Lifeblood (15 page)

The doctor nodded, took a few evasive steps, then looked back at Rachel and shook her head sadly.

No need to wonder anymore whether she had heard.

999

“Reasonable and finance company are contradictions in terms,” she told Marty when he stopped by to see how it was going. They were eating green enchiladas at the counter of Rachel’s tiny kitchen.

“I can’t find a single loan where the company doesn’t want a big chunk of money just to give you the loan. Then they hit you with an interest rate so high you can’t imagine ever paying it off. Then there are clauses that say I have to get permission to do anything to the mortgaged property, even to make a repair. And the loan officers treat me like I’m trying to rob them at gunpoint. I hate to think what they’d do if they knew why I need the loan. I’m afraid to tell them and scared to death they’ll find out. Doesn’t anyone get arrested for something they didn’t do?”

Marty gave her a worried look. “Why won’t you let me stake you?”

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate your offer, Pop. But if you really want to do me a favor, put that money in a CD.”

“Okay. It’s your life. But the offer stands.” He pointed to the enchiladas. “You make these?”

“I’ve been working on the recipe. For starters, it’s Mesilla Valley chile. From New Mexico. Supposed to be the best in the country.”

“It comes in cans?”

“Good God no. After a little experimenting I realized there’s no such thing as good chile from a can. What kind of Mexican are you?”

“We didn’t eat enchiladas.”

“In Mexico? You didn’t eat enchiladas?”

“My father—and maybe my mother, I’m not sure—regarded enchiladas, burritos, tacos, stuff like that, as peasant food, unworthy of the upper classes. My father wouldn’t have a taco in the house.”

“What the heck did you eat?”

“Mostly French. My brother and I used to buy tamales on the street, but we had to hide them.”

“No burritos?”

“Not until I got to San Francisco. Then, after I met your mom, well, she ate a taco now and again, but I still remember the look she gave me when she saw a plate of flat enchiladas.”

Rachel remembered the looks her mother could give and they both laughed.

“She would have tried them if you had made them,” Marty said. “These are very good.”

“They’re a job to make, but fun to see how different kinds of chile, and even how long you cook the sauce, change the flavor.”

“So what are you going to do if you can’t find a loan?” Marty asked when they had finished eating and Rachel was clearing the plates.

She sighed. “I don’t know. The fine print, the points, the fees, the processing expenses just about drive me over the edge. It’s like applying to be robbed. To say nothing of finding and gathering all the papers they insist on seeing. I’m three months shy of being formally in business the acceptable number of years, which I suspect is an arbitrary number they use as an excuse to charge me higher rates.” She bit her lower lip. “There are so many hidden ‘gotchas,’ it scares me silly.”

“I could call El Jefe.” Marty had earned the man’s appreciation because El Jefe’s son had lost a lot of money to Marty and Marty had given it back when he learned it was the boy’s college money.

“He’s a criminal, Pop.”

“How do you know that?”

“He reeks of gangster. You can’t be that naive.”

“He loves his son. He’s sending him to a good college. He’s repaid the debt in more ways than money, which seems pretty honorable to me,” Marty said. “For that matter, I don’t think he hides any gotchas. He seems very up-front, which is more than you’re saying about the loan people. And I’m sure he has a lot of connections.”

“Okay, what sort of business is he in?”

“I think he owns three or four companies. Maybe more.”

“What kind of companies, Pop?”

Marty shrugged. “I never asked.”

“He’s a criminal.”

“Rachel, I don’t like to put it this way, but at the moment, some people think you are, too.”

She groaned, and after a long moment, asked, “You don’t think I did this thing, do you?”

“Not if you say you didn’t. But the evidence is pretty strong. You’ll have to prove someone planted it on you. And why would anyone do that?”

Rachel shook her head back and forth. “God only knows. I sure don’t.”

Marty’s eyes searched hers and she knew there was at least ten percent of him that didn’t believe her. When he looked away, he asked, “How do you feel about that attorney?”

“I don’t know. This guy Edgar whatever his last name is, seems okay. But maybe I should try to get Aaron to come down.” Aaron had gotten her out of jail several years ago when she had been guilty of possession.

“El Jefe might know a good attorney, too.”

Twelve thousand five hundred dollars of the bail bond was forfeit regardless of her guilt or innocence. That was bad enough. But she also had to pay her attorney.

“Okay, Pop,” Rachel said dully. “My back’s against the wall. If you think he can get me a good mortgage on the garage, ask him.”

An hour after Marty left, the banging on one of the pedestrian garage doors began.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Rachel ran down the ramps and called through the door, “What’s all the ruckus?”

Goldie’s voice yelled back, “I want to know what the hell is going on!”

“Okay, okay.” Rachel unlocked the door and opened it. “Nothing’s going on. What’s got you madder than a wet hornet?”

Goldie gave her a hard stare. “Since when is getting arrested nothing?”

“How’d you find out?”

“Irene told me. I need a sit-down explanation.” Goldie nodded her head toward the sidewalk behind her.

Rachel pulled the door closed and followed Goldie to their much-used bench under the streetlight in front of the garage. “How could Irene know? I never told her a thing about it.”

“Well, she does fortunes, doesn’t she? She hears things. And if there’s anyone Irene doesn’t know I can’t think who it might be.”

“The governor, maybe.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Goldie chuckled.

“Okay. The fact is, someone planted a drug on me. OxyContin. A prescription drug,” Rachel said in the tone of someone trying to believe her own statement. “Who the hell would do that?”

Goldie tilted her head back and gave a low whistle. “No clue, girlfriend. That’s pretty serious shit. I hear that OxyContin stuff is sort of like heroin. I think they even call it hillbilly heroin.” She looked at Rachel. “How about that guy you met?”

“Who?”

“The one with the pheromones.”

“Gabe? Why would he plant a bottle of pills on me?”

“He works at that hospital. He’s a pharmacist, isn’t he? That means he’s got the easiest access to just about any drug you could name. Legal drugs anyway. Controlled substances. That must be what OxyContin is, right?”

“I guess he could do it, but that doesn’t mean he would. What reason would he have?”

“Maybe he’s a pervert. Wants to see you squirm. Then when you’re feeling real bad he can get in your pants.”

“Goldie, that’s pretty far fetched.”

“Maybe, maybe not.”

“I don’t think it has anything to do with Gabe. If you want the truth, I think it has to do with that closed ward on the fourth floor of the hospital.”

“That’s what’s far fetched. You have been connecting everything with that. If there’s an earthquake tomorrow, you’ll be thinking it has something to do with that ward. Or maybe it was because of those kids you found.” Goldie nodded a couple times. “But okay, while we’re at it, let’s get them out of the way. Why would those kids have anything to do with someone planting drugs on you?”

“Maybe because I’ve been asking questions about them. Maybe someone doesn’t like that, doesn’t want anyone looking for them.”

Goldie rolled her eyes. “Okay, then how about that hospital ward? Why would anyone connected with that ward plant drugs on you and have you arrested?”

“Okay, you’re right,” Rachel said slowly. “It’s crazy.”

At that, they sat in silence until Goldie broke it. “I can hear the gears grinding in your head.”

Rachel looked over at her. “I do think I know when those drugs got planted.”

Goldie’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “You said they were in a pocket, right?”

Rachel nodded. “The left pocket of my jacket.”

“Maybe someone behind you on a crowded elevator…?”

“I didn’t take the elevator while I was wearing that jacket. I took the stairs.”

“Then you got me,” Goldie said.

“It had to have happened while I was in the O-R, or when I was up on that fourth floor.”

“You think someone was following you or knew where you were?”

“Had to. I’m certain that damn bottle of pills wasn’t in my pocket when I walked to the hospital. It’s cool that early in the morning. I had my hands in my pockets.”

A car sped by, a Hummer, its windows looking absurdly small in the large body.

“Come to think of it,” Rachel mused, “a woman called out to me, in that ward. I think she was trying to stop me. She ran after me. And she had a cell phone.”

Goldie’s eyebrows climbed nearly to her hairline. “So where was your jacket at this time?”

“That’s exactly the point. It was hanging in an open locker next to the dressing rooms in the O-R.”

“So if she called someone, how would this person who wanted to plant drugs on you know that?”

“I’m back to square one. I don’t know.”

“Why would this person, whoever he, she, it, is, want to plant drugs on you?”

“I don’t know that either.” Rachel gnawed her lower lip and slowly shook her head. “To keep me from nosing around that ward? Or nosing around anywhere at that hospital?”

“Okay,” Goldie said. “So what did you see in that ward that somebody didn’t want seen?”

“Well, that janitor guy you talked to was right. There were lots of patients. More than thirty, I think. Other than that, I didn’t see anything. I went into the john down the hall. It was an pretty ordinary john.”

“So why would anybody get so uptight about your being there that they’d stick a bottle of drugs on you?”

“They didn’t just stick some drugs on me, they also sicced the security guy on me. He stopped me the minute I tried to leave the hospital. And he knows me. He’s the guy we saw in the cafeteria. The one you said was a looker. There’s no way he would have stopped me unless someone told him to. Someone who knew there was a bottle of pills in my pocket.”

“Maybe he’s the one who planted them.”

“I don’t think so. He seems like a really nice guy. I was hoping to fix you up with him.”

“Mmmm-mmmm,” Goldie said. “That is too bad. In more ways than one.”

“Why would it be a big deal for someone like me to see those patients on the fourth floor?”

“Maybe they’re experimenting on people. Making Frankensteins or something.”

“You’ve been watching too many horror movies. That hospital has a very good reputation.”

“Maybe it’s because they want to hang onto that reputation and if anyone found out they were making Frankensteins…. What else could it be?”

“I don’t know.” Rachel thought for a moment. “Let’s back up a minute. What if it wasn’t because of that hospital ward but had something to do with the two poor kids I found. One dead, one alive, and they both just disappeared.”

“I knew you’d get back to that.” Goldie leaned her head back on the bench and studied the sky. “Let’s see. You went to the hospital to see how the one kid was doing.”

“Right.”

“And you went to the cops.”

“I will choose this moment to remind you that both those things were your idea. And I called the coroner’s office.”

“I didn’t say you shouldn’t have nosed around. I just said you did. But no one had any idea what might have happened?”

“Like I told you, a couple people thought maybe the boy who was still alive died before he was admitted to the hospital. But the coroner’s office didn’t know anything about either boy, or said they didn’t.”

“Why would they lie?”

“How do I know? Maybe the receptionist is lazy and just wanted to get rid of a pesky phone call.”

999

The next morning Rachel looked up from her bookkeeping in the booth to see a large hand ready to tap on the window and behind it, the woeful face of Dan Morris. His routine had settled into a steady, almost daily schedule of sending parcels via helicopter from Rachel’s rooftop helipad.

She slid open the door. “Hi, Dan. What can I do for you?”

“I just want you to know I’m really, really sorry.” He sounded genuinely upset. “I’ve been told the parking lease will be cancelled.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

“But the lease is paid…through the end of the year, I think,” Rachel said.

“That’s right. I just have to tell you it won’t be renewed.” Morris’ eyes slid away. “They said…I’m sorry to put it this way…They said they can’t do business with a…a felon.”

“For God’s sake! Aren’t people innocent until proven guilty anymore? I didn’t do it, Dan. I swear it.”

“I believe you. I do. But I don’t make the decisions. I sure don’t know where we’re going to find space for all those cars, either.”

“And I doubt you’ll find a nearby helipad.” Her anger surfaced along with a desire to make Dan, as a representative of Jefferson Hospital, even more uncomfortable.

“We won’t be using this one much longer anyway. Couple weeks ago the order went down to the physical plant folks to drop everything and get our own pad back in shape. We’re just waiting for the inspector now.”

“I see.” Rachel had never billed the medical center for the frequent use of the pad, thinking it a good will gesture to keep her new client happy. She made a mental note to bill them for that extra use now.

999

Each of the following three days, Rachel visited loan brokers and picked up applications. She tried to fill out the papers while she was on duty in the booth, but she couldn’t concentrate. After most of her clients had picked up their cars, she pushed the talk button on her phone and dialed the number of Hank’s cell phone. The voice mail picked up.

She imagined him taking out the phone, seeing her name and number on the readout, and turning off the ringer.