Forgotten Place (7 page)

"Can you tell me what happened to her? 
Was she shot?"

"Some son of a bitch slit her throat,"
Devlin said.  "She's lucky one of our detectives was around
the corner in the parking garage when she was attacked."

Chapter 6

One of the side effects of drugs in the
class of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors is bizarre
dreams.  I know this.  I know a lot of things about drug
therapy, even though I've never actually treated patients with
emotional disorders.  Sometimes it's the odd information about
mental illness and its treatment that sticks in my brain. 

If my subconscious was projecting the
freakish garbage of my mind onto the backs of my eyelids before I
added Prozac to the cocktail in my blood, its addition certainly
didn't help.  At least the cognitive dissonance was absent
this time.  No way was a hot fudge sundae capable of chasing
me around the house.

I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and tried
to reconcile that the luscious maraschino cherry transforming into
a red fire alarm clanging probably wasn't an accident.  All
the phone ringers were off but one – the iPhone on the stand beside
my bed.  My fingers crawled across the surface and grabbed
it.  One of them smeared across the glass screen.

"H'lo?"

An awkward pause followed. 

Ah, hell.  Is this Orion already?

"Did I wake you?"

The voice wasn't immediately familiar. 
It floated back slowly.  "Detective Mackenzie, isn't it?"

"Am I disturbing you?"

"No, you're fine.  What's going
on?"

"Just got a call from MSUH.  Journey
Ireland is waking up.  Wanna ride along?"

I rubbed a little more sleep out of my
eyes.  "Detective –"

"I know we got off on the wrong foot this
morning, Dr. Eriksson.  I'm so sorry I didn't know who you
were."

"We'll be on better footing if you stop
calling me doctor.  Helen will do.  And besides, I'm not
on active duty yet, detective."

He explained the conversation he had over a
midafternoon meal with one of Journey Ireland's
ex-boyfriends.  "You say Ned is taking the interview with
Linder?"

"Uh-huh.  But my concern with Ms.
Ireland is that if she was reluctant to tell her close friends why
she dumped this guy, she's probably going to be even less likely to
tell me.  I figured somebody with your background and
experience could relate to her better, maybe one psychologist to
another."

I didn't disagree with his reasoning, but in
the recesses of my dream state another thought occurred to
me.  "There's another avenue entirely that I'm not sure we've
considered.  If Dr. Ireland is treating patients as a clinical
psychologist, her attacker could've been a former or even current
patient.  What do we know, if anything, about her job at
MSUH?"

"I could come pick you up if you want to tag
along but aren't feeling up to the drive," Mackenzie suggested.

More coddling from the male
population.  My old friend stubbornness dug in her
heels.  She might've been muted by pain of multiple sources,
but she wasn't dead.  "I'll meet you at the hospital,
detective."

"Hey," he said, "if I have to call you
Helen, you could at least call me Devlin."

"Deal."  I squinted at the Rolex. 
Quarter to four.  "Give me about half an hour and I'll meet
you in the hospital lobby."

I splashed water in my face
and realized it had been two months since makeup had coated the
surface of my skin.  Did I have time?  Crevan's warning
about how Orion would react if he saw me in my current state loomed
on the periphery of items in the category of
I don't have time for this bullshit
. 

Layers of Estée Lauder filled in the lines
and grooves that if I could be more honest probably resembled
craters and canyons, and hid dark circles that would've made Tom
Brady proud.  (Go Patriots!)  I had to speed like a
maniac, but I made it to MSUH looking a little more human if not
still emaciated.  How had my rib cage become so visible
without me noticing?

Mackenzie waited for me in the lobby.

"Shall we get it right this time?"  I
grinned and extended a clean hand.  "Nice to meet you,
Devlin.  I'm Helen."

He squeezed my hand gently.  "You look
much better this afternoon.  Ned, Crevan and I were talking
earlier this afternoon, and even Ned said he hardly recognized you
this morning."

"Well," here came the carefully constructed
half-truth, "my therapy is so early in the morning that I generally
roll out of bed and dash off without worrying about looking
presentable.  Unfortunately, my therapist isn't always treated
to my best behavior.  I figure it's less jarring if I behave
like an ass when I look the part."

He chuckled.  "She thinks pretty highly
of you from what I gathered."

"When did the hospital call about Journey
waking up?"

"About five minutes before I called
you.  The nurse said her surgeon reported that the procedure
went well.  They used some kind of patch, I guess, on the
jugular vein."

I was vaguely familiar with
the procedure called
patch
venoplasty
.  It was important because
it indicated that the injury to Journey's jugular vein had not
caused such massive blood loss prior to treatment that she had been
too unstable for the procedure.  "Do we know who her surgeon
was?"

"Doctor by the name of Waters, Alexander, I
think she said.  Is that important?"

"All details are important.  Don't get
your hopes up too high about how much she'll be able to tell us
right now, Devlin.  Anesthesia takes awhile to wear off beyond
waking.  She's probably pretty terrified right now too. 
Imagine how you'd feel if some guy grabbed you and slit your
throat."

"I'd like to see somebody try."

"Where does the machismo out here come
from?  I realize that a lot of men around here are unnaturally
large, but seriously," I shook my head and dipped my chin to mask
the grin.

"Did I offend..."  He caught a glimpse
of my grin and chuckled.  "You're runway material yourself,
Helen.  Don't cast stones at those blessed with height greater
than yours."

"It's great though, isn't it?  I find
myself missing that distinct advantage out here."

"Towering over short men and intimidating
them?"

"Ah, good times."

The elevator chimed and we stepped into a
unit I knew all too well – the surgical floor, where I spent time
with Maya during her ordeal and later, suffered through my early
recovery.  Ginny was on duty.

"Helen!"

"Don't they ever let you have a day
off?  How are you Ginny?"

"I'm great, but you look a little...
thin.  Please tell me that you're not checking back into the
place."

I smiled past the annoyance of having my
weight loss highlighted and made a silent promise to gorge on every
high calorie food I could find on the way home from the
hospital.  "I wasn't that much of a terror was I?  Jokes
aside, we're here to see someone."

"Journey Ireland," she said softly. 
"She's waking up.  You must be the detective I spoke to when I
called."  Ginny turned to Mackenzie and gave a curt
nod. 

"Do you think she can answer questions yet?"
he asked.

"I'm not her nurse, but Jan was told to let
me know when she woke lucid so I could call right away."

I noticed the new badge Ginny wore
designating her as the charge nurse.  "Congrats on the
promotion Ginny.  Which way to Journey's room?"

She directed us and I reiterated to Devlin
not to anticipate a smooth interview.  "It was a full day
before I was aware of much more than agony after I was shot. 
We're somewhat prepared for the notion of injury on the job. For
Journey, this assault came out of nowhere."

"I get it, Helen.  Let's see what we're
dealing with.  I'm anxious to find out what Linder did that
prompted her to cut him out of her life.  While I can't say
this for a fact, from what Evans told me, I have every reason to
believe this girl isn't the type to let people drift out of her
life, yet the welcome mat was definitely revoked in Linder's
case."  He added, half muttering under his breath, "Another
reason why people should stick to their own generation when looking
for a mate."

"Detective Mackenzie, are you an
ageist?"

He eyed me carefully.  It was clear he
was trying to gauge the seriousness of my question.  Finally
he grinned.  "Anything up to eight years is fair game. 
Much more than that and it's entering a creepy zip code."

I shook my head.  Ideas etched in
stone.  I started to see a little bit more of Darnell's
influence on Detective Mackenzie.  "How old are you
anyway?"

"You interested?" he grinned.

I elbowed him in good nature.  "I'm
thirty-eight.  You tell me?  Am I off limits."

"In the allowed range."

"Good to know."

He pushed the door open after a light
knock.  "Ms. Ireland?  Detective Mackenzie and Dr.
Eriksson from Darkwater Bay police.  Do you mind if we come in
for a moment?"

I stared at the girl lying in the bed and
wondered if I'd ever been that young.  She looked like
eighteen tops, but I knew she had to be older than that if she had
a PsyD already.  Ebony hair was pulled into a pony tail draped
over the back of her pillow.  Her skin, while probably a bit
on the anemic side from the trauma of her morning, looked natural
somehow.  From ten feet I could see the brilliant blue of her
eyes. 

Like
Johnny's
, my heart whispered.  Johnny
the still absent, but probably lurking around a corner somewhere
ready to jump out and impale me with his sad eyes, ex-lover that
couldn't understand why I had to push him out the door.  None
of them could understand.  Did I understand it?

She blinked at us like a china doll and
opened deep red lips that stood out in stark contrast to the
unblemished white skin.  Not even a hiss escaped her
throat.  Panic flooded our living china doll's face.  One
hand flew to the bandage on her throat. 

The first thing I noticed was the betadine
that stained her skin, orange streaks that bore evidence to her
surgical treatment.  A few crimson droplets marred the crisp,
sterile gauze.

"Journey, are you in pain?"  I stepped
close to the bed and perched on the edge.  "I'm Dr. Helen
Eriksson."

The orbs grew in diameter. 

"Do you know who I am?"

Journey nodded.

"Are you in pain?"

Slight head shake.  One large tear
drooled from her right eye and got trapped in long
lashes. 

"Can you speak?"

She shook her head again.

"Can I leave you with Detective Mackenzie
for a moment while I talk to your nurse about this?"

Yes, again, this time knocking the tear free
to the law of gravity. 

"Devlin, I'll be right back."

I slipped out of the room and found
Ginny.  "Were you aware that she's unable to speak?"

"Uh... no.  Jan?"  No
response.  Ginny stomped five steps and ripped an ear bud out
of Jan's ear (at least I presumed it was Jan).  "Did you
actually talk to Journey before you told me she was awake?"

"Huh?"  She snapped gum between her
molars.

"Journey.  Journey Ireland.  You
reported that she was awake about an hour ago.  When you did
your assessment, did you speak to her?"

"Well duh."

Ginny's posture
bristled.  "And did she happen to
answer
any questions you asked
her?"

"Well, I didn't like, ask her
anything.  I did my assessment and told you she was
awake."

I heard Ginny's eyes roll
hard.  She spun around and made a loud
ahem
.  "What's going on,
Helen?"

"We tried to talk to her.  She is
completely lucid, but she can't even whisper."

"Let me see if Dr. Waters dictated report
has been transcribed yet.  From the report I got, the accuracy
of which I question," she tossed the comment back at Jan who
already replaced her ear bud and thumbed through a magazine,
"Journey's injury didn't include damage to her vocal chords, but
you never know what can happen when an endotracheal tube is
inserted."

Her fingers clacked over the keyboard. 
A moment later, Ginny was half reading aloud.  "Laceration to
the external jugular... segment of vein approximately zero point
six millimeters too damaged for sutures or anastomosis...
hemodynamically stable... damaged area patched with... soft tissue
injury to the left neck closed without complications..."

"Ginny?"

"I don't see anything in here that would
indicate injury to her vocal chords, Helen.  Let me page Dr.
Waters and have him come down and take a look at her."

"I'd appreciate that, but in the meantime,
would it be possible for me to have some paper and a pen?  I'd
like to be able to communicate with her before the surgeon gets
wrapped up in diagnosing what might be wrong with her.  The
sooner she can give us a statement, the better."

"Absolutely.  Waters might be in
surgery this afternoon, and his tend to be complicated enough that
we end up dealing with his residents for emergencies post op."

"What's his specialty?"

She grinned.  "He is the great vascular
God.  Sweetest surgeon you'll ever meet, but the guy is in
demand like you wouldn't believe."

I understood completely.  I read
somewhere once that if every vessel in the human body could be sewn
into one long strand, it would measure over 68 thousand miles in
the average adult.  That's a lot of pipes pumping blood. 
There wasn't a surgical procedure that couldn't conceivably require
the expertise of someone like Dr. Waters if something went
wrong.