Book 42 - Cotton Candy Fluff Murder_KDP Read online

  Amy pressed her back against the wall by the door and scanned the room, constantly, searching, searching for whatever clue they might find.

  “He was paralyzed from the neck done. They struggled to keep him alive. His Doctor, uh,” he said, and rifled through his notes, “Jenny Ford, said it was as if he just wanted to give up. Like his soul knew that it was time to go.”

  “That’s quite spiritual coming from a doctor.” Heather walked to the equipment beside the bed.

  “She broke down the minute we got here. I’ve never seen someone cry as much for a person who wasn’t in their family.”

  “Interesting,” Heather said. She filed that fact away for later dissection. “So he was on life support. How was he murdered?”

  “He was taken off life support,” Ryan said. “Unplugged, if you will, though I figure the process is more complex than that.”

  “Euthanized.” Amy shuddered. “Who would do something like that?”

  “That’s what we’ve got to find out,” Ryan replied. “Regardless of who did this, it’s murder. It’s coldblooded murder.” The growl in his voice told Heather this had hit home.

  “What are the legalities here?” Heather asked.

  “Basically, they can retract life support on the order of the surrogates. That means the family which is responsible for his care. So, the parents would discuss it with the doctor in charge, in this case, Jenny Ford, and they would uh, move the process forward from there. The doctor can also withdraw life support if she feels she can’t help the patient further.”

  “Wait one hot second, are you telling me that a doctor can just – just walk in and tell you that they’re going to kill your relative?” Amy asked.

  Ryan nodded once. “Texas Advance Directives Act. The doctors discuss and withdraw care. A lot of the time it’s financially motivated.”

  Amy’s lips peeled back. “That’s repulsive.”

  Heather waved a hand. “But no one discussed this with the doctor? And she never gave an order for this to happen?”

  “The consent was never given,” Ryan said. “That’s what we got from her. We’ll need to chat with her again. She was pretty upset when we first got here.”

  Heather tucked her hands into the pockets of her jeans. She agreed with Amy, but she had to remain objective. The doctors hadn’t shut off the respirator or pulled the plug, so to speak. But someone had.

  “What have we got for evidence?”

  ‘We’ve got prints that’ve gone back to the lab but we can’t be sure they’ll give us anything. Fred had plenty of visitors, family, and friends, nurses and doctors. They don’t give us a lead on when those people were in the room. We could check the visitor's log and look for discrepancies but I’m not holding any hope for that.”

  “Surveillance?” Heather asked.

  “Yeah, cameras in the hall outside. I’m hoping that’s going to be our lead,” Ryan said. “And we’ll have to speak to all the family members, doctors, nurses. We’ve got our work cut out for us on this one.”

  Heather ran her tongue along the back of her teeth. She resisted the urge to hum under her breath. “We’ll figure it out,” she said.

  Nobody said a word. Ryan flipped through his notes and Amy stared at the empty beds, the sheets tangled at the foot.

  Chapter 4

  “It’s sick,” Amy hissed.

  They sat behind Heather’s desk in the office in Donut Delights. Ames had dragged one of the chairs around and taken up the position beside her ten minutes ago and hadn’t stopped grumbling since.

  “What’s wrong?” Heather asked, though she already had a hunch. She tapped on the screen of her tablet and brought up the surveillance footage which Ryan had sent over to her an hour ago.

  He’d gotten it as soon as they’d finished up at the hospital and let her know that they’d finished taking statements from everyone. Heather was free to get the investigation started.

  “Amy?”

  “I just think it’s wrong that doctors can decide whether they’re going to kill a person or not. It’s unnatural,” Amy said.

  Heather’s finger hovered over the play button in the center of the screen. “But the doctors didn’t do that, Ames. We’re after a killer.”

  “What’s the difference, though? Someone crept in and did it without permission but the doctors could just as easily have done it with consent. I mean, isn’t that still murder?”

  “Death is more complicated than that. So is intensive care. I don’t think it’s fair to judge when we haven’t been in either the position of the parent or the doctor in this case,” Heather said.

  “Do you have to be so annoyingly level headed all the time?” Amy folded her arms across her chest and glared at the tablet’s screen. “I just think it’s wrong.”

  “I know, and that’s fine. But that’s not we’re focusing on here. Can I trust you to check out the evidence and remain unbiased?” She’d trusted Amy with everything else but her bestie did have a temper.

  “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I guess this is more important than my ethical issues.”

  Heather pressed the play button and angled the tablet so they could both see the screen without any glare. She hadn’t shut the blinds, but the afternoon sun had mellowed outside.

  “Here we go.” Ryan always sent her the most relevant portions of the recordings and this time was no exception.

  A few seconds of empty hallway played out and then a figure appeared in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen.

  “It’s a woman,” Heather said, immediately. “A nurse. Or someone in a nurse’s uniform, at least.” They couldn’t assume anything without hard evidence and this didn’t count as it.

  “Do you recognize her?”

  The woman kept her head down and shuffled forward, pushing a cart. She halted, fiddled with something in a metal tray, then hurried across the hall diagonally. She slipped into Fred’s room and the door snapped shut behind her.

  “Timestamp reads 1:01 am,” Heather said.

  “It might not be a woman. It might be a short guy dressed up as a woman. I mean, we can’t see the suspect’s face.”

  “True,” Heather said.

  They watched three minutes of blank hallway. Finally, the door opened and the figure emerge. The killer left the cart behind and hurried off down the hall in the opposite direction, never showing the camera her face.

  Heather tapped on the screen and paused the video. “Well,” she said. “Well. That doesn’t clear things up much.”

  “Aren’t there any other cameras in the hospital? Surely they caught a shot of this person leaving?”

  “No,” Heather said. “Ryan said they’re still combing through the stuff, but nothing so far. It’s like the killer disappeared.”

  “But you and I both know that’s not possible. Right?” Amy’s voice quavered with fear. She wasn’t great with anything which even hinted at supernatural.

  “Of course not. My best guess is the killer entered another room and waited it out. Changed out of the uniform, then left when things got busy.” Heather touched the bar at the bottom of the screen and rewound the footage. “See here?”

  The figure rushed down the hall and paused at the end. It looked up and to the left.

  “Spotting cameras?” Amy asked.

  “Exactly. They’re looking for blind spots.”

  “So, what? We find the room they hid out in?” Amy scratched her chin and sat back. “How do we do that?”

  “I don’t know that we can. We’ll have to interview the doctor first and find out who was on duty that night. Maybe that will offer up a lead,” Heather said. She had to hope it would. “Whoever did this would’ve acted strangely in the lead-up. And if it was a nurse or another doctor, surely the other staff would’ve picked up on the behavior.”

  “Yeah, these people are working together frequently. They would’ve noticed if one of their own broke habit.”

  “Precisely.” Heather put down the tablet and con
sidered the options. This would be tricky. The hospital setting complicated things. It sullied the physical and trace evidence.

  Heather reached for her coffee cup and –

  Bang!

  Something smashed into the window behind them.

  Amy squealed and tipped backward. She hit the carpet and flailed her legs around. “What? What’s that? Attack?”

  Heather swiveled in her chair and stared at the pane. A red velvet cupcake sat flush with the glass, cream cheese icing plastered to it and red cake crumbling to the sill.

  “Get the Taser!” Amy struggled upright.

  Heather offered her a hand and helped her up all the way. “It’s just a cupcake. I’ll bet anything it’s one of Kate’s.”

  “Right. Just a flying cupcake. No big deal,” Amy said and lifted her chair. “I didn’t sign up for this, you know.”

  Heather laughed in spite of the clear threat from Miss Laverne. “Nobody signs up for flying cupcakes, Givens. That’s one of the perks of the job.”

  Chapter 5

  If flying cupcakes were the worst thing in Kate’s arsenal of anger they’d get off easy. Heather couldn’t force the sight of the squished up red velvet treat out of her mind, even as she settled into the seat in front of Dr. Jenny Ford’s broad, walnut desk.

  The doctor had a doll face Heather wouldn’t have associated with a white coat. She was short, petite and wore her hair in a wild frizz which surrounded her face and cut off at her chin.

  “Mrs. Shepherd,” she said, then looked at Amy. “I’m afraid I didn’t catch your name.”

  “Amy Givens.”

  “Welcome,” Jenny said. “I’m sorry if I seem a little out of it. I’m not used to dealing with this type of situation in my hospital.”

  “I understand.” Heather brought her tablet out of her handbag and clicked the button on its side. She’d opened up her Evernote app in preparation for the interview and had typed out Jenny Ford as a heading. “We’re just going to ask you a few questions. Are you okay with that?”

  “Yes,” Jenny replied and bobbed her chin up and down, once. “I’m fine with that. I want to help. I just don’t think I was much help yesterday when the police were here. That Detective Shepherd is a relation of yours?”

  “My husband,” Heather said and typed out the date on her screen.

  “Dr. Ford, could you tell us a little more about your patient, Fred Nolan?” Amy asked.

  They’d agree she’d do most of the talking this time around – she needed the practice and it would free Heather up to type out any notes. She’d considered downloading an app which recorded the interviews but then she’d have to ask permission to record the people she interviewed.

  Jenny chewed the inside of her cheek and it caved inward. She exhaled through her nose. “Fred will remain a contentious patient in my mind, even after his death.”

  “Why?” Amy asked. “What was contentious about his situation?”

  “He came to me unconscious with a subdural hematoma and paralyzed from the neck down,” Jenny replied, and all hints of weepiness had vanished. She was in business mode. Another woman who could compartmentalize when necessary.

  “That sounds serious,” Amy said.

  Heather glanced at her askance. Serious didn’t cut it.

  Amy caught Heather’s gaze and shifted. “I mean, that’s terrible. But I’m sure you’ve dealt with similar situations before.”

  “Never under this set of circumstances. The manner in which the accident with the horse occurred and the attitude of the family, it added up to a tough situation for everyone to deal with, including the staff here,” Jenny said.

  Heather typed out: ‘manner of incident’ and ‘family.’

  “Tell me about the attitude of the family.” Amy hesitated. “Please.”

  “Of course. The Nolans were… how do I put this? They were difficult to deal with.” The doctor sniffed. Apparently, difficult was an understatement. “We might be in a small town but the staff at Hillside Regional know how to handle every medical emergency imaginable. We’ve dealt with everything from snake bites to clogged arteries.”

  “The Nolans doubted you could handle the situation?”

  Jenny wiggled her head to the left and then the right. She dropped her chin. “I think they doubted everything because they were upset about what’d happened to their son. But yes, they made it amply clear that they thought we were understaffed and underequipped.”

  “What did you tell them?” Amy asked.

  “That short of bringing in specialists, there wasn’t much we could do but keep their son on life support. You can see why they were angry,” Jenny said. “They fought about what they should do in front of me. In this very office.”

  “You mean they talked about –”

  “About whether he should be kept on life support or not,” the doctor replied. “The father, Donald, insisted that he wouldn’t allow his son to become a veggie bake on wheels as he put it.”

  “Oh heavens,” Heather muttered and made a note of that too. Her mouth twisted at the distasteful choice of words.

  “Nice guy,” Amy said.

  “And Mrs. Nolan slapped him for that. I stepped in before it could go further and told them that I wasn’t anywhere near ready to approve the removal of his support.”

  “Why not?” Heather asked.

  It was Amy’s turn to shoot a glance in her direction. She’d already developed a sensitivity to the doctor’s ability to ‘pull the plug.’

  “Because I hoped he would recover. There are precedents in a situation like Fred’s. I’ve seen patients on the brink of death recover overnight. It sounds unlikely but these types of things do happen. His hematoma wasn’t as bad as it might’ve been.”

  “So you believed there was hope,” Amy said.

  “That’s right. And I told the parents exactly that. Poor Mrs. Nolan burst into tears and rocked back and forth. Mr. Nolan didn’t believe a word of what I’d said. He called me a liar. He said he wouldn’t put any stock in false hope.” Jenny sighed.

  That left them a first stop for the following morning: the Nolan residence. Ugh, Heather detested questioning families after they’d lost a loved one. She’d managed to distance herself from it before, but it became harder each time. Especially, now that she had her own daughter to look after.

  “Did you see anything on the night of Fred Nolan’s death?” Amy asked.

  “No. Unfortunately not. I was in the ER at the time. We had a walk-in stab wound.”

  “Stab wound!” Amy yelped, then cleared her throat. “That’s not something I hear a lot. Sorry.”

  “That’s all right,” Jenny said. “It’s not something we used to get a lot of around here. That’s changed lately, though. Stab wounds are a regular Sunday night event around here.”

  “And surveillance footage will confirm your whereabouts?” Heather asked.

  “That’s correct.” The doctor brushed back the sleeve of her white coat and checked her watch. “Is there anything else? I’m sorry, I have to head out and do my rounds, soon.”

  “That’s all, Dr. Ford. Thank you for your time.” Heather clicked off her screen, burning with more questions than she’d had a half hour before. Luckily, she’d grown accustomed to this part of an investigation.

  In the beginning, questions always led to questions instead of answers.

  Chapter 6

  “You could’ve stayed at Donut Delights,” Heather said.

  Amy shook her head, wordlessly, and raised her fist to rap on the front door of the Nolan’s home. She’d been quiet on the walk over, partly because Heather hadn’t let her have a donut before they’d set out and partly because she too didn’t like the idea of interviewing grieving folks in their home.

  What could they do, though? The crime had to be solved and the Nolan’s were, currently, their only lead. Ryan and Hoskins had scoured the surveillance recordings and come up with nothing.

  The killer had successfully used the bli
nd spots and disappeared into a room. They’d taken to trawling through hours of footage in search of any woman exiting a room at any given time.

  After all, it’d happened on the second floor. The killer couldn’t have disappeared.

  Amy knocked again.

  The door swung inward on well-oiled hinges and a blond woman met them. Pammy. This had to be Pammy. Her hair had been pulled back into an unforgiving bun, tight enough to tug at her forehead.

  “Mrs. Nolan?” Heather didn’t offer her hand, only because Fred’s mother looked ready to crack.

  “What do you want?” She asked, squeaky as a mouse.

  “We’re working with the Hillside Police Department,” Heather said. “We’ve come to ask you a few questions about your son.”

  Pammy Nolan stared out at them. She didn’t speak.

  Amy opened her mouth, but the woman walked off before she could get a word out, and disappeared through a doorway down the hall.

  “I guess that means we can come inside,” Heather said. She led her friend down the hall but stalled in front of a massive glass cabinet, packed with trophies.

  “What’s this?” Amy asked.

  A horse and rider topped each golden trophy. “Must be Fred’s awards,” Heather whispered and inched toward the doorway. She didn’t want to hang around in the hall – Mrs. Nolan could come back and fly off the rails.

  “These trophies don’t belong to Fred.” Amy tapped the glass. “They’re engraved with the name Suzanne Nolan.”

  Heather’s interest peeked, but shuffling and low murmurs from the room ahead quashed that, fast. “Come on,” she said. “We’ll make a note of that later.”

  “I guess.” Amy dragged her feet after Heather.

  They entered a large, narrow living room, devoid of a TV but filled with shelf upon shelf of books, of every size.

  The family members, all three of them, sat in a row on the sofa, opposite a two-seater. Mrs. Nolan stared out of the window. Mr. Nolan frowned at his daughter, who had to be Suzanne.

  “Good morning,” Heather said.

  “Nothing good about it,” Mr. Nolan snapped. “Sit down. We’re only doing this because the police told us you’d come. That’s the only reason, hear? Otherwise, you wouldn’t be in my home, right now.”