"Production."

"I'm not anywhere near you. I'm in Deception Bay. Don't tell them that. Tell Pauline to call me and I'll . . . I don't know . . . give her a quote, or something. Better yet, have her call the public information officer at the sheriff's office. That's what she's paid for."

"But-"

"Oh, hell. Give her my cell number. Give 'em all my number." Clicking off, he climbed into the Impala, irked. He was going to have to hand out his digits to every Tom, Dick, and Harry, because Kirsten was right: his days of being banished to a small town were nearing an end. He was headed for the big game, which had been his plan all along, right? And if he was going there, he needed people to be able to reach him.

And then, as if already knowing he was changing his protocol, his cell phone buzzed at him again.

Without looking at the caller ID, he answered, "Frost."

"Hi, there," Geena Cho said. "Got a minute?"

"Geena, for you . . . always."

She snorted at his bullshit, then said, "You know what happened at Seagull Pointe?"

"No."

"Where the hell have you been? Hiding under a rock?"

"Something like that," he hedged, realizing he hadn't been near a television all day.

"And you call yourself a reporter?" she joked. Then, before he could answer, her voice lowered. "So get this. It looks like Justice killed his mama, Mad Maddie. And some other lady, too, who was just found in a wheelchair, apparently, half dead. They transferred her to a bed and she later died. We're putting her picture on the evening news because she's unidentified at this time. They're keeping Maddie's death under wraps as long as they can. Don't want to cause a panic about Justice, but they're pretty sure he's the doer."

Harrison's heart nose-dived. "Where did you say this happened? Seagull Pointe?" he asked, more convinced than ever that somehow Laura had reached him, taunted him, challenged him. His throat tightened at the thought, and he was sick that she, along with the two people already murdered, was in the psycho's sights.

"You got it. And you owe me a drink tonight at Davy Jones's. I'll be there around eight. Don't tell anyone I told you. . . ." And she was gone.

"Son of a bitch," he said into the phone. Switching on the ignition he was about to throw his Chevy into gear when he remembered to check his phone log and the call he'd missed. He recognized the number as Laura's. His heartbeat ramped into overdrive. "Damn." He hadn't expected her to phone him from work, and he listened tensely to her message.

Justice may have killed Madeline. . . . Call me. . . .

So, she'd already learned that Justice had possibly murdered his mother. But at least she was alive. Safe. Or had been when she'd called.

Quickly, he pressed in her number, then waited impatiently while the phone rang and rang and rang. Swearing under his breath, he debated on leaving her back a response on voice mail, then instead decided on "Got your message. Call me back."

"Damn it all to hell." He snapped on the radio, finding an all-news station, then revved out of the Sands of Thyme's lot. He considered driving straight to Seagull Pointe, but he would really like to talk to Laura first. Make sure she was all right. He called again as he hit the highway and, like before, was sent directly to her voice mail. Swearing, he hit the gas, pushed the speed limit.

He knew she was working, that she didn't have her cell on her. That was undoubtedly the reason she wasn't picking up.

Still . . . his mind wheeled to unconscionable images-Justice Turnbull, the icy-eyed psychotic with his need to kill, and the victims. His own mother. An unknown woman and the others . . . oh, Jesus! He punched the accelerator and headed straight to Ocean Park, taking the curves on 101 a little too quickly, the cliffs and dark forest racing by on the eastern shoulder of the road, the sea shrouded by fog stretching to the west. The hospital was on his way to Seagull Pointe, and he intended to stop. If only for a few minutes. He needed to see Laura, to witness for himself that she was okay.

Despite getting hung up behind a logging truck mounded with a heavy load of fir, he pulled into the lot at Ocean Park within half an hour. He parked what seemed a mile from the front doors, as the place was full of vehicles. Jogging, he made his way through the vehicles and into the building, where he didn't bother with the reception desk, entering purposely and heading straight for the elevators. Ocean Park was only three stories high, but he wasn't sure which floor Laura worked on and he would rather discover where that was on his own than reveal his intent to the beady-eyed, suspicious woman manning the desk.

In the end he found that Laura worked mainly on the first floor, and he wound his way back to her nurses' station, only to learn that she was busy with a patient. A petite woman with spiked hair and too much mascara asked him if he would care to wait in one of the two molded plastic chairs set against the wall. Unhappily, he planted himself on the edge of the first chair, taking out his phone to check the time. Five p.m. He'd really wanted to get to Seagull Pointe before the dinner hour. He hoped to interview as many people as possible about both Madeline Turnbull's death and the unidentified woman left in a wheelchair. That was headline news in itself. Who was she? Did her condition have anything to do with Justice Turnbull?

"Harrison."

Laura's voice sounded from down the hall, and he looked over to see her walking his way. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail. The earpiece of a stethoscope peeked out of the pocket of her scrubs, and a look of worry darkened the even features of her face.

Relief washed over him and he shot to his feet. God, it was good to see her.

She was near enough not to shout when she said, "What are you doing here?"

"I got your message. Called you back, but you didn't pick up."

"I know. I'm on duty." She glanced around and seemed to notice the teenager slouched in one of the nearby chairs. He appeared to be asleep, his iPhone tethered to his ears as he listened to music. Nonetheless, Laura shepherded Harrison away from the cluster of uncomfortable chairs.

"I knew you were working, but I just didn't know if you . . . needed me. You told me to call you, and when I couldn't get through . . ." He left the thought unfinished, thinking about how she'd challenged Justice. "I just wanted to make sure everything was okay."

"Everything's fine." She glanced around again, very aware of others' listening ears. As if on cue, an older nurse appeared from the south hallway, one Harrison recognized from Friday night. Perez, he remembered as she approached, a frown deepening across her face as her gaze fell on him.

"You're that reporter," she said, her dark eyes moving from him to Laura.

"I'm following up on the victims of Justice Turnbull's attack," Harrison said to shift the spotlight from Laura.

"One of them was released earlier today," Laura answered, giving him a grateful look, which Perez didn't see.

"I'm assuming that would be Dr. Zellman, as he had the less critical injuries?" Harrison asked.

"I really can't give out any patient information," Laura said, and he caught the warning in her eyes.

Nurse Perez jumped in. "Mr . . . . ?"

"Frost," Harrison supplied. "Harrison Frost with the Seaside Breeze."

"Frost," she repeated. "If you have questions, there's a protocol. Talking to our nursing staff isn't the way it's done." She shot Laura a warning glance.

Harrison nodded. "All right. I'll check with the front desk and have them connect me with your media liaison."

"Good," Perez said with a bite. She looked Harrison up and down, clearly wondering at his easy capitulation.

He sketched a good-bye to both Nurse Perez and Laura, keeping up appearances, but his jaw was rock hard on his way back to his Chevy. Perez's attitude bugged the hell out of him, but he reminded himself that Laura was healthy and safe. That was all he really cared about here, at Ocean Park. As he was getting into his vehicle, his cell rang and it was Laura.

"I only have a second," she said. "I'm off around eight tonight."

"I've got a meeting with a woman from the TCSD at the same time," he said. "I'll come by your place afterward." He made it a statement, but he was waiting for an answer. "Make sure Nurse Ratchet isn't with you."

"Nurse Rat . . . Oh, I get it. Funny," she muttered, and he thought there might be relief in her tone. "Trust me, Perez slash Ratchet is not invited."

"Good."

"See you."

"Looking forward to it, Lorelei," he said, meaning it.

"Only my family calls me that," she told him again.

"I know."

"Okay," she said after a moment and then hung up.

Lang checked the clock in his Jeep: 5:15 p.m. He was driving back from the crime scene site, where he'd met with Deputy Delaney and viewed the dead male body that had attracted the carrion birds. He and Delaney had ended up hanging around a lot longer than either of them wanted while the CSI team swarmed over the scene and the ME finally arrived and examined the body before it was sent to the morgue.

"Busy day for Gilmore," Delaney had said, referring to the medical examiner. "First the body at the nursing home and now this guy."

Lang had nodded. "I'm going to check in at the department and then call it a day."

"You and me both," Delaney had said, giving a last look around, his nose wrinkling in distaste.

Lang drove straight to the TCSD without encountering too much traffic and caught O'Halloran as the sheriff was getting ready to leave. "The would-be wife's on her way from Salem to see if the body belongs to James Cosmo Danielson, her significant other," O'Halloran informed him as they stood on the worn wood floor of the hallway outside the sheriff's office.

"Did our Jane Doe's picture hit the news?" Lang asked.

"Uh-huh. Got her photo and Turnbull's posted about everywhere we can think of."

"Okay. I've got a little paperwork to finish. Then I'm outta here. Unless there's anything more to do tonight?"

O'Halloran sighed and shook his head. "Nope."

"Nothing from the cars watching the lighthouse or the motel?"

"We're having to move around and answer other calls, you know," the sheriff said, a bit defensively. "We're short staffed already and stretched thin with this Turnbull business and the Tyler Mill fire, along with everything else, but we're still patrolling regularly. Somebody'll find him."

Lang had fallen in step beside the sheriff as the older man headed for the back door. They could see through a window to the back lot and together watched as a beat-up Ford Focus dragging its back fender suddenly careened through the mud puddles of the parking lot and came to an abrupt halt outside the back door.

"Who's this?" O'Halloran muttered.

"Don't know."

A woman jumped out of the Ford, her long brown hair a mass of tangles, a baby in one arm and a toddler stuck to her leg like a burr, holding on to her around a tie-dyed dress of olive green, brown, and burnt orange that looked as if it could use a good cleaning.

"Glad I'm leaving," the sheriff muttered.

"Me, too," Lang said.

As she was obviously headed for the back door, they both retraced their footsteps into the hallway, giving her room. Then she burst inside, her face red and puffy, her eyes wild, still balancing both of her kids. The back door was used almost exclusively by the members of the sheriff's department, and when she entered, May Johnson steamed over to bar her from entering.

"Ma'am, you are not allowed through here," Johnson told her sternly.

"I've got my sister's car!" the woman wailed. "I have to see him! I have to see Cosmo! Oh, God."

"The would-be wife," Lang realized in an aside to O'Halloran. He felt instant sympathy for her. She was frantic and then there were the little kids. . . .

"Ahh." The sheriff nodded.

"Ma'am . . ." Officer Johnson had on her deepest scowl.

Which cut no ice with the newcomer, who screeched hysterically, "Where is he? Where's my man? Oh, God. Oh, please, please, God, where's my beautiful man!" And then she collapsed on the floor along with her children, and for once May Johnson looked perplexed and at a complete loss.

CHAPTER 24.

Harrison was buzzed into the reception area of Seagull Pointe and then was immediately greeted with suspicion by the woman at the desk as soon as he said he was a reporter. This was nothing new; it was a condition of the job, a reporter's bane. After dealing with her, he was ushered swiftly into a small room with a calming decor: gray walls, a jade plant near the window, a seascape mounted over a bookcase that held a few tomes, including the Holy Bible. He took a chair at the round Formica-topped table and faced both the director of the place, Darius Morrow, a man in his late sixties with a pious expression and a way of folding his hands in front of him in a holier-than-thou way that set Harrison's teeth on edge, and his female head nurse/administrator/jailer, Inga Anderssen, who, if you looked in the dictionary, the picture beside her name would read "Battle-ax."

"You need to be a relative to receive information on a patient," Darius informed him as soon as he asked about Madeline Turnbull. The man had a habit of wrinkling his nose, as if there were a bad smell in the room, and with the way he held his hands, he looked as if he were about to pray.

"I understand Madeline died from either smothering or strangulation," Harrison said.

"Confidentiality, Mr. Frost," he was reminded tartly.

"The police are investigating," Harrison pointed out. He was winging it, in a way, but Geena Cho's information was generally golden, so it wasn't that much of a stretch, and he'd seen a cruiser parked outside. "They're going to release her name to the media soon enough. I'm going to start reporting today, one way or another. You can give me facts, or I can go on conjecture."

Inga had leaned close to him, glaring at his audacity, but Darius held up a smooth white palm. "Seagull Pointe is a prime facility with an excellent reputation. Of course we don't want conjecture."

Harrison thought he heard a little capitulation in his tone. Just a little. "It sounds like Justice Turnbull came to your facility, found his mother, and killed her."

"That is untrue. He could not get in," Inga snapped as she threw Darius a harsh look that said as well as any words, "Don't buy into his BS." To Harrison, she said aloud, "The doors are locked."

"You need a code," Darius explained and Harrison nodded; he'd been granted entry by the woman at the desk, who clearly watched every newcomer enter with a suspicious eye.

"But if he had the code, he could get in any door, right? He wouldn't have to pass the front desk." Harrison sat back in his chair, growing impatient with the way they carefully thought through every response.

Both Darius and Inga stared straight ahead, as if they were both, independently, trying hard not to give away something on their faces. Harrison reviewed what he'd just said, and it came to him as if their thoughts had materialized in the air in front of him. "The desk isn't manned at night."

"After ten," Darius admitted.

"But he'd still need a code." Harrison was puzzling it out. "Is it a big secret, or just a means to contain the patients with dementia?"

"He's never been here before," Inga stated. "He would not know it."

"Before," Harrison repeated. "So, you do think he did come last night. And it's definitely what the sheriff's department thinks, too." When they didn't respond, he said, "The other woman he killed . . . maybe she gave him the code?"

"She wasn't a patient here," Darius told him. "She is no one we know."

"Maybe she was visiting someone?"

"She was a stranger," Inga said firmly.

"You know everyone who visits everyone?"

Darius dropped his pious look for a brief moment to shrug and spread his hands. "This is a nursing home and an assisted-living facility," he explained. "If a new face comes through, it's noticed. Someone notices. No one knows this woman, and she would not have been able . . ." He let his voice trail off, as if realizing he was giving away more information than necessary.