Jeffrey Bailey hung up the phone and immediately dialed a number. He quickly told the man on the other end of the phone about the call he’d just received from River Ryland.
“It’s time to put a stop to these two,” he said.
“And just how do you propose I do that?” Jeffrey retorted.
“The answer is to get rid of your so-called daughter. The doctor gives her a shot, and she goes to sleep. Poof. Our troubles are over.”
“No,” Jeffrey said, his heart racing. “I told you that I won’t let that happen. I mean it. I’ll go to the police myself if you hurt April. You’re going to have to handle these detectives yourself.”
Jeffrey disconnected his phone, his hands shaking so hard, he almost dropped it. Then he called the hospital and asked for Dr. Marnet.
“I’m sorry, sir, but he’s seeing patients right now. Can I take a message?”
“I want to talk to him immediately. It’s an emergency. You tell him it’s Jeffrey Bailey, and if he knows what’s good for him, he’ll get to the phone right this minute.”
There was silence on the other end for several seconds, and then a click as he was put on hold. A couple of minutes later, Alexander’s voice came over the phone. He was clearly angry.
“I won’t allow you to order my staff around,” he said, his words like small bursts of staccato explosions. “The last thing I need is for them to be any more suspicious. Since we brought your daughter back to the hospital, I’m getting some very strange looks.”
“I don’t care about that. Your job is to keep April sedated. What did you tell them about that nurse?”
A heavy sigh came over the line. “I told them that Audrey removed April from the hospital against my advice and she was fired. That she told me she was going back home to Georgia and that she didn’t want to talk to anyone. A couple of the other nurses were her friends. I’m not sure they bought it.”
“You better make sure they do. I’d like to know why she smuggled April out of there in the first place. Can you explain that to me?”
There was a long pause. Finally, Alexander said, “I believe she heard me talking on the phone to you the other day. When I told you I couldn’t keep this up indefinitely. That we needed to find a more permanent solution. I think she thought I meant we wanted her dead—which isn’t what I was saying at all. I didn’t realize Audrey was in the hall outside my door. I believe that, in her mind, what she did was an act of compassion.”
“You’d better be careful before something else happens. I warned you about that.”
“Look,” Alexander said, “you haven’t made a payment in over a month. I’m only doing this because I was desperate for money. If you don’t pay up . . .”
“You’ll what? You’ll tell the police that you’ve been drugging my daughter for months? And that because of you, your nurse is dead?” Jeffrey laughed. “Sorry. You’ve gotten yourself in way too deep. There’s nothing you can do except to keep your mouth shut and do what you’re told. And you’d better find a way to keep your staff in line before something else happens.”
“Why did you call? Just to hurl more threats at me? Sometimes I think you forget who I am.”
“Who you are? A doctor at a second-rate hospital who needed a place to hide out because he made so many mistakes. Don’t be ridiculous. You need me and my money. You do exactly what I tell you to do, or you’re going down.” Jeffrey took a deep, shaky breath, trying to calm his nerves. “Look, the other person involved in this thinks the easiest thing would be for April to die. I won’t allow it. If anything happens to her, you’re done. I mean it.”
“I don’t get it,” the doctor said. “You can’t possibly love this girl. If you did you wouldn’t keep her here—so drugged up she doesn’t know where she is or even who she is.”
“Shut up!” Jeffrey said loudly. “How I treat my daughter isn’t your business. You just concentrate on your job. If this goes south, you’ll end up spending the rest of your life in prison. I’m pretty sure your beautiful wife and those three children of yours won’t want anything to do with you when they find out the truth. You chose to drink and harm your patients. You gambled away your money. You got yourself into a hole so deep your only hope was to make a deal with me.”
“I didn’t realize it was a deal with the devil,” the doctor mumbled.
His comment shocked Jeffrey. Was he right? Had he become the devil? “You just remember what I said.” He hung up and stared at his phone. You can’t possibly love this girl.
A memory of a little girl’s arms around his neck popped unbidden into his mind. Dancing lessons with her small feet on top of his. I love you, Daddy. You’re the best daddy in the whole world. In the beginning, he’d only put up with April because of her mother. She was rich and he wasn’t—until they were married. But as time went on, he began to care for his stepdaughter. He even adopted her so that she’d have his last name. When Katherine died, April clung to him. It changed him on the inside. He wasn’t sure he loved her more than he cared about her money, but he couldn’t get rid of the memories. As she got older, April began to pull away. Began to look at him with suspicion. The police hadn’t been able to prove that he’d killed Katherine, but it was clear that April had doubts. Still, he couldn’t let her die. Maybe his heart was hard, but there was one soft spot—and it belonged to April. If he hadn’t taken so much money from her trust fund, he might have tried to be a different man. Might have tried to become the kind of father that April wanted. But it was too late for that. He knew that keeping April alive in the hospital couldn’t last forever. But he wasn’t ready to let her go. At least not yet.
TONY PICKED WATSON UP and put him on River’s bed. Then he covered himself with the folded blanket at the foot of the bed while Watson turned around several times and lay down. Tony stroked his soft fur for a bit before he put his head on the pillow and stared up at the ceiling. The fire had upset him more than he’d let on to anyone. His home was gone. He couldn’t even allow his mind to take an inventory of the possessions he’d lost. He was grateful that he and Watson were okay, but ignoring the losses he’d suffered was impossible. Photos with his family, awards from the academy, the Bible his parents had given him when he graduated from high school.
“Stop it,” he said quietly. “They’re just things. None of them are worth Watson’s life—or mine.” Still, there was a deep hurt inside him, one that he would have to deal with at some point. He turned his head when he heard someone knock softly on the door.
“Come in.”
The door opened, and River stepped into the room. “I wanted to check on you before you go to sleep. I heard you coughing.”
Tony had been coughing on and off since last night but really hadn’t been paying much attention.
“Sorry. The EMT said it might last for a while. I think it’s getting better.”
“You mentioned at lunch that you had a headache. I brought some aspirin.”
Tony sat up. “Thanks. Another symptom of smoke inhalation, I guess.”
“Maybe you should have gone to the hospital,” River said. “Had them check you out.”
He shook his head. “Not necessary. Really. I’m fine.”
She handed him the aspirin and a water bottle. He quickly swallowed the pills and put the bottle down on the table next to the bed.
“So, are you nervous about tonight?” Tony asked.
River sighed. “To be honest, with everything going on, I haven’t had a lot of time to think about it.”
“Yeah, that was my plan. The fire was just my attempt to keep you occupied so you wouldn’t have time to worry about your dad coming.”
“Wow,” River said. “That’s a lot of dedication. Starting a fire in your apartment complex just to make the confrontation with my dad easier. You really went above and beyond.”
Tony nodded. “Yeah, I thought you’d be impressed.” He felt something on his leg and looked down to see Watson moving up closer to him. Tony moved his hand and patted Watson’s head.
