Deadly Diversion: A Medical Thriller (15 page)

ELEVEN

Monday, 13 August, 1822 Hours

“YOU HEAR ANY MORE from Harding?” BJ asked me as we waited in line to go through the turnstile into Busch Stadium. “Not from him or his partner.”

After work I’d changed from my green hospital scrubs into cream-colored shorts and a Cardinal-red T-shirt. Standing in the sun, I could feel both already damp with perspiration.

“I didn’t know there were two of them.”

“I don’t remember the second one’s name,” I said over my shoulder. A large man, pot-bellied and chewing on a used cigar, bumped me from behind. I scooted out of the way and waited for BJ to catch up with me.

“McNeil, Tom McNeil’s Harding’s new partner,” she said. “Dark hair, our age, about six foot, good-looking?”

“That’s him.”

“Be careful around him,” BJ said.

“Why? He looked okay. Seemed a little lost on the unit, but that’s pretty normal. Intensive care’s pretty intense.” I laughed. “No pun intended.”

“He’s a hotshot, out to make a rep for himself.”

We started up the ramp, winding around to the upper levels.

“It’s too late, now. Whatever Huey wanted to tell them went to the grave with him.”

“Don knew who Huey was. Said he’d been picked up for some minor stuff over the years.”

I giggled. “He listed pickpocket as his profession on the admitting form.”

She tilted her head, puzzled.

“He only had one arm, BJ, and a metal hook. He’d have had a hard time picking anyone’s pocket.”

“Apparently he was a runner for numbers’ guys back when they had those. Liked to hang around the action,” she said as we wiggled through a line waiting before a concession stand.

“Action?”

She gave me a look I couldn’t read. “Gambling.”

“Uh-oh. Was he in debt, do you think?”

“Don’t know. Maybe. He was a regular at the Ambassador, I heard. He’s one of those guys the department keeps an eye on. They’re never going to do the really bad stuff, they just hang around on the fringes.”

We stopped to catch our breath at the top level.

“Umm,” I said, sniffing. “There’s nothing like a ballpark hot dog.”

“And a beer,” BJ added. We stopped and BJ checked our tickets again. “Straight ahead.. .to the nose-bleed seats.”

The game was sold out and the stands were a sea of red. Cardinal shirts, ball caps and banners were interspersed with a few blue shirts of the Cubs’ fans. BJ sported her Cardinal T-shirt, slightly faded now. It was the one she’d worn the day McGuire had hit his record-breaking homer. We settled in our seats, the shade almost reaching us and promising some relief from the unrelenting heat. BJ took off her cap, shaking her blond hair loose, and fanned herself with the cap.

I hesitated. “BJ.”

“Yeah?” She was watching the players warm up. The Cardinals’ mascot, Fredbird, was running around on the field, goofing it up for the fans.

“You know a guy they call Dog? He’s probably called that because of the way he looks like a basset hound. He used to run numbers.”

Fredbird bounced up the steps into the stands and shook his feathered booty at a woman sitting at the end of a row, eliciting laughs from the crowd.

“Do you know him, BJ, Dog?”

She pulled her eyes away from the field and squinted at me. “I’m not gambling, BJ. And besides, nobody runs numbers anymore. Not now that it’s legal—the lottery.”

“Yeah, I know him. Well, I know who he is. A Cl.”

“Cl? What’s that, short for CIA?”

“No, silly. Confidential informant. Don knows him. He’s given them some good intel, Don says.”

“What’s he do? Just hang around with the bad guys?”

“He works for the casinos. Sits at the table, gambles. They front him the money, and he watches for cheaters—players or dealers.”

We stood so a family of four, lugging Cardinal pennants and balancing drinks and hot dogs, could get by us to their seats.

“Sounds like a perfect job for him,” I said as we sat back down. “Anyway, Dog was in to see Huey a day or so before he died.”

“What’s that got to do with his death? He wasn’t there when Huey died, was he?”

“I don’t think so. I didn’t see him.”

“So what’s your point?”

“Nothing, really,” I said. “I’m still wondering what Huey wanted to tell Harding.”

“Didn’t you say he talked to your chaplain? Maybe he knows.” BJ turned her attention to the field where the team was warming up.

“I doubt he’d tell me if he does. If it was Huey’s confession, that survives death.”

The noise died down and we stood for the national anthem. The sun had dipped below the stadium and a puff of air momentarily straightened the flag to attention.

“Maybe it wasn’t a confession,” BJ said, when we were seated. “Strictly speaking. Maybe Huey just told Father something. You can tell a priest something and, as long as it’s not a formal confession, it’s not sacrosanct.”

“Boy, BJ, you paid more attention in religion class than I did.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t have any choice. Not with Uncle Joseph— Father Joseph to you—teaching the class.”

“Ah, yes, the good old days. ‘Brandon Julia...’” I deepened my voice . .give us the answer! ’” I poked her in the arm. “And then he’d snap his ruler down on your desk!”

“I am not amused,” she said, but laughed to show otherwise, and we turned our attention to the game.

“DID I TELL YOU ABOUT the missing narcotics?” I asked a little while later when the umpires were discussing a disputed call. I had gone out in the meantime and brought us back hot dogs— two apiece—and a beer for each of us.

“I don’t think so,” she answered, her eyes on the field.

The game resumed amid cheers.

“Some are missing.” I bit into my mustard-and-relish-covered hotdog.

Another Cardinal player walked to first base. The pitcher sped a ball to third but the runner jogged back to second.

“They think some nurses are taking them,” I said.

“What do you think?” she asked me as another strike was called and the inning ended. She unwrapped her first hotdog, studied the mustard and ketchup inside, and took a bite.

“It’s a mistake, or a series of mistakes. Maybe a dose gets wasted—the patient changed his mind and didn’t want it, or the doctor changed the order after the nurse checked it out—and then the nurse gets busy and forgets to chart it.”

BJ wiped her fingers on a napkin. “That sounds dangerous,” she said, taking a sip of beer.

“It is. And illegal.” I tucked my trash under my seat and drained my beer. “It never used to happen, or if it did, then we knew some nurse was taking it. But these days we’re just so damn rushed that we have to focus on the patient and not worry too much about record keeping.”

“I guess it would be pretty easy for nurses to take drugs. Couldn’t they just grab two doses and keep one for themselves?”

“It’s not that simple. There are lots of checks and balances.

Narcotics are kept in a locked cabinet, and only one nurse on each shift has the keys. We have to count every vial, ampule and tablet in the cabinet at the beginning and end of each shift. Both nurses sign, the one leaving and the one coming on. Well, usually.”

The first Cubs’ batter struck out.

I went on. “Except when we’re busy and when are we not these days? We hand off the keys like we’re in a relay race. That’s what it feels like every day these days—a relay race.”

The next batter hit a double, running to second base. I pictured nurses jogging around the unit passing off the keys to the next runner.

“So now they’re testing the nurses for drugs. I had to pee in cup this morning.” I clenched my teeth.

“What’s the big deal? You don’t have to worry about them finding drugs in your piss.”

“I’m not worried. It’s just the indignity of it. And they’re not testing the docs.”

“Why not? Don’t doctors give drugs, too?”

“Doctors can only write the script, the pharmacist fills it, and the nurse gives it. And the pharmacy would have a record of it.”

“I thought some doctor in Ohio did that. Overdosed his patients. How’d he do it if they can’t get drugs?”

A ball shot in between first and second base, sliding by the player who grabbed at it. The next batter hit a foul ball, eliciting a sigh from the crowd. He tapped the plate and readied his stance. The pitcher adjusted his cap, squinted at the catcher and leaned back, then released the ball at ninety miles an hour, according to the scoreboard. The bat hit the ball with a crack and sent it spinning into the outfield and over the fence. Cheering Cubs fans jumped to their feet as two runners jogged home.

When the noise died down, I went on with my story. “That doctor in Ohio did it very creatively. He wrote scripts for fictitious patients and picked up the drugs at the hospital pharmacy.”

A ball zinged into the outfield and the fans jumped to their feet as the Cardinal outfielder caught it easily. The Cardinals came up to bat again.

“I’m just keeping my fingers crossed they don’t make a mistake with the nurses’ tests. That’s all we need, to lose more nurses.”

“Don’t worry about the tests. We use them all the time with perps.”

The first batter struck out.

I explained what Max had told me about chain of custody, contamination, and how they set the cutoff.

“See what I mean? They know what they’re doing. Believe me, if someone tests positive for a drug, it means they really took it.”

“It sure set off the nurses who want a union.” I told BJ about the demonstration in the lobby earlier.

“So that’s what that was about,” BJ said, applauding the player who slid into first base, just beating the ball.

“You heard about it?”

“Just that there was some kind of ruckus at St. Teresa’s.”

“It was the nurses and they were mad.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad.”

“Oh, no? You didn’t see it. They were screaming at visitors and staff alike.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know. I left. I don’t know what happened to them.”

“They got hustled outside, Don told me.”

“Any arrested?”

“Cops don’t want to arrest people for union stuff if they can help it.”

“Oh, yeah, you have a union, don’t you?”

“We can’t. We can’t bargain and we can’t strike.”

“Really? I thought you did.”

“I wish. Then we’d have some recourse when the board—the police board—comes down on us. For trying to do our job,” she added.

“So why do you like union members?” I asked, forestalling her litany about injustice for cops, something I’d heard before.

“It’s a brotherhood thing. Working stiffs like us.”

“Sounds like you don’t have much power.”

“So what’s new? We do have an association. Two, actually. One for uniforms, Police Officers Association, and another for sergeants and above, Fraternal Order of Police.”

“I heard something about those, something about them supporting different candidates for mayor.”

BJ laughed. “Yeah, that’s how it always is, isn’t it? Somebody gets a little ahead and suddenly their politics change. But all cops, whatever their rank, are ruled by the police board. Did you know that the board’s appointed by the governor?”

“Why does that matter?”

“The state governor appoints the city police board. What kind of sense does that make? The members of the police board don’t even have to live in St. Louis, yet they can make it a requirement that we have to live there.”

There was an ongoing battle between officers on the force who wanted to move out of the city and into the suburbs mostly because of the sad state of our public schools, and the police board that wouldn’t let them, thinking cops would work harder to protect their own neighborhoods if they lived there.

“What about the bad cops, though, BJ? I’ve seen some of those videos on TV.”

“Yeah, well, they don’t tell the whole story. You ever try to arrest somebody who doesn’t want to be handcuffed?” she asked, downing the last of her beer. “You know how dangerous that is?”

“Okay, okay. But the union fight at the hospital is detracting from what we should be doing—taking care of patients. I think administration and some nurses have lost sight of that.”

“Nobody’s getting violent, though, are they?”

“No, but there were some rough-looking guys hanging around. You know, all muscle, no brain types.”

“Who were they? Cop wannabes?”

“They looked liked gangsters.”

BJ laughed.

“You think that’s funny? Remember the man who died last week? You told me who he was yesterday,” I said, keeping my voice low.

She turned serious. “What’d they do?”

“They just stood around, looking mean.”

“Maybe they’re from the union supporting the nurses. Or maybe the hospital hired them to intimidate the nurses.”

“Hmm. You could be right about that. I wouldn’t put it past them to try to frighten us. They looked like they could hurt someone, that’s for sure.”

“Stay away from them, Monika. Guys like that play rough, regardless of whose side they’re on.”

I told her about Judyth watching in the background.

“You think she knew who they were?” BJ asked.

“I don’t know. She did come from Chicago, though, and they have a lot of gangsters there, don’t they? Maybe the Guardinos sent them to scare Bart, the nurse who was caring for Mr. Guardino when he died.”

“Nah, those guys wouldn’t fool around with anything so subtle.” She chuckled, standing for the seventh-inning stretch. “They want you dead, you’re dead.”

TWELVE

Tuesday, 14 August, 0732 Hours

I HURRIED TO CROSS the street from the parking garage as thunder boomed around me and dark clouds threatened another downpour. Why hadn’t I remembered to use the tunnel? I had voted in the primary election and it had made me late. The woman in front of me had argued with the officials who had told her she wasn’t registered in the precinct. She kept waving her registration card and yelling that they were just trying to keep black people from voting. Finally, two police officers—both white—arrived to escort her out of the building. Luckily, the rain had held off while I had waited outside but had let loose when I came back out and made a dash to Black Beauty. Just as quickly, the sun came back out, steam rising from the rain-slick streets. By the time I reached the hospital, my scrubs were wrinkled, my hair had frizzed, and I wasn’t in my best mood.