I was dreaming. I dreamed I was in a hospital room. I was seriously injured. There seemed to be a tube protruding from my left forearm that led to a plastic bag hanging from a metal stand. Another tube. No, it was a wire attached to what looked like a clothespin, the clothespin squeezing the middle finger of my left hand. The wire ran to a small machine with a numerical display that reminded me of the depth finder on my bass boat. The light above me was dim and cast everything in shadow. It was hard to see. A woman with butterscotch hair was sitting in a chair near my bed and reading a magazine.
“Turn on the lights,” I told her.
Her head came up abruptly and she closed the magazine without marking her place.
“Hi,” she said. “How are you feeling?”
“Feeling?” I didn’t understand the question.
She placed her palm against my forehead the way my mom used to.
“I love you.” I think I told her that.
“I love you.” I think she told me that.
Everything went dark.
I thought I heard someone calling.
“Don’t you die, McKenzie. Don’t you dare die on me.”
She was dressed in white and hovering above me like an angel. Only she didn’t act like an angel.
“McKenzie, McKenzie,” she called while she slapped my face lightly. I used an open hand block to grab her wrist and pull her down across my chest. Muscle memory.
“Where am I? What happened to me?”
“Do you mind?” She tried pulling away.
“Sorry.” I released my grip.
“You’re in Regions Hospital,” she answered, massaging her wrist. “You were hit on the head real hard.”
She looked like someone I should know, only I couldn’t place her. “How are you feeling, cowboy?”
That’s when I recognized her.
“Lilly?”
I glanced at the photo ID that hung from a tiny chain around her neck. Lillian Linder, MD.
“Lilly.”
“I thought I told you I didn’t want to see you in here again.”
“I’ve missed your kind and gentle bedside manner.”
She grinned. “It’s starting to get old, you know, having to save your life every couple of years.”
I was that close? Again? I refused to think about it. “What’s my status?” I asked.
“Surprisingly good, but then you always were a quick healer.”
“Merci Cole?”
“The woman you came in with. She’s fine. Physically, anyway. Emotionally she’s still a bit unhinged—she’s been through quite a trauma.”
Her and me both, I nearly said.
“She’s been visiting a couple of times each day. Quite a few people have dropped by, in fact. I’m amazed that an arrogant jerk like you has so many friends.”
“Have I told you how much I’ve missed you, Lilly?”
“There’s good news and bad news, cowboy.”
“Tell me the bad news.”
“You suffered an epidural hematoma.”
“Sounds serious.”
“It is serious. There’s a blood vessel—the middle meningeal artery—under the skull that lies alongside the brain. When you were hit, the artery was torn and you started to bleed. The bleeding put pressure on the brain. That’s why you lost consciousness.”
“But I came out of it. At least I think I did.” My memory was still a little foggy on the subject.
“That’s not unusual. The initial trauma—the blow itself—knocked you unconscious the first time. You came back. You did what you had to do.”
I liked the way she put that.
“Meanwhile, the lacerated blood vessel was bleeding. When enough blood built up, the pressure forced you into unconsciousness for a second time. We did a CAT scan immediately after you were brought to us. The CAT revealed the hematoma. So we drilled two burr holes smaller than a dime into your skull to drain the fluid and alleviate the pressure.”
“You drilled into my skull?” The thought of it shocked me. My hands went to my head. There were two patches where my hair had been shaved that were covered by bandages.
“It took forever, too. You have a very thick skull, McKenzie.”
“What about the artery?” I asked.
“The meningeal should repair itself. We’ll do another CAT scan later today to make sure there’s no additional bleeding.”
“I’m all right, then?”
“You’re off the ventilator, oxygenating well, your BP and heart are much stronger than you have a right to expect, you’re going to be fine.”
“What’s the good news?”
“That’s the good news. We’ll keep you here for a while, observe your functions, your kidneys, make sure everything is working the way it’s supposed to. I’ll send up an OT and PT …”
“Occupational therapist and physical therapist.”
“You remember from last time, good. They’ll do an assessment. If you pass, you should be out of here in two, three days.”
I expected it to be worse and told her so.
“It could’ve been, cowboy. If you hadn’t been brought to us immediately, if surgery hadn’t been in time, you could have suffered brain damage. Or worse. As it is, we don’t expect any deficits.”
I heard everything she said, but the words “brain damage or worse” seemed much louder than the others.
“We don’t expect any brain damage,” Lilly told me, as if the thought had leaked out of the holes drilled in my head.
She patted my cheek. The thing about Lillian Linder, MD—despite her brusque manner, you knew you were in good hands.
“I need to go and see some sick people now,” she told me gently.
“Thanks, Lilly.”
“McKenzie, we have to stop meeting like this.”
“The doctor says you’re going to be all right,” Merci Cole assured me.
“What does she know?”
Merci was holding my hand against her smooth cheek. Tears collected in her eyes, but none fell.
“Thank you for saving my life.”
“You’re welcome.”
She tried to smile but couldn’t. There was a sadness in her that I had not seen before.
“I’m going home,” she said.
“To Grand Rapids?”
She nodded.
“Good for you.”
“We already took the tests. The doctors say I’m a perfect match. B-negative blood, all that. Stacy should be fine after we do the transplant.”
“That’s great. Just great.”
“My father and I—we had a long talk. Several, actually. With Molly. Molly’s like the arbitrator. She wants me to stay with them and Richard says okay. Me and Jamie’s son. I think they were so delighted at getting their grandson that taking me in, too, seemed like a small price to pay. I probably won’t stay long, though. Just until I decide what to do next. I was thinking of going back to school, see what the Vo-Tech or Community College has to offer.”
“Good luck.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“Richard wants me to tell you he expects to see a bill for all your time and expenses, hospital expenses, too, if you’re not insured. He hasn’t changed much. All he cares about is money.”
“He cares about much more than that,” I told her.
“We’ll see.”
Merci smiled ever so slightly. In the end she was just like the rest of us. She needed to be loved. Eventually, it’s what life comes down to, a few people loving us and us loving them. Sometimes it takes a tragedy to impress that upon us.
“Don’t be too hard on him,” I told her. “I admire a man who pays his own way.”
Merci held on to my hand for a while longer.
“Will you come visit me?”
“Sure. I have property near Grand Rapids.”
“Better hurry. If things don’t work out, I might take off again.”
“If you do, don’t let me find you.”
Bobby Dunston entered my hospital room carrying a bouquet of flowers. “These are from Shelby,” he announced so I wouldn’t think he’d give another man flowers. “I tried to smuggle you a six-pack, but the nurses stopped me.”
“Sure.”
“Shelby sends her love. You might not know it, but she’s been here almost without a rest since they brought you in. But now that they say you’re all right, she’s packing.”
“Packing?”
“We’re sneaking up to your place for a few days.”
“Just you and Shelby?”
“Just me and Shelby. Mom is taking the kids.”
“Good for you.”
“Shut up, McKenzie.”
He sat on a chair and crossed his legs.
“I had him, you know. Devanter. I had him. I knew he killed Katherine and Jamie eight hours before you killed him. I had a warrant for his arrest, only I couldn’t find him. I couldn’t find him because apparently he was hiding at your house. Why I didn’t think to look there first I’ll never know.”
“Don’t be bitter,” I told him.
“Who? Me?”
“I didn’t know it was Devanter,” I confessed. “I didn’t have a clue. Not until I saw him hovering over Merci with the knife. Hell, the people I accused were innocent. Innocent of that, anyway.”
“Maybe so, but the way the papers are playing it you’d think you were the greatest thing since Dick Tracy.”
“A very underrated investigator, I might add.”
“You realize, of course, that you look ridiculous with those bandages on your head.”
“I’m starting a new fashion—next week I’ll be on the cover of GQ.”
“It was the twine,” Bobby said. “The twine used to tie down both Katherine and Jamie. Microscopic examination indicated that the lay, circumference, and strand number were identical. So was the reason they each had it—to secure the rose bushes to the trellis on the south side of their houses. They had the same gardener. Devanter. That’s why he knew precisely where the twine was kept. I would have figured it out sooner only I let you distract me with all that Family Boyz nonsense.”
“It really was a coincidence, Jamie’s murder and the Boyz,” I admitted. “You guessed right the first time.”
“I made a lot of mistakes.”
“Why did Devanter do it? Do you know?”
“No, I don’t.”
“He was at the VA—I saw his wounds. Maybe the answer is there. An honest-to-God deranged Viet Nam vet like you see in all the movies.”
“Except Devanter was never in Viet Nam, or the Persian Gulf, or anywhere else for that matter. He never served. He suffered his wounds working on an off-shore oil rig fifteen years ago.”
“But he was a patient at the VA.”
“He was a groundskeeper at the VA. We interviewed his former coworkers, the hospital staff. Apparently, he didn’t have any friends. Everyone who remembered him, and there were only a few, said he was scary, but quiet—a loner, but a good worker.”
“Aren’t they all?”
“We traced his movements. Born in Des Moines. After high school he drifted south, more or less in a straight line, working for a farm co-op
in Iowa, a nursery in Missouri, another nursery in Oklahoma, a golf course in Texas, then an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. He was engaged to be married to a woman in Fort Worth, but he called it off just before the wedding and moved here. I spoke to the woman. She said Devanter broke off the engagement when he found out she couldn’t have children, something about a botched abortion when she was sixteen.”
“Was there anything about her that resembled Jamie and Katherine?”
“Not that we could determine. Little over a year ago, Devanter went to work for Warren and Lila Casselman. The Casselmans introduced him to their entrepreneur friends—by the way, did you hear that the feds busted them and the Family Boyz and a couple of Russians …”
“I was there. Front-row seat.”
“Then you know why everything happened the way it did.”
“Pretty much, but we can talk about that later. What about Devanter?”
“The ladies of the Northern Lights Entrepreneur’s Club apparently admired his handiwork. He agreed to help them with their gardens. They paid him for his trouble. That’s all we know and are likely to know.”
“No motive then?”
“Jealousy. Frustration. Obsession. Pick your own.”
“I thought you were the psycho expert.”
“Obsession, then. You were a little obsessed yourself. Why else would you put yourself through all this?”
“I was just doing my job.”
“Job? What job?”
I recalled the mission statement that Kirsten had attributed to me. Live well. Be helpful.
“Uh-huh. Speaking of which, I have a message from Chief Casey of the City of St. Anthony Village Police Department. ‘All sins are forgiven.’ Whatever that means.”
“Whatever.”
“Are you thinking of getting back into harness, Mac?”
“I honestly don’t know what I’m thinking.”
Bobby didn’t push. Instead he told me I had had another caller while I was unconscious.
“Nina Truhler.”
That made me smile.
“Nice,” Bobby suggested.
“Very.”
“I like her.”
“She is likable.”
“How do you do it?”
“It’s a gift.”
“Speaking of gifts, Shelby is waiting for me.”
“Thanks, Bobby.”
Before he left, Bobby found the remote control and aimed it at the TV set suspended on the wall at the foot of the bed. He surfed past several channels until he found WGN—the Cubs were playing Houston. Sammy Sosa was up with two on base.
“Are you going to be all right, alone like this?”
“What do you mean alone? I’m in a hospital.”
“I have a few minutes. Let’s watch the game.”
“Get out of here. Shelby’s waiting.”
“McKenzie?”
“Dunston?”
“Screw it. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”
“Love to the family.”
“Back at ya.”
After he left I turned up the volume.
“Whaddaya say, Sammy,” I said to the TV screen. “Just me and you, man. Just me and you.”