Blind Spot. Nancy Bush
He grabbed onto his chair and started rocking. “No!”
“It’s up to you. TV time. Or back to your room.”
“She wants the TV. She does. She said so.”
Darlene motioned to Greg, and Gibby knew he was going to be hauled away from his new friend. He gazed at his blond friend wildly. She gazed back at him. Her eyes were blue, blue, blue.
“Go ahead,” she said. “I’ll be right here waiting for you.”
“I’ll be back! I’ll be back!” Greg and one of the other big guys who yanked Gibby around whenever he got upset walked toward him, but Gibby shot out of his chair. “Okay. I’ll go. Okay. I’ll go.”
Darlene folded her arms and gazed at him in that mean way. Gibby shuffled off toward his room but glanced back just before he turned the corner. The blond woman’s eyes were sending out blue laser beams. She was saying something, wasn’t she?
“I’ll miss you,” Gibby yelled at her. “You’re my friend!”
She didn’t respond, but then Darlene got in the way and he couldn’t see the laser beams any longer. Darlene was looking down at her hard, like she thought she was lying or something. She always thought Gibby was lying to her but he never was.
Help me…. Tasha thought again, but the words floated away slowly. She could see the words. They were black. Right in the air in front of her. But they were leaving, and after a while she couldn’t see them anymore. Couldn’t remember what they’d said. She wanted to reach out a hand and grab them, but her hands were tied with leather thongs.
Time passed…it grew darker. They moved her to her room, fed her, left her alone.
But they always kept her tied. She had to get away. She had to escape.
When? How?
They were coming. She could hear the death knell of their footsteps.
Coming for her.
Coming for her.
She tried to scream. The scream was in her throat but it was caught there. As caught as she was by them. She heard their steps on the floorboards and smelled the scent of seawater.
The ocean…so near and yet so far.
She had to get away. Get away. Get away….
Somewhere outside her world, a woman’s voice: “Look at her. Get Dr. Norris.”
“You mean Dr. Freeson?” a man’s voice questioned.
“Norris! I don’t give a damn about Freeson!”
“I’ll go.” A younger woman.
“Hurry,” the first woman urged. “I think she’s coming out of it.”
Chapter 3
The coroner’s office was painted green and smelled of antiseptic with a faint underlying metallic scent that Lang recognized as blood. An autopsy was taking place in an adjoining room, and as Lang watched, the door to that room opened and the medical examiner stepped through in bloodstained scrubs. Seeing Lang, he brushed by and growled, “Who are you? You’re in the wrong place.”
“I came to see the body that was found at the rest stop.”
He was tall and stooped and had a tendency to glare. He glared at Lang, who returned his gaze blandly. “On whose authority?”
“Sheriff Nunce,” Lang lied. He hadn’t heard back from Nunce yet. The man was on vacation and Lang, surprising even himself, had been bitten by the need to do something and had moved forward as if he were the homicide detective assigned to the case.
“Nunce didn’t call me.”
Lang shrugged. “Yeah, well. I’m Detective Langdon Stone. Portland P.D. We’re helping County on this one.”
“Winslow County,” the man said suspiciously. “Not Multnomah.”
“They’re short on manpower,” Lang went on, freewheeling. “Call Nunce and check it out.”
“I don’t have time to entertain you or the sheriff.” He pushed through another door, Lang right on his heels.
“Show me the body and I’ll leave you alone.”
“When Nunce calls me, then we’ll talk.”
“You want it that way? Sure, I’ll just sit down over here.” Lang grabbed a rolling stool with a Naugahyde top and plopped down on it. He glanced at a tray of utensils sitting on the counter and reached a hand in to pull up a scalpel.
“Pain in the ass,” the doctor snarled, then threw up one hand in a gesture for Lang to follow. Lang jumped up and strode to catch up with the man, who turned right and pushed through swinging doors into another green room, this one with a bank of stainless steel drawers, the kind that held bodies. Lang unconsciously held his breath against the odor of death, though there was none. He’d seen his share of dead bodies but it always gave him a moment’s pause; his own particular need for solemnity and the passing of a human spirit.
The drawer ran back with a loud rattle, evidence of his guide’s impatience. Inside was a young man with dark hair, olive skin, and a body slashed and stabbed with knife wounds. An autopsy had been performed to determine cause of death, and the Y of the incision stood out against his sallow pallor.
“Stab wound to the heart did it,” the doctor told him dispassionately. “Not the first wound, but it was the C.O.D.”
Cause of death.
“Anything else?” Lang asked.
“No defensive wounds.”
Lang glanced again at the corpse. A young man. Muscular. He leaned down and looked at his palms. Nothing.
“He was either unconscious or he didn’t want to fight back. He’s got a contusion near his temple. Maybe that incapacitated him and then whoever had the knife just started slashing.”
“Age?”
“Around twenty.”
“And no one’s come forward with any information?”
“Missing persons isn’t looking for this guy. Not a word. He’s off the grid, or no one cares.”
He thought about that as the doctor waited with studied patience. “Got a picture?” Lang asked.
“You’re such good friends with Nunce, get it from him.” He stomped off and Lang was alone. He stared down at the man’s face a long time, memorizing it. Angular cheeks. Black hair, longish.
Young.
Carefully, sensing the quiet of the room, the sharp scents, the feeling of a deep, impersonal institution—exactly what it was—Lang closed the drawer. Even with his effort of quiet, it seemed to clang and reverberate, a harsh metallic sound that spoke of the finality of death.
“Dr. Norris! Jane Doe. Cat…she might be coming to.”
Claire glanced at Alison, then at her office clock. It was almost five. “What’s happening?”
“She’s tense. Gripping her chair. Gibby says she’s talking.”
Claire and the aide shared a look. “I’ll be right there,” she said and Alison nodded and hurried away. It was early, but she might be able to leave after she checked on Cat. There was no pressing reason to stay late, and she’d already spent far too many hours on the job.
Grabbing her coat and tossing her purse strap over her shoulder, she walked briskly down the hall toward the skyway that led to the main hospital and the gallery above the morning room. Descending the steps, she could smell the scents of cooked carrots and potatoes and chicken. The kitchen was preparing the evening