Thank goodness Amos drove. I pressed Cedric’s phone number over and over again, but all I kept getting was his voicemail. Cedric often stayed on call at the hospital since he was always delivering babies. No matter how upset he was at Carmen, he would be available for his patients. If I called him and he couldn’t get to the phone, I always left a message for him. Cedric was good about calling back or better yet, showing up at my house.
“What should we do? I don’t know whether to find Cedric or check on Carmen.” A thought had occurred to me as soon as Carmen said Darius was dead, but I couldn’t bring myself to focus on the thought.
“If Carmen was worried about Cedric, maybe we should find him.” As though he could read my mind, Amos asked the unthinkable. “Do you think Cedric would have gotten angry enough to go after that man?”
“No! Cedric didn’t even know the man. That’s not Cedric. He would go off in a corner somewhere to think, but he wouldn’t do anything impulsive.”
Amos nodded as though to reassure me. “The police are going to want to know both Carmen and Cedric’s alibis. I will find out what I can from the police department. I still have some buddies over there.”
“I do know Cedric spends the night at the hospital if he has a patient in labor. Maybe if we swing by there, we can find him.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Amos merged into I-526 traffic to head out towards Bon Secours St. Francis Hospital. He found a parking space at the hospital and turned to me. “I’ll make some calls out here. You go find your son.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. I was sprinting towards the hospital door as though I was in medical trouble, but my emergency was a little different. I headed straight to the elevators. There were a few others waiting for the elevator to go up. I tried to remain calm, but my breakfast was turning cartwheels in my stomach.
Seniority was in my favor when the elevator arrived because the others waited for me to step on first. Going on what I knew about my son, I pressed the number for the maternity floor. Cedric was a sensitive soul who didn’t get along with his father at all. It was ironic that he was the one to follow in Ralph Patterson’s footsteps. My eldest son, Ralph Patterson, Jr., better known as Junior to everyone, followed his own path and became a lawyer.
Ralph had been an obstetrician at the old Charleston Memorial Hospital for thirty years and created quite a legacy before he passed. Though Cedric had stepped into his father’s role, he made his own mark. Like father, like son. They were trusted doctors delivering thousands of babies.
As soon as the doors opened, I walked purposefully towards the nurse’s station. I had known many nurses in my time. They were a sharp crew who could tell you anything you needed to know. It was their duty to look after their patients which also meant keeping up with the doctor as well.
Head Nurse Maddy O’Donnell was barking out orders to three nurses at the station. I walked directly towards her. If anyone knew where Cedric was, it would be Nurse Maddy. She’d been at the hospital when Ralph was still alive.
She looked up as I approached, a smile stretching across her stern face. “Mrs. Patterson, it’s been awhile since I’ve seen you. Don’t you look good? Retirement is certainly agreeing with you.”
“It’s the best thing ever to finally have time for oneself.” I tried to smile back, pretending like I wasn’t going out of mind. “Would you happen to know where my son is? My future daughter-in-law and I are trying to track him down.”
“Oh yes, we’re all so excited about the upcoming wedding. Who knew someone would finally snatch the bachelor?”
“Yes, I know. Do you know where he is?”
“He was sleeping in the resident’s room. Looked like he’d been there all night. He has Mrs. Hanson on his list today, but she’s only dilated two inches so far. Looks like a long labor for that woman.”
“Sounds like it. Can you point me in the right direction?”
“I’ll walk you back there.”
“Bless you, Maddy. I appreciate this so much, thanks.”
I followed Maddy towards the back, hoping not to walk all over her feet in my hurry to get to Cedric. If he’d been sleeping all this time, did he know what poor Carmen was going through right now? I also hoped more nurses than Maddy noticed Cedric was here at the hospital. Before I arrived at the door, I asked, “Maddy, did Carmen call here?”
Maddy arched her eyebrow with questions in her eyes. “She may have left a message at the nurse’s station. Is everything alright?”
“Yes.” I forced a smile that was not matching with my twisting insides.
Maddy knocked on the door and then pushed it open. The room was dark except for a lamp in the corner of the room. Cedric sat upright on the edge of one of the beds in the room. He looked up, his eyes looking worn out as though he hadn’t slept. “Mom, what are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.” I shot a glance over at Maddy who seemed very interested in our conversation. The last thing we needed was for the nurses to be spreading gossip. “Thank you, Maddy, for helping me find him.”
Maddy grinned. “Certainly. Dr. Patterson, I will keep you updated on Mrs. Hanson’s progress. Right now, she’s slowly dilating.”
Cedric stood and stretched. “Thanks, Maddy.”
Maddy closed the door as she left the room, and I turned to examine my son. He was usually meticulous about shaving, so this was the first time I noticed the gray in his beard which was moving past the five o’clock shadow phase. He wore scrubs and his white coat was thrown across the chair.
“Have you spoken to Carmen?”
He shook his head. “Not since last night. I needed to … take a breather.”
“So she told you about her ex-husband?”
Cedric frowned. “How did you know about that?”
“I met him yesterday. He’s a creepy man. I think he may have been following us or something. Maybe I should have told Carmen to go to the police yesterday. She was really terrified of him.”
Cedric’s face looked conflicted. “She told me what he did to her. I just wished she’d said something earlier. Two years of being together and not once did she mention him. What do you mean he was following you?”
I shook my head, “That part isn’t important at the moment. Carmen really needs you. I think she’s frantic to make sure you didn’t do anything rash. You did come straight to the hospital after you left home last night, right?”
“No, I drove around for a while. I just thought it would be good to be near my patients. I checked on two patients, looked in the nursery and then I came in here and tried to sleep. I guess I got some sleep. Not much.” Cedric threw up his hands. “Mom, what’s going on?”
“Then you don’t know?”
He eyed me. “Know what, Mom?”
“Darius Randall is dead, and Cedric, you need to come up with a better timeline than that.”
He jumped up. “What? How did he die?”
“I have no idea. We need to get to Carmen. When she called, she said the police had shown up. But she didn’t tell me where she was.”
Cedric frowned. “How did she know he was dead? Did she go see him?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Why don’t you call her and find out?”
Cedric looked around on the bed and grabbed his phone. “My phone is dead.” He slapped the bed. “Can you call her?”
I’d already reached into my purse for my phone and started the call. My son may have been an outstanding doctor, but sometimes I wondered about him.
I was also pondering if the one we should be more worried about was Carmen. She was a tall, athletic-looking woman, and I didn’t doubt for a minute that if she needed to, she could handle herself. When I first met her, she struck me as a woman with a tough attitude. But I saw another side of Carmen yesterday that I had only seen a few other times, a young woman with self-doubts who was unsure of herself. A woman who was very terrified of a now dead man.
Would Carmen have confronted Darius in a fit of rage? Fed up that he would come back into her life and try to destroy her future with Cedric.
Carmen answered the second time I tried to call her. “Hello, Ms. Eugeena. Did you find Cedric?”
“I did. He was sleeping at the hospital. He’s right here. Let me give him my phone.”
Cedric nodded his gratitude. “Just place her on speaker phone, Mom.”
Like I knew how to do that.
I will admit I’ve learned a lot of technology the past few years, but some of it was beyond me. I fiddled with the button that had the speaker. “Carmen, are you there?”
“Yes, I’m here. Cedric?”
“Honey, I’m here. Where are you?”
“I’m at the Charleston Place hotel.”
Cedric raised his eyebrows. “Why are you there?”
“I went to see Darius this morning. I wanted to tell him he had to leave me alone. It was too late though.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Was his hotel door open? Did you see anyone else around him?” My amateur detective hat was officially on.
“The door was slightly open, and no, I didn’t see anyone. I just pushed the door open and walked in. He was lying on the floor staring up at the ceiling. There was blood underneath him around the back of his head. I ran out, but I knew I needed to call the police. So, I did and waited for them in the lobby.”
“Oh, poor Carmen.” I said. “We’re coming to get you.”
“No, Cedric shouldn’t come here.”
He frowned. “Why not? I have nothing to hide, Carmen. I didn’t even know the guy, nor did I know anything about him being at that hotel. I’m coming to get you right now.”
“There’s no need. I already gave them my statement. I’ll meet you at home so we can talk.”
Carmen ended the call, leaving us in silence. I placed the phone back in my purse. “What are you going to do?”
Cedric shrugged his shoulders.
“Amos is outside. He’s making some calls. Maybe he can get some more information for us.”
“I’m going to let Maddy know I’ll be out for a bit.” He shook his head. “I wish I hadn’t left last night. I didn’t know what else to do. It was all a shock. You know I love Carmen. I just couldn’t understand why she’d keep this from me. I mean if this guy hadn’t showed up, would she have ever told me about him?”
“What I want to know is why did he show up and why now?” I held up my finger. “And who else would want him dead?”
Cedric stared at me, and I could see even more worry lines sketch across his face. “Mom, I know you have had a few incidents in the past year or so, but you’re not going to play detective here.”
“I was just thinking aloud. Don’t tell me that you wouldn’t want to know the same thing. They could be looking at Carmen as a suspect. Suppose they question you?” I stepped back. “Then, how are you both supposed to get married and have your happily ever after?”
“No one has a happily ever after. The wedding is the least of our concerns right now, Mom. Promise me you’ll stay out of trouble.”
I nodded and followed Cedric out of the room towards the nurse’s station.
I waited as he talked to Nurse Maddy, thinking there was no way I could make any promises not to stick my nose into Darius Randall’s life. If he was mean to Carmen and called himself trying to get back into her life, then he had probably done the same thing to someone else.
Who else hated Darius Randall enough to kill him? I prayed there was someone else and Carmen had not become a murderer overnight.