Got Your Number

NELL to plump her pillow and brush off the crumbs. "Thank you."
    "I brought you something," Nell said, holding up a white bag. "Jelly doughnuts and milk."
    Angora smiled—maybe she'd misjudged Dr. Oney. She'd thought for some reason that the woman didn't like her. "Thank you. The food here is terrible."
    Nell handed her a doughnut and opened a pint carton of milk. "Go ahead and eat. I had one already."
    She frowned at the message still playing over the intercom. "If there's no fire, why don't they turn off the alarm?"
    "They probably have to wait for the fire department to reset it."
    Angora bit into the doughnut—the food of all foods, in her opinion. Dee wouldn't even allow them in the house. Ooh, and whole milk. Wow. She took a big drink, then winced. "This milk tastes funny."
    "It's fresh," Nell assured her. "I just bought it in the cafeteria."
    "Oh. I'm used to drinking skim."
    "That must be it," Nell agreed.
    She took another large bite and swallow of milk, "Roxann said she was coming over."
    "I'm sorry I'll miss her. I can't stay very long."
    "Roxann really thinks the world of you, you know."
    Nell looked sad. "I think the world of her, too." She stood and walked around the room with her hands clasped behind her, as if she were in the classroom giving a lecture. "I hear that you've been spreading lies about Dr. Seger."
    She stopped mid-chew and talked through a mouthful of jelly. "Huh?"
    "Mike Brown said you told the police that you had a sexual encounter with Carl in his office."
    She swallowed and tried to speak, but her throat was dry and tingly. She downed another drink of milk, then laid her head back. "I wasn't lying. It...happened."
    "You lying little glutton of a bitch," Nell said in a calm voice.
    But Angora wasn't sure she heard her correctly, because something was wrong. Her head felt funny, and her stomach burned—inside and out.
    "He also said that you saw Carl driving away from the scene the night that Tammy Paulen was killed."
    "I...did." She moaned and clutched her stomach.
    "That makes two lies, Angora. I was driving Carl's car. I saw that little slut in the road and I ran over her." She laughed. "Not only did I not slow down—I actually sped up. She was pregnant, you know. She told me it was Carl's baby, but she was a liar, too."
    Nell walked over and lifted Angora's hand, then dropped several capsule halves from her own gloved hand and closed Angora's fingers over the bits of plastic.
    Angora couldn't resist her—she had no control over her limbs. She watched as Nell guided her hand over the tray table and allowed the empty capsules that now had her fingerprints on them to fall out and roll next to the carton of milk.
    "But those are our little secrets, Angora. You can take them to your grave. Which should be very shortly considering the amount of painkiller I put in that milk."
    Angora's tongue seemed to overflow her mouth. She couldn't talk, but she could hear every word the sick woman was saying.
    "I thought they'd lock you up for sure. I set you up with a dim farmer who thinks he's F. Lee Bailey. He told me things because he thought I was trying to help you." She laughed. "I think the poor clod is in love with you."
    "Help...me," Angora whispered.
    "Oh, but I am. You see, you have the reputation of being unstable. Did you know there's schizophrenia in your family? It's hereditary. I know because my mother was schizophrenic." She laughed. "But I digress. You were depressed, Angora. You were just jilted at the altar, then all this business with Carl, then your surgery. You were so overcome with grief that you took your own life with pills you stole from my kitchen cabinet. I made a point of telling my sister when I went to Indy that someone had been pilfering my medicine." She sighed. "So you see, everyone will believe you simply gave up."
    Angora fought the urge to give in to sleep. This was the third time in as many days that she'd thought she was dying, and Dee always said that the third time was the charm. Where was that senior guardian angel? Oh, boy, she was a goner this time, taken down by jelly doughnuts.

Chapter Thirty-five

    ROXANN RAN DOWN the hall, looking for Angora's room number. The acrid smell of smoke was even stronger on this floor, although she didn't see smoke. Capistrano was behind her, followed by two security guards. She was short of breath from running the eight flights of stairs.
    "Here!" she shouted, moving the "room evacuated" door tag to try the handle.