Chapter 24

 

Drake arrived sometime around when I might normally be thinking of bedtime if I was home. He looked slightly bedraggled after flying half the length of the state, not to mention two nights in motel rooms that surely were not four-star. His flight suit definitely needed a wash and he smelled of jet fuel. He apologized for this, saying he hadn’t wanted to take time to go home and shower until he saw us. We filled him in.

Victoria’s status was the same—surgery went well and recovery room time seemed to take forever, to us anyway. Eventually, we sensed motion around the nurse’s station and I jumped up in time to see them wheel Vic’s bed back to her ICU cubicle. There didn’t seem to be any fewer machines or wires now but the mood of the nurses had definitely picked up. I hung unabashedly nearby as the nurse we’d spoken to earlier picked up the phone. I could tell she was talking to Kent Taylor. She granted him five minutes if he could get here within the hour.

I kept staring wistfully toward Victoria’s little room but the nurse firmly shook her head. The two police officers came back. I supposed I should be grateful for them. We knew Ron wasn’t the assailant but they didn’t. And none of us knew who really shot her. The added protection was a good thing.

I’d rejoined Ron and Drake in the waiting area when Kent Taylor arrived. He greeted us.

“They say she’s been able to speak a little,” he said. “I won’t learn much, I’m afraid.”

“Can you at least tell her we’re here,” Ron asked, “and tell her I love her?”

If Taylor was uncomfortable with that request he didn’t show it. He pulled out a small notebook and headed toward the desk.

“If he gets five minutes with her, I’m betting the rest of us will be allowed even less time, if at all,” Drake said. “So, if you don’t mind, I’m heading home for a hot shower and something to eat.”

“Go,” I said with a little laugh. “That fuel smell is getting a little overwhelming. Throw your clothes in the washer while you’re at it.”

Ron shook his hand and they turned it into one of those man-hugs that involves hearty slaps to each others’ shoulders. Drake’s elevator arrived and there was a slight commotion as four people emerged, one carrying a camera and one a microphone. They headed our direction.

“Oh, no you don’t,” called the head nurse. She buzzed around the end of that desk faster than I would have thought possible with her stocky body. “No press in here. This waiting area is for families and there’s no way in hell you’re getting near any of our ICU rooms.”

The blond reporter opened her mouth, looking as if she would argue, but the nurse was larger, older and carried herself with a lot more authority. She placed herself between us and the media gang.

“Get, now! Go on out. If the police want to talk to you it’ll have to be in the conference room on the first floor or outside the building.” She swished her hands, the way you might send a group of kindergarteners out to play, and they minded.

I heard a couple of mutters as the group headed toward the elevator but none of them tried to get past Nurse Barricade to speak to Ron or me.

“Thank you,” I said to her as the elevator door swooshed shut with them inside. “Dealing with them hasn’t been fun.”

“This ain’t about fun, sweetie. It’s about protecting my patients.”

I wanted to bristle at ‘sweetie’ but her attitude was cool. I had to be happy she was there, along with the police, to stand guard over Vic. I paced the length of the waiting area twice. At this hour we were the only ones there. Kent Taylor’s five minutes began to feel awfully long but finally he emerged and walked over to us. I found myself holding my breath.

“You’re in the clear, Ron,” he said.

I thought my big brother was going to weep. He blinked several times and swallowed hard.

“How is she?” he asked. “Is she in a lot of pain?”

“She’s pretty doped up. No pain. But she dozed a couple times.” He stuffed the small notebook into his inner jacket pocket. “What she did say was very clear. Two men, strangers, broke into her house and shot her.”

“What did they want?” I asked.

He shook his head. “She didn’t know. Usually with a home invasion it’s druggies wanting cash, the kind of guys who’ll take your TV set and jewelry and sell it to support their habit.”

Something seemed off. As far as I’d noticed, nothing of value had been taken. Certainly the TV and other electronics were still in place. Even Vic’s purse had been there.

“My guess,” said Taylor, “is they either didn’t think she’d be home or thought they could intimidate her into handing her stuff over to them. One guy got flustered and the gun went off. She said she got out of the house and ran for her life. I’m thinking once they’d shot her they didn’t dare hang around. Late at night like that, any neighbor could have become involved. The men probably took off without getting what they came for. Anyway, once she’s back home and feeling up to it, she can let us know what, if anything, is missing.”

His conclusion about the men leaving quickly seemed obvious, but there were still a lot of holes in the scenario.

I wanted to ask more questions but Taylor was in a hurry. Most likely the hospital call had interrupted his own plans for the evening. He walked away before I got the chance to bring up the other thing I wanted to ask.

Ron was already on his way to the nurse’s station, and this time he didn’t really ask.

“I’m going to sit beside her for the night. She needs to know I’m here.”

“No long conversations,” said the no-nonsense nurse.

Remembering what Taylor had said about Victoria’s drowsiness, long talks seemed unlikely. Still, I completely understood my brother’s need to be at his fiancée’s side. I followed him past the desk, across the hall and up to the two uniformed officers at the door. They’d gotten the word from Taylor, obviously, because they parted to let us in.

It’s unnerving to see someone you love lying in a hospital bed, bandaged and hooked to strange, noisy equipment. Last time I’d seen Victoria she’d been glowing with anticipation of her wedding, beautiful and perfect. Now she seemed smaller, shrunken somehow under wraps and blankets. Her face had been washed, but not thoroughly, leaving ragged scraps of days-old mascara, and her hair’s luxuriant waves had morphed into stringy dark hanks. A stickler for looking good in public, she would be horrified. A thick bandage covered her injured shoulder and both feet had bulky wraps of gauze and tape. I thought of what the nurse had said about her losing toes to frostbite.

Ron moved past all that, looking only at her face, reaching for the hand lying outside the blanket. He picked it up, stroking her fingers and being careful not to touch the IV line taped to a vein. His lower lip quivered and I looked away to give him a moment’s privacy.

“She won’t be able to talk to you,” I said. “You might as well at least sit down.”

I spotted a chair in the corner and shoved it close until it touched the backs of his legs. Like a robotic man, he bent at the hips and knees and sank onto the seat.

“She’s battling infection,” said a voice at the door.

The nurse who’d been such a drill sergeant with those media folks now had a voice tender and caring. She moved into the room and checked a bag of clear fluid hanging from a hook near the head of the bed. “That GSW nearly got her even though the bullet itself only lodged in muscle. We’re pumping in the antibiotics and she should be a whole lot better in a day or two.”

She touched a button here, a dial there, moving around the room efficiently.

Ron hadn’t taken his eyes from Victoria’s face.

“I’m gonna go,” I said, patting his shoulder and giving the nurse a smile. “Call if you need me—otherwise I’d better tend to my hubby at home.”

Ron tilted his head until his cheek rested against my hand and we held that pose for a moment.

“I’ll come back in the morning unless you want a break sooner.” I realized it was already nearly ten o’clock.

I drove through fairly quiet streets, avoiding the university. With some exceptions Albuquerque isn’t a big night-life city. I made it home in about fifteen minutes and that was mainly because I’d hit three red lights in a row along Lomas.

The first thing I noticed on my own street—the news vans were all gone. Now that there was no killer bridegroom, apparently there was not much of a story. Sad but true.

Elsa’s place was dark. Poor dear had probably not slept much with all the commotion outside, and I knew for a fact several other neighbors had pestered her for information about us. Yet another thing to deal with sometime in the future, the family reputation within our own neighborhood. There’d been so many home sales in the past ten years or so, nobody knew us long-term, the way Elsa did.

From behind our drawn living room drapes, I could tell the television was on which told me Drake was waiting up. I let myself in, got jumped by the exuberant puppy, and greeted Drake as he came through the kitchen door.

“Want some hot chocolate?” he asked. He had a steaming mug in his hand.

“That’s yours,” I protested.

“Won’t take but a second to make another one.” He took my jacket and handed me the cocoa, then ducked back into the kitchen.

The show he’d been watching ended and a newscast came on, telling me what I already knew—missing Victoria Morgan had been found and the police were now considering this to be a case of home invasion. A couple of experts were brought on to give statistics on the shocking number of these crimes. I was just happy not to hear Ron’s name on the news, for once.

I filled in Drake on Victoria’s condition and Ron’s reaction to knowing she would be all right.

“I never really thought Ron would find the right person,” I said, “the way I did.”

In quick order, the cocoa was gone, the TV shut off, and we found ourselves in bed celebrating the fact that we have each other—as only we can do.

 

* * *

 

Three days later, the doctors cleared Victoria to go home. She was considered something of a miracle patient having only lost one pinkie toe to frostbite and with what would eventually become a dimpled crease across the top of her left shoulder. There would be some physical therapy to make sure use of that arm had not been compromised and she might have to adapt some of her sandals and most of her strapless dresses. All in all, we were one very lucky family.

I called Kent Taylor to be sure it was all right for us to take down the crime scene tape and deliver Victoria to her own home. While I wouldn’t have minded taking her in at our place, I know too well the feeling a person has when she simply wants to go home, to be in her own bed. With the detective’s clearance, I headed over there. I had roughly four hours to clean the house and make it comfortable for our patient’s recuperation.

Armed with a few bags of groceries and some basic cleaning supplies I parked in the driveway beside Victoria’s now-dusty blue PT Cruiser. Ripping the yellow strands of tape away from the door frame was one of the most pleasurable things I’d done in the past week, I’ll tell you. It shouldn’t take me long to straighten the furniture, run a dust cloth over everything and vacuum up any stray footprints the police had left behind. I would stash her vacation suitcase discreetly away in a closet and put a roast in the oven so she and Ron would have a hot dinner tonight. All those great plans sort of went whoosh the minute I opened the front door.

The place had been ransacked. The hairs on my arms prickled as I looked around.

The hall closet door stood ajar, drawers in the console hung open, sofa cushions lay on the floor spouting tufts of stuffing. Books were strewn from the shelves. As I moved toward the kitchen I saw cupboard doors open and items from a linen closet flung about.

Nothing appeared as it had the night I made my little foray for business files and the contents of her safe.

I set down the items I’d carried—two food sacks and my purse—and dashed downstairs to see if the intruders had also located the safe. The same disarray was evident here but they’d not moved the heavy lamp which concealed the opening to the safe. Not that it mattered—they would have needed a master safe-cracker to get into it, of that I felt sure, and I’d already taken the contents.

My mind whirled with the implications. I should probably call the police immediately and report this, but they were stuck on the random-home-invasion theory and might not even listen to me. Worse, they would be all over the place for hours, completely disrupting Victoria’s homecoming. None of the typical burglary items were taken—two flat screen TVs and some other electronic gear were all in place. She was so desperately looking forward to being home again … I couldn’t ruin that for her.

I started with the furniture in the basement, straightening and organizing, stuffing the filling back into cushions and pillows as best I could, working my way through the house. The jolt of fear, which ran like an electrical tingle throughout my body, propelled me to maximum efficiency. My hands worked coolly while my brain buzzed along at a zillion miles a minute.

The men who’d broken in, that fateful night, must have been watching the place and come back for whatever they wanted in the first place. The good news about that was they were obviously after something other than Victoria herself. Knowing they hadn’t intended to murder her was some consolation at least. On the other hand, if she knew what they wanted and where they could get it, they might have plans to come back and force her to reveal whatever it was.

I couldn’t get all this out of my mind as I neatened the kitchen and put the new food away in the fridge. Every room had received the same treatment, telling me the searchers had spent some time. I’d already found their point of entry, the back door I’d left unlocked after my own hasty departure.

Oh my god. The knowledge hit me at once. The car that had pulled into her driveway the early morning I was there—it had to be those men coming back. I’d escaped with moments to spare.

The theory made perfect sense. Knowing the police were finished with the house and the owner was gone, they knew they had plenty of time to search at their leisure. It had been daybreak when I was there. They might have stayed all day, with no neighbors the wiser, perhaps thinking their car belonged to one of the relatives … or maybe they’d only used the driveway to turn around, not left a car in sight at all.

I’d finished what I could do in the bedroom and office, forcing myself to stop guessing at what the intruders might have done. We needed facts, and the only place we could likely get them was from Victoria herself. It wouldn’t be easy, but we would need to discuss this soon.

I’d plumped the last of the living room cushions and pushed the sofa back in place when I heard Ron’s car in the driveway. By the time I reached the front door, he’d helped her from the passenger seat into a wheelchair he must have borrowed somewhere. One foot was encased in some kind of fat medical-looking ‘boot’ and her left arm was in a sling. She wore the new flannel nightgown and plush robe I’d taken to the hospital as a gift yesterday.

Getting the wheelchair up the front steps proved too much of a challenge so Ron simply picked her up and carried her into the house, while I wheeled the chair along and set it to the side.

“We’ll have to rearrange things a little,” I said, “but that’s no problem. I’ll do it.”

Victoria, without makeup or styled hair, still looked beautiful to us. She gave an almost-exact replica of her old smile. “I don’t plan to be in that chair very long. The doctor said I could walk on this boot as soon as I feel ready. They just didn’t want me going into a swoon the moment I stood up on my own.”

“And I’m not leaving her side,” Ron said. He stood beside the couch where he’d deposited her.

She gave him a scolding look. “We talked about that. I’ll be able to get around the house in a day or two. You have your office to run.”

No one mentioned that they’d both cleared their calendars, planning to be away on their honeymoon for another ten days. They would have been in sunny Florida until right before Christmas, coming back all tanned and fit and rubbing it in our pasty winter-white faces.

“I was just about to put a roast in the oven for your dinner,” I told them. “Ron? Want to give me a hand?”

He sent a quizzical look my way. Since when did Charlie cook? Much less, since when did Ron ever lend a hand in the kitchen?

“You sure you’re okay?” he asked Vic, pulling a cashmere afghan over her lap, tending to the pillows behind her.

“I’m fine. I actually just want to snuggle down here and grab a quick nap,” she said, making little nestling movements.

I rattled some pots and pans, getting into kitchen mode, and kept my voice low as I told Ron about the condition of the house when I’d arrived.

“I didn’t call the police. Was that the wrong way to handle it?” I worked at the counter, chopping onions, carrots and potatoes with my back toward the living room.

He thought about it for a very long minute.

“I don’t know. They seem happy enough to believe the whole incident Friday night was random. So far, she hasn’t said anything to contradict that idea.”

“We have to talk to her about it. Whoever came back here—I have to believe it was the same guys—was after something. Maybe they found it and will never show up again. But what if they didn’t?” I saw his protective mode kick in.

“I’m not leaving her side, day or night,” he said.

“I think that’s a wise idea.” The roasting pan went into the oven and I cleaned up my scraps while Ron practically tiptoed back to the living room and gingerly lowered himself onto a chair where he could watch Victoria sleeping.

With similar silent intentions I walked quietly across the room and picked up my purse. I signaled goodbye to Ron and blew a little kiss across the room to both of them. I’d just reached the front door when the doorbell rang. Ack! My thoughts ran the gamut—from the police, to the intruders (silly, I know, why would they ring?), to Drake showing up to be of help.

What I didn’t expect, until I opened the door, was the sight of Gladys Peabody standing there with a plastic-covered plate of cookies.

“Hello, dear,” she said. “I saw your cars here. Noticed that Victoria is home.”

“She’s sleeping right now,” I whispered.

I could see she would have loved to come in but at least she took the hint. She held out the plate. “Give her these and let her know I’m thinking of her.”

I thanked her as profusely as you can do in a whisper, took the plate, and closed the door before the conversation could go any further. When I turned around Victoria was stretching.

“Something’s wrong with this couch,” she mumbled, coming awake. “The cushions feel all wrong.”

I covered by holding out the cookie plate. Ron took it and lifted the plastic wrap.

“I heard you guys talking in the kitchen,” Victoria said. “You’re wanting to know whether you should tell me something, and I heard the word police. What is it?”

I gave the quick and vague description of what I’d found and our dilemma. She’d pulled herself to a sitting position by the time I finished.

“I don’t think we need to call the police,” she said. “There are some things I need to tell both of you first.”