Chapter Five

“You’re late.” Marlee’s gaze scrolled over Lacy before it dropped back to the chart in her hand.

“I know and I’m sorry, but guess what?” Lacy asked the moment she spied her supervisor leaning against the customer service counter with her brows angled into a stern V. “I ran into Jake at lunch, and he needed medical attention, too. I couldn’t just leave him.”

She hated lying, but it wasn’t a total untruth. She had run into Jake. He did need medical attention, and she did plan to treat him when she got back home—if he’d let her. Jake always had that force field of his on high alert, like he was afraid to breathe around her. Mental note to self: Buy a couple shaving kits on the way home. No. Make that one. Two will overwhelm Jake. He’ll have a hard enough time accepting one, but buy two toothbrushes. They don’t need to share dental hygiene.

“I guess we all do what we have to do,” Marlee replied.

Lacy glanced at the attending physician out of the corner of her eye. Marlee almost sounded like she knew what happened, but by then she had her face buried in another chart. Lacy couldn’t tell for sure what was going on.

The flu season was in full swing, as well as all the usual ailments that came with cold December weather. The clinic walls were thin. It was hard not to know everyone’s business.

Myra Miller brought her mother in with another UTI, urinary tract infection. Stanley Bernstein needed a different blood pressure medication, and shy little Deloris Wasserman came in under the pretense of needing a flu shot when she’d actually wanted contraceptives. She was thirteen, going on thirty, also going behind her mother’s back, but the law was the law. Deloris went home with a six-month supply of birth control and a gentle admonition from Marlee that boys who wanted you to prove you loved them weren’t the right kind of boys to hang around with. Deloris hurried by Lacy with her head lowered and the small brown paper bag tucked under her arm.

All in a day’s work.

The Good Samaritan didn’t close its doors to anyone for any reason or at any time. The night shift was due at six pm. Until then, Lacy went back to restocking the supply cabinet.

The next emergency came through the front doors with two firemen and Mr. Lamont Adams, the elderly owner of Lamont’s Pool Hall, an established hangout on Sixteenth Street. The aroma of smoke and ash came with the threesome, only Lamont was on a stretcher with an oxygen mask strapped to his face, and he was fighting mad.

“He insisted,” the taller fireman with the crooked smile, said. The name on his chest said Cruz. Hispanic, she guessed. Sexy, her brain noticed. “Besides, we couldn’t wait for the paramedics to show up. Chief said to transport so we brought him here ourselves.”

“What burned?” Marlee asked as she took over the gurney, her hand on Mr. Adams’ shoulder to calm him.

“They torched my pool hall, Doc Presley,” Lamont growled beneath the mask. He was in his late seventies and as feisty as ever, but angry tears stained the sides of his sooty black face, dripping through the wiry hair of his gray sideburns.

“And I’ll bet you tried to put it out all by yourself, didn’t you?” Lacy asked, relieved it was just his pool hall and not his home. Mrs. Adams was sickly. She might not have made it out alive.

He nodded, choking with emotion. “’Course I did. Only way they could get me to move was to burn me out. I been there fifty-five years. I wasn’t going easy.”

“Who?” Lacy asked. “Who wanted you out?”

“That sissy from California, that Poindexter punk. He’s been by my place a couple times with his highfaluting offers that ain’t worth crap. He’s got another thing coming. I ain’t giving him squat.”

“Were you there when the fire started? Did you see anything?” the other fireman asked. He was as rare as Lacy and Dr. Presley, another white person in all dark Anacostia. They did tend to stand out.

“’Course I was there, sonny,” Mr. Adams snapped. “I’m always there. You can’t trust anyone these days. Don’t you know nuthin’?”

The guy winked at Lacy for the chewing out he was taking. Her gaze shifted over his name. Smyth. Even with soot on his face, he cut a handsome profile. Tall, dark and extra hot. Crap. After six years in the military, she was still attracted to a guy in uniform, even the dirty yellow turnout jacket and pants this guy wore. Designed to repel heat, they weren’t working on her. Damn, he made his protective gear look good.

“I just need to ask a few questions, Mr. Adams,” he said, his attention back on their cantankerous patient. “Tell me exactly what you saw.”

“I seen them two sneaking bastards of Poindexter’s driving away in a dark blue SUV just before I unlocked my front door and smelled the gasoline. There was smoke everywhere by then. The basement must’ve already been burning. Soon as I opened the door, the whole place…” He choked, dashing his tears away angrily. “The whole place went up like they’d planted a bomb in my pool hall.” His thumb hit the center of his chest. “My pool hall, goddammit. They blew me off my own front step and twenty feet into the street. Damn punks.”

“Don’t you worry,” the tall fireman said, thumping poor Mr. Adams’ ankle. “I’ll check what’s left of your business once it stops smoking. I think you’re right. It looked like arson to me too, but we need to make sure.”

“You’re damned right it was arson,” Mr. Adams barked, coughing and sputtering, his anger getting the best of him. “That snot-nosed punk made me an offer two days ago. Said I couldn’t refuse, well I showed him. I told him where he could stick his twenty K.”

“He offered you twenty thousand for your pool hall?” Lacy asked in shock.

“That’s all?” Marlee asked right on the heels of her question.

Mr. Adams nodded, lifting the oxygen cannula out of the way so he could talk. “It’s winter. I got no insurance,” he muttered. “I got nothing. And Martha’s sick. What’s an old man supposed to do now? I can’t start over. I can’t rebuild. How am I supposed to take care of my wife? I can’t even buy her a Christmas present now. Damn him. He got what he wanted after all, didn’t he?”

Poor Mr. Adams fell apart and no one spoke. Marlee took over, soothing him with medical chatter while she rolled him into Exam Room One. The firemen retrieved their gurney and went out the door and back to work. Smoke inhalation wasn’t a two-woman emergency, but Lacy hovered within earshot anyway. Mr. Adams refused to go to the hospital for further treatment, said he still had work to do at his pool hall. Marlee said no, he didn’t, and that she’d prefer to keep him for observation the rest of the afternoon just to be safe. He relented, but only because Mrs. Norton was staying with his wife. Lacy added his name to the list of people in special need of Christmas assistance.

She and Marlee had spent one glorious evening last December delivering surprise packages to folks who had nothing. Some of the donations came from local merchants and grocery stores. Some came from other doctors and nurses, but some were from her own pocket. The thrill of hiding behind bushes to watch what those random acts of kindness meant once they were received? Priceless.

But something was definitely going on in already troubled Anacostia and all fingers pointed to Poindexter.

The mighty Anacostia River used to divide the haves on the north side from the have-nots on the south side. There was a day not too long ago, when just the thought of making a wrong turn and ending up across the Pennsylvania Street Bridge was enough to send a visiting tourist into cardiac arrest. After all, certain sections of the district were known for their high murder rates, drug use, and lots of other unsavory stuff. Nice tidy tourists didn’t care to see squalor, poverty, and the rundown side of the nation’s capital while on their vacation.

Even Rafael Poindexter never showed up in this lowly part of D.C. without his stretch limousine and bodyguards. You’d think a real estate chump in a three-piece suit would stay on the safe side of the river where he belonged, but no. Intent on what he called, ‘The abundant opportunities for gentrification of downtrodden Anacostia,’ Poindexter had rammed one new business development after another down the throats of the beleaguered whether they wanted it or not.

First came the artsy-fartsy cafes, the upper-scale smoke and espresso joints, the one-of-a-kind museums that sold off the wall crap they called art. Those kinds of businesses were designed to intrigue the free thinkers and hippies with low rent and the slim possibility of getting rich quick. But then came the clever franchise stores with their familiar names and the implied trust it brought with them. It wasn’t like their presence didn’t lure a few brave entrepreneurs and customers across the bridge, but they pushed a lot of the artists out, and despite all, business remained slow and lackluster. This was Anacostia after all.

Poindexter didn’t seem to understand that a bad rep was a hard thing to turn around and Anacostia had one of the worst. Hell, the town had always had double-digit unemployment, even when the rest of D.C. prospered. What’d Poindexter expect? It would be easy?

So why didn’t he just pack up and go back to the West Coast where he belonged? Was beating up a couple bums the likes of Jake and Jamaal going to change anything? And who needed the one-eighth acre lot where Lamont’s Pool Hall now lay burned to the ground?

Lacy put in another half hour of work to make up for being late. She couldn’t afford to have her paycheck docked. While Marlee was busy with a patient, she requisitioned an extra-extra-large sweatshirt and matching pants for Jamaal. He needed more than a skimpy hospital robe to wear when he came to. But just in case, she guessed wrong, she snagged another size. Who knew? Maybe he liked his clothing loose? Stashing the sweats, a couple packs of men’s briefs and socks into her backpack, she breathed a sigh of relief. At least Jamaal would be warm until she could find a way to replace the clothes she’d cut off him earlier.

For her last duty of the day, she dusted off the cardboard carton from the farthest back corner of the supply closet. She’d meant to decorate the clinic counter before Thanksgiving, but the flu and cold season had been busier and earlier than usual. After rinsing the cheery red and green garland, she shook the excess water off and taped it to the edge of the customer service counter. A small tabletop Christmas tree with white twinkling lights took up its normal post to the side of the counter while a box of tissues and a bowl of peppermint candies sat beneath it. If nothing else, the patients who came and went during the holidays would have fresh breaths when they left.

With her backpack securely over her shoulder, and finally on her way home for the day, Lacy turned and ran smack into Dr. Presley.

“We need to talk,” she said sternly.

Crap. Lacy gulped. She’d been caught. To make it worse, Marlee’s toe was tapping on the linoleum. She must’ve found out that Jamaal wasn’t at the hospital where she’d sent him. Maybe she knew what was in the backpack, too? Crap. Dropping her gaze to the floor, Lacy followed Marlee to the end of the hall and her office opposite the supply cabinet.

“Have a seat,” Marlee directed as she closed the door behind them.

Lacy took the chair in front of Marlee’s desk. Crap. I’ll be fired for sure. Damn it. Who’ll hire me now?

“As you may or may not know, we’ve had some thefts lately,” Marlee said as she took her seat opposite Lacy, too serious to be anything less than a stern administrator and her brown eyes intent on the pen in her hand.

Lacy gulped past the dry knot lodged at the back of her throat. She’d done wrong with the best intentions and gotten caught anyway. Marlee must know about the Z-pak, too. Crap. All Lacy could do was apologize for not following orders and hope Marlee gave her another chance. And if not? Crap. Giving Jamaal back wasn’t in the cards. Crap and double damn. She’d be back in the unemployment line by morning. How could she help Jamaal then?

She bit her lip and faced Marlee, prepared to face her consequences head on, if she’d ever look up from that stupid blue pen she kept rolling between her index finger and thumb. Lacy held her breath. She’d learned damned early in the Corps. Never volunteer anything.

Finally, after what felt like ten minutes but was probably only sixty seconds of sheer hell, Marlee lifted her chin and stared Lacy down. “I want to trust you.”

You can—most of the time. Swallowing with a gut full of guilt was impossible, so Lacy gave Marlee more time to expand on that very duplicitous statement that didn’t tell her a damned thing. You can trust me all right. To do what’s right even when it gets me in a pile of steaming crap. I am a Marine, remember? I don’t follow bullshit rules, and I don’t give up on my men.

“Something is going on in this clinic,” Marlee said quietly.

Okay, go on. That could mean you’re still going to stick it to me. Spit it out. Why am I here?

“Oh?” Lacy offered nothing up and went fishing instead. Her jarhead swagger began to emerge. Instinctively her chin cocked and her already stubborn back stiffened. If Marlee wanted to make accusations, she’d better be ready for a fight. “Like what?”

“Like Mr. Adams for one thing,” Marlee said quietly. “Mrs. McCallister for another. Did you know someone burned a cross on her back porch two nights ago?”

Anger replaced Lacy’s defensiveness. Sweet Emma Shirleen McCallister? The elderly widow who showed up every Christmas Eve with homemade cookies and hand-crocheted doilies for everyone who worked at the clinic? The thoughtful grandmother who called everyone doll or honey? “Was she hurt?”

Marlee shook her head. “No, but she left town the next day to move in with her sister in Rhode Island. The poor thing walked away from everything she owned, even left her door unlocked. Lamont told me Rafe’s men paid her a visit before she left, too. Her place is across the alley from his pool hall. Now it’s empty, but that’s not all.”

Lacy held her breath. What could be worse than bullying a poor widow out of her home and all her earthly possessions?

“I want you to take something home with you tonight,” Marlee said, pivoting her knees to her right while opening her side desk drawer. Out came a black cash box with a silver handle on the lid. It measured no bigger than a shoebox. She set it in the center of the desk. “I’d take it, but I already take all the narcotics home every night. I could get fired, but I don’t care. I’d never ask you to do this if I didn’t trust you implicitly.”

Whew. Lacy swallowed. Implicit trust was good. Out went the fear of reprisal and in came cold hard dread. What was so bad that Marlee took the narcotics home every night?

“I used to live in Sacramento,” she confided. “I’ve seen Rafael at work.”

“Mr. Poindexter?” Lacy had to ask, just to make sure she’d heard right. What did he have to do with the drugs or what was in that lock box?

Marlee nodded. “He’s a driven man, Lacy, and he will turn Anacostia around. It will prosper by the time he’s finished if he has to drive everyone out to do it.” She gulped, and for the first time, Lacy’s eyes were drawn to the tight lines in Marlee’s slender neck. Her fingers trembled on the lid of that black box between them.

“What’s in it?” Lacy nodded her chin toward the box.

Marlee’s eyes brimmed. The tremors of her hands had moved to her head. This poor woman was falling apart. “Evidence,” she whispered.