M Sellars - The End Of Desire

“How did you get in here anyway?” I asked. “I seem to recall a cop standing outside the door when the doctor left earlier. It looked like he was guarding it or something.”

“I told him I was your wife,” she replied.

“You did what?”

She smiled. “Calm down, I’m only kidding.”

“Okay…I just didn’t figure you for that sort of levity.”

“I have my moments,” she replied. Then, she shrugged and continued, “Actually, it didn’t seem to be a problem. I just asked if I could check on you, and they let me right in. Maybe it was because I already gave a statement and…”

She was interrupted by a quick knock then the door swinging open. A petite, dark-haired woman clad in scrubs came in then shut the barrier behind her.

“Oh, hello,” she said, noticing Velvet. “I’m Doctor Miller… You are?”

“Doctor Rieth,” Velvet replied, shaking her hand.

Doctor Miller canted her head to the side and furrowed her brow.

Before she could say anything else, Velvet offered, “I’m a different kind of doctor.” She nodded in my direction and added, “Actually, I’m only here because I’m a friend of Rowan’s. I was just keeping him company.”

Doctor Miller gave her a quick smile, “I see. Well, I need to go over a few things with Mister Gant, so…”

“Say no more,” she told her before she could finish the spiel. “I need to go get a cup of coffee anyway.” Glancing in my direction, she added. “I’ll see you in a little while.”

“Yeah,” I returned. “Do me a favor and have a cup for me while you’re at it.”

“Will do.”

After Velvet left, the doctor turned her attention back to me.

“So, how are you feeling, Mister Gant?”

“Pretty much like I was run over by a truck,” I replied.

“The way I understand it, you almost were.”

“Yeah, there is that.”

She opened a chart and scanned the papers inside. “I wanted to ask you something. You mentioned earlier that the only medication you had been taking lately is aspirin?”

“That’s right.”

“How often?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “A few times a day I guess.”

“How many is a few?”

“I don’t know… Six… Maybe eight.”

She frowned. “What dosage?”

“Just a handful.”

She looked at me and frowned even harder, “Seriously?”

“Well, not a big handful. I guess maybe six or seven. Or ten or twelve. Depends on when I was taking it and how bad I hurt.”

“At a time?”

“Yeah.”

“Eighty-one or three hundred twenty-five milligram?”

“Whatever regular old aspirin is. Three twenty-five I guess.”

“Why?”

“Chronic headache.”

“Have you seen a doctor about it?”

“Trust me, it’s not that kind of headache.”

“Really. What kind of headache is it then?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I sighed.

“So, you haven’t been taking the aspirin on doctor’s orders?”

“Not unless I’m now a doctor.”

“Honestly, I had you pegged as more intelligent than this, Mister Gant. You do realize that OTC meds are still drugs, don’t you? Self-medicating is extremely dangerous. Especially the way you were doing it.” She huffed out a disgusted breath before continuing, “Did you even bother to read the directions on the bottle?”

“Of course. Take two, yadda, yadda…”

“Mister Gant,” her tone remained serious. “Do I have to spell this out for you? The reason you collapsed is that you are severely dehydrated and have dangerously low blood pressure; both of which are symptoms of severe salicylate poisoning.”

“So, what you’re saying is I overdosed on aspirin?”

“To put it simply, yes. Given the amount you said you were taking, I’m surprised you aren’t in much worse shape.”

I let my head fall back on the pillow. “Doc, you have no idea.”

“What do you mean?”

I lifted my head back up. “I mean I just let a killer get away because of a goddamned headache. You can’t imagine how that feels.”

She thumbed through the papers in the file then looked back at me with a confused expression. “Are you a police officer?”

“No,” a new voice answered for me. “But, he likes to pretend he is.”

Doctor Miller turned and at the same time, I looked over toward the door. Neither of us had noticed the new arrival until now.

“Detective Fairbanks,” I said with a dispirited sigh.

“You done with him, Doctor?” he asked, flashing his ID.

“Actually, I’d like to admit him for observation. Will that be a problem?”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not stay,” I interjected.

“You shut up,” Fairbanks instructed, glancing at me. “Right now you’re in custody, and what you want doesn’t matter.” Looking back to Doctor Miller, he continued, “If you need to keep him, that’s no problem, as long as he doesn’t go anywhere. But, right now I do need to talk to him if you don’t mind.”

“Be my guest,” she replied. “I’ll go get the paperwork started.”

The detective waited for her to leave then looked back at me with a stoic expression. After a moment of playing stare down, he said, “I thought we had an agreement. So I’m sure you can imagine my utter dismay at finding out you were still in town.”

“You didn’t really expect me to leave, did you?”

“Yes, actually I did.”

“Well, sorry about that, but I wasn’t finished here yet.”

“What? You just aren’t happy with your visit until you cause a multi-car pileup on one of the busiest streets in the city?”

“That was unfortunate,” I replied.

“Unfortunate?” he harrumphed. “I was thinking more like unconscionable. You’re just lucky no one got hurt. Although, I wouldn’t be surprised if you end up getting sued by a couple of people, and I wouldn’t blame them a bit if they do.”

“I was chasing the killer,” I said.

“That’s what your friend out there told us in her statement,” he agreed with a nod. “But, tell me this-how do you know you were chasing a killer and not just some frightened woman who thought you were going to rape her or something? We have at least two eyewitnesses who claim they saw her running from you screaming just exactly that.”

“You wouldn’t…”

He held up a hand to stop me. “Yeah, I know, I wouldn’t believe you if you told me. That seems to be your excuse for everything.”

“It’s not an excuse, it’s the truth.”

“Yeah, whatever. Sounds like an excuse to me.”

“If I told you, you would think I’m insane.”

“Hell, Gant, I already think you’re insane.”

“Look, you said you’d talked to Ben, and he filled you in on this case.”

He nodded. “You mean this case that you aren’t actually working? Yeah, he did.”

“That’s not the point. What I’m trying to tell you is that the woman I was chasing is Annalise Devereaux. She’s your killer.”

“No, Mister Gant, she is a person of interest to the Major Case Squad in Saint Louis,” he corrected.

“Call her whatever you want, I’m telling you she killed two men in Saint Louis, at the very least one here, and who knows how many more. She’s been implicated in…”

He cut me off. “You aren’t telling me anything I don’t already know. We cops actually know how to work telephones. Some of us even go so far as to use fax machines and email you know.”

“Then why wasn’t someone watching the cemetery? If you knew about her then all of this could have been avoided.”

“Mister Gant, in case you haven’t noticed, we have our hands full around New Orleans. Hell, I’m just down here as a volunteer. I was actually expecting to shuffle papers for a few weeks to help out, but I ended up on the streets working a homicide, and somehow that managed to get me hung with you. All I can figure is that I’ve done something to piss off God because my life normally doesn’t go like this.”