now. Even if he recovers, he may have no memory of the events. All I have to go on right now is you, Miss Smith.”
And she looked into those coffee-dark eyes and knew he wasn’t too happy with what he was hearing from her. They didn’t believe her. They didn’t want to believe her. This man sat there, looking at her right now, and what he wanted to believe was that they had gone for each other’s throats, she and her father, and tried to kill one another. What kind of a world was this where this was the kind of truth they wanted to see? How could she ever hope to change his mind?
Death Watch Page 11
