Playing God (23 page)

Perry shook his head. "Nothing solid. They're shaking some cages."

Burgess shared what he'd learned from the security guard, Charlie, and from Alana. The guy in the pickup. Pleasant's meeting with someone who fit O'Leary's description. The tip about drugs from the ER nurse. The suggestion they look to disgruntled patients. "No clear winners. So we keep digging. Stan, talk to the Rockland police, see if they have any leads on O'Leary, get an address and find a time to go see his momma. Go by Pleasant's place and get his financial records. His wife said she'd give us access. And expect the cold shoulder. She's decided we're a bunch of mannerless thugs." He gave quick directions.

"Terry, you come to the hospital with me. We've got a list of people to see. Three docs who were Pleasant's friends. The parking lot attendant. Got to get the names of other security guards, other parking lot attendants, their schedules. Talk to the administration. And then there's Pleasant's attorney." He snapped his notebook shut. "Anybody got any ideas where O'Leary might have hidden those video tapes?" He waited. "Think like a scumbag, it just might come to you."

"At the hospital," Melia said. "Kid gloves, okay?"

Burgess pushed back from the table. "Not you, too, Vince."

"Just a part of the food chain, Joe. They bite my ass, I bite yours."

There was a knock on the door and a detective stuck his head in. "Hey, Joe? There's an old lady out here wants to talk about Dr. Pleasant. You got time?"

He always had time for someone who wanted to talk about Pleasant. "Tell her five minutes." He opened his notebook, scribbled a quick list, and gave it to Kyle. "See if these docs can give us some time?"

Melia stayed behind, resting his arms on the back of a chair. He dressed smart and he looked smart, a GQ kind of guy with a gun on his belt. His crisp shirt matched his sharp blue eyes. "I should send you home, Joe. Doesn't look like you're gonna make it."

They both knew Melia wasn't sending him anywhere. Not with a jittery city and bigwigs breathing down their necks. "We're playing pin the rap on the bad guy and we might as well be blindfolded, Vince. This case has everything—unhappy wife, angry ex. Hookers. Drugs. Money problems. Maybe blackmail, and a vic nobody liked, including his patients. Hard to pick a winner. But I got my shoulder to the wheel, and if I just keep pushing, it'll move. Besides..." He allowed himself a smile. "Gotta let Cote gnaw my ass."

"Let Terry drive you, okay? If you need him for something else, I'll find you a driver. I don't want heroics here. Understood?" Right. Vinnie wanted X-ray vision and for him to leap small buildings in a single bound. "Better go see your old lady. Any senior citizen out on a day like this deserves a medal."

Burgess got slowly to his feet. This must be what it was like to be old—mind racing ahead like always, poor old body dragging behind like an afterthought.

A small, upright woman in a severe navy coat and an ancient hat sat by his desk. "Sergeant Burgess, ma'am. You wanted to see me?"

Her glasses were thick, her face gaunt and wrinkled, but her response was quick. "You're investigating Dr. Pleasant's murder?"

"I am."

"Then it's you I came to see. I'm Maude Libby. My late husband, Oscar, was one of Dr. Pleasant's patients."

He got an address and telephone number. "What did you want to see me about, Mrs. Libby?"

"I read about you in the paper," she said. "You got attacked last night but you're not home in bed, feeling sorry for yourself. My Oscar would have approved of you. Hit Oscar over the head and he would have come to work extra early, just to show they couldn't keep him down." She pulled a crumpled tissue from her coat pocket, took off her glasses, and wiped them. She didn't wipe her eyes, though Burgess saw tears. "I didn't like Dr. Pleasant, though I suppose he was a good enough doctor. He didn't treat people with respect. He treated Oscar like an old dummy."

She touched Burgess's arm, a sign this was important. Women of her generation didn't touch strange men. "My Oscar ran a trucking business nearly fifty years. That's no business for weaklings. He fixed trucks, loaded trucks, drove trucks. Beat up people who tried to steal his trucks. He wasn't the sort of man you patted on the head and told what to do. Seeing him humiliated was one of the hardest parts of watching him die."

She pulled her hand back and set it in her lap, a wrinkled, age-spotted hand with a magnificent diamond ring. "I know you're a busy man and I don't mean to waste your time. I'm telling you this so you'll understand. I'm not usually a vindictive woman. I hope I'm not being one now." She coughed, patted her chest, and said, in a smaller voice, "Could I have some water?"

He couldn't get water with one hand, so he asked one of the other detectives to do it. Where was this going? He'd seen plenty of people with chips on their shoulders, few so open and dignified about it. He gave her the water and waited.

"Oscar died at home on a Thursday morning. That afternoon, Dr. Pleasant stopped at the house to collect Oscar's unused medicine. He said it was donated to an organization that provided medicine for people who couldn't pay. Perhaps I'm making a mountain from a molehill, but I didn't believe him. He didn't give me the organization's name. He seemed extremely nervous. Just the week before, when we all knew the end was near, he'd prescribed a batch of new painkillers without explanation. I wondered whether he wanted that medicine for something other than humanitarian purposes."

She reached up and straightened her hat. As she did, her neck lengthened, her chin tilted up, and he had a sudden vision of her fifty years earlier, of the grace and elegance which had attracted Oscar. She noticed the look. Lowered her eyes with a faint smile. "I hope I'm not wronging the man, sergeant, but I have always been a good judge of character."

He got the name and address of her pharmacy, and she agreed to call and okay the release of her husband's prescription records. "If he did it to Oscar," she added, "he may have done it to others. Prescription drugs for the elderly are so expensive and our insurance companies fight constantly to keep from paying. We don't need this nonsense on top of everything else."

While people much closer to the crime were hiding their heads in the sand, Maude Libby had come out on the morning after a snowstorm to tell him this. "Mrs. Libby, I wish more of our citizens were like you."

"So do I," she said.

"How did you get here today?"

She seemed surprised by the question. "I drove, of course."

Fifty years married to a trucker, Maude Libby was probably a hell of a driver. Undaunted by a little snow. "Did you ever drive the trucks?"

"During the war, my sister Edna and I both did. Had the time of our lives. Then the men came back and needed the jobs, so we went home and had babies. Driving in snow, you know, some of it's experience, a lot is common sense. Something that seems to be sorely lacking these days." She stood up. "I won't keep you. I know you're busy. I'd appreciate knowing what you find out, though."

"I'll let you know. Thank you for taking the time to come in, Mrs. Libby." One more thing he had to ask. "What are you driving these days?"

It was there again, just a touch of pride. "Oscar always thought I should drive cars. He considered them more ladylike. I used to have a Lincoln. Now I drive Oscar's truck." She inclined her head, a very small gesture, and walked away. She'd been a woman men noticed. It had never quite gone away.

He found Kyle making coffee. "Any luck with the docs?"

"Level of cooperation over there is very low today."

"Then we'll just drop in. Sometimes that works better anyway. You ready?"

"Thought I'd get some coffee first. That hospital stuff's pathetic."

"No problem. I've got reports to write."

"One-handed?"

"I've got a choice?" Back at his desk, he called his sister. "Hey, it's Joe. Listen, if you're looking for a project, Alana would be great at massage. Maybe you could find a program she might get into." He listened to Sandy's reflexive complaint about money. "Pay? Who'd you think, the Hooker Rescue League? Of course I will. Well, I guess that's right. I found her so that makes her mine. Meanwhile, you could bake some cookies or boil a chicken to make soup for the invalid."

He started typing. Not doing too badly for a cripple. He was into his third report when Kyle showed up, and only then remembered that he was supposed to see Cote. Odd how easy it is to forget what we don't want to do. "Give me a minute, Terry. Gotta pop upstairs and see the Captain."

Normally, he wouldn't take the elevator up one flight, but today, the slam of his feet hurt his head. Must be time for another pill. Light was painful and he wanted to squeeze his head between his hands and bellow curses. Those were clues. The throbbing in his arm was another. That little crack in the bone felt like dentistry without Novocain.

Cote, on the phone, motioned him into a chair. Burgess lowered himself slowly, tipped his head back, and rested his eyes. He heard a muffled mumble-mumble, some placating phrases about busy man and so sorry, his officers hadn't meant to be rude, and he'd see what he could do. Suddenly, in a louder voice, he heard Cote say, "No, they are not harassing your medical staff. It's standard procedure for detectives to question the victim's friends and co-workers. These aren't interrogations, they're interviews, collecting information about the victim. Of course they'll respect your staff's privacy."

Captain Rigid SOP actually defending cops? His eyes popped open. What was wrong with Cote?

"Sir? I'm not sure I understand your complaint. A serious crime has been committed. It's the duty of every citizen to assist the police."

Burgess stared. It was Cote's head, Cote's voice. "Suppose your wife or child was a victim. Would you want people to refuse to give information because it was inconvenient?" Cote listened, then asked, "Well, how many people have the detectives spoken with?" Burgess held up three fingers. Cote sighed. "Do what you feel you must, but I'm not going to instruct detectives working a homicide to stay away from the victim's workplace or his friends and colleagues. And doctor, if you think calling the Mayor is necessary, that's certainly your right, but why not just cooperate?"

It was so unlike Cote's normal placating and servile attitude toward VIPs. Enlightenment came quickly. The Chief, who'd been in the doorway, cleared his throat as he came into the room. "No one wants to be bothered anymore, do they? Hey, Joe," he said. "How are you?"

"Been worse," Burgess said. It was true. His life had been a trail of tears.

"Who was that?" the Chief asked.

"Hospital administrator. Complaining our detectives are driving them crazy."

The Chief's calm eyes fixed on Burgess. "Are you?"

"I've been there twice, sir. Right after the murder, I interviewed his boss. Yesterday I interviewed his secretary and a security guard. We called just now to set up interviews with three docs who were Pleasant's close friends, and they blew us off."

"Sounds like they got on the horn to this guy right away. Any idea why?"

"Case is ugly. No one wants to be connected with it. Vic was partying with two hookers just before he was killed. The body was found partially undressed. Hooker we've located says the party was videotaped. We've got rumors on the street that the vic might have been peddling classified drugs, including Oxycontin. Vic may have had financial problems. All pretty nasty, and the widow's Ted Shaw's daughter, so he's throwing his weight around, doesn't want to be embarrassed. As for why they're in such a snit over there, I can't tell you, sir. Everything's been SOP."

The Chief nodded. "Everyone's in favor of law enforcement as long as it stays away from them. But we don't have one set of rules for the little people, another for the big fish. Go over there and do what you have to do." He headed for the door. "And keep Paul in the loop so he can run interference."

Cote stared coldly over his desk, looking really eager to run interference for Joe Burgess. "You got anything on this yet? Anything?"

"What I told the Chief. Bits and pieces."

"Well, go out there and get me something."

Like he'd been hanging around eating donuts and drinking coffee. Like Cote wouldn't have made doing interviews at the hospital impossible if the Chief hadn't been listening. Cote was looking at him like he had dung on his shoes. He knew he wasn't pretty today, but he hadn't been pretty before, either. He hadn't even been a pretty baby. He wanted to pound Cote's mean little two-faced head against the wall until the faces blended into one. It was an ugly impulse and he didn't like having it.

He stood up ever so slowly, being careful of his own head. Sketched a salute. "I'm on my way... Sir." Off to interview the hell out of those whiny suckers. Stomp on every foot he could.

Chapter 19