Coldwater Revenge by James Ross (e novels to read online TXT) 📗

and roll him in bed. He’ll be fine in the morning.”

“He has to stop vomiting first.” The revelation was met with silence. Tom filled it with, “Maybe he’s got a bug, Mom. I don’t know. But I thought it was better to bring him here and let a doctor figure out what he’s got, than bring him there and maybe give it to you and the kids.” The silence continued. Tom sensed a quiet dusting of a lifetime’s experience weighing the fibs of small boys.

“I’m not getting a good feeling, Tommy.”

“You’re tired, Mom. I should have called earlier.”

“What aren’t you telling me?”

“That’s all I know, Mom. I haven’t spoken to a doctor yet. I’ll come home when I’ve done that. With Joe, if they let him.”

“Call me as soon as you know.”

“It could be hours. I’ll catch up in the morning.”

“Call me.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

As he folded the phone, a short, round man in a doctor’s white lab coat approached carrying a clipboard and a stack of blue cardboard files. Tom noticed the sign on the wall showing a cell phone inside a circle with a line through it. He dropped the phone in his pocket. “Sorry”.

The doctor shook his head. “No. No. I’m looking for Sheriff Morgan’s brother. Nurse Mulvey said someone who might be him was wandering the halls.”

“Right. That’s me. How is he?”

“He’s spoken about you.”

“At least he’s talking. How is he?”

“No, no. Before.” The doctor tapped the stack of files in his arms. “Our sheriff is a frequent visitor to our small hospital. Nothing life threatening—contusions, lacerations, that sort of thing. He takes his job seriously.”

“Doctor.” Tom read the name tag pinned to the white coat. “Sayed. How is my brother? Is he all right?”

“He’s quite ill, I’m afraid.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

The physician moved his head from side to side, but kept his face forward. “Dehydration. Upper respiratory trauma. We’ll have to wait for lab results to determine what from.”

“Can I take him home?”

“No. He needs to remain on an I. V. for a while. We’ve stabilized his breathing. But without knowing what’s causing his symptoms, it would be dangerous to discharge him.”

Bonnie’s going to freak. “Could it be the flu or something?”

The doctor pressed his lips together, but didn’t answer. Tom could sense that the hesitation had nothing to do with giving serious thought to the suggestion of flu. “It could, yes. But I don’t think it is.”

“Why not?”

The doctor shrugged. “For one, the symptoms are too severe for someone as robust as our Sheriff.”

“And for another?”

The doctor shrugged again. “The lab results may tell us more.”

Tom suppressed a sudden surge of adrenaline—something he did not need more of now. “But that’s not what you tracked me down to tell me, is it?” He tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice and off his face.

Sayed seemed to hesitate.

“What has he got, doctor? Or what do you need from me to help you figure it out?”

“So very much like our Sheriff.”

“I’m sure you mean that well. Now tell me what he’s got, or what you need to know in order to find out. What you tracked me down to find out.”

Sayed seemed to make up his mind. “I listened to a recording of the paramedic’s transmission. And I understand from it that you and our sheriff spent the day in Manhattan, in a car and at the diner where he became ill.”

“Right. But I think he was already ill before we stopped to eat. He said in the car before we got there that he felt like crap.”

“Do you know where your brother was in the twenty-four hours prior to starting your day together?”

“Some of it: home in bed before we started, say from midnight last night until six this morning. Before that, his office and around town.”

“Do you know where, specifically?”

“No. There was a body recovered from the lake the day before yesterday. He’s been running around looking into that.”

“Running?” Sayed asked. “To where? Please, if you know.”

“I don’t. Other than the office we visited today. And the diner where he collapsed.”

“I see.” The muscles around the doctor’s mouth tightened.

“So it’s not the flu?”

“No. It’s not.”

“But you’ve got a theory that had you hustling the halls looking for an answer to the question of where your patient’s been in the last twenty four hours.”

Sayed shrugged.

“And you’re disappointed that I don’t know.”

Sayed offered a weak smile. “So very much alike.”

“So what is it?”

“Sorry?”

“Your theory.”

“The lab results…”

“May tell you nothing. You wouldn’t have tracked me down if the information you hoped I had wasn’t just as important—or more.”

“My, my.”

“So what’s your theory, doctor? What fits these symptoms you’ve either seen before or read about, that works or not depending on where my brother may have stuck his muddy boot in the last thirty six hours?”

The doctor put his hand to his chin, partially covering his mouth. His eyes met Tom’s. “His arm, I think.”

“What’s he got, Doc? And how did he get it?”

Sayed looked into Tom’s face. “I can’t yet tell you how, Mr. Morgan. But I believe that sometime in the last thirty-six hours your brother was exposed to some kind of chemical toxin.”

“Accidentally?”

The doctor tapped the stack of files in his arms. “Your brother’s job can be physically demanding. But unless it also involves experimentation with lethal compounds….”

“Let’s assume it doesn’t.”

“Then someone exposed him.”

“Exposed?”

“Poisoned.”

CHAPTER 16

Mary waited for the crunch of tire on gravel, the pop/whoosh of front door quietly opening, or the heart-jolting trill from the silent phone at the end of the couch. But the only sounds that broke her night-long vigil were the creaks and groans of an empty house, the hum of a dying fluorescent light and the rattle of a wind-teased chimney. Bonnie and the children were asleep when Tom called, and with this silly broken leg, she hadn’t been able to get up and let the poor woman know her husband was in the hospital. When she tried Tom’s cell phone, she got his voicemail.