Private L.A. (Private 6)

Justine was out cold, already snoring.

Chapter 83

IT WAS ALMOST midnight before I reached UCLA Medical Center. I got past security by showing my Private ID. We’ve done pro bono work for the hospital in the past, which helps when we want access at odd hours.

I reached the floor of the ICU, my mind whirling with everything that had unfolded during the day, including several things Justine had said to me before I was able to get her back to her apartment, into her bed, under the covers, lights off with a bucket by the nightstand.

In my car on the way there, she’d roused from her stupor.

“Love you, Jack,” she mumbled. “Thanks.”

“I love you, too, Justine, and no problem.”

She shook her head. “Can’t work, though. Us.”

“I know.”

Joy and Luck, her female Jack Russell terriers, kept jumping up on her bed and whining after I’d laid her in bed fully clothed.

Justine’s eyes were glassy and roaming as she soothed the dogs into lying beside her. “Sorry.”

“For what? You had a few too many. I was glad to bring you home.”

Her eyes closed. “Not ’bout that,” she said.

“Go to sleep, Justine. I’ll let the girls out, talk to you in the morning.”

“I had … I had sex with this perfect … no, not-perfect stranger, and … I’m not perfect stranger, and …”

She passed out again, and I walked the dogs and headed for the hospital, feeling oddly hollowed out by her convoluted drunken confession. Justine having sex with not-perfect strangers? Getting drunker than I’d ever seen her?

What the hell was going on?

That question was still bouncing through my brain when I went through the ICU doors and saw Angela, Del Rio’s Filipina guardian angel, glaring at me from inside the nursing station.

“He’s sleeping,” she hissed. “You can’t go in there.”

I held up my fingers in a cross and hurried past her. I could hear her clogs clip-clopping after me all the way to Del Rio’s room. Ducking inside, I found him sitting up, watching Anderson Cooper’s interview with June Wanta.

“You see this?” he asked, laughing. “Crazy old lady.”

I stopped at the foot of his bed, looked to my right, saw Angela coming, said, “Speak of the devil.”

Del Rio laughed again and then said, “Angela, it’s okay. I couldn’t sleep, and this guy’s so boring to listen to he’s better than pills or counting sheep.”

She thought about that, shot me another hostile glance, said, “You cannot sleep here. UCLA Medical Center is no Super Eight.”

“I’ll leave when he conks out,” I promised, and waited until she’d left before taking a chair. “How are you?”

“Lift the sheets,” Del Rio said.

I did and was amazed to see him moving both of his feet ever so slightly.

I said, “Keep this up, you’ll be back dancing with the Bolshoi in no time.”

“The Bolshoi?”

“Twyla Tharp?”