Simon Rising

by Brian D Howard

  He had a number of contacts to call and homework to learn more about Ambrose and who might benefit from sheltering him. That meant legwork to do and calls to make. He was not going to do any of that from here. He stood up, dug some cash from his pocket and left some on the table.

  “Have a pleasant day,” the nicer waitress called out from behind the counter as the door chimed open. He ignored her and headed across the parking lot to his car, already forming a list in his head of who he would contact first. No matter what it took, he would find Ambrose. No matter what he had to do, he would make damned sure the kraut fuckhead had no reason to even think of looking for his little girl.

  CHAPTER 10 – THE NURSE

  11:20 A.M., Friday, April 20

  Rachel and Lieutenant Thorne each took chairs at the interrogation table. Thorne turned his around and straddled it in typical male testosterone fashion. Rachel let the folder she was carrying slap down on the table harder than necessary as she sat.

  She flipped the folder open and flipped through pages in it, pretending to read them. Half the pages there were blank ones, some for writing notes and some just to pad it for psychological effect. “Hurm,” she added here and there while she continued flipping through it until the squeak of the metal chair suggested the woman across the table shifted uncomfortably.

  She looked up at the woman and slapped the folder shut. The forty-seven-year-old Mexican nurse sucked the corner of her lower lip, nervous already, and stared at the folder. Big black lettering spelled out “Investigation File” large enough to read upside down. She drew a recorder from her jacket pocket and set it on the table, clearly pressing Record.

  “Miss Angela Vasquez,” Rachel stated, getting the woman’s attention.

  “Yes, that’s me.”

  “I know. Would you like a glass of water?”

  “Um, no thank you.”

  Rachel filled one of the white plastic cups from the pitcher on the table. Thorne took it and did the same while she took a sip. There was even ice in the pitcher. Cool water would be the only available comfort in the warm, almost stuffy room. Harsh fluorescent lights only drew attention to the plain white walls, the polished pale gray floor tiles, the mirror dominating the wall behind her Vasquez would see herself fidgeting in.

  “What is this about? The officers wouldn’t tell me.”

  “Miss Vasquez, I’m Special Agent Rachel Moore with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.” She patted the folder and watched the nurse’s eyes return to it once more.

  “Feder...FBI? I don’t understand. And he’s police?”

  “Yes,” Thorne replied, leaning forward. “We have a couple questions.” He made it sound so casual the way he said it. Part of her wanted to chuckle. She would have sworn he was the Bad Cop type.

  “You had a federal suspect in your care, who escaped during your shift. So, naturally, we do have a few questions. Mostly to establish what happened, and when. You found Steven Ambrose’s IV and wristband in Mr. Jenkin’s room, correct?”

  “Y...Yes. I went in for vitals. Around 4:15.”

  “When was the last time you saw Ambrose?”

  “About...About 2:30,” the nurse said, looking up and to her right, remembering. “Pretty much right when my shift started. He...he was asleep.”

  “Tell me about what happened in the couple of hours before you found the IV.”

  “I said my shift just started.”

  “Of course, I’m sorry. When you get relieved at the end of your shift you let the next nurses know if anything noteworthy happened, right?”

  “Well, well yeah.”

  “And?”

  “Mostly it was, mostly it was usual stuff.”

  “Usual is good. It’s okay, Miss Vasquez. We’re just trying to understand what happened. Was there anything at all unusual that happened before you found Mr. Ambrose’s IV?”

  “There...there was a problem with one of the lights. That was during my shift. Suddenly it just popped and broke. Almost like it exploded.”

  “Exploded?” Thorne asked, leaning forward with his arms crossed on the back of the chair.

  “Yeah, there was this kinda crack or pop. Made a mess all over the files. I was at my computer, updating inventory. We keep...,” her eyes shifted left, thinking rather than remembering. That was worth noting for later. “We keep running out of IV start kits, someone...someone isn’t tracking them right, so the inventory keeps getting messed up. I...I had to fix it.”

  “I see.” She ran her finger along the edge of the folder, watching the nurse’s eyes follow. “Where there any visitors on the floor that night?”

  “No. No no, we don’t get...We don’t get lots of night visitors. A couple a week, maybe. Tops. None last night.”

  “So the patients had all been in their rooms for the night?”

  “Sometimes they...sometimes they have trouble sleeping. Mister Jenkins mostly. But he was asleep when I started my shift.”

  “And you know this how?”

  “I always start with vitals. He was asleep. So...so was Ambrose.” Eyes shifted left again. She at least wasn’t certain about one of the two.

  “And you didn’t see him walk out, I’m assuming?”

  “Ambrose? No. No, he couldn’t....No, he couldn’t walk out. Not like that. He can’t move nothing except his head.”

  “So you’re convinced of his condition, right?” She leaned forward, resting both elbows on the table and propping her chin in one hand.

  “Well, yeah.” Eyes went left again. What was she thinking?

  “What if I told you there were witnesses that saw him walk out of the hospital on his own, that it was on camera?”

  “That don’t make any sense at all. He was pretty bad off when he came in, and his depression got a little better, but he still had to be fed by hand like a baby. Walk? I...I don’t think so.”

  “So, help me out here. Let’s just say—for sake of argument—that somehow his injuries were faked. Or maybe just exaggerated. Maybe the paralysis was even real at first. And maybe he was recovering in the time leading up to his escape. He was facing pretty significant prison time, so he had motive, you’d agree with that at least, right?”

  “Well, yeah. The news sure made it sound that way.”

  “Okay, so—and again, this is just hypothetically, of course—if he was getting better, what would have to happen to cover that up?”

  “To cover it up?”

  “Yes.” She slid the folder aside to the edge of the table. “To cover it up, so that people would think he was still paralyzed so no one would believe he was capable of walking. What would that take?”

  The nurse looked up and left, and she sucked the corner of her mouth in again.

  “Wow. Um, I’m not sure. At least the doctor. Someone in Imaging, if the scans were doctored up. Maybe someone in Pharmacy? Maybe some kind of drugs could help? I don’t know how somebody might do all that.”

  “What about nurses or orderlies? Would it take any of those?”

  “There’s...There’s not much we can do like that. No, I don’t think you’d need that.”

  “Your boyfriend is Kenny Brown, right,” Thorne interjected, making a show of reaching across for the folder. Rachel sat up straighter—and back from his reaching arm.

  “Yeah. But he don’t work at the hospital.”

  “But four days ago he was arrested as part of a drug sting, isn’t that correct?”

  “Yeah, he was. He has a problem. He’s been in rehab. What does he have to do with anything?”

  “Ms. Vasquez, has anyone ever asked you to falsify records?”

  “No! What...Wait! You don’t think I had something to do with...? I just said you wouldn’t need a nurse involved!”

  “Kenny was arrested four days ago, and last night a patient in your care, who is waiting on a trial for bank robbery, disappears. Can you understand why some people might think that looks odd?” Thorne pushed.

  “Kenny’s no bank robber! What...wh
y are you...why are you asking about him? “

  “Were you dating him when Ambrose’s robberies were going on?”

  “No...not all of them. Some were...some were before. I don’t know how many.”

  “Did he ever say anything to suggest having ties to any criminal organization?” Rachel asked. Maybe this would lead somewhere, since nothing else seemed to be. Thorne leaned back, letting her have the lead back.

  “No! He barely knew how to find drugs after his last dealer got beat up by some vigilante.”

  “A man in black with a helmet?” Thorne threw in.

  “I don’t think so. He said somebody said it was some woman, some little white chick, but that was just what he heard. But after that he didn’t know where to go. He said he was gonna stay clean. I thought he meant it this time. He said he was gonna stay clean. I don’t know...I don’t know how he even found a new guy. I guess he asked around.”

  “Well, if he knew someone who’d heard rumors about what happened to his dealer he must have known somebody....”

  “I don’t know. He said he was staying clean this time.” She was consistent, at least. About everything so far, which was not helping. Angela Vasquez was looking more and more like yet another dead end.

  “Did anyone ever come to the hospital asking about Mr. Ambrose?”

  “Huh? No. I mean I don’t think so. I mean, there were some reporters at the beginning, but the cops and security kept them away.”

  “Did anyone ever contact you outside of the hospital and mention him?”

  “No.”

  “Did Mr. Ambrose ever give any indication he might not be paralyzed?”

  Angela scoffed. “No. We already went over this. Limp like a wet sock. Once I accidentally banged his arm on the side of the bed turning him over. He had a little bruise for days. He didn’t react at all. No, agent, I’ve seen paralyzed before. I’m telling you, he wasn’t faking.” The bruise was new, but consistent, and nothing suggested the nurse was making it up.

  “And he never had any visitors?”

  Now it was an angry sigh. “Not that I ever saw. Lonely depressed fuck must not have anyone else in his life.”

  “Was he pretty consistently depressed?”

  “Yeah, most of the time. Sometimes he had these swings where he wasn’t so bad. Somebody said that happened right after he met his lawyer.”

  “Did anyone you work with act weird at all the past couple of weeks,” Thorne tossed out.

  “Huh?” The nurse pulled back, visibly caught off guard and shaking her head.

  “Another nurse, an orderly, anyone on the staff at all?” Thorne leaned in as he spoke, getting closer. The nurse shrank back into her chair a little.

  “What...what kinda weird?”

  “Anything,” Rachel suggested, taking the cue to play good cop. “Anything maybe out of the ordinary. Anything at all. Sometimes the littlest things are how we solve these things, so anything you can think of might help us Ms. Vasquez. You do want to help us, don’t you?”

  “Well, yeah. I mean there were some pranks, those were kinda weird, but nothing.”

  “What kind of pranks?”

  “Little shit. Goofy stuff, I guess. Someone circled one of his pain assessment faces once. Obviously that wasn’t him, because he can’t feel pain. Never heard who did that. But I’m sure it was nothing. One of the orderlies getting bored, probably. Sometimes things got moved around and rearranged. Went in one time to change his IV and all the supplies were all messed up. But stuff like that happens sometimes. Especially...especially with patients nobody likes. Like sometimes they provoke it. Not like we can take anything out on them....”

  “Of course,” Rachel said. She gathered up the file, pretty resigned that they had gotten all they were going to get from the nurse. “Thank you for your help, Ms. Vasquez. Please call us if you think of anything else.”

  “Yeah, course.”

  “You can go now,” Thorne added, frustration deepening, darkening, his voice.

  The other nurse on shift last night had most of the same things to say.

  She met with an occupational therapist who had met him once and then supervised some of his ongoing care. Yet another person convinced Ambrose was genuinely paralyzed and nothing unusual had happened leading up to last night. Three different orderlies involved with taking him for tests and scans also agreed although one mentioned some in the police detail acted more resentful than other times a patient had a police detail. Not enough to stand out at the time though.

  Eventually the bureau lab called back to confirm the scans showed no signs of tampering. She slammed the phone receiver down much harder than she intended to.

  CHAPTER 11 – ON THE TABLE

  Andrew Barton took off his tie, folded it, and set it on the table, off to the side and away from his dinner plate. His dining room resembled many of the things in his life, and his personal sense of style: understated yet projecting power and wealth. The Italian mahogany table with a subtle sunburst teak and rosewood inlay, off center to emphasize the head of the table when company was present. The starburst-shaped chandelier above the sunburst played off it differently depending on the dimmer setting. Expansive city skyline stretched away outside the large window opposite the doorway to the large living room.

  For a formal meal he would sit with the window behind him, the city at his back, but with just him and Sandy he preferred to see the city outside. For as much time as he spent in the city’s omnipresent dark underbelly it was the lit, shining buildings at night that warmed him, that made him love Bay City. To him those lights spoke of promise and potential. Of a future waiting to be built, of dreams waiting to be realized. Only at street level were those dreams so often crushed and ground up into crumbs of despair.

  He fled to Bay City in the ‘80s, leaving Chicago and failure behind him. This city offered him a fresh start; he broke from his Pop, from the loan sharks and street hoods. Here he found a place to build a life of his own. And build he had.

  He sighed. Friday. How many people breathed relieved sighs, knowing their work week was over, no energy left to dream of a future? Barton never had one of those jobs. Running a crime family was far from nine-to-five; no setting it aside for later.

  Sandy sat across the table, rubbing his shin with her foot. He wished it made him feel better this time.

  The stress of the day hung on him like a sweater on a muggy summer day. Steven Ambrose disappeared from his hospital room overnight and that fucking masked vigilante, Messenger, smashed one of his more lucrative drug operations. Either one would have been annoying enough on its own, but both happening in one day ruined his plans for the day completely.

  And Sandy worried. He never liked letting things worry her. She was always a reassuring presence in his life, and her worrying left him feeling less steady. She was just as upset as him when they heard the first reports of Steven’s injuries. She always held a more pragmatic view of their friend, and she complained about the danger he represented whether in police custody or missing.

  “I don’t like it either,” he said to her around a bite of tender salmon with a crusty pine nut topping, one of her new recipes. It did not suck having a wife taking culinary classes. “Müller’s guy’s supposed to take care of it,” he reassured her. “Hopefully he’s on Steven’s trail. If not, he’ll turn up at some point.” His fork glinted in the multiple subdued lights from overhead. Every meal used good china and real silver. Andrew saw no point to having something nice and not using it. Wealth and prestige only had value to him because they could be used. Similarly, he gathered around him useful people. That had been an early lesson.

  But how far did he really trust the German, anyway? He and Müller had been working their joint plan for more than a year now, working slowly, each consolidating their power bases, keeping each other apprised of their moves to make sure they would not inadvertently work against each other. He suspected his “partner” was holding back on him.

  To be fa
ir, it wasn’t as if Barton laid all his cards on the table. His day should have been spent with two of his lawyers hammering out final details on a car factory he was buying. It was a complicated matter he kept close to the chest. He did not want his sometimes partner, Müller, finding out about it until too late. Not that he cared much about it as a car factory. Between shifts the plant would make robotic drone soldiers. He already had technicians finishing up the designs.

  She held up a fork loaded with asparagus. “And if the police find him first?” She was ten years younger than him, forty-eight in about another month. He had hoped to tell her about the drone plan on her birthday, but it kept getting delayed. It would not be ready enough in a month. It was one of the few pieces of his business he deliberately concealed from her.

  He especially did not want the Etherax finding out about it. The Boss—as most called him—usurped too much power in the city, and Barton was determined to overthrow him. But doing so would not be easy. The Etherax had some kind of source for alien technology. It seemed the Englishman knew where to find every piece of it, and knew how most of it worked. That kind of knowledge was a dangerous and powerful thing in this city.

  As far as the public knew, the ship which crashed in the bay four years ago remained impenetrable, keeping its alien secrets locked safely inside. The public knew some parts of the ship broke off before the crash, and the occasional bits and pieces had been found. A large piece exploded in the harbor four years ago, plus the Hoffman Reactor explosion. Yet there was certainly more than that.

  Etherax’s men recovered, or acquired from others who recovered, several pieces. One of the few artifacts he had not been able to retrieve, he let slip, was hidden in a safe deposit box. If Ambrose had been able to retrieve it....But that was only one of his problems tonight.