Chapter Nine

Margo Angelhart

I'd practically grown up in hospitals.

My dad was a VA doctor most of his career, so I'd visited him often, did school reports on different aspects of the hospital and had access to many people in different capacities. My favorite report was in eighth-grade science when I wrote an essay about how X-rays worked. Maybe it fascinated me because I'd already broken three bones before I turned thirteen.

And then there was Nico. My younger brother had some serious health problems as a kid that took years to diagnose as a rare but treatable bone cancer. Tess, Jack, and I took turns keeping him company when he had to go in for tests, some that required overnight stays. I usually volunteered because I have a soft spot for Nico. He's funny and sweet and sarcastic and kind without a mean bone in his body, though sometimes his wit was a bit too sharp and not everyone appreciated his dry sense of humor. To this day, some people never knew when Nico was being sarcastic or serious.

So between dad and Nico, I knew my way around hospitals. What staff did, how they managed floors, routines, rules, and schedules. Getting information about a patient you weren't related to was next to impossible, but visiting a patient—even in the emergency room—was a piece of cake.

At least for me.

The first part was understanding the routine of a particular emergency room. Jennifer White had been taken to Abrazo, only a few miles north on Highway 51. The paramedics would bring her in through the emergency room, and she would bypass anyone waiting in the lobby. They'd hook her up to machines, check her vitals again, draw blood, inspect her for external signs of distress or injuries. This time of day—early Sunday evening—wasn't generally busy. With the increase in urgent care sites all over the valley, emergency rooms mostly saw the seriously injured or those experiencing a major health event like a heart attack.

It would take the triage nurse fifteen to thirty minutes to process Jennifer, and depending on how busy they were, the doctor or PA might overlap. The best time to sneak in was after the initial exam while they awaited test results.

That was the one thing that still bugged me: what had they been poisoned with? Logan Monroe wasn't faking. Though he recovered quicker than White, his eyes had been unfocused and he appeared genuinely confused when he first regained consciousness. Still, I'd been fooled once by a bounty I nabbed before he crossed the border into Mexico. I'd Tasered him, took him down, pleased with myself that I'd found the bastard who'd molested little boys and bolted before his court date. Then he faked a heart attack and it seemed so real that I called for an ambulance and took the cuffs off.

Then he hit me.

I used my Taser on him (again), took him down (again, harder), but still remembered how my jaw had smarted almost as much as my ego.

So yes, Logan Monroe could have been faking. But I didn't think so and I trusted my instincts, bounty mishap notwithstanding.

Angelhart Investigations had been hired to look into Jennifer White for possible corporate espionage. No way would my mother take an adultery case—she considered it beneath them.

Well, Mom, some of us have bills to pay and can't afford to pick and choose.

Jack and Tess worked full-time for Angelhart Investigations; Lulu worked part-time. Nico, like me, had kept his old gig—he worked at the Phoenix PD crime lab. I'd been a private investigator since a year after I parted with the Army—eight years this fall. I was supposed to join Angelhart Investigations. I'd helped my mom plan, organize, set up the office and the business. Then she stabbed me in the back. My own mother.

Dammit, I didn't want to think about all that. Jack and Tess would be here soon enough, and I needed information before they arrived. I'd share because I'd promised Jack, but I wanted the upper hand.

I tossed my backpack over my shoulder. My just-in-case bag with extra supplies like water, energy bars, phone charger, cash, Taser, personal items.

Just in case I broke down by the side of the road in 110 degree heat...

Just in case I couldn't make it home for the night and desperately needed to brush my teeth...

Just in case I needed a prop to bypass hospital dictators...

I entered the emergency room and immediately assessed the situation. Nearly empty. Three people waiting to be seen. A nurse in the triage area taking an elderly man's blood pressure. Another nurse filling out paperwork. The intake clerk sat behind a glass window.

Through double doors were the emergency bays, each separated by privacy curtains. They weren't visible from the lobby. To the right of the bays, a hallway led to additional rooms, the surgery center, offices.

Jennifer White would be in an emergency bay.

The intake clerk was likely the most dictatorial in the room. She made the trains run on time, made sure insurance papers were in order, was the first line of triage. She also knew occupancy, staffing levels, and resource availability. She wouldn't just let me walk in.

But the nurse doing paperwork at her small cubicle? That was the one.

I smiled warmly as I approached her desk. "Hi, I'm Margo. My roommate texted me from an ambulance. She was in some sort of accident—Jennifer White? She asked me to bring her a few things. I rushed over—can I just go back and give this to her?" I held up my backpack.

The nurse smiled kindly. "I just processed Ms. White's paperwork. I think the doctor is with her right now. Let me check for you. Feel free to have a seat."

"Thank you." I sat down in the chair closest to the nurse so I could eavesdrop.

The nurse picked up the phone. "Hi, Don, it's Cindy. I have Jennifer White's roommate here with personal items. Is Dr. Patin still with her?"

Silence for a moment, then, "Okay, thanks."

I pretended to read my phone. Cindy said, "Ma'am? She's having bloodwork done, so it'll be ten, fifteen minutes."

"Thanks so much."

Bloodwork did not take fifteen minutes. They'd bring the phlebotomist to her. Five minutes, tops. I set the time on my phone. When it vibrated, I got up, paced, looked out the window at the parking lot. Sat down in a different chair—one where Cindy couldn't see me, but where I could hear her. As soon as Cindy got a call, I stood, poked my head around the corner, held up my phone. "Hey, Jennifer just texted me—I'm going to walk this back, okay? Oh, sorry," I said, pretending I had no idea she was on the phone.

Cindy waved me toward the bay doors and continued her conversation.

Piece of cake.

Discreetly, I looked into each of the bays to find Jennifer.

The first bay was empty. The second had a mom and a little kid who was crying as a doctor examined an arm that was clearly broken. Ouch. Been there, done that. Third bay was empty, but the bed was rumpled—someone had recently been here. Fourth and last bay had an elderly woman on monitors.

I rechecked the third bay, picked up the chart at the end of the bed.

White, Jennifer.

Maybe she was in the bathroom.

Except that her messenger bag wasn't here.

An orderly walked by pushing a gurney. "Hey, sir," I said, "my friend was brought in by ambulance, and the nurse said she's supposed to be here." I pointed to the bed.

"She may have gone for tests."

"Can you check for me? Please? I'm really worried about her."

"Name?"

"Jennifer White."

"One sec."

It took more than a second. When the orderly came back, he said, "She must have been assigned a room, but it's not in the system yet."

Her chart was still here; if she had been assigned a room, the chart would have gone with her.

She had bolted.

I thanked him, then walked out and spotted Jack and Tess in the lobby talking to the intake clerk. I caught Tess's eye and motioned for them to follow me outside.

"She ran," I said when they exited.

"She was in no condition," Jack said. "I talked to the paramedics, who said she was still pretty out of it when they arrived."

"Maybe then, but now she's gone. Could have exaggerated her symptoms. Logan Monroe was confused and queasy for about five, ten minutes after he came around, then he was talking and walking just fine. She could have milked it to get out of the house, away from us, so she could disappear."

"Why?" Jack asked.

"I should be asking you that," I said. "I thought you wanted a partnership."

"You haven't agreed."

"We already know what you're doing," Tess interjected. "You're trying to prove Monroe is cheating on his wife. Jennifer isn't married, he is. End of story."

I shrugged. "I'll find out what's going on, you know that."

Silence.

"Fine," I said and opened the Jeep door. "Do it your way. I'll do it mine." I got into the driver's seat.

Jack walked over, stopped me from closing the door. "Don't go."

"You want my information, but you don't want to share. I have my own contacts, my own resources, I don't need you."

"Okay, I'll tell you," he said.

Tess didn't argue with him, but she didn't look happy about it.

"Something is going on with Monroe and White. It might not be an affair, and it might not be corporate espionage," Jack said.

"How did you track her to Monroe's house?"

"She had a confirmation of the rental," he said, "but it was under a business name, not her name, sent to her email."

"Monroe owns the house, but it's in the name of one of his LLCs," I said.

"Yeah, I learned that today."

I wanted to ask why they didn't check property ownership before jumping to conclusions, but I didn't. Not my place.

"Money laundering?" Tess offered, then shook her head. "No, that's small potatoes. And how did someone know they would be there and why kill them?"

"No one tried to kill them," I said, my thoughts running in a completely different direction. "Whatever they were dosed with knocked them out, that's it. But I think I have more information than you."

"Right," Tess said. "In an hour, you learned so much."

"Drop the fucking attitude," I snapped. "I've been doing this a hell of a lot longer than you, Tess."

Jack put his hands up, one palm toward Tess, one toward me. "Truce. What do you know?"

I almost walked away, but knew that my anger was about everything that happened three years ago. I didn't know if I'd ever come to peace with it.

Yet, I'd promised Jack, and my word meant something. Besides, I'd been skeptical about the whole affair angle after tracking Monroe for the last ten days and finding zero proof of infidelity.

"Logan Monroe originally founded Desert West Financial with Gavin O'Keefe. Together they'd started several businesses over the years, built them up, sold them off. This time he sold his half to O'Keefe and walked away."

From the look on her face, Tess was in shock. I smiled, added a bit of snark, "Researching your target is good, but researching who you work for? Better." I turned the ignition and was about to close the door but Jack put his hand between the door and the frame of the Jeep.

"Come to the office."

"No."

"Please. We'll share everything, you share everything, and maybe between the three of us we'll figure out what the hell is going on."

I didn't want to. This felt like Jack's way of sucking me into the family business. Every few months, he'd try to sell me on the benefits of Angelhart Investigations. I'd happily drink the free beer and listen and then tell him no, not interested.

But this was a puzzle, and I loved puzzles. Why had Jennifer White disappeared from the hospital? What was she up to? What did Monroe have to do with it?

You were hired to prove whether Logan Monroe was having an affair. He's not. Case closed.

"Tomorrow morning," I said. "If I help you, I'm billing you."

"We don't need your help," Tess said.

"I don't really care. I have plenty of work." Not.

"Tomorrow morning," Jack repeated. "Eight."

I looked at my brother. God, I loved him. He was a true big brother in all the best ways. Sure, he loved to tease us and he could be downright mean when Tess and I hogged the bathroom in high school. But he defended everyone in the family without question. He was the first to help in a crisis. Jack was the most honorable person I knew. Loyal. Honest.

"I'll be there."

As soon as Jack moved his hand, I closed the door and backed out.