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Thirteen

“Do you mind taking a cab back to your car, Cozy? I have some calls to make before I leave here tonight. I need to find an adolescent female bed somewhere for Merritt. And I have to fill out the paperwork to place her on a seventy-two-hour hold.”

“No. I don’t mind. I’ll get a ride.” He paused. “You don’t have her on a hold already?”

“No. So far the admission has been voluntary. Her docs have stretched out the medical side of her hospital stay hoping she would start talking. She hasn’t. But that means she hasn’t complained about being here much, either.”

He raised his eyebrows at my explanation. I was assuming that now that Merritt was his client, he wasn’t sure he wanted her silence to be viewed as tacit agreement to anything. “Will finding a bed for her be difficult?”

“You never know. There aren’t that many acute adolescent beds available anymore. I’m going to have to run a gauntlet with her insurance company over approvals, too. But that won’t be until the morning.”

“If our suppositions are correct, the state will be paying for this admission, I’m afraid. Insurance approvals will be unnecessary.”

“I hope you’re wrong about that, Cozy. But you’re probably right. The truth is that I don’t want to see her at Fort Logan. I want her in a private hospital, so I’m going to try to get her a psychiatric bed before she’s taken into custody. If we can get that established, maybe the court will be more reluctant to order her moved.”

“If she goes to Fort Logan, would you be allowed to continue as her doctor?”

“Probably only as a consultant. Someone on staff would take the case.”

“An employee of the state?”

“Yes, an employee of the state. That person could be excellent, could be less than excellent.”

“That’s not good. I like your alternative better. But, as I said before, I don’t think you have more than eighteen hours or so to pull it off. Good luck.”

Before he left the hospital, Cozier Maitlin displayed his considerable charm and distributed his business cards to anyone willing to stick out a hand for one at the nursing station. I watched the craftiness from a distance. Although I couldn’t hear him, I figured he was busy weaving a legal safety net for Merritt, counting that the good will of the nurses and aides would cause them to call him if they noticed anything unusual happening with the police. From experience, I knew that Cozy didn’t miss much where his clients were concerned.

I sat down and wrote an obtuse chart note about the heightened suicide risk and filled out the paperwork for placing Merritt on a seventy-two-hour hold-and-treat. The hold allowed me to hospitalize Merritt against her will for three days because I judged her to be gravely impaired or a significant danger to herself or others. In most instances, after those seventy-two hours expired, I would need to consider other options. In this case, in fewer than twenty-four hours, I feared that the Boulder Police Department would be holding Merritt against her will for reasons much more sinister than mine.

As soon as I finished the paperwork I started calling around looking for available adolescent female psychiatric beds.


Sam Purdy was sitting on the hood of my Land Cruiser when I finally made my way down to the hospital parking lot.

He didn’t seem to expend a single calorie of energy as he eyed my long approach across the mostly empty lot. I said, “Hey, Sam.”

“I was hoping you would come down pretty soon. I was about to page you. How is she?”

“Hard to say, she’s still not talking. These latest developments don’t help the situation, I’m afraid. She seems even more entrenched than before.”

“Is Brenda up there with her?”

“Not yet. Wait, look, there she is now.” Across the parking lot, Brenda Strait was walking deliberately, with long strides, toward the hospital entrance, her hands in the pockets of a long gabardine trench coat. Her head was down.

“I didn’t want to run into her in Merritt’s room; that’s why I’m down here. It would be too goofy for the kid, I think, given the water that’s already passed under the bridge in this nutty family.”

“Yeah, I understand. Maybe it’s best for now. Merritt actually seemed incredulous when I told her that her mom had called you for help.”

“The kid is sharp. Maitlin’s on the case, right? That’s okay with her?”

“Who knows what’s okay with her? But he’s definitely on the case. He’s working already, putting things in place. He’s good, Sam.”

“I know he is. That’s why we called him.”

“Merritt’s going to be arrested, Sam? That’s for sure?”

He stared at me, not even comfortable with the words I was speaking. His voice suddenly rusty, he said, “Let’s get in the car.”

I unlocked the doors and we climbed in.

“Merritt’s…up shit creek. The gun in her bathroom is registered to Dead Ed. It’s missing two rounds. Everybody is assuming the blood on her clothes is Dead Ed’s blood. You can’t know this,” he paused to be certain I understood, “but we collected, oh, I don’t know, about a dozen good latents from Ed’s house that we haven’t been able to match to anyone. If any of those belong to Merritt, well, I don’t have to paint you a picture.”

“When will it all be clear?”

“The forensic team will get some of it packaged overnight. The prints and advanced blood work will take longer. Since Merritt doesn’t drive yet, I don’t think they will have any file print comparisons for her. While they dot all the i’s, someone will watch her hospital room. Is there a cop there yet?”

“No, not yet. Will there be?”

“Soon, I think. She’s in a relatively secure place. She’s not a flight risk. But she’s a kid, and that’s always a wild card. We can keep an eye on her as long as she’s in the hospital, so there’s no real hurry. The profile on this will be stratospheric, given the fallout from the JonBenet case, given who Dead Ed was, given that Brenda’s a celebrity, and given that Chaney is so sick and so damn cute. Everyone in the department is going to make damn sure the process looks perfectly deliberate and thoughtful. But I wouldn’t be surprised if the DA signs off on the evidence sometime tomorrow, with some fanfare. Then, if I’m reading things right, Merritt will be booked.”

“God, Sam, I’m sorry for what everyone is going through. There’s enough tragedy here for ten families for an entire lifetime.”

“And it’s only starting. The worst news could be yet to come for both of these kids. And now I have to go home and tell Sherry.”

I glanced over. He was opening and closing his right fist. “You want to tell me about that part? About what happened with Sherry and Brenda?”

“No, not now. Some other time.”

I didn’t press. “Who’s investigating this-Merritt’s situation? In the department?”

“The Dead Ed team. It’s part of that case. Maybe it’s the whole Dead Ed case.”

“Whew,” I said. “That means Malloy?” Scott Malloy was the detective who, the previous autumn, had arrested my wife for attempted murder and directed a search of my house. I had a lot of feelings about him, not all of them enthusiastic.

“I know you’re not crazy about him, but I’m glad it’s Malloy, Alan. It could be worse. He’ll work it up fair. He’s still trying to make amends for what happened with Lauren. And he has kids. I think that will help. It should be somebody who has kids.”

“What about motive, Sam? Does anyone have a clue why Merritt would do this?”

“You know, nobody’s there yet, as far as I know. That will come last. At first, I wondered about burglary. Sometimes these adolescent girls get into goofy stuff, especially when they’re together. But I checked their house real carefully for signs of stashed valuables. I didn’t find anything. Maybe she has a partner in crime who has all the stuff stashed. If that’s the case, it’ll surface. Scum always does.”

I asked, “Have you talked to Brenda to get names of Merritt’s friends?”

“Yeah, already did that.” He readjusted the ventilation vents, which weren’t blowing any air.

I said, “I’m going to see one of them tomorrow. A girlfriend named Madison.”

“Is this part of therapy? Or can you tell me what you find out?”

“I think I can tell you what I find out.”

“Good. What’s this button do?” He pointed at the dashboard.

“Rear speakers.”

“My car doesn’t have any. Merritt’s been under a lot of pressure lately. The whole family has. You know that. Doesn’t excuse anything, but still.”

I said, “Yeah, I know, still. Did Brenda call John while you were at the house?”

“She said she did. She went into the bedroom to do it, though. I didn’t hear anything.”

“I have to talk with him some more. It looks like I may have to go to Denver to do it.”

“John’s all right.”

I said, “What about the suicide note we found on that little computer? What about that?”

“What about it?”

“If Dead Ed killed himself, there’s no crime. Merritt’s clean.”

“Alan, use your head. There are two gunshots in the victim, not one. No weapon was found on the scene. There’s enough evidence-even for an L.A. jury-in my niece’s bedroom. The note is easy enough to fake.”

“I didn’t memorize it, Sam. But it seemed authentic enough to me. I mean, a fifteen-year-old faking that?”

“Maybe, why not? She’s bright.”

“Were her prints on the computer?”

“We don’t have good comps, remember.”

“Were anyone’s prints but his on the computer?”

He didn’t answer me, but his eyes said, “No.”

“Wouldn’t her prints be on the keyboard? If all those other prints you guys collected were hers, wouldn’t hers be on the keyboard, too?”

He placed the pad of a thumb under each of his nostrils and forced air into his nose, clearing his ears. “I know. I know,” he said. “It’s screwy. I told you that from the beginning. It’s goofy.”

“Sam, anything else seem not right to you tonight? I mean, did anything strike you as particularly odd?”

“Other than finding my niece’s clothes covered with somebody else’s blood and a gun in her bathroom? No, nothing else seemed odd at all.”

“Brenda didn’t seem strange?”

“Come on, Alan. Everything involving this family and Brenda and Sherry is strange.”

“Sam, would there have been any reason for Brenda to know Ed Robilio?”

“I’m the last one to ask. I don’t know who they know in town. Sherry has never even seen the inside of her sister’s house. But given Brenda’s line of work, she could know just about anybody, couldn’t she?”

“I guess.”

“Where are these questions coming from? You know something I should know?”

“I’m not sure where I’m coming from. When I first saw the gun in the bathroom tonight, I immediately thought about picking you up for the Rangers game yesterday and going into that house and seeing…the dead doctor. I ran off at the mouth a little about that with Brenda-” I could tell he was about to reprimand me. “Don’t, Sam. And I told her that there was an unsolved shooting that had just been discovered in town and told her who the victim was, and I got the impression, when I said that his name was Edward Robilio, that she knew him.”

“She didn’t say?”

“Not exactly, no. Actually, when I asked if she knew him, she denied it.”

Sam said, “But maybe she knew of him? You know, from her work. Maybe she was investigating him or one of his companies for one of her little features?”

“Cozy just told me who he was. He has more than one company?”

“One major one, that’s MedExcel; I’m sure you’ve heard of that one. A couple of smaller related things that he started recently.”

“I’ll ask her about it, but I don’t think she’s going to tell me the truth.”

Sam nodded. “If Sherry were here, she would be agreeing with that. She thinks that Brenda knows as much about honesty as Simon knows about nuclear physics.”

Finally, I had an inkling of what the feud was about. Brenda’s lack of honesty was part of Sherry’s indictment of her sister. I changed the subject in order to feel Sam out about my plans for the next day.

“I put Merritt on a seventy-two-hour hold tonight. I’m trying to find an adolescent bed in a psychiatric hospital for her. Will the police object to that, to moving her to a psychiatric hospital?”

He was fiddling with the glove box knob. “Probably, but you never know. They may argue that they handle suicide watches better than the hospitals do. If I were you, I would have a judge-proof argument ready, in writing, in case they challenge you. Where are you thinking of putting her?”

“Maybe Centennial Peaks, but I called already and the charge nurse on the evening shift thinks they’re full, though they may have a female bed-maybe-coming free by the weekend. There’s that new place in Niwot, but I don’t have privileges out there and they’re getting mixed reviews from people I know, anyway. I’ll call them first thing tomorrow.”

Sam said, “Wait a second. What about Denver? At Children’s? You worked there once, right?”

“Yes.”

“It would sure make things easier for John and Brenda, having both kids at the same hospital, don’t you think?”

I hadn’t considered the advantages of transferring Merritt to The Children’s Hospital, probably because it would mean a round-trip daily commute to Denver for me to see her for treatment.

“It’s a long way to go, Sam.”

“That’s my point. Save Brenda and John a ton of commuting. You still okay with the people at Children’s, haven’t burned any bridges?”

“Yes, I still have privileges there.”

“Well?”

“I’ll think about it. You want Merritt out of Boulder for some reason?”

“Why would I want that?”

He had that look on his face, so I let it drop. “I don’t want her at Fort Logan, Sam. I’ll warn you now that no matter where she ends up being admitted, I’m going to try my best to get an ambulance transfer completed before the DA gets all his ducks in a row. I’m thinking it’s going to be easier to get a transfer accomplished before the courts and the cops are formally involved.”

He didn’t actually smile, but his mouth widened. “You’re thinking clearly now.”

“Can I take you somewhere, Sam? I’m about ready to go home.”

“No, I want to hang around until Merritt’s protection shows up. Maybe stop in and see her before I go. It’s important to show her we’re behind her, right?”

“Absolutely. You’re a good uncle, Sam Purdy. She’s lucky to have you.”

“I don’t know about that. What she needs right now, I’m afraid, is magic. And I’m no magician.”

“Try and convince Lauren and me of that.” Sam’s police magic had saved my butt and my wife’s butt more than once.

He opened the car door and stepped out. “Think seriously about Children’s. Think of it mostly in terms of what’s best for Merritt. And remember a couple of things. First, sometimes friends lose sleep for friends. And second, I’ll pay gas, even for this bus.”

“You know that’s not necessary.”

“Good, because I was kidding. I do want to know what that friend of Merritt’s says tomorrow.”


I was halfway home when I guessed at Merritt’s motive for killing Dead Ed.

For the first time, I had serious doubts about her innocence.


Twelve | Critical Conditions | Fourteen