Unknown Means (4 page)

Mom! “Hello?”

“Is this Evelyn James?”

“Yes.”

“This is Doctor Bailey at Metro General Hospital ER.”

“How did she get there without calling me?” Her mother wouldn’t have—

“Ma’am? Do you know a Marissa Gonzalez?”

THIRTY MINUTES LATER, with wrecked hair, no makeup, and clothes dampened by a cloudburst, Evelyn stumbled through the automatic doors of the hospital emergency room. The lights blinded her. White-coated staff moved with purpose. The results of assorted dramas waited in plastic chairs—a hugely pregnant teenager stared at the ceiling with a steely gaze of resignation, an odiferous older man moaned in the agony of delirium tremens, three men seated together

had blunt-force injuries to various limbs. Through eyes like slits, she saw a young black man in a dark blue uniform approaching.

“Hey, Evelyn.”

“Billy. Is she all right?”

He paused. “She’s still alive.”

Her voice ridiculously desperate, Evelyn asked again, “Is she going to be all right?”

“She’s still alive.”

They stepped to one side as a badly mangled young man went by on a gurney; for a moment Evelyn felt surprised to see him move, then she remembered that this was a hospital and not the ME’s office. “What happened?”

“I was first on scene, a little after one. The doorman in the apartment building told 911 that she stumbled in from the parking garage, clutching her throat and trying to scream. Then she collapsed. They had to intubate her to keep the swelling from closing off her air.”

“Someone attacked her?” Evelyn tried not to picture her friend with a tube in her throat, but the image sprang to her mind and stayed there. “Any description of the guy?”

The young patrolman took her elbow and guided her down the hallway. “The doorman didn’t even look. He’s not the intrepid type, I guess. My partner cleared the garage while the ambulance loaded her up, but he didn’t find anything. The guy was long gone.”

She had to force herself to ask the next question. “Did he rape her?”

“No. She had all her clothes on and no other injuries.”

Evelyn let out the breath she’d held. “Where was her fiancé?”

“Working.”

“At one in the morning? Where?”

“Here. He’s on call tonight up in pediatrics.”

“Of course. I wasn’t thinking.” Marissa had been complaining about her boyfriend’s irregular hours since she’d moved in with him.

“He was waiting for us when the ambulance arrived. I guess the doorman called him—one of the perks of high rent. They keep their tenants informed. Apparently they were getting married next month?”

“They are getting married.” No past tense. Not yet.

“I know a lot of guys who are going to be mighty grieved over that. Do you think this is the same guy?” Cops never used the word perp—the guilty party was just the guy. “The one that killed that rich girl?”

“Who? Grace Markham?”

“Yeah.”

“Why would it be the same guy?”

“Well, the strangling bit and all. And it’s the same building—the Riviera.”

She blinked at him. “You mean La Riviere?”

“Yeah.”

“What was Marissa doing there?”

“She lives there. With her doctor boyfriend.”

Evelyn absorbed this. Marissa had told her about the new apartment, but Evelyn hadn’t visited yet. She and Marissa saw each other every day at work, but life as a single mother was just too busy to allow for many nights out with friends. If Marissa had mentioned the name of the building, she’d missed it. Then, by the time Evelyn had returned to the lab to log in the evidence from Grace Markham’s scene, Marissa had left for the day; there had been no chance for the coincidence to surface.

She pressed herself to the wall to avoid getting run over by a patient and two nurses. “Is it always like this around here?”

“They’re still behind after that bunch came in from the salt mine.” Evelyn and Billy entered the elevator, and the doors closed, sealing them in blessed quiet.

“Oh, yeah. I had to go to that.”

The young officer shuddered as he pushed the 4 button. “I don’t

envy you. My cousin worked there one summer, but he can’t take enclosed spaces.”

Evelyn wished she could sit down. She also wished she’d brushed her teeth before leaving a note for Angel and peeling out of the driveway. It would be a long night, and she would have liked to have felt as together as possible. The elevator doors slid open.

“You! Evelyn James.”

A stormy-faced Mama Gonzalez sailed down the antiseptic hallway like a tall ship with sheets unfurled. Evelyn felt like letting the doors drift shut and riding the small box to another floor, one where she wouldn’t have to confront her friend’s anxious mother.

She stepped out into the hallway. “Mrs. Gonzalez.”

“You will find out who did this to my Mareesa.”

“I will.” She didn’t dare say anything else. Rotund as well as tall, Mama Gonzalez could have snapped her in half.

“You will bring him to me.”

“I’ll . . . do my best.”

“You will bring him to me. I rip his arms from his sides. I will tear out his heart.”

Anger, Evelyn knew, felt more comfortable than fear. “And I’ll help you. How is she?”

Tears gathered in the woman’s eyes.

Evelyn hugged her, gently. “There’s nothing worse than seeing your child in pain. I know. But the doctors here will help her. She’ll be healthy again.”

“This would never have happened if she’d stayed on our prada.”

The old woman snuffled against her shoulder. “If she’d stayed with her family, instead of moving out without the grace of marriage to live with that man.”

“She loves him. And violence can happen anywhere.” Evelyn patted her shoulder before stepping back.

Mama Gonzalez pressed a clean handkerchief to her nose.

“We’ve lived on the same street all her life, and never did anyone

touch her, not with her brothers around. You must find this man.

She thinks you are so smart, she tells me so. Be smart now.”

Evelyn did not make promises. She considered them risky. But no sort of qualification would do in this case. “I’ll find him.”

“Come on, Mrs. Gonzalez,” Billy said. “Your son is in with the intake counselor, and they’ll need you. She’s in there,” he added to Evelyn, pointing at the last room on the left as he led Marissa’s mother away.

With a deep breath, Evelyn walked into the hospital room. It took conscious effort. She didn’t want to see her friend—fiery, outspoken Marissa—laid out, scratched and bruised, with a tube in her agonized throat because some son of a bitch—

A whistling sound came and went in the clear plastic tube protruding from Marissa’s perfect lips. Ice packs covered her neck. Her clothing had been replaced by a gown, and she had a scratch on her forehead. Long eyelashes rested on her cheeks. A doctor stood on one side of the bed; Evelyn approached on the other.

This drained form bore no resemblance to her friend. She had never seen Marissa function at less than 100 percent, somehow ex-pending more energy than she took in, as if she culled it from the air.

Evelyn felt the red rush of pure fury start at the back of her scalp and work its way down, until her nose tingled and her heart thudded with hate. She would find who did this. And they would pay.

She grabbed the young woman’s hand as if one of them were drowning. She wasn’t sure which.

The doctor spoke. “Evelyn.”

She saw now who he was. She had noticed only the white coat at first. “Robert. How are you?”

Dumb question. Despite being clean-shaven, wide awake, and neatly dressed in Dockers and a polo shirt under his lab coat, he looked like hell. His eyes glittered with unshed tears. “I hope you get this guy.”

She nodded, unable to speak about their pain. Instead she gestured at the ice packs. “Okay if I take a look?”

“Anything, if it will help.”

The ice bag felt subzero to her flushed palm. Marissa’s entire neck had turned bright red, from either the cold or the irritation, and seemed double its normal size. A dark red line ran through the middle of it, developing the purplish hue of nascent bruises. Evelyn bit her lip and looked closer.

The ligature had left an inch-and-a-half-wide, uniform indentation, without dipping significantly in the middle. This indicated a flat shape, as opposed to a round type of rope or wire. The pattern had established itself in the front but wavered a bit on the sides, consistent with someone crossing the ends and pulling from the rear. It seemed to have a slight checked aspect. Like a weave. Like mesh fabric.

Like Grace Markham.

Damn.

She replaced the ice, caught Robert’s eye, and jerked her head toward the door. They moved into the hall and conversed in low murmurs. “What is her condition?”

“They intubated to keep her from suffocating. It was either that or a tracheotomy, and you know how Marissa would feel about a scar.”

“I know how she’d feel about dying,” she snapped, stung that he would consider his fiancée’s beauty in any medical decision.

“A trach is too risky, anyway,” he hastened to add. “Of course, intubating means she has to be heavily sedated or she might pull the tube out. She won’t be conscious to answer any questions for a while.”

For a doctor, he seemed to be thinking like a cop. “Is she on a respirator?”

“No. The tube is there to keep her trachea from swelling to the point it cuts off her air. There’s nothing wrong with her lungs. But now we have to make sure she doesn’t stop breathing from the heavy sedation. If she does, then we will have to use a respirator, and that brings another host of dangers. We might have to paralyze the muscles with curare, and then she’d have to be weaned off that—”

Now he sounded like a doctor. “Did the lack of oxygen have any . . . effect?”

“Her EEG is normal. No brain damage. Her body is in shock from what has happened to it, but she should recuperate. She’ll be fine.” He repeated this, as if convincing himself. “She’ll be fine.”

“There’s something else you should know.” Evelyn gave him the basic information regarding Grace Markham’s death.

“And this woman lived in our building?”

“Tenth floor. You didn’t know her?”

“No, but I never have the time to meet my neighbors.”

“Marissa moved in with you, what, three months ago? Did she ever mention the name Grace Markham?”

“No. You think this guy could live in the building?”

“It’s a possibility.” Evelyn moved out of the way of a nurse with a meds cart. Marissa and Grace Markham vaguely resembled each other—in their twenties, pretty, long dark hair. The killer could have an obsession with those characteristics. “Any odd incidents come to mind? Weird phone calls or letters? Someone following either of you? Any ex-boyfriends of Marissa’s coming out of the woodwork?”

She could see the gears in his battered mind dutifully turn.

“Nothing. We’ve had tons of calls lately, but all about the wedding.

We just want to get married, and my mother is trying to turn it into the social event of the season, so there’s a lot of back-and-forth with caterers and the ballroom. But nothing odd.”

“Where was she tonight?”

“Out with the entourage—the bridesmaids. They had a dress fitting tonight and were going to get dinner afterward.”

“Has Marissa seemed worried lately?”

He managed a grin for a split second before reality returned and erased it. “Just about my mother. And her mother. And then my mother again.”

Evelyn asked herself the same question and got the same answer.

She saw Marissa five days a week at a stressful, demanding job, and lately the girl had been nothing but radiant. Evelyn leaned closer, trying not to breathe on the young man through her unbrushed teeth. “What about you? Any old girlfriends, a past flame who can’t let go?”

A brief, modest smile, which didn’t reach his eyes. “Nope. My girlfriends bid me adieu with shocking ease. Hell, the last woman I dated before Marissa is coming to the wedding and bringing her husband.” He paused. “What about Marissa’s job? You guys must come in contact with scumbags every day.”

“Yes and no.” Marissa’s DNA analyses had sent a lot of people to jail, but forensic testimony represented only part of the overall prosecution. Defendants were more likely to resent the cops who arrested them, the juries who convicted them, or the judges who sen-tenced them as opposed to one lone lab tech. But one never knew. If Marissa’s testimony had been the prosecution’s entire case, a violent offender might have secretly vowed revenge. Evelyn would direct the cops to Marissa’s past cases, ask them to check who might have been recently released.

And whose trials were approaching. A criminal might just be stupid enough to believe he could prevent the DNA results from being presented in court by killing the analyst, unaware that another analyst, such as Evelyn, could read them into the record.

The next time Evelyn testified, would a stranger tail her red Tempo all the way to Strongsville? Where her mother and daughter lived?

Such melodrama. There must be a more mundane explanation.

“We’ll be sure to go over all Marissa’s cases, carefully,” she promised Robert. “Have there been any problems here at the hospital? Any parents—” She stopped, unsure how to word the question she needed to ask. The man had obviously had a hard few hours.

“Have any parents been unhappy with you? Perhaps one of your patients suffered an unexpected tragedy?”

“Have I killed any kids lately, is that what you’re asking?” He did not seem offended. “I lost one to pneumonia last week, but if that kid had any family, I never saw them. Parents are— Well, parents are usually the worst part of pediatric medicine. They’re never happy, no matter what I do, but I’ve never had one angry enough even to refuse to pay the bill, much less—”