The Botanist (20 page)

Chapter 32

Cody stared out the window of the hospital. The sun was out, the sky was blue, birds were singing, and he felt numb. Utterly numb.

The safe house was compromised, Alex was badly hurt, and the units that had gone out with Frank had found nothing—absolutely nothing—in the desert.

And Tom was gone, just like that. He’d been circling the drain when the ambulance pulled into the bay. They hardly bothered with the ER—just rushed him up to the operating room, where he “expired.” Cody hadn’t even gotten to say goodbye. No one had.

The medical staff cleaned Tom up and covered the gaping hole in his neck with a thick cloth, so the family could say goodbye. Cody sat with the body until Margaret and the kids arrived.

He hadn’t cried, at least not right away.

He sat with the man who’d been his mentor and partner since he’d joined the force, and simply couldn’t imagine that Tom wouldn’t sit in the desk across from his at work anymore. He knew once the tears came they’d be unstoppable.

That moment arrived with Margaret and the kids. The second they entered the room, the wailing began. Cody stepped out into the hall to give them privacy, but the sound of little Hank crying for his father was too much, and Cody had to leave.

Normally, he might have gone out to his car, but hundreds of uniforms were standing around the hospital grounds, so Cody found a bathroom in a quiet part of the hospital and locked the door. He slid down the tiled wall, helpless and impotent, and the tears had come. Sobs wracked his body for more than an hour before he’d exhausted them. Even then, he remained on the floor for a time, unable to stand and face what lay beyond the dead-bolted door.

Finally he pushed himself to his feet. His face was wet, but clean. His eyes were dark red with blood. He splashed some water on his face and left the bathroom.

He walked through hallways with lines of blue-uniformed men and women lounging on either side. Young beat cops in uniforms lined the hallways. Cops, especially when they were all together, tended to be loud and jovial. These were solemn and melancholy. They’d all heard the news. The uniforms straightened up when they saw him coming. So they also knew who he was, that he’d just lost his partner. Many of them took off their hats as he passed. Some even reached out to touch his shoulder as he walked by them. Their faces were filled not with pity, but with empathy and genuine sorrow.

Cody thought he’d cried himself dry, but his eyes watered again at the show of respect and strength they were giving him. He might outrank most of them, but these were his brothers in arms, and they understood Tom’s loss in a way no one else in the world could.

Walking the long, blue-lined hallway felt like walking a gauntlet, or a funeral march. It was the opposite of lonely, though no less painful.

Finally, Cody reached the captain, who stood at the end of hallway like a sentinel. He glanced up at Cody, then did a double take and turned his attention full toward him. Cody knew it was obvious he’d been crying, but the captain didn’t ask if he was okay, and Cody was grateful.

“What now?” Cody asked.

The captain studied Cody for a moment, then looked past him at the dozens of uniforms still watching. The captain swallowed, and his eyes looked haunted.

“Do you want to make arrangements for the funeral?”

Cody looked up at him, and the captain hurried on.

“I can do it. I’d be glad to do it. But you were his partner, so . . .”

Taking care of the arrangements would be painful. It would be easier to lose himself in the work—go find this bastard hiding in the desert and kill him—but he also knew that if he didn’t take the time to pay Tom his proper respects, to do what he owed his partner after so many years, he’d regret it later.

“We should ask Margaret what she wants. I’ll take care of it. Is she still here?”

The captain shook his head. “Frank took her and the kids home a few minutes ago.”

Cody nodded. “I’ll go over and see them, talk to her about it.”

“Take all the time that you and she need. When you get done, come to the station. You and Frank and Court and I need to have a meeting.”

The profound sadness stole over Cody again. This time he hadn’t expected it, and it took his breath away.

“What is it?” the captain asked when he saw Cody’s face.

“Just the four of us.”

The captain’s eyes were suddenly wet, and he looked away. “Yes,” he whispered.

Cody cleared his throat. “What do we need to have a meeting about?”

“We need to keep people calm.”

Cody frowned. There were plenty of things that had happened in the last twelve hours than warranted fear, but he wasn’t sure exactly what the captain meant.

“Which people?”

“The public. The press has the story. They ran wild with it before we could stop them.”

“And what are they saying?”

“That the most prolific serial killer this state has ever seen came into town, broke into a residential house, went through a seasoned cop, and snatched someone.”

Cody sighed. There was bound to be panic. There might even be a mass exodus from Mt. Dessicate. Cody wouldn’t blame anyone who left. Any decent person with a family—which was most of the town of Mt. Dessicate; these were salt-of-the-earth people with children to protect—couldn’t help but be afraid.

And could the cops defend them? Obviously not. This guy had killed a detective in a safe house, for heaven’s sake. And what could anyone say to persuade the people they were safe? Cody couldn’t be sure that they were. Despite the fact that this guy was zeroing in on Alex for some reason they still hadn’t figured out, there was no guarantee he wouldn’t prey on someone else if she kept getting away from him. Everything about this situation reeked of chaos.

“I’ll be there after I talk to Margaret.”

The captain nodded.

“Alex,
wake up.”

The hand shaking her shoulder yanked Alex from disturbing dreams. It hadn’t been the red room this time, but rather one of those dreams where she couldn’t keep her eyes open, no matter how hard she tried. In it, she was running from the Botanist, but she couldn’t see where she was going, which direction was best, or how close he was. Then she heard Cody’s voice, beckoning her to come to him and she’d be safe. The problem was that it seemed to come from every direction and because she couldn’t see, she couldn’t tell where he was.

Alex sat up. She was in a hospital bed. The room was light—bright, actually. The illumination filtering through the windows was that of midday. She was surprised she’d slept in this kind of light. Normally she needed darkness to sleep well.

“Sorry, honey,” the nurse who’d awakened her said. She had auburn hair that was twisted up in a claw, but down would probably fall to her shoulders. “You can go back to sleep now.”

Alex wore a white hospital gown and tried to brush away a stray piece of hair she could see out of the corner of her eye. After the third attempt, she realized it wasn’t hair. It was the outside of her eye. It was so swollen she could see it.

“How did I get here?” she asked, probing her face gingerly.

The nurse, whose name tag read, “Hi, I’m Tanya,” looked at her with concern. “You’ve been here since early this morning, honey. I’ve been waking you up every two hours. You don’t remember?”

Actually, she did. Was it two hours between each time? It felt like two minutes. Alex vaguely remembered answering questions each time she was awakened, and even remembered seeing Cody sitting by her bed a few times.

“Do I have a concussion?”

“Yeah. Pretty bad one. We have to wake you up every couple of hours to make sure that, you know, we can.”

Alex nodded. The previous night came back to her in halting patches. Then she remembered.

“Tom! Is he okay? The detective that was brought in? With a neck injury?”

Tanya studied her for minute, looking torn. “Maybe I should go get the doctor—”

“No! Please, Tanya. Just tell me. I need to know. Is he okay?”

Tanya slowly shook her head. “They took him up to surgery, but he died on the table before they could start.”

Alex’s heart turned to stone and sank into her stomach. Tom was dead? She couldn’t comprehend the idea. How could he be gone? She’d been bantering at the dinner table with him not eight hours ago.

She drew her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them. Hot tears welled up in her throat, but for reasons she couldn’t comprehend, they came out of her eyes instead of her mouth.

Tanya came up beside her. “It’s not your fault, honey. He was a cop. These things happen.”

“Of course it was my fault! He was there to protect me. This guy just . . .”

Tanya perched on the side of Alex’s bed. She took Alex’s arm and rubbed it compassionately. “What can I do?”

“Tell me what to do. I’ve never felt so . . .
not
-in-control in my life! This psycho keeps doing things that we can’t predict. What if this keeps happening? He’ll find me no matter where I go and kill anyone who’s trying to help me. I don’t know what to do.”

Tanya was quiet for a long time, and the scalding tears stung the cuts and bruises on Alex’s face as they passed.

“When I was a teenager,” Tanya finally intoned, “I was a cheerleader. Junior year, another girl in the squad started a vicious rumor about me. Every time I passed her in the hall, she’d give me nasty looks, point and swear at me. She had a coterie that always followed her lead. Finally, my mom told me that I needed to act, rather than react to her. So, even though the last thing I wanted was to ever see her again, I sought her out, cornered her, and forced her to tell me what I’d done to deserve her behavior. She finally admitted that she liked the boy I was dating and wanted him for herself. That was it.

“I told her that if she liked him, she should approach him about it. He and I were dating, but we weren’t exclusive. Well—” Tanya shrugged and studied the afghan that was draped over Alex’s legs. “I don’t think she ever
liked
me, but it diffused the situation. She stopped harassing me in the halls, and by senior year, we managed to be . . . civil.”

Alex thought about that for a few minutes, and Tanya pretended to study Alex’s chart, to give her time to think. The last thing Alex wanted was to ever see the Botanist again. And yet, Tanya might have a point.

“Act, rather than react, huh?”

“Yes.” Tanya smiled. “If you wait for someone to seek you out, it will always be on their terms. If you want to set the terms, seek them out. Make them face you on your own turf. It’s the only way that you can control the situation. Oh, I don’t know what your situation is, honey, and I hope this isn’t bad advice. But it’s a lesson I learned early.”

Alex nodded. “Thanks, Tanya.”

Cody
was gathering his things, preparing to visit Tom’s family, when a uniform came into the ER calling his name.

“Detective Oliver? Is there a Detective Oliver here?”

“That’s me, Sergeant. What is it?”

“There’s a man outside asking for you, sir. He’s a civilian so we can’t let him in, but he’s putting up a bit of a stink. He asked me to come find out where you were. Seems pretty desperate, sir.”

With a nod, Cody followed the man outside. A crowd pressed against the police blockades, trying to find out what was happening. It was a small town, after all. Dozens of squad cars with flashing lights, congregating outside the hospital, was big news. The sky was overcast, due to the pending storm, and the gray clouds highlighted the police lights more than normal. There were dozens of officers who were looking to the Mt. Dessicate detectives because they were heading up the case; camera crews from different states and networks wandering around, looking for a good angle; and a crowd of civilians who, even if they didn’t know Cody personally, knew he was a detective.

“Cody! Cody, there you are!”

It was his dad. His face was gaunt, his eyes slightly sunken, hair unkempt. Cody had rarely seen him in this state, and certainly never in public. Fear rose in his chest. He didn’t think he could take any more tragedy today. He crossed to where his dad was and motioned to the cops manning the blockade to let his father through.

“Dad, what is it? What’s wrong?”

His father stepped between the two wooden barriers when the uniforms pulled one of them back to let him in. He crossed to Cody looking incredulous.

“What’s wrong? With
me?
What do you mean ‘what’s wrong?’ Why aren’t you answering your cell phone?”

Cody’s eyes immediately looked for his car, but it was in some random spot in the hospital parking lot. “I must’ve left it in my jeep. Why? Was I supposed to . . . ?”

He wracked his brain, trying to come up with some commitment he’d forgotten about.

“
Cody!
The local news channel has been reporting the murder of a detective for half the night. Your mother and I have been trying to call you for four hours. She’s having a fit of hysteria wondering if it was you!”

Cody let out his breath. He closed his eyes as guilt washed over him. He hadn’t thought to call his parents. He hadn’t thought about the fact that the media would already have reported the incident, which meant his parents had probably heard it. He should have. There were already news crews at the hospital when he’d arrived, which meant a few of them had police scanners and had heard Alex’s 911 call when she made it.

“Oh, Dad, I’m so sorry. I didn’t think—”

“No you didn’t think! I know you and I don’t get along, Cody, but your mother doesn’t deserve this.”

Cody had never seen his father this unhinged before. He was exhausted, both emotionally and physically, and his anger flared.

“I didn’t do it on purpose, Dad. A lot has happened tonight and I haven’t even slept yet—”

“What could you possibly be dealing with that’s more important—?”

“Tell Mom,” Cody spoke over him, “that I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to worry her, but I’ll come see her as soon as I—”

“
Tell
her? Aren’t you coming with me now? She’s sitting in the car in a puddle of tears.”

Though they had long differed over Cody’s chosen profession, hitting his father had never crossed Cody’s mind. Before now. All his pent up emotions over Alex, Tom, and a soul-numbing situation that was spiraling out his control rose to the surface.