Code Blue (16 page)

"You've really made me feel at home." Cathy thought about what she wanted to say. It sounded terrible, but it was the truth. "You know, Mrs. Kennedy, I'm more comfortable here than the last time I stayed with my parents."

"Cathy, I mean, Dr. Sewell—"

"Please. I've always been Cathy to you and your husband.Let's don't change that."

"Cathy then. I know you may not want to talk about it, but everyone around here knows about your mother's problems.I'm sure you must have been uncomfortable when you were around her after she got to be so difficult. But before she got sick, she was a wonderful person. And your daddy took good care of her."

Cathy shook her head. "Sorry. That's not what I've heard."

Mrs. Kennedy appeared unfazed. "Dear, you can't be a pastor's wife for almost forty years without learning a few things. You've heard rumors that your daddy wasn't faithful to your mother, haven't you?"

"Yes." Cathy started to say more, but decided to leave it at that. After all, most of what she suspected was unproven. But how do you get hard evidence that your father, who'd been dead for over three years, had cheated on your mother?

"I can't give you the details—I know them, but you'll have to hear them from someone else—but I can tell you this for sure." Dora moved from the doorway into the room and picked up the Bible that lay on the bedside table. "With my hand on this Bible, I'll tell you that your daddy was not unfaithful to your mother."

Cathy couldn't believe it. Emotions swirled through her head like a weather vane in a Texas tornado. Relief. Regret.Anguish. Confusion. She slumped onto the bed and buried her face in her hands. "I so want to believe that."

Dora's voice was soft. "Believe it, dear."

Cathy felt tears form. "I feel so guilty. I didn't want to believe my suspicions about Daddy, but I let them taint my memory of him anyway. Daddy, please forgive me." She choked back a sob. "And God forgive me too."

The bed sagged beside Cathy as Dora Kennedy sat down and gently patted her shoulder.

Her voice was like a gentle wind. "Dear, would you like me to pray with you?"

"Please," Cathy choked out. "Yes, please."

Cathy and Will sat across from each other at the Kennedy dining table. Will made notes on a yellow legal pad while Cathy shared the details of her conversation with Mrs.Gladstone. "I don't know why Gail Nix would have it in for me, but apparently, she's the one who bullied her husband into filing the malpractice suit."

Will leaned back and balanced his chair on the two back legs, keeping himself in position with one hand on the table."I think maybe I can tell you a bit about that. This all happened about four years ago. You were still in medical school.I'd just come back to Dainger and started practicing law."

Cathy looked at him expectantly.

He brought the chair down, leaned forward, and drained his coffee cup. "This won't be nice for you to hear."

"I've heard a great deal since I've been back here, and most of it has convinced me that everyone knows everything about everybody else in this town, and most of it's bad.Go on."

"Okay. You remember that Gail Nix is Lloyd Allen's big sister, right?"

Cathy nodded.

"She and Lloyd had another sibling, a sister, Mattie.Mattie was the oldest. Got married and was divorced within a year, but kept her married name: Mattie McElroy. She stayed in Dainger—taught grade school." He picked up his cup, found that it was empty, and put it down. "She came to the emergency room one night, throwing up and hurting something fierce. Fever and chills. Really sick. Unfortunately, she'd waited three days before calling Gail to take her to the hospital."

"What happened?"

"Your father diagnosed a ruptured appendix. He did his best to save her. Folks tell me he sat at her bedside for thirtysix hours straight, doing everything he could. But Mattie died."

"Surely Gail's not holding a grudge against my father for that? By the time he saw her she probably had peritonitis. Some people just can't be saved, and especially if you don't see them until they're already half dead."

"True, it doesn't make sense. And neither does it make sense for her to carry that grudge forward to you. But that appears to be the case."

Cathy stood and paced the few steps from the table to the door and back. "Are you sure about this?"

"Sure as I can be. Gail came to me and wanted to file a malpractice claim against your father. In case you're wondering, I'm not really breaching client confidentiality here, because I wouldn't take her as a client. I told her it wasn't malpractice, just a bad result."

"Did she end up getting another lawyer?"

Will shook his head. "Nope, I was the last one in town she went to. She'd already tried everyone else. Nobody would touch the case. So I guess she's stored up all that venom over the years, and now you're the target of her anger."

J
ANE PUT A CUP OF COFFEE AND THREE PINK MESSAGE SLIPS ON CATHY'S desk. "Will your insurance cover your losses in the apartment fire?"

Cathy picked up the mug and took a grateful sip. Jane's coffee was better than any she'd ever been able to make herself.She'd have to ask the secret. "Apparently so. The Elams have the same insurance company I have, and the adjustor's already been by. Insurance will pay a professional fire restoration company to clean my clothes and linens. My CDs were ruined by the heat, and my TV set appears to have given up the ghost, but the company will issue a check to cover those." She gazed into her coffee cup. "But they can't give me back the photos the smoke and water ruined."

"So how soon can you move back in?"

"Realistically, I'll probably have to live with the Kennedys for at least another month. Maybe more."

Jane turned toward the door. "That shouldn't be too hard."

"Do you mean Dora's cooking? I agree. She's the best."

"That too, I suppose. But what I meant was the chance to see more of Will Kennedy."

Cathy made a shooing gesture. After Jane left, she smiled to herself as she looked at the list of appointments. If this kept up, the practice might actually show a profit soon. That would be good, considering the size of the note she'd signed at the bank when she borrowed the money to set up her practice. Cathy had been thoroughly confused by the legal language, but Mr. Nix had assured her there'd be no problem renewing it after a year. "Just pay the interest," he'd said. Of course, that was then, and this was now. Nix might not be so accommodating anymore.

There was enough variety among the cases she saw to keep Cathy engaged, but every time she had a break, her thoughts turned away from medicine. The witnesses Will wanted to depose had been served with their subpoenas.Today, he would start with the first two on the list: Milton and Gail Nix. The depositions were scheduled, one after the other, in Sam Lawton's office. Cathy wanted to be present, but Will advised against it.

"We'll get together this evening, and I'll fill you in on everything. I don't expect to learn a lot, but you never know."

All day, Cathy wondered whether Gail Nix was behind the wheel of that Ford Expedition. Somehow, that seemed more like something a man would do. Was Gail's brother, Lloyd, the person who was out to get her? He could have driven the car, probably could have set the fire. And it would have been no problem for him to pull Milton Nix's original prescription from the files and replace it with the altered photocopy.

Then again, perhaps this was connected to her father in some way. Doctors might be respected by most patients, but someone could still be carrying a grudge, one they were willing to extend to the next generation.

Did the cause of her problems lie in Dallas? Maybe not just her troubles with Robert. Had anyone suffered from a mistake she made during her residency?

"That was the last patient." Jane took the chart Cathy handed her. "Going home?"

"No, I'll try to finish this paperwork while I wait for Will."

It was almost six thirty when Cathy heard rapping at the outer door. Will stood in the hall, the picture of exhaustion.His tie hung at half-mast, his dress shirt was wilted and sweat-stained. Cathy motioned him in and followed him into her office.

"I take it the deposition didn't go well?" she said.

Will nodded silently before slumping into the chair across the desk from Cathy. He dropped his briefcase and rubbed at his temples.

Cathy gave him a "wait a second" gesture and went to the workroom to get sodas for them both.

Will took his and held it against his forehead for a moment before pulling the tab and gulping half the can. "It was like butting my head against a stone wall. In the law, the term is 'the deponent knoweth not,' meaning that the person giving the deposition denies any knowledge. Maybe they forgot, maybe they can't recall. Whatever it is, it doesn't give the lawyer doing the questioning anything he can sink his teeth into."

"So you didn't find out anything useful?"

"Nix says it was his idea to file the suit. Maintains that, although he discussed it with his wife, he made the final decision. I believe his words were, 'to protect the citizens of Dainger from Dr. Sewell.' Made you sound like a cross between Typhoid Mary and Son of Sam."

Cathy took a sip of her soft drink. "And I suppose they denied altering the prescription?"

Will shook his head. "I didn't bring it up. I asked them how they explained the directions being different from what you had charted, and they both had the same answer: You must have written the prescription wrong, then realized your mistake and tried to cover it up by making the right entry on the chart."

"That's so—"

"Easy." Will held up a hand, palm forward. "Let's don't show our defense just yet. I've still got to depose both pharmacists.I want to get these people alone in a room with a stenographer, under oath, and see if I can rattle them enough that they can't keep their stories straight. Somewhere along the line, maybe I can trip up the person responsible for all this."

Cathy spun around in her chair to look at the books behind her. She didn't know everything that was in each one, but she knew most of it. She was a good doctor—as good as any other doctor in Dainger, probably better than some of them. Why did she have to go through all this? Who was behind it? Maybe it wasn't one person. Could there be two? Three? Apparently there was no lack of people who had something against her or her family.

"Penny for your thoughts," Will said.

"Just wondering whether we should lump all these incidents together. Is it possible that the person driving the black SUV, the one who almost killed me, is a different person from the one who set the fire? And could a third person be responsible for the altered prescription? Are there two or three people—even more—who are in some sort of a conspiracy to drive me away?"

Everyone else had gone to bed, but Cathy couldn't sleep.She decided to curl up in bed with a book and read. She was about to turn out the light when her cell phone rang. The caller ID showed "Marcus Bell." She didn't really want to talk with him, but she was on call tonight. Maybe she was needed at the hospital.

"Dr. Sewell."

"Cathy, this is Marcus. I hope it's not too late."

Too late for us,
she thought. She tried to put a smile in her voice. "Not at all. How can I help you?"

Marcus cleared his throat. "Actually, I think it's the other way around. As I've told you before, you seem to have impressed the doctors on the credentials committee who voted against giving you extended privileges. Now I think you have the votes you need to get everything you've requested. The committee meets next week. All I need from you is a verbal request for them to revisit the issue."

"And if the vote ends up tied, does the Chief of Staffplan to abstain again?"

"Cathy, you have to understand. I can't take sides. Why don't you just depend on the impression you've made on the committee members to give you a solid majority?"

Her gut instinct told her to hang up on the man. How could she have let herself be attracted to someone this selfcentered? Instead, she said, "Yes, please ask the committee to reconsider my privileges. Maybe this time I won't have to depend on your support."

"I can understand how angry you must be."

"Not really, Marcus. You're an honors graduate of a prestigious medical school. You got your surgery training at a top-notch program. You came here with all sorts of recommendations.And, besides that, you're a man. No, you can't possibly understand how angry and frustrated I am to be treated this way." Cathy heard the shrillness creep into her voice. Well, let it. It was time Marcus heard this. "I've heard doctors refer to female colleagues as 'pushy broads' when all they asked for was respect. Well, I've tried not to be a 'pushy broad,' but no more. I intend to stand up for myself—with or without your help."

Marcus started to respond, but she ignored him. He was still talking when she pushed the button to end the call, wishing for an old-fashioned black Bakelite instrument— one she could slam down into its cradle with a satisfying bang.

Jane put a slim number ten envelope on Cathy's desk."This came for you this morning."

"There's no stamp. How did it get here?"

"Myra Johnson, one of the tellers at the bank, brought it by."

Cathy noticed the return address printed on the envelope: First State Bank of Dainger. Was this about the lawsuit? Why would Nix have a teller hand deliver it? Why not his lawyer? She reached for the envelope, but stopped with her hand hovering in the air. Letter bomb?
Don't be silly. Now
that's
paranoid.

She slit the envelope with the brass opener that rested inside a mug on her desk, along with a collection of pens and pencils. Inside was a single sheet of bank stationery. The letter, only three paragraphs long, was signed by Milton Nix, President and Chairman of the Board. Although most of it was "legalese," she had no trouble understanding the last paragraph. It began with a sentence that brought her world crashing down around her.

"The Loan Board has reviewed your circumstances and believes that there is an undue element of risk present in the loan as it stands. Therefore, we must ask that you reduce the principal balance of your indebtedness by at least five thousand dollars, as well as paying the interest to date, before we can continue the loan."

Her stomach churned. She swallowed hard to force down the bile and acid she tasted. She hadn't counted on this. The note she'd signed wouldn't mature for another nine months.Several times over the past few months the thought of a seventy thousand dollar debt hanging over her had brought her to the edge of panic. But Nix had assured her: "Simply pay the interest, and we'll renew it for another year." How could the bank do this?

More importantly, how could she pay? Cathy knew, almost to the penny, the balance in her bank accounts. Her personal account was almost nonexistent. The separate account she maintained for the practice had just enough to cover this month's expenses and perhaps a small salary for her. It would be a struggle to come up with the interest payment, but how could she raise an additional five thousand dollars? How long did she have? She read the final paragraph of the letter again and again, each time swiveling her eyes between her desk calendar and the letter. She had less than a week.

Jane still hovered nearby, apparently sensing the letter had delivered bad news. Cathy turned to her.

"Did Ms. Johnson say why she delivered this by hand? And why I'm just getting it? I should have had this at least two weeks ago."

"She said they'd tried to mail it to you twice, but it came back."

"What is it with those people?" Cathy fumed. "First they bounce a check for my insurance premium. Now they can't get my address right. You'd think—"

"What?"

"Nothing. Give me a few minutes before you put the first patient in."

Cathy sat tapping the letter opener on the desk. At first she thought it was far-fetched. The longer she thought about it, the more logical it seemed. Was there someone at the bank who didn't want her to succeed? Was the person so anxious to see Cathy leave town somehow connected with the bank? She ticked offthe suspects on her fingers.

Milton Nix? He'd been helpful, gone out on a limb to give her the loan in the first place. Why the change? Cathy could think of one reason—her next suspect.

Gail Nix? She was the one who'd badgered her husband into filing the lawsuit. And wasn't there an SUV in their garage? Was this because of the death of Gail's sister, a death she still blamed on Cathy's father?

Ella Mae Mercer? Cathy hadn't figured her out. Why would she go to the trouble of making sure Cathy received the money to cover her loss after the car crash, and then do this? Or did Will put pressure on the woman so that she had to appear to help. And what had been Ella Mae's relationship to Nolan Sewell? Could that have a connection to this?

Then it struck Cathy. There was one more person with possible access to the digitalis prescription. If Nix went back to his office and left his prescription lying on his desk, what was to stop Ella Mae from snatching it, making the alterations, and returning it before Nix had a chance to get it filled? Cathy couldn't believe the woman would have the knowledge to change the prescription, but then again, with the Internet there was a lot of information out there for the taking. It was a long shot, but it was possible. Or could someone else at the bank have altered the script?