Glenda shook her head. “I should be the one to tell her.” She reached for her cell.
“Probably best to use a land line here,” I said. “There’s a pay phone over there by the door.”
Zack and I watched Glenda walk to the pay phone, then steel herself to call her mother. I didn’t need to hear Beverly’s side of the conversation to know that Glenda was getting a tongue-lashing. When she came back, Glenda was pale. “My mother says it’s all my fault.”
Zack and I both started to offer reassurance. Glenda waved us off. “Don’t worry about it,” she said wearily. “My mother has been blaming me for everything since I told her I was a girl.”
The physician who approached us was a tall, no-nonsense woman whose hospital badge identified her as Roses Stewart. Certain that the name must be Rose, I checked again, but that whimsical final s was no mistake. There was a romantic in Dr. Stewart’s past.
“Are you Sam Parker’s family?” she asked.
“I’m his daughter,” Glenda said.
“It might be best if we sat down,” the doctor said.
Television has taught us all to read the signals of tragedy. Glenda closed her eyes, shutting out the messenger. “He’s dead,” she said quietly.
The sorrow on the doctor’s face was real. “I’m sorry,” she said. “We did everything that could have been done. It was simply too late.”
Glenda nodded numbly. “Can I see him?”
“Of course,” the doctor said. “But why not wait till we get some of the tubes and wires out of the way.”
“No,” Glenda said, tilting her chin. “I want to see him now.”
“All right,” Dr. Stewart said. “Come with me.”
After they disappeared down the corridor, Zack uttered an expletive.
I rubbed the back of his neck. “You should call Beverly,” I said. “It would be cruel to let her show up here thinking there’s still hope.”
“You’re right,” Zack said. “Although I wish you weren’t.” He wheeled towards the nursing station. As he talked to Beverly, I could see him fighting anger. When he came back, he was coldly furious. “Grief has not softened Beverly’s heart,” he said. “She’ll be here in an hour, and she wants me to make certain that Glenda is nowhere around. To quote the lady, ‘I don’t want Sam’s death to turn into a freak show.’ ”
“What did you say?”
“My first impulse was to tell the widow to go fuck herself, but then I thought about Sam. His family life was complicated, but he loved his wife and he loved his daughter. Anyway, I told Beverly I’d get Glenda out of the way.”
“Glenda won’t object,” I said. “When she comes back, she and I can get a cab and go back to my place.”
Having deferred the meeting of the Parker women, Zack and I sat back to wait … and wait. When Zack checked his watch and realized Glenda had been gone half an hour, he narrowed his eyes. “Maybe somebody should get her out of there,” he said. “This is getting a little weird.”
As if she’d read his mind, Dr. Roses Stewart strode through the doors from Intensive Care. She seemed surprised to see us in the waiting room. “Glenda left twenty minutes ago,” she said. “She only stayed with her father for a few minutes. I apologize. Someone should have told you.”
“It’s a crazy day,” Zack said simply. “But I could use your help. There will be media people downstairs wanting answers. Is there someone who can give them the facts and get them the hell out of here? Mrs. Parker is coming to the hospital straight from the airport. She shouldn’t have to deal with the press.”
“I’ll talk to them,” Dr. Stewart said. The three of us were silent as we took the elevator to the main floor. But as the door opened, Dr. Stewart turned towards us.
“I’d just heard the verdict when they brought Mr. Parker in,” she said. “All the time I was working on him, I kept thinking how relieved he must have been to know he was a free man.”
The press had been shepherded into a boardroom on the main floor. Dr. Stewart’s announcement was brief. She gave the time and cause of death, and said there was no point asking questions because she had no answers. Then she walked out of the room. The press spotted Zack and when they redirected their energies to him, he followed the doctor’s lead and told everyone he had nothing to say, so they might as well go home. There was grumbling, but with no reason to stay, people left. When the boardroom had emptied, Zack rubbed his forehead. “Jesus, Jo. I’m going through the motions, but I really can’t believe any of this.”
I could see the sorrow gathering. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s blow this pop stand. There’s a Robin’s Donuts down the hall. We can have a cup of coffee and be back in the waiting room at Intensive Care by the time Beverly arrives.”
The hospital’s Robin’s was called The Heartbeat Cafe – a questionable choice for a place that pushed caffeine, sugar, carbs, and grease, but in every other way it was identical to its sister stores in the franchise: metal tables and chairs, perky servers in brown and orange uniforms. Zack peered gloomily at the displays that featured every conceivable permutation and combination of fried dough and glaze, then turned to me. “Why don’t they serve martinis here?”
“No initiative,” I said.
“They’re missing a bet. Life’s lousiest moments call for something more than coffee, and right now you and I are three for three: Sam’s dead, Glenda has vamoosed, and Beverly’s on her way.”
I picked up our coffee and followed Zack to a table.
“Do you want me to stay when Beverly comes?”
Zack sipped his coffee. “No. You’d probably feel compelled to kill her, and I don’t think I can handle any more
