Notorious Nineteen

“And Briggs is waiting for us.”
    “Then let’s get the job done.”
    “My jeans aren’t fitting all that great right now,” Morelli said.
    I noticed.
    Briggs was in his office waiting for us with Mickey Zigler. Zigler was in his fifties. Gray hair in a buzz cut, barrel-chested, bloodshot eyes.
    “Sit,” Morelli said.
    We all sat.
    “What’s your routine on the night shift?” Morelli asked Zigler.
    “I make the rounds every hour. Between the rounds I watch the monitors. We got them all over the building and in the parking areas.”
    “That’s a lot of monitors to watch,” Morelli said.
    “Not so much at night,” Zigler told him. “Nothing happens. Once in a while we get something coming into the emergency room but usually they go to St. Francis. Especially if it’s a shooting. St. Francis specializes in gunshot wounds. Mostly what I see is pigeons walking around in the lot. And sometimes kids making out in the parking garage.”
    “Who watches the monitors when you’re making the rounds?” Morelli asked him.
    Briggs answered. “No one. It’s like that during the day too. There’s no money in the security budget for two guys on a shift.”
    “So if someone knows when security is on the second floor and the nurses are sleeping on the surgical floor, it wouldn’t be impossible to sneak a patient out,” I said.
    “Yeah,” Zigler said, “except we reviewed all the video for the night when Pitch went missing, and it was all the usualstuff. Two to seven is the dead time. There aren’t even pigeons walking around between two and seven.”
    “How long does it take you to make the rounds?” Morelli asked.
    “A half hour. Unless something unusual happens, it’s a half hour on my feet going through the hospital and then a half hour watching the monitors.”
    “When you get to the fourth floor what are the nurses doing?” I asked him.
    “They’re usually at the desk, working on the charts or talking.”
    “Are they ever asleep?”
    “I never saw anyone sleeping. Sometimes Julie looks a little zoned out. She has a tough life. But I never saw her sleeping.”
    “How about Kruger?”
    “I never saw Kruger sleeping.” He looked at Briggs. “Sometimes she disappears for a while.”
    “Where does she go?” I asked Zigler.
    Zigler grinned. “Sometimes she gets the orderlies to diddle her in the dayroom. I figure it’s none of my business, but since you asked.”
    “Do you have any idea how these patients disappeared while you were working security?” Morelli asked Zigler.
    “No, sir,” Zigler said. “I think it must have been aliens. You know how they can beam you up?”
    “That’s on television,” Morelli said.
    “Maybe,” Zigler said.
    I followed Morelli out of the hospital and we buckled ourselves into the SUV.
    “Aliens,” Morelli said. “I think he was serious.”
    “It is hard to explain.” And hell, I was carrying a chunk of wood around with me that I almost believed was putting ideas into my head. I was ready to believe just about anything.
    We called ahead to Pino’s and ordered meatball subs. Morelli stopped at his house and got Bob and a six-pack of Bud. We picked the subs up and took everything up to my apartment. We were in front of the television, eating the subs, drinking beer, and watching a pregame show for the Mets. I heard something go phoonf from the parking lot and my living room window shattered.
    Morelli vaulted over the couch, picked something off the floor, threw it out the shattered window, and a moment later there was a loud explosion from the parking lot.
    I went to the window and stood next to Morelli. Three cars were furiously burning. One was Morelli’s. The Buick was fine.
    “I’m thinking about marrying a woman who gets rockets launched into her living room,” Morelli said. “What’s wrong with this picture?”
    “You’re thinking about marrying me?”
    “I’ve been thinking about marrying you for ten years,” Morelli said. “Do you want to explain this latest terrorist attack to me?”
    “It’s all a misunderstanding. Some nutcase guy thinks I’m in a relationship with Ranger.”
    “Are you?”
    “In a relationship with Ranger? No! I’m working for him.”
    “And this is why the nutcase guy just fired off a rocket into your living room?”
    “Yes.”
    “Do you know him by name?”
    “Not exactly. Ranger’s working on it.”
    Emergency vehicles were pouring into my parking lot. Fire trucks, EMTs, police cars.
    “I