revelation to Doyle. His view has always been that this marriage contract was a trade of Nadine’s dizzying curves for the lieutenant’s new-found wealth. Body for bucks — an age-old barter. But right now he has too many worries of his own to go diving into that murky pool.
‘You heard about Tony Alvarez though, right?’
She nods. ‘It was on the news. An explosion of some kind. They’re saying it may not have been an accident. That it may have been deliberate, and that there might even be a cop killer on the loose. Are they right, Cal? Is that why you’re in danger?’
‘Yeah, but not in the way you’re thinking. After Joe was killed, Tony took over as my partner. They both died because of me. Somebody’s trying to hurt me through the people I’m close to.’
‘How do you know that?’
He tells her about the two notes he received, and he can see the shock, the disbelief on her face. Which is fair enough, since he’s finding it difficult to accept this himself.
‘So that’s why I think you should go home, Nadine. If this guy’s willing to kill my partners and knock my wife about, then harming you is something he probably won’t think twice about. I don’t want the responsibility of that.’
He watches her as she mulls over his words. When she nods her head he thinks at first that she’s conceding, but her expression tells him she’s merely signaling the end of an internal argument.
‘I have to see that Rachel’s okay. She’d do the same for me.’ If he were not so strung out, Doyle would smile. The belle has balls.
After Nadine has taken a right onto the service road that runs alongside the FDR Drive, she voices another of Doyle’s fears. ‘Cal, did the hospital say anything about Amy?’ Doyle shakes his head. ‘No. They don’t know where she is.’ He stares at the tall gray-brown building looming up ahead of them and wonders what he will find there. He wants to walk in and see Rachel sitting up in bed. A few cuts and bruises, but nothing a little extra make-up won’t mask. She’ll be sipping the insipid brown stuff that hospitals dare to call tea, and telling him how she left Amy playing at a friend’s apartment. She will tell him that she’ll be able to go home soon, and that she needs to be a bit more aware of her surroundings in future, so as not to get caught like that again. She will tell him that she was furious at him for not calling, but only because she loves him so intensely. She will tell him how much Amy loves him too, and that his little girl can’t wait to show him the picture of a dragon she drew today. And everything will be okay again.
On the way to the emergency room, Doyle steps around a man on crutches, dodges a drunk with blood streaming down his face, and keeps on marching until he reaches the reception counter. Behind the counter two nurses are laughing and joking. One of them manages to slot the words ‘donut’ and ‘anus’ into the same sentence, and the other — a redhead — laughs even harder. The redhead’s hair is an alluring auburn rather than shocking ginger, and is formed into soft curls. She has pale skin and a laugh that hints of mischief and adventure in the bedroom. She reminds Doyle of a girl he once knew in Ireland — an older girl who gave the impression of knowing all the secrets of post-pubescence — and so it is
His first thought is that things can’t be all that bad. Nurse Lynley, the woman he spoke to on the phone, is too filled with joy. She has had a good day. Nobody assaulting or abusing her. No costly mistakes. Nobody in her care dying.
‘Hi,’ he says. ‘My name’s Doyle. I spoke with you on the phone.’
And then it is as if a rain cloud has moved across her head, darkening her features. The sudden sobriety shocks Doyle into the realization that, like him, she is a professional who is used to dealing with death and injury on a daily basis, and that, like him, she has to make sure it doesn’t warp her view of life. It’s why cops tell jokes at murder scenes. It’s why nurses tell jokes about the anatomical applications of confectionary. It says nothing about your satisfaction with the day you’re having.
It’s a mirror that Doyle finds unsettling to face.
When the nurse comes around the desk and takes him by the arm and leads him off to a small side room, he is only vaguely aware of Nadine trailing behind. In the room itself he sees a small table and plastic chairs, a coffee machine, a sink with two unwashed mugs. Nurse Lynley is talking to him, but he feels like he’s bobbing up and down in a choppy sea, catching brief snatches of conversation each time he comes up. The isolated fragments make little sense to him. He stares into the sink. The faucet is dripping into one of the mugs:
The cry from Nadine breaks the spell. His brain wakens again, and he sees the nurse searching his face. Jesus, she is so like that girl back in Ireland. A real tease she was. Proud of her body and keen to impart its mysteries to all of us grubby boys. What was her name again? Helen something. .
‘Mr Doyle? Do you understand what I’m saying to you?’ He blinks, tries to clear his fogged head. ‘Yes. No.’
So she tells him again, and this time his brain drops its shield and allows the painful arrow of truth to penetrate.
Rachel, his beautiful Rachel, has died of her injuries.
ELEVEN
No.
This can’t be right.
He must be getting confused. Thinking about the time Amy was being born. Rachel lying on a hospital bed, pressing a mask to her face between the screams. The midwife issuing her instructions — when to push, when not to. The blood, so much blood. And then the sudden change in the atmosphere in that room. The
And so he waited. Through all the talk of placental abruptions and blood loss and transfusions, he waited.
When she came back to him, her tiny gift of life cradled in her arms, he cried. And she said to him, ‘You don’t get rid of me that easily.’
It became kind of a joke after that. Whenever they argued, and they sulked about it for a while, and they got back together again, she would repeat her mantra.
So, yes. That must be what he’s thinking about. It’s the hospital environment and the stress. They’re taking his memories and twisting them into horribly warped hallucination.
He looks at Nurse Lynley.
‘I want to see her.’
She stares back at him as though in appraisal. As if she is assessing his strength for this.
‘Mr Doyle, I’m not sure it’s a good idea. Your wife. . She won’t look the same to you. Especially after the work the doctors have done on her. It can be a shock to some people.’
‘I want to see her. Where is she?’
The nurse tilts her head as she considers the request. ‘Come with me.’
He follows, passing Nadine who has tears in her eyes and a sheen of wetness on her cheeks. They head down a brightly lit corridor. A scrawny man on a gurney shows them a toothless smile. A black porter whistles ‘If I Were a Rich Man’. Nurse Lynley pauses at a pair of swing doors. Gives Doyle a look that asks,
They enter. The room is empty. Except, of course, for the body on the steel table.
Doyle swallows, and wills himself forward. He has to see, has to be sure.
He sees her hair first of all, shoulder length and dark. Normally glossy, but now matted into thick tendrils. He wonders why he can’t see her face properly. What have the doctors put over her face?
