A Desperate Silence (Dr. Sylvia Strange Book 3) (32 page)

     
It took two tries with her key to unlock the street door of the hospital.

     
A young man, barely twenty, on graveyard duty, was slumped over the admissions desk. His body was so limp, he looked dead. Sylvia called out to him. When he didn't answer, she felt a tug of misgiving and walked to the desk. His face was pressed against a logbook. His arms hung loosely at his sides. Misgiving turned to alarm.

     
"Hey!" Sylvia slapped the desk. "Wake up." She heard the padding of soft footfalls behind her, and she swung around. Noelle Harding's security guard—Khalsa—gave her an oddly penetrating look.

     
"Are you here twenty-four hours a day?" she asked.

     
"The shifts are twenty-four on, twenty-four off—my relief called in sick." He reached past her and brought his baton sharply down on the desk.

     
The attendant's head jerked twice, then he wrenched his shoulders back in a motion that could only hurt. He focused warily on the security guard, blinked, and offered Sylvia a too casual greeting. She leaned over the counter to whisper: "I think you should call somebody to cover your shift tonight."

     
He rubbed his eyes like a child, then mumbled, "I'll get some coffee."

     
"Do that. What's your name?"

     
"Theo."

     
"Theo, I don't suppose you'd know if the cops have been by?"

     
The security guard answered for the young man. "It's been over an hour; they're due any minute."

     
When Sylvia left the lobby, the guard followed. The hospital was quiet, the main hallway dimly lit. The locked ward would be slightly eerie—it always was at night. Sylvia was approaching the security door to the ward when a psychiatric nurse stepped out of a stockroom. Sylvia greeted the woman. "Hey, Peggy."

     
The woman lifted her finger in a small wave and moved briskly in the opposite direction down the hall, back toward the reception area. As the nurse walked, she called over her shoulder, "I'm taking a coffee break in thirty minutes. Fresh pot of java in the lounge if you drop by."

     
"Maybe." Sylvia entered the locked ward with the security guard on her heels. As the psychologist passed the private rooms, she heard an occasional whimper or sigh from a restless occupant. She rose slightly on tiptoe, keeping her heels above ground to muffle the sound her shoes would make on linoleum.

     
She reached the child's room—Khalsa took up his position guarding the door—and she entered quietly, alone. Serena was in bed asleep. Her breathing was shallow and even. The covers were twisted around her small body; her arms clutched the pillow to her cheek. Sylvia sat on the edge of the bed. The glow of a street lamp rinsed the child's skin of its warmth and made her look unnaturally pale. Her mouth was pursed, lips just slightly parted, eyes closed and fringed with lashes. Her fingers clutched fabric. Her face—sweet and sad—reminded Sylvia of an angel.

     
Sylvia pressed the palm of her hand to the child's forehead, felt skin that was warm and moist. Serena didn't wake, but she turned, a sigh escaping her lips. Sylvia knew she could tell herself she didn't love this child. But that would be a lie. She wasn't sure when curiosity, duty, fascination had turned to love. Had it happened when Serena tamed Nikki? Or when the child wrapped her arms around the psychologist's legs, attaching herself permanently? Or when they slept side by side?

     
Sylvia sat still, letting her breathing soften, allowing herself to slide into that space between sleep and waking. She felt hyperalert, but her mind drifted, floating on each breath. No insistent thoughts rattled through her consciousness. In her brain pictures appeared and disappeared just as quickly. The child. Her own face as a child. Cash Wheeler behind the prison barrier. Her father, Daniel Strange.

     
She held the image of her father's face. Held it without pain. Without recrimination, for the first time in years. Until that image dissolved with all the others.

     
Time didn't stand still, but it didn't seem to pass either. It simply balanced between the life-and-death decision of each inhalation, exhalation. Sylvia slid out of the space as gently as she had entered it. The first thing she saw was the sleeping child.

     
So that's what the good part of meditation was all about
. All these months of sitting, straining her back, aware of every distraction, every ache and pain—all the while her mind revving like a motor. But this was a completely different state: clarity, simplicity, light. Perhaps Serena experienced something similar when she prayed?

     
She stirred, then gazed out the window, searching for a moon. If it was up there, it wasn't visible; it would have already moved along its path of orbit beyond the limited view offered by the east-facing window. When she stood to leave, her hand grazed the pocket of her silk jacket, and she felt something hard.

     
The medallion.

     
She'd forgotten to return it to the child. She took the silver chain and guided it gently over Serena's head.

     
"I promise, I'll always look out for you," she whispered. Then she kissed the child's cheek. Serena stirred without waking, twisting her body on the bed, and her small fingers found the medallion.

     
When Sylvia left the room, Khalsa was at his post outside the door. She said, "Keep an eye on her for me."

     
He nodded, and a ghost of a smile played over his rough features.

     
As she approached the lobby, Theo the Sleepy appeared from another hallway with a cup of steaming coffee. He lifted the cup and said, "
This
will keep me awake. Peggy made it fresh."

     
"You sure you don't want to get someone to cover for you?"

     
"Too late now. Anyway, I've got an astronomy midterm to study for." He slipped behind the desk, dropped into his chair, and faced an open textbook.

     
"I'll be right back." Sylvia heard the lock engage as the front doors closed behind her. She moved quickly down the walkway and stepped over to an idling vehicle. "Hey, wondered where you guys were."

     
A red-haired police officer smiled at her. "McDonald's. This is our dinner break. Aren't you here kind of late?"

     
"My third trip today. Might as well bring my suitcase and move in." Sylvia pulled a cigarette from her pocket and smiled. "Coffee break. Just wanted to say hi."

     
The cop handed her matches. She shivered as she lit the cigarette. The November air was cold, and she was dressed for a cocktail party. As she inhaled smoke, she lifted her face to gaze at the night sky. Yes, the moon was floating above the western horizon. Liquid yellow, it was somewhere between phases: gibbous and quarter.

     
She allowed herself three hits of nicotine, then she dropped the cigarette and ground it with fierce energy into the sidewalk. She waved to the cops. "Bye, guys."

     
Briskly, she retraced her steps to the hospital door where Theo the Sleepy let her inside. When she glanced back at the street, the cop flashed his lights.

R
ENZO WATCHED THE
cop's headlights flash—once, twice—as the woman returned to the hospital. Was it the shrink? From this distance, he couldn't tell for certain. He'd parked the Seville one block south of Mesa Verde Hospital. At the moment, he could see Santa Fe P.D.'s finest, engine idling, in front of the building. His mouth tightened; they should have responded to a radio 10 code by now: burglary in progress. His decoys were late.

     
But even with the delay, Renzo felt as if his body were encased, safe from emotion, shrouded in calm. He didn't blink when the cops activated their flashing lights. They accelerated down to the end of the block, away from where Renzo was parked. As they turned the corner, they sounded the vehicle siren, one short
whoop
.

T
HEO WAS FAST
asleep at his post behind the reception desk at Mesa Verde Hospital when the police siren sounded. He was still asleep forty-five seconds later, when someone rapped hard on the glass doors.

     
Khalsa had left his post in front of Room 21 to walk to the lobby; he'd heard a faint siren—one short wail—and he wanted to investigate. Two feds had come by the hospital earlier in the day—asking questions, looking at the girl. The combination of the feds and the regular cop patrols had him spooked. Everybody was interested in the half-pint occupant of Room 21. He'd read the newspapers today. He'd known right away—they were writing about her. Why else would a woman like Noelle Harding hire him to stand outside a hospital door all night?

     
In the lobby, when he heard the rap on glass, his blood pressure jumped. The sight of the man startled him—black pants, shirt, vest, and cap, gun in holster, badge, insignia. The uniform wasn't anything he recognized right off. It wasn't a D.E.A. or police SWAT uniform.

     
He tried to make sense of the picture: Was the man in black one of the
good guys?
If so, let him prove it. Khalsa approached the door cautiously. As he moved, his right hand dusted the weapon riding his hip. Through glass he studied the man's badge and I.D. According to that, the man was a cop, all right—a
Mexican
cop. A
federal
. What the hell, didn't he know
New
Mexico had declared independence a hundred years ago?

     
Warily, Khalsa retreated to the admissions desk, where Theo was snoring like a warthog, dead to the world, facedown in his astronomy textbook. The security guard jabbed at the young man, but Theo didn't stir. Khalsa found the main key ring on the desk. He shook the ring, picked out the key labeled
MAIN
, and returned to the door to unlock the dead bolt.

     
Khalsa blocked the open door with his substantial body mass. "What's going on?"

     
"Someone's coming after the girl. You're going to need backup. Radio your Dispatch." The Mexican cop stared down the security guard. "I'll patch you through to the feds."

     
"You're with the Mexican
federales
, you're not D.E.A.—"

     
"We're working with the D.E.A. and F.B.I." The Mexican set one hand on the guard's shoulder. He didn't push, but he said, "We're running out of time."

     
Khalsa gave way grudgingly, and the man brushed past him.

     
"D
ID YOU HEAR
something?" Sylvia froze, listening. Peggy had the radio playing in the hospital's staff lounge—the oldies station—and it was hard to hear anything except the chorus of "Under the Boardwalk."

     
Peggy shrugged, filling a coffee mug to the brim. "I heard a fire siren. I hear them every shift because the station's so close."

     
Sylvia stepped to the door of the lounge and strained her ears, listening closely. The only audible sound was the mundane white noise of the hospital—and Peggy's radio.

     
The nurse handed Sylvia the coffee mug with a smile. "You're kind of jumpy tonight, huh?"

     
Sylvia nodded; she kept expecting a tall, dark demon to appear around every corner.

     
Peggy sat down at the small Formica-topped table, humming the 1960s tune. She patted the chair next to hers. "I get that way sometimes."

     
Sylvia sat in the designated chair, sipping gingerly at the scalding coffee.

     
The nurse touched Sylvia's arm. "I read the papers today. That story was about your little girl in Twenty-one, wasn't it?" She interpreted the psychologist's silence as confirmation and continued, "What's wrong with her? Why doesn't she speak?"

     
Sylvia suddenly felt weary. She really enjoyed Peggy, but she didn't feel like discussing Serena with anyone tonight

     
"Is it psychological?" Peggy pressed.

     
"Ummmm." Steam wafted into Sylvia's nostrils.

     
"She could join the Carmelites." Peggy rolled her eyes at her own joke.

     
"What did you say?"

     
"I was joking." Peggy looked sheepish. "The Carmelites—the nuns who live up by St. John's College? Don't they take a vow of silence to God?"

O
NCE
R
ENZO HAD
gained access to the hospital lobby, he said, "Call your dispatcher—I'll give you the number to verify my involvement—"

     
As the security guard activated his radio, Renzo lifted the .22 to the base of the man's neck. He said, "But first, let's go see the girl."

     
Khalsa stiffened and glanced toward the young man behind the desk; there would be no help from that quarter: Theo's snores rose and fell with stubborn consistency. Still, Khalsa hesitated. He could yell for help—but he'd be shot along with Theo and whoever responded to his summons. Best to keep silent, to play along and wait for a moment to catch the other man off guard. He yielded to the persuasive prod of a cool metal gun barrel.

     
The two men moved as one down the hallway—the guard in the lead, Renzo close behind—past private rooms. Renzo scanned glassed doors for curious feces. But apparently, the inhabitants of Mesa Verde Hospital slept through the night. Maybe it had something to do with the drugs doctors gave crazy people.

     
He was prepared for any encounter with additional staff. He knew the hospital kept two nurses on night shift; at this moment, they were probably in the acute-care wing. That was only a few hundred feet away, but the building wings were separated by soundproofed walls and metal designed to keep agitated patients in check.