Almost Dead (16 page)

CHAPTER 36

It was still early when Lizzy wandered into the kitchen.

Once again Kitally was cooking at the stove.

“Hey, there,” Kitally said, sounding much too chipper.

Lizzy’s greeting came out sounding a lot like a grunt. She found a mug and poured herself a cup of coffee. “Have you ever considered opening a bed-and-breakfast?”

Kitally snorted. “In Carmichael?”

“I was thinking Napa or La Jolla.”

“Nope, never crossed my mind.”

“You’re one of those people who’ve never met a stranger. You like to cook, and you’re a morning person. It makes perfect sense.”

“I’m really not sure what I want to do when I grow up. Right now I’m just happy to be doing what I’m doing. Catching that dognapper was very satisfying. And the
Sac Bee
called me. They want to interview me.”

“You’re going to be Sacramento’s sweetheart,” Lizzy said.

“What would you like in your omelet?”

“I’ll take whatever you’ve got,” Lizzy said as she took a seat at the table. “Hayley’s door was open, and she’s not in her room. Any idea where she might have gone?”

Before Kitally could answer, the front door opened and closed. Hayley gave a slight nod of her chin as she walked by.

Lizzy got up and followed her halfway down the hallway. “Is that blood on your arm?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

“Where have you been?”

Hayley turned around.

They were face-to-face, only inches apart.

The girl smelled like cigarettes and bad news.

“We’ve talked about this before, Lizzy. No mothering me. You do your thing and I’ll do mine.”

Lizzy didn’t know what to say to that. Kitally kept telling Lizzy that the three of them were in this together, they were all a team, but were they really? They were each living in their own little worlds within the same house. Insanity was what it was.

Hayley’s hair was mussed. She looked exhausted, her eyelids at half-mast.

“I’m going to take a shower. I’ll be down in a little bit.” With that, Hayley walked off.

Lizzy trudged back to her chair at the kitchen table. “That girl is not taking care of herself.”

“Two peas in a pod,” Kitally said as she slid a plate in front of Lizzy, complete with a sprig of parsley.

“What do you mean by that?” Lizzy asked.

“Just what I said. You two are a lot alike. Neither of you take care of yourselves. You don’t get enough sleep, don’t eat the right things, both on automatic pilot.”

“That’s not true.”

Kitally blew out some air. “When was the last time you laughed?”

“Just the other day, when someone told me a joke.”

“Tell me the joke.”

“A magician was driving down the road.” Lizzy paused for effect. “Then he turned into a driveway.”

Kitally pulled the pan from the heat. “That’s not even funny. I know you didn’t laugh at that one.”

Lizzy shrugged. “Trust me—I can tell a joke. And I don’t come home at five in the morning with blood on my arm.”

“Are you sure it was blood?”

“Almost positive. She’s up to her old tricks.”

“What did I miss?” Kitally asked. “What does that mean?”

“Before you came along, Hayley used to stay out at all hours. It was in the paper, and there was even a blurry video on YouTube showing a young woman taking out a couple of punks in the middle of the night.”

“You think she’s doing that again?” Kitally asked.

“Doing it still, not again.”

“What’s she think she’s doing?”

“Taking care of business. Doing the same thing the woman who keeps calling me is doing.”

“The woman who delivered poisonous cookies?”

Lizzy nodded.

“So you think Hayley might have her own personal kill list?”

“No, I don’t think Hayley would go that far, but I do know that not too long after I saw the video, Hayley was taken into custody for cutting off a man’s penis.”

They were quiet for a second after that. Then Kitally said, “Well, I agree. I don’t think Hayley would kill anyone—”

“Of course she wouldn’t.”

Kitally sighed. “I wasn’t finished. I don’t think Hayley would kill anyone who didn’t deserve it.”

Lizzy closed her eyes.
Just breathe
, she reminded herself.

“Don’t worry, Lizzy,” Kitally said. “I would never take a life unless it was in self-defense.”

Lizzy had no response to that.

“But I guess I wouldn’t mind finding other ways to make some of these people pay for their actions.”

“Let’s change the subject,” Lizzy said. “It’s much too early in the morning to have this conversation.”

Kitally carried another plate to the table and took a seat across from Lizzy. “All right. On a cheerier note, I was able to reach three of the four people on the kill list: Chelsea Webster, Mindy Graft, and Aubrey Singleton. All three of them sounded concerned and yet doubtful at the same time.”

“Well, all we can do is warn these people,” Lizzy said. “Tell them we believe it’s a woman and that she’s used a variety of ways to kill and make it look like an accident.”

“That’s exactly what I did. I read off the list of people who’ve died. I told them everything I knew, told them not to eat anything they didn’t cook themselves. The rest is up to them.” Kitally sighed. “As long as they’re aware of their surroundings, stay alert, and keep their doors and windows locked, they should have a fighting chance, right?”

Lizzy shrugged. The fact was, no matter how careful they were—how careful
any
of them were, every last one of them was vulnerable as hell. She thought of Shelby Geitner. There was no way Shelby hadn’t been careful, and it hadn’t mattered. She’d still been taken. Lizzy closed her eyes and curled around the painful ball of impotent rage that seemed to be growing inside her, day by day.

“Hayley suggested we keep an eye on some of these people,” Kitally said. “Maybe we can catch this woman in the act.”

Lizzy forced herself to open her eyes, take a breath. “As long as the two of you work together, I’m not opposed to that idea.”

CHAPTER 37

Kitally followed the light-blue Toyota Yaris into the parking lot of a discount market, parked in the next lane where they would have a clear shot of the car, and shut off the engine.

Hayley sat in the passenger seat and breathed in that new car smell everyone always got all worked up about. She didn’t understand the appeal. It just smelled like rubber and leather.

“Mindy Graft was just warned that someone might be after her,” Kitally said. “Someone armed and dangerous, and she didn’t even bother to lock her car.”

They watched the woman stroll toward the store.

Hayley shrugged. “I don’t think any of these people are taking the threat on their life too seriously.”

“I wasn’t able to reach Gary Perdue. We should drive by his place later if we have time.”

“Where does he live?”

“Auburn.”

“Let’s watch Mindy’s car until she comes back. Make sure the woman calling Lizzy isn’t watching her, too.”

Hayley looked around the parking lot until her gaze settled on a black Land Rover. A woman was sitting in the driver’s seat. Hayley was about to go check the license plate number when the woman got out, opened the back of the car, and pulled out a stroller. “Lizzy said the woman should be in her early thirties and single. Isn’t that right?”

“That’s correct.”

Hayley forgot about the woman with the baby and continued her search through a sea of cars. Nothing unusual.

“So, what do you do late at night when you’re out walking the streets of Sacramento?” Kitally asked.

“Just keeping an eye on a few people.”

“What sort of people?”

“Bad people. Evil people. Just making sure they’re staying out of trouble.”

“What happens if they’re not staying out of trouble—if they do something you don’t like?”

“I give them a few warnings—let them know they’re being watched.”

“You can’t watch every loser in town.”

“No, I can’t. That’s why I keep the number to a minimum. And I have rules.”

“Wow, you’re really serious about this, aren’t you?”

Hayley pushed a strand of hair out of her face and kept her focus on the parking lot.

“What sort of rules?”

“I wouldn’t bother teaching them a lesson unless I was sure they couldn’t be rehabilitated any other way.”

“How could you possibly know?”

“I just know.”

“You sound like a vigilante.”

“I guess if you have to label it—”

A siren broke into their exchange, growing louder as an ambulance with flashing warning lights pulled in front of the store.

“What the hell?” Hayley got out of the car and started jogging that way with Kitally on her heels.

The back of the ambulance flew open. Two men in white grabbed a stretcher and headed inside the store.

Hayley tried to follow them inside but was stopped by store security.

It wasn’t long before a woman was brought out on the stretcher. There was an oxygen mask on her face and a tube in her arm.

“Mindy Graft?” Kitally asked.

“No.”

Hayley heard panic in a medic’s voice as he called for backup.

A police car pulled up next to the ambulance, leaving enough room for the medics to do what needed to be done.

Countless sirens sounded in the distance. A fire truck pulled into the parking lot, followed by two more emergency vehicles.

People were coming out of the store now. Many of them were talking on their cell phones; some were crying, others running for their cars.

“What the hell happened in there?” Kitally asked nobody in particular.

A police officer used a bullhorn to tell people to back away from the front of the store. If they weren’t waiting for someone inside, they were to leave the vicinity immediately. Nobody would be allowed inside.

Not too far away, a man was talking loudly, recounting to a police officer everything he’d seen. Before he’d entered the store, there was a woman standing near the entrance passing out brownie samples. She said she was opening a bakery and was doing a little test marketing. He hadn’t eaten all morning, so he tried to get one, but someone else snatched the last one before he could get a bit of brownie for himself. He said that the woman who was brought out on the stretcher was one of the people who he’d seen eat a sample. When the officer asked for a description, the man said she was a white lady with red curly hair. She wore plastic gloves, which he thought made sense since she was dealing with food. He couldn’t see her eyes because she had on a pair of dark oversized sunglasses. She wore a long dress and was heavyset.

“That’s Mindy Graft,” Kitally said in a low voice when another stretcher was wheeled out. There was a white sheet pulled over her face.

“How do you know that’s her?”

“The boots. Look at her feet.”

“You noticed her shoes when she left her car?”

“Of course. Valentino with the bow over the knee boots. I’ve been eyeing those for a while now.”

Hayley had no words, so she started walking for the car.

“Where are you going?”

“There’s nothing more we can do for Mindy Graft. We better pay that Auburn man a visit and pray we get there in time.”

Lizzy’s footfalls echoed as she made her way past the nurse’s station toward Jared’s room. She could feel a half-dozen pairs of eyes boring into the back of her head. She pivoted about. “What are you all looking at?”

One nurse looked away; another grabbed a clipboard and took off in the other direction. The chirpy nurse, the one who always told her how good Jared looked, walked her way, cupped her hand around Lizzy’s elbow, and ushered her into an alcove where they could talk in private. She said, “I wanted to let you know that Jared’s family is here.”

“Jared’s father?”

“There’s three of them in his room right now—his mother, father, and his sister.”

Was she being ambushed? “Do you know if a decision has been made as far as the directive goes?”

The nurse shook her head. “I’m not sure. I do know that whenever a family member petitions the court to be named guardian, these things sometimes take time. And being that Mr. Shayne is a former judge does not help matters. Until the court makes a ruling, your hands and ours are tied.”

Lizzy took in a breath as she tried to decide whether to leave for now and come back later. The nurse must have read her mind because she said, “Mr. Shayne told me he planned to wait until you arrived.”

“How long have they been here?”

“Over an hour.”

Lizzy thanked her and said, “If Dr. Calloway is around, could you ask him to join us?”

“I’ll page him,” the nurse said before heading off.

Lizzy walked down the corridor to Jared’s room. His family hadn’t bothered to call or visit in years, but now that Jared was on his deathbed, they wouldn’t leave him alone. This was crazy. Lizzy refused to back down. It was time to hear what Dr. Calloway had to say and hopefully set them all straight.

Jared’s father stood near the window looking out, while his sister and mother sat near his bedside, talking to one another in low voices. Both women looked up when she entered the room.

“Hi,” Lizzy said. “You wanted to talk to me?”

Michael R. Shayne, a tall, distinguished man with silver hair, turned to face her. His piercing blue eyes narrowed. “We were hoping that if we all met face-to–face, you might come to your senses.”

“Come to
my
senses?”

“Yes. As Jared’s father, I have the right to make any and all decisions regarding my only son.”

“I would be fine with that,” Lizzy stated firmly and calmly, “if that’s what Jared had wanted.”

It never took much to get a rise out of the man, and today wasn’t proving to be any different. His face turned red. “There’s no way that directive will hold up in court.”

It was plain to see that he was grasping for straws. “Why do you say that?”

“For starters, you’re not exactly a stable and competent being.”

Lizzy lifted her brows. “But you are?” Lizzy recalled the night when Jared was called home because his father was waving a gun around, threatening his mother’s life. “I don’t think you want to bring this to court, Mr. Shayne.”

He pointed a finger Lizzy’s way. “Your witnesses aren’t exactly model citizens.”

More grasping. And it took everything Lizzy had to impede her mounting resentment. “Jessica Pleiss is currently training to be an FBI agent,” she told him. “And Hayley Hansen has proven herself time and time again to be a caring and thoughtful human being. They are both over eighteen and well-thought-of witnesses, handpicked by your son.”

Lynn looked at Lizzy with pleading eyes, as if she thought there was a chance, however slim, that Lizzy would sign over a release naming Mr. Shayne as Jared’s new health-care proxy and then simply walk away forever. It was the same as it had been in high school when Lizzy had first started dating Jared—Lynn would do anything to avoid conflict with her overbearing father.

Before Lizzy could say another word, Dr. Calloway knocked on the open door and came inside. “Is this a bad time?”

“No. It’s perfect timing,” Lizzy told him.

Quick introductions were made before Dr. Calloway asked everyone to take a seat. Of course, Mr. Shayne insisted on standing. He liked to tower over people when they talked to him.

“There is always discomfort when it comes to determining when continued care is futile,” the doctor said. “The situation we find ourselves in concerning our patient is always difficult. Sometimes medicine has nothing more to offer, and I’m afraid that’s where we are today.”

“So this is it?” Lizzy asked. “That’s your official determination?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so.”

“Well, I think we need a second opinion,” Michael insisted.

“That’s fine,” Dr. Calloway said, “but I am afraid Lizzy has the legal authority here.”

Michael was about to protest before Dr. Calloway cut him off. “And you do realize that your son gave Lizzy power of attorney stating that in the event he was ever diagnosed as being in a vegetative state, his directive is clear: withhold all treatment.”

“Clearly, my son wasn’t thinking straight when he signed that worthless piece of paper. Otherwise he would have chosen life over death.”

“Jared is not breathing on his own,” Dr. Calloway stated calmly.

Michael finally looked at Jared.

“His kidneys are shutting down,” Dr. Calloway continued, his tone respectful and professional. “The only thing keeping your son alive is the ventilator and feeding tube.”

“This isn’t about me or you,” Lizzy said to Michael. “It’s about doing what’s best for Jared.” She forced herself to take a deep breath. “I love Jared. I don’t know how I will go on without him, and if you decide to drop your petition, I’ll let him go because I love him.”

Silence.

And then Jared’s mother stood and turned toward Michael. “She’s right. We must honor Jared’s wishes. If you love him like you say you do, you’ll let Lizzy handle this. You’ve got to let him go.”

Mr. Shayne’s entire body seemed to tremble. He looked from the doctor to Lizzy, his eyes no longer blazing with anger but with a sudden bleak understanding. And then, with sadness weighing down his shoulders, he left the room.

Thirty minutes later, Lizzy sat alone by Jared’s side, exhausted as she watched him. She felt no victory in having seen clarity come to his father’s face or with knowing his mother was on her side, since there was no good side in this fight. They all loved the same man, wanted only the best for him.

Her gaze drifted to the flowers by the bed. She took the tiny envelope and opened it.

I kood have killed him, put a pillow over his nose and mouth. So easy. But I want to watch you sufer instead.

She closed her eyes, swallowed, read the note again. Shooting to her feet, she looked around the room, from right to left, for any further signs that a madman might have been inside this room.

A nurse came by, and Lizzy called out to her and asked her who left the flowers for Jared.

“He came by this morning to drop the flowers off. A tall man, said the two of them went way back.”

“Did he sign in?” Lizzy didn’t wait for an answer. She headed back to the nurses’ station to see for herself. The nurse followed her, even passed her by. She tried to grab the sign-in sheet before Lizzy could get her hands on it. “He signed in an hour ago. His name is Samuel Jones.”

Lizzy pulled out her cell phone and took a picture of the sign-in sheet.

“What are you doing?”

Lizzy ignored her.

The nurse grabbed the clipboard. Lizzy didn’t care. She had what she wanted. She walked back to Jared’s room, took pictures of the card and the flowers, then tucked the card into her purse.

Outside, she walked quickly to the parking garage. It irked her to know that she might have driven past the man who was doing his best to make her life a living hell.

The lighting in the garage was minimal.

She watched a car pull in, take a ticket, and move on. As she made her way to the elevators, her gaze roamed over every alcove and dark space between cars. She felt for her shoulder holster, made sure her gun was in place. She fingered the pepper spray on her key chain as she approached the elevator doors, pushed the button, and waited.

A ding sounded.

The door opened.

After she stepped inside, she realized she’d been holding her breath. As she exhaled, a hand reached in and stopped the elevator doors from closing.

The second she saw his face, she aimed the nozzle at his eyes and sprayed.

He cursed as he bent over, rubbing his face with the sleeve of his left arm as he reached out with the other. She darted past him, out of the elevator, and ran for the exit.