Always Watching (7 page)

“
Let’s just… not get
carried away until we’ve got the facts.”

“
Yo, Eriksson!”  Tony
Briscoe barked from halfway down the hall.  “We got us
somebody that ought to talk to you sooner rather than
later.”

“
Go back in there. 
Get them to print the personnel files we need and hand them off to
Darnell.  He’s gonna have to divvy up the workload with all
these cops from Darkwater with Charlie Haverston.  I’m gonna
go see what Briscoe thinks is such an earth-shattering
statement.  Meet me downstairs in twenty minutes.”

“
Where are we
going?”

“
To see Danny
Datello.”

My eyes darted around the crowded space
looking for Crevan.  He was nowhere in sight.  “Who am I
talking to?”

Briscoe grinned.  “Good to see you too,
Helen.  She’s right in there.  Name’s Kelly
Robards.  She was working with the babies earlier with the
missing nurse.”

“
Excellent.”  I
pushed the door open and stopped short.  The nurse was sobbing
on Crevan’s shoulder while he patted her back
soothingly. 

“
There now, just tell Dr.
Eriksson everything you remember this afternoon.  You’re not
in any trouble, Kelly.”

She gazed up at him with doe eyes.  It
explained Tony’s glee. 

“
Ms. Robards?”

She nodded and sniffled, offered one hand
and thought better of it.  “You’re Dr. Eriksson.  I
remember reading about you with that shooting last fall.”

Yeah, didn’t we all?  “Tell me what you
observed this afternoon.”

“
I didn’t think anything
of it, you know?  We all have to run to the bathroom from time
to time.”

“
You’re telling me about
Nurse Payette’s bathroom breaks?”

“
I went to lunch late, you
see.  I came back to the nursery and Flo was just… gone. 
The babies were all screaming bloody murder.  She said she had
to run to the bathroom, but when she came back, she seemed like she
was out of breath.”

“
Don’t you have a staff
bathroom inside the nursery?” I asked.

“
Sure we do, but the
keypad has been broken for a week or so, and we’ve had to leave the
nursery to use the one down the hall.”

“
I’m told that Ms. Payette
is older.  Late fifties?”

“
Probably.  She’s
funny about that sort of thing.  Doesn’t want anyone to know
her age.  I guess that happens when we get old.”

“
Over the past week, has
she seemed short of breath when she comes back from the
bathroom?”

Kelly shook her head.  “She’s fit, you
know?  But that wasn’t the weirdest thing I noticed.”

“
Tell me.  Time is
critical Ms. Robards.”

“
Flo always carries this
big bag to work.  She knits or reads or whatnot when things
are slow in the nursery, like when the mom’s have their babies, or
we don’t have many in the nursery.  I saw her slip out the
stairwell tonight.  She wasn’t carrying her bag.”

“
And it ain’t in the
nursery,” Briscoe said.  He waggled his eyebrows.  “So
what do you think, Kelly?  That bag big enough to sneak out a
newborn baby inside it?”

She swallowed hard, a soft echo punctuating
her nod.  “God help me, but I can’t imagine why Flo would
steal a baby.”

“
How long was it between
the time she came back to the nursery and you discovered that the
Datello infant was missing?” I asked.

“
Probably half an
hour.  I didn’t even realize the baby had come back to the
nursery until Suzanne came to take her back to Mrs. Datello. 
I must’ve been at lunch when Flo checked her in.”

“
I see.”  Looked like
a slam dunk on our inside job.  At the same time, a glance at
my watch revealed that the baby had been missing for five
hours.  Florence hadn’t made her escape from the hospital for
at least ninety minutes after the baby disappeared.  It was a
long time to stash a newborn elsewhere in the hospital where it
wouldn’t be discovered.  Then again, that shortness of breath
issue gave me pause. “Thank you for the information, Ms.
Robards.  Please make sure that Detective Conall has your
contact information should we need to ask you additional
questions.”

Crevan followed me out of the room. 
“What do you think?”

“
She probably took the
baby,” I said quietly.  “But she was here too long to have
stashed the baby in the hospital.”

“
You think she had a
partner?”

“
We can’t rule it
out.  Call Chris.  I want financial records on this
Payette woman.  If someone from the Marcos tribe paid her to
abduct this child, I want to know about it.  Is our FBI agent
here yet?”

“
No,” Crevan said. 
“He called about an hour ago and said that he was unavoidably
delayed.  He should be here by midnight.”

I snorted softly.  “So much for the
bureau’s commitment to finding missing children.”  At Crevan’s
concerned expression, I added, “No, not the whole FBI.  I
could make one phone call and have a team from DC here before this
buffoon makes an appearance, I’m sure.  I don’t think that’s
what we want, Crevan.  We’re making better progress on this
without their interference.”

“
Still, don’t you think
you should let someone in D.C. know about this?  Don’t you
still have that friend –?”

“
David.  Yeah, Devlin
and I are heading over to the county jail to talk to Datello right
now.  I’ll call him on the way.  In the meantime, get a
status report on Payette.  We need her in custody now,
Crevan.”

“
Got it.  Talk to you
soon.”

Devlin was with Chris in the lobby of the
hospital.  From their expressions, I couldn’t mistake the
black cloud about to burst into torrential rain.  I gripped
Chris’s arm.  “What’s wrong?”

“
Carlos Stefano is what’s
wrong.”

“
Dear God, now
what?”

“
He’s gone back to Judge
Gates alleging misconduct against OSI,” Chris growled. 
“Apparently he was lurking in the wings when you and Devlin showed
up.  He’s filed an injunction with the court barring us from
using you to help close this case.”

“
Christ,” I hissed. 
“I’m starting to wonder if Datello wants his kid found or
not.”

“
I had the same notion,”
Dev said.  “What do you want us to do, Helen?”

“
I guess we call Zack and
see if he can talk some sense into Judge Gates.  Please tell
me she didn’t rule on this right away.”

“
She’s waiting for Zack to
show up to hear arguments,” Chris said.  “But given your
history and the allegations he’s made against you personally
through four long weeks of delays, I can’t help but feel a little
worried.”

“
And I’m feeling the
filthy fingerprints of Danny Datello all over this case.”  I
gritted my teeth.  This would’ve been so much simpler if I’d
just crept into town, put a bullet in the back of his head and
sneaked off into the night.  “He’s orchestrated this whole
thing.”

“
You think his wife was
putting on a show upstairs?”

I rolled my eyes at Devlin.  “You heard
her.  He could blow my brains out right in front of her and
she’d refuse to believe what she saw.  Why should I believe
she means anything more to him than I meant to his cousin? 
Wives are insurance policies, Dev.  Nothing more.”

“
She offered to talk to
him if he tried to stop you from finding this baby,” Dev
said.  “I say we get his ass on a phone to his wife
pronto.  Chris, can you facilitate something like
that?”

“
Damn right I can. 
Call Crevan and tell him to talk to her.  She needs to
understand that her husband wants Helen off this case before he
calls.  You two carry on.  Get over to the county lockup
and talk to him whether he likes it or not.  I’ll let Zack
know what we’re doing.”

The melancholy at the beginning of my day
drifted quickly away in light of the new business at hand.  My
rusty brain sparked back to life.  Cobwebs sizzled away. 
How had I ever believed that giving up the job was a good
idea?  I rubbed my face.

Oh yeah, the constant battles and character
assassination had been part of the problem.  Somehow it didn’t
seem to bother me much in the heat of the moment.  Datello
would end up making himself look guilty as hell if he kept fighting
the efforts of law enforcement to find his daughter. 

That thought alone pleased
me immensely. 
Keep it up, you stupid
fool.  I’ll find evidence that puts you right in the middle of
this plot.  We’ll see how long you can delay more charges
tacked onto your indictment.

“
You all
right?”

“
Yes.  Just trying to
figure out how to collect my thoughts and how to approach my
personal nemesis.”

“
Helen, if you think this
would go better if you aren’t in there with him, I can wear an ear
bud and you can tell me what to ask him.”

“
No way, Dev.  You
don’t know this man like I do.  You won’t be able to read
him.  And yes, he’s that subtle that unless I’m standing right
in front of him, I won’t know what he’s really doing.”

My cell phone rang.

“
Eriksson.”

“
It’s Crevan.  We’ve
got Payette in custody.  I’ve got a team delivering her to OSI
right now.  Chris set up the phone call with Datello and his
wife.  It hasn’t come through yet, but I’ll call you back with
a status update.”

“
No need, Crevan. 
We’ll be at the jail in a matter of minutes the way Devlin is
speeding through town.  How far out are we from the
abduction?”

“
Creeping up on six
hours.  Why?”

“
I suppose roadblocks are
moot at this point.”

“
Chris has techs going
over hospital security footage on all the exits right now. 
There was some foot-dragging at first.  Apparently you put the
fear of God in the CEO.”

“
Bastard,” I
muttered.  “What’s wrong with a world that worries about
litigation first when a baby’s life is at stake?”

“
It’s sure not one we want
to live in.  Call me if you need to.  Like I said,
Datello might be on the phone when you get to the jail.”

“
Thanks Crevan.  We
can see it now.  If she’s not on the phone with him in thirty
seconds, I’m afraid we’re going to beat her to the
punch.”

“
Gotcha.”

I disconnected the call and jumped out of
Devlin’s sedan before it came to a complete stop.  His long
stride outmatched mine by the time we got to the door.

“
Hey, Eriksson!” 
Saul Becker recognized me from Central Division.  He worked as
a reserve cop downtown when shifts were cut at the county
jail.  Since Jerry Lowe’s arrest, that was no longer an
issue.  People were arrested and sentenced to
county.

“
We’re here to see Danny
Datello,” Devlin said. 

“
Right.  We’re
wrangling over how to get him a phone call to his wife at the
moment.”

“
This won’t wait,
Saul.  I need to talk to him now,” I said.  “I don’t know
if you guys have heard, but his newborn baby was abducted from
Saint Mary’s late this afternoon.”

His eyes widened.  “No shit?”

“
Not even a skid mark,” I
said.  “Has he had any visitors today?”

“
His lawyer came back with
him from the courthouse, but he hasn’t even had a phone call
tonight.  Sullen son of a bitch threw his dinner tray when
Thomas delivered it.  We figured if that’s gonna be his
attitude, he can go hungry.”

“
Does he know that Celeste
had the baby, that she’s medically stable?”

“
Sure,” Saul said. 
“We got the phone call from his lawyer and delivered a
message.  I figured it was a little weird that he didn’t ask
to tell him personally, but you know how these guys are.  He
probably had something brewing with that business at the courthouse
this morning.”

Saul slid open a drawer for our weapons –
something I no longer had the authority to carry in an official
capacity.  He disengaged the lock on the heavy glass door and
waited for us on the other side.

“
You want him in a holding
cell or an interview room?”

“
Interview, but Saul, what
did you mean when you said you were wrangling to get him on the
phone to his wife?”

“
Ah, hell, he started
going off on how it was probably some bullshit you guys cooked up,
coercing her into believing that she’s not in danger.  Like I
said, Thomas is still arguing with him, trying to convince him that
his wife asked to speak to him.”

“
Do me a favor. 
Radio Officer Thomas and have him just bring Datello to the
interview room without an explanation.  And Saul, do you think
he already knows what happened today?”

He scoffed softly.  “Are you kidding
me?  He’d be screaming to high heaven if he did.  I can’t
say much good about that guy, but he happens to worship the ground
the little woman walks on, if you know what I mean.  Eyes
light up like a kid at Christmas every time she comes to
visit.”

“
Thanks, Saul.”

He opened the door to the interview
room.  Dev perched with one leg bent, foot against the wall
while I paced.  It felt like eternity before my eyes met those
so familiar to me, not because I’d ever spent much time with my
former cousin by marriage, but because it was one physical trait he
shared with my late ex-husband.