The reservation would have to wait.
A painted sign on a skinny post outside the clinic showed a red cross and the words 'Grey Rock Medial Clinic #4.' A couple of cars and trucks were parked on the paved lot outside the tiny concrete-block building, a cube painted a kind of sunset rose that made Nick think of diluted blood. Right in front, not in a parking spot but cutting across the entry path, was the white pickup with tribal police markings that Rico Aguirre had sent over.
He was glad to see the vehicle, though, glad that the cop inside had followed orders and come there to guard Torres.
It looked as if the officer was sitting inside the truck, behind the wheel. Nick walked over to check in, to let the cop know he was there before going inside to see how Torres was doing. He crossed the parking lot, hand raised to shield his eyes from the afternoon sun glinting off the truck's windshield.
But when he reached the truck, its driver's-side window was open, and the driver hadn't budged. He was leaning to his right, his head tilted forward, his straw cowboy hat shading his face. Taking a nap, it appeared. 'Hey,' Nick said, putting some extra volume into it. 'Everything okay here?'
The cop didn't respond. Nick went closer, and the smell hit him like a clenched fist.
Nick halted and made a quick scan. Whoever had done the cop didn't seem to be present anymore.
Or, more likely, he had gone inside.
Nick drew a weapon and took a few steps nearer the truck. The guy had been shot through the open window and slumped away from it, but his seat-belt held him in place. The shot had come from a slightly up angle, catching the cop just below his left eye. He had probably been talking to his assailant through the open window when the person outside raised a small-caliber weapon and shot him. The bullet exited out the back of the cop's skull – the truck's passenger side was painted with blood, hair, and brain matter.
Did he know the shooter? Why was he wearing his seatbelt? Had he been somewhere else and just returned to the clinic? Or was he about to leave?
Another crime, another crime scene. Nick would have to call it into the tribal police headquarters and hope that they had the staffing available to handle one more scene in a day full of them. Or, once again, he would have to work it himself.
Not right away, though. First he had to get into that clinic and make sure that whoever had shot the police officer wasn't doing the same to Meoqui Torres and his friends.
He hurried to the door, which was around the side of the building, under another painted red cross. A concrete ramp led up to it, with an aluminum handrail, and there was a large, square button that a person in a wheelchair could push to open the glass-and-steel door. Nick peered through the glass, seeing a cozy, empty waiting area and a reception counter. The reception area was separated from the waiting area by windows, which would slide open for the person on duty to talk to patients and close for privacy. Behind the counter were racks full of medical file folders. Either it was a quiet day at the clinic, or everyone inside had been chased out.
Pulling the door open, Nick went inside, moving the barrel of his weapon from left to right, covering the space. He couldn't see anybody or hear anything inside. Rather than call out, he covered the tile floor to the reception counter in a few quick steps.
On the floor behind the counter, a young Native American woman in forest-green scrubs lay in a pool of her own blood. The pool was streaked, and now Nick noticed that it had actually begun beyond the edge of the counter. She had fallen past it, then been dragged back behind it to keep her body hidden from the doorway.
Whoever was inside the clinic was racking up a body count.
A heavy wooden door separated the waiting area from the examination rooms. Nick moved to it silently, pressing his ear to it. Hearing nothing, he pushed it open a fraction of an inch, just enough to put his eye to it and look through.
Two crumpled bodies littered the hallway floor. He recognized them as two of the three men who had brought Torres there in the first place.
So the big question facing him now was, where was the third man?
Inside Torres's room?
And if so, was his purpose protection? Or something else?
23
En route to the hospital, paramedics had hooked Daria up to an IV, putting some needed fluids and salts back into her body. Once they had arrived, she was taken swiftly from Greg's sight, off the roofop helipad and into an elevator. Greg waited for more than an hour before a nurse told him Daria wanted to see him, and showed him into her room.
She was sitting up in the bed, still wan but looking better than she had in the desert. 'You're the one who found me?' she asked.
'That's right. Are you feeling better, Daria?'
'They tell me I will be.'
'Good. I'm Greg Sanders, with the Las Vegas Crime Lab. When I found you out there, you were severely dehydrated.'
She managed something resembling a smile. She was pretty, or she would have been under better circumstances. Her full lips were dried out and cracked, her eyes bloodshot, her hair a wild tangle, but Greg could see the fine facial structure, high cheekbones and firm jaw, and a narrow, strong nose. She looked like a woman who should be taken seriously.
'I… I should be dead,' she said. 'Thank you for what you did for me.'
'I'm just glad I got there in time.'
'I… I've been so sick.'
'You weren't sick,' he said. 'How much did the doctor tell you?'
'Just that I would be okay, after some treatment. That I was stabilized. Then I said I wanted to see you. I remember you… from the helicopter. I woke up once, and saw you sitting beside me.' Her face seemed to cloud over. 'What do you mean, I wasn't sick?'
'You were being poisoned. Once we stop that, the doctors can get you back on your feet.'
'P-poisoned? Really? By who?'
'We don't know yet,' Greg said. 'Anyway, you shouldn't try to talk. Save your strength.'
'I
Greg knew he should stop her there and tell her about what had happened to Troy. But she was in perilous shape and he didn't want to make her any worse. He decided to save the bad news, to let her talk as long as she didn't tax herself too much, and to break it to her when she was better able to receive it. 'We will,' he said. 'You just take it easy.'
'Look, I don't know what's going to happen to me. I mean, I know what you said, and the doctor. But if I don't make it -'
'You will, Daria.'
'But if I don't… just let me tell you what I found out.'
Greg didn't want her to tax herself, but he was afraid that arguing with her would upset her more than simply letting her tell her story.
'Sick or poisoned or whatever… I was sure I was dying. I quit my job, stopped going out much, calling friends, all that. Just… withdrawing. I've been spending my time in the past… looking through old family videos, photo albums. Trying to remember my dad and brother, because I was sure I would be joining them soon. It's just been me and Mom for so long, a family of women, but there was a time that our family included men, too, and it was so
