Джеймс Паттерсон - The Summer House

He switches on the Ford’s directional and slowly pulls over to the side, where there is nothing around save for tall pines and flat swampy areas, while recalling the text he got a few minutes ago from Pierce, back at Sullivan.

YORK IN CRIT CONDITION, ICU, MEMORIAL HEALTH UNIV MED CTR, SAVANNAH.

A thought comes to him. If he’s lucky and can spin a good tale, maybe this trooper will let him go. Hell, almost everyone down here is a huge supporter of the military. Say the right words, Sanchez thinks, and maybe the trooper back there will give him a police escort to the hospital, shave off some of the desperate minutes left in his travel time.

The cruiser pulls to the side as well, comes up to him, and in Sanchez’s rearview mirror, he spots that it’s from the Georgia State Patrol. The cruiser sits there, and Sanchez taps his fingers on the steering wheel, impatient for the process to start. From the glove box he pulls out the rental agreement and takes his driver’s license out of his wallet.

The door to the cruiser opens up. A heavyset African American woman steps out, putting on her gray campaign-style hat, and starts walking in his direction. She has on a light-blue uniform shirt and gray trousers with a black stripe down the side.

Sanchez lowers the window, switches off the engine.

She maintains a distance behind him and says, “Are you sick, sir? Is there an emergency?”

“I’m fine,” he says. “But there is an emergency. I’m trying to get to Memorial Health in Savannah as fast as I can.”

“I see,” she says. “Family member?”

“No, ma’am,” he says. “My coworker. I’m a special agent with the US Army. She’s been shot.”

The woman bends over a bit. “May I see your license and registration?”

He passes over his California driver’s license and rental agreement. “I don’t have a registration. This vehicle is a rental.”

“Uh-huh,” the officer says. She seems to take her time examining his license and the rental agreement.

Minutes seem to drag as traffic roars by, the occasional tractor-trailer truck buffeting the Ford.

What ’s taking her so long?

“Mr. Sanchez, you say you’re a special agent? With the US Army?”

“That’s right,” he says. “Hold on, I’ll show you my identification.”

He opens his leather wallet with the badge and identification, and she gives it a quick glance. Her eyes seem to darken, and she bites her lower lip.

“Well, I’ll be,” she says. “You sure are an agent, then. A special agent.”

Sanchez takes back his identification and says, “Yes, ma’am. And please…would you consider giving me an escort to Memorial Health?”

“I clocked you going at one hundred miles an hour, Mr. Sanchez. You think I could do better?”

His hands squeeze the steering wheel. “Ma’am, I—”

“That group in the Army,” she says. “Known as CIS or something, right?”

“United States Army Criminal Investigation Division,” he says, trying very hard not to lose his temper.

“Ah, that’s right,” she says, smiling. “I remember now. You see, my boy, Troy, he was an E-4 in the Army, in the 173rd Airborne, stationed over there in Italy. He had a nice Italian girlfriend, but she kept it on the down low, and when her Eye-tie family found out that their blond princess was dating an American black fellow, they freaked. Got the locals to arrest him for rape. And the Army was supposed to protect him…and you know what happened?”

Sanchez grits his teeth. “Ma’am, I’m quite sorry for what happened to your son, but—”

Her voice is louder. “That Army CID over there in Italy and the rest of the Army, they made the rape case go away, by forcing my Troy out of the Army. That’s what happened.”

“Ma’am, I—”

“You hold your ass right in place till I check you out.”

She turns around and goes back to her cruiser, the blue lights on the roof’s light bar still flashing. The officer seems to take her time getting back into the cruiser.

Shit, he thinks.

He’s done this before, back on the job in LA, showing a suspect or a driver or a pain-in-the-ass civilian who’s really in charge.

Now it’s this trooper’s turn.

Shit, he thinks again.

And…

All right. Suppose she checks through the GCIC system here, looking at his driver’s license status. Everything is fine—no outstanding warrants or violations, of course—but suppose Colonel Broderick up at Quantico…could he be so angry at his calls being ignored that he flagged his license?

Meaning that trooper could bring him into custody?

Sanchez looks back at the cruiser, and the traffic.

There’s an opening behind him, with two tractor-trailer trucks in the distance, traveling side by side, heading in his direction.

He starts up the Ford’s engine, puts the car into drive, and slams the accelerator with his foot, pulling out in front of the approaching trucks.

Chapter 77

NINETEEN MINUTES LATER and after screeching the Ford into a space in the parking lot nearest the main entrance, Sanchez barrels his way through the hospital’s complex until he finds the facility’s Trauma ICU.

The place is pleasant-looking enough, with light wood cabinets and white ceilings and soft overhead lights, but Sanchez is in a hurry, not sure how far that Georgia State Patrol officer will go in tracking him down. Entry into the Trauma ICU looks to be controlled by a big guy at an exterior reception desk. When he buzzes in two hospital personnel, Sanchez follows them inside.

At the nearest nurses’ station, he shows his badge, and almost out of breath from running here, he says, “Special Agent Manuel Sanchez, US Army CID. You have a CID agent here, Connie York. Where is she?”

The male nurse is in light-blue scrubs and looks at him with suspicion. After staring at his badge and identification, he says, “She’s in trauma room 2, but I don’t think visitors—”

“Thanks,” Sanchez says, moving on. The place is quiet, but nurses and doctors bustle around him, and down the hallway is a series of sliding-glass doors with handles.

The nurse yells out, “Hey!” but Sanchez ignores him.

There.

Room 2.

He slides the door open, surprising two nurses—one male, the other female—at their work.

The woman says, “Excuse me, who are you?”

He shows his badge and identification. “I’m Special Agent Manuel Sanchez, Army CID. How is she?”

The male nurse slips out, and the woman says, “Have you registered up front?”

“No,” he says.

“You need to.”

Sanchez snaps, “How is she, damn it?”

“Critical,” she says. “Look, you need to—”

“Ma’am, all due respect, you can get the hell out. I’m not going anywhere.”

She leaves and Sanchez steps forward, thinking there’s been a mistake, a serious mistake, because that’s not Connie in that bed, hooked up to IV tubes, wires, and other sensors.

The poor woman there is heavily bandaged about her head, the head mostly shaved, and she’s breathing through a tube stuck down her throat. Her eyes are swollen and her cheeks are puffed out.

It can’t be Connie.

Can’t.

But there’s a whiteboard near her bed, and sure enough, in careful block lettering above her vital signs and the names of the doctors and nurses taking care of her, it states, CONSTANCE YORK.

The door slides open. He turns.

A large man is there, dark hair, wearing black trousers, black sneakers, and a black vest over a light-blue shirt, the vest with bright-yellow letters saying SECURITY. Sanchez looks him over, notes the handcuffs, the expandable baton, and another weapon with a bright-yellow handle, denoting a Taser.