Never Tell (Detective D.D. Warren #10)(13)

To judge by the look on his face when I opened the Tiffany box, my mother had done the actual picking out of the pendant, but I still hugged my father gratefully, his beard tickling my cheek. And he still hugged me back enthusiastically. Geniuses are geniuses, you know. You can’t expect them to waste their brilliance on such trivial matters as a daughter’s birthday gift. That’s what wives are for, my mother would tell you.

If everything had stayed on track, I would have attended Radcliffe, married some up-and-coming genius, maybe one of my father’s own research students, and gotten a string of pearls of my own to wear in a neighboring Cambridge home, where I would teach piano, or something equally respectable.

If everything had stayed on track.

“Squat,” the nurse says now.

I am completely naked. My clothes stripped off and taken away as promised, even my underwear. I stand alone with a female nurse, who—given my rounded belly, or maybe the lack of needle tracks on my arms—is doing her best to appear kind.

I still have that surreal feeling. This can’t be me; this can’t be my life. It’s three A.M. I should be home. With Conrad.

I don’t know what to do with my hands. Cover my belly, as I’ve been doing for months now? Or my bare breasts? My exposed pubis? I settle on my stomach. The rest of me already feels too long gone.

“Nothing but an unfortunate accident …”

She will come. She will come for me next. Then, the real adventure will begin.

“Honey,” the nurse says, snapping the glove on her right hand. “The sooner you do this, the sooner both of us get on with our lives.”

I nod. I squat. She inspects. Next order. I bend over, best that I can. She inspects.

I don’t cry. I’ve never been good at tears. My mom, she breaks into hysterics at the drop of a hat. Sixteen years ago, she did enough crying for the both of us. But me—under stress, loss, extreme pain?

I never cry.

I just … hollow out. A pit of anguish.

I feel it now, for my baby. Who will never grow up in an impressive Colonial in elite Cambridge, or even a well-intentioned fixer-upper in Winthrop.

Then I take it back. Because if I’m found guilty of shooting Conrad, if I go to jail this time, when my baby is born, they will take him or her from me. And there’s only one person they’d give my baby to.

I start shivering then, and I just can’t stop.

The nurse thinks I’m cold. Given my unclothed state, I don’t blame her. She produces the promised orange jumpsuit, along with voluminous panties. She steps back a few feet as I wrestle the clothing on. The underwear are just plain wrong, like granny panties met men’s boxers and tried to mate. The orange jumpsuit is also overly large, and scratchy from harsh chemicals. I can get it over my belly, but it swims around my upper body. The shoulders land somewhere around my ears. The leg length is intended for someone twice my height. The nurse takes pity on me and helps roll up the hems before I trip and fall.

We’ve already run through all my vitals. Physical description, date of birth, identifying tattoos. Foreplay before this main event.

Now it’s done. I’m in the system. Not a prisoner, yet, I’m told, as I’m in jail, which is considered temporary. It all depends on how good my attorney, Dick Delaney, is and what happens at the courthouse a mere few hours from now.

“You’ll be in your own cell,” the nurse tells me now, throwing away her gloves, picking up her clipboard. “How do you feel?”

She nods toward my rounded belly.

“Tired.”

She hesitates. “You’re entitled to a medical hold. If you have any concerns about your health, the baby’s health.”

I have a sense of déjà vu. Mr. Delaney asked me all these questions. I didn’t get it then. I don’t get it now.

“Your pulse rate is fine,” the nurse says now, looking straight at me. “Surprisingly strong, all things considered.”

I don’t have tears. Just an endless void of anguish.

“Your vitals are stable. In my honest opinion, I would stick to your own cell. But of course, you have rights …”

“What happens in medical?” I ask finally.

“The infirmary is a different ward. More like … a hospital. You’d get your own room there, as well as access to medical staff, twenty-four/seven. Are you depressed?” she asks abruptly.

“I’m tired,” I say again.

“If you have concerns, any thoughts of harming yourself, your baby …”

“I would never do anything to hurt my child!”

She nods. “This place, it’s loud. The pipes, the walls, the inmates in the wards above you. You’re going to hear noise, all night long.”

I smile; there’s not much of night left.

“But the infirmary … let’s just say, it’s its own special kind of shrill. It’s not populated by inmates with physical injuries as much as by prisoners with mental ones. The screazies, the other inmates call them—screaming crazies. But again, if you have any concerns for your or the baby’s well-being …”

I get it now. They all think I’m going to kill myself. Or the baby. Mr. Delaney, this nurse, they don’t want me on their conscience. Even if that means assigning me to a night surrounded by frothing lunatics.