Faces of Fear (17 page)

Reluctantly, Alison took off the bathing suit top, trying to resist the impulse to hide her breasts behind her arms since the other girls seemed to be so unconcerned about their nudity.

Dawn expertly fitted the rubber push-ups into the bikini top, then handed it back to her. "Try that."

Alison put the top back on and tried not to blush as Dawn readjusted everything.

"Take a look," Dawn said when she was finished.

Alison stared at herself in the mirror and for a moment thought she was looking at someone else. How could those little pieces of rubber make such a difference? She looked like an actual woman instead of a flat-chested adolescent child.

Her breasts were actually mounding over the top of the bathing suit's bra.

"Just like me," Tasha said, nodding in approval at the new contours. "You need implants. Ask Santa for a pair."

Alison stared at her. "Me? You've got to be kidding! I could never—"

"Never say never," Dawn Masin interrupted. "You've probably got everything you're going to get from nature. So now's the time. You want to get it all done before you go to college."

Alison turned to Dawn, whose body filled her bikini as perfectly as Tasha's. "You've had something done, too?"

Everybody laughed.

"We all have," a girl Alison hadn't met yet said.

"It's no big deal," Dawn said. "I had my boobs and lips done over Christmas, and Tasha's getting cheek implants next summer."

Alison stared at Dawn's lips. They were plump and looked perfectly natural. How was it possible she hadn't been born with them?

"Believe me," Dawn said, leaning forward so Alison could see her mouth more closely, "I had no lips before. None."

Tasha sucked in her cheeks so Alison could get an idea of what she was planning, then let them back out again. "I think the way we're born is just a suggestion."

A suggestion?
Alison thought as she wrapped a beach towel around her body and followed the rest of the girls out to the pool.
What were they, crazy?
Yet as she listened to the whistles from the boys in the pool, she hesitated.

Nobody had ever whistled at her like that, and they weren't right now, either. They were whistling at Tasha and Dawn and all the rest of them.

"Come on in, Alison," Budge Phelps called out. "We're losing. We need you." He held up the volleyball.

"Going in?" Alison asked Tasha.

"Later," Tasha said as she smeared lotion on her long brown legs.

"Come on, Alison!" Trip called. "We need you."

Alison dropped the towel and waited.

No whistles—none at all.

They knew her breasts were not her own.

Suddenly regretting that she hadn't just gone home, she plunged into the pool, wishing that not just her body, but she herself could disappear.

* * *

DAHLIA MOORE CLOSED the file on her desk and reached for the next on the stack. Before she opened it, she rubbed her neck, trying to relieve some of the pain in her shoulders and upper back that eight hours a day of sitting at her keyboard had made into a chronic condition. And trying to decipher the scribbled notes the doctors made on the patients' charts wasn't doing anything for her eyes, either. Sighing heavily, she flexed her fingers, took a sip of her tea, inhaled deeply, and reached for the next folder on the bottomless heap in her in-box.

She was just opening the file when the door to the Records Office opened and a woman walked in.

A woman Dahlia recognized not only from television, but because she'd been in this very office at least three times before, and not once had the newswoman ever gotten anything at all out of her.

But apparently she never learned.

"Hello, Dahlia," Tina said, her lips curling into the smile she usually used only on TV.

Dahlia wondered if Tina Wong had actually remembered her name or just read it in one of the directories in the hospital lobby. "May I help you?" she said, doing her best not to let the newswoman know she'd been recognized.

"Tina Wong?" Tina said, moving close to the counter in front of Dahlia's desk. "You remember me, don't you, Dahlia? Channel 3 News?" Barely acknowledging Dahlia's curt nod, she plunged on. "I'm doing a story on the Kimberly Elmont murder, and her mother told me that Kimberly's appendix had been removed here at Holy Cross two years ago."

Dahlia scowled. Of all people, Tina Wong should understand patient confidentiality. It wasn't as if they'd never played this game before. "So?"

"So I'm hoping you can tell me who has access to her medical records."

"Her doctors," Dahlia responded. This was way too simple a question for the famous Tina Wong, so she was after something else, but Dahlia knew her job, and wasn't about to jeopardize it for a reporter. "That's assuming she was a patient here, and you know as well as I do that I can't tell you anything about a patient."

"I told you—I'm not asking for information about the patients. All I want to know is if anyone but their doctors accessed their records."

Dahlia Moore's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, ‘patients'?" she asked, emphasizing the plural. "Kimberly Elmont was only one person, wasn't she?"

Tina pounced. "So she was a patient here!"

"You already knew that," Dahlia retorted, rolling her eyes. "Her mother told you, didn't she?"

"Can you tell me if a woman named Caroline Fisher was ever treated here?"

Dahlia frowned. "How many times do I have to explain confidentiality to you?"

"Confidentiality dies with the patient," Tina said, putting a lot more certainty into her voice than she felt. Then, as Dahlia's expression turned even stonier, she changed her tactics. "Look," she said, her voice much softer. "Both of these girls were murdered. I can't believe you didn't hear about Kimberly—I broke the story, but every other station's been on it ever since. Caroline Fisher was murdered last year, and I think the same person killed them both."

Dahlia pursed her lips but said nothing. She'd certainly heard about Kimberly Elmont—there'd been practically nothing else on TV all weekend. And she remembered Caroline Fisher, too, because Caroline had been killed only two blocks from the house Dahlia shared with her husband and daughter, and she'd made Fred put extra locks on the day after they found the Fisher girl.

"Come on, Dahlia," Tina said, sensing the records clerk's indecision. "I don't even want medical information. All I want to know is if Caroline Fisher was ever a patient here, and if she was, if there was anyone who looked at both their records."

Dahlia turned it over in her mind. Technically, Tina Wong was right—the information she wanted wouldn't break any laws. On the other hand, it would sure violate hospital policy, maybe even badly enough to get her fired. On the third hand, she and Fred hadn't spent fifteen years raising Jessica so some madman could kill her, and if all Tina Wong wanted was a simple confirmation that someone had been here—

Dahlia's fingers flew over the keyboard for a few seconds, and finally she nodded. "Okay, Caroline Fisher was a patient here, too."

"Can you tell me if the same people accessed both those girls' records?" Tina pressed. "I'm not asking for names—just whether anybody worked with both of them."

Dahlia opened a second window on her computer screen and pulled up Kimberly Elmont's records, then pulled up pop-ups in both windows that showed the names and dates of everyone who had ever accessed them.

Both lists were short, and none of the names appeared on both lists. Then, just as she was about to close the window on the Elmont record, she noticed something: the last entry on the access record showed a date, but no name. Dahlia's brows furrowed as her eyes shifted to the Fisher girl's file.

"What is it?" Tina Wong asked. "What did you find?"

"Now, that's not right," Dahlia muttered, barely even aware that she'd spoken out loud.

"What's not right, Dahlia? What did you find?"

"Kimberly Elmont's file was accessed two weeks ago, but there's no log-on information. And the same thing with the Fisher girl. A little over a year ago someone looked at her file, but there's no log-on information."

"What does that mean?" Tina pressed.

Dahlia opened her mouth, but before she could say anything she remembered to whom she was talking. If there was a hole in the hospital's security system, the last thing she needed was for Tina Wong to know about it before she told her boss. "Probably nothing," she said. "It's just a violation of policy, that's all. Now I'll have to try to run it down and write up the violations."

Tina smiled knowingly. "Someone hacked into the computer, didn't they?"

"I didn't say that," Dahlia replied. "And if you say I did, our lawyers will be contacting you." She rose to her feet, fully intending to escort the newswoman out of the Records Office so she could close the door, lock it, and then get on the phone to her boss to report her discovery. But then an image of her daughter rose in her mind, and she hesitated before saying, "You promise you won't quote me? You won't use this on the air at all?" She saw the excitement in Tina Wong's eyes as the reporter swore she'd keep whatever she was told to herself. "It's not supposed to happen," Dahlia said. "It's supposed to be impossible to access our records without logging on. It's probably just a glitch in the system, and there's nothing wrong at all."

"But you don't think so," Tina said quietly.

Dahlia looked directly into her eyes. "Please, Miss Wong, if you say anything about this on the air, I'll lose my job. But I have a daughter about the same age as Kimberly Elmont."

"I'll keep it confidential," Tina assured her. "But even if it gets out, don't worry about it—you haven't done anything wrong."

After Tina Wong was gone, Dahlia sat staring at her monitor, trying to figure out what she should do next. She pulled up a few random files, hoping the same unidentified access would show, but on every record she looked at, each access had proper log-on identifications listed.

So maybe Tina Wong was right.

Maybe these were the only two.

But what if there was another?

And what if no one found it until someone else was murdered?

She printed out the two records and headed to the hospital administrator's office, deciding that even if she'd told Tina Wong too much, her boss had to know their records were no longer secure.

"DINNER IN FIVE MINUTES, MISS ALISON."

The disembodied voice coming out of the intercom didn't startle Alison half as much this evening as it had last night, partly because she'd heard it before, but mostly because now she at least knew who it was: Maria, who worked for her stepfather five days a week, coming in sometime in the afternoon and not leaving until after dinner. In fact, she might not have jumped at all if she hadn't still been staring at the clothes she'd found in her closet five minutes ago.

She'd been intending to take a minute to change her blouse before she went downstairs, but then she opened the closet and saw them. Half a dozen pairs of slacks hanging neatly on wooden hangers, covered with transparent plastic covers, as if they'd just come from the cleaners. Next to them were just as many blouses, wrapped the same way. At first she thought they must be her mother's and that Maria had just put them in the wrong closet, but she didn't recognize them as her mother's. At least, she didn't recognize the pants—they were mostly in shades practically everyone had. But the blouses were gorgeous, and if her mother had ever worn any of them, she would have remembered. She took one off its hanger.

Not quite new.

And the label was Roberto Cavalli.

It had to be expensive, and even though it was gorgeous, it wasn't the kind of thing her mother would ever have worn, let alone bought. So where had it come from?

She was still examining the clothes, all of which were from designers just as famous—and no doubt as expensive—as Cavalli when she heard Maria's voice through the intercom.

"Be right down," she replied. Grabbing one of her own blouses from the back of the closet, she quickly put it on, closed the closet door, and headed down to the dining room.

Just like last night, her mother and stepfather were looking almost lost at one end of the huge table, the seat across from her mother waiting for her.

Her mother, a goblet of white wine held halfway to her lips, paused to smile at her. "How was the first day at school?" she asked.

Suddenly wishing she'd changed her pants as well as her blouse before coming down, Alison perched uncomfortably on the edge of her chair, feeling lost in the ornate dining room. It didn't help that her hair was still wet from the pool party. At least she'd combed it back and tied it into a ponytail so it wasn't making her shoulders damp, and if she didn't lean back, it wouldn't get the velvet upholstery on the chair wet, either. "It was okay," she finally admitted. "I hear the lit teacher is tough, but it's my favorite subject, so I'm not too worried."

"See?" Risa said. "All that worrying was for nothing."

Alison's eyes avoided her mother's. "I guess."

Risa cocked her head, eyeing her daughter appraisingly. Something, obviously, was wrong. Or at least not right. "And you went swimming with some new friends?" she prompted.

Alison kept her eyes on the plate Maria set in front of her. "It seems they were told to invite me."

"Told to?" her mother echoed. "What do you mean, ‘told to'?"

Alison finally looked at her mother. "Conrad called their parents and told them to be nice to the new kid."

"Oh, Lord," Risa said, slowly setting her wineglass down and turning to Conrad.

"I was just trying to help," he said before either his wife or his stepdaughter could say anything. "I thought—"

Risa laughed. "You thought what any man with no children would think. But all you did was make Alison feel like—"

"An idiot," Alison finished, supplying the word her mother had hesitated to use. "How could you do that?" she said to her stepfather. "I was so embarrassed I wanted to die! How could you even—"

"But you didn't die," Risa intervened, hoping to head off the conversation before anyone lost their temper. "Conrad was just trying to make sure you didn't spend the day with no one talking to you. It was a nice thing to do."