Imperfect Contract (15 page)

"Maybe it was a weaning accident."  I didn't want to believe someone killed Hutchinson in my hospital and on my watch.  I told him what Staiger has said about Hutchinson's weaning progress.

"I questioned her about that." 

Ray grasped things medical, always had.  He read a lot and asked questions, and he'd suffered a severe gunshot injury many years ago—we had that in common.  His wound took down his lung and almost cost him his life.  I remember his telling me his son was a baby at the time.  After he recovered, he and his wife split, and he moved to Florida.  I wondered how much his job had to do with their divorce.

"What did Staiger say?"

"Hutchinson was having some success off the ventilator.  In her opinion, he was off the machine for ten to twenty minutes before having the arrest.  That gives us a time frame."

"Ten minutes, more or less, is tough to track on a busy nursing unit."

"True.  It's plenty of time for any number of people to have dropped by for a visit, done the deed, and strolled off the area."

The waiter appeared, and we placed our orders.  I decided on the poached Norwegian salmon, and Ray ordered broiled snapper. 

As the waiter walked away, Ray continued.  "None of the other interviews at the hospital turned up anything.  The family and friends were at the funeral, so we have to wait to talk to them."

"Fast.  I didn't expect the funeral for several days."

"I wonder about the rush."

"Maybe Amelia wanted to put it behind them."

"'Um."  He stroked his goatee.

"Did you talk to Wiley?"  I sipped my wine again, being careful not to drink too fast.  I wanted to remain in control of myself.  We'd be at the restaurant for a couple of hours yet.  Ray had pointed to the dance floor in the lounge on the way in and suggested we finish off the evening there. 

"One strange dude."  He raised a finger, giving it a single shake.

"How so?"  I felt my eyebrows rise as I asked the question.

"When I called him, he volunteered to come to the station.  In fact, he left a few minutes before you and Vanessa showed up."

"Good thing we missed him."

"Probably.  Anyway, he had a lot to say."

"For instance?"  Wiley was high on my list of suspects.  He struck me as a weaseling kind of guy, one who would take advantage of an opportunity.  Of course, I had no facts on which to base my opinion.  I fanned the fingers of my free hand toward my face, encouraging him to continue.

"He was open about wanting to put Hutchinson Realty out of business.  He said he and Hutchinson cooperated on the surface, but were fiercely competitive.  A long time ago, Hutchinson had the biggest agency and did some things like stealing listings and putting flyers on cars parked in front of Wiley's office.  When their fortunes reversed, Wiley returned the favor."

"I understand why Amelia wasn't interested in working for him.  But that's not the story I heard from Wiley, or his man Art, or Amelia either for that matter."

"Yeah, I know.  Wiley didn't want her around either.  He described her as a lousy agent, but he'd help her out for a while if he could.  I think he figures he'll grab the listings.  From what he told me, Hutchinson attracted many upscale minority clients with substantial properties."  He paused a minute while our meals were placed in front of us. 

"Amelia gave me the impression Hutchinson's business was going down the tubes, and he was cutting back in preparation for retirement."

"Wiley thinks Hutchinson deliberately created that impression for Amelia's benefit.  Hutchinson came to Wiley a few months back and asked him to employ Amelia.  Hutchinson wanted out of his marriage because he liked his girlfriend better."

"The SOB."  I tasted my dinner.  The salmon was firm, falling in thick flakes when I worked it with my fork.  "Figures."

"Why?"

"Men are all alike."  I regretted the remark the second it left my lips.  We were having a pleasant evening, and I'd been hoping it would get more pleasant.  Now, I'd ruined everything.  I stopped myself mid-thought.  What did I care?  I didn't want to go there anyway.

"I'm trying to make amends here."  He took the crack as a personal insult, and he looked hurt.

"Ray, I know you are.  I'm sorry.  It slipped out."  I reached across the table and touched him.  He stared at my hand touching his, making no move to reciprocate.

"Anyway," he continued, "Wiley admitted he agreed to hire Amelia to have an inside track on the customers.  He figured she'd be so pissed she'd talk about the proprietary information."

"Good instinct on Wiley's part."  I stopped short, my salmon-laden fork suspended in the air.  "He wouldn't have motive to finish Hutchinson off, even if he took out the original murder contract, not really."

"Why?"  He raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Because Amelia doesn't have a real estate broker's license.  The customers are ripe for the picking, at no cost to him."

"That's about what he said.  He's planning on hiring her anyway to be honorable."

"Interesting.  What did he say he was doing at the hospital on Sunday?"

"Visiting his sister.  He decided to stop and pay his respects."

"Likely story."

"It checks out."

"Oh," I said.

"Anything else exciting?"

"Wiley gave me enough information to track down Hutchinson's girlfriend.  She was out of town at the time of the shooting and in church when the staff found the vent disconnected."

"Convenient."

"Verified.  Besides, I can't come up with a motive for her.  She's off my list."

We ate in silence for a while.  I couldn't think of more questions to ask about the case and for the moment didn't have anything else to say.  

Ray broke the silence.  "Dessert?"

"Dance," I said.

"I'd like that."  He raised his hand to catch the waiter's attention.  He mouthed, "Check," and soon the waiter appeared with it.  A few minutes later, he guided me onto the dance floor.  Tuesday was ladies' night, and the dance floor was crowded with people getting to know one another.

It had been years since we'd danced together, but it didn't seem to matter.  I knew his every move.  Ray was a superb slow dancer.  He guided me around the floor with a firm hand in the small of my back.  I kept a little space between us, but still I felt his body heat and smelled the damn Nautica.  I thought they should call it Erotica instead.

Though I thought it unusual, he stayed on the floor for the faster numbers.  His moves showed a bit more variety and polish than in years earlier.  When I commented, he smiled.  What did I expect?  He wasn't a monk.  And to tell the truth, I wasn't a nun either, I thought, scanning my memories of my love life since Ray.  It didn't take long.

When the music slowed again, he overpowered my resistance to body contact.  He bent to nuzzle his soft beard against my neck, whispering tender things—the things I'd lain in the hospital and dreamed about.  I blocked the old regrets from my mind and molded my body to his, relishing the feeling.

The unexpected intimacy on the dance floor created desires I wasn't prepared to satisfy.  On the drive home, I rehearsed how I would tell him he couldn't come in.  We pulled in front of my house, and he walked me to the door.

"Sophi," he said, softly, soberly, "I had a wonderful evening, even if you did make me talk about work for over an hour.  Can I call you again?"

"Yes."  I couldn't get much else out.

He held me hand for a moment, then he was gone.  I pulled my front door closed and peeked through the window until his taillights disappeared around the corner.

24

Sunshine awakened me at the crack of damn-dawn by licking my ear.  I felt refreshed and ready to conquer the world despite the storm during the night, and the dog's shaking and crying with each rumble of thunder.  The weather report forecasted continued rain, though the glow through my window hinted at a beautiful, sunny day.  It would be clear for the morning—I hoped. 

As I lay in bed listening to morning radio, I decided it would be a good beach day.  However, I also needed to pull a few weeds in the yard.  I hated yard work, so I decided to do it first.  Then I'd call Connie and see if she wanted to go along. 

Sunshine stretched and crawled off the pillow on the unoccupied side of the bed, sitting next to my hand.  I rubbed his ears, then when he laid back and rolled over, I massaged his chest and belly.  I enjoyed running my hands through his thick coat as much as he seemed to enjoy having it done.  I took my time, then I chased him off the bed, brushed the dog hair off the sheets, and pulled up the quilt. 

I never thought I'd sleep with a dog—at least not the barking kind.  It all started when he became fearful of thunder, and I couldn't calm him during a middle of the night storm.  I never bothered to crate him at night after that.  I liked the idea of having him close, not for protection, but for someone living and breathing next to me.  The funny thing is I still can't keep him settled when there's a thunderstorm.  I've accomplished nothing other than waking every morning with dog hair in my nose.

I stuck in a load of wash, ate a light breakfast, then yanked out a forty-gallon bag of weeds.  The people who owned the house before me planted Devil's Ivy as a ground cover in the back of the yard.  It's effective, covering ground, grass, and anything else it its path.  I try to keep it under control by pulling a bunch of it at regular intervals, but it has a life all its own. 

I can't judge my predecessors' choices too harshly.  I covered the fence in vines after I moved in.  The nurseryman sold me a vine in the passionflower family.  It has beautiful and bountiful, dark-red flowers that open wide to reveal several white-topped stamens.  The guy didn't tell me it was a canopy-seeking forest vine.  Now it covers my fence, the neighbors' fences, and it's running across the tops of the trees.  I should kill it, but I like it. 

By eight in the morning, I was satisfied I had done my duty as a homeowner.  I called Connie.  She sounded gloomy.

"Connie, I'm headed to the beach.  Want to go?"  I tried to be cheerful and positive, but I regretted the phone call.  I hoped she had other plans.  Often times, Connie pulls me to her level, be it depressed or cheerful.

"Hang on a second."  I heard the telephone receiver make contact with something firm, then voices in the distance.  She was checking with her husband, Darrell, and her son, Wayne, who was home from college.  She came back sounding more cheerful.  "I'd like to come.  Can you pick me up?  My car needs to go in for service.  Darrell and Wayne will do it, but then I won't have wheels."

"No problem," I said.  "I'll be there in about an hour.  We need to go early to beat the rain."

"Perfect."

I pulled in front of Connie's little house a few minutes early.  Connie lived south of me in a neighborhood once reserved for retirees, but now filled with small families living on limited funds.  The rows of white buildings looked as if they rolled off an assembly line.  The concrete block construction made the square design more defined.  I called them Florida boxes. 

Connie's husband couldn't hold a job.  Like many nurses, she married someone needy.  She spent her entire life supporting him and the kids.  From what I saw, the son would turn out fine.  He had worked his way through the first two years of college with minimal help from his mother and planned to continue.  Her daughter, who is grown and out of the house, graduated nursing school and worked at the county hospital.

Connie wasn't quite ready to leave for the beach.  After retrieving a cup from the dark-mica cabinet over her sink, I helped myself to coffee and wandered into the Florida room, which was more of a sun porch.  The previous owner enclosed the patio, installed awning windows, finished the interior, and raised the floor.  Instant addition.

The room felt comfortable, homey, with pictures of family interspersed with violets on a small shelf under the side window.  Connie had a knack with plants.  I envied that.  I killed almost anything green and growing—except Passion Flower and Devil's Ivy. 

One snapshot caught my attention.  It showed her father looking strong and handsome.  He sat on the end of a dock, dressed in fishing clothes, his gear off to one side and an outlet to Florida's Gulf a blur in the background.  She bought her house with money left to her by her father. 

Following a boating accident, rescuers pulled his almost lifeless body from the Gulf and whisked him away to an ICU unit in a nearby hospital.  He spent several months on life support before dying of infection and shock.  Though he had a living will, his wife, Connie's stepmother, wouldn't allow doctors to disconnect the ventilator.  She protested, fought, and resisted, then acquiesced.  The doctors refused to go against the wife's wishes, and Connie didn't have the gumption to take her stepmother to court to force the issue.

Connie missed more workdays than she attended during that period.  I think she spent most of her time on Alligator Alley going back and forth to the west coast.  When her dad died, she came back full-time with a new attitude about long-term ventilator patients.  After watching her father die a long, slow death, she did everything she could to get a family to honor the patient's wishes.  As I thought of Ray's comments, I hoped that was all she was doing.

"That's the last really good photo I have of him."  Connie's voice, close to my side, startled me, and I jumped.  "It was taken a couple of months before the accident, just after he turned sixty-five."

"It's a great picture.  It seems to capture his personality."

"It does.  He lived his dream retirement.  All he talked about for years was getting a small house on some obscure body of water and fishing away his waning years."

"I wouldn't call the Gulf of Mexico obscure."  I laughed at the thought.  She did too.

She pointed to the photograph, "The dock was behind his house.  It extended out onto the Peace River."

"Who took the picture?"

"Me.  I took several that day.  I wanted to get the perfect image of a man completely happy with his lot in life.  I think I did."  She grew quiet.  "The next thing I knew, Mildred was on the phone telling me he was in the hospital on a ventilator."

"That was a hard time for you," I said, touching her arm.  "Losing a parent is always hard, but especially to a tragedy."

"Seeing him suffer was the worst thing about it, but Mildred couldn't stand to let go.  She didn't believe me when I told her Dad wouldn't recover.  Even the doctors refused to offer her any hope, but she persisted.  I don't hold it against her—we're still close.  One day she admitted she was prolonging Dad's agony.  Then infection took over, and he slipped away during the night.  I knew it was the best thing.  I'm still sorry we couldn't save him from those last months of suffering.  All the needles.  The skin problems.  I hope he didn't feel anything."

"I remember when you came back to work.  You seemed to have real interest in taking care of vent patients.  I was surprised.  I thought you'd transfer to a unit with lighter patients."  I watched her expression.

"I thought about it.  The supervisor talked with me and suggested my unique perspective might be helpful to patients' families.  After all, I relate to what they are going through."  She was matter-of-fact, no tears, no hesitation.

"Doesn't it bring back old memories every day you're working?"

"It does, but my memories of my father are positive.  I try to put those last days out of my mind and think of him as filled with life.  Besides, every time I'm able to help a family make a decision that's good for them, I feel like I've done a service for my dad."  Still no emotion.  "Let's go."  She raised the beach bag in her hand. 

Intent on the conversation, I hadn't noticed Connie wore her swimming suit.

***

I took 441 south to Sunrise Boulevard, then turned east towards the beach.  The commuter traffic was gone, and we sped along, hitting most of the lights on green.  Since it was mid-week with school in session, we found a parking space with no difficulty and didn't have to resort to going into one of the expensive parking lots. 

We walked a short distance to the boardwalk and trudged across the warm sand, chairs and tote bags in hand, and picked a choice location near the water.  I suggested a spot close to several young women with small children.  I found watching the activity entertaining.

Connie grew quiet during our long ride.  When she'd arranged all her stuff to her exacting specifications, she settled herself in her chair and said, "You brought up my father because you're digging for information, right?"

"I did, but how did you know?"

"I had a visit from your friend Ray yesterday.  He asked me about the Hutchinson case, my involvement, and my feelings about ventilator patients."

"I knew that."  I pulled a cold Coke from my tote bag and popped the top.  "I helped him make a list of the people who were involved in Hutchinson's care on Sunday."

"What did he tell you?"

"He said you had a negative attitude about ventilator patients, and you are a suspect, way down on the list, but a suspect nonetheless."

"I'm being accused of murder, and you helped?"

"Connie, it's not like that.  I defended you, and I'm looking for ways to support your innocence.  He has to consider all the possibilities, everyone who had contact with the man.  Besides, I didn't discuss your attitudes about ventilator patient with him.  You did."

"He asked if I thought some of these patients would be better off dead, better off than on a ventilator I mean, and I said I did."  She accepted my offer of a Diet Coke.  "I couldn't lie.  What would it look like if I told him one thing, then said something else under oath?"

"You were truthful, as you should have been.  So was I, as I had to be.  I expect, since I was charge, my involvement will cease.  Someone other than Ray will need to interview me about the day."

"I hadn't thought of that."  She grinned.  "Maybe you disconnected the ventilator before you went downstairs?"

"Except you were in his room when I left.  Remember, I stuck my head in and said I was going to lunch and you were to keep an eye on the desk."

"Um.  I finished cleaning him and was about to do his trach care.  Vanessa came in and offered to finish for me." 

I watched as Connie made little designs in the moisture forming on the outside of her Coke can.  The drops consolidated and dripped onto her leg.  She didn't wipe them off. 

"That fits.  The tubing was sparkling clean when he coded.  Where was Amelia?"

"In the room, like always.  So was the kid."

"How about his friends?"

"They left much earlier, if I remember correctly."

"How about Mike Wiley?  Tallish man with a nasty scar on the right side of his face."

"Now that you mention it, I saw him walking down the hall when I was going back to the station.  Who is he anyway?"

"He's a realtor friend of the Hutchinsons."  I took a gulp of my Coke, hurrying to finish while it was cold.  I looked at a bank of clouds rolling in.  The weatherman was right. 

Connie said, "Who do you think disconnected the vent?"

"I really don't know.  I thought if we figured out who the last person was in the room with him, we'd have our villain.  But then the person would be sure to lie about it."  I stood.  "I'm going for a swim."

"I'll stay here with the stuff."  She settled back in her chair and closed her eyes.

The water was warm, like a bath with surf and seaweed.  I had intended to swim, work my bad hip and leg, but I felt lazy in the warm water.  Instead, I rolled over on my back and floated in the sun.  When I swam back to shore, Connie lay splayed out, her skirted swimming suit emphasizing rather than hiding the unattractive parts of her body.  She had caught her ragged curls in a banana clip, exposing her neck to the sun.

"Connie," I said, sitting down and reaching for my bottle of sunscreen.  "You're burning, even with the clouds.  Want some of this?"  I extended it her way.