Sleep No More (18 page)

“You told me.” He reached out and covered her hand with his own on the seat. “But now she’s free, too.”

“But for how long?” She moved her shoulders as if shrugging off a burden. “Sorry. Brooding isn’t going to help. We’ve just got to find her.” She glanced at him. “Did you find out anything from those computer files while I was sleeping?”

“I was mainly trying to access the physical records from her accident.”

“And did you?”

“I found some forms with several complicated diagnoses and treatments. All under the supervision of Pierce.” He paused. “But no record of any X-rays taken of the injury. Most unusual. You’d think the X-rays would have been sent with her from the clinic where she was first treated. I searched most of the afternoon in those computer banks and couldn’t find a trace or cross-reference to them.”

“Could they be entered in a separate file?”

“Possibly. Not likely. My bet is that Pierce destroyed them. It’s difficult to forge an X-ray.”

“You’re saying that she probably didn’t have a head injury.”

“I’m saying that I can’t find a record if she did.” He pulled into the parking lot of the Sungate Apartments. It was a small, modest, two-story apartment complex with palm trees framing the entrance and the obligatory swimming pool. He parked and ran around to open her car door. “But maybe Newell can help us out. If he helped her get away, he must have believed that she shouldn’t be in that hospital.” He scanned the numbers on the apartment doors. “I think Newell’s on the second floor.” He headed for the staircase. “Let’s go.”

A few minutes later, they were standing before Apartment 2A. But Jessie Newell didn’t answer the door when Eve and Joe rang the bell.

“Not at home?” Eve said. “Maybe he had to work late. We didn’t really know his schedule.”

“According to his personnel records, he drives a silver Honda.” Joe was frowning. “And there’s a silver Honda in the parking lot. I don’t like it.”

And neither did Eve. Joe’s instincts were near infallible. “Do you have his telephone number?”

“Yes.” He rang the bell again. “I’ll try it if he doesn’t—shit.”

She heard it, too.

A gasping groan, then steps inside the apartment.

But the steps were not coming toward the door.

“Step to the side.” Joe reached for the doorknob. “I’m going in. Stay here.”

“Hell no.” Eve followed him into the apartment.

But she stopped in shock just inside the door. “Dear God.”

Blood.

Blood spattered on the floor of the foyer.

Blood on the chair at the table in the kitchen.

Blood on the man tied to that chair.

Jessie Newell.

There was so much blood running from the two cuts on the face and clothing of the man in that chair that she could barely recognize him. He was gagged, and his eyes were wide with agony.

A knife was sticking out of his shoulder.

Joe was running toward the back of the apartment. “I think whoever did it ran out the back way. I heard the door slam.”

So had Eve, but it hadn’t registered in the shock of seeing the carnage that was Jessie Newell.

She was across the room in seconds and jerking the gag from Newell’s mouth. She was afraid to touch the knife sticking out of his shoulder for fear of damaging organs. “It’s okay, we’ll get you help.”

“Bastard,” Newell whispered. “Stop him. He took—he’ll find her—”

“Quiet. Don’t talk.” She was untying the ropes binding his wrists. “Joe will stop him.”

“I won’t let him kill me. He’s not going to win.” He closed his eyes. “I’m losing blood. No time for EMTs. An intern lives in the apartment downstairs. Jensen. Go get him.”

“I shouldn’t leave you. You’re bleeding…”

“If you don’t get me help, you’ll be staying with a dead man. I’ll be okay. I don’t think he cut any arteries. He wanted to keep me alive.”

Make a decision.

“I’ll be right back. I’ll call 911 on the way down to get this Jensen.” She ran out of the apartment and down the steps to the first level. Which apartment? She was talking to 911 as she went from door to door checking the caption beneath each doorbell.

There it was. K. D. Jensen.

Now pray that he was home.

*   *   *

JOE HAD COME BACK
to Newell’s place by the time Eve and young Dr. Jensen entered the apartment. He was kneeling by Newell and applying pressure to a wound on his upper arm. Joe glanced at Eve. “I lost him. He had a car parked in the back.”

“License plate?”

He nodded. “But Newell should know who he is.” He turned to the doctor. “What can I do?”

“Go down and wait for the EMTs and bring them up here.” He glanced at Eve. “You apply the pressure.” Then he was examining the wound in Newell’s arm. “What the hell have you been up to, Jessie? You into drugs?”

“I’m not stupid,” Newell gasped. “Get—this thing out of my shoulder.”

“In a minute.” He was checking Newell over. “It might be better left in it for a little while. But you’re lucky it’s not buried in your heart.”

“No … luck. I dodged to the side when I saw him coming to finish me off when the doorbell rang. The blade’s mostly in the muscles of my shoulder. I knew he wouldn’t have time for a second try at me.” He was looking at Eve. “You were with that woman snooping around the third floor at Seahaven. Who are you?”

“Eve Duncan.”

“Help me ease him out of the chair to the floor,” the intern ordered Eve. “He appears stable enough, and I need to take a look at his kneecaps. There’s blood on his jeans.”

“There’s blood all over him. So many cuts…” She carefully helped Jensen ease Newell to the floor, and resumed the pressure.

Newell flinched with pain and closed his eyes. “Why … Did Pierce send you to find out if I was the one? Did you send Drogan after me?”

“I don’t know any Drogan. Is that who did this to you?”

“Drogan…” He opened his eyes. “I didn’t know his name, but he told me. Every time he cut me, he told me who was doing it. He was proud of the pain he was causing. Bad…”

“Why did he do this to you?” Eve asked.

“Beth. He wanted to know where she was…”

She stiffened. “But you didn’t tell him?”

“Bastard…”

“Did you tell him?”

His gaze fastened on her face. “You know Beth?”

“No.” She drew a shaky breath. “But I don’t want her hurt. Believe me, I want to keep her safe.”

Newell’s gaze was searching her face. “You’re with the man who ran through here and scared off Drogan. I saw him at the hospital. He’s a detective.”

“Yes, Detective Joe Quinn.”

“He scared the shit out of Piltot and Pierce. I do—believe you.”

“Stop asking him questions,” the doctor said. “You can do that later.”

Newell gave her a ghost of a smile. “If I’m still alive.”

“Just yes or no,” Eve said. “Tell me.”

“No.” His eyes closed again. “But he took— He may find her…”

“What did he take—”

“The EMTs are here.” The intern lifted his head as he sat back on his heels. “I hear them on the steps.”

So did Eve. It sounded like a herd of elephants running up the metal steps.

“Don’t leave me,” Newell whispered. “Stay with me at the emergency room until I get out of surgery. Don’t let them check me into the hospital. Too easy. Doctors … Nurses…”

“Shut up, Jessie,” Jensen said as he got to his feet as four EMTs poured into the room. “The police will find that scumbag. Nothing’s going to happen to you now. We’ll take good care of you.”

Newell’s gaze clung to Eve’s. “Don’t leave me.”

Eve nodded as Joe reached down and helped her to her feet. “Don’t worry, I’ll hardly let you out of my sight.” She added grimly, “We’re going to talk.”

“Soon,” he said, as they carried him out of the apartment. “It doesn’t matter that I didn’t tell him. He’ll find her…”

“Which hospital?” Joe asked Dr. Jensen as the intern hurried after the EMTs.

“Santa Barbara General.” He tossed back over his shoulder, “Did I hear that you’re a police detective? You’d better contact your headquarters. This has to be reported.”

“Yes, it does.” He took Eve’s elbow and nudged her toward the door as Jensen left the apartment. He added in a low voice to Eve, “But not before we get a chance to talk to Newell.”

“He told me that the name of the man who cut him is Drogan. While we’re waiting for word on Newell, can you run a check and see if you can find anything about him on the database?”

“You bet I will. Drogan…”

*   *   *

DROGAN’S FOOT PRESSED HARD
on the accelerator, then lifted the pressure. He mustn’t be caught speeding. That would be the stupidest thing he could do. It would be the crowning blow to a totally frustrating night.

Not that he hadn’t enjoyed making the son of a bitch hurt. But Newell had been stubborn, and Drogan hadn’t been able to squeeze the information about Beth Avery out of him before that detective Joe Quinn had broken into the apartment. It had to be Quinn. Pierce’s description of the cop matched, and who else would be snooping around the hospital personnel?

Why the hell couldn’t Pierce have managed to throw Quinn off the track? It was just one more example of the doctor’s pitiful inadequacy and another wall for Drogan to overcome. The anger was searing through him, and he had to get a grip on himself so he could think clearly. He took a deep breath and tried to relax.

It was going to be all right. He had lost Newell as a source of information, but he had something else that might give him what he needed. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the cell phone he had taken from Newell.

Phones were magical instruments, and Drogan knew just how to pull that magic into the real world. First, go the simple route. Check and see just what calls Newell had received lately. Then check them all out until he hit pay dirt. Identify, locate the target, then execute.

But he had to hurry. He wasn’t sure that he’d managed to kill Newell, and he couldn’t chance him calling and warning the woman.

He pulled over to the side of the road and began to go through Newell’s call list.

Seventeen Mile Drive

BETH MADE A FACE
as she switched the news channel off and leaned back in the chair. So much ugliness and corruption. Wars and dirty politics and unbelievable cruelty. Occasionally, there was a story that raised the heart, but they were rare. She had been tempted to turn the set off a dozen times and just stare out the window at the sea.

But she had promised Billy that she would take this time to learn about all the events of the years she had missed and try to grasp how the world was working. She had been studying the History Channel and Discovery as well as the news channels, and she preferred the past to the present. It was the violence of the present that was goading her to draw back into her shell and just look out the window at the sea.

Coward. She had done just that for all these years, and it was time for her to come alive. She had been drugged and manipulated into that false contentment, and she wouldn’t do that to herself now that she was free. She was learning. She wouldn’t be defenseless when she ventured out into the world. She just had to do as Billy told her and not try to hide her head.

She reluctantly reached out and turned the news channel back on. “Go ahead,” she muttered to the slick-looking newscaster who was showing scenes from the latest Middle Eastern atrocity. “Give me another couple days, and maybe I’ll get as callous as the rest of you. Though God knows I don’t—” She broke off, stiffening, as her gaze flew to the desk across the room.

Her cell phone was ringing.

It was the first time the phone had rung since Billy had given it to her.

Billy?

She jumped to her feet and ran across the room. He had said he wouldn’t contact her, but he was the only one who had her number.

Or it could be a wrong number.

She hesitated.

The phone rang again.

But what if it was Billy, and he needed to reach her?

Private number on the ID panel.

She slowly reached out and punched the access. “Billy?”

“No.” The voice was crisp and businesslike. “Santa Barbara Police Department. We’re investigating the homicide of a Jessie Newell. Your number was on his phone. What is your name please?”

“Homicide?” Murder. He was talking about murder. Billy’s murder. She couldn’t breathe. “How? What—”

“He was stabbed to death. What did you say your name was?”

Stabbed. She closed her eyes. “Dear God.”

“Your name.” This time his voice was no longer crisp and businesslike. It was rough and ugly.

And she recognized it.

“
Bitch.
”

A dark hospital room where she struggled for her life.

A man who cursed her and tried to inject her with that deadly hypodermic.

Panic.

Her heart leaped in her breast.

She hung up the phone.

He had found her.

She felt a wave of sickness wash over her.

And he had found Billy.

Stabbed him. Billy was dead.

He had died for her.

And now his killer would be coming to get her.

She steadied herself on the desk as the sadness and fear and anger attacked her.

Billy.

CHAPTER

9

JOE AND EVE WERE IN
the waiting room for over three hours before Jensen gave them a report. “He’ll be okay. The shoulder wound was only a glancing blow, and that was the worst of it,” he said as he came out of the emergency room. “Thirty-two wounds, inflicted to give maximum pain. Whoever did it knew what he was doing.” His face was tight. “Jessie could have bled to death if he’d been careless, or he might have gone unconscious from the trauma effect. Jessie’s a good guy, he didn’t deserve this. Do you know who did it?”

“No, did he tell you?”

Jensen shook his head. “I didn’t ask him. That’s not my job. But evidently it’s your job. He’s waiting for a room to be readied. You can go in and ask him a few questions, but I don’t want him agitated.”

“No problem.”

Jensen frowned. “I mean it. Everyone likes Jessie Newell. The nurse on duty has been taking inquiries ever since we got here asking about him.”