Eve’s lips twisted. “We appear to be in the same boat. No one told me either until she disappeared. My mother had to sign papers that Beth’s birth was not to be disclosed. And I doubt if Beth knew about me. My mother kept her word. Beth belonged to the Averys and not to her.”
“Interesting.” His gaze focused on her face. “You don’t look like her.”
“No. But there’s a slight family resemblance.” Bonnie’s curly hair that was so like that of Beth in the photo. “And I’m sure that she looks more like her father. He was very good-looking, wasn’t he?”
“Yeah, I guess so. Beth said he was the handsomest man she’d ever seen. She only saw him a few times a year, but she loved him. She still loves him.” He was carefully taking off the bandages on his face and neck. “The bastard never visited her since she came to that hospital.”
“What are you doing with those bandages?”
“Quinn called me a mummy. The bandages attract too much attention. They’ll stop me if I try to walk out of here with them on my face. I can cover the ones on my chest and arms.” He frowned impatiently. “If Quinn gets a move on and brings me—”
“Shut up,” Joe said as he came into the room. He tossed a bundle of blue-green scrubs on the bed. “It takes time to walk in and steal surgical garb from under the noses of everyone in the ER. We’re just lucky it’s a busy night. Tunic, pants, slippers. Do you need any help getting dressed?”
“I can manage.” Newell swung his feet to the floor. “But I’ll need to hurry. I can’t take the chance of—” He inhaled sharply as he stood up. “Shit.”
“Sure?” Joe asked.
Newell nodded and reached for the tunic. “I’ll slip out the door where the ambulance brings in the patients. Bring your car around and wait for me there.”
Eve gazed at him skeptically. “You don’t look very well. There’s a good chance someone will stop you.”
He shook his head. “Not if I do it right and look as if I know where I’m going. If I seem to have a purpose and appear a little impatient, no one is going to get in my way.”
“Will they put out an alarm when they find this room empty?”
“No, they’ll just assume someone else has come in and taken me to an available room. Hospitals aren’t always efficient, and it may take them a few hours just to find out I’m not here. Believe me, I know.” He was carefully working the tunic over his head. “Get out of here. I’m okay.”
“If you say so.” Eve turned away. “But if you go out another door and try to give us the slip, I’m coming after you, Newell.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not well enough to be deceptive. Though I might have tried that if I thought I could get away with it.” He added grimly, “But I’m not the one who is going to suffer if I move too slow. Just have that car at the entrance. I’m not going to be able to do much for a few hours beyond getting to the front door.”
“It will be there.” Joe took Eve’s arm as they left the room. “Tough. I believe we’d better look beyond the personnel record he gave to the hospital.”
“I’m glad he’s tough. He would never have been able to get Beth out of there if he weren’t.” She added as they walked out of the hospital and headed for the parking lot, “He told me that he’d found out that she was attended by all kinds of different doctors during the years. One of the first ones was a German doctor who specialized in memory erasure by hypnosis. It was the principal treatment during her first year at the mental hospital.”
“Did you get his name?”
“Yes, Gelber, but won’t it be in the records?”
“It depends on whether they wanted to have the details of that particular therapy documented.” He opened the car door for her. “And what memory they were determined to erase.”
“You mean the memory that someone tried to kill her on that ski slope?”
“I’m not sure they did.” He shook his head. “I’m not sure of anything right now. We’re only putting together the pieces one by one.”
“And Newell should be able to give us a few more pieces to add to the puzzle.” Eve’s gaze was on the emergency door. “I think he cares about her, Joe.”
“We’ll see. When he first came around her, evidently she was almost a vegetable. It’s difficult to develop any feeling for a woman in that condition.” Joe’s tone was noncommittal. “It could be that he just hates her enemies. It would have the same effect.” He started the car. “There he is. Bold as brass. He’s right. No one is going to stop him.”
Newell’s skin was pale against the blue-green scrubs, but his step was firm as he came toward their car as they pulled up before him. “It’s about time.” He opened the rear door and climbed into the car. “I told you it was an emergency.” He sat up very straight on the seat until they had driven out of the hospital zone. “Okay.” He slumped back on the seat and closed his eyes. “Give me a minute. Get on the highway and head north.”
“Suppose we talk first,” Joe said.
“I can’t talk right now. And I can’t wait for you to interrogate me.” His hands closed into fists at his sides. “Drive, dammit. There’s no time. Look, he got my cell phone. I tried to get one of those EMTs to let me use his phone to call Beth, but he wouldn’t do it.”
“I imagine they were too busy trying to save your life,” Eve said dryly.
“I have to warn her, and they wouldn’t listen to me. By the time I got to the hospital and persuaded the intern to let me use his phone, it was too late. She didn’t answer.”
Eve stiffened. “You think Drogan managed to find her?”
“I don’t know, but there’s a possibility. He could locate the nearest tower from her GPS if he has the right equipment.” His lips twisted. “And he impresses me as a person who’d have the right equipment. He takes both pride and pleasure in his work. I learned that when he was cutting my flesh with such precision.”
“Could he con her into telling him where she’s located?” Joe asked.
Newell shook his head. “She’s inexperienced, but she’s not stupid. She’d see through him.” He added half beneath his breath, “I hope.”
“But you’re not sure?” Eve asked.
“How can I be sure? Look, Beth has had years of being told she’s a mental cripple and had to be cared for. They reinforced it with hypnosis and drugs. I’ve only had her for the last eighteen months. She’d grown accustomed to trusting everyone with whom she comes in contact. Do you know how hard it was for me to break that trust?”
“Tell us,” Eve said. “And while you’re at it, tell us why you bothered to do it.”
He didn’t answer for a moment. “I … like her. At first, I just felt sorry for her and pissed at those sons of bitches who were making her into a living corpse. She was like a little girl lying in that bed and smiling at me whenever I came into the room. She smiled at everyone, even Pierce’s whore, Stella Lenslow, who liked to come in and taunt her. The bitch was even cutting her medication during the last six months. She was hoping that Beth would suffer withdrawal from the drugs.” He shrugged. “She didn’t realize that I’d begun weaning her off them nine months before that. But Stella’s viciousness made Beth’s increasing alertness more plausible, and since she was Beth’s principal nurse, it worked into my plans. Toward the end, I had to make Beth pretend to be in pain a couple times when Stella was in the room to make Stella happy and not give away the fact that the decrease in dosage had little effect.”
“We’re on the freeway,” Joe said as he entered the ramp. “Now where are we going?”
“Seventeen Mile Drive. Near Carmel.”
“That’s where she is?” Eve asked.
He nodded. “I used to work for a man who has a house there. He always spends this time of year in the south of France, and the house is vacant. I knew it would be safe for Beth.”
“How? It’s too close to Pierce and the hospital. I would have thought it would be safer for her to get out of California entirely.”
“It was better if she was close enough so that I could help her if she needed me.” He paused. “Besides, she wasn’t ready.”