Chương 4
“It means I am not going to lie to you.”
For the first time since the alarms began, Grace felt something close to relief.
The relief lasted less than a minute.
The door opened, and Mason entered without knocking.
Ortiz stood.
Mason had put his jacket back on. The charcoal fabric looked freshly brushed. His cuff links were gone.
“This is a restricted conversation,” Ortiz said.
“This is a private hospital floor leased by Adrian’s family office.”
“You don’t own the police department.”
“No. I’m told it has become expensive.”
Ortiz did not smile. “Leave.”
Mason looked at Grace. “Your building manager received two calls asking whether you were home.”
Grace’s mouth went dry.
“Who called?”
“The numbers were blocked.”
“How do you know?”
“I have someone watching the building.”
Ortiz said, “Without her consent?”
“With the consent of the man who owns it.”
Grace stared at him. “Adrian owns my apartment building?”
Mason’s silence answered.
She had signed the lease through a property company with a name she had forgotten before reaching the second page. The rent had stayed below market for three years. Repairs happened within a day. She had believed herself lucky.
Adrian had built walls around people without telling them whether the walls were meant to keep danger out or keep them in.
Mason set a phone on the table. “Your neighbor called Grace’s number. One of my men answered because her personal phone is being held by hospital security. She said a black SUV circled the block twice.”
Ortiz said, “Give me the phone.”
“It belongs to Grace.”
“Then give it to her.”
Mason slid it across the table.
Grace did not pick it up.
“Who knows Lily saw something?” she asked.
“Everyone who heard her in the corridor.”
“Your men.”
“Nurses. Administrators. Security personnel. At least one patient’s family.”
“And whoever you called.”
Mason’s eyes did not change. “Yes.”
Ortiz took the phone using a tissue from the box and placed it in an evidence sleeve.
Mason watched her. “You think I contaminated Adrian’s wound.”
“I think you were in the room during a period that requires explanation.”
“I stepped into the family room at four twelve and returned at four fourteen.”
“The hallway camera went offline at four eleven.”
“That is convenient.”
“For whom?”
Mason looked at Grace again. “Lily said the man smelled like me. Three weeks ago, Adrian gave the senior security staff cedar shaving soap and hand balm from a company he invested in. Seven men use it. So do I.”
Grace remembered gift boxes stacked in Adrian’s service pantry, matte black with a silver tree printed on the lid. She had thrown away the shipping cartons.
“Why did your face change?” she asked.
“Because I knew what the smell meant.”
“That one of your men did it?”
“That it could be made to look that way.”
Ortiz said, “Names.”
Mason’s gaze stayed on Grace. “Nolan Sykes. Peter Lyle. Vincent Marr. Joel Carrigan. The others are out of state.”
“Were any of them here?”
“Nolan managed the loading entrance. Peter was at the house. Vincent transported Adrian after the shooting. Joel drove the second vehicle.”
“Which one wears a ring with a shiny moon?”
Mason’s hand moved inside his pocket again.
“They all wear the same ring,” he said.
Grace felt Lily stir.
Mason continued. “It is a compass. Silver crescent around a black center.”
“A uniform.”
“A promise.”
Ortiz said, “To do what?”
Mason’s jaw tightened. “Whatever Adrian required.”
The operating-room red light went dark shortly before noon.
Dr. Brooks returned to tell them Adrian had been transferred to intensive care. He remained unconscious, ventilated, and unstable. The next twelve hours would determine whether the infection had outrun the surgery.
Grace listened while Lily ate dry crackers one corner at a time.
A hospital social worker found them an unused pediatric family room two floors below. It had a pullout chair, a television fixed high on the wall, and wallpaper printed with faded sailboats. Two uniformed officers stood outside. The door locked from the inside.
Grace removed Lily’s shoes and socks. She wiped the child’s feet with a warm washcloth, changed her into a T-shirt from Adrian’s overnight bag, and used the beige dress as a pillow cover. There was no reason to save the dress from wrinkles, but she smoothed it anyway.
Lily watched cartoons without sound.
“Why did the man hurt Mr. Vale?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Because he’s bad?”
“Maybe.”
“Mr. Vale is bad sometimes.”
Grace sat on the edge of the pullout chair.
“Why do you say that?”
“He made Tommy cry.”
Tommy was one of Adrian’s drivers. He had disappeared from the household six months earlier after a closed-door meeting. Grace had heard shouting from the study. Afterward, Adrian came into the kitchen and washed blood from one knuckle while asking whether Lily’s preschool had corrected the billing error.
“Grown-ups can be bad sometimes and still be hurt by worse things,” Grace said.
Lily frowned at the silent television. “That’s not fair.”
“No.”
“Do bad people get doctors?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because doctors don’t decide who deserves to live.”
Lily absorbed this.
“Do you?”
Grace looked at her daughter.
“No,” she said. “I’m trying not to.”
Lily climbed beneath the thin hospital blanket. She tucked the rabbit under her chin and fell asleep before the next cartoon ended.
Grace sat in the blue light from the television and listened to footsteps pass outside.
Her phone remained with Detective Ortiz. She borrowed the room phone and called her neighbor, Mrs. Alvarez. A police officer had already spoken with her. The black SUV had left, but two men had asked the building superintendent whether Grace kept a second car.
“I told them you don’t even keep the first one running,” Mrs. Alvarez said.
Grace closed her eyes. “Thank you.”
“Were they cops?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were they Mr. Vale’s people?”
“I don’t know.”
May you like
A silence followed.
Mrs. Alvarez had watched Lily on Sunday mornings for almost a year. She kept apple juice in the refrigerator and let Lily draw on grocery-store receipts. Yet Grace could hear distance entering her voice.
