“Delia,” Thea called weakly from her table behind us. No energy. Hardly a smile. “You’re here. How long has it been?”
Before Delia could reply, the skin-shivering sound of a rattle filled the rec room. My stomach clenched and my palms went sweaty at the sight of a snake, striated silver with dark gray diamonds, gliding out of the supply closet and across the rec room floor, silent but for its tail.
For a split second, everyone stared, no one moved. Time stopped.
“You gotta watch for pit vipers, Jim,” Grandpa Jack said from the recesses of my memory—a fishing trip to Lake Murray. “’Round here, the Massasauga rattler is the deadliest. Black and silver beauties, they are, but bad news.”
Bad news.
Someone screamed, and time lurched forward. Residents scrambled out of their chairs and backed away. Delia stumbled in her hurry to reach Thea and fell against the table.
And Thea…
My stomach recoiled in horror as Thea calmly watched the snake make its way toward her. With perfect calm, she kneeled on the floor. Her expression blank but almost peaceful. Serene. Resigned. She held out her hand.
The snake’s tongue was a flicking black fork in a mouth that opened to hiss and show its elongated fangs, less than a foot from Thea’s fingers.
I gripped the broom in both hands like a baseball bat, and in three longs strides, I was there. Thea snatched her hand back as I brought the broom handle down on the snake’s head. It made a sickening splat as it connected. Blood and brain matter spurted across the linoleum in a halo beneath its crushed head, but its body still writhed.
Again and again, I brought the broom down, hating the destruction of the animal, hating what Thea had been doing more.
The Massasauga was dead, and I stood, panting, adrenaline coursing through me instead of blood. Rita and the other residents stared. Delia crouched beside her sister, staring up at me with a mixture of fear and shock.
Thea trembled in her arms, locked in a seizure.
Chapter 13
Jim
“Well, Rita?” Delia demanded as the nurse came down the hallway toward the rec room.
“I gave her a mild sedative,” Rita said. “She’s calm and resting.”
Delia sniffed, checked her watch and continued her pacing.
Now Anna Sutton, the head nurse, joined the gathering. It was her only day off, but when Rita couldn’t get Dr. Poole to answer his phone, she begged Anna to come in. She smoothed her skirt and blouse, clearly wishing she were in her uniform.
“Where is Dr. Poole?” Delia asked, arms crossed tight and fingers gripping the sleeves of her blazer. “Or Dr. Stevens? I told you, I want a meeting with both, Monday morning.”
“Dr. Stevens is at a conference in Miami until tomorrow,” Anna said. “Dr. Poole is unavailable. But we’ll arrange—”
“Unreachable, you mean,” Delia said. “Disgraceful.”
“Rita, I want a nurse stationed in Miss Hughes’ room for the next twenty-four hours,” Anna said. “Alonzo, what’s the situation in the rec room?”
“Joaquin’s cleaning up. All other residents are safe.”
The rec room door opened, and Joaquin came out with the mop bucket and a plastic bag, heavy with the bloody coils of the dead snake. I’d offered to do the cleaning, but Delia didn’t want me out of her sight.
“All good, boss,” he said. He gave me a sympathetic glance and rolled the mop bucket down the hall.
“How on earth did a snake make its way into our walls in the first place, Mr. Waters?” Anna asked.
“A hole in the exterior wall that should have been fixed days ago,” Alonzo said. “I take full responsibility.”
I whipped my head toward him. Alonzo had called maintenance a dozen times to fix the hole in the supply closet, and no one showed up. I opened my mouth, but he shot me a hard look and shook his head.
“I see,” Anna said.
“Do you see?” Delia snapped. “A deadly rattlesnake got into this facility and my sister—under your care—tried to kill herself with it.”
I flinched at the words.
Like Cleopatra. She put her hand in the snake’s basket because she’s so fucking alone…
“Given the eyewitness reports,” Anna said slowly, “I’m not sure that’s an accurate assessment of what Miss Hughes was doing.”
“No, she’s just an animal lover,” Delia said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “She was merely trying to pet a deadly snake. And you forget—I was an eyewitness too. I saw what she did.”
“Ms. Hughes—”
“Thea was doing just fine until he showed up.” She jerked her chin in my direction.
“Jim saved her life,” Rita said quietly.
“Jim put her life in jeopardy in the first place,” Delia snapped. “Thea was perfectly happy drawing her drawings. But he took it upon himself to alter her treatment plan, without her unavailable doctor’s consent or consultation, and this is the result.”
She was right, but something still itched the back of my thoughts. Thea had been happy for days before, creating her masterpiece. It’d only been recently that she’d spiraled down.
Still trying to play doctor? Doris sneered. You big dummy.
Anna folded her hands in front of her. “Ms. Hughes, I can assure you—”
“You can assure me of nothing,” Delia said. “Dr. Stevens has vanished. Unqualified staff members are deciding what’s best for Thea. And there was a poisonous snake inside the recreation room.”
She fixed us each with a cold stare, then gave an irritated sigh and checked her watch again.
“I have to go. I actually have a life of my own that needs attention. I’ll be back on Monday for a meeting with Dr. Poole and Dr. Stevens.” She gave Anna a hard look. “Make it happen. Meanwhile, I don’t want this man”—she jabbed her finger at me—“anywhere near my sister. I want him gone. Now.”
“Ms. Hughes,” Anna said. “We do not have all the facts. Dr. Stevens needs to hear the entire story and examine Thea himself before we begin arbitrarily releasing staff members.”
Delia’s eyes flared. “Arbitrarily?”
“However, given the severity of the situation and the fact Mr. Whelan and Nurse Soto both acted without authority or permission…” She gave first me, then Rita a hard look. “I feel a three-day suspension for Mr. Whelan is appropriate. Unfortunately, I simply can’t afford to have Nurse Soto absent.”
“Of course not,” Delia said. “This place is barely functioning as it is.” She shouldered her purse. “I’ll be back on Monday for that conference. If either of the doctors fail to show up, I will remove my sister—and her money—and find another facility that cares about its patients.”
When she was gone, Anna turned her hard look on all three of us. “There is a temporary fix to the outer wall, Mr. Waters?”
Alonzo nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
“And Miss Hughes is stable?”
“She is,” Rita said.
“We’ll keep her on twenty-four hour watch,” Anna said. “If there’s no improvement in her condition tomorrow morning, we’ll extend it to forty-eight. Hopefully, no further measures will need to be taken.”