James Patterson: 10th Anniversary

Her last big story, which was about Hello Kitty, a jewel thief who preyed on the rich and famous, had been a huge and splashy success. The thief had either skipped town or retired, probably due to the work Cindy had done. But that was old news now, and the next big story, the kind that sold newspapers, had yet to appear.

Cindy sat back down as Prem finished his report, and Lisa Greening turned her sharp gray eyes on Cindy.

“Cynthia, what’s coming up for us this week?”

“My ATM mugger story is wrapping up,” Cindy said. “The kid was arraigned and is being held without bond.”

“That was in your column yesterday, Cynthia. What’s up for today?”

“I’m working on a couple of ideas,” she said.

“Speak up if you need assistance.”

“I’m good,” said Cindy. “Not a problem.”

She flashed a smile at Greening, a smile that was both charming and confident, and the editor moved on to the next in line. Cindy couldn’t have reported anything about the next hour.

Only that it was finally over.

CINDY LEFT the editorial meeting in a deep funk. She walked down the hall to her office and before even sitting down called Hai Nguyen, her cop contact in Robbery.

“Anything new on ATM Boy?” she asked.

Nguyen said, “Sorry, Cindy, but we’ve got no comment at this time.”

Cindy believed that Nguyen would help her if he could, but that woulda-coulda sentiment was of no help to her. While the cops and robber worked out their deal, Cindy still had eight column inches to fill by four o’clock today.

How was she going to do that?

She had just hung her coat on the hanger behind her office door when her desk phone rang.

The caller ID read “Metro Hospital ER.”

She grabbed the receiver and said, “Crime desk. Thomas.”

“Cindy, it’s me, Joyce.”

Joyce Miller was an ER nurse, smart, compassionate, and companionable. She and Cindy had once lived in the same apartment building and had bonded over single-girl nights, drinking cheap Bordeaux and watching movies on Sundance.

“Joyce. What’s wrong?”

“My cousin Laura, she’s acting weird. Like she’s just visited an alternate universe. You met her at my birthday. She works for a law firm. She loved you. Listen, I talked her into coming into the ER by saying I’d get her some sleep meds, but she won’t let a doctor touch her and she won’t call the police.”

“What do you mean, she’s ‘acting weird’?”

“She must’ve been drugged. And I think something happened to her while she was out. For eight hours . Woke up in the shrubbery near her front door. That’s what I mean by acting weird. I love this girl, Cindy. Will you come here while I’ve got her? I think together we can get her to talk.”

“Right now?” Cindy asked. She looked at her Swatch. Only six hours until her drop-dead deadline at four o’clock. Eight empty column inches that she’d told Lisa Greening she could fill. It was a crevasse of empty space.

“She’s like a sister to me, Cindy,” Joyce said, her voice breaking with emotion.

Cindy sighed.

She forwarded her calls to the front desk and left the building. She took BART to 24th, walked four blocks to Metropolitan Hospital at Valencia and 26th, and met Joyce just outside the ambulance bay. The friends hugged, and then Joyce led Cindy into the crush and swarm of the ER.

LAURA RIZZO sat at the edge of a hospital bed in the ER. She was about Cindy’s age, around thirty-five, raven-haired with an athletic build, and she was wearing jeans and a dark blue Boston U sweatshirt. Her movements were jerky and her eyes were open so wide, you could see a margin of white completely surrounding her irises. She looked like she’d been plugged into an electric outlet.

“Laura,” Joyce said. “You remember Cindy Thomas?”

“Yeah.… Hi. Why — why are you here?”

Joyce said, “Cindy is smart about things like this. I want you to tell her what happened to you.”

“Look. It’s nice of you to come, I guess, but what is this, Joyce? I didn’t tell you so that you’d bring in reinforcements. I’m fine . I just need something for sleep .”

“Listen, Laura. Get real, would you, please? You called me because you’re freaked out, and you should be freaked out. Something happened to you. Something bad .”

Laura glared at Joyce, then turned and said to Cindy, “I have to say, my mind’s a blank. I was coming home from work last night. I remember thinking about getting pizza for dinner and a bottle of wine. I woke up lying in the hydrangeas outside my apartment building at around 2 a.m. No pizza. No wine. And I don’t know how I got there.”

“Good lord,” Joyce said, shaking her head. “So you just got up and went inside?”

“What else could I do? My bag was right there. Everything was in it, so I hadn’t been robbed. I went upstairs and took a shower. I noticed then that I felt sore —”

“Sore where? Like you’d been in a fight?” Cindy asked.

“Here,” Laura said, pointing to the crotch of her jeans.

“You were assaulted?”

“Yeah. Like that. And as I’m standing there in the shower, I have like this vague memory of a man’s voice. Something about winning a lot of money, but I sure don’t feel like I won anything.”

“Did you go somewhere after work? A bar or a party?”

“I’m not a party girl, Cindy. I’m like a nun. I was going home. Somehow, I–I don’t know,” Laura said. “Joyce, even if I let a doctor examine me, I don’t want to tell the cops. “I know cops. My uncle was a cop. If I tell them that I don’t know anything about what happened to me, they’re going to think I’m a wacko.”

PHIL HOFFMAN PACED in front of the reception desk at the seventh-floor jail in the Hall of Justice. He was waiting for his client Dr. Candace Martin, who was changing out of her prison uniform in preparation for her first day of trial.

Candace was holding up well.

She was determined. She was focused. And while she was uncomfortable in her present circumstances, she had borne up well under the confinement — the close contact with the other inmates, the rules — because that was what it took to get to this day.

Now it was up to him.

If Phil won an acquittal, Candace would go back to her job as head of cardiac surgery at Mercy Hospital. The stain on her name would be eradicated. She would be able to pick up the parenting of her two children, who were, even now, waiting for them outside the courtroom.

Phil had talked to both of the kids, and in his judgment they could handle the pressure. But he did expect a challenge from opposing counsel.

Phil had gone up against Yuki Castellano before, and he quite liked her. She was feisty and she was smart, but Hoffman knew her greatest weakness, too. Yuki bulled ahead, wielding her passion while skipping over potholes and ignoring warning signs that the bridge ahead was out.

Without being cocky about it, he liked his odds of winning better than hers.

Phil stopped pacing. There was a clanking of barred doors, then the echo of footsteps, and Candace came through the door in a tailored suit and handcuffs.

“Hey, Phil,” Candace said.

Phil came toward her, touched her shoulder, and said, “How are you doing? Okay?”

“Way better than okay, Phil. I’ve been waiting for this day for a lifetime. A year, anyway.”

The guard removed her handcuffs and said, “Good luck, Dr. Martin.”

Candace rubbed her wrists. “Thanks, Dede. See you later.”

Phil held the elevator door for Candace and smiled at her as they descended to the third floor.