One September Morning (41 page)

Seattle Flint

T
he Lakeside Hospital Web site dedicates an entire page to Dr. Charles Jump, Director of Psychiatric Services. His record in the U.S. Army is lauded, as well as his educational background—a Bachelor of Science at Rutgers University and an M.D. at Harvard University School of Medicine.

“Very impressive,” Flint says aloud for the benefit of anyone in the newsroom who cares to hear.

The snag here is that it’s a load of bullshit.

Charles Jump didn’t attend Rutgers or Harvard University.

A check with the American Medical Association revealed that Dr. Charles Jump was a Board-Certified Psychiatrist, a graduate of the University of Missouri School of Medicine.

A good guy, according to his obituary. Dr. Jump passed away in Kansas City back in 2003 at the age of seventy-four.

Something stinks here, a real rotten egger. Flint’s favorite kind of story.

He’s supposed to be covering the grand opening of the Potlatch Trail, a new path connecting South Lake Union to Elliott Bay. Snooze. The exposure of Charles Jump’s fraudulent ways, however, is a story with mileage.

His only concern is that Abby Fitzgerald is caught in the eye of this storm.

He tries calling her for the ninetieth time, but again, the voice mail clicks on. Damn. Where the hell is she? No answer on her home phone or her cell.

To build a story, he needs to speak with someone from the hospital’s human resources department, inquire about their hiring practicing and process of checking employment history, but that will have to wait until morning, since HR people work bankers’ hours.

So where does he stand now?

He’s got to talk to Abby.

She needs to be warned. And if he’s going to write this story, which he’s itching to do, he wants her to be onboard. Although the promise was unspoken, he never intended to write about John Stanton, never wanted to use his connection to Abby for a story. But now…this thing is spiraling out of control, way beyond the orbit of John’s celebrity, and Flint wants to be the one to lasso the moon.

He could lump this all into an e-mail, but that would be a little abrupt, considering they haven’t had any contact with each other since they argued. Somehow, an attack on Jump doesn’t seem to be the best way to reestablish the connection.

Hey, here’s some dirt on the asshole you were shacking up with last time we tangled.

No, that’s not quite right.

You know the dickhead who’s been borrowing your razor? He’s actually an imposter, someone who’s stolen a dead man’s identity.

But Suz Wollenberg said Abby and the dickhead weren’t shacking up anymore. Actually, she said Abby never slept with the man, though that wasn’t his take on it.

“Believe me, it never happened. Never.” Suz was emphatic on the phone. “But I think Abby is embarrassed because she let him push her around and…well, you’ll have to get the details yourself. Abby says the man is a sociopath, whatever that means, but it’s clear he’s targeted Abby and he’s like a shark with his jaw clamped shut and just can’t let go. Just this weekend, he slipped Abby drugs and scared the hell out of her by taking Sofia, but he’s a careful motherfucker. We can’t prove anything. The bottom line is, this guy is a psycho tyrant, and we’ve got to figure out what rathole he crawled out of and expose him.”

“I never liked the guy but I didn’t peg him as a psycho.”

“Well, think again. Abby says he’s a sociopath, a manipulative, charming asshole who doesn’t feel guilt. Look, I’ve got to get to a meeting, but you get going and do some digging, okay?”

“You’re pretty passionate about your cause,” he told Suz.

“I’ll leave the passion to you. Me, I’m just trying to watch out for my friend. She’s been through a lot, and she’s in an impossible situation right now. This psycho is her boss at the hospital.”

“I get it. I’ll do some digging under Jump’s rocks,” he told Suz.

Of course, when he made that promise, he had no idea that a few records checks would open a huge can of worms.

He tries Abby again, but still gets no answer. This time he leaves a message. “Dammit, Abby, call me.”

“Charming,” says his editor, Nina Torkelson, as she walks past him without looking. Nina possesses a luscious voice and the body of a Teletubby. When he was embedded in Iraq, speaking to her daily on the phone, he was sure she was much sexier than he remembered. Wrong. “I wouldn’t wait around to hear back from that one, Flint.”

Flint rakes his hair back with his fingers. “Yeah, I always stick my foot in it.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be at the Potlatch Path event?” Nina calls.

He checks the clock in the corner of his computer. Might as well, since there’s no way he’s getting through to Abby today. “I’m on it,” he says, swinging his fleece-lined denim jacket over his shoulders as he heads out to the elevator.

Today he’ll cover the community event. Tomorrow, Doctor Imposter.

Lakeside Hospital
Sharice

I
n the haze of near-sleep inside Madison’s room, colors dance in Sharice’s mind.

Velvety evergreen branches. Emerald green fields of clover edged by wildflowers in bursts of brilliant yellow, red and violet. A dusky purple mountain ridge holding up a big cerulean sky. The rich colors come to mind when she thinks of Noah these days, having seen her youngest son standing before towering pines in a photo on the war resisters’ Web site. In the picture Noah looks healthy, and his e-mails are very positive, talking about the hard work of helping some Canadians run a dairy farm and the peace he’s found living in the countryside. Madison has already promised him a visit, and Sharice hopes that one day that might happen. Maybe she and Madison could travel there together, a mother-daughter trip before Madison finishes high school.

Settling into the corner chair under the blankets the nurses brought her, Sharice falls into melancholy over her failure to protect her children. Why do parents believe they can handle the navigation and growth of tiny beings when the world is riddled with hazards, dangers, evils?

How ambitious she was when her children were toddlers. How blissfully ignorant of the dangers that would appear suddenly, giant potholes in the course of a life.

Good, solid, strong John…all the love in the world could not keep him alive.

Sensitive, smart, diligent Noah…living a world apart, unable to ever rejoin them.

And Madison, her persistent baby girl who taught herself to walk at ten months, bruised shins and all. How does a mother help a child walk without worrying that she’ll walk away?

Her daughter is breathing more deeply now in the nearly dark room. The light rack behind Madison’s bed has been switched to night-light mode, and the only other light in the room floods in from the corridor through the glass window in the door. In the dimness, Madison’s body seems so small under the sheets, as if she were still a child.

And in a way, she still is. Sixteen. A foot in each world.

Sharice rarely questions the decisions she’s made regarding her kids. Somehow, a mother just knows what’s right for her own kids.

But what if she and Jim were wrong about Dr. Jump? Madison, who vehemently resisted when they made her see the psychiatrist for her first session, recently softened her attitude toward Jump. Or was that the drugs making her go soft? Sharice worried about those drugs, too. Maybe they should wean Madison from them?

Or maybe Abby was right about switching to a different therapist. Sharice still had a bad feeling about Charles Jump’s credentials—the lies about Rutgers and Harvard. Since that day, she has not mentioned her discoveries to a soul, but it always niggles at her.

Why did he lie about his college alma mater?

What was he trying to hide?

Really, if there was any question about the man’s credentials, he shouldn’t be treating her daughter. Her baby girl. It was Sharice’s job to watch out for Madison, and if that meant hurting some feelings here and there, so be it.

Tomorrow morning, when Jim stops in to visit, she’ll discuss changing therapists for Madison. Certainly, after the incident today, Dr. Jump would understand. In fact, he might welcome the change that would let him off the hook. She settles into the chair, relieved to have a plan.

The slightest creak of a rubber sole on the tile awakens her. She stares at the strange properties of the room, taking a moment to realize where she is.

A glance to her left reveals someone standing over her daughter.

Dr. Jump.

At first realization she is warmed by his presence. She wouldn’t expect a psychiatrist to visit his hospitalized patients in the middle of the night.

Then she sees the syringe in his hand.

What?

As she watches in horror he folds down the sheet and reaches down to Madison’s hips, turning her slightly in the bed. His hand snakes under her gown to her bare bottom, smoothing a path there.

He tests the syringe. In the silhouette of light from the hall she sees the tiny spirt of liquid arching through the air from the needle.

“No!” she shouts, startling him. “Don’t do it. She’s not going to have any more medication from you.”

He swings the syringe aside, wheeling to see who’s been behind him. “Mrs. Stanton! I’m sorry, did I wake you?”

She throws off the blankets and rises. “Take that away. We’re done with drugs, doctor.”

“This? Oh, this is just something to help her sleep peacefully.”

“I said take it away.”

Dr. Jump places the syringe onto its tray and steps back. “I just didn’t want Madison to have a restless night.”

“But I want her to wake up. Three, four in the morning. I’ll be happy to have her awake, happy to have the chance to talk with her.”

“That’s not advisable. Madison is in such a deep depression, she’ll probably be unresponsive, anyway. I hate for you to be frustrated.”

“I’ll deal with that when it happens. If it happens.”

He folds his arms across his chest. “Oh, it’ll happen, all right.” Anger simmers in his words. His gaze scrutinizes her as she lowers Madison’s gown and pulls the sheet up to her chin. “And I don’t take kindly to people coming in here and telling me how to do my job.”

Sharice smooths her daughter’s hair back and turns to him. “Dr. Jump, that’s the last time you will ever, ever touch my daughter.” She grabs her cell phone and flips it open.

“Mrs. Stanton…Sharice…” His tone softens in appeal—back to Dr. Jekyll. “Don’t do something you’ll regret.”

Oh, she had regrets, all right. And they started with choosing him as a therapist.

“Jim?” Her eyes never leave Dr. Jump. “Sorry to wake you, honey, but I need you, now. We’re taking Madison home. No, she’s not awake yet, but…we’ll figure it out. I’ll pay for an ambulance if need be.”

“You’re overreacting,” Dr. Jump says. “And you’re making a mistake. Home is a negative environment for her.”

“Well, then,” Sharice pushes the nurse’s call button, “we’ll have to work on that, won’t we?”

After the nurse responds, Dr. Jump recedes to the doorway. “This is a mistake, Sharice.”

“Not the first time, and it won’t be the last,” she says. “Goodbye, Dr. Jump.”

Fury flares in his eyes, but he turns on his heel and leaves.

Finally.

As Sharice packs up Madison’s clothes and belongings, her duty as a mother crystallizes in her mind. She’s taking her daughter home, which is where Madison needs to be right now. When Madison wakes up, Sharice is going to open the lines of communication between them and they are going to talk, every day and always. She’s going to make sure Maddy attends a twelve-step program. And she’s going to let her daughter march in war protests 24/7 if that’s what Madison thinks is right.

I’ve lost one already. I am not going to lose Maddy.

Fort Lewis Flint

T
he last time he did this, he walked in on a half-naked man and a roomful of underwear.

“Maybe you can get it right this time,” Flint tells himself as he takes the Fort Lewis exit off I-5 and cruises to a stop at the light. This time, he’s got some information Abby wants. Hell, he’s got stuff that should keep her away from that hospital until the real psycho is under lock and key.

He just hopes she’ll listen.

The lights are on, but Abby isn’t answering. He moves away from the door to the front window, looking for signs of life. “Abby? Where the hell are you?”

“I’m right here,” comes a voice from the side of the house. Abby steps out from behind the shrubs, an aluminum baseball bat dangling from one hand. She’s wearing a short silk leopard-print robe with sweat pants and Crocs.

“Practicing your batting stance?”

“Just taking some precautions,” she says, motioning him over. “Come on. We’ll go in the back door because I left it open.”

“I’m impressed. You’ve devised your own alarm system.”

“Don’t be. It’s more like an escape hatch so I can get the hell out. And I guess I should apologize for chasing you out last time you were here. I was kind of worn down by everything, and I lost perspective.”

“I’ll say. You were dating Charles Jump.”

“I was
not
dating him.” She tightens the belt of her robe. “I wasn’t really, though he was pushing for that. But a few things have changed since the last time you were here. I’ve discovered that Dr. Charles Jump is a sociopath, and I’ve determined that I’m his next target.”

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.” The cavalier attitude is a cover for the protective instincts that slammed him when he started researching Jump yesterday. He’s relieved that she’s being careful, that she’s making an attempt to protect herself from Charles Jump, but from the research he’s done on the profile of a sociopath, her baseball bat security system might not be enough.

He wants to protect her. He’d like nothing more than to keep her at arm’s length until Jump is apprehended. But, being a practical person, he knows you can’t have everything you want.

“Jump is one of the reasons I’m here.” He pauses in front of the back door. “After you.” When she passes by him in a cloud of sweet flowers, he has to restrain himself from touching her hair.

Better watch it, or she’ll use that bat.

Inside, the house is not as homey as he remembered it. The kitchen walls are bare, and boxes line one wall of the dining room, stacked up to his shoulders. “What happened here?” he asks.

“I’m packing. I need to be out next month, but I haven’t had time to find a new place with my internship and everything else that’s going on. My stuff is going into storage and I’ll be staying with Suz and Sofia in Tacoma.”

A few miles closer to me.
“Sounds like a plan. Honestly, I wish you were living there already. Not that the base isn’t usually safe, but even the Military Police can’t guard an individual twenty-four/seven.” He leaves his jacket on but sits down at the kitchen table.

“And you think Suz can protect me?”

“Safety in numbers. I have to admit, after Suz called and asked me to check out Jump, it really rattled my cage.”

“Suz called you…” She rolls her eyes. “Of course, she did.”

“And it’s a good thing. I don’t think you realize who you’re dealing with here. And I agree that he’s targeted you. That’s something sociopaths do, right?”

“They seem to choose victims, find the individual’s weakness and prey upon it. But with Jump, I think he devised a grander scheme, starting with John.”

“Back in Iraq?” He shrugs out of his jacket. “You think Jump was the killer?”

She nods. “You don’t seem surprised.”

“I’ve had some experience with reading people. I’ve always known that Jump was a great bullshit artist. You couldn’t trust him.” He puts a hand up. “Not that I knew Jump killed John when I met him back at Camp Despair. I’m not that good.”

“Do you want some tea?” She turns the gas on under the kettle. “I’ve got decaf.”

“Now you’re making me feel old. Sure, but do you have straight up, conventional tea?”

“
Man
tea? Let me look.”

“I’m sorry about John.” She looks up from the open canister, and he continues, “I didn’t mean to sound cavalier about it just now. While I suppose it must be a relief to identify the man who murdered him, it’s a concern to know the killer is still out there, free.”

“It’s more than a concern. Jump has targeted the people who were important to John: me, John’s sister, his parents. He’s zeroed in to identify our weaknesses and, well, attack our vulnerable spots.”

“Not if we stop him first. I’ve been checking up on Dr. Charles Jump, and the man is not who he claims to be.”

She swings around with a mug in her hand. “What did you find?”

“First off, Jump didn’t go to Harvard or Rutgers.”

She points an empty mug at him. “I knew he was lying about Rutgers! You know that photo of Jump and John? It was Photoshop’d. Jump’s face was plastered over Spike Montessa’s. What else?”

“Dr. Charles Jump died in 2003. The guy was in his seventies, and his wife reported a burglary at his home the week after he died. Some lowlife broke in and robbed the place while the family was attending his funeral. Can you imagine that?”

Abby frowns. “I can imagine.”

“So here’s the thing from my angle.” Flint shifts in the kitchen chair, wishing he could do more than just write Charles Jump up in a story. “Investigating Jump could be a great story for me, but I wanted to check in with you first. I don’t want to write a piece that takes advantage of our relationship.” Whatever that relationship might be. At the moment, he’s not really sure.

“A story about Charles Jump? Write anything you want. You wouldn’t need to quote me, would you?”

“Definitely not. Though I’d like to point to the possibility that Jump murdered John in the so-called friendly fire incident.”

“Then go right ahead.” She pours hot water into the two mugs and places one in front of him. “Here you go. One mantea. I’m sticking with chamomile. Not that I’ll ever get to sleep, but I like to think it will help.” Squeezing honey into her mug, she asks: “So what’s your next step to research the piece?”

“I’ve already sewn up interviews in Kansas City, Missouri, where the Widow Jump lives. The police there were pleased to have a lead on their old burglary complaint. I’ll see what my army contacts can find out about a sociopath like Jump slipping through the screening process. And I’d like to talk with Lakeside Hospital’s HR department in the morning.”

“The hospital…are you planning to reveal the truth to them tomorrow?”

“That’s not the way I usually work.” A journalist’s job is to find your lead, build a story, get the facts straight, and get it printed. He was not a cop or a federal prosecutor empowered to stop or punish crimes. He lifts the mug to his lips. “But I suppose I could let one or two disturbing facts slip if it helps your case.”

“That would be extremely helpful.” She sips the tea, then holds the mug below her chin. “Tomorrow morning…that gives me opportunity to strike at the same time.” Her green eyes soften with relief, and from this close proximity he can see the little flecks of gold that have always intrigued him. A man could spend days lost in those eyes.

Snapping out of it, he asks, “You have a plan in mind?”

“My first strike would be to go to the head of the psych services team and report that Dr. Jump is not really a doctor.” She places her mug on the table. “After that, I’m not sure I’ll have my internship anymore, but I’ll deal with that when it comes. I’ve got a discharge review for Emjay…I wish I could get that done beforehand, but if Jump is relieved of duty, I’m sure the doctor who steps in will do the right thing.”

“So first you get him out of the hospital.” He nods.

“It’s a start. Then…it’s a matter of getting him incarcerated. I’ll go to Sergeant Palumbo and my other military contacts with the theory that Dr. Jump killed John.” She shrugs. “We’ll see what they do with—”

The crash startles her. Her arms fly wildly, knocking her mug of tea to the kitchen floor.

Adrenaline stings right up to the top of Flint’s head as he slides out of his chair and leaps over to Abby. He pauses in the doorway of the dining room, standing between Abby and the source of the noise.

“Who’s there?”

He flips the light switch and the room is awash in stark white, illuminating a box that has fallen from the top of the stack. Books spill out from the top, one of them cracked open.

“A box fell,” he says, leaning down to stack the books. “Looks like these are stacked too high.”

“Oh my God.” Abby presses a hand to her chest, her fingers flat beneath the fine bones of her clavicle. “That scared me.”

“Got my blood moving, too. There’s nothing like being the target of a sociopath to keep you on your toes.”

She turns to the kitchen and sighs. “Look at the mess I made.”

While Flint picks up the fallen box and begins to rearrange the more tenuously stacked items, Abby cleans up the spill in the kitchen.

“So you’re planning to come back here in the morning,” she says. “The traffic between here and Seattle is going to be a bitch.”

“Yeah, that’s a given.”

“You could stay here, if you want. The couch opens up to a bed.”

He hesitates. “That’s a great offer.” It would save him a frustrating drive, and give him peace of mind knowing Abby had protection tonight. “But I don’t want you to think I’m pulling a Jump on you.”

“Well, first of all, I won’t be doing your laundry. And second, it would be a favor to me. I’ll sleep a lot better knowing I’m not alone in the house. And third, we lived together for four years in college.”

She appears at the doorway of the kitchen—sweat pants, spotted silk kimono, and dish rag.
Has a woman ever been more beautiful
? “I think I can trust you for one more night.”