Bad Medicine (29 page)

"No, ma'am. Could you have given a spare key to a neighbor?"

Sure. She'd given one to Sam. But Molly wasn't about to wake him at three in the morning to the sight of her face. So she shook her head.

"In that case," Rowdy said, dropping the dog food, "we'll just wait for the locksmith."

And he did. He even waited until the disheveled, garlic-and-Old Spice-scented man had broken into Molly's house. When Molly saw how quickly the locksmith made it past what she thought were high-security locks, she let him replace them with the newest pickless variety instead.

After seeing the locks taken care of and taking care of Magnum herself in between visits to the porcelain god to purge the evil kidnap spirits, Molly tried her best to fall asleep in her bed fully clothed. She couldn't seem to do it. Someone had kidnapped her tonight. Someone who had been watching her, who could still be watching her. Someone who twice had threatened her with men who seemed to enjoy hurting women just for the fun of it. And there was only one person connected with this investigation so far who merited the word
snake.
As in, "I slept with the snakes, Mama."

In the morning when her brain was in working order again, Molly was going to sit down and find the connection between William T. Peterson and the rest of these suicides. She was going to pay him back for terrorizing her like this.

In the morning.

During the long, dark hours of the night, though, all she could think of was what an easy target she seemed to be. A woman who traveled alone. Who worked in a marginal area. Who lived by herself in a big house near a high-crime area.

Molly knew it wasn't rational. They'd already delivered their message tonight. She was in a house with new locks and a state-of-the-art alarm system she'd for once been very careful about setting. Even so, she spent the rest of the night curled up on the bathroom floor with Magnum and her stun gun, listening for intruders.

She must have fallen asleep at some time, because the phone woke her. It woke her again when it kept ringing. Molly didn't bother with it. She didn't move until the sun was well up, Magnum started whining, and the doorbell joined in the chorus.

Molly hurt everywhere, she still felt mostly like barfing, and she was having residuals from one of her 'Nam dreams that must have crept in when she'd nodded off. Even so, she slowly uncurled herself and went on down in the same scrubs and lab coat she'd fallen asleep in, a wriggling oily lump of fur in her arms.

And of all the things to find on her front porch, there was Frank Patterson. Dressed in chinos and a chambray shirt, he looked and smelled like an ad for cologne. He was also holding a wriggling burden of his own.

"What the hell is that?" he demanded, looking at her dog.

"What the hell is
that?"
Molly demanded right back.

"I asked you first."

"This is my new friend Magnum," she said, never once taking her eyes from the solemn brown pair watching her next to Frank's. "He saved my life last night."

Frank considered her appearance. "Not a moment too soon, it appears. I've been trying to return your call from yesterday. I finally tried you at your hospital and somebody named Sasha told me what happened. In detail. She asked if I'd like to help you sue the hospital over something called Mugger's Delight. Are you all right?"

"I'm not sure," she replied. "Is that a child in your arms?"

Frank smiled. "Molly, I'd like you to meet Abigail."

She was a beautiful little girl, with thick dark hair, huge dark eyes, and a sweet bow mouth. Clad in a sweet green-and-white-striped pinafore with matching hair bows and Mary Janes that gleamed as brightly as Officer Rowdy's uniform shoes, this kid was the poster child for innocence.

"Abigail," Frank said, "say hello to Miss Burke."

"Hello, Miss Burke," the little girl responded obediently in a soft, breathy little voice.

"Hello, Abigail," Molly responded, then turned to the man holding her. "So, what'd you do, Patterson? Hire her to give you that all-important family look when you're defending an allegedly negligent daycare center?"

Frank didn't look the least perturbed. "See what I mean about those head injuries, Ab?" he asked gently of the little girl in his arms.

She nodded. "Yes, Daddy."

"You'll wear your bike helmet all the time like Grams asks now, won't you?"

"Yes, Daddy."

Daddy. Daddy?

"You're kidding," Molly whispered, truly stunned.

"Are
you okay?" Frank asked, stepping on in as if he'd known all along that Molly meant to offer the invitation. Then he scowled, as if she'd asked him in to mop the floors. "You look like hell."

Molly never moved. "Is this really your daddy, honey?" she asked.

She really didn't have to. There was just something about the way the little girl rested her hand against Frank's cheek that spoke of the connection. Even so, Abigail nodded, still watching Molly as if unsure just what Molly was going to do. Molly didn't really blame her. Molly wasn't so sure either.

"You have breakfast yet?" Frank asked, walking on by toward the kitchen.

"What do you mean?" Molly asked, belatedly remembering to close the door.

"My wife always said that tea made anything feel better. But then she was English, wasn't she, Abs? You got tea, Burke?"

Molly was breathless with sudden distress. "Patterson, don't do this to me!" she protested.

Frank turned around just as he got to the door of the kitchen. "What?"

Molly waved in the direction of the kitchen, which just made Magnum squirm all over again. "Don't take care of me."

Frank's eyebrow went up. "How dare you, Burke? You know what an act like that would do to my reputation?"

And then he walked right into the kitchen, set Abigail down in a chair, and put the teakettle on the stove.

"You
had
a wife?" Molly asked quietly behind him. Without turning around, he lifted a finger in exception. "That, Saint Molly, is a discussion that we have over dinner and drinks. Not tea and concussions. By the way, have you seen your eye? You look like you went ten rounds with Tyson. And your dog needs a bath."

"Do you have any other surprises for me?" Molly demanded, completely overwhelmed.

Frank never turned around. "You mean, like the twins?"

Molly stood at a complete loss in her own kitchen. All she could think to do, finally, was crouch down next to Abigail's chair so she was eye level with the little girl, who couldn't quite decide whether she wanted to watch Molly or the intriguing package in her arms. "Do you have twins in your family?" she asked.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Is your daddy always like this?"

Abigail nodded again. "Yes, ma'am."

* * *

They never did get around to that discussion. They did get the dog bathed, uncovering the startling discovery that whatever they had, at least had the auburn red coat of an Irish setter. They shared tea and toast and information on what Molly had found at the MAC and the caves. They let Abigail take the puppy into the backyard when the FBI guys showed up, because Molly said she didn't think it was wise for a three-year-old to be exposed to violence.

"We aren't on the job to protect you," Lopez said evenly. "We were watching to see what you'd do."

"I got tossed out a van," Molly retorted.

"We heard. And you think that the Shitkicker's Club was involved in something illegal?"

"Something ill-advised, anyway. The name William Peterson did come up, if you remember."

A round of nods. "We'll look into it. It probably has something to do with the investigation we've already instituted on Pearl."

"Well then, why didn't they throw
you
out of a van into a trash bag?" she demanded.

The FBI guy smiled. "Because we're the FBI. We'd get them back."

"That's what I'm asking you to do now," Molly told them.

They both stood up together, as if on silent cue. "We'll talk to Officer... uh, Parker about this. Coordinate with him. You understand, though, that simple assault isn't really under our jurisdiction. Unless you were black or Jewish, of course."

"Gee, thanks."

"Any time."

"Frank," Molly said as the two of them watched the FBI agents climb into their regulation sedan at the curb, "I think I said something important."

Frank closed the door and turned her back toward the kitchen where more tea awaited. "What's that?"

Molly was busy rubbing at her head, which was throbbing even worse. "They've been investigating Pearl, right?"

"Uh-huh."

"Everybody knows that."

"Uh-huh."

"Then why was it me those guys warned? Why
didn't
they warn the FBI?"

Frank stopped just shy of picking up the teakettle. For the first time since Molly thought she'd known him, he wasn't smiling, or at least grinning. He looked downright unhappy.

"You think it's Peg?"

Molly escaped over to the sink. "Her brother thinks she was involved in something. Her friends all committed suicide within weeks of her. Could she be the one at the head of this thing instead of Pearl? Shouldn't somebody at least have asked?"

"You think she was involved in the gambling too, then."

For just a second, Molly's attention was caught by the sight of a little girl chasing a littler dog around the yard. She could hear the squeals of delight from both of them, saw Sam wander over toward the fence to investigate. She thought, just briefly, that that was what she'd fenced in the yard for, and it broke her heart all over again.

So she closed her eyes. And remembered something she hadn't told Officer Rowdy. "There were three of them," she said suddenly.

This time, Frank wasn't laughing at all. "What?"

Molly opened her eyes wide. Faced Frank and fought an odd clutch of claustrophobia. "That's what was wrong. The van was moving when I was tossed out. And I was tossed out by two men. So there had to be three of them, only I never saw the other one. What does that mean, Frank?"

"It means you've pissed off more than two people, Saint Molly," he retorted, putting the teakettle back unused. "You're sure?"

"Yeah."

There was still something else, something she'd wanted to remember. She couldn't, though. For some reason, it made her more afraid.

Frank was nodding, his own attention caught by his daughter and the old man who leaned over the fence to smile at her.

"I think it's time to quit," he said.

"I could use a nap," Molly agreed.

"Not that quit," he said, turning to her with eyes more serious than she'd ever seen them. "The big quit. I think we've managed to step far too near the quicksand."

He'd done such a quick U-turn Molly was dizzy with trying to keep up. "What?"

He looked outside again. "Give it back to the police where it belongs."

"The police don't want it."

"They will."

Molly's head was beginning to hurt so badly she was seeing stars. Even so, she grabbed Patterson by the arm and swung him back around to face her. "What the hell are you talking about?" she demanded. "You're the one who got me into this and now you want me to just walk away?"

"Well, don't
you?"

"Yes! No! Damn it, Frank, I can't just ignore it."

"Sure we can. We were just doing a friend a favor anyway. I don't remember ever saying anything about taking a bullet for him."

"You can't mean that."

"You really want to go back down into those caves?"

He really knew how to hit below the belt. Molly was breathless with fury. "Just about as much as you do," she challenged.

"Okay, then."

Frank flashed her the smile. Molly simply couldn't keep up with him. "Time for me to get home, Saint Molly. The twins have soccer. You gonna be okay alone?"

Molly snorted. "I've been okay alone most of my life, Patterson. Why should now be different?"

He seemed to see something on her face she didn't know was there. It made him shake his head. "No wonder you were so easy to persecute, Saint Molly. You're so damn pure."

"Shut up, Frank."

"I mean it. Give it back to the police and cut yourself some slack for a change. It won't kill you." Reaching up, he gently tapped her forehead where Molly knew he could see the brand-new bruising and scrapes. "These guys, on the other hand, just might."

Molly locked all the doors behind Frank, and she fended Sam off to a mere phone call. She called the intelligence team down at police headquarters, but they couldn't be found. She called Rhett, who could be found in conference with the Major Case Squad on the dead little girl, who, they'd found, had lived in the city. She called her credit card companies, found a substitute purse, fed her puppy, and erected elaborate barricades to keep him in the back of the house so she could try again to sleep.

She ended up wide-awake in her bed, thinking about Frank Patterson and his three children. Thinking about Joseph Ryan and the caves where he hid. Thinking about people who were trying to kill her because she didn't want to deal with suicides.