A.W. Hartoin - Mercy Watts 04 - Drop Dead Red (11 page)

I couldn’t imagine growing up the way Abrielle and Colton would. Murdered father. Accused mother. Even if the accusation was crap, it was still out there. A question that hadn’t been answered.
 

“I have some small idea,” I said. “So I assume you have a plan or I wouldn’t be here.”
 

“We want to hire you,” said Ameche. “We want to prove where the listeriosis came from, so we can show that my sister didn’t have a damn thing to do with it.”

“I thought so. What about my dad? He’s the professional.”
 

Donatella twisted the bag into a tight rope. “I’d rather have you, if you don’t mind.”
 

“Why’s that?”
 

“Nothing against your dad. He was great to get involved at all, but you’re a young woman. I’m sure you need the money more than your dad. He was on 20/20 last week.” She held out her hand to Ameche. “I’ve followed your career. It’s impressive, even if you’re not technically a professional.”
 

“I’ve been lucky a lot.”

“I’d like you to get lucky for me. Plus, you helped out, Joey. He’s moving up, thanks to you. My family owes you.”
 

I shook my head. “That was my dad’s doing. I just passed along his name.”

“The nursing thing will help,” said Ameche. “You know your way around diseases and stuff.”
 

“I do, but I can’t say I’m any expert on meningitis.”
 

Donatella dropped her brother’s hand and took mine. It was cold and sticky with fresh tears. “What you don’t know, Dr. Lydia will tell you. Will you do it? I need a medical professional. Your dad gave me his price. I’ll gladly pay it to you.”
 

Dad’s price. Yes!

“You have to understand that I don’t have a license,” I said.
 

“That doesn’t matter to me. I just want this settled before the children realize something’s happened. They still don’t know about their father and the rest of the family. I want this to go away before they’re told.
 

“I’ll see what I can do.” I got out my phone and opened my note-taking app. “Okay. Tell me everything that happened that day.”
 

Donatella straightened up and blew her nose. “Right. Everything. I’m afraid it’s not very exciting.”
 

She was right about that. It was a pretty typical day for a regular family. Rob left the day before Donatella and the kids to hang out with his brothers, so they were alone on Friday. They all got up at six. Donatella took Abrielle and Colton to school and she went to work at the French Quarter elementary school my mom attended. Donatella picked the kids up early from school and drove to Tulane, where her oldest son was a freshmen. They picked up his gift for his grandparents, a drawing of them on their wedding day. Christopher couldn’t come, because he had a huge test in calculus and his grade wasn’t great.
 

“You have an eighteen-year-old kid?”
 

Donatella looked like death on a bad day, but still not old enough to have a kid that old.
 

She gave me a wan smile. “I got pregnant my freshman year of college.”
 

“Was Rob Christopher’s father?” I asked.
 

“No. We met later.” She flushed and then said, “Why are you frowning? Christopher was an accident, but he’s a great kid.”
 

“I don’t doubt it. I’m thinking that the Berrys can use it against you.”
 

“What?” asked Dr. Lydia. “So what if she had an out-of-wedlock child?”
 

“The one child who wasn’t poisoned isn’t Rob’s kid. Their lawyers can twist it. Donatella didn’t care about Rob’s kids. She wanted to get rid of all the Berrys. That kind of thing.”
 

“But Christopher really had a test,” said Donatella.
 

“Please tell me he’s here,” I said.
 

“Christopher? Of course. He flew in on Saturday.”
 

“Good. It would’ve looked bad if he didn’t. What happened after you saw Christopher?”
 

Donatella continued her story, sounding stronger by the moment. They flew out of New Orleans after getting on standby for an earlier flight. The kids weren’t feeling good when they boarded, but Donatella just thought it was carsickness. That wasn’t unusual. Colton was the first to feel ill. It started with a terrible headache and quickly progressed to projectile vomiting. Then Abrielle started with the headache. They landed at St. Louis in the nick of time. The pilot called ahead and there was an ambulance on the tarmac. Rob met them at the hospital. The anniversary dinner was at eight. Once they were stabilized, Rob couldn’t do anything and decided to go tell the family what had happened in person. Rob was killed at restaurant, but Donatella didn’t know anything about it. She didn’t want to know. The play-by-play was too much for her.
 

“This sounds like an incredibly short incubation period,” I said to Dr. Lydia.
 

“It came on very fast.”
 

“A large amount of the bacteria would have to have been ingested then.”
 

She nodded. “Definitely direct contact, but this is a new strain and we don’t know how they got it.”

“Has to be food,” I said.
 

“I believe so.” Dr. Lydia became pensive and avoided my eyes while Donatella ran down all the food they ate. Cereal for breakfast, school lunch, and pretzels at the airport. She ate the cereal herself.
 

Clem came in. “Donatella, Dr. Bergamo is coming up and Colton is asking for you.”
 

I gave her all my numbers and promised to update her daily. She gave me her house key and security code and left with Clem supporting her.

“So what are you not saying?” I asked Dr. Lydia.
 

She leaned her elbows on her leopard print pants and said. “I can’t say anything for sure.”
 

“Then say what isn’t for sure.”
 

“This hit them hard and fast. That combined with the lack of other cases in the kid’s vicinity…”
 

“You think they were infected on purpose,” I said.
 

Ameche put his face in his hands

“It’s just a feeling,” she said.
 

“I have a deep respect for feelings, so let’s go with it,” I said. “If you were going to infect someone with meningitis, how would you do it?”
 

“Well, I’d have to have access to the bacteria first of all.”
 

“Let’s say you do.”
 

“I’d inject it. That’d give me a fast infection.”
 

“Did you find any suspicious injection sites?”
 

Dr. Lydia shook her head. “By the time we started questioning where they got it, the injection site could’ve healed enough so as not to be detectable.”
 

“But you found nothing on either child? No bruising?”
 

“No. Both children were in excellent health at the time they got sick. Colton had bruising consistent with playing soccer, mainly on his legs. Abrielle had no bruising whatsoever.”
 

“What’s your second choice?”
 

“I’d have to get bacteria on their mucus membranes, nose or mouth.”
 

“So, like using a sick person’s fork.”
 

“Except there are no other sick people.”

“So it’s food.”
 

“Donatella didn’t get it at home. And like I said, there were no other cases at their school or the airport.”
 

“If their lunches were the only ones contaminated, Abrielle and Colton were specific targets,” I said.
 

“I remember lunch lines at school. It would be pretty hard to make sure Abrielle and Colton got the contaminated trays. You never know where a kid is going to be in a line. It’d have to be lunch personnel and they’d have to do it right in front of the kids and the other adults.”
 

“That’s true, but they got it somehow. Maybe it wasn’t the food. Maybe it was the forks. It’d be easy to pull a fork out of a pocket and put it on a specific tray,” I said.
 

“It could be done but keeping the bacteria live on a dry surface isn’t easy. I think it would have to be a good-sized amount, too. We’ll know more when we know the strain.”
 

“When will that be?”
 

“Four or five more days.”
 

“I take it you haven’t told Donatella you think someone did this on purpose,” I said.
 

Ameche’s head popped up. “No way. She couldn’t deal with it. She’s already lost Rob and rest of his family.”
 

“We’re not sure,” said Dr. Lydia. “There’s no reason she has to know.”

“I agree, so I think I’ll start at the other end.”
 

“What does that mean?” asked Ameche.
 

“Instead of worrying about how, I’m going to figure out who. If this wasn’t an accident, someone hates that family enough to kill the children. I just have to find out who.”
 

“I’d begin with the family that’s suing Donatella days after her husband was murdered,” said Dr. Lydia.
 

I rolled out of my comfy beanbag. “My thoughts exactly.”
 

Chapter Nine

THE SECURITY GUARD acted like I was a loon for wanting an escort out to my truck mid-morning. I didn’t care what Julio thought. Parking garages were gloomy at the best of times with plenty of places to hide. Plus, Dad and Chuck would ask if I got someone to walk me out and neither of them were above calling security to confirm my story.
 

Julio put me in my truck and I locked the door immediately. I saw him roll his eyes and mutter something as he walked away. Probably how I was a lunatic. Maybe so, but I wasn’t a kidnapped lunatic and that was all that mattered.
 

I pulled out of the garage, looking for the guy in the hoodie and dialing Uncle Morty.
 

“Shit! It’s you,” he snarled into the phone.
 

“I love you, too,” I said.
 

“Yeah. Yeah. What do you want?”
 

“It’s the Ameche case.”
 

“What of it?”
 

“I need the address of the Berrys that are suing Donatella,” I said.
 

“
You’re
gonna pay them a visit?” He chuckled like I was some kind of candy ass girl. I’d done stuff, survived stuff.

“Yes. Why is that funny?”
 

“‘Cause the last time you interviewed a family of suspects you missed the murderer.”
 

It was true, but how was I supposed to know. It was my first murder investigation, which also happened to be Dixie’s husband’s murder. I was upset. It was personal. The interview was short and it’s not like they were wearing ‘I
♡
murder’ hats.

“Can’t we forget about that?”
 

“Loser.”
 

“Are you going to tell me where they are or what?” I asked.

“You paying?” he asked, suddenly all business.
 

“The client will be paying.”
 

“Holy shit. You got a paying client. Tommy’ll throw a parade.”
 

I pulled onto the highway and longed to throw my Bluetooth out the window. “Whatever. How long will this take?”
 

“Got it now. Well, well, well. Somebody thinks they done hit the lottery,” he said.
 

“Why?”
 

“They’re staying at the downtown Westin at 350 a night. Two rooms.”

“So? Donatella didn’t blink at Dad’s rates. The Berrys must have money,” I said.
 

“Some Berrys have money. The ones that are dead.”
 

I yawned and asked, “How much money are we talking about?”
 

“It’s not Bled money, but they were comfortable.” Uncle Morty explained to me that there were two lines of Berrys. One brother, Rob Berry’s grandfather, invested in McDonalds in the mid-sixties. The other brother, grandfather of the surviving Berrys, headed a pyramid scheme that landed him in prison in 1972. That line never recovered and, for some reason, blamed the other side for their problems. Rob Berry, Donatella’s late husband, was a partner in a high-class real estate firm in New Orleans and she was a school administrator. Their children, Abrielle and Colton, would inherit several million dollars, since they were the surviving heirs to the successful Berrys. The other side would get nothing.

“Unless Donatella were sent to prison and they got custody of the kids and control,” I said.
 

“Yep,” said Uncle Morty.
 

“I don’t suppose—”

“Already checked. The other Berrys have never been to New Orleans and have had no contact with anyone in the city.”

“They still could’ve had the kids poisoned but if the whole family was supposed to be dead anyway, why bother?”

“Good question.” Uncle Morty hawked up a phlegm wad and made me involuntarily hork.
 

“Don’t do that. It’s too disgusting.” I shuddered. “Any connection between Blankenship and the other Berrys?”

“Not yet, but they all live out in Belleville. It could’ve been arranged face to face. You think Blankenship had someone in the mix, right?”
 

I pulled onto my street and got lucky with a space in front of my building. “I got that feeling.
So the other Berrys aren’t
connected
, are they?”