Nowhere to Hide (25 page)

“What about our FBI friends? They’re gonna be . . . pissed,” Gretchen pointed out, but her tone said she couldn’t care less.

“I’d rather ask forgiveness than permission.”

“Oho, you’re learning.”

“What about George’s sandwich?” September asked, as Sandler put the Jeep into reverse.

She snorted. “It’s way too early for lunch.”

And she tore out of the lot.

Grandview Senior Care was a one-story brick building with wings that ran off it like spokes from a wheel hub. The wings connected to other wings, some added long after the original ones, creating a maze of passageways that were confusing to the newcomer. September and Sandler walked up to the woman at the front desk, whose ropy arms stuck out from her T-shirt. She was tanned and her nose was faintly burned. She might work at an institution, but it looked as if she spent a lot of time outdoors. September asked for a nurse named Sofia.

“We have a Sofia Markam,” the woman said, eyeing her and Gretchen’s badges with some alarm. “She’s on West A. I can call her to the front, but it may take a while. Unless you want to go back and see her there . . . ? Most of the residents in that area require increased care.”

“Can you direct us?” September asked, and the receptionist pointed to her left and told them to take the second turn to the right. Before they left, September asked, “And I understand you have a Mrs. McBride as one of your residents?”

She made a funny sound. “Mrs. McBride would never break the law!”

“It’s more about gathering information,” September told her.

The woman pointed in the opposite direction for Amelia McBride, and gave her room number as East C #222 in the assisted living section.

“McBride sounds like she has all her marbles, at least,” Gretchen observed.

“I’d like to talk to the nurse first. Find out about her sister.” September had filled Gretchen in on what Auggie had told her about his trip to Grandview Senior Care several weeks earlier.

“Hey, I could miss talking to your old teacher entirely, and it would be fine by me.”

“She was Auggie’s teacher.”
And Jake’s.

Gretchen lifted her shoulders.

They took a wrong turn and had to retrace their steps before they found the correct hallway. There was a small area designated behind a half-wall where two employees were making notes and looking at a central desktop computer. Neither looked up when September and Gretchen arrived and they had to wait a few minutes before the one closest to them, a slim woman in her fifties wearing blue hospital scrubs and a serious expression, looked at them over the top of her glasses. “Yes?” she asked.

“We’re looking for Sofia Markam,” September explained. “The woman at the front desk said we could find her here.”

“Sofia’s with a resident.” She turned back to the computer screen.

“Is there a place where we could wait?” September asked with forced graciousness.

“We’re with the Laurelton Police Department,” Gretchen said, holding out her badge.

The woman zeroed in on the badge, so September showed hers as well. She blinked several times and said, “I’ll be sure and let her know. There’s an alcove with a back door to the central patio. You can either wait inside or out.”

“Inside,” Gretchen said.

“It is hot,” the woman said, trying on a smile that looked like it was a bit rusty.

September and Gretchen moved to the area she mentioned and sat down on a padded bench beside each other. They could look through the windows to the enclosed patio. Several elderly women were seated under the covered section, half in wheelchairs.

“You ever think about being old?” Sandler asked.

September turned to her in surprise. “Not really. Do you?”

“I just can’t see it happening to me,” she said. “I’m gonna burn out early.” Before September could think of a response, she added, “Dom’s off tonight, so we’re going out, thank you, God. He’s probably no better than any of the rest, but there’s got to be something more than the job.”

A large woman with heavy breasts and short gray hair appeared from around the corner. She wore pink scrubs and when she came toward them her brows were drawn into a line and her eyes were full of suspicion. “I’m Sofia Markam,” she stated, stopping directly in front of them.

“I’m Detective September Rafferty,” September said, standing to meet her. “You spoke to my brother, Detective August Rafferty, a few weeks ago about Dr. Frank Navarone. In that interview, you mentioned that your sister worked at Grandview when it was still a mental hospital, possibly when Dr. Navarone worked there. I was wondering if I could get in touch with your sister.”

“I never met any Detective August Rafferty.”

“He goes by Auggie,” September said.

“I spoke to a man who said his brother was Hague Dugan. He didn’t give me his first name.”

September held a beat. “Um . . . yes . . . he was working undercover.” This was a half-truth because, yes, though Auggie worked undercover on various task forces, it hadn’t been quite that way on the Zuma case. Damn him for forgetting to tell her what he’d told Sofia.

“Could I see your ID?” she asked.

September dutifully pulled out her badge again, as did Gretchen who was starting to look annoyed.

She examined the badge carefully, then handed it back, and crossed her arms under her ample breasts. “You want to reach my sister?”

“Yes. When did your sister work at Grandview Mental Hospital?”

“About ten to fifteen years ago, give or take. The hospital closed over five years ago.”

September quickly calculated that Glenda would have been about fifteen or sixteen at the time. That fit.

“You want to know more about Navarone? I thought he finally got put in jail.”

“We’re investigating the death of his niece, Glenda Navarone Tripp,” September admitted. “And we’re just looking for background on the hospital as well.”

“I thought he killed her to cover up something.”

“It doesn’t appear that way,” September said.

“My sister’s name is Dawn Markam-Manning,” she finally said reluctantly. “She didn’t work there long. A couple of years is all. Let me give you her number.” September pulled out her notebook and Sofia gave her the digits. “She works nights at Laurelton General,” she finished.

“Thank you.”

As they walked back down the hall, Gretchen said, “Laurelton General. Everything keeps circling back to our area.”

“Yeah.”

“Auggie didn’t tell her he was a detective. Any idea why?”

“I’m sure he had his reasons, but I wish he would’ve told me. Sofia’s a lot like . . . well . . . Mrs. McBride.”

“Oh, that’s just wonderful.”

September smiled. “You don’t have to go. I don’t even want to go, but in the name of being thorough, I might as well interview her while I’m here.”

“I’ll meet you in the Jeep,” she said and they parted ways at the reception area.

September walked down the hall, aware of an underlying smell of disinfectant and a surprisingly enticing scent of baking bread as they neared the lunch hour. She hadn’t liked hearing Gretchen’s assessment of how she expected to burn out early and realized she wanted the whole enchilada: career, love, marriage, and a family. She understood her sister July’s desire to have a child, not that she was ready for that yet herself, but she certainly hoped that was part of her own life plan.

Jake’s visage floated across her mind and she shook her head. A high school one-night stand did not a relationship make. Still . . .

It took a while for Amelia McBride to answer September’s knock. The white-haired, stooped ex-teacher came to the door leaning on a cane and peered at September sternly through sharp, brown eyes. “Do I know you?”

“I’m September Rafferty. My brother, August, was in your homeroom when we were in the second grade.”

She thought about that a moment, then said, “You’re twins.”

“Yes,” September answered. Apparently she and Auggie’s relationship was memorable enough that both Osborne and McBride remembered.

Her gaze dropped to where September’s jacket had pulled away and she saw the badge clipped at September’s right hip. “You’re a police officer?”

“I . . . yes. Both my brother and I are with the Laurelton Police Department.”

“Well, you’d better come in.” She shuffled back from the door and September entered her apartment.

The place was stuffy hot, but McBride didn’t seem to notice. Her age, probably, September concluded and decided not to ask to open a window or ask for the air conditioning to be turned on. “I retired shortly after your year,” the older woman observed as she sank with a sigh into a La-Z-Boy chair and pulled an afghan over her lap. “That was a difficult year.”

“How so?” September asked, as she perched on one of the two wooden chairs around a narrow table near the kitchenette. She couldn’t believe she needed a blanket in this room.

“It’s always a different mix of kids. Ratio of boys to girls. Social development rates. Temperaments of the families . . .” She said it grimly and September recalled the same “mean face” she’d exhibited to the kids—er—children when she was a younger woman. “We had a lot of boys that year,” McBride finished.

“The boys were what made it difficult?”

“I don’t remember their names. Wouldn’t have remembered yours if you hadn’t told me. I just see the faces.” She sucked on her teeth and shook her head. “That one child . . .”

“Yes?”

“What is it you’re looking for?” she asked.

September thought a moment, then launched into the tale of the artwork that was sent to her, how she’d seen it on the bulletin board in the picture from her homeroom class that Mrs. Peterkin had pulled up, how she was thinking someone from her class might have ended up with it.

“He would have had to have stolen it,” Mrs. McBride stated flatly.

“Maybe he took it off the bulletin board.”

She shook her head and sucked on her teeth some more.

“You were mentioning one child from the class. A boy, maybe?” September prompted.

She made a face. “We had several that were problems that year. Home life wasn’t what it should be. One of them was an object of ridicule for wetting his pants at recess. Another one brought a knife to school. Another one kept pantsing his friends.” She frowned. “Was that Tim . . . no . . . maybe he was from a different year. Had to keep sending them all to the office. It was a revolving door. Just get one back, send another one down.”

“Was there anyone called ‘Wart,’ do you remember?”

“These were second graders, my dear. They bandy around bad names all the time.”

“This might be a nickname.”

She shook her head.

September felt like she might pass out if she stayed much longer, so she stood up, thanked Mrs. McBride, and then said she’d let herself out, when the older woman struggled to get up. McBride waved at her in acquiescence and ordered, “Make sure it’s locked.”

Once she was in the outer hallway, September tested the knob and found it secure. The staff had keys to all the rooms, but McBride was safe within her oven from unwanted strangers.

Gretchen was driving them back to the station as September placed a call to the number Sofia had given her for Dawn Markam-Manning. It rang four times before it was picked up. “Hello?” an impatient woman’s voice answered.

“Hello, is this Dawn Markam-Manning?”

“Who are you?” she demanded.

September quickly launched into who she was, how she’d gotten her number, and what she wanted to know in terms of information. “Anything about Grandview Mental Hospital that may have included Dr. Navarone’s niece, Glenda Navarone Tripp. I also want to—”

“Glenda Tripp was murdered. I saw it on the news. If anyone did it, it was probably her uncle. Look, I was not a fan of Navarone. Didn’t my sister tell you? He used dangerous,
dangerous
methods. He got his license revoked for damn near killing someone he was supposed to be helping!”

“Her uncle was cleared of any involvement in her death,” September said, realizing she’d hit a hot button.

“Keep looking at him,” she advised. “He’s a bad’un.”

Dr. Navarone was a zealot who believed in himself and his healing practices beyond all reason, but he hadn’t killed his niece. September tried another tack. “Did Glenda visit her uncle at the hospital?”

“While I was there? Maybe a time or two . . . I don’t know for certain.”

September said, “We have information that she may have had a sexual encounter during that time on—er—her uncle’s examining table.”

Dawn made a strangled sound. “How did you hear that?”

“Do you know something about it?” September asked when Dawn didn’t deny it straight out.

“Well, Glenda was kind of a wild thing, in those days. Something happened on the examining table. We all sort of suspected, so we hid it from her uncle.” There was a bit of satisfaction in her tone.

“Could it have been with another patient?” September asked.

“I don’t know.”

“All right. Was there someone with the nickname of Wart there at that time?”

“Wart . . .” She turned that over in her mind for a few moments. “No . . . we tried to discourage that kind of thing. It was like name-calling, and it would send some of the patients into a rage.” She paused, then said, “There was one, though, that stuck even with the staff. The boy’s name was Hague, but everyone referred to him as The Hague, which I didn’t get at first, until I found it was the center of government in Holland. This Hague was always ranting about something political, so he got tagged with that.”

“Hague?” September repeated, with a sinking heart. Hague Dugan couldn’t have been the one,
could he?
But then Dawn answered that question for her, by adding, “But he was there a few years after I left.”

“Okay,” September said with a kind of relief. It didn’t sound like Hague and Glenda could have been at Grandview at the same time. “Let me ask you about another murder victim. There was a Grandview patient around the same time, Emmy Decatur. Were you there—”

“Oh, yes. I remember Emmy.”

September gave Gretchen the thumbs up. “Was there something particularly remarkable about her?” September asked, because of the way she’d cut in.