The Ghost in the Doll (Fox Meridian Book 6) (7 page)

Fox watched as Kit found and displayed a number of LifeWeb feeds and Napier’s personal page, all laden with testimonials. He certainly seemed to be a reliable, well-respected doctor.

‘Dad had a new lease of life after the op,’ Crabtree continued. ‘For about two weeks, it was like he was forty years younger. And then he just…’ She swallowed hard, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. ‘We found him in his room, collapsed on the floor. The paramedics weren’t able to do anything for him. They said it was probably a stroke.’

‘I understood there was CRS?’

‘Yes… His body rejected the heart, partially. Blood clots formed and one… one of them broke free and blocked an artery into his brain. It can happen in older people, I understand. Bart’s been lucky. And an absolute gem. Really, Bart, I don’t know what we’d have done without you the last few days.’

Bart waved that away. ‘I’ve known Sam since fourth grade. I’ve known
you
since you were in diapers.’

‘Just a couple more things, Mrs Crabtree,’ Fox said. ‘Your father had his liver replaced a few years ago?’

‘Dad drank like a fish,’ Crabtree replied, grinning weakly. ‘We always said
that
was what would get him. So he had a hardened liver put in… three years ago. Of course, that didn’t stop him drinking, but it did stop him suffering so much from it.’

‘No problems with that?’

‘None. Mister Napier said that CRS didn’t always affect biological implants.’

‘No. That’s true. Bart has a computer implant to monitor his cybernetics. Your father didn’t?’

‘Oh, he was dead set against having anything plugged into his brain. Said it was unnatural.’

‘I told him he was missing out on a great source of gossip,’ Bart said, ‘but he wouldn’t have it.’

‘Okay,’ Fox said. ‘Thank you for your time, Mrs Crabtree. And again, I’m sorry for your loss.’

~~~

‘Of course,’ Bart said as they walked back out to the Q-bug, ‘they
made
me take an implant. Wouldn’t do the heart without the computer. I wasn’t as averse as Sam, but still…’

‘Yeah,’ Fox said. ‘It does seem a little shoddy for a respected surgeon. Lower profit margin, I’d imagine, too. Still, if his heart was giving out and the alternative was letting him die, I guess some doctors would go ahead and suggest more frequent check-ups.’

‘Maybe. Yeah, you might be right.’

‘Come on. I’ll take you back home and then I’ll go talk to a few more people.’

‘Sounds good to me.’ There was a distinct leer in the old man’s grin.

Fox swung her leg over her bug and settled into place. ‘I think you’re enjoying this
far
too much.’

Bart settled into place behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. ‘When’s the last time you think I got to ride one of these behind an attractive young woman in a little top and shorts?’

‘Dirty old man. Chasing girls at your age…’

‘Huh. I’m old, not dead.’

~~~

Fox did, however, change her outfit before going out to find more victims of the ‘statistical anomaly.’ A blouse and slacks fitted with the idea of someone looking into the death of your relatives better than a cami-top and denim shorts, and she no longer had Bart to make the introductions. By late afternoon, she had amassed relatively little information that Kit had not already found on the internet, but one name had kept coming up which bothered her a little.

‘Harlan George Napier,’ Kit said, redisplaying various internet feeds as Fox drove toward home. ‘Born in Topeka, educated in Topeka and Boston. He was rated in the top five of his graduating class at medical school and did his residency in New York, which is also where he practised until twelve years ago.’

‘Why’d he move?’

‘Unclear. However, he professed a desire to give back to the community which raised him. There is also the fact that a position opened up which gave him a relative increase in salary. He earned more in New York at the time, but the cost of living, especially of housing, is considerably higher in the metro.’

‘Tell me about it. Have you any idea how much a house like my parents’ one would cost in New York?’

‘Yes, I do. Would you like me to tell you, or was that entirely rhetorical?’

‘The latter, as you well know. Okay, so he came home to better living conditions and out of altruism, whatever the percentage mix.’

‘There
may
also have been a woman involved. Eight months after arriving here, he married Christina Cline, a childhood sweetheart, according to the gossip channels. Christina’s previous husband died four months prior to Mister Napier’s move to Topeka.’

‘Did you run her?’

‘Not yet, but I will have a more thorough profile on both of them by morning. I wish I could set up a murder room viron, but we don’t have the spare processing capacity.’

‘And we don’t have a murder. I think you’d have to call it an incident room. We can make do without.’ Fox paused, biting her lip. ‘Could be Napier’s just got sloppy. Could be he’s suffered a run of bad luck.’

‘His reputation is flawless. It seems unlikely that he would be killing these people on purpose. I can see no motive for it.’

‘No, but maybe you will when you’ve worked up those profiles.’

~~~

Andrea was in the kitchen, organising food, when Fox walked in. Fox paused at the sight of her mother wearing a string bikini with a light, candy-striped mesh top and short shorts over it. Andrea carried on preparing lettuce as though oblivious.

‘Mom, what are those denim things you’re wearing called? Because they sure aren’t shorts.’

Andrea patted her behind and then went back to the lettuce. ‘You were out all day, and your father is partial to a little booty. I’ll get changed before dinner. We decided on something light and early. It’s been a hot one.’

‘Yeah, with you dressed like that, I can imagine it was.’

‘I shall take that as a compliment.’

‘Yeah. I think Bart’s partial to a little booty too. Dirty old man. He enjoyed his ride out to see Samantha Crabtree
way
too much.’

‘I’m sure he did. And he wolf-whistles whenever he sees me in this outfit, so you’re probably right.’

‘You let
other people
see you dressed like that?’

‘
You
let Bart Wade ride a Q-bug with you, and you weren’t wearing a whole lot more than I am.’

‘Fair point,’ Fox conceded. ‘I’m going to get back into that outfit. Black was
not
a good choice for today.’

‘Probably not. There have been a couple of tornado warnings for the next day or so. It’s early in the season, so it’s probably nothing.’

Kit popped up beside Fox. ‘I have obtained a feed from the Doppler radar network, Mrs Meridian. There are no indications of tornado activity in the region currently.’

‘Thank you, Kit. You know, I don’t see how Tara managed before she got you. You’re like a little genie popping up with useful information.’

‘Not so much of the little,’ Fox said. ‘She’s taller than you.’

‘But I do have a genie costume,’ Kit added. ‘I’d demonstrate but, uh, it’s a little risqué.’

Andrea turned and raised an eyebrow at her daughter. Fox held her hands up. ‘Don’t blame me. She wears it for her boyfriend.’

‘Vali, isn’t it? Lucky Vali.’

~~~

‘Anything useful come out of your interviews?’ Jonathan asked. They were sitting around the kitchen table for the daily ‘Fox watching her parents eat’ ritual.

‘Nothing I’d call definitive,’ Fox replied.

‘You sound alarmingly like your mother hedging around some politics she doesn’t like.’

‘Huh.’ Fox noted that her mother did not say anything to correct the analogy. ‘Well, the only thing I came up with that
might
lead somewhere was the surgeon. The people who knew who had operated on the… subjects sounds too clinical, but it’s what I’ve got. Anyway, they were all worked on by a guy named Harlan Napier.’

‘I can’t believe he’s responsible,’ Andrea said. ‘He’s
very
well respected.’

‘So it would seem.’

‘He’s fairly big in health and safety voting. Quite a large delegation in that category. Ross has been courting him to help with anything that may need doing regarding this MarTech biotechnology business.’

‘Well, I’ve nothing to suggest he’s done anything wrong. He’s just the man who’s done the work. It’s still quite possible this is all just a big coincidence. I take it you’ve met him?’

‘We both have. You remember, Jonathan. He was at that charity dinner just after New Year.’

‘To be honest, I remember his wife more than him. Christy? That’s right, isn’t it? Attractive, certainly, and the only woman in the room whose dress was more risqué than yours.’

‘Christina, yes. Of course, she married him for his money. Always had a taste for the finer things, but preferred not to work. When her husband died, she didn’t take too long over finding another.’

‘How’d he die?’

‘I’m not sure… I believe it happened in New York. Some kind of robbery, perhaps. It was all over the news channels at the time. “Local man dies in the big city.” That sort of thing. Everyone pointing out how dangerous it was and how it was all so much nicer here.’

‘Yeah, that sounds right. Go to the metros and get killed by a stranger. Stay home and get killed by your husband.’

‘Yes, well, that’s another attitude I had that has changed since I got involved with the Watch. Crime statistics have an irritating habit of destroying your illusions.’

Fox grinned. ‘Aww, you’re just looking at them wrong, Mom. I bet if I gave Kit the stats and thirty minutes, she could have you believing this was the safest city on the planet.’

Kit appeared beside the table with half a dozen charts hanging in the air beside her. ‘Oh, it wouldn’t take me thirty minutes. Statistics are wonderful, so long as you don’t care about little things like facts.’

Andrea narrowed her eyes at the displays. ‘Didn’t we use several of those in our campaign to get the Watch formed?’

‘Yes, Mrs Meridian,’ Kit said brightly, ‘and the conclusions drawn from almost all of them are completely fallacious.’

‘Oh… You know, you should really start calling me Andrea, Kit. If you’ve got to the point of insulting my politics just like Tara does, we should be on a first-name basis.’

3
^rd
April.

Fox waited for the afternoon to go out looking for interviewees because there were still plenty of people in the Kansas Belt who thought of Sunday morning as a time for church. Plus, Fox considered Sunday morning in Topeka as a time to laze around in the sun. Andrea was envious of the fact that Fox’s new skin didn’t burn.

When Fox did finally go out on her Q-bug, she had fairly dismal luck in getting useful information. Two more people named Napier as the surgeon in their own operation or that of their relatives, but one gave a different name, which broke the pattern. There was one more family to try, and Fox let the bug guide itself as she headed out to the north-eastern side of the city for that meeting. Kit had information for her.

‘I tracked down the crime report on the death of Christina Napier’s husband. She was Christina Robby then, married to a real estate agent. His business had taken something of a dip prior to his death, apparently putting strain on the marriage, and the trip to New York was meant as a romantic gesture. He was mugged in Central Park. The perpetrators were never identified, or were caught by one of the private groups and never reported to NAPA.’

‘Cause of death?’

‘Stabbing. He was stabbed through the heart with a slim blade. The ME suggested a screwdriver.’

‘Well, it happens.’

‘There was some suggestion on the gossip channels that Mrs Robby was having an affair prior to her husband’s death, though no potential partners were named. NAPA did a cursory run against her at the time of her husband’s death, but there was no evidence suggesting that she was involved. There were a few eyebrows raised when she married so soon after the funeral.’

‘Doesn’t sound like they were getting on that well before he died, so it’s not
that
shocking. Okay, well, let’s see what this last lot have to say.’

~~~

‘Celia was such a bright girl.’ Celia Partridge’s mother was not a bright woman, as in there was definitely still a cloud hanging over her head, but that was to be expected. ‘She was
so
looking forward to starting her new job and then…’ Mrs Partridge sighed, her hands twisting at the handkerchief she was holding.

‘She died of renal failure? Is that correct, Mrs Partridge?’

There was a nod. ‘Yes… a-and no. They said that her new kidneys hadn’t bonded correctly. Some form of CRS problem.’

‘And she died in Chicago?’

Another nod. ‘She was up there for training. She was starting a new job, you see? She had the new kidneys put in for it and then went straight up to Chicago for the induction course. She was so excited. She was going to guide tourists around the protectorate. She always loved the outdoors. And then she got sick. Collapsed right in the class and they rushed her to hospital, but… There wasn’t anything they could do.’ Partridge smiled. ‘She was so excited. She told me she had military-grade implants. LWE twenty-two kidneys. That was what she called them.’

Fox frowned. ‘LWE twenty-two? You’re sure she called them that?’

‘Oh yes. She said they were among the best. Her surgeon, Mister Napier, told her so.’

‘Yeah, they’re a good model. The army fitted me with them. Uh, she died in Chicago, so did they do an autopsy?’

‘Yes. They had to. We would have preferred… But there are rules, I understand.’

‘There are. Thank you, Mrs Partridge. You’ve been very helpful and, once again, I’m sorry for your loss.’

Mrs Partridge nodded again. ‘Do you think there was some problem with my daughter’s operation, Miss Meridian?’

‘Oh, that’s not really for me to decide, Mrs Partridge. I’m just collecting information. Someone will be in touch if anything does come up.’ Fox got to her feet and started for the door. ‘Kit,’ she said silently, ‘get your hands on that autopsy report and see whether they
definitely
fitted LWE twenty-twos into Celia Partridge.’