I sat down at my desk and pulled Henry on his feet, his arms raised in victory over his head. I could not stop staring at that drawing.
Did I deserve a guy like that? A guy who could draw, a doctor who spent his spare time teaching himself different languages and who would work his old psych contacts just to help me out?
What about Ryan spending his vacation and his hard-earned cash armoring my apartment and building a computer model for Mrs. Lee? I'd bought him a thank you present online, some cuff links made out of Lego men, but it seemed so inadequate.
Too much thinking. I got myself a huge glass of water and checked my voice mail messages.
"Hi, it's Mom. Dad is back from his trip to Toronto, but Kevin has a cold and I'm not feeling so good. I don't know if you want us to come visit or not—"
I forwarded to the next message. Only my mother would ask if it was okay to visit me with a cold, when every day I usually saw about a billion colds, flu, stomach viruses, and other infectious diseases.
"Hi, it's Mom. Dad has a cough, too, maybe from the airplane. You remember, he flew to Chicago the week before? I don't know why, such a funny time to get a cold, I hope it's not anything. You know, with global warming, I worry sometimes."
That explained why my family wasn't all over me, the way they had been for my week off recuperating. The little-girl part of me wished they could have stayed here longer. My mom would make congee like I was the one with a cold. My father would pat the couch and ask me to watch TV. Kevin would offer to play the violin or to do math homework with me to cheer me up.
On the other hand, by the end of last week, I was more than ready to escape my tiny apartment and get back to work.
My mother was still talking. "...Grandma was saying you saw Ryan this week. His grandmother told her." Pause. "I don't know if you want to say anything about that."
My father's voice rumbled in the background. I couldn't make out the words, but his chiding tone was obvious.
"Okay, okay, Dad. It's none of our business. I'm just saying, if you wanted to talk."
My father murmured again.
"Okay, never mind, forget I said anything. Are we still talking tomorrow, or are you on call? Wait, Kevin wants to talk, even though he's sick. Okay, pick up the phone, Kevin."
Kevin's cough exploded into the recording. "I'm sick. My head hurts. My nose is all runny, mostly clear, but yellow, too. I can't wait until I start coughing up stuff. That's pretty cool. But Mom's been making me take lots of cough medicine, so maybe I won't."
I touched my hand to my temple. Sometimes I missed them so much, especially Kevin.
Two hang-ups. I refused to speculate. I just noted down the date and time. Caller ID had finally kicked in, but both of the hang-ups were from unknown callers and it was too late to trace them because I'd gotten one more call after both of them. I'd send my data to the police.
The last recording held Ryan's low voice. "Hello, Hope."
I closed my eyes. Hearing from him felt like a tonic. I needed him. I shouldn't, but I did.
"I wanted to come up this weekend. I wanted to show you and Mrs. Lee the model, which is going pretty well. Work has been crazy, but I spent some time on it. I think I can show they ran Laura over on purpose."
Hallelujah. That was one reason I loved that guy. I could count on him. I seized a pen in case he was going to deliver any details. He could e-mail me the rest later. Mrs. Lee would be ecstatic.
"The only thing is..." He sighed. "Something's come up. Well, actually, Lisa came up. The Chinese grapevine probably already told you. It's no big deal, she caught a ride with a friend, but she's staying until Sunday."
Slap down.
I started hyperventilating. I knew it was too good to be true. Two guys wanting me. Now Tucker was off doing God knows what, and Lisa was working her charms on Ryan.
Did I have any right to be jealous? No.
Was I?
Hell, yeah.
Ryan's voice penetrated my consciousness again. "Did Tucker ever find that Martinez guy? He never answered my message. Anyway. Like I said, about this weekend, no big deal. I'll be up next weekend. I'll call you later, okay?"
No big deal.
No big deal.
No big deal, my sweet brown ass.
And why was he talking about Mike Martinez with Tucker?
After that, I abandoned my tentative plans of R&R with water, ice, a fan, and a well-read copy of Sarah, Plain and Tall. I got up and paced. I did not want to brood. I did not want to weigh my own hypocrisy. I could not bring myself to study psychiatry.
Ryan said his preliminary model showed it was murder. I assumed he wanted to demo it for me and Mrs. Lee, and troubleshoot any problems before we took it to the police, but we'd better have our act together when we hit the station.
Ergo, I reviewed the facts that I knew about Laura Lee.
Someone ran her down on August eighth, 2003.
They found the vehicle, but no fingerprints except members of the owner's family, and a single blond hair that wasn't in their criminal database.
We had no suspects, although Tucker was suspicious of Michael Martinez from Laura's borderline group.
How could we track down this Martinez guy?
I flipped through the white pages and found three listings for M. Martinez, no Michael. That was a start. I'd have to come up with a good story, though. Maybe pose as a telemarketer?
While I was thinking, I Googled Michael Martinez in Montreal. The online white pages were the same as the print listing and the name was so common, I found listings on everything from a baseball player to a music teacher.
I wanted to talk this over with someone. Tucker and Ryan were both out. I hesitated with my hand on the phone for a minute. I'd been really bad about calling back my med school friends, and it was a bit weird to start ringing them up and saying, "How you doing? Crack any chests? Cool. Listen, I'm pretending to be a detective now...."
Suddenly, I remembered Tori Yamamoto, my bestest Montreal girlfriend. Duh. I'd been overdosing on testosterone lately and she'd been working off-site. Time to give her a call. She could apply her meticulous intellect and give me another, much-needed perspective.
The phone rang and rang. I waited for her machine to kick in, but suddenly I heard a click and she said, "Hello?"
"Hey Tori, it's Hope."
"Oh, Hope!"
She sounded surprised. I forced a laugh. "Yeah. Sorry I haven't been in touch since Tuesday. How've you been?"
"I'm good."
I remembered Tori was not a big chatter. It was always kind of a shock after my other, motor-mouthed friends. I came to the point. "Great. Listen, I don't know what you're up to tonight, but I was wondering if we could hang out."
She paused long enough that I knew it would be a 'no.' I doodled on my phone pad, a monster of curlicues and googly-eyes with hooked eyebrows, while I waited for her to frame her response. At last, she said, "Well, I would like that, but...please hold on a second." She covered the receiver, but I heard her light voice and then a man respond.
A baritone, actually. One that was strangely familiar.
No. It couldn't be.
My gut said otherwise.
Tori came back on again. "I'm sorry, Hope, I don't think tonight is—"
"Is that Tucker?" I burst out.
"Well." For the first time, she sounded flustered. "Actually, yes. But it's not, ah..."
I waited for her to explain herself. Themselves.
His voice rumbled in the background again.
"I would like to see you," she said finally. "Maybe tomorrow?"
I could not believe it. He'd only left my place a little over an hour ago. He must have gone straight to Tori's.
Did the guy have yellow fever or what?
The walls of my little apartment seemed to fold in on me.
I thought I was so special, but I wasn't. I was just another prospective notch on Tucker's bedpost. I was just Ryan's ex-girlfriend. I was just another resident grinding my way through the medical system. I was just another sucker Mrs. Lee had prodded into helping to dig up ancient history.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to smash the phone. I wanted to kick in Ryan's computer screen and tear Tucker's drawing up with my teeth.
No. I would never tear up that drawing.
What I really, really wanted to do curl up and cry my eyelashes off.
"Hope?" said Tori. "I'm sorry, I really should go. I'll call you tomorrow, if that's all right. Maybe after breakfast?"
Sure. After you have breakfast in bed with Tucker. I could hardly speak through my clogged throat. "All right. 'Bye," I managed.
And then I did cry. I was just so exhausted. I sobbed until my nose and throat were raw and my head ached.
I knew I should just drop off into sleep.
I knew I was not firing on all cylinders, what with the previous case, the psych stress, the man-madness, and the patient potentially about to deliver.
Instead, I called the one person I was sure would be healthy, home on a Saturday night and happy to talk to me.