So far so good…
She didn’t wait to revel in her success. Instead, she transferred the cash into the yellow medical waste bags, hoping that the biohazard symbol, warning of highly infectious diseases, might just be enough to keep anyone from examining it if someone wanted to search the ambulance. It was farfetched and unlikely, but then again, an hour ago she never would have believed she’d have stolen from a dead patient.
Now with two empty medical kits, she raced back into the apartment. Her eyes darted from street to the various closed windows, where someone might be watching. She felt exposed and helpless, trying and discovering it was impossible to come up with any excuse for why she should be carrying heavy drug kits out to the ambulance and then back again.
Virginia reached the open room and immediately started the process again. There was no time for planning, only time to move. She quickly shifted the next set of bundled cash into the two empty medical kits.
She finished transferring the cash.
The enormity of what she was doing weighed heavily on her as she wrestled with the last of the resus gear, randomly shoving it into the top of the kit bag and trying to drag the overloaded zipper forward. It was stuck, and for a moment it wouldn’t move. She tried to force it, but the zipper only broke free of the toothed running line. She wanted to just force it harder, but experience had taught her that the only solution was to return the zipper to the beginning and start again so the toothed grooves could be fed correctly.
She sped the zipper all the way back to the beginning, squeezed the equipment down as hard as she could, and then tried again.
This time, when the zipper reached a small amount of resistance, she stopped. Took a deep breath in and held it. Jiggling the zipper, she eased it forward. It slid past the obstruction, running all the way along its rail and sealing the medical kit.
She expelled the breath with an audible sigh.
Virginia stood up, gripping both medical kits. She glanced at the scene once and then felt her stomach churn with fear. A single $10,000 bundle of cash was lying next to the dead drug dealer’s chest. It must have fallen while she was transferring the money from the duffel bag. If it was left there, the detectives would instantly question where it had come from and where the rest of the cash might have gone.
There was nothing she could do about it. She needed to get rid of the bundle. She dropped the medical kits and raced over to pick up the money.
Virginia gripped the bundle in her hand, trying to think where she could possibly put it. There wasn’t even anywhere to hide it on the floor. The bed was just a mattress on the floor. Without a base, there was nowhere to hide it. She frantically searched for another place to put it, stepping toward the bathroom.
The beam of a powerful flashlight lit up the hallway.
There was a firm knock at the door. “Police.”
Chapter Eighteen
Virginia held her breath, counted to three, and then said, “I’m down here at the end.”
She stood up, and watched two uniforms and two suits enter. One of the uniforms shined his flashlight around the room, and said, “Hello? Police.”
“In the bedroom” Virginia said, walking toward the door.
The detective glanced at her, with an incredulous smile. “They sent you to this place on your own?”
“They didn’t have any other crews to cover the job.”
“And you entered here on your own?”
She nodded. “Yeah, worse than that I’m on dayshift.”
He smiled. “You’re a brave woman. I wouldn’t want to do that and I carry a gun. Place like this is dangerous for anyone. I’m surprised your union lets them get away with it.”
She shrugged. It was an ongoing debate. “Ideally paramedics should never be sent anywhere alone, but when you don’t have the resources to cover emergencies, what are you going to do about it?”
He made a modest smile, like they’d both had to deal with the same sort of bureaucratic budget restraints. “My name’s Eric Greentree. This is Paul and Doug from the 79th, and this is my partner, Kay Armstrong.”
“Virginia Beaumont.”
Greentree ran his eyes across the body. “This one been here long?”
“A few hours I’d say,” Virginia said, taking off her gloves and hoping the Police wouldn’t notice the rivers of sweat that now dripped off her saturated, wrinkled hands “I got all set up to give it a go, but once I got a better look at him, well, that’s when I realized it had already become more of a job for your agency.”
“Drug overdose?”
“There’s injecting stuff on the bedside and he’s got a belt on his arm there, but I’ll leave it up to the coroner to decide. I’ve been wrong before and all that,” Virginia added, as she tried to sound casual and risked eye contact with the lead Detective, a small waxy man who seemed all elbows and hips in a badly fitting suit.
“Do you think you’re wrong here?” Greentree asked.
“No. But…”
“Go on.”
Virginia smiled. “There were no track marks on the guy’s arm. He did a good job finding the vein with a single needle. If I had to guess, I’d say it was the first time he ever used the stuff… but, as I said before, I’ll leave that up to the coroner — I’ve been wrong before.”
Greentree nodded and glanced at the bags of meth amphetamines and heroine. “Sure. It’s unlikely the coroner’s going to be interested in the case. Looks to me like you’re right.”
She started to pack up the remaining medical waste into a yellow biohazard bag. She could feel her heart pumping in her throat. She was close, she just had to get past the natural line of questioning, and she’d be free. “Yeah, that’s what I figured. Drug dealer tries his own merchandize for the first time, and it all goes wrong.”
Greentree studied her. His brown eyes intense and penetrating, like he was ready for an interrogation. “You don’t look so great.”
“I know, I’m sweating up a storm here. I think I’m coming down with something.”
“Are you from the fifty-seventh?”
“Yeah.”
“I can catch up with you later in the week for your statement if you like. You must by dying to get home if you’re dayshift.” The Detective reached for his notebook. Before the policeman could ask, Virginia volunteered her details.
“I’d appreciate that.” Virginia sidestepped closer to the man and the odor of stale black coffee and cigarettes crept over her. “My name’s Beaumont, I’m in car three-twenty-six. I’m back on dayshift tomorrow and nights after that for two.”
“Okay, thank you ma’am,” Greentree replied, without writing down any of the details. “Talk to you later, we’ve got it from here.”
Virginia tucked the first medical kits over her shoulder and then picked up the second kit, followed by the biohazard waste bag.
Detective Greentree stared at her. “Here, let me carry one of those for you. You look totally wrecked. Maybe you should call in sick tomorrow.”
She headed toward the door. “It’s all right, I’m fine. I’m used to it.”
The detective ignored her and removed the larger of the two kits from her shoulder. “It’s all right. I want to head out to the car and make some calls, anyway.”
“Thanks.”
Greentree gripped the medical kit. “Wow. It feels like it weighs a ton. I can’t believe they make you carry this stuff into each case. What have you got in this thing?”
She made a thin-lipped smile as he held the front door open for her. “Yeah. You get used to it. It’s meant to all be for emergencies, but half the stuff we almost never use.”