Chapter Eight

The Washingtons headed to Sunshine Haven. Dad and I followed a few minutes later. With several people visiting Mom at once, it might not seem as odd if someone wandered off and chatted with the staff.

In the parking lot, I scanned the cars. Some must belong to visitors or patients at the physical therapy offices. Even if the car that had almost hit me belonged to an employee, they might not be working this shift, or they might have more than one vehicle. Still, maybe I’d spot some bumper sticker or mark on the car that I’d only noticed subconsciously. The lot held half a dozen smallish gray or silver cars, and several more white ones. None caused me to say, “Aha!”

I could only keep an eye out and use car color as one small point of reference if we narrowed our suspect list.

As we passed the reception desk, I waved the others on while I stayed behind to talk to June Songpole. Her smooth, young face, framed by black hair, was only vaguely familiar. How had I missed her silvery-gray eyes, even when I’d been doped up on pain beds three days before? But her regular schedule would have put her at the desk during my first visit.

I leaned on the desk to take some weight off my leg and gave her my best tough reporter stare. “You were here the other day, when I spent some time with my old friend Heather.”

Her eyes widened. “Yes?”

“Who did you tell about our chat?”

Her gaze darted side to side. “I didn’t . . .” She sat up straighter and firmed her expression. “I’m not a gossip. Mr. Mendelson always warns us about that.”

“Mr. Mendelson?”

“He’s the memory care program coordinator.”

“What does that mean?” We were already off topic. Curiosity is a curse.

“He trains the care staff and volunteers to ensure each patient gets the right care plan.” June shuffled some things on the desk. Her long, painted fingernails had little stars on them. “Oh, and he screens new patients and explains things to the families.”

“Okay.” I needed to get back on track. “So he wouldn’t approve of you gossiping.”

She shook her head. “No, he’s always talking about patient confidentiality.”

“That’s fine, but I’m not a patient. And you did tell someone about my meeting with Heather, didn’t you?”

“Honestly, I wouldn’t gossip!” June lowered her voice. “Please don’t get me in trouble. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt anyone here, honestly.”

I didn’t entirely trust anyone who felt the need to use “honestly” that often, but if she had mentioned my meeting to someone, she was too frightened to admit it. Maybe I should have tried a gentler approach. After all, she was a young American office worker, not a suspected terrorist or military commander.

Did I know any gentler approaches? None came to mind.

I eased off the desk. “All right, I’m going to talk to Ms. Garcia now, if she’s available.”

The girl’s eyes widened.

I sighed. “I won’t complain about you, but make sure you don’t gossip about your boss’s meetings either. She wouldn’t like that.”

June nodded. “I’ll let her know you’re here.” She picked up her phone and pushed a few buttons. She gave my name, so she knew who I was. “You can go back.”

I went in Heather’s office and closed the door. I would’ve liked to know if June called anyone to report my presence, but I couldn’t spy on her and keep my conversation with Heather private at the same time.

I limped toward Heather’s desk. “I have some questions.”

“I thought we weren’t supposed to talk while I’m at work.”

“That ship has sailed. I believe someone already thinks I’m investigating. And they don’t like it.”

She blew out a long breath. “That’s not good. What am I going to do? If one of our staff has been killing patients, we’ll be ruined.”

I plopped into the chair across from her. “Not to mention people dying.”

“Yes, of course, and we can’t let it happen again.” She sighed. “I sound callous, but I want this place to succeed, to be a great home for patients, and I . . . we can’t afford more scandal.”

“More scandal?”

She winced. “We reorganized some time back to improve patient care. We’d had some complaints.”

That was a dodge if I’d ever heard one, but I’d likely get more from news archives than pressing her. I settled back into the chair and stretched out my legs. “There’s no guarantee yet that you have a killer.”

“But if someone is worried about you investigating, doesn’t that mean they’re guilty?”

“Probably, but guilty of what?”

She shook her head. “You’ve lost me.”

“Someone seems to be anxious, maybe even panicked, simply because they know I’m a journalist, and you and I talked. You’re focused on the deaths because that’s what has you worried. But how would anyone know I was investigating that? Unless your office really is bugged and they heard the whole conversation.”

She peered around the room. “Can you check?”

“Sorry, journalist, not spy. If anything, I’m usually the one doing the recording. But I wouldn’t worry. How would they know to bug the office in advance? They’d have to be . . .” She wouldn’t like the idea that someone had been spying on her long term. “Anyway, the point is, I’ve stirred up someone, which suggests something illicit. Could be illegal, could be legal but secret, like an extramarital affair. Could be related to the deaths, could be something else entirely. I don’t want to make assumptions yet.”

She placed her hands palm-down on the desk. “So I don’t have to bring the police in yet?”

“I don’t have anything solid, so let’s wait on that. I need to know more about the patients who died, and the woman who got sick. Symptoms, who was on duty, that sort of thing. And I want to talk to the families.”

“I shouldn’t—but—give me an hour and I’ll see what I can do.” She drummed her fingers on the desk. “In the meantime, if you’re here to visit your mother, you might take her to the sunroom. It’s a lovely space and a lot of the families enjoy sitting there to visit. In fact, Mrs. Gregorian’s family came in a little while ago, and they always take her there.”

“Mrs. Gregorian?”

“Yes, you probably won’t get much out of her, but you might like speaking to her family. They can tell you about her experiences here. How she was treated when she was sick, for example.” She raised her eyebrows and I could practically see the thought bubble over her head yelling, Hint, hint!

The spirit of confidentiality might be broken, but at least Heather had avoided telling me flat out that Mrs. Gregorian was the patient who’d gotten sick but recovered.

“All right, thanks.” I rose, took two steps, and turned back. “One more thing. Do you know any employees who drive a silver or gray car?”

She stared. “Probably several of them. Can you be more specific?”

“Unfortunately, no.”

She shrugged. “My Taurus might fit, depending on how broad you want to go with the color. Officially, I think it’s called champagne. Why?”

“Never mind.” If all else failed, I’d get someone watching the parking lot, or maybe tracking down registrations. I’d followed slimmer leads before. Though not often.

Mom’s room was packed. Between my parents, the Washingtons, and to my surprise, my sister, I could barely get in the door. I greeted Mom and suggested we move to the sunroom.

“We were waiting for you, so you’d know where to find us,” Dad said.

Jen helped Mom stand, but then Dad edged between them, offered Mom his arm, and led her out. The Washingtons followed, while I lingered behind with Jen, who glared at me for some mysterious reason.

“I didn’t expect you here today,” I said.

“Mom had an appointment to get her toenails trimmed. Someone had to be here to make sure they did it right.”

“I thought you wanted me to take over stuff like that.” Not that I particularly wanted to, but she’d made it clear that it was my turn.

“Would you have done it?”

“If I’d known about it.” It had never occurred to me that someone would need an appointment to get their toenails clipped, or that such a momentous event couldn’t happen without our supervision.

Jen huffed out a sigh. “If I have to explain everything, it’s easier to do it myself.” She stomped out of the room.

I closed my eyes and took a couple of deep breaths. I really didn’t have the time or patience to deal with her issues right now. On the other hand, I didn’t have the tolerance to put up with them long term. Add “sort this hostility with Jen” to the to-do list. Way, way at the bottom.

She stood outside the door, hands on hips. “Do you even know where the sunroom is?”

“I suspect I could have found it. I am a journalist, you know. I do have some ability to uncover simple facts.”

Jen rolled her eyes. “If you want to make sure Mom is getting good care, you can’t merely stop by once in a while to chat with her. You need to be on top of everything. This place is better than most, at least now, but the only way we got Mom in at this price was because of the reputation it had two years ago. They seem to be trying hard, but for how long? They’ll start cutting back on staff to save money again, and patients like Mom will suffer.” She hurried down the hall. I could barely keep up with her pace and also process her words. She turned at a wide doorway and entered a large, sunny room with clusters of tables and chairs. She paused to look around.

I grabbed her arm. “What kind of problems did the place have before?”

She twitched her arm away. “Poorly trained staff and not enough of them. Patients got urinary tract infections because their diapers weren’t changed, or gum infections because their dentures weren’t cleaned. One woman got sores on her feet from wearing the same compression stockings for weeks.”

“What?” My stomach clenched. I’d seen people suffering from hygiene-related illnesses and wounds, but I didn’t expect it in America, at a nursing home supposedly run by medical staff.

Jen hugged herself tightly. “Horrible stuff. Some patients were heavily sedated and only allowed to leave their rooms with a family member. That was the staff’s way of making sure no one got injured in a fall, but what an awful way to live.”

“They can do that?”

She blinked moist eyes. “No, but yes. It’s called medical restraint, using drugs to keep people immobile like that. It’s illegal, but there’s a clause about using the minimum means necessary for safety, and it was abused.”

I leaned heavily on my cane to keep from collapsing under the weight of this new knowledge. “But it’s not like that now?”

“Not since the lawsuit.” Jen gave herself a little shake and strode across the room to join our parents.

I slumped against the wall, thinking about what she’d said. I’d heard horror stories about nursing homes before, but the topic had never been a particular interest of mine. Children dying in war was a bigger issue. But now that my mother was in this facility, the problems of caring for an aging population took on greater meaning.

Heather must have quite a job, trying to keep patients healthy, family members happy, and costs reasonable. If Sunshine Haven had received such bad press a couple of years earlier, no wonder she worried about its reputation.

How long had she been working here? Had she been part of the problem, or only part of the solution?

The answer might turn up in her background check. In the meantime, I needed to identify Mrs. Gregorian and her family. The room held two groups besides ours. Three elderly people, possibly all patients, sat at a table playing cards while a heavyset woman in a white uniform looked over a man’s shoulder. They probably weren’t the Gregorians, but the woman might be one of the nursing staff we wanted to investigate.

Joe Washington strolled toward me.

I said softly, “Check that woman’s name tag, and if she’s on our suspect list, listen in a bit.”

He nodded and kept wandering the room, as if admiring the views from the windows.

The other group had a white-haired woman with a walker next to her chair, a man and a woman probably in their fifties, and a girl who might have been in high school. The women were all seated, the older two holding hands while the girl talked animatedly. The man stood behind them, glancing around and shuffling restlessly. He might welcome an interruption.

I made eye contact as I approached.

“Hi, I’m Kate Tessler, Ursula’s daughter.” I nodded toward my mother.

He gave Mom a split-second glance. “Quincy Russo.”

“Is that your mother?”

“Mother-in-law.”

So it might be Mrs. Gregorian.

We chatted about the place in general. He clearly didn’t like Sunshine Haven much, but that seemed to be his discomfort at being in a nursing home, rather than specific complaints. His wife gave me puzzled looks, but Quincy seemed happy to have someone to talk to. Meanwhile, the young woman described a recent dance recital. Across the room, Joe Washington laughed with the nurse and her charges. Dad and Marty Washington visited with my mother, while Jen glared at me.

Finally, I asked Quincy, “What happens if she gets sick or injured? Or haven’t you had that problem yet?”

“Oh, she was real sick not long ago.” He glanced at his mother-in-law with an odd expression. “Recovered, though.”

His wife stood to join us. “You’re talking about when Mom was sick?”

I nodded. “My mother is new here, and I want to make sure they’ll take care of her properly.”

“Of course. We were so worried about Mom. Her recovery was a miracle.”

Quincy grunted.

“That sounds pretty serious,” I said. “What did she have?”

“We never did find out. They called us because Mom was vomiting. We figured stomach flu or food poisoning, but the nurse insisted no one else was sick. And then Mom went unconscious.”

“Not exactly,” her husband said.

“Close enough.”

I looked between them. “What happened?”

“They called it stupor,” Quincy said. “We could wake her up, but she kept dozing off again. I mean, she’s usually out of it, but this was extreme. You couldn’t keep her attention for more than a few seconds.”

“Sounds scary. I’m glad she got better.” I gazed at the patient, trying to think of additional questions.

She was slim and I thought she’d be tall, although it was hard to tell since she was sitting with her shoulders hunched forward. She had fluffy white hair, oversized glasses, and a yellow sweatsuit. As I watched, her eyes drifted closed and her head dipped forward.

The young woman said, “Mom, I think Gran is tired.”

“Let’s get her back to her room.”

The two women roused the patient, who seemed surprised to see them, and helped her stand at her walker. They stayed close to her as she shuffled toward the doorway. I got a glance at her nametag and confirmed that I’d found Mrs. Gregorian.

Quincy lingered behind, watching them. He said softly, perhaps to himself, “It would have been better if she’d died.”

I stared at him.

Quincy quirked a half smile and shrugged. “Someday, you’ll understand.”

He strode after his family.

Surely, if he’d tried to kill his mother-in-law, he wouldn’t have spoken like that to a stranger. Was he simply tired of visiting Sunshine Haven? Tired of the expense, the time spent, the worry? Did he think his mother-in-law’s life was pointless now?

I looked at my family. Would I ever get to the point where I thought Mom would be better off dead? Where her passing would be a relief?

Alzheimer’s patients could live for years. That had seemed a comfort at first. It was a horrible disease but not an immediate death sentence. Now, I imagined visiting day after day, watching Mom slip away, while we fought to give her as much comfort as possible.

I shook away those thoughts and reviewed what the Gregorians had said about the illness. Vomiting and a stupor. She’d recovered, even though they didn’t know what was wrong. But it wasn’t clear if Mrs. Gregorian had been treated somehow.

I hurried after the family, dodging around a man who’d entered the room in the last few minutes. I spotted Quincy heading into one of the patient rooms. When I got there, I rapped on the open door.

“Sorry to interrupt. I wondered, when she recovered, did they do anything for her, or did she get better on her own?”

Quincy shrugged.

His wife looked thoughtful. “You know, she actually seemed to get better after her dialysis treatment.”

“Oh, she gets dialysis? That’s for kidney failure, right?”

The woman nodded. “She’s been getting dialysis for over a year now, every Monday morning. The doctor didn’t want to delay her treatment, even though she was so sick Sunday night. She seemed a lot better Monday afternoon, although maybe it’s a coincidence.”

“Interesting. Well, thank you.” I backed into the hallway.

My foot landed on something and a grunt ruffled my hair. I shifted my weight to regain my balance and twisted toward the man I’d passed as I left the sunroom. I skirted around him. “Sorry,” I muttered, although if he didn’t want people stepping on him, he shouldn’t hover so close.

He walked beside me and spoke in a low voice. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t bother the other patients and their families.”

“Excuse me?” I stopped and turned to face him head-on. He was about forty, wearing a button-up sweater over a dress shirt, which seemed a bit warm for Arizona, even inside in November. He wouldn’t have stood out in a crowd—medium build, brown hair, plain face, wire-rimmed glasses. He smelled like a type of laundry detergent I particularly hate because it reminds me of cat pee.

“I wasn’t ‘bothering’ anyone,” I said. “I was simply making conversation.”

He lifted his chin. That was the only way he could look down his nose at me, since he was only a few inches taller. “I heard you asking about Mrs. Gregorian’s illness. That was a difficult time for the family. You brought up bad memories.”

“They seemed willing to talk about it. And I have a right to ask other patients and their families about their experiences here.”

He gave a little hmph. It wasn’t quite the same as the throat clearing from the fake Henry Wilson. I tried to compare his voice to the one I remembered and could only decide they might be the same, if he’d been trying to sound different before. This man seemed more soft-spoken and prim, less confident and blustery, but neither had a noticeable accent.

“In the common rooms, perhaps, but please stay out of patient rooms,” he said. “If you have questions, you may ask me. We take patient confidentiality and privacy seriously, and I don’t want to see anyone upset or disturbed.”

“And you are?” I asked, even though I had a guess.

He frowned. “Norman Mendelson, memory care program coordinator. You can make an appointment to see me any weekday, and I’ll answer all questions you have about patient care.” He strode away.

So I’d met the man the receptionist mentioned, the one so concerned about confidentiality. I was generally in favor of privacy. Still, I had to wonder—was this obsession designed to protect the patients?

Or was it to hide wrongdoing?