J. Jance - Left for Dead

Carinda had fallen asleep in Ali’s lap. Ali shifted the child to another position, wrestled her cell phone out of her pocket, and speed-dialed High Noon.

It may have been Sunday afternoon, but Ali wasn’t surprised when Stuart Ramey, B. Simpson’s geeky second-in-command, answered the phone. As far as B. was concerned, Stuart was the perfect employee. When it came to computers, Stuart, like B., was a self-taught genius. He loved his work and had no outside interests. B. said he paid the guy a king’s ransom, and he was worth every penny.

“Hey, Ali,” Stuart said. “What’s up?”

“We have a situation. My friend Sister Anselm has a patient here in Tucson at Physicians Medical Center. Somebody delivered some flowers to the patient, and we need to know who it was. I’m sure the guy’s picture is on the hospital’s security tape, but they won’t let us look at it. I was hoping maybe you could-”

“You’re asking if I could I hack into their security system and lift the photo from their video feed?”

“Well, yes,” Ali admitted. “That’s pretty much it.”

“And this is all because someone delivered flowers and didn’t leave their name, address, and phone number?” Stuart asked dubiously. “It’ll probably turn out to be some do-gooder who does this kind of thing all the time and wants to stay anonymous.”

“Someone tried to murder this girl on Friday,” Ali explained. “She should be dead right now. Sister Anselm is worried that the flower delivery guy may be working for the bad guys and is going to take another crack at her. I’m worried, too. If the flower guy turns back up, it would be a big help to know what he looks like. It’s also possible that the flower delivery was a ruse attempting to nail down the girl’s location inside the hospital for someone else. The third alternative is what you said-the guy is totally harmless-but do we want to take that risk?”

Stuart sighed. “All right. No doubt the hospital security system is password-protected, but breaking it will probably be a piece of cake. You want me to send the film directly to Sister Anselm’s phone?”

“No,” Ali said. “Send it to mine.”

“Okay, so when did this questionable flower delivery happen?”

“Right around noon,” Ali said. “The guy should be easy to spot. He was wearing jeans, a baseball cap, and a U of A sweatshirt. He was carrying a pot of Easter lilies with yellow foil wrapped around the pot.”

“Okeydokie,” Stuart said. “I’ll get right on it. Anything else?”

On the drive down, Ali had been thinking about her parents and their plans to sell the Sugarloaf to a party or parties unknown. What if the purported buyers turned out to be some kind of flimflam outfit? Since one of High Noon’s specialties was doing background checks, it didn’t seem completely out of line to ask.

“Now that you mention it, there is one more thing,” Ali said casually. “There are some people I’d like you to check out for me.”

“No problem,” Stuart said. “Who is it?”

Ali had to think a moment before she could dredge up the names. “Derek and Elena Hoffman,” she said at last. “I’m not sure where they live.”

“You mean the people from Milwaukee who are buying the Sugarloaf from your folks?” Stuart asked. “I already did a background check on them for your mother. Since she paid for the initial report, I should probably get permission from her before I copy you on it.”

Chagrined, Ali felt herself blushing. She was surprised to think that it would even occur to her mother to have a background check done on the cafe’s proposed purchasers, but these days there seemed to be any number of things about Edie Larson that set her daughter back on her heels.

“Never mind,” Ali said quickly, trying to cover her embarrassment. “I didn’t know she had already ordered one. I’ll just get a copy from her.”

2:00 P.M., Sunday, April 11

Tucson, Arizona

Breeze Domingo stirred in the bed. She had no idea where she was or how she had come to be there. She seemed to be in a hospital. It looked like a hospital, but the last thing she remembered was being in a house, a big house and … No, she didn’t want to remember that or the man who was there, the one who had burned her and cut her. She could remember that, but she didn’t want to. What she really wanted to know was where Chico was. Why didn’t he come for her? Why had he abandoned her?

In the background, someone was talking-a woman. It was a voice rather than a presence. Breeze could hear the woman speaking, but she couldn’t see her. She seemed to remember having heard the voice before, although she wasn’t sure exactly when or why or who the woman was. Is she someone I know?

For a while-when was that? — the woman had spoken in both English and Spanish. That seemed weird. Why would she do that? Did she think Breeze didn’t understand English? Now she had dropped the Spanish and settled into English, telling a long complicated story.

At first Breeze thought the woman was speaking about someone else. Finally, though, she realized she was talking about Breeze-about what had happened to her; about her being found in the desert; about her being raped and beaten. She tried to stop listening. It hurt too much to think about it. Now the woman was talking about what had happened in the hospital. There were surgeries and something to do with blood poisoning and wiring her jaw shut. Breeze didn’t care about what the doctors had done or would do. It was too complicated. Too much information. All she wanted to do was go back to sleep.

But then the woman said something shocking-her name! Her real name. Not Breeze Domingo but Rose Ventana!

How did the unseen woman know that? How could she possibly?

Now she was talking about Breeze’s family, offering to be in touch with them if that was what Rose wanted, to have them come to the hospital to visit her.

Her family? Her family was so long ago that they might well have lived in another universe. They would be so disappointed in who she was now; in what she had become; in how she had lived all this time. She didn’t want to see them. She was too ashamed. She didn’t want them to know anything at all about her. No. No. No. Especially not her stepfather. Especially not him.

She tried to say the word aloud: NO! But nothing came out of her mouth. So she shook her head instead.

“All right,” the woman said comfortingly. “As you wish. I won’t make any effort to contact them until and unless you say so.”

Breeze wanted to say, Thank you. And who are you? And any number of other things. But that didn’t work, either. With her jaw wired shut, it seemed impossible to speak. She felt the wetness of a single tear rolling down her cheek.

“Rest now,” the woman murmured gently, wiping the tear away. “We’ve talked quite enough.”

3:00 P.M., Sunday, April 11

Tucson, Arizona

Teresa’s cell phone rang at ten past three. “Ms. Reynolds?” a male voice asked when Ali answered.

“Yes.”

“I’m Tomas. Maria’s brother. I drove down to pick her up. We’re almost there. Have you heard anything?”

Ali was grateful that Teresa’s uncle had a cell phone, even if Maria didn’t. “No,” she said. “I’ve heard nothing. I have a friend who might find out for us, but …”

“What about Jose? How’s he doing?”

“He’s stable, as far as I know.”

“I don’t have a handicapped sticker on my Taurus,” Tomas said. “Maria has a tough time walking any distances at all. If I dropped her at the main entrance, do you think you could meet us and take her where she needs to go?”