Deserves to Die (5 page)

She’d never been queasy at a crime scene, except years before . . . Oh, God. Another roll of her guts, and saliva gathered in her mouth.
For the love of—

At that moment, she knew she was going to be sick. She turned away, took a few steps from the creek, and just managed to get behind a fir tree before she upchucked into the snow. She hadn’t thrown up at a crime scene since . . . she was pregnant with Bianca. Morning sickness.
Perfect.

“Hey!” Alvarez said. “You okay?”

Pescoli heaved once more, then straightened, a sour taste in her mouth. “Fine,” she lied, running her tongue over her teeth.

“Jesus, Pescoli! Look what you’re doing to the crime scene,” Watershed admonished. “It’s not like you haven’t seen a dead body before.”

She didn’t dignify his remark with an answer. To Alvarez, she said, “I’ll talk to O’Halleran. You take the boy. See what he has to say. Maybe he saw something he doesn’t realize might help.”

Alvarez was already on her way to the idling car where an officer was staying with Eli O’Halleran, and Pescoli walked over to where Trace O’Halleran was deep in conversation with Cabral.

Nurse Amy Blanchette was dead tired. Thankfully, her shift was nearly over. In five minutes, come hell or high water, or even a damn plague, she was “outta here.” Northern General Hospital wasn’t her idea of a dream place to work, but since Johns Hopkins and the Mayo Clinic didn’t seem to be calling, she’d stick it out and collect her paycheck, at least until she could figure out if she was going to stay in Montana near her parents, who lived in Hamilton, or venture out into the much bigger world. God, she’d love to get out of the miserable weather and try somewhere a little warmer, or exotic, or at least, somewhere that had a little more mystique. A place by the ocean, maybe.

LA sounded good. Or maybe San Antonio or somewhere in Florida. Anywhere she didn’t have to wake up to piles of snow and freezing temperatures would be nice. Better still, a hospital where she didn’t work with her damn ex-fiancé, who’d decided to bail six months into the engagement. Thankfully, she’d only lost her heart, not her life savings on a wedding. But even though she tried desperately to work opposing hours, she ran into Dr. Dylan Stone—yes, he sounded like he was one of those fake doctors on an old soap opera—too often. The fact that he was dating a handful of her coworkers made her working environment all the more caustic. By summer, she swore, she’d have that job elsewhere.

She had a few more minutes of her ten-hour workday to get through. A few nurses and orderlies on her shift were starting to leave while the nurses for the next ten hours were arriving. The hub was a little chaotic with the switch. Nurses who were leaving exchanged patient information, a few jokes, and a little bit of gossip with the nurses coming on duty. Worse yet, the flu had not only infected several patients on the wing, but the staff as well, devastating some of the teams. Her floor in particular was short-handed and the staff was forced to depend upon recruits from other areas of the hospital, sometimes working for the first time with newbies. Just today, Amy had shared her area of the wing with a couple orderlies, two doctors, and a nurse she’d previously never met.

But it was about over.

“One more patient,” she reminded herself as she responded to the call light for room 212. The patient, Reina Gehrig, was a real pain in the butt. Amy wasn’t one bit sorry that she would be able to pawn the older woman off on Mona Vickers, the nurse scheduled to take over Amy’s patients. Mrs. Gehrig in particular, seemed to believe she was the only patient in the entire hospital.

Most definitely a pain in the backside.

Forcing a smile, Amy slipped into the room where Reina Gehrig was propped in her hospital bed, television tuned to a game show, her head swiveling expectantly as the door opened.

“How’re you doing?” Amy asked, turning off the call light.

“Oh, not so good, I’m afraid,” the small woman said. She was a frail thing with a lined, narrow face and a halo of thin white curls that didn’t quite hide the pink of her scalp.

She’s lonely,
Amy thought and felt a little ashamed for thinking badly of her.

Barely a hundred pounds, with hazel eyes that snapped behind the folds of her eyelids and thick glasses, Reina said solemnly, “I think there’s something wrong.”

“Well, that won’t do.” Amy gave the woman a smile. “Tell me, how do you feel? Rate your pain.” She indicated the chart that hung on the wall that showed caricatures of faces in varying expressions of discomfort.

“ ’Bout an eight, maybe a nine, I’d say,” the patient said. “And it doesn’t just hurt in my leg, but all over.” Frowning a little, she added, “I think I might be coming down with something. The flu’s going around this year, you know. And my neighbor Elsa, she caught it. Nasty stuff.”

“Hmm. Well, we can’t have that,” Amy said. “Let me check your vitals again.”

The patient’s chin suddenly thrust out. “I need to see Doctor Lambert.”

“She didn’t do your surgery.” Amy checked Mrs. Gehrig’s temperature, blood pressure, and pulse again, noting that everything was in the normal range, right where it should be. “Dr. Bellingham says you can go home tomorrow.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. I’d feel a lot better if Dr. Lambert had a look at me.” Mrs. Gehrig was nodding in her bed as if agreeing with herself. Her thin hands, with veins visible, plucked at the edge of the sheet covering her.

“I’ll let her know,” Amy promised, “and mark it on your char—”

“Room two-o-six STAT!” Polly, another floor nurse, poked her head into the room as she passed the open doorway just as Amy heard the Code Blue announcement from the speakers in the hallway.

“What?” Mrs. Gehrig was confused.

Amy was already reversing toward the door. “I’ll be back.”

“No, please—” Mrs. Gehrig’s face folded on itself in disappointment. “Wait! Where are you going? I need—” The rest of her request was cut off as Amy rushed toward the room a few doors down.

“Mr. Donnerly’s coding!” Polly called to her as they entered 206.

Already, the room was bustling with staff members. The patient had recently had heart surgery and had been improving enough to be released from ICU to his private room. One nurse was handling his chest compressions while another had a bag valve mask in place over the patient’s mouth and nose. A doctor was giving orders as the defibrillator cart was rolled quickly inside and another locking cart with narrow drawers for medications followed. Amy stood at the ready should she be required to administer the epinephrine or whatever other drug the doc ordered.

“How long?” the doctor asked.

“Coded under two minutes ago,” a floor nurse who had been attending Benson Donnerly said as the rest of the team continued working.

“Pulse?” the doctor asked and another nurse pressed against the patient’s neck, checking the patient’s carotid artery.

“No pulse.”

“Code Blue!” another page called over the loudspeaker, adding to the tension.

We’re here already,
Amy thought, refusing to be distracted in case she was needed.

“Code Blue! Room two-twenty!”

“What?” The doctor turned his head.

“Has to be wrong,” Polly said, surprised.

“Double-check,” he said, nodding at Amy, who quickly slipped out of the room and caught up to two nurses headed rapidly down the hallway.

“Let’s go,” Reba, a tall RN with a single braid falling down her back said to Amy. She was hurrying, the braid swinging side to side as she tried to keep up with Brad King, a male nurse with a trimmed beard and long, athletic stride.

Avoiding an orderly heading in the opposite direction, Amy hurried to fall into step with Reba. “Wait,” she said, trying and failing to keep up. “The patient who’s coding is in two-o-six.” She hooked her thumb in the direction of Mr. Donnerly’s room.

“Yesterday’s news,” Brad said over his shoulder as he broke into a jog and Reba followed suit. “We’ve got another patient coding.”

Two cardiac arrests on the same floor at the same time?
It happened, of course, but very infrequently. “But—Hold up.” Amy was processing what the senior nurse had said. “Two-twenty?” she repeated, hoping she’d misunderstood. “Isn’t that the sheriff’s room?”

“That’s right,” Brad confirmed as he pushed open the door of the room where the patient lay unmoving, his chest no longer rising and falling, his pallor weak, his eyes closed.

Oh, no.

His heart monitor was visible from the doorway and the green line moving across the screen remained level, not so much as bumping the slightest as a piercing sound that should have been softly beeping was a steady, ominous warning.

Brad moved to the patient’s side and started compressions on his chest as Reba found the bag valve mask to force air into the patient’s lungs.

“Make sure the doc knows that we’ve got a second cardiac arrest. We need a defib cart ASAP!” Brad was still working over his patient as he barked at Amy.

“The cart’s in Mr. Donnerly’s room—”

“Order another one.”

“There’s only one on the floor.”

“Then get one from another floor. STAT!” he ordered as he worked over the patient who, so far, wasn’t responding. His heart monitor showed a flat green line, its high-pitched whine piercing. “For Christ’s sake, move it!”

Amy was already turning into the hallway to get more help, but her own heart was pounding double-time at the thought of losing this patient, who just happened to be the sheriff of Pinewood County.

H
earing the sound of another vehicle approaching, Pescoli looked up and squinted through the curtain of falling snow. She and Alvarez were about to leave the O’Halleran ranch as they’d already taken statements and looked around as much as they could in the frigid conditions. The victim’s body had been taken to the morgue, the emergency workers had left, and the O’Hallerans had returned to their house. A guard was still posted near the front gate and the crime scene team was still finishing up gathering trace evidence, but her work was done.

A Jeep emerged, twin headlights cutting through the gloom, big tires kicking up snow. The driver parked next to the crime scene van, cut the engine, and emerged swiftly. Blackwater.

“Just what we need,” Pescoli said under her breath. Half expecting to see the KMJC news van following in his wake, she glanced to the ruts cut into the snow where half a dozen or more vehicles had come and gone, mashing the snow beneath dozens of tires.

But Blackwater was alone, no entourage of reporters following.

A first.
Well, that wasn’t really the truth, but she wasn’t in the best of moods after losing her breakfast and dealing with the bitter cold as, potentially, another nutcase of a killer was making his presence known in this part of the Bitterroots.

Blackwater’s expression was grim as he strode through the powder to her vehicle.

“We’re just about done here. Wrapping things up,” Pescoli told him.

“Good. I need to talk to the both of you. In person.” A muscle worked in his jaw.

“Something up?” Pescoli asked as Alvarez’s eyes narrowed a fraction.

He hesitated, glanced at the woods for a second, then forced his gaze back to the two detectives standing before him. “Bad news,” he said.

Pescoli felt her back muscles tighten. “What?”

Beside her, Alvarez drew a sharp breath as if she guessed what was coming.

“It’s the sheriff,” he said solemnly, the corners of his mouth twisting downward. “He didn’t make it.”

“What?” Pescoli exploded. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Oh, God.” Alvarez leaned hard against the front panel of Pescoli’s Jeep, her knees buckling. Her face had washed of all color and she was shaking her head. Even as she did, she made the sign of the cross over her chest.

“No!” Pescoli stared down Blackwater and fer vently shook her head. “Not Dan Grayson. There must be some mistake.”

“I wish there was.” Blackwater seemed sincere, holding back his own emotions. “Grayson’s heart stopped. A Code Blue was issued, and as I understand it, the team was there in seconds, trying to get him going again. Spent nearly forty minutes trying to get a pulse—defibrillation, epinephrine, whatever it is they do to bring someone back, but it was over. They couldn’t revive him.” He glanced from Pescoli who’d gone numb with disbelief to Alvarez who turned her head away, probably to hide her tears.

“What the hell happened?” Pescoli demanded, gesturing angrily. “He was getting better. Stable, that’s what the hospital and his damn doctor said. They even moved him out of ICU because he’d improved, right?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “He was shot in the head, not the heart, for Christ’s sake! His heart was fine. Strong.” She swung back to look at Alvarez for confirmation, but her partner didn’t respond. To Blackwater, she snapped again, “What the hell happened?”

“The hospital is checking. Could be that the injuries he sustained were too much for him and his heart just stopped,” Blackwater said without his usual bluster. To his credit, he seemed genuinely disconsolate. “I don’t know. No one does. Yet. He’d been through a lot.”

“Through a lot and out the other side!” Pescoli insisted, though the truth, like the steadily falling snow, was cold and bleak as it settled over her. “Oh . . . oh Jesus,” she finally said in a rush as she started to believe what Blackwater was saying.

“I came out to tell you myself, so you wouldn’t hear it on the police band or the news or from someone else.”

Alvarez let out a soft moan.

“They told us he would be all right,” Pescoli said. “And those bastards lied.” Turning to Alvarez, she said, “Let’s go.”

“Where?” her partner asked and even as she did, she seemed to stiffen her spine, to gain control, her mask of always cool detachment slipping back into place.

“To the hospital to get some damn answers. To find out what went on, why they lost him.” As she said the words, the full truth hit her like a ton of bricks. Grayson was gone. Forever. She’d been there when he’d been shot and in her mind’s eye, it was Christmas morning once more and she watched in horror as the bullets from a hidden assassin’s rifle had struck the tall man with kind eyes and a thick moustache.

Grayson’s body had spun with the first bullet, his ever-present Stetson flying off his head, the split kindling he’d been carrying flying end over end to land on the snow-covered earth. With the second shot, his head had snapped back and he’d fallen to the snowy ground and lay inert. Pescoli, who had been driving to his house to ask about cutting back her hours, never got the chance.

She’d been the first responder, viewed his blood, prayed like she’d never prayed before and then had sworn vengeance on his assailant, that coward who had hidden in the snowdrifts with a high-powered rifle aimed straight at Dan Grayson.

“Son of a bitch!” she said angrily and kicked one of the Jeep’s tires in fury.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Blackwater said. “You’ve got a new case to investigate with the Jane Doe found right here, so I suggest you start.” He frowned. “Hell, I know this is a blow for the two of you and the whole department. That’s why I came out, but that doesn’t mean we still don’t have jobs to do.” Snow was collecting on the brim of his hat and shoulders of his jacket. Though there was a trace of compassion in his eyes, he remained rigid, ever in charge. “The Missoula police are on the scene and the hospital is double-checking every procedure, all of his vital signs records, every report and notation. Of course, there will be an autopsy.”

“Fuck the autopsy!” Pescoli said, her anger exploding. “I’m going to the hospital, whether you like it or not!”

“Detective,” he warned.

But Pescoli was already around the Jeep and behind the wheel.

Alvarez slid into the passenger seat. “Let’s go,” she said in an out-of-character display of disobeying her commanding officer.

“What?” Hattie Grayson dropped the jar of jam she’d been holding. The small container shattered on her kitchen floor, shards of glass flying, sticky strawberry jam spraying in thick clumps. “No. Not Dan. Not Dan!”

She stared into the tortured gaze of Dan’s brother Cade, who had just driven over to give her the news that cracked her world in two. Disregarding the spilled jam and shards of glass, she fell into his arms. Tears welled and she felt as if they’d started in the center of her soul. She’d known Dan all her life, been married to Bart, one of his brothers, and had half-fancied herself in love with him before reuniting with Cade. The Grayson brothers—all four of them, including Big Zed—had been the center of her universe.

Now two of the brothers were gone. Bart’s death had been ruled a suicide, though she was certain that he’d been killed. Dan had been murdered by a maniac as well, someone he should never have trusted.

“I don’t want to believe it.”

“Me neither.”

“The bastard who did this—”

“Will pay.”

That much was true. Dan’s assailant was already captured and behind bars, fighting his own injuries.

Still, the rage at the man who’d snatched Dan’s life away burned deep. “I hope he rots in hell.”

Cade’s strong arms folded her tight against him. “I know.”

Thank God he didn’t say “it will be all right” or any other platitude, because deep in Hattie’s heart, she knew that it would never be. With Dan Grayson’s easygoing strides no longer walking the earth, the planet would be an emptier, colder place. He’d been so good to her, to her twin daughters, to everyone in Grizzly Falls. At least she had time to pull herself together before she told her girls. Mallory and McKenzie would be as devastated as she was. A coldness settled over her and she shivered in Cade’s embrace.

“First Bart, now Dan,” she whispered, drinking in the smell of the man holding her so close. The scents of leather and horses clung to him and filled her nostrils. “I don’t want to believe this, Cade. I just . . . I just can’t. There’s got to be a mistake.”

“I wish, darlin’,” he said, his own voice rough, his warm breath ruffling her hair. His jaw was scratchy with beard-stubble, his eyes a deep, somber gray, all of the carefree, bad-boy attitude gone. He squeezed her a little more tightly and his voice cracked as he said, “God, don’t I wish.”

The hospital was remarkably calm, Alvarez thought, almost as if the whole world surrounding Grizzly Falls hadn’t changed drastically with the passing of Sheriff Dan Grayson. Yes, there was a news camera crew outside. Nia Del Ray, a reporter for KMJC, was standing near the sign at the entrance of Northern General Hospital, snow catching on her short black hair as she was probably reporting on Grayson’s demise, unless some other story had trumped his, which Alvarez doubted.

Inside the wide hallways, the floors gleamed under bright lights, conversation hummed, and people went about their work as if nothing monumental had just gone down within the hospital’s walls. Near a placard that listed those who had donated to the hospital, she and Pescoli stepped around a woman with a cast on her leg, being wheeled down the hallway by the orderly, after which they nearly ran into an elderly man who had suddenly stopped for no apparent reason.

“Sorry,” he apologized, blinking as if he’d been in a daze.

They moved past him to the elevators. “You know what this means, don’t you?” Pescoli said, slapping the call button just as the doors to one of the cars opened and a group of three women emerged.

“Tell me.” Alvarez walked into the car.

Once they were inside and the elevator doors had whispered shut, Pescoli pounded her fist on the button for the second floor. “That the son of a bitch who took down Grayson just lost his
GET OUT OF JAIL
card forever. No more
attempted
in the charge. He’s going down for murder.”

The doors opened and they stepped into the wide hallway, again brightly lit and complete with alcoves, benches and chairs, and a wide nurse’s station at the center of it all.

They walked up to the desk and a woman seated at a computer looked up. Pescoli showed her badge and said, “Detective Regan Pescoli, Pinewood County Sheriff’s Department. This is my partner Detective Alvarez. We have some questions about . . . about the sheriff . . . Dan Grayson . . . and what happened to him. We’d like to talk to the supervisor of the floor and his doctor, whoever was in charge of his care.”

Alvarez’s gaze shifted to Pescoli, whose green eyes shifted in hue with the light.

Under the glare of the hospital’s illumination they were a light jade color and hard as stone. Athletic and tall, with sharp features and a penetrating gaze, she was intimidating. An ex-basketball player, Pescoli wasn’t afraid to get into anyone’s face and bore more than her share of battle scars as a no-nonsense police officer and single mother. She was glaring at the small, nervous-looking nurse behind the desk as if the poor woman was a hardened criminal.

“I’ll get Rinalda, uh, Mrs. Dash. She’s in charge,” the girl behind the desk said.

Before either of the detectives could thank her, a booming female voice carried up the hall. “Is there a problem, Stephanie?”

In her peripheral vision, Alvarez caught a glimpse of a slim woman quickly approaching. Tall, African-American with close-cropped hair and an expression that was as stern as Pescoli’s, she stopped at the desk. “I’m Rinalda Dash.” With her height, she actually looked down at Pescoli. “What can I help you with?”

Again, Pescoli flashed her badge and introduced them both. “We’re here about Dan Grayson, who was your patient. We’d like to know what happened.”

“We all would,” Nurse Dash said solemnly. “And we’re looking into it as we do with all unexpected deaths. There’s a place where we can talk more privately,” she said, indicating a small niche near a bank of windows. Complete with a square of carpet, a coffee table, bench, fake ficus tree, and two side chairs, the spot offered little privacy, but it would have to do.

To the nurse behind the desk, the supervisor said, “Stephanie, page Dr. Zingler, please. See if he’s still in the building. I’m sure the detectives would like to speak to him, as well.” She gave Pescoli a patient but firm smile as she led them into the alcove. “Believe me, we will find out what exactly caused the sheriff’s death.”

Blackwater held a meeting in the conference room, which not only opened from the hallway but from his office as well. Everyone who worked for the department and currently not on the road was required to attend. One person in each department was to man the phones and he expected the meeting to be short, but he owed it to the officers, those who had worked under Dan Grayson, to explain the situation as best he knew it. He stood before the deputies, secretaries, volunteers, detectives, and various officers and met all of their solemn gazes with his own.