Guilty as Sin (40 page)

"All right." He slid the note into an inner pocket. "I'll save it for later."

The boy nodded again, scooted behind Father Tom, and scurried along the edge of the room again to the doorway, watching Jay with those , somber eyes.

Hannah came back, pausing to touch her son's head. Josh ducked out from under the caress and disappeared into the family room.

"I'm sorry for the interruption," she said. "Did you decide about the coffee?"

Jay rose. "No, thank you, ma'am. I've got to be going." He dug a card out of one of the many pockets on his parka and handed it to her. "In case you change your mind."

"I won't," she said firmly, but tempered it with an apologetic look.

She was a far cry from her husband. Their marriage would be a story itself, he supposed. Which of them had changed for better or worse? How long would they have hung on if Josh's abduction hadn't pulled them apart?

"It was a pleasure meeting you, Hannah," he said. "Father Tom is it right. You're an extraordinary person. Whether you care to think it or not."

A deep sadness darkened her eyes. "But that's just my point, Mr. Brooks—I don't want to be a heroine. I just want our lives back."

It didn't look as if she would get that any time soon, he thought with pity when he stepped out through the front door and a photographer shot his picture from the window of a Toyota parked on the street.

"She doesn't deserve what's happened to her," Father Tom said once inside the Cherokee.

Wasn't it the role of priests to listen to their faithful ponder the cruelties of the world? Jay thought. Tom McCoy seemed to have more questions than answers, a burden that appeared to be weighing on him heavily.

"In my experience, Father," Jay said, "life is scattershot with random acts of cruelty. Trying to make sense of it either keeps us human or makes us crazy."

Father Tom said nothing but slipped Josh's note out of his coat pocket and unfolded it.

The drawing was simple: a sad face with blank dark eyes, set in the center of an inked-in black square. The caption broke his heart. When I was lost.

Josh wasn't the only one who had been lost in this ordeal. Lost lives, lost love, lost trust . . . lost faith. Tom had tried to make sense of it, had prayed for some comfort, but all he felt was fear as the faith that had anchored his life slipped farther and farther away, and all he wanted to hold on to was another man's wife.

When I was lost . . .

He folded the page and tucked it back into his coat pocket.

The funeral dragged on interminably. Victor Franken had accumulated scores of acquaintances in his seventy-nine years, none of whom was shy about using his death as an excuse to show off their skills as orators. The weather had prevented those from any distance outstate from coming, which the locals interpreted as meaning more time on the pulpit for themselves.

Ellen sat toward the back of Grace Lutheran, fanning herself with her program, wondering if all the hot air was coming from the furnace or if it was simply a by-product of this many lawyers in one place.

The narthex was crowded with reporters, lying in wait to jump people for comments on their way out. Franken's relatives sat in the front pews, including the great-grandson from LA, who had opened the ceremonies with an interpretive liturgical dance that made the locals squirm in their

seats. Minnesotans rarely interpreted anything with their bodies, and never clad in a black unitard.

Life in Deer Lake had taken on all the weirder qualities of a Fellini film, with Rudy Stovich as the sad clown. He stood at the pulpit, his voice rising and falling as dramatically as his expressions.

Mike Lumkin, an attorney from Tatonka, leaned into Ellen and whispered, "If he's like this on the bench, I'm going into real estate."

"Cross your fingers," she whispered back. "Maybe he'll be discovered by television. He could be the next Wapner."

"Who'll play Rusty?"

"Manley Vanloon."

"Sounds like an episode of Hee-Haw," he said with a grimace. "Hey, we need to talk dispo on Tilman. What do you think about time served?"

"I think you're dreaming. Time served and eighty hours of community service."

His eyes bugged out. "Eighty?"

"Ninety?"

"Sixty."

"A hundred."

"Eighty sounds good," he said reasonably, and sat back as Rudy launched into the last leg of his tribute.

Ellen stifled a sigh. She tried to block everything around her from her mind in order to give Judge Franken her own personal tribute. Brief and to the point. He was a good man, a good judge, he would be missed.

The burial had to be postponed until a good thaw. After the final prayer, and three verses of "Abide with Me," everyone trooped to the church basement for cake and Jell-O from the Lutheran ladies' auxiliary and conversation that centered not on Judge Franken but on Garrett Wright and the kidnappings. Ellen made one obligatory round of the room and escaped through a little-used side door that let out onto the parking lot.

By the time she made it back to the courthouse, those who had remained behind to conduct business were closing down for the night and or the weekend. Coats were going on, computers and typewriters turning off, pumps going into tote bags while feet were sliding into snow boots.

Quentin Adler stood with briefcase in hand, talking at Martha, their receptionist. "I would have gone to pay my respects, but I'm up to my ears in work," he stated importantly. "You know, Rudy asked me to take on some of Ellen's cases."

Ellen rolled her eyes and ducked behind him, heading to Phoebe's desk. Her secretary sat with her woolly poncho across her lap, her expression that of a third-grader who was being made to stay late after school.

"Do I have any messages?" Ellen asked, pretending not to notice the pout.

"Your mail is on your desk. Someone sent you roses. Pete Ecklund wants to cut a deal on Zimmerman. A gazillion reporters called. Agent Wilhelm says toxicology shows traces of Triazolam in Josh Kirkwood's bloodstream," she recited, thrusting the slips up at Ellen. "Do I have to stay?"

"Got a hot date?" Ellen raised her brows, trying for girlish camaraderie.

"Not anymore."

"No, you don't have to stay." Ellen dropped her gaze to the note from Wilhelm and tried not to feel like an evil stepmother. "But we could use your help tomorrow afternoon."

Ignoring the hefty sigh, she went into her office. Triazolam. She went directly to the bookcase and pulled a reference book that listed virtually every drug, legal and otherwise, known to mankind. Triazolam, better known as Halcion. A central nervous system depressant once commonly prescribed as a sleeping pill, also commonly used in psych wards. She scanned the list of side effects that included memory loss and hallucinations. When withdrawn suddenly, there may be bizarre personality changes (psychosis) and paranoia.

That might have been one explanation for Josh's behavior, she thought. A strong enough dose could have kept Josh in a hypnotic state during his captivity, during which time Wright could have planted anything in his mind—including threats. Taking him abruptly off the drug might have set off a mild psychosis.

She dialed Wilhelm's number and noticed for the first time the bouquet of red roses in an all-purpose green office vase. Brooks was her first thought. The bastard thought he could ease past her guard with flowers and that damned smile. He and Costello had probably had a good chuckle, strategizing about her over drinks. Sandwiching the receiver between her shoulder and ear, she plucked the note card out from between the thorny stems and tore it open.

"Agent Wilhelm."

"Ellen North here. Thanks for calling about the tox report," she said. "It might answer some questions for us."

"I've got people looking into prescriptions for Halcion filled locally," he said. "We might get lucky. Then again, it might have been filled in Minneapolis where there must be a couple hundred pharmacies."

"Gotta start somewhere," Ellen said. "Have you got a report on O'Malley's blood tests? She believed Wright injected her with something while she was unconscious. If we could get a line on both drugs . . ."

The rustle of paper sounded like static over the phone. "Hang on."

Ellen opened the note card. A folded piece of paper dropped out. The ird itself was blank. Odd. Ellen set the card aside and opened the folded aper.

                
evil comes to SHE who searches for it

                        
search S for SIN

                       
see where we've been

Ellen dropped the note and shot up out of her chair, jumping back from the desk. The telephone receiver clattered down over the drawer fronts and dangled.

"Ms. North? Are you there? Ms. North? Hello?"

search S for Sin . . . see where we've been . . .

"Oh, God," she whispered, looking wildly around her office. Her sanctuary. The one place in her professional life she felt she had absolute control. Her gaze landed on the filing cabinets.

search S for Sin . . .

Shaking, she jerked the drawer open and flipped through the files. One stood out—cleaner, stiffer, unworn. The word "sin" in bold caps on the tab.

He'd been in her office. The son of a bitch had been in her office.

She lay the file atop the others in the open cabinet and turned the cover back. Staring up at her from the small square of a Polaroid snapshot, blank-eyed and expressionless, was Josh Kirkwood.

CHAPTER 22

The day had seemed to last forever, and yet night fell too soon. The contradiction, Hannah thought, was just a reflection of her own inner turmoil. She had been gone from the hospital longer than two weeks. She couldn't imagine leaving Josh and Lily, and yet she missed her work terribly. She missed the place and the people, her patients, her co-workers, her friends, the normalcy of routine, the drudgery of paperwork. Most of all, she missed who she was at work. The strength of mind and will she wore in that role seemed to have come off with the white lab coat and the fake brass name tag.

She would never have said she defined herself by her job. It wasn't who she was, it was what she did. But without the frame of reference it provided, she felt lost. And with the feeling of loss came guilt. She wasn't only a doctor; she was a mother. Her children needed her. Why could she not define herself in those terms?

The curse of the nineties woman, she thought, struggling for a sense of humor. A futile struggle. The day had held little to laugh about and was only going to get worse.

The weather had forced her to cancel Josh's appointment with Dr. Freeman. A friend from the hospital had called and told her Dr. Lomax was beginning to make noises to the administration about officially naming him temporary director of the ER—a condition he would then fight to make permanent. Director of the ER—the promotion that had passed over his head and landed squarely on Hannah's shoulders just a month ago. She worried that they might actually listen to him, then raked herself over the mental coals for letting anything but Josh's situation take precedence in her mind.

Ellen North had called to tell her they had another piece of physical vidence against Wright, but that Garrett Wright's attorney wanted access to Josh's medical records, a ploy meant to divert attention away from Wright and onto Paul.

And Jay Butler Brooks wanted to write a book about it all.

Hell of a day.

Costello's charge occupied her mind like a big black rat chewing at her nerves. The implication was that Paul had abused Josh—a charge that she had rejected out of hand. Paul would never intentionally hurt his children. He didn't even believe in spanking. And yet how many times lately had she been struck by the horrible sensation that he had become a stranger? He had lied to her, lied to the police, evaded questions and twisted nonanswers into self-righteous outrage.

She remembered too well how Megan O'Malley had questioned her about Paul after Josh's jacket had been found on Ryan's Bay.

"When did you start to notice a change in him? . . . he's been withdrawing more recently? . . . Does he normally ignore his answering machine when you call him at the office at night?"