Always Watching (6 page)

“
No,” she whispered. 
“After he… after you arrested Danny, my family wanted me to make a
choice I couldn’t make.  He’s my husband.  Our child’s
father… I couldn’t turn my back on him, not when he needs me so
much.”

I bit back the urge to snort at her
stupidity.  If the tables were turned, Datello would’ve thrown
her under the bus just as fast as anybody else in his warped
family.

“
You don’t believe
that.  I know you don’t know Danny the way I do.  I knew
he had a horrible life… before.  But he really did put it
behind him.”

“
Celeste, I’m not here to
talk about that.  We need to focus on the baby right
now.”

“
I need you to believe
that my husband would sacrifice his life, his freedom, his fortune,
everything he has to protect me and our daughter.  Someone
said that he was probably behind this.  You need to know that
he would never do this to me.  His family on the other hand
…”

“
I’m aware of the lengths
they’d go to, Celeste.  Let’s talk about your family for a
moment.”

“
They wouldn’t,” she
whispered.

“
Perhaps not, but I think
that this might be the perfect time for you to mend fences with
them, don’t you?  The next few hours are critical in this
investigation.  I don’t feel right about you facing this
alone.”

“
Can’t you talk to that
judge?”

“
I’m not sure what you’d
like me to talk to Judge Gates about.”

She clutched my hand.  “She could give
Danny permission to be here with me.  If he could be out for
just a little while, I know he could help you find our baby.”

“
I know you believe that,
but his interference will only hamper our search,” I said. 
“We’ll try to talk to him, Celeste.  I hope he’ll be
cooperative.”

“
But you don’t think he
will be.”

I shook my head.  “Unfortunately, your
husband doesn’t trust me.  Frankly, I was surprised that you
wanted to talk to me at all, Celeste.  I don’t doubt that
Danny has shared his opinions with you on a number of things.”

“
I don’t believe you
could’ve killed Rick,” she said.  “I don’t see that kind of
hate in your eyes.  You’re not like the rest of those people,
Detective Eriksson.  I’d like to think that if Danny had
gotten away from his family the way you did your father, that he
could’ve been very much like you are now.  Noble. 
Honest.  Decent.  Those were the traits I saw when I fell
in love with him.  I knew there was another side, but I
thought …”  Speech disintegrated into sobbing.

“
You thought you could
save him?”

She nodded.  “I will never believe that
he’s the monster that people have accused him of being.  But
we won’t heal this rift if you can’t find my daughter.”

I was momentarily taken aback, not only
because she refused to acknowledge that there were scores of
witnesses to what Datello perpetrated at the Medical Examiner’s
Office, but his employees tried to kill uniformed police officers
when we attempted to apprehend them.  I couldn’t begin to
process her comments on healing some alleged rift.  Did she
really believe that good old Danny and I could bury the
hatchet?  He believed, and rightly so, that I murdered his
cousin, my ex-husband.

My fist flew to one eye and rubbed
hard.  “Celeste, you need to understand that I will put forth
all of my energy and effort into finding your daughter, but not
because she’s your daughter.  I would do the same for any
missing child.”

“
I know that,” she said
softly.  “Which is exactly why I want you looking for
her.  Please tell Danny that I want him to cooperate with
you.  If he thinks you’re lying, maybe he could call
me.”

There was no mistaking the fact that this
woman ached to hear her husband’s voice, maybe even receive some
reassurance that everything would be all right.  It tugged at
my newfound empathy.  “I’ll see what I can do.”

Out in the hall, Devlin muttered, “That
wasn’t particularly helpful.  In fact, I’d call it on the far
side of creepy.  What the hell was that shit about
healing?”

“
Don’t go there,
Dev.  We both know that this woman is blinded by the image
he’s painted for her.  He’s not a good person, and I doubt
he’ll cooperate with me, even if it could save his daughter’s
life.  No, our best bet is to look at who inside this hospital
had both access to the baby and the opportunity to remove
her.”

“
Agreed.”

“
Where’d that smarmy
little administrator go?”

Crevan joined us from behind. 
“Conference room at the end of the hall.  He’s got some woman
in there with him, Vanessa somebody.  Fremont maybe.”

“
Do they have the
personnel files I requested?”

“
Uh, nothing physical but
the woman showed up with an enormous laptop computer.”

“
Dev, are you ready to do
this?”

“
Should we keep
interviewing the staff?” Crevan asked.

“
Yeah.  I want a head
count.  Everybody scheduled to work this shift needs to be
present and accounted for.”

“
Slight problem there,
Helen,” Crevan cringed.  “They had a change of shift just
before you got here.  Hospital security assured us that they
detained everybody that was here at the time the baby disappeared,
but some of the nurses are talking.  It seems that at least
one of them managed to slip away.”

“
Get her name and send a
car out to pick her up,” I said.  “I want her back here before
Dev and I are done talking to the administrator.  What’s her
name?”

He flipped open a notebook and flipped
through several pages.  “Florence Payette.”

“
And her job?”

“
She’s an RN in the
nursery.”

“
Find out if she had any
contact with the child from her coworkers.  Also, Celeste
Datello has some snapshots of the baby on her phone.  They’ll
be useless to us sooner than you might imagine, Crevan.  It’s
all we’ve got at the moment.  Better than nothing I
suppose.”

“
They change a lot after
they’re born, don’t they?” he said.

“
Drastically.  Ask
somebody if Celeste had a cord blood kit.  It’ll be invaluable
if it takes us awhile to find this kid, but regardless will provide
instant DNA for comparison.”

“
I’m on it.”

Devlin held his tongue until we were out of
earshot down the hall in the direction of the conference
room.  “I doubt any of us would’ve thought of that cord blood
thing, Helen.  If we find her, it’ll be a good tool to make
sure she’s who we think she is.”

“
Exactly.  If this
takes more than a day, her features will be significantly different
than they were today.  Birth is a traumatic experience. 
The shape of her head will no doubt be different.  This is a
nightmare.  Toughest thing you can imagine, a baby this
young.”

“
I take it you’ve done
this kind of investigation before.”

“
Unfortunately, more than
once.  Let’s see what we can learn about our missing
nurse.”  I shoved the conference room door open and found
Fangman with a woman we had yet to meet.

“
Mr. Fangman.”

He rose.  “This is the head of human
resources, Vicky Ferrite.”

Not Vanessa Fremont.

“
Ma’am,” Devlin nodded
curtly.  “Wish this was under better circumstances. 
We’re going to need access to your personnel files right
away.”

“
Mr. Fangman and I were
discussing the rigorous process required to hire our staff, sir,”
she said.  One hand rested in a protective gesture over the
laptop computer.  “I can assure you that none of our staff has
a criminal record of any kind.”

My smile sent frost climbing up the
walls.  “Then again, Ms. Ferrite, every criminal has his or
her first time.  I’d prefer that we avoid any delay in
obtaining the information we need.  I believe that Mrs.
Datello – and the lawyers she and her very wealthy husband are
certain to hire – would appreciate your immediate cooperation,
rather than forcing us to obtain a search warrant for these
personnel files.  That kind of lawsuit would be a public forum
after all, and would hurt the confidence the city has in your
hospital.”

One of her perfectly manicured claws tapped
the laptop.  “And I’m sure that you realize we’ve already
summoned our legal department –”

“
Devlin, would you get
Zack Carpenter on the phone?  We’re going to need a phone
warrant from a judge to access these files.  Also, if you
could call someone from the Sentinel over here, the television
stations too.  We’re going to get that Amber Alert on the air
right away, and I don’t see any point in holding the press
conference for this abduction anywhere else.  I’m sure Chris
Darnell can handle it from his command center downstairs until the
FBI arrives.”

Ferrite flipped open the laptop.  “Are
there any employees in particular that you need information
about?”

“
Everyone on duty during
the time that this child disappeared, specifically those with
access to the nursery.  At the top of that list should be one
of your nurses who escaped questioning and slipped away at change
of shift.  Her name is Florence Payette.”

“
Florence Payette?”
Ferrite echoed.  “But she’s a harmless old woman.”

“
How old?” Devlin still
held his phone poised and ready to dial.

“
Mid fifties.  She’s
worked here on and off for years.  Since she graduated from
nursing school, Florence has been voted employee of the quarter, of
the year, countless times by her peers.  She’s worked here
nearly twenty years.”

“
How many babies have been
abducted from your hospital in the past, Mr. Fangman?” I
asked.  “Two?  Five?  Twenty?”

“
Three,” he said
softly.  “But this is the first since we implemented the
security system that is mandated by JCAHO.”

“
When did the first two
take place?”

He glanced at his fuming human resources
director.  “There was one in the mid 1990s, the other probably
before you were born. This one is the third.”

I did the math.  The one in the ’90s
was during the Lowe years of Darkwater Bay.  “And were those
children ever found?”

“
I don’t believe so. 
That was long before our tenure in this hospital, Dr.
Eriksson.”

“
I’d like Ms. Payette’s
file now, if you don’t mind,” I said.

A printer hummed to life behind
Ferrite.  Devlin retrieved the pages and handed them to
me.  I scanned the ancient cover letter.

“
She wasn’t trained in the
United States?”

“
Her mother was a citizen,
but Florence was born overseas.  Saudi Arabia I
believe.”

“
Interesting.”

“
Is it?” Dev
asked.

“
We’ll talk about it
later.  I’d like to see her performance reviews as well,” I
said.  “Has she always worked in obstetrics?”

“
Yes,” Ferrite said. 
“I believe that while she was working her way through nursing
school that she was employed as a nanny for a retired
diplomat.  Her mother had worked for him in Saudi
Arabia.  When he came back to the United States, Florence and
her mother came with them.”

“
And Florence was the
nanny for this diplomat’s children?”

“
I think so,” Ferrite
said.  “This is based on what I can recall from Florence’s
profile being published in the hospital newsletter for her many
honors as an exemplary employee.”

“
I don’t suppose you
remember the name of this alleged diplomat,” a little venom seeped
into my voice.  Ferrite was really beginning to annoy me with
her attitude.  Couldn’t she put a missing newborn ahead of the
hospital’s reputation?  Perhaps she didn’t comprehend that we
could destroy public confidence in the place.  I glanced at
Devlin.  “Did you call Chris about that press
conference?  We need to get the pictures of the baby plastered
all over the country, Dev.”

“
I’ll have Crevan get
right on it,” he said.

Ferrite sighed heavily.  “He’s in
Montgomery.  Every year, he gives the hospital an
endowment.  His name is Sherman.”

“
Hang on, Crevan.” 
Devlin pressed his phone to his chest.  “Eugene
Sherman?”

“
Yes, I see you’ve heard
of him.”

Devlin turned his pointed stare on me. 
“Helen, we need to talk right now.”

Chapter 6

I let him drag me out into the
hallway.  “What I need to do is bitch slap some sense into
that woman.  What’s so important that it couldn’t wait for ten
minutes?”

“
Eugene Sherman is
very
well known in
political circles in Montgomery.  He also died in
February.”

“
Shit.”

“
He’s been a staunch
supporter of Collangelo.  We can’t possibly think some woman
whose mother used to care for his children, probably grew up with
them, is guilty of kidnapping a baby from a hospital.”

“
Why can’t we think
it?  She’s the only person who ran when the police showed
up.  An innocent person doesn’t run, Devlin.”