The Night Stalker_ A Novel of Suspense - James Swain [41]
“It is a voice,” Crippen said.
“I think it’s a woman.”
“What is she saying?”
“I’m not sure. We need more volume.”
Crippen cranked up the phone’s volume and replayed the message. We both leaned in to listen. The voice was a woman’s, and she sounded as if she was at the bottom of a deep hole.
“Somebody help me!”
“Is that her?” I asked.
Crippen opened his mouth, but no words came out. It was all the answer I needed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Call the police,” I said.
Crippen was visibly shaken. He picked up the phone on Stone’s desk, and mechanically dialed 911. Taking the transcript and police reports, I went into the hall and copied the pages that Stone had highlighted, then returned the originals to the office. I clicked my fingers, and Buster rose from the floor.
“Where are you going?” Crippen asked.
I stopped in the doorway. I was going to Memorial Hospital to visit Ron Cheeks, and talk to him before the police did. I wanted to know why Cheeks hadn’t leveled with me about his involvement with Abb Grimes’s case. Only Crippen didn’t need to hear that.
“I’m going to look for Stone,” I said.
“Please call me immediately if you learn anything.”
“I will. I’d appreciate it if you did the same.”
Crippen nodded absently and I left.
The hospital lot was full. I parked on a residential side street and rolled down the windows. Buster got the hint, and curled up on the passenger seat. I went inside.
The lobby was filled with pregnant women and half-dead retirees. I got Cheeks’s room number from the receptionist, and took a stairwell to the fourth floor. Cheeks was in a single at the end of the hall. I peeked into his room to make sure he had no visitors. Cheeks sat upright in bed watching Divorce Court with the volume jacked up and a big smile on his face. The room was devoid of flowers or balloons or even a single Get Well card. As I entered, he jumped.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Cheeks asked.
“Bedpan check,” I said.
“I’m recuperating. Get out.”
“Not before we have a little chat.”
“I don’t have anything to say to you.”
I tossed the copied pages onto his lap and pulled up a chair, the metal legs scraping harshly across the floor. Cheeks grabbed the phone from the nightstand.
“I’m calling security,” he said.
“I’m working with the police,” I said. “Call Chief Moody if you don’t believe me.”
“I don’t care who you’re working for. I’m having you tossed.”
“Do that, and I’ll tell Moody about you and Piper Stone.”
Cheeks’s face twisted in a frown. “The bitchy little lawyer? What about her?”
“She disappeared this morning. Left her office and came over here to talk to you about Abb Grimes’s trial. That was the last anyone saw of her. She left a message on the voice mail at her office. You can hear her screaming. Where did you put her, Ron?”
Cheeks dropped the phone into the receiver with a horrified expression on his face. “Are you accusing me of abducting her? You’re flipping nuts. I’m sick.”
A clipboard hung on the edge of his bed. I picked it up, and read through Cheeks’s medical condition as recorded by his doctor at nine o’clock this morning.
“According to this, you’re perfectly normal,” I said, dropping the clipboard. “My guess is, you faked that heart attack, giving you a convenient way to get taken off the case. But Stone figured out you’ve been hiding something, and she confronted you.”
“Crazy talk,” Cheeks said.
“Did you speak with Stone this morning?”
His face reddened. “What if I did?”
“What time?”
“You don’t have any right to grill me.”
“I’m on the case, dickhead. What time did she come in?”
“Around eight. It was cordial. I got the orderly to get her coffee. We talked for about twenty minutes, then she split.”
Cheeks was softening up, trying to placate me. I pointed at the copied pages lying in his lap. “You were actively involved in Abb Grimes’s murder investigation. Is that what you and Stone talked about?”
Cheeks hesitated. He blinked several times.
“She wanted to go over some things,