The Pain Nurse - [12]

“No.” She tried to keep her face calm. She knew he was trying to rattle her. “I have a great record. I’ve never had drugs go missing. You can check it.”

After a long pause, Dodds said, “I have.” He raised his head and studied her anew. “Why do you wear a lab coat?”

“I get cold, and I need all the pockets.”

He fell silent for what seemed like an hour. Maybe it was five minutes. He just watched her, his eyes not quite kindly, not quite hostile. If he talked again it would seem as surprising and sudden as a stopped heart that suddenly began beating on its own.

Finally: “And it gets you more respect?”

“The coat? Maybe. I guess.”

He made a humming sound, looking at her for a long time before returning to the notebook and leafing through it. She sat back in the seat, then squirmed forward again.

“Were you wearing a lab coat on Friday night?”

She nodded.

“Is this it?”

“No.” She explained that lab coat had been smeared with blood and she threw it away in a hazmat container.

“Why would you do that?” His voice was even, but his eyes were large with suspicion. This was a man who did most of his talking through his eyes.

“It was ruined. What should I have done with it?”

“It was evidence. You should have given it to the police.”

“It would have been nice if the police had told me that.” She heard the defensiveness and stress in her voice.

He made notes-an impossibly long paragraph-and sat back studying her. He spoke after a long pause.

“So how long have you been seeing Dr. Nagle?”

“Damn it.” She spoke quietly but vehemently. “Who told…?” She stopped herself, feeling small and off balance. “We saw each other for about a year.”

“While he was married?”

“He was separated.” She sighed. “Part of that time, but, shit, sure, he was married.”

“Did Dr. Lustig know?”

She became only gradually aware of the avalanche bearing down on her. “Am I a suspect?”

Dodds pursed his lips. “I can declare you a person of interest. That’s not quite a suspect.”

“Holy crap,” Cheryl Beth said. “You can’t think I could…? I found her!”

“Dr. Nagle told us that you and he had an affair.”

“Why isn’t he a suspect? Because he’s a hotshot neurosurgeon?”

“You might both be suspects,” Dodds said.

“Look, Detective.” Cheryl Beth touched his arm and drew back. “This isn’t what you think…Hell, I know you hear that all the time. You’re used to people lying to you. Me, too. It goes with my job. I broke it off with Gary three months ago. Christine probably knew about it for a long time. But we weren’t enemies.”

Dodds again let the conversation fall into another canyon of silence. He hadn’t mentioned that Cheryl Beth and Christine had been at a bar together that night. That meant Gary hadn’t told him, despite the threat he had made at her house. Why? She realized she didn’t know Gary at all. Indeed, she was now afraid of him.

“How would you characterize your relationship with Dr. Lustig?”

Cheryl Beth was aware of how fast her breaths were coming. “Coworkers. Colleagues.” She nervously added, “In another life maybe we could have been friends.”

“Really?” Dodds’ comeback was sudden. “Funny way to treat a friend.”

Chapter Six

Dodds clapped his large hands on the tops of his thighs and stood, leaving the nurse sitting, staring at his back as he did his heavy stomp away. Then she put her head in her hands, just for a few seconds, before sweeping back her light-brown hair, adjusting her white coat, and at a brisk pace joining the flow of people headed into the main part of the hospital. She had large, attractive eyes and moved with an intuitive grace. Will watched from his wheelchair and turned to follow Dodds.

Two tough-looking, muscular black men stood outside one of the rooms, arguing with a uniformed officer. Leaving, they nearly ran into Dodds. They wore hoodies and very baggy pants, the mainstream gang attire that Will’s own son favored. The shorter of the two chewed on a toothpick. They wore blue do-rags, signs that they were Mount Auburn Boyz, friends of the kid shot the night the doctor was murdered. Now he lay in that hospital room, three doors down from Will, unable to move his arms or legs. Dodds knew they were “representing” with hand signals and slang, but merely gave a look of bored contempt. They gave him the typical dead-eyes expression, before sidling down the hall in an oscillating pimp roll, sweeping past Will. “Monkey five-oh,” one of the bangers said to the other.

“What’s the deal?” Will asked the uniform, a petite young woman who recognized him. “I thought he tried to shoot a cop. Why isn’t he in the jail unit?”

“They haven’t charged him. He was just in the crossfire, and now maybe he’ll tell us who the real bad guys were. I’m just here to make sure some of his buddies don’t try to keep that from happening.”

Will nodded and wheeled to watch Dodds. He knew that Dodds liked to walk a crime scene, sometimes repeatedly, always slowly. Now the big man moved leisurely down the neuro-rehab unit. It might make no sense to an outsider, even to many cops. But Dodds always had his way of things. They had made a good team once, Dodds seeming plodding and distracted, Will garrulous and focused. That was part of Dodds’ camouflage and also how his mind worked. He would have done his slow move with the nurse, with everyone he interviewed for this case. The long pauses between questions, only to pause an even longer time after the subject had answered. What could his silence mean, they wondered? Dodds was a master. So, too, with his “homicide stroll,” as Will called it. Dodds would walk a scene, keeping his opinions to himself until later. It was interesting he was working alone on this case.