Mother-Daughter Murder Night(55)
Jack went to school. Beth went to work.
At 6 p.m., the two younger Rubicon women stumbled back into the hospital, less hopeful but more prepared, with clean pajamas for Lana, and burritos for themselves.
After an unsatisfying check-in with the doctor in the patient waiting area, Beth sent Jack to get hot chocolate and entered Lana’s room on her own. The only noticeable change was a large bouquet of wildflowers on the bedside table next to the heart-shaped rock. The card read, “I am so sorry. Please call me. I want to know everything you saw, everything that happened, so I can make it right. Wishing you every recovery. V.”
Beth didn’t understand it. But the flowers were the least of the things that didn’t make sense about the situation. Just a few days ago Lana had been strong-arming Beth to help with the investigation. And now here she was, prone on a hospital bed, a bundle of ragged breath and unanswered questions.
Lana looked even smaller than she had the day before, fragile, as if the aura of invincibility that usually surrounded her had cracked and torn. Beth had always seen Lana as one of the strongest women on the planet. That didn’t exactly qualify her as a good parent, but Beth had gotten over that a long time ago. Lana was someone impressive. Someone, she realized, she was proud to know.
The woman in the hospital bed before her had dark bruises, sunken eyes. There was a butterfly bandage over the tiny stitches on her cheekbone. Beth bent down and gently ran her hand over her mother’s patchy hair, picking a tiny black pebble from her scalp.
“What were you doing?” Beth whispered. “Come back to me.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
On Friday morning, after a fitful sleep at home, Beth and Jack arrived at Lana’s room to find an empty bed.
Beth’s heart raced. “Ma?” She knocked on the pocket door of the tiny bathroom. “Are you in there?”
The door slid open. Lana shuffled out of the bathroom and stumbled toward her daughter. Beth flung her arms wide, and Lana fell into them. Jack came over and wrapped herself in from the side. For a long minute never to be spoken of again, the three women hugged.
They resettled around Lana’s bed, Lana propped up against a stack of crinkly pillows, Jack curled on the mattress around her feet, Beth on a plastic visitor’s chair.
“Is one of those for me?” Lana asked, eyeing the Styrofoam cups of coffee.
Beth handed her a bottle of water, twisting the cap half-open. “How are you feeling?”
“I’d be better with coffee.”
“Let’s take it slow, Ma. You’ve been out for almost two days.”
“Not quite. I woke up late last night with a terrible crick in my neck. I would have called you, but I couldn’t find my phone.”
“I have it. And your tote bag.”
Lana took a long sip of the water. “Did my wig make it?”
“I don’t think so. I have your suit, but it’s in pieces. The ICU nurses had to cut it off you because of all the glass embedded in the back. How are you feeling?”
“Sore. But I’ll survive. The doctor came by this morning. He said he expects I’ll make a full recovery.” Lana’s voice was rough, as if she’d swallowed a lump of charcoal.
Jack squeezed Lana’s hand.
“You were so brave, Prima.”
“Not really, Jack. I just don’t want to miss your high school graduation.”
“Don’t start getting modest now,” Beth said. “I talked with the firefighter, Chase Tucker, who brought you in. He said you practically leaped out of a burning building and kept going. He said if he hadn’t run into you, you would have crawled all the way here yourself.”
“Mmm. Chase. I had a dream about his . . . suspenders.” Lana looked over at the bedside table. “Are the flowers from him?”
Beth handed Lana the card.
Lana read it, looked at the bouquet, and jammed the card back into its envelope, her mouth set in a tight line.
“Victor. Hmpf. He probably set the damn fire,” she said.
“The man who runs the land trust? Why would he do that?”
Lana glared at a calla lily. “Maybe he wanted to scare me off. I think he was involved in Ricardo’s murder.”
Jack rested her hand on her grandmother’s ankle. “What did you find?”
“Victor and Ricardo were doing a brisk business in that little do-gooder office. Lots of contracts, lots of money. The fire started right when I was getting to the good stuff.”
Beth shook her head. “I don’t think you’ll be able to go back anytime soon. The rear of the building is apparently a crater, and the rest of it’s covered in water and soot. You got out of there just in time.”
“It was arson, right?”
Beth rubbed at the dark circles under her eyes. “I don’t know, Ma. But Detective Ramirez came by. Apparently the Santa Cruz police towed your car. Evidence, the detective said. She wants to meet with you.”
“Now she’s willing to talk to me.” Lana’s smile broke into a hacking cough.
Beth handed her mother the bottle of water. “We can call her when we get home.”
“Once I get my list of questions together.”
“Sure, Ma.”
Lana put down the water bottle and motioned with her chin to the Styrofoam coffee cups. “You aren’t going to tell me this is a stupid endeavor? Trying to crack the case? Chasing down a murderer?”