Retribution (9 page)

She flung a leg out, muttering, "Jagger, get
over
," and tried to open her eyes.

"Charlie, honey, it's your mother. Can you hear me?"

Charlie pried one eyelid open successfully, though the blurred vision which met her did no good at all. What was her mother doing there? "Mom?"

A blur of light and shadow converged into a large blob that leaned near her. "It's me, honey. I'm right here."

Sitting on top of Jagger, if Charlie could judge the position properly. She slid her legs farther away from the heaviness. With a tongue that felt as sticky and foul as an old turpentine oil rag, she tried to lick her lips. "Jagger's too heavy… make him get down, Mom."

"The dog isn't here, Charlie. Do you know where you are? Do you know what happened?"

She peered through the one eye which would stay open, though not focused, and managed to shake her head. A touch, quick and cool and damp, brushed her forehead.

"You're in the hospital, honey. You fainted on the stage during the benefit."

Dismay shot through her. "Oh, no. No…."

Back in the hospital again. Of course that could not be Jagger on her legs. Jagger came after the hospital… no, even after that. Before Jagger, she'd had a dog named Monte. But the hospital had come first. Always first.

Charlie closed her eyes.

And before the hospital, Midnight had come.

The aching throb pounding her skull suddenly became secondary to the drumming of her heart. She let out a tiny groan, one that was not supposed to escape her lips, but she seemed to have as little control over her lips as over the rest of her. She hated hospitals, she despised them, and if she was in one, she did not wish to stay.

The weight from her leg lifted suddenly as her mother stood up and moved to the head of the bed, adjusting the pillows behind Charlie's head.

Charlie wet her lips and opened both eyes successfully, gazing around. She knew the look of the room when it met her eyes, and the banks of monitoring equipment sitting with the green screens and tiny blips and floating lines.

"Take me home, Mother."

"Charlie! I can't do that. There are tests scheduled. We have to know what happened."

"I didn't have a chance to eat till eight o'clock, that's what happened. If you won't take me home, I'll call Daddy." Charlie struggled to bolster herself upright in bed, and look her mother in the face.

Her mother's lips thinned.

Quentin Saunders, like Charlie, had a poor opinion of hospitals while Mary had the opposite, fully embracing the miracle which seemed to have saved Charlie's life the first time around.

"Charlie, I don't like it when you threaten me. They have an MRI ordered."

She shuddered. She could not stand the confinement of the coffinlike enclosure, had never gotten used to it, her panic growing worse with every exam taken in it. Her heart began to drum faster at the thought of lying in the noisy tunnel for even a minute, let alone the thirty to sixty minutes she knew they would ask her to endure. She wet her lips.

"Mom, every time I trip or forget something or get a little dizzy or nauseated or something goes wrong in my life does not mean the tumor has come back." She pushed the sheets aside and swung her legs over the edge of the bed.

Mary put a firm hand on her shoulder. "You're not going anywhere. Quentin is coming down— I don't have my car here. I came in the van with you and the paramedics." She sighed, and then put a hand out to help Charlie sit up. "You don't know what it's like," she added, her tone conciliatory. "Seeing you faint like that again, remembering last time—"

"Mom, I live in this body. I have a far better idea of what it's like than you do." And she had no intention of staying in the hospital for another minute while they tried to understand what had happened. "I've got deadlines to meet for the Kensington buildings and I'm not going to make it if I'm lying here while they stick pins in me for a week as if I were some kind of voodoo doll." Charlie scooted to the edge of the bed, then she realized she had nothing on but one of those soft cotton gowns that hung open in the back. "Where are my clothes!"

"Hanging in the closet. A little rumpled, and I don't know if dry cleaning can save your blouse…." Mary's voice trailed off. She made a slight movement with her hands as if embarrassed at retreating into a mundane subject like laundry.

Sitting at the edge of the bed, a wave of unsteadiness swept Charlie. She clenched her eyes shut for a desperate second, ducking her chin so that her mother could not see it pass through her. When she opened her eyes, she looked for Jagger who should be curled up in one corner or another of the room.

"Where's Jagger?"

"Oh, Charlie, he was dreadful! He snapped at everyone who tried to get near you. Poor Cameron Mott had to run for his life. He tried to throw his jacket over that dog to get to you—"

"I would have snapped at Cam myself." Charlie tried to shrug, and ended up wincing at a sudden tenderness in one arm. Thinking of the event organizer, she added, "Call Janie first thing in the morning. I want Cam's tickets refunded even before he thinks of asking for his money back. But Jagger… you didn't just leave him there? Or call the pound?"

"Of course not. Some young man seemed to know what to do, he got Jagger to lie down. He said he would take him home."

Charlie stared at her mother in amazement. "You let some stranger take my dog home?"

"Charlie, I wasn't worried about Jagger at the time." Her mother's mouth went into a hard, thin line, and her eyes glistened.

She took a deep breath. "Mom, I know, I'm sorry. But I need Jagger and you don't even know who has him!"

Her mother took a crumpled business card out of her purse and tried to smooth it between her fingers. "He gave me this. I will call him first thing in the morning." Mary Saunders said that firmly as if no one in the world would want to keep a dog longer than absolutely necessary.

"Mother, sometimes I just can't believe you." Charlie put her feet to the cold floor and stood, holding onto the railing to steady herself. She reached for the card. Relief struck her at the name. "This is Ruby."

"You know him?"

Charlie felt her face warm slightly. "We had dinner together. He was pleased to see Jagger." She waved the card. "Put this in my pants, wherever they went to." Her mother watched in disapproval but said nothing as Charlie stood. Instead, she reached into the small wooden closet, rummaging through a plastic bag which turned out to contain Charlie's underwear, and then spread out the evening pants, vest, and torn blouse, slipped the business card into the pants' pocket, and neatly put everything back.

A nurse hurried in, frowning as she took in the erect Charlie and the monitors. "What are you doing up?"

"I need the bathroom," Charlie answered. She found herself losing strength and sat on the edge of the bed.

The furrow in the woman's face deepened. "Bedpan."

Charlie shook her head. "Just point me in the right direction."

The woman hesitated, then took the IV stand and untangled it from the monitor cords. "I'll go with you." She unsnapped the leads dotting Charlie's chest from the heart monitor, tapped in a code, and made ready to escort Charlie. "I have to get you ready for the MRI, anyway."

Charlie trembled. "Not tonight."

"You're not leaving here without one. Don't worry, we located your doctor and he's ordered Valium by IV." The nurse put a firm hand on her arm, and resigned, Charlie shuffled after her.

When they returned from the bathroom, her mother seemed to be asleep, having finally collapsed in the chair in the corner, and Quentin stood over her. He put an arm around Charlie to guide her back to bed, his square face creased with his intense dislike of the hospital. He had nursed his invalid mother in and out of them for the last ten years of her life, and although Charlie scarcely remembered the step-grandmother she saw little of in that time, she knew how he felt. The nurse moved the IV stand back in place and left briskly.

She squeezed his arm. "It's all right, Daddy, everyone's just overreacting."

He tucked the sheet around her legs, before looking at his Rolex. "Your shot should be here any minute, the MRI is scheduled in about twenty." How he knew, she did not know, but she did not doubt that he had already been to the nursing station in the ER and probably knew much more about what was going on than she did. He brushed his silvery hair off his forehead. "I knew I should have come tonight."

"No, you shouldn't have. Just an ordinary art auction, and you needed the rest." Charlie sighed and looked at her mother. "So did Mom."

She plucked at the hem of the hospital sheet.

Quentin Saunders, his near black eyes sharp, his face creased from years of work in the sun as well as behind a desk, watched her. "What happened?"

She shook her head. "I just fainted."

"You don't just faint." Quentin perched on the edge of the hospital bed. He wore casual clothes like some men wore suits, impeccable, creased, and with authority. "You're like me, a workhorse." He patted her sheeted foot. "You missed your last appointment for a checkup."

"Of course not. I went in, it was clear—"

"Don't lie to me, Charlie. That's the first thing the doctors out there told me." He eyed the IV, the small cotton ball and Band-Aid on her arm where someone had drawn blood, though she did not remember it, the leads to the heart and other monitors. "Why did you do that?"

She looked into dark eyes that had negotiated tough contracts the world over, and she was the first to blink.

She exhaled. "All right. I didn't go in."

"Why?"

"I feel great. And I hate that thing, you know how I hate it."

He nodded slowly. "I understand. You're not leaving here tonight till they take a look at you."

"Daddy—"

He put up a hand. "This is not negotiable."

She felt cold.

Quentin Saunders said, "You have to trust me on this."

The nurse bustled back in with a tray, syringe rolling around on top of it. The sight of the needle made Charlie queasy and she fastened her attention on Quentin, as the nurse took her wrist, checked the information on the plastic bracelet and said, "Tell me your name if you can."

"Charlotte Saunders," she answered lowly. Before she'd finished, the woman snapped the end of the syringe off and plunged the medication into the IV shunt. Her stomach clenched at the thought of the MRI coffin. The nurse emptied the syringe and pushed her gently into the bed, saying, "You won't be out, but you won't care."

Efficiently, she put the railing up, brushing Quentin aside to do so. She paused, looking at him. "You the father?"

He nodded.

"They're asking for someone down in administration, for the insurance information and background."

Quentin smiled gently at Charlie. "You have your calling, and it looks as though I have mine." He patted her foot again before stepping away and then carefully putting his hand on his wife's shoulder.

Mary shuddered awake. He leaned down and kissed her forehead. "I am here, and I am gone again. They need me downstairs. She's almost ready for the MRI."

She smiled tremulously. "Hurry."

"I will." He gripped her shoulder as if infusing his strength into her, and left the curtained area.

Charlie settled into the hard pillow, unwillingly, but feeling the lassitude creeping over her, a welcome melting of flesh and blood and nerve. She put her hand on the railing. "Mommy…"

"I'll be right there with you, honey."

Charlie nodded, her eyesight blurring. It was becoming difficult to focus. She closed her eyes.

* * *

As Mary trailed after the bed, the orderly in scrubs wheeled it through half-lit corridors to the Radiology department. She watched them transfer Charlie's almost totally limp form to the bed of the MRI, and strap her down lightly, admonishing her not to move. She stepped back into the operating booth as they took her daughter's blood pressure and checked her before switching on the equipment. Its noisy, resonating hum began, and Charlie's still body rolled slowly into the enclosure.

Behind her, a tech stood at the bank of monitors and screens and a second tech stood waiting to inject the dyes for the second phase of the MRI when signaled. Her daughter disappeared from sight and Mary watched the monitor instead, Charlie's face even bleaker in the black-and-white video quality of the screen.

"She claustrophobic?" The male tech looked bored. His thin, stringy brown hair was combed back, and braided into a tight little pigtail at the back of his neck. His scrubs were rumpled and a coffee stain trailed-down the front of the top.

"Didn't used to be. But she's had so many of these…." Mary's voice trailed off.

"Yeah? How come?"

"She had a pediatric brain tumor."

"That'll do it. What, two, three times a year follow-up?"

"Three times a year, first two years. Now, twice."

He nodded. He began to hum a flat, unrecognizable tune, as he made adjustments and lined up the first scans on the monitors in front of him.

Mary wanted to ask him what was happening, but she knew he would not tell her. If he saw something, he would not comment. It would be up to the staff doctor to read the MRI and interpret it, a formal declaration, and that might not be for a day or two. Everything in writing, carefully worded, precise, not to protect the patient, but the hospital. She shifted her weight.

Music was being piped into the enclosure, and she became aware of its overflow, it vaguely matching the tuneless hum of the tech. He pointed at some stiff plastic chairs in the corner of his booth. "Going to take a while, might as well have a seat."

She took the chair, almost thankful for its discomfort, gouging her behind the shoulder blades, hard as a rock on her bottom, keeping her awake. In spite of it, she must have dozed, for a muttered exclamation from the tech seemed to jar her into awareness.