Due Process (Joe Dillard #9)(29)

“Have you talked to the coaches?”

“Every damned one of them. I made sure they knew if we found out they’ve hidden something, they’d be out on their ass.”

“Good,” Brady said. “I appreciate it. We’ve done what we can do. We’ve taken affirmative action. Now I guess we just hunker down and see if the storm passes.”





MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

Caroline Dillard watched from the bedroom window while the small, white car with “LifeCare” painted on the side pulled into the driveway. It was Labor Day, but she needed her fluid infusion and the home health care service worked on holidays. Joe had gone into town to run a few errands, but Caroline suspected he was afraid of what he might do or say to Tracey Rowland.

As always, she’d unlocked the front door and shut Rio in the garage. He was going nuts, barking and growling. Caroline had tried to introduce Rio to Tracey. With almost everyone, once they were in the house and Rio had a chance to sniff them and size them up, he tended to leave them alone. He would always bark when someone pulled into the driveway or came to the front door, but he was just doing what German shepherds do—protecting his territory. Once the person got inside the house, he was friendly.

But not with Tracey. There was something about Tracey that made Rio crazy. When Caroline, and even Joe, had tried to introduce Tracey to the dog, the hair on his back bristled and he growled. Caroline knew if Rio got an opportunity, he would sink his teeth into whatever part of Tracey he could. Tracey laughed it off and acted as though it didn’t bother him, but Caroline knew he was terrified of the animal, as well he should be. Rio and Joe had a lot in common. They were both fiercely loyal, they were intelligent, and they had an amazing instinct when it came to judging people’s character. Rio obviously didn’t think much of Tracey, and now Caroline knew why.

Joe and Jack had installed the tiny camera above the vanity in the bathroom where Caroline kept the bottle of thirty milligram Oxycontin pills. They’d done an excellent job of hiding it, because when Caroline went into the bathroom and looked after Joe told her they were finished installing the camera, she couldn’t see it even though she knew it was there. Before Joe had left for the office that morning, he and Caroline had gone into the bathroom, emptied the contents of the pill bottle onto the vanity, and counted them in plain view of the camera. Then they returned them to the bottle. The plan was to let Tracey into the house, allow him to do what he always did, and then, after he left, Joe and Jack would hook the camera to Joe’s phone and watch the video. If Tracey stole drugs—and Caroline was sure he would—they would pour out the pills and count them again.

Caroline was worried about what would happen. Joe was angry, but Jack, after Joe told him what was going on, had become furious. Jack was as protective of his mother as Joe was of his wife, and Caroline was genuinely concerned that one or both of them would seriously injure Tracey and that they would wind up either paying tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills, perhaps wind up in jail, or, even worse, put their law licenses in jeopardy. She didn’t want any of those things to happen, but neither did she want Tracey to continue to steal medication from her. She was also sure that if he was stealing from her, he was stealing from others.

She walked to the front door and opened it just as Tracey walked up onto the porch. He was a decent looking man in his mid-30s, lean and average height. His hair was sandy blond and he wore it long. Sometimes he wore a man bun, which Caroline found extremely unattractive and which Joe found utterly repulsive. His eyes were a pretty, forest green and he sported a closely-trimmed stubble of beard. He was wearing light blue medical scrubs. It was as though he was trying very hard to look macho, but Caroline had been around him enough to know he was far from macho. She was married to macho. This guy was a cupcake compared to Joe.

“Good morning, Caroline,” Tracey said as he walked into the house.

“Morning, Tracey.”

“And how are we feeling this morning?”

“As well as can be expected under the circumstances.”

“When do you have to go back to Nashville?”

“I’m off this week. We go back next Tuesday.”

Caroline went into the bedroom and sat down. Joe had bought her a mattress that was adjustable so she could raise her head and her feet, something that had helped make her far more comfortable than lying flat on her back. She climbed into bed and turned on the television.

“Let me just run in and wash my hands and we’ll get started,” Tracey said.

“Okay.”

He disappeared into the master bathroom, like he always did, and was back in about four minutes. He cleaned his hands with hand cleaner, put on a pair of latex gloves, and began to run the plastic tubing through the IV tower that regulated the flow of the sodium chloride that would be running into Caroline’s body. Caroline had a PICC line (Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter) that had been inserted into her cephalic vein several years earlier. The PICC line ran to her heart and allowed medical people to give her various medications without having to stick needles into her all the time, something which had once caused her veins to begin to collapse. She didn’t like the PICC line because she had to keep it covered with some kind of sleeve all the time, but it was better than being constantly stuck with needles.

Tracey flushed the PICC line and hooked up the tubing that led from the bag of fluid to the PICC line. He turned on the machine, set it to the proper flow, and removed his gloves.