“She should go and stay with friends or a relative,” Sean said. “There’s only two of us, covering the two of you, twenty-four /seven. We can’t be everywhere at once.”
“So, call in more people,” my father said, his arrogance surfacing again.
Sean just stared. “And who’s going to pay for that?” he demanded in that quiet deadly tone of his. “Charlie and I have stuck with you like bloody glue since this happened, which is costing Parker thousands of dollars in lost revenue. Not to mention the damage your exploits have already done to the business.”
“I might have known it would be the money you cared about,” my father sneered.
“I don’t care about it and wouldn’t have accepted anything, had you offered it,” Sean said coldly. “But that’s just the point. Not once—
“But … Charlotte’s family,” my father said, sounding scandalized.
“Yeah,” Sean said, his face cold, “but—as you’ve always made
The end result of Sean’s parting shot was that my father grudgingly announced he would personally pay Parker’s fees for someone to come and stay with Miranda. It was the lady herself who turned him down flat.
“I have a friend over in Vermont I haven’t seen since college,” she said. “She just had a baby and I’ve been promising I’ll go visit with her for a few days—a week maybe. Help her out with the older boys, let her get some rest.” She gave a watery smile. “Give me something else to think about, too.”
“We’ll get to the bottom of this,” my father said gravely, in the same tone of voice I imagined him assuring a patient they’d diagnose some mystery illness. “I promise.”
Miranda had no idea who’d taken her late husband’s journal, but, whoever they were, they’d been pretty subtle about it. Despite my father’s concerns over her safety, so far there had been no overt threats made towards her. And she had no idea when the robbery might have taken place. She hadn’t noticed anything amiss and claimed it had been weeks since she’d last looked in the desk drawer where it had been kept. She’d looked sad when she’d said it. Too many painful memories there, I guessed.
We’d left her organizing her trip and were headed back up towards Boston when Parker called to inform us of Collingwood’s displeasure.
Now I asked, “And how did he know we
This time, I heard the smile in Parker’s voice at my naivete. “He’s with the government, Charlie,” he said. “They have access to just about anything that’s logged-on to a computer—credit cards, cell phones, flight manifests, carrental companies, hotel registers. You name it.”
“Shit,” I muttered, earning me another clearly audible intake of breath from the rear.
“That’s one way of putting it,” Parker said dryly. “One last thing,” he added. “Collingwood knows that you’re carrying—must have pulled the flight details and picked up that you checked firearms—and he knows you don’t have the permits for Massachusetts. He’s hinted that he could have you both picked up just for that. If things get hairy up there, they’re going to go bad pretty fast. Just remember. And watch your backs, both of you.”
“We will,” I said gravely. “Thanks, Parker.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, matching his tone to mine. “Keep in touch.”
As soon as I’d hit the button to end the call, Sean said brusquely, “It’s obviously not good news. So, what gives?”
Briefly, concisely, I told him Parker’s latest information about Collingwood, aware as I spoke of the solid weight of the SIG at my waist. Already, I’d feel lost without it, especially in light of this morning’s discovery.
“So, what do we do now?” I said when I was done, twisting in my seat so I could take in my parents’ anxious faces. “I’m open to suggestions.”
“We go to the hospital,” my father said slowly. He glanced up, mouth thinning as the decision firmed. “We go and look at Jeremy’s records at the source, so to speak.”
“Don’t you think,” Sean put in, “that whoever took the journal from Miranda’s house will also have covered that angle? And be expecting us?”
“Probably,” my father said, frowning, “but they may well have assumed that the records were secure where they were, and best left alone.”
“Interesting you should use the word
My father gave a tight little smile. “Well,” he murmured, “let’s go and find out, shall we?”
But first he leaned forwards in his seat and directed Sean through the suburbs to one of the numerous small shopping malls, and then to a particular store that seemed to sell brightly colored pajamas, if its window display was anything to go by. It was only when we got inside that I discovered the place sold surgical scrubs.
“If one wants to blend in with a forest,” my father murmured, “it’s best to dress like a tree, don’t you think?”
The question that formed in my head—how my father knew the place was even here—was answered as soon as we walked through the door. The elderly man behind the counter greeted him by name like an old friend, and asked how the bone work was going. He greeted the next customer with the same easy geniality.
We moved deeper into the store and Sean nudged my father’s arm as soon as we were out of earshot. “Is this the only surgical-garb shop in the area?”
“Of course not,” my father said, nonplussed by the question. “But this is the place Jeremy recommended. He used to use it all the time, and they should have everything we need here.”
Sean suppressed an annoyed sigh. “Yeah, including an owner with photographic recall,” he said, “who will no doubt remember us six months after we’ve gone—and be able to describe us very nicely to the police. Did it not occur to you that picking somewhere you’re
“I’m not planning on engaging in any activity that would interest the police,” my father shot back in a savage whisper, trying to hide the pink stain that had risen from his shirt collar. He had, after all, engaged in plenty so far. “Besides, all we’re going to do is look at some records, not burn the place to the ground.”
“Well, just supposing things get a little more
My father looked him up and down with insulting calculation. “Well, I’m sure I can rely on you to start a fire, if need be.”
He stalked along the shelves and quickly outfitted the pair of us in dull hospital garb. It was not, I concluded quickly, designed to flatter. My father was annoyed that Sean wouldn’t carry his selections to the cash register for him.
“If you want to shop, carry it yourself,” Sean said flatly.
There was a very good tactical reason for Sean needing to keep his hands free, but by not explaining it, he just came across as rude and argumentative. I scowled at him behind my father’s back. Sean gave me a bland stare in return.
I had to give my father a swift nudge in the ribs when he would have dragged out his platinum AmEx to pay for the gear. We were already leaving a trail that a bloodhound with a heavy cold could have followed through a nest of skunks. There was no point, I reasoned, as I avoided eye contact with the security camera on the way out, in making things worse.
The hospital where Jeremy Lee had been both a doctor and a patient was set a long way back from the road on a huge sprawling piece of land south of Boston itself.
I still had trouble getting my head round how wasteful America was with its land. Unless you were in the heart of a big city, nobody seemed to bother about redeveloping brownfield sites. They just boarded up the old building and went and broke ground somewhere fresh. Even the smallest business had a car park the size of Sweden.
It seemed to take forever to reach the hospital entrance. We drove in through carefully landscaped grounds that looked more like a golf club than a medical facility, with fiercely posted speed limits. I hoped the ambulances had a faster approach road, or their emergency patients were likely to expire between the main road and the front
