David Baldacci - Hour Game

"Well, it's your life," commented Michelle.

He looked at her strangely. "You'd think so, wouldn't you?" He finished his drink and said, "So I heard on the news that they've called in the big guns to help."

"Including your old friend Chip Bailey."

"I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for him."

"I'm sure your parents were really grateful to him."

"Oh, yeah. My father offered him a position as head of security in one of his companies. Big bucks."

"I didn't know that," said King. "But he obviously didn't take it."

"No. I guess he liked being a cop." Eddie tapped his spoon against his fork. "I remember when I was a kid and this area was nothing but hills and woods. It was great. We never worried about anything happening."

"And now?" asked Michelle.

"And now people are getting killed in their homes, left in the woods, shotgunned in their cars. If I ever did have a family, I don't think I'd do it here."

"Well, I guess you could live anywhere," said King.

"I'm not sure my mother would be very happy about that."

"Again, it's your life, Eddie, right?" said Michelle.

This time Eddie Battle didn't bother to answer her.

WHILE KYLE MONTGOMERY WAS committing his felony and Eddie, King and Michelle were in the bar, Bobby Battle lay in his hospital bed under a mass of IV lines. Remmy Battle sat next to him, her right hand clasped inside her husband's still, pale one.

Remmy's eyes were on the array of monitors that vividly detailed the slim grasp her husband had on life. He'd had a minor setback and gone back on the ventilator machine, and it emitted its unnervingly high-pitched screech whenever Bobby's breathing veered off course. Remmy's own breathing rose and fell erratically with the squawks of the infernal contraption.

The nurse walked in. "Hello, Mrs. Battle, everything all right?"

"No! He doesn't know me," she snapped back. "He doesn't know anyone."

"But he's getting stronger, the doctors said so. It'll just take time. His vitals are much better. Even though he's back on the ventilator, things are looking up, they really are."

Remmy's tone changed. "I thank you for telling me that. I really do, honey." She looked down at the large man in the bed.

The nurse smiled and then seemed uncomfortable. "Mrs. Battle," she began in a deferential tone undoubtedly reserved for those fortunate few who had their names on buildings.

"I know," Remmy said quietly.

"Are you going to sleep here tonight?" the nurse asked. "If so, I'll get your bed made up."

"Not tonight. I'll be back in the morning. But thank you."

Remmy rose and left. The nurse made a quick check on her patient and then exited the room a few minutes later.

Battle was the only patient on this short hallway that was otherwise largely taken up with storage rooms. The rest of the unit's ten beds emptied out onto a central area across from the nurse's station. Remmy Battle had demanded this particular room for her husband because it allowed for more privacy. There was also a rear entrance at the end of this hall that enabled her, with a special access code, to come and go without having to pass by a large number of rooms, nurses and prying glances. The room that she sometimes slept in was down this hall from her husband.

It was a few minutes after ten, and this part of the hospital, isolated from the rest, was undergoing the nightly shift change of personnel. The nurse attending Battle would spend the next forty-five minutes in the staff room with her replacement, going over the current status of the patients under her supervision as well as pertinent medication and physician instructions.

Each patient room in this unit was monitored by camera, with the live feed going to the unit's central nurse's station. The television monitors at the nurse's station were supposed to be watched constantly, although during shift change this procedure was not observed for about twenty minutes as the nurses, overworked and stretched to their limits, struggled to cram an hour's worth of work into a third of that time. However, the machinery helping keep the patients alive in each of the rooms had warning devices that would immediately alert the staff to any drastic changes in condition.

Shortly after Remmy had left, a person came in the same rear entrance that Remmy had passed through minutes earlier. Dressed in scrubs and white hospital coat with a protective mask covering the lower part of the face, and looking very much a part of the hospital world, this individual passed by the door of Bobby Battle's room, glanced inside and saw that it was empty except for the patient. A quick peek around the corner showed that the nurse's station was unattended. The intruder entered Battle 's room and closed the door.

Wasting no time, the person slightly moved the camera bolted to the wall across from the bed such that the live feed wouldn't show the area to the left of the bed. Then the masked figure hurried across to the IV stand next to the bed, removed the hypodermic needle from a coat pocket and stabbed one of the medication bags above the fluid line with the needle, shooting the entire contents of the hypo into it. The person glanced once at Battle lying there, features peaceful, even with a tube down his throat. The intruder picked up his hand, placed the wristwatch on it and set it to five. Finally, the person pulled the object from another coat pocket and laid it carefully on Battle 's chest.

It was a single white bird's feather.

Moments later the person had shot out the rear entrance, clambered down the stairs, slipped out into the parking lot and climbed in a car. The vehicle sped from the hospital.

The driver had a letter to write and mail.

Barely ten minutes after the car had driven off, a warning bell sounded on one of the machines in Bobby Battle's room, followed by another. Within seconds all were screaming their collective and ominous warnings.

The nurses rushed en masse to the room. A minute later a code blue was broadcast over the P.A., and a highly experienced medical crash team dashed into the room. It was all for naught. At 10:23P.M. Robert E. Lee Battle was pronounced dead.

AT FIRST IT WAS ASSUMED THAT Battle had simply succumbed to the aftereffects of his stroke. The white feather left on his chest by his killer had fallen to the floor unnoticed as the medical team attempted to resuscitate him. When the feather was later discovered by a hospital technician, he placed it on the table next to the dead man's bed, perhaps assuming it might have come from a pillow. The watch the killer had placed on Battle 's wrist was covered under IV lines and also obscured by Battle 's ID and medication wristbands. An anguished and angry Remmy Battle came and went and didn't take note of the watch or the feather. It wasn't until a nurse called into question the feather that people began to wonder. It hadn't come from a hospital pillow, since they didn't contain feathers. In addition, the swift and unanticipated change in Battle 's condition was puzzling and certainly not above scrutiny.

However, it wasn't until around three in the morning, when they were about to move Battle 's body to the hospital morgue, that the watch was finally observed on the dead man's wrist, prompting a much closer examination of the body and subsequently the IV bags. That's when the attending physician saw the puncture in the bag where the hypodermic had plunged through.

"Dear God," was all he could manage to say.

Todd Williams was roused from his bed, and on the way in he called King, who in turn called Michelle. All three arrived at the hospital at about the same time. They were surprised to see Chip Bailey there. Williams quickly introduced King and Michelle to the FBI agent.