Page 69 of The Mermaid Murder

“Let me finish. Protect your badge. Unless there’s something more important in need of protecting. I trust you to know when that is, and what it is. And I will always have your back.”

Relief dragged a smile across Jeremy’s face, and he hugged Mason hard. “Thanks, Uncle Mace.”

“I’m proud of you,” Mason said, clapping him on the back.

It was probably just the smoke in the air making my throat tighten and eyes water.

* * *

RACHEL

When Mason and I walked into the hospital, we didn’t have to ask where Quaid was. Two cops were standing outside door of his room. Jen was one of them. The other was a sixty-plus, whipcord lean man with a face like shoe-leather, snow-white hair, and a mustache that would make a dust mop jealous. He wore a uniform and a badge, Saratoga County Sheriff.

Jen said, “Sheriff Rasmussen, these are the people I was telling you about, Detective Brown, Rachel de Luca.”

“Folks. Appreciate your intent, but uh?—”

Mason held up his hands. “Hey, we’re only here to help. We don’t want to get in the way of your case.” Then he shook the man’s hand. “Good to meet you, Sheriff.”

“This is way too many people!” A nurse, a redhead I could feel was all business and super good at her job, came waving her hands like she was shooing pigeons off a park bench. “There’s a waiting room right through those doors. Sheriff, you have a call. You can take it at the nurse’s desk.”

The sheriff nodded, then pointed a finger at Jen. “Nobody in or out ‘til I come back.”

“On it,” she said, then she moved to stand beside the hospital room door with her back toward the 227 on the wall.

I looked at Jen and shrugged. She said, “I’ll get you in fast as I can. Promise.”

“Thanks.”

The nurse leading Sheriff Rasmussen away sent us a glare over her shoulder, so Mason and I retreated into the waiting room. Jeremy was just coming in. He’d hung back, because Misty had called, and the expression on his face was lighter and more cheery than was appropriate for the situation. Worry cleared from my mind like dark clouds driven by a warm wind. Then a little bit of darkness returned. I hoped she hadn’t used her own phone.

“What’s the update?” Jeremy asked.

“Detective Scott and Sheriff Rasmussen get to go first,” Mason said. “I’m not sure we’ll get a shot at all.”

“Which is fine, because that way I get take my turn with you. Your uncle’s pep talk back at the scene was great. But now you get to hear mine.”

“Ah, hell.”

“You’re a rookie cop and you’re—” I stopped, looked around the waiting room. No one was around. I lowered my voice all the same. “You’re risking your career. Your future.”

“Like Uncle Mace hasn’t done the same for you? For me? for Josh?” He walked to a chair but didn’t sit in it. He stared down at it instead. “It was Misty. And she wasn’t doing anything wrong. Really. A little wrong, but…” He heaved a sigh and turned to face us as a bunch of racket broke out behind the double doors.

I got up and pushed them open to see people in scrubs racing into Paul Quaid’s hospital room, past Jen and the sheriff who were standing outside the room trying to see past the crush of bodies.

“What happened? What’s going on?” I moved toward them and kind of herded them away from the door. They were blocking the flow of staff.

“I don’t know. I think— I think he’s dead.” Jen pushed a hand through her hair and rose on tiptoe to try to see him. The door was still open, so we could see the backs of the people who surrounded him. Yellow scrubs, blue scrubs, scrubs covered in cartoon cats.

Sheriff Rasmussen gave Jen Scott’s shoulder a brief squeeze, a fatherly sort of gesture. “Don’t know what happened,” he said. “We went in to talk to him, and he was… gone.” He shook his head. “I know dead when I see it, and he was gone.”

I looked at Mason and bunched up my eyebrows. He acknowledged my feeling without even changing expression. Something wasn’t right here. I looked around, thinking maybe the dead guy would put in an appearance. I even closed my eyes, not giving a shit how odd it might look.

Hey Paul Quaid, I thought at him. You can talk to me if you need to. I can usually hear.

But there was nothing. Mason put his hand on my shoulder, and I opened my eyes to see Jen and the sheriff looking at me oddly. Jen said, “I know it’s a lot. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought you guys in.”

A nurse came out, the same one, but she looked frazzled and sad. “I’m so sorry. He’s passed.”

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