Nurse Atkins lifted the half bottle of wine from between Dave’s atrophied legs and took a couple of swallows.
It was pretty good. She drank some more and put the rest of the bottle back where she’d found it. Dave Channing was still breathing, but barely. He was wearing a long-sleeved shirt with buttoned cuffs and a turtleneck underneath.
She managed to get a couple of fingers against his wrist. His pulse was slow. His breathing was shallow. She knew what dying looked like. Dave Channing was on his way out.
She said, “I’m getting the painting now, Dave. And thanks for that. I forgive your jackassery. Have a good trip.”
Atkins got out of the passenger seat and walked around to the rear doors of the panel truck, hoping to find them unlocked. They were.
She felt a little dizzy as she twisted the handle, pulling the doors open. That was from the wine. She focused on a pile of quilted mover’s blankets on the floor of the cargo compartment. She didn’t see a crate or a mailing tube or any kind of box at all.
Had Dave’s last act been to prank her?
She got into the rear compartment on her hands and knees and felt along the back wall. Nothing. That son of a bitch. She backed out of the van, cursing. Had he forgotten to put the crate in the van? Or had he been so stoned he couldn’t lift it?
Getting out of the van was proving to be harder than getting in. There was no light back there, and now she was feeling nauseous. She’d left the papers in the front seat. She had to get them. She carefully backed out of the rear compartment, made for the front door, passenger side—and gasped. Something hard had poked her in the back and was pressing against her spine.
It could only be a gun.
A man’s voice said, “Put your hands behind you, Ms. Atkins. I’m taking you into custody.”
She recognized the voice but still turned her head to check. It was Dave’s friend. Joe something. He was strong. A former football player. She couldn’t outrun him, but maybe she could talk him down.
“Dave said he left something for me in the back. You should call an ambulance. He took all of his father’s pills. I wanted to call 911, but he wouldn’t let me.”
Atkins continued to look at the man who was threatening her with a gun. “I’ve done nothing wrong. You’ll see the papers. Dave decided to commit suicide. He wrote it all down.”
Carolee Atkins planned her next move. She would leave the papers and just start walking toward the office. It was only thirty yards to the door. Her key card was in her bag inside the van, but people leaving the building would let her in. Even now the parking lot was coming to life. The sounds of electronic locks opening. Headlights coming on. She heard the purr of a motor. She was taking a chance, but she didn’t believe that this Joe guy would shoot her in the back.
She’d taken a few steps toward the medical building when Dave came around the side of the van, maneuvering his chair so that whichever way she walked, he blocked her way.
What was going on? He looked wide awake and fully cognizant. And he, too, held a gun on her. He had his phone in his lap, and he lifted it, pressed a button.
She heard her own voice saying, “Your father had been sedated, Dave. They’re all sedated. I put a little something in the drip line. They’re already asleep and they’re asleep when they die. Ray felt nothing. He didn’t have to suffer like you.”
Then Dave’s voice: “You do that. For them?”
“I’m a helper. Someone has to do it, and I know how.”