Sara left the clinic at quarter till ten so that she could go by the pharmacy before she saw Jeffrey. There was a chill in the air and the clouds promised more rain. She tucked her hands into her pockets as she walked down the street, keeping her eyes on the sidewalk in front of her, hoping her posture and her pace would make her seem unapproachable. She needn’t have bothered, though. Since Sibyl’s death downtown had taken on an eerie quiet. It was as if the whole town had died with her. Sara knew how they felt.
All night, Sara had lain awake in bed, going over each step she had taken with Julia Matthews. No matter what she did, Sara kept seeing the girl laid out on her car, her hands and feet pierced, her eyes glazed as she stared without seeing the night sky. Sara never wanted to go through anything like that again.
The bell over the pharmacy door jingled as Sara walked in, breaking her out of her solitude.
“Hey, Dr. Linton,” Marty Ringo called from behind the checkout counter. Her head was bent down, reading a magazine. Marty was a plump woman with an unfortunate mole growing just above her right eyebrow. Black hairs shot out from it like bristles on a brush. Working in the pharmacy, she knew the latest gossip about anyone and everyone in town. Marty would be certain to mention to whoever wandered into the store next that Sara Linton made a special trip to see Jeb today.
Marty smiled slyly. “You looking for Jeb?”
“Yes,” Sara answered.
“Heard about last night,” Marty said, obviously fishing for information. “That’s a college girl, huh?”
Sara nodded, because that much could be found from the paper.
Marty’s voice lowered. “Heard she was messed with.”
“Mmm,” Sara answered, looking around the store. “Is he here?” she asked.
“They both looked alike, too.”
“What’s that?” Sara asked, suddenly paying attention.
“Both them girls,” Marty said. “You think there’s some kind of connection?”
Sara cut the conversation short. “I really need to talk to Jeb.”
“He’s out back.” Marty pointed toward the pharmacy, a hurt expression on her face.
Sara thanked Marty with a forced smile as she made her way toward the back of the store. Sara had always liked being in the pharmacy. She had bought her first tube of mascara here. On weekends, her father used to drive them to the store for candy. Not much had changed since Jeb bought the place. The soda counter, which was more for show than for serving drinks, still shone from polish. Contraceptives were still kept behind the counter. The narrow aisles up and down the length of the store were still labeled with signs made from marker and poster board.
Sara peered over the pharmacy counter but didn’t see Jeb. She noticed the back door was open, and with a look over her shoulder, she walked behind the counter.
“Jeb?” she called. There was no response, and Sara walked to the open door. Jeb was standing to the side, his back to Sara. She tapped him on the shoulder and he jumped.
“God,” he yelled, turning around quickly. The fear on his face was replaced by pleasure when he saw Sara.
He laughed. “You scared the crap out of me.”
“I’m sorry,” Sara apologized, but the truth was she was glad he could get worked up over something. “What were you doing?”
He pointed to a row of bushes lining the long parking lot behind the buildings. “See in that bush?”
Sara shook her head, not seeing anything but bushes. Then, “Oh,” as she saw a small bird nest.
“Finches,” Jeb said. “I put a feeder out there last year, but some kids from the school took it away.”
Sara turned toward him. “About last night,” she began.
He waved her off. “Please, Sara, believe me, I understand. You were with Jeffrey a long time.”
“Thank you,” she said, meaning it.
Jeb looked back into the pharmacy, lowering his voice. “I’m sorry about what happened, too. You know, with the girl.” He shook his head slowly side to side. “It’s just hard to think about things like that happening in your own town.”
“I know,” Sara answered, not really wanting to get into it. “I guess I can forgive you, skipping out on our date to save somebody’s life.” He put his hand over the right side of his chest. “Did you really put your hand on her heart?”
Sara moved his hand to the left side. “Yes.”
“Good Lord,” Jeb breathed. “How did it feel?”
Sara gave him the truth. “Scary,” she said. “Very scary.”
His voice was filled with admiration when he said, “You are a remarkable woman, Sara. Do you know that?”
She felt silly being praised. “I’ll give you a rain check if you want,” she offered, trying to move him off the topic of Julia Matthews. “For our date, I mean.”
He smiled, genuinely pleased. “That’d be great.”
A breeze came and Sara rubbed her arms. “It’s getting cold again.”
“Here.” He led her back inside, shutting the door behind them. “You doing anything this weekend?”
“I don’t know,” Sara said. Then, “Listen, I came to see if Jeffrey picked up his medication.”
“Well.” Jeb clasped his hands together. “I guess that means you’re busy this weekend.”
“No, it doesn’t.” Sara paused, then said, “It’s just complicated.”
“Yeah.” He forced a smile. “No problem. I’ll check his script.”
She couldn’t stand to see the disappointment on his face. She turned the Medic Alert display to give herself something to do. Bookmarks with religious sayings were alongside diabetes bracelets.
Jeb opened a large drawer under the counter and pulled out an orange pill bottle. He double-checked the label, then said, “He called it in but didn’t pick it up yet.”
“Thanks,” Sara managed, taking the bottle. She held it in her hand, staring at Jeb. She spoke before she could back out of it. “Why don’t you call me?” she asked. “About this weekend.”
“Yeah, I will.”
She reached out with her free hand, smoothing the lapel of his lab coat. “I mean it, Jeb. Call me.”
He was quiet for a few seconds, then suddenly he leaned down, kissing her lightly on the lips. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Great,” Sara said. She realized she was gripping the pill bottle so tightly that the top was about to pop off. She had kissed Jeb before. It was really no big deal. Something in the back of her mind was scared that Marty would see, though. Something in her mind was scared that news of the kiss would get back to Jeffrey.
“I can give you a bag for that,” Jeb offered, pointing to the bottle.
“No,” Sara mumbled, tucking the bottle into her jacket pocket.
She murmured a thanks and was out the door before Marty could look up from her magazine.
Jeffrey and Nick Shelton were out in the hall when Sara got to the station. Nick stood with his hands tucked into the back pockets of his jeans, his regulation GBI dark blue dress shirt tight across his chest. His nonregulation beard and mustache were trimmed neatly to his face, and his equally forbidden gold rope chain was hanging from his neck. At just under five feet six inches, he was short enough for Sara to rest her chin on the top of his head. This had not prevented him from asking her out a number of times.
“Hey, girl,” Nick said, putting his arm around her waist.
Jeffrey had about as much to worry about competition-wise from Nick Shelton as he did from a reindeer, but he still seemed to bristle at the familiar way Nick held her. Sara thought Nick was overly solicitous for this very reason.
“Why don’t we start the meeting?” Jeffrey grumbled. “Sara has to get back to work.”
Sara caught up with Jeffrey as they walked down the hallway toward the back. She tucked the pill bottle into his coat pocket.
“What’s this?” he asked, taking it out. Then, “Oh.”
“Oh,” Sara repeated, opening the door.
Frank Wallace and a reedy-looking young man in khakis and a shirt like Nick’s were sitting in the briefing room when they entered. Frank stood, shaking Nick’s hand. He gave Sara a firm nod, which she did not return. Something told Sara that Frank had a hand in what happened last night, and she did not like it.
“This is Mark Webster,” Nick said, indicating the other man. He was a boy, really, hardly older than twenty-one. He had that still-wet-behind-the-ears look about him, and a piece of his hair stuck out in the back in a classic cowlick.
“Nice to meet you,” Sara said, shaking his hand. It was like squeezing a fish, but if Nick had brought Mark Webster all the way down here from Macon, he couldn’t be as goofy as he looked.
Frank said, “Why don’t you tell them what you were telling me?”
The boy cleared his throat and actually tugged at his collar. He addressed his words toward Sara. “I was saying it’s interesting your twist picked belladonna for his drug of choice. It’s very unusual. I’ve only seen three cases in my work, and most of those were rule-outs, stupid kids who thought they’d have some fun.”
Sara nodded her head, knowing that “rule-outs” meant ruling out foul play in a death. As a coroner as well as a pediatrician, she was especially careful when young children came into the morgue with cause of death unknown.
Mark leaned against the table, addressing his remarks to the rest of the group. “Belladonna is in the deadly nightshade family. During the Middle Ages, women chewed small quantities of the seeds in order to dilate their pupils. A woman with dilated eyes was considered more attractive, and that’s where they got the name ‘belladonna.’ It means ‘beautiful woman.’ ”
Sara supplied, “Both victims had extremely dilated pupils.”
“Even a slight dose would cause this,” Mark answered. He picked up a white Tyvek envelope and pulled out some photographs, which he handed to Jeffrey to circulate.
Mark said, “Belladonna is bell-shaped, usually purple, and smells kind of funny. It’s not something you’d keep around in your yard if you had kids or small animals. Whoever is growing it probably has a fence around it, maybe three feet tall at the least, in order to keep from poisoning everybody around.”
“Does it need any specific kind of soil or feed?” Jeffrey asked, passing the photo to Frank.
“It’s a weed. It can grow practically anywhere. That’s what makes it so popular. The only thing is, it’s a bad drug.” Mark paused at this. “The high is prolonged, lasts about three to four hours, depending on how much you take. Users report very real hallucinations. A lot of times they’ll actually think it happened, if they can remember it.”
Sara asked, “It causes amnesia?”
“Oh yes, ma’am, selective amnesia, which means they only remember bits and pieces. Like she might remember it was a man that took her, but she won’t remember what he looked like even if she was staring him in the face. Or she might say he was purple with green eyes.” He paused. “It’s a hallucinogen, but not like your typical PCP or LSD. Users report that there’s no discerning between the hallucination and the real thing. With, say, angel dust, ecstasy, what have you, you know you’re hallucinating. Belladonna makes everything seem real. If I gave you a cup of Datura, when you came around you might swear to me you had a conversation with a coatrack. I could hook you up to a lie detector and you’d come out as telling the truth. It takes things that are there in reality and puts a twist on them.”
“Tea?” Jeffrey asked, giving Sara a look.
“Yes, sir. Kids’ve been boiling it in tea to drink.” He clasped his hands behind him. “I’ve got to tell you, though, it’s dangerous stuff. Real easy to OD on.”
Sara asked, “How else can you ingest it?”
“If you’ve got the patience,” Mark answered, “you can soak the leaves in alcohol for a couple of days, then evaporate it. It’s still a crapshoot, though, because the consistency isn’t guaranteed, even with people who grow it for medical purposes.”
“What medical purposes?” Jeffrey asked.
“Well, you know when you go to the eye doctor and he dilates your eyes? It’s a belladonna compound. Very diluted, but it’s belladonna. You couldn’t take a couple of bottles of the eyedrops and kill somebody, for instance. At this low level of concentration, the worst you could do is give them a really bad headache and killer constipation. It’s at the pure level that you have to be careful.”
Frank bumped her arm, handing her the photograph. Sara looked down at the plant. It looked pretty much like every plant she had ever seen. Sara was a doctor, not a horticulturist. She couldn’t even grow a Chia Pet.
Without warning, her mind was racing again, thinking back to when she first found Julia Matthews on her car. She was trying to remember if the duct tape had been there. With sudden clarity, Sara remembered that it had. She could see the tape on the woman’s mouth. She could see Julia Matthews’s body crucified on the hood of the car.
“Sara?” Jeffrey asked.
“Hm?” Sara looked up. Everyone was staring at her, as if they were anticipating a response to something. “I’m sorry,” she apologized. “What was it you asked?”
Mark answered, “I asked if you noticed anything strange about the victims. Were they unable to speak? Did they have a blank stare?”
Sara handed back the photo. “Sibyl Adams was blind,” she provided. “So of course her stare was blank. Julia Matthews…” She paused, trying to force the image from her mind. “Her eyes were glazed. I imagine it was from being gorked out on this drug more than anything else.”
Jeffrey gave her a funny look. “Mark mentioned something about belladonna interfering with vision.”
“There’s a sort of blindsightedness,” Mark said in a tone that implied he was repeating himself. “According to user reports, you can see, but your mind can’t make out what it is you’re seeing. Like I could show you an apple or an orange, and you would be aware that you were seeing something round, maybe textured, but your brain wouldn’t recognize what it is.”
“I know what blindsightedness is,” Sara returned, realizing too late that her tone was condescending. She tried to cover for this by saying, “Do you think Sibyl Adams experienced this? Maybe that’s why she didn’t scream out?”
Mark looked at the other men. Obviously, this was another thing he had covered while Sara was zoning out. “There’s been reported loss of voice from the drug. Nothing physically happens in the voice box. There’s no physical restraint or damage caused by the drug. I think it’s more to do with something happening in the language center of the brain. It has to be similar to whatever causes the sight recognition problems.”
“Makes sense,” Sara agreed.
Mark continued. “Some signs that it’s been ingested would be cotton mouth, dilated pupils, high body temperature, elevated heart rate, and difficulty breathing.”
“Both victims experienced all of those symptoms,” Sara provided. “What kind of dose would bring this about?”
“It’s pretty potent stuff. Just one bag of tea can send somebody loopy, especially if they’re not recreational drug users. The berries aren’t that bad on a scale of things, but anything from the root or the leaf is going to be dangerous, unless you know exactly what you’re doing. And then there’s no guarantee.”
“The first victim was a vegetarian,” Sara said.
“She was a chemist, too, right?” Mark asked. “I can think of a million different drugs to fool around with other than belladonna. I don’t think anybody who took the time to research it would take that kind of risk. It’s Russian roulette, especially if you’re dealing with the root. That’s the deadliest part. Just a little bit too much from the root and you’re gone. There’s no known antidote.”
“I didn’t see any signs of drug use in Julia Matthews.” She said to Jeffrey, “I suppose you’re going to interview her after this?”
He nodded, then asked Mark, “Anything else?”
Mark brushed his fingers through his hair. “After the drug, there’s noted constipation, still the cotton mouth, sometimes hallucinations. It’s interesting to know that the drug was used in a sex crime, ironic even.”
“How’s that?” Jeffrey asked.
“During the Middle Ages, the drug was sometimes inserted with a vaginal applicator so that the rush would come sooner. There are even some people who think the whole myth of witches flying on broomsticks comes from the image of a woman inserting the drug with a wooden applicator.” He smiled. “But then we’d have to get into a protracted discussion on deity worshipping and the rise of Christianity in European cultures.”
Mark seemed to sense he had lost his audience. “People in drug communities who know about belladonna tend to stay away from it.” He looked at Sara. “If you’ll excuse the language, ma’am?”
Sara shrugged. Between the clinic and her father, she had pretty much heard it all.
Mark still blushed when he said, “It’s a total mind fuck.” He offered Sara a smile in apology. “The number one memory, even among users with amnesia, is flying. They really believe they’re flying, and they can’t understand, even after they come down, that they haven’t actually flown.”
Jeffrey crossed his arms. “That might explain why she keeps staring out the window.”
“Has she said anything yet?” Sara asked.
He shook his head. “Nothing.” Then, “We’re going to the hospital next if you want to see her.”
Sara looked at her watch, pretending to consider this. There was no way in hell she was going to see Julia Matthews again. It was too much to even think about. “I’ve got patients,” she said.
Jeffrey indicated his office. “Sara, mind if I talk to you for a second?”
Sara felt the urge to bolt, but she fought it. “Is this about my car?”
“No.” Jeffrey waited until she was in his office, then shut the door. Sara sat on the edge of his desk, trying for a casual pose. “I had to take my boat in to work this morning,” Sara said. “Do you know how cold it is on the lake?”
He ignored this, getting straight to the point. “Found your gun.”
“Oh,” Sara answered, trying to think of what to say. Of all the things she had been expecting him to say, this was the last one. The Ruger had been in her car for so long that she had forgotten about it. “Am I under arrest?”
“Where did you get it?”
“It was a gift.”
Jeffrey gave her a hard look. “What, somebody gave you a three-fifty-seven with the serial numbers filed off for your birthday?”
Sara shrugged this off. “I’ve had it for years, Jeffrey.”
“When did you buy that car, Sara? Couple of years ago?”
“I moved it from the old one when I bought it.”
He stared at her, not speaking. Sara could tell that he was mad, but she did not know what to say. She tried, “I’ve never used it.”
“That makes me feel good, Sara,” he snapped. “You’ve got a gun in your car capable of literally taking somebody’s head off and you don’t know how to use it?” He paused, obviously trying to understand. “What’re you gonna do if someone comes after you, huh?”
Sara knew the answer to this, but she did not say.
Jeffrey asked, “Why do you have it in the first place?”
Sara studied her ex-husband, trying to figure out the best way to get out of this office without having another fight. She was tired and she was upset. This wasn’t the time to go a few rounds with Jeffrey. Sara just did not have the fight in her at the moment.
“I just had it,” she answered.
“You don’t just have this kind of gun,” he said.
“I need to get back to the clinic.” She stood, but he was blocking her exit.
“Sara, what the hell is going on?”
“What do you mean?”
His eyes narrowed, but he did not answer. He moved aside, opening the door for her.
Sara thought for a second that it was a trick. “That’s it?” she asked.
He stepped aside. “It’s not like I can beat it out of you.”
She put her hand to his chest, feeling guilty. “Jeffrey.”
He looked out into the squad room, “I need to go over to the hospital,” he said, obviously dismissing her.