High Country Nocturne (David Mapstone Mystery 8)

“We continue to hold out hope,” the woman said.

I realized that was meant to be honest yet comforting but it almost pushed me off the edge of a very tall cliff. I nodded.

Did I wish to speak with a social worker? No.

They swept off to do doctor things. Had I even gone to use the restroom, I might have missed them.

I waited for visiting hours and sat with Lindsey. I left reluctantly. I wanted to stay, sleep in a cot next to her, never let go of her limp hand. But I didn’t have that choice.

So I decided to take a walk.

It was Monday.

Chapter Eighteen

The address McGuizzo had given me went to one of the skyscrapers in Midtown Phoenix. Once it had been the headquarters of a bank.

The bank was long gone, one of the many casualties of the 1990 crash. Since then, much of corporate Arizona had either been bought up or migrated out to Twenty-Fourth Street and Camelback Road or to north Scottsdale. That left Midtown with half a dozen zombie towers. This office was in one of them.

It was close enough to walk on a morning like this, when the temperature was barely sixty and the dry, clear sky ridiculed the plight of Lindsey and me and hundreds of other patients and family members at Mister Joe’s. The sun was its intense self. I slid on dark glasses. They also helped conceal my black eye.

I trooped across the parking lot of Park Central, past the Good Egg where Lindsey and I had eaten breakfast what seemed like years ago, when we were fresh from our fun in the hotel shower and the biggest problem was a missing Mike Peralta and the diamonds. It seemed like a big deal then.

The tower was a bland sheet of blue glass, turned at an angle to the avenue, utterly dead at street level. The architect, if you could call him that, had intended the building to have a relationship only with the automobile. Like all its siblings, it was attached to a long, multi-level garage that sat on its backside.

That’s the way I made sure to come in with others. My timing let me catch up with a half dozen of the few people that still worked there. It was eight-thirty. I was the tallest in the group, dark hair, broad shoulders, too memorable. I was the only one who pressed the elevator button to the eighteenth floor.

When the doors opened, a sign directed me to a law office in one direction. He was not a lawyer. I went the other way until I found the suite number that Jerry had written on the notepad. It went to a door, five long steps on the carpet and ten more on tile, making the turn that the building’s cube shape demanded. The door was only adorned with a number, no nameplate. Across from it was a fire extinguisher set into the wall, nothing else. Not even restrooms or a drinking fountain. It looked like a dreary place to work.

I listened for a few minutes, pretending to study the note. Only the electrical hum of the tower’s core spoke back. Was the occupant a guy who rolled into the office early to talk to clients on the East Coast, or did he keep ‘Zonie mañana-time hours? There was only one way to find out.

I put my hand on the door and turned it.

The door opened.

The view was dazzling through large windows. The outer office was empty and the lights were off. A receptionist’s desk was unstaffed. Two chairs and a sofa held no customers. On a low table, several celebrity magazines were neatly laid out.

The art on the blond wood walls consisted of colorful, vintage travel posters: “visit the Pacific Northwest wonderland—travel by train,” “Grand Hotel Roma,” and “the Dune Beaches by the South Shore Line.”

It was difficult to tell what business resided here.

I decided to wait by the glass, taking in the South Mountains and Sierra Estrella. The air wasn’t too dirty this morning. I prevented my gaze from going lower, where it would find the white hulk of the hospital.

And like the hallway, the room contained only the silence of human-made spaces, especially the whoosh of the air conditioning.

“Anyone here?” I finally called out. The reception area had two doors. One, I had used to enter. The other was between the sofa and a sickly looking potted tree. I knocked and no one answered.

I said “hello” as I opened the door inward. No one responded.

This office was large but spare. The walls held more of those travel posters with fantastical images of trains, ships, and bathing beauties from the twenties and thirties. Two dark wood chairs sat in front of a desk that might have been new when the building went up. An executive chair with the stuffing coming out of a tear beside the head completed the ensemble.

It was dim with shades down keeping out much of the light.

I stepped in.

“Hello?” Out of old habit, I added, “Sheriff’s Office.”

It looked as if I had beaten everyone to work this morning.