Dead Ringer (39 page)

Thank God.
Bennie couldn’t let Marshall die. She couldn’t let her baby die. They needed an extra hand.
David
. He’d be good in an emergency. She lunged for her cell phone, dropped forgotten on the rug, then flipped the phone open, hit the speed dial, and David picked up.

“David, come now! It’s Marshall! We need help!” Bennie shouted just as Murphy and a young security guard burst into the office with a white plastic first-aid kit bearing a red cross.

“Holy shit!” the employee said at the sight of the bloodstain spreading on Marshall’s dress.

“Carrier, I wanna talk to 911!” Bennie hollered, closing her cell phone and taking Judy’s when she rushed it to her. “Help me, would you?” she yelled into the phone. “Tell me what to do, for God’s sake! We put her feet up already. There has to be something we can do. This woman is
not
going to die in my arms!”

“Whom am I speaking with, please? Ms. Carrier?” the dispatcher asked, with so much attitude that Bennie wanted to strangle her.

“You’re speaking to
me
now!” Bennie shouted, and she handed the phone back to Carrier when David bounded into the room, with two uniformed paramedics hustling in with a stainless-steel stretcher and a large black duffel bag.

“Found these guys outside,” David said quickly, going to Bennie’s side. His expression only momentarily betrayed the shock he had to be feeling at the sight of Marshall. Mrs. DiNunzio rose and edged away, praying to herself. The paramedics took over, sprinting to Marshall, unpacking their duffle, and moving expertly around her.

“Miss, we’re here and we’re gonna take care of you,” one paramedic soothed. “What’s your name?” he asked, and when Marshall managed to cry out her name, the paramedic didn’t bother trying to make further conversation. He located a vein in the crook of her arm and put in an IV shunt while the other paramedic pulled a plastic oxygen mask from the duffel and tore off the sterile plastic encasing it, then threaded it to the tank.

“Please lie still, miss,” the second one said, his tone controlled as he positioned the plastic oxygen mask over Marshall’s nose and slipped green elastic straps behind her head. Then he shifted over to unfold the stretcher and unbuckle bright orange restraints. “We’re going right to the hospital with you. No stops for pizza, so don’t even ask.”

“Which hospital are we going to?” Murphy called from the phone on the reception. “We need to tell her husband.”

“University of Penn,” the second paramedic answered, nestling the small green oxygen tank next to Marshall on the stretcher.

It was all happening so fast that in the next second the paramedics were counting “one, two, three,” lifting Marshall onto the stretcher, strapping her to it, getting her moving with oxygen, and shouting to Carrier to grab their “first-in bag” and to Bennie to hold the saline IV up high. They all hustled out of the office together with the stretcher, with David holding one end next to Bennie, and rushed into the hallway and out to the reception area. The security guard scurried ahead to the elevator bank and hit the down button, and when the cab came, Murphy held it open.

“Okay, take it easy,” a paramedic ordered as the men angled the stretcher into the cab and David hit the button for the lobby floor. Carrier hurried inside after Bennie, who nodded to Murphy.

“Murph, you stay with my girl Mrs. DiNunzio. Make sure she gets home okay.”

“Sure,” Murphy said, biting her lip. “See you later, Marshall!” she called out as she slipped an arm around the little woman and the doors slid closed.

It was scary-quiet in the elevator, and Bennie eyed the deep furrow of David’s forehead. She flashed on the newspaper article, back on her desk. Had he been here before? Trying to save a life? Failing? The elevator doors slid open onto two jumpsuited building employees, who cleared an aisle. The paramedics rushed the stretcher to the back of a waiting red truck that read PHILADELPHIA FIRE RESCUE, its backdoors wide open, and on another “one, two, three” count, the paramedics slid the stretcher inside the back of the truck.

One paramedic jumped in after Marshall’s stretcher, the other paramedic took off to drive, and Bennie tried to board until he blocked her. “No riders! Not on my bus, lady.”

“But I’m family!”

“Sorry. Liability issues.”

Marshall cried out, “Let her come! I want her here!”

“I’ll write you a release,” Bennie said, jumping in anyway as the paramedic scrambled past her to the backdoors, slammed them closed, and twisted the inside lever to lock them, and the truck lurched off.

“Hang on, Marshall,” Bennie said, squeezing Marshall’s damp hand. There was a padded jump seat behind her but she didn’t sit down. “Hang on, honey, we’re going to the hospital.”

Marshall thrashed on the gurney, trying not to scream, and Bennie held fast to her hand, appalled. Clotty bleeding soaked her sunny yellow dress, bathing her knees and calves. The paramedic rolled up a hand towel, set it between her legs to absorb the blood, and wrapped a blood pressure cuff on her arm, his dark eyes fixed on her trembling form. He appeared to be counting her breaths.

“What’s the matter with her?” Bennie asked, panicky.

“We don’t do the diagnosis, lady. We’re the swoop and scoop crew, me and Derek.” The paramedic frowned at the blood pressure gauge, then placed two fingers at the pulse on Marshall’s wrist. “Everything’s fine, Marshall. So how do you take your pizza? Double cheese?”

“Please!” Marshall cried out, in torment, and the sound went right through Bennie. “Is the baby okay! How’s my baby?”

“The baby’s going to be fine, Marshall,” the paramedic answered, but the rescue truck bucked and stalled in rush-hour traffic. Sirens screamed in Bennie’s head. She kept telling Marshall everything was going to be okay, though she knew the person she was trying most to convince was herself.

“Let’s move it, Derek!” the paramedic called out to the driver. “BP is sixty over forty! Respiration is thirty! Pulse is a hundred ten! She’s diaphoretic!”

“Goddamn it!” the driver cursed in the front seat, and the truck slowed almost to a full stop. “This Lexus is trying to turn the corner!” Suddenly there was a crackling over the radio in the front seat, near a computer keyboard and small blue screen, and the driver called back, “Change of plans. We’re going to Memorial. Tractor-trailer overturned on 95, and they got the ticket to Penn. Traffic to Memorial will be lighter too.” The driver hit the horn, hard,
honk honk,
and the truck finally broke free and, with a few stutter steps, took off, veering around the corner.

“Memorial Hospital?” Bennie asked. “Her husband will be going to Penn.”

“So call and tell him.”

“Right,” Bennie said, then remembered she didn’t have a cell phone. She’d left it somewhere on the floor of her office. Carrier and David would go to Penn to find Marshall.
Damn
. She’d have to find a pay phone at the hospital.

Honk honk honk,
the horn blared. The siren screamed. The truck accelerated, then began to fly. Everything on the shelves rattled, even behind smoked plastic windows. Boxes read VIONEX WIPES and a container labeled GLUCOSE TUBES. Marshall’s head bobbled, and Bennie leapt to hold it still. It was something she could do as they raced through the city. They were on the way to the hospital. They were going to save Marshall and the baby. They were going. They were moving. They were
flying
.

“Go, go, gophers, watch ’em go, go, go,” the paramedic sang under his breath. But the tune stopped abruptly when he slipped a stethoscope into his ears and placed its bulb on Marshall’s huge belly.

Bennie held her breath. She wanted to ask how the baby was, but in the next second the paramedic looked up and met her gaze. His face had gone completely white.

And something in his eye told Bennie to start praying.

34

I’m sorry, but you have to go,” one of the nurses told Bennie. They’d rushed Marshall to Memorial’s Labor and Delivery floor, and a group of nurses were hurrying to prepare her for an emergency C-section. A nurse grabbed the checked curtain that hung around Marshall’s bed and whisked it along its metal J-shaped track with a
zzzipp,
blocking Marshall from Bennie.

“I hate to leave her alone,” Bennie said, her throat thick with emotion. “Her husband’s not here. He’s at the wrong hospital.”

“Husbands can stay, but you can’t.” The nurse’s brown eyes softened. “We’ll take good care of her and the baby. She’s getting blood now. The baby’s on the monitor. The doctor will be right here. He’s dealing with another emergency.”

“What’s the matter with her? She’s in so much pain.”

“We think it’s placenta abruptio,” she said, and Bennie looked puzzled. “An abruption. The placenta peels away from the uterine wall. It’s terribly painful.”

Oh my God.
“How did she get that? She was fine.”

“No one knows why it happens, but it does.”

“Is there a phone, so I can call her husband? I left my cell phone.”

“You couldn’t use a cell here anyway. Use our L and D phone.” The nurse pointed to the station behind them, covered with baby photos and thank-you notes, but another nurse in a puffy scrub hat was already on the phone. “There’s a pay phone, but it’s quite a ways, because the new labor wing is under construction. I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but take the shortcut.”

“Where?”

The nurse pointed down the hall and to her right, at a makeshift plywood door with a handmade sign that read NO ADMITTANCE! CONTRACTION SITE. “Take that door, go through the double doors, take a right at the sign for the elevators, and you’ll see the pay phones. I think they’re still there. But tell Dad to get here quick. We go in five minutes.”

“
Five
minutes?” Bennie took off. She hustled down the hallway to the door, flung it open, and found herself in a construction site, with temporary drywall where corridors evidently used to be. Her house had looked like this for two years, while she’d rehabbed it. The air was warm here—the air-conditioning hadn’t been put in yet. She ran down the hall of exposed drywall and raw concrete subfloor, but it ended in another corridor of drywall, which she also ran down, then stopped.

Shit!
There
were
no double doors. Just another makeshift corridor. A trash bag against one wall overflowed with empty Mountain Dew cans, Tastykake wrappers, and bunched-up paper bags. There were no workmen around to ask for directions. It was after five, and they would have cut out by four.

Bennie spun around. Two glass doors lay on their side, resting on a pile of two-by-fours, and next to them hung a bright blue tarp, duct-taped over a hallway entrance to keep the dust out, which everybody knew never worked. On the tarp hung another sign that read DANGER—KEEP OUT. Maybe the tarp had become the double doors, or vice versa. The phones must be on the other side of the tarp. Bennie didn’t have time to be law-abiding.

She ducked under the tarp and came out the other side, into another drywall corridor, almost finished and painted with white prime coat. The floor was bare cement, spotted with drips of paint. What had the nurse said?

Damn. Go!
She ran down the corridor, which angled into another corridor, less finished than the first, partly unpainted. She ran down it, too, and it was longer, some twenty-five feet. The drywall was completely unpainted in the corridor, and the air smelled like something burning. It didn’t seem more finished, it was obviously less so, and Bennie couldn’t believe phones were anywhere near here.

Fuck!
She must have gone the wrong way. It was like a maze of drywall! She didn’t have the time to run back, but this couldn’t be right. She heard a sound and spun around on her pumps.

And came face-to-face with herself.

35

Alice!” Bennie said, startled. Her twin stood directly in front of her. She was Bennie’s double. Same blond tangle of hair, same light makeup, same linen suit. Bennie could have been standing in front of a mirror, but for the gun. A Beretta, it was small, black, and deadly. And its snub nose was aimed at her heart.

“Scream and I’ll shoot you dead.” Alice’s voice had the same tone and timbre as Bennie’s. She raised the gun, sending a tingle of fear through Bennie.

Stay calm. At least Marshall is being cared for.
Bennie sensed that talk was her only chance of getting out of this alive. David was up at Penn. She was on her own. “I am curious why.”

“Why what?”

There are three two-by-fours on the cement floor, by the drywall.
“Are you kidding? The whole thing.”

“This is a hard one? To take everything from you.” Alice’s lips—Bennie’s lips—curled into a sneer. “To take every last thing you owned, worked for, built, or created. Because you got all of it at my expense.”

The lumber is about ten feet away, slightly behind Alice and to the right.
Bennie took a step closer to the plywood, as if she were startled, which wasn’t hard to fake. “I didn’t even know you until two years ago.”

“And I didn’t know you either. But it doesn’t mean you didn’t take from me.” Alice cocked the gun, and it made a mechanical
clik
. “Every day you lived in the nice house, with the boyfriend and the furry doggie, those were days that belonged to me. Things that I would have had, but you got instead. And once I knew that you had it all, I wanted it, too.”

I have to get close enough to dive for the wood, then swing it at her.
Bennie inched closer to the lumber. Nine feet away now. “I defended you when you were charged with murder, Alice. I got you out of jail, free.”

“You didn’t do it for me. You did it for yourself. You’re the famous one. You’re the one with the degrees and the cool job. You were the one who got the glory.” Alice’s eyes narrowed, and Bennie was reminded of herself. “Tell the truth, Bennie. Isn’t there a part of you that feels guilty that Mommy gave me up, and not you? But for that one little thing, my life would be yours, and yours would be mine.”

It’s true.
Bennie swallowed hard.