The Taint (23 page)

EIGHTY-TWO

Even as she walked down the hall toward the morgue she knew what it was about the John Doe that had been eluding her.

The wounds on his arm.

There had been a bandage on his arm covering what looked to be puncture marks. She had thought initially that he’d probably had a series of blood tests and had allowed the wounds to become infected. But where would a man who lived on the fringe of society get blood tests?

It was painfully obvious. The man had been selling his blood. And, Amanda had received blood.

It was almost too impossible to believe.

She pushed the door open and went directly to the man’s body, turning his arm and examining the wounds.

They still had no name on him although Jon had taken fingerprints for identification, which were probably en route to the FBI. He was just a man who had died.

Except, maybe he was not.

She hurried to the lab, mind racing.

The records were kept in a file just inside the door and she opened the drawer, thumbing through the pink slips of paper.

Blood given to Amanda Frey, bought from Aid Services. The donor number was 82-563. The company would have a name for the donor, although it might be a false one. Blood was too valuable a commodity to be too particular about details. If the donor denied having hepatitis and other communicable diseases, by and large, anyone would take the blood.

The phones were still out or she would call the company and ask them to look up the name of 82-563. There was a slim chance she might be able to find some sort of medical history on him. Something to give her a clue as to what she was dealing with.

There certainly was a possibility that the man had been the donor whose blood was given to Amanda Frey.

Yet even if that proved to be true, what form of insanity was transferable through blood? She shook her head. Jumping to conclusions. She had no proof that the man was anything more than a bum. Certainly she could not presume the state of his mental health from a rather tenuous connection with Amanda.

It was entirely possible that Amanda had just been disguising an increasing emotional problem. That, much like the copy-cat killers who emulated bizarre murderers, she had been pushed over the edge by the events of the past days.

Still . . . the odd scene at the man’s death. The absence of decomposition. The clay figures and signs of ritual. The lack of a clear cause of death.

“I’m getting nowhere fast,” she said out loud, closing the file cabinet. She looked around the lab and went over to the incubator, opening the door and pulling out a stack of culture dishes.

These were the post-mortem cultures she had done this morning, having found the other ones missing. The sensitivities were as before: resistant to Ampicillin, Carbenicillin, the Cephalosporins, Erythromycin, Gantrisin, Gentamycin, and on through the list.

She closed the dishes and dumped them into the trash. If there was nothing to which the organism was even moderately sensitive, she was wasting her time running the same tests over and over.

Nathan’s black leather notebook was on the shelf above the counter. She took it down and flipped through the pages—his tiny precise printing throughout.

The most recent entries detailed the existence of 10 cc’s of serum, and, interestingly, a carefully-worded description of the isolation of the invasive body of the organism in the blood taken from Wendall Tyler.

He hadn’t mentioned it . . .

It all seemed to come back to Tyler. Maybe the real answer was there.

She replaced the notebook and turned to leave. Maybe between the two of them, they could make some sense out of it. One thing she was sure of; she’d never heard of anything like it outside of superstition.

Superstition . . .

A tap at the door and she looked up, surprised. “Earl,” she said, “I didn’t hear you come up.”

“I wonder if you could take a look at Jon . . .”

Her heart began to pound. “Why, what’s happened?”

It was an eternity before he answered. “He had a little accident, hurt his ankle.”

“That’s all?” Relief flooded her.

“The nurse is putting ice on it now, she told me to see if I could find you.”

“But he is all right?”

“Oh yeah. He wouldn’t have come in if I hadn’t insisted.”

“Well I’m glad you did. With everything that’s happened, it won’t hurt him to take a few hours off to rest . . .”

“I don’t think he knows how to rest. He’s always working, never takes a day off . . . no, I take that back. About a year back he cut loose, got drunker than I’ve ever seen him, and could hardly walk the next day.”

“Hm?” They started down the hall toward Emergency.

“And Dr. Adams was out of town, so there was nothing to do for him but let him sleep it off.”

She stopped, something clicking in her mind. “A year ago? Do you by any chance remember the date?”

“Sure, June 12th. The first and only time since I’ve known him that he’s missed a day’s work.”

“Really?” She permitted herself a tiny smile. June 12th was the day that she was supposed to marry Kelly. “Well, we’d better not keep him waiting.”

Jon was sitting on the bed watching as Susan tried to balance an ice bag across his ankle. He looked up when Rachel entered.

“This is ridiculous,” he said and pointed at the ice bag.

Rachel came up beside Susan. “It would work better if you would immerse the ankle in cold water for a while.”

“He refused to put on a gown,” Susan smiled grimly. “This is the best I can do if he won’t cooperate.”

Rachel met his eyes. “Aren’t you cooperating?”

“Not if it means putting on a gown.”

Earl snickered from the doorway and all three of them turned in his direction.

“I’ll wait outside,” he said and disappeared.

The ice bag slipped to the floor, scattering ice across the room. Susan sighed and picked it up.

“I’ll have to get another one,” she said.

After she left Rachel stood, hands on hips, facing Jon.

“What is a gown between friends?” She tried to restrain her smile but found it impossible.

“Just look at my ankle.”

“Yes sir.” She ran her fingers along the ankle, making him flex it, feeling the play within the joint. It was somewhat swollen but not obviously deformed. “I don’t think it’s fractured, but I’d better take an x-ray.”

“Is that necessary?”

“Yes.” She paused. “What happened?”

“I ran the truck off the road.”

“On purpose?”

“It was that or else.”

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant when Susan returned with a second ice bag.

“Bring him down to x-ray,” she said to Susan, “I’ll go warm up the machine.”

She positioned the machine over his ankle and put a fresh plate in the slot in the table.

“I’m going to take a series just to be on the safe side. It won’t take long.” She went behind the radiation shield and snapped the first exposure.

In fifteen minutes she was done and she had him wait in the small anteroom while she developed the x-rays.

“Well?” he said when she came out.

“Nothing broken, but you’re probably going to have some tenderness until the soft tissue swelling goes down.” She sat opposite him and regarded him in the half-light.

“Thank you,” he said. He made no move to leave.

“Don’t mention it.” She didn’t want him to leave. There was nothing more than the look in his eyes.

“Rachel,” he said.

“What?”

He stood up, putting out his hand to her and helping her to her feet.

“We need to talk.”

She could not speak because, incredibly, he was kissing her, his arms around her tightly, possessively. When he released her she stepped back and looked up at him, trying to read his eyes.

“Can you leave?”

“Yes, but I’ll need to tell Susan.”

“I’ll be outside,” he said and walked away.

She felt as if she couldn’t breathe until she went outside and saw that he was waiting for her.

“Where are we going?” she asked a minute later as he pulled the Bronco onto the main road.

“My house.” He picked up the microphone and began talking to the dispatcher.

Rachel leaned back in the seat and tried to stop smiling.

She was still smiling when he held the door open for her and helped her out of the truck. She stood waiting for him to lock up and stared up at the night sky. Black velvet with millions of stars.

He began to pace the moment they were in the house, casting glances at her, limping only slightly. She was tempted to tell him to sit down, not to stress the leg but she could sense that whatever it was he was thinking needed an outlet.

She sat primly on the couch and watched him.

Finally he stopped and turned toward her. “How do you feel about me?” He shook his head and held up a hand to keep her from answering.

“I love you,” she said anyway.

He looked at her hard, nothing in his expression to reveal how he felt.

“You were gone for eleven years,” he said then.

She nodded and waited for him to continue.

“And you were very young when . . . that night.”

“I’ve always loved you.”

Again she could not judge the impact that her words had on him and again she waited for him to continue.

“There are things . . .” his voice faded.

“Nothing that matters,” she said.

“But it does. We’re so different . . .”

“Don’t try to be logical, the only thing that’s important is how we feel.” She stood up. “You haven’t said how you feel.”

He didn’t speak and they stood, six feet apart, time passing slowly as she waited.

“It isn’t that simple.” His voice was so quiet she could barely hear him.

“It is.”

“No. It’s not right . . .”

“Damn what’s right; it’s you and me, how we feel. You’re always walking that thin line of what’s right or wrong. It only matters in theory. In practice . . . how do you
feel?”

“I love you.”

“Then it is right.” She smiled. “What are we going to do about it?”

He crossed the room and stood before her and she reached up to touch his face before moving to unbuckle his gunbelt.

She looked at her reflection in the bathroom mirror.

“Hussy,” she said but she couldn’t stop smiling. She ran a comb through her hair and then took a deep breath, turning to the door.

Opening the door, she arranged herself in the doorway, dressed only in Jon’s windbreaker and waited.

He was pacing again but he stopped when he saw her.

“I’m ready,” she said.

“You look beautiful,” he said, still standing halfway across the room.

“I’m supposed to slink over to you but I’m afraid if I try to walk that far my legs will give out.” She pulled the windbreaker zipper down an inch. “You’ll have to come get me.”

Then he was there, lifting her effortlessly up into his arms and carrying her toward the bedroom.

Her body was pliant, moving with his, straining to be ever closer, luxuriating in the feel of his skin against hers. She ran her hands over the lean muscles of his back wanting to memorize every line but he was distracting her and she turned her attention to the insistence of his body.

“Jon,” she said once, just to hear his voice and then she raised her hips to meet him, wrapping one leg over his and there was nothing else.

Friday

EIGHTY-THREE

She watched him sleep, her eyes caressing his face. A remarkable face, strong-featured but capable of expressing such depth of emotion and sensitivity. Kept, most of the time, in check, but there nonetheless.

His hair was tousled, making him look younger and more vulnerable and she smoothed it back from his forehead. Soft, as she remembered it, from all those years ago.

She could hardly believe that it had finally happened.

She smiled and kissed him lightly on the mouth. Moving carefully, she sat up in bed, and pushed back her own hair. She was desperately thirsty but she didn’t want to wake him just yet so she slipped off the bed and walked toward where she thought the door was, hoping that she didn’t run into the wall.

The door was where it was supposed to be and she closed it behind her, groping around the wall for a light switch. Finally, finding none, she started out across the room.

Just as she reached to open the refrigerator door he grabbed her from behind, lifting her off the floor.

“Going somewhere?” He buried his face in her hair, kissing the back of her neck.

“You scared me to death.”

He let her down and turned her to face him. “Hungry?” He kissed her soundly.

“Maybe,” she said. “What’ve you got?”

“What do you want?”

“Dessert.”

This time was slower, more tender, as they learned each other’s bodies, kissing and whispering endearments, melding together until they were one. Afterward they lay, still entwined, kissing until neither could breathe.

“God, I love you,” he said into her neck.

She ran her tongue over his collarbone, tasting him. Her hands explored his body.

“This is assault on an officer,” he said and tried to grab her hands. He caught them and held them behind her back.

She looked at him through a wave of her hair.

“Consider it performance above and beyond the call of duty . . .”

He laughed and let her hands go.

“You’ll get a medal for valor,” she said as he pulled her on top of him.

“Posthumously.”

Now she drifted toward sleep, her body wrapped in his arms, his breath warm on her shoulder. She was warm and relaxed but her mind was not ready to relinquish control and she began the deep-breathing exercises that she used to induce sleep.

If nothing else she had to get a few hours’ sleep so she could function in the morning. Nathan would probably still require medication and further treatment before he could return to the hospital, and she would be little good to him or anyone else if she didn’t rest.

Still, she wanted to savor the realization of her fantasy. How strange that she never would have thought it would happen this way.

She focused her thoughts inward in the form of self-hypnosis, suggesting that she sleep as deeply in the few remaining hours before dawn as possible. Deep, comfortable sleep, emptying her mind of distractions, just sleep.

The animals danced in her dreams.

Hazy, filtered light, like late afternoon, the sun a vivid red ball in the sky.

A flute, the melody somehow more threatening than the shadows behind her.

There he was, drawing the shapes in the loose soil, his hands shaking and unsteady, chanting something unintelligible under his breath.

He looked at her with eyes that glowed red in the thick air. He looked at her and smiled, beckoning to her, come closer, come see and understand.

She could see, now, the circle and the triangle, and the strange markings, which he dug with a grimy finger into the earth. He opened a small pouch and poured the white powder onto the ground.

The straw figures he fashioned from handfuls of the bedding, his fingers stroking the forms into life. He smiled at her slyly and nodded and then brought out the clay figures.

He had all of them again, and he placed them along the triangle, the horned creature at the apex of the shape.

She was there, somehow, in the small shack, watching as he waved his hands and lit the candle. The flute fell silent and a tendril of smoke drifted up from the flame.

Now the chant was merely a series of sounds and she could sense the urgency in his uplifted hands which darted back and forth in the air as if drawing the signs there.

She looked down and saw that the figures were moving, the snake uncoiled and slithering through the dirt, the lynx with opened mouth crouched, ready to spring. The creature bared its fangs, head back, blood streaming from each eye, staining the dirt.

She tore her eyes away and looked back at the man. He showed her a copper box and nodded, then turned his face upward and felt the hand of death.