The Final Victim(53)

"About medium-sized…"

Hearing his snort in response, she keeps her eyes shut, not wanting to see his expression as he jots that down on his report.

He's already all but berated her for not having any idea-who could possibly want to hurt Royce. He questioned relentlessly, as though if he asked enough times, she'd pull a likely suspect out of thin air-or confess to the crime herself.

"Was he fat?" Dorado continues. "Skinny?"

"About medium weight, I guess," she reluctantly says again, and opens her eyes in time to see the look that passes between the two men.

"Listen, I know I'm not much help, but I'm doing the best I can." Her tone is as steely as she can muster, and she clasps her hands on her lap beneath the table so they won't see how badly she's still shaking even now, a good eight hours after Royce was shot.

"We're trying to help you, Ms. Rem-Mrs. Maitland,"

Detective Dorado tells her. "We're going to do everything we can to find whoever did this to your husband. We just need every detail you can possibly come up with."

"Okay."

"Is there anything else you can tell us about his appearance?"

"Just that I know the person was small enough and agile enough for me to think he might be a teenager. You know-he wasn't big and bulky." Like you, she adds silently to Detective Williamson.

"Can you estimate his height?" Williamson asks.

"Not really." Sensing by the look on his face that her answer isn't sufficient, she offers, "I guess somewhere between five-foot-five and six feet"

He writes it down. "And weight?"

"I don't know… under two hundred pounds, I guess."

There's a moment of silence as the detective finishes writing. Then he closes his pad, a cue for him and Dorado to get to their feet and thank her.

"What do y'all do now?" Charlotte asks them.

"Now that the sun is up, we'll be conducting a more thorough investigation of the cemetery," Williamson informs her.

"Let me know what y'all find." She, too, stands, and realizes her legs feel as though they're going to give out Well, what do you expect after a night without sleep and at least eighteen hours without food?

She can't imagine eating anything right now, but she could probably force down a cup of coffee. She needs the caffeine. It's been a long night and it's going to be a long day.

Royce won't be out of surgery for at least another hour. She'll go make a couple of phone calls, then stop in the cafeteria for coffee to bring back up.

"We'll be back to check in with you as soon as we know something, Mrs. Maitland," Dorado says, and both men shake her hand. Williamson's beefy grasp is sweaty and it's all she can do not to wipe her palm on her dress. She's not exactly unsullied herself.

After the detectives leave, she checks in with the head OR nurse to make sure there's no news about Royce. There isn't Clutching her cell phone in her hand, she hurries to the nearest exit, past signs indicating the turnoff toward the Remington Wing.

The first call she places is to Oakgate, hoping someone will answer before the ringing wakes Lianna. Grandaddy had never bothered getting an answering machine or voice mail.

As the phone rings on and on with no answer, she remembers that it's Sunday, the housekeeper's day off. But Nydia usually doesn't leave until late morning, and it's still early, so maybe- "Hello?"

"Nydia?"

"Yes?"

"Have you heard what happened?"

There's a pause. "What do you mean?"

Charlotte fills her in as quickly as she can. T know this is your day off, but-"

"I'll stay right here," Nydia offers without hesitation. "I didn't have any plans for today, anyway."

Grateful, Charlotte doesn't argue with her. "This news is bound to get out, and when it does, reporters might call the house. Can y'all please make sure you don't give out any information? And whatever you do,don't let Lianna find out. She shouldn't hear this from anyone but me."

"I won't say a word."

"Are my cousins there?"

"I don't know. Do you want to hold on while I check?"

No, she doesn't want to hold. She wants to do something else, anything else. She wants to be someplace other than this hospital; longs to flee the concrete walkway leading up to the surgical wing where her wounded husband lies unconscious and ripped open.

"Yes," she tells Nydia, "I'll hold."

She's gone several minutes. Charlotte listens to silence on the other end, watches a couple of doctors step outside and light cigarettes, joining a group of other employees on a smoking break. She turns her back on them, not in the mood to witness their easygoing, upbeat, meaningless chatter out here in the sunshine.

The ER doctor told her Royce was lucky. The bullet lodged in the muscle tissue of his upper thigh. If he had been hit as little as an inch in any other direction, things might have been very different. He should regain full use of his leg after surgery, recuperation, and physical therapy.

Lucky.

The irony of that word choice keeps coming back to haunt Charlotte. Lucky, to be chosen at random by a sniper?

"Mrs. Maitland?" Nydia is back on the line. "Mrs. Harper is here. I told her what happened and I'm handing her the phone now."