The woman’s eyelids fluttered and then her blue eyes stared. Alex saw a natural focus in them, an awareness, and she smiled warmly at the critically ill woman. ‘Hi, sweetheart, are you talking to me?’
The voice was weak, the breathing laboured, and Alex sensed in her heart that her patient wasn’t going to make it. This moment might be the last that this young woman ever had to speak, and Alex ignored the anaesthetist who was now indicating that she move away so that he could proceed. She was going to give her patient this time.
‘Tell mum I’m sorry. Tell her I love her. I’m so stupid .?.?. I .?.?.’
She was panting and Alex quickly replaced the oxygen mask.
Fiona appeared at her side, smiling at the patient, her tone gentle but firm. ‘She needs to be out of here now, Alex.’
Alex stroked the woman’s forehead.
‘I’ll tell her, sweetheart, but you’re going to get better and you can tell her yourself.’
‘Alex!’ Fiona commanded through gritted teeth.
‘Dr Taylor, you need to let the anaesthetist get to her.’ Maggie Fielding stated calmly, her voice finally conveying to Alex the urgency of the situation.
Alex stared at the medical team surrounding her, impatience stamped on all of their faces.
‘Dr Taylor, we need to help her!’ Maggie spoke for all of them.
The eyelids suddenly lifted higher and the woman’s eyes were filled with fear. ‘You said you’d help me. You, you .?.?.’ Her eyes rolled back. And then a whisper of final words: ‘I should have said yes .?.?.’
Chapter seven
She had yet to be seen by her family, but in a purse in her leather jacket a NatWest debit card and a Barclaycard identified her as Amy Abbott.
She had been declared dead two hours ago and had yet to be moved from resus. Amy Abbott was not going to be wheeled down the corridors to the mortuary. Instead, the coroner’s private black ambulance was standing by, ready to take her away. Her clothes had been bagged, her medical notes photocopied, her body briefly inspected. A police officer stood near the trolley guarding her until the time came for her to be collected.
Alex wanted to brush her dark hair, wash her blood-stained hands and remove the hideous airway tube protruding from her mouth, but she didn’t. Amy Abbott was no longer her patient. She was now in the care of the coroner. She would be cut open, her organs lifted from her body, each dissected and microscopically examined until an answer to her death was found.
Alex was rooted to the spot she had been standing on for the last hour. She was out of the way of the police, but close enough to see Amy’s face. There was no peace written in her features. Her eyes were wide open in fixed surprise and her lips were prised apart with rigid plastic.
A plain-clothes police officer arrived and Alex watched him talking to Nathan Bell, Maggie Fielding and the anaesthetist over in a corner. He looked her way and nodded briefly, suggesting he was aware who she was. The anaesthetist did most of the talking, and from his gesticulating hands, aimed twice in her direction, and the tight expression on his face it looked like he was blaming Alex for the situation.
Immediately following Amy Abbott’s final words, the anaesthetist had none too gently pushed Alex aside and taken over. He had tried to resuscitate the woman for a further thirty minutes, with him ventilating and Nathan Bell giving chest compressions. When Alex said they needed to call the coroner, he had quietly agreed. Any sudden death from an unknown cause had to be reported, but when Alex declared she believed Amy had been murdered, his eyebrows rose in astonishment and she distinctly heard him say through gritted teeth, ‘Oh God. So you’re the one.’ Leaving Alex little doubt that she had been widely discussed, that he had heard about her abduction, and from his tone, was sceptical.
Fiona Woods and the other nurses had glanced away in embarrassment. Nathan Bell had tapped the floor with his foot and fiddled with the equipment over on the counter. But Maggie Fielding had surprised her. On the pretext of turning off the oxygen behind Alex’s back she had squeezed Alex’s shoulder comfortingly and offered words of support. ‘You did everything you could,’ she’d said.
The grey-suited officer walked towards her.
‘Dr Taylor? My name’s Greg Turner. Detective Inspector. Can we find somewhere quiet to talk?’
Alex noticed a shiny patch staining his dark-patterned tie, and the collar of his white shirt curling up at the ends. He was probably no older than his early thirties, but grey was running through his dark wavy hair and lines fanned his tired green eyes.
Peeling off her rubber gloves and shoving them into her pocket, Alex led the way to the relatives’ quiet room. She sank down on one of the low, boxy armchairs and he followed suit, leaving only inches between their knees.
He rested his hands in his lap. ‘Why did you decide to call us? Was it because you knew she had gone missing? That she was Amy Abbott? A nurse who worked at this hospital?’
Alex cleared her throat, her mind searching for the right words so that she came across as a professional trying to help. ‘I didn’t know who she was until after she died. Until after I made the call. I’ve heard that she worked here, but I’ve never met her. It was what she said that made me call you.’
Her silence prompted him to ask the obvious. ‘Which was?’
‘She didn’t get to say much. We were getting ready to anaesthetise her when I saw that she was trying to talk. She asked me to tell her mum she was sorry, that she was stupid. And then she said, “I should have said yes”.’
Greg Turner’s expression was difficult to read. His eyes didn’t give away what he thought, nor did his next question. ‘And you felt this was reason enough to call us?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
Alex pressed back against the chair, wishing the room was bigger so she could get up and pace about. It would be easier for her to talk on her feet and not be so close to the man.
‘Two weeks ago something happened to me, something that I don’t think your officer believed. I was meeting my boyfriend, Patrick, in the car park. I’d just finished a late shift. I got knocked out, and when I came to I found myself in the hands of this man. I was .?.?. Look, it might be better if you talk to Detective Best. She’ll have all the details. I er .?.?. it’s not that it’s difficult to talk about. It’s just .?.?. Well, frankly, I’m not sure you’ll believe it.’
Unexpectedly, tears rolled down her face.
Greg Turner pulled some tissues from a nearby box and gave them to her. ‘Well, it’s obvious you believe it. If you don’t mind, I’d rather hear about it from you first.’
Over the next half hour Alex told him everything, even down to the CT scan and the holiday in Barbados.
‘And this is your first shift back?’ was his first response.
‘Yes.’
‘Do you think perhaps it was too soon?’
Alex shut her eyes in frustration and sighed resignedly.