Shit!
Jamison was startled when Decker came bolting out of his room and shot down the hall like a torpedo. She had just lifted to her mouth a spoonful of cereal that she was eating next to the kitchen sink.
“What the hell?” she exclaimed.
“We have to go.”
“Go where?”
“Dominion Hospice.”
*
The rain had picked up and Jamison’s wipers were having a hard time keeping pace. Wedged into the passenger seat like a watermelon in a sock, Decker looked fidgety and upset.
“You want to tell me why we’re going to the hospice?” said Jamison.
“Why would she be volunteering there?”
“I don’t know. Why would she be substitute teaching at a school?”
“Because her storage unit was right across the street. I think she wanted to be close to that stuff for some reason. And remember her comments to Billings? I think she liked feeling superior to American teachers and students. If so, that scratches that one off the list. That leaves the hospice. And if she was still spying, I’ve crossed altruistic off my list. So why the hospice?”
They arrived at Dominion Hospice. Visiting hours were over, but their credentials gained them access. The director, Sally Palmer, had gone home for the night, but the evening manager, a man named Alvin Jenkins, met with them in his office.
Jenkins was short and flabby, in his late fifties with glasses and a circle of graying hair surrounding a bald pate. In answer to their inquiries he said, “I never met Anne Berkshire, though I had heard the name. I work evenings, and I understand that she would come in during the mornings.”
“You have other volunteers?” said Decker.
“Oh yes. Quite a few. Mostly older, retired folks who have the time to come in and visit.”
“Do you have a list of them? And one with all of your employees? Nursing staff and admin, everybody.”
He turned to his computer and hit some keys. “I can print them out for you, but what is all this about?”
Before Decker could answer, Jamison said, “National security.”
Jenkins’s jaw dropped, “Oh my goodness, right.” He handed them the printed pages.
“I have to go and make my nightly rounds,” he said. “Feel free to use my office as long as necessary.”
He left, and Decker and Jamison started going over the pages.
“What are we looking for, Decker?”
“Anything that seems out of the ordinary.”
“I’m not sure how we can tell that by looking at people’s ages and pictures. I mean, what would she be doing here anyway? And we’re not even sure if these people were here at the same time she was. I mean, if she wanted to talk to someone they would have to be here, right? And she only visited with a few patients. Maybe we can ask Jenkins if he knows—”
“Prisoner,” exclaimed Decker.
He had jumped up and raced out, leaving Jamison sitting holding sheets of paper and looking stunned.
She slumped back in her seat for a few moments before getting up and hustling after him. “I swear to God, one day I’m just going to kill him.”
CHAPTER
54
DECKER STOOD in the darkened doorway and looked down at the little boy.
Joey Scott was sound asleep in his bed.
The rain continued to pour down outside.
Decker’s gaze swept the room, taking it all in. Then he saw what he had come here for.
A moment later Jamison came to stand next to him.
“What are you—”
When Jamison saw Joey she fell silent. She looked up at Decker.
He said in a low voice, “He has leukemia. The really bad kind. He’s not going to make it.”
Jamison’s mouth quivered. “How old?” she said in a crackling voice.
“Ten. His name is Joey.”
Jamison’s gaze ran along the lines running to his body from the IV stand. The monitor’s greenish screen was filled with the boy’s weak vitals.
“But why are you here?”
“Because of that.”
He walked over and picked the book off the shelf next to the bed. He looked down at the cover.
The Prisoner of Azkaban.
“Hello?”
Decker turned to see Joey staring up at him.
“Hello, Joey.”
“You’re the Cleveland Brown.”
“That’s right. Amos Decker.”
“What are you doing here?”
Decker looked over his shoulder and said, “I brought my friend Alex to meet you, Joey.”
He eyed Jamison, who still stood in the doorway, and inclined his head toward Joey. She slowly came into the room and drew close to the bed.
“Hi, Joey.”
“Hi, Alex.”
He glanced at Decker’s hand. “Did you come to read to me? Is it morning yet?”
“No, it’s nighttime. We didn’t mean to wake you. I’m sorry.”
“That’s okay. I wake up sometimes just because.”
Decker and Jamison together watched the slender chest rise and fall, as Joey seemed to work to catch his breath.
“Do you need us to get help?” asked Jamison nervously.
Joey shook his head. “No. It happens sometimes. It’ll pass.”
They waited another minute or so and Joey’s breathing became normal.
Decker sat down in the chair next to the bed and held up the book. “Anne was reading this to you?”
“Yeah.”
A spear of lightning lit the sky. It was followed by a boom of thunder that made Jamison jump.
“Did she read the first two in the series to you?” Decker asked.
“The first two?”
“Yeah, this one is the third one. There are two books before it and four that come after it. You learn where Harry Potter came from. And how he got to go to Hogwarts and meet his friends. Stuff like that.”
Joey looked confused. “No. That was the only one she’d been reading to me.”
“And she leaves it here?”
“Well, sometimes. But other times she takes it with her. But then she always brings it back. We don’t have too many pages left. I think I can make it to the end.” He sucked in a huge breath. “I hope I can anyway.”
At this, Jamison looked away, her eyes filling with tears.
Decker looked very tense as he prepared to speak. “Does anyone else come here and read this book to you, Joey?”
Jamison shot him a glance.
“No. Just Anne. Nobody else.”
Decker said, “You’re sure?”
“Yeah. Just Anne. I think it’s her book. Why?”
“We were just wondering, Joey,” said Jamison hastily when it didn’t appear that Decker was going to answer. “Do you like the story? The Harry Potter series is great. I started reading them when I was in elementary school.”
“Yeah, it’s good. I like Harry. But Hermione is my favorite.”
“Why is that?”
“She likes to read. I do too. I did anyway. Lots of books.” He pointed at Decker. “But I played football too, like him, before I got sick. I bet I would have been pretty good.”
“I bet you would have been pretty great,” said Jamison, trying very hard to keep her voice from cracking.
Decker looked down at the book as though it had somehow failed him.