The Final Victim, page 21
"Thank you," she says stiffly.
He doesn't reply. No, he's not the most pleasant guy in the world, but these are far from pleasant circumstances.
Being called by her proper name and title should be the least of Charlotte's concerns at a time like this, but she can't help it. She's been the object of blatant curiosity ever since somebody on the hospital staff recognized the Oakgate address on the paperwork and asked- with the other ER waiting room occupants in earshot- whether she's one of ^Remingtons.
As in, one of the Remingtons for whom the entire ambulatory wing of the hospital is named.
Like his father and grandfather before him, Gran-daddy never was much of a philanthropist-not, that is, until fairly recently. But in Charlotte's opinion, the state-of-the-art addition to the hospital could hardly be considered too little, too late.
She just wishes Royce had been brought to some other hospital, or that she hadn't been recognized.
As word spread, some of the nurses seemed more curious about her pedigree-and the potential scandal of her husband being gunned down on a city street-than they were concerned about her husband's well-being.
Oh, how the mighty have fallen, she can imagine people thinking as they stare at her: unkempt, her rumpled linen shift covered in dried blood, her cheeks mascara-stained.
She was a crying, quivering mess, perpetually on the verge of hysteria before she found out Royce is going to pull through.
But even now…
Somebody shot my husband. Dear God, this can't be happening…
"What about the perp's build?" The question comes from the other officer, Detective Phillip Dorado, who's about twenty years younger and a hundred pounds lighter than his hulking partner. With his Latino good looks, he could be playing the role of a cop on one of those television dramas Royce likes to watch. And there's a shimmer of kindness in his rich mocha-colored eyes when he speaks, as though he, unlike his partner, realizes Charlotte is a victim, not a perpetrator.
"His build? I don't know…" Charlotte closes her eyes, trying to remember. "He was so far away from where I was in the window…" 'Was he tall? Short?" Williamson prods impatiently.
"About medium-sized…"
Hearing his snort in response, she keeps her eyes shut, not wanting to see his expression as he jots that down on his report.
He's already all but berated her for not having any idea-who could possibly want to hurt Royce. He questioned relentlessly, as though if he asked enough times, she'd pull a likely suspect out of thin air-or confess to the crime herself.
"Was he fat?" Dorado continues. "Skinny?"
"About medium weight, I guess," she reluctantly says again, and opens her eyes in time to see the look that passes between the two men.
"Listen, I know I'm not much help, but I'm doing the best I can." Her tone is as steely as she can muster, and she clasps her hands on her lap beneath the table so they won't see how badly she's still shaking even now, a good eight hours after Royce was shot.
"We're trying to help you, Ms. Rem-Mrs. Maitland,"
Detective Dorado tells her. "We're going to do everything we can to find whoever did this to your husband. We just need every detail you can possibly come up with."
"Okay."
"Is there anything else you can tell us about his appearance?"
"Just that I know the person was small enough and agile enough for me to think he might be a teenager. You know-he wasn't big and bulky." Like you, she adds silently to Detective Williamson.
"Can you estimate his height?" Williamson asks.
"Not really." Sensing by the look on his face that her answer isn't sufficient, she offers, "I guess somewhere between five-foot-five and six feet"
He writes it down. "And weight?"
"I don't know… under two hundred pounds, I guess."
There's a moment of silence as the detective finishes writing. Then he closes his pad, a cue for him and Dorado to get to their feet and thank her.
"What do y'all do now?" Charlotte asks them.
"Now that the sun is up, we'll be conducting a more thorough investigation of the cemetery," Williamson informs her.
"Let me know what y'all find." She, too, stands, and realizes her legs feel as though they're going to give out Well, what do you expect after a night without sleep and at least eighteen hours without food?
She can't imagine eating anything right now, but she could probably force down a cup of coffee. She needs the caffeine. It's been a long night and it's going to be a long day.
Royce won't be out of surgery for at least another hour. She'll go make a couple of phone calls, then stop in the cafeteria for coffee to bring back up.
"We'll be back to check in with you as soon as we know something, Mrs. Maitland," Dorado says, and both men shake her hand. Williamson's beefy grasp is sweaty and it's all she can do not to wipe her palm on her dress. She's not exactly unsullied herself.
After the detectives leave, she checks in with the head OR nurse to make sure there's no news about Royce. There isn't Clutching her cell phone in her hand, she hurries to the nearest exit, past signs indicating the turnoff toward the Remington Wing.
The first call she places is to Oakgate, hoping someone will answer before the ringing wakes Lianna. Gran-daddy had never bothered getting an answering machine or voice mail.
As the phone rings on and on with no answer, she remembers that it's Sunday, the housekeeper's day off. But Nydia usually doesn't leave until late morning, and it's still early, so maybe- "Hello?"
"Nydia?"
"Yes?"
"Have you heard what happened?"
There's a pause. "What do you mean?"
Charlotte fills her in as quickly as she can. T know this is your day off, but-"
"I'll stay right here," Nydia offers without hesitation. "I didn't have any plans for today, anyway."
Grateful, Charlotte doesn't argue with her. "This news is bound to get out, and when it does, reporters might call the house. Can y'all please make sure you don't give out any information? And whatever you do,don't let Lianna find out. She shouldn't hear this from anyone but me."
"I won't say a word."
"Are my cousins there?"
"I don't know. Do you want to hold on while I check?"
No, she doesn't want to hold. She wants to do something else, anything else. She wants to be someplace other than this hospital; longs to flee the concrete walkway leading up to the surgical wing where her wounded husband lies unconscious and ripped open.
"Yes," she tells Nydia, "I'll hold."
She's gone several minutes. Charlotte listens to silence on the other end, watches a couple of doctors step outside and light cigarettes, joining a group of other employees on a smoking break. She turns her back on them, not in the mood to witness their easygoing, upbeat, meaningless chatter out here in the sunshine.
The ER doctor told her Royce was lucky. The bullet lodged in the muscle tissue of his upper thigh. If he had been hit as little as an inch in any other direction, things might have been very different. He should regain full use of his leg after surgery, recuperation, and physical therapy.
Lucky.
The irony of that word choice keeps coming back to haunt Charlotte. Lucky, to be chosen at random by a sniper?
"Mrs. Maitland?" Nydia is back on the line. "Mrs. Harper is here. I told her what happened and I'm handing her the phone now."
Phyllida is on the line instantly, asking one fervent question after another. It takes a while for Charlotte to even get to the point of the call and ask her to bring a change of clothes and her toiletry bag to the hospital.
There's a moment of silence. "I don't have a car, Charlotte."
"Isn't Gib there?"
"No. I don't know where he is, but I'll try to reach him on his cell. We'll be at the hospital with your things as soon as I find him."
"Thanks."
It isn't until she's hung up that Charlotte realizes this is the first conversation she's had with either of her cousins since the meeting in Tyler's office the other day. Now she'll be forced to come face-to-face with them as well.
But Phyllida and Gib's lingering animosity and contestment of the will are the least of her worries.
Right now, all she cares about is Royce.
She reaches into her pocket and finds his cell phone, which the nurses gave her along with the rest of his personal belongings. For the second time since the shooting, she searches the phone's memory base for his daughter's cell phone number, then presses send.
It takes a few rings for Aimee to answer, with a fumbling sound as she does.
"Sorry, Charlotte, I'm at the airport trying to get to the gate," she says, sounding a little breathless.
"I'm glad you got a flight." Charlotte can hear the noise from the terminal in the background.
"I'm on the next plane out of here, but I have to connect through Atlanta so it's going to be a while. How's Daddy? Is he out of surgery yet?"
"Not yet. What flight are you on, Aimee? Do you want me to have somebody meet you at the airport?" Even as she asks the question, she hopes her stepdaughter will say no. Who, after all, could Charlotte possibly send to the airport?
The chauffeur is away, she wants Nydia to stay at home with Lianna, and she isn't comfortable asking her cousins for yet another favor. Nearly all of Charlotte's friends in Savannah are traveling this summer, and she hasn't been in close contact with them, anyway, since moving out to Oakgate. Not close enough to involve them intimately in something like this.
But it doesn't matter, because Aimee tells her she'll just take a cab to the hospital when she lands.
"Make sure you tell the cab driver that it's the hospital off the expressway… Are you at all familiar with Savannah?" Charlotte asks.
"No-hang on a second, they're making an announcement…"
In the background, Charlotte hears, "The aircraft that will make up Delta Airlines Flight 640 to Atlanta is now at the gate and will begin boarding momentarily. Please have your tickets ready so we can board the plane for an on-time departure."' "I have to go," Aimee says in a rush. "I'll get there as soon as I land."
"Have a safe flight."
Delia Airlines flight 640…
That's the one Royce always takes home to her from New Orleans, first thing in the morning. Ironic that just days ago, Charlotte was sitting in the Oyster Bar, worried about something happening to him.
Maybe it really was a premonition.
And maybe the next time you have one, you should listen.
Remembering to stop in the cafeteria, she waits in line for coffee with yet another group of casual, chatting staff members, along with a smattering of patients' loved ones. They're easily identifiable, not just by their street clothes and hushed conversations, but by their drawn faces etched with telltale concern.
To the workers, who seem disconcertingly oblivious to the life-and-death domestic dramas unfolding around them, this is just another morning on the job.
As Charlotte flips a black lever and watches steaming, aromatic liquid pouring into her white foam cup, a long-forgotten detail flits into her exhausted mind.
She remembers being huddled in the sand on the dusky beach off Achoco Island, some distance from the cluster of divers that had just emerged, empty-handed, from the depths of the sea.
She couldn't hear what they were saying as they removed their equipment.
Then the wind shifted abruptly and the unmistakable sound of laughter reached her ears. As she listened in disbelief, it became clear that they were discussing bets they had placed on the weekend's opening games of the NFL season.
Somebody's son had been lost in the treacherous Atlantic, and the men responsible for finding the child were engaged in lighthearted, meaningless conversation.
She never forgot it.
Nor did she ever tell Royce.
The divers were human. They were doing their job. Their cavalier talk of football wagers had nothing to do with the fact that they didn't retrieve Theo Maitland's body.
Intellectually, she knew that. Of course she did.
She just never got over that feeling of betrayal-or the realization that the immediate family, despite the hustle of activity by the many helping hands that materialize in their time of need, is unalterably isolated in any loss.
Feeling lonelier than she has in years, Charlotte pays for her coffee, grabs a couple of creamers and a packet of Splenda, and makes her way back to the elevator.
Upstairs, the nurse spots her coming toward the station and shakes her head. "Nothing yet, Ms. Remington."
'Thank you."
And it's Mrs. Maitland.
Toting Cameron on her hip, Mimi steps into the kitchen of her mother's small tract house in Tidewater Meadow to find Maude Gaspar seated at the table with a cup of coffee, utterly fixated on the small portable television on a metal stand in the corner.
"Good mornin', Honey Buns. How's Jed today?"
"Still asleep. He had another restless night" And so did I.
"I lit a candle for him down at church this morning." Maude's eyes remain fastened to the screen even as she holds out her arms for Cameron. "Where's my precious grandson? Come here to Granny, sugar, and let me give you some lovin'."
"Is there coffee?" Mimi asks, placing her son in her mother's embrace.
"Is the sky blue?"
She glances out the window above the sink, framed by limp, once-white curtains trimmed with red rickrack. Today, it is."
"Gonna stay that way till about noon, accordin' to the weatherman."
Mimi crosses to the counter, and the electric percolator her parents received as a wedding shower gift three decades ago. Her mother has used it faithfully every morning, but Mimi wonders now how much longer it can possibly last without Daddy here to tinker with it the next time it goes on the fritz.
Behind her, Cameron squeals, "Bob!"
"Bob?" Maude bounces him on her lap. "What does that mean?"
"He wants to watch Bob the Builder. On TV. It's his new favorite show."
"I thought you didn't like him to watch television."
