The Trouble with Twelfth Grave (Charley Davidson #12)(23)

“Okay,” she said, lifting a slim shoulder. “No murders lately or I would’ve called. I’ve only had three incidents since we met, and they were all natural causes.”

“Well, cool. Cool.” I studied the wallpaper. A stapler on the desk. A basket of pens with a yellow ribbon around it.

Nicolette giggled. “Are you going to tell me why you’re really here?”

I bit my bottom lip, realizing what I was about to ask might sound bad. But it was now or never.

“Can we go over here?” I motioned for her to follow me until we were a few feet from the nurses’ station and hovering near the entrance of a waiting room with a nervous looking couple inside. “I have a favor to ask. A big one.”

“I’m intrigued.”

“I’m glad, because this might sound bad, so I want you to keep an open mind.”

“Charley, I may not have known you for very long, but you did me a huge favor once. I figure the least I can do is repay the gesture.”

“Nicolette, you don’t owe me anything. You know that, right?”

“Of course. Still, good karma is good karma.”

“True.” Gosh, I liked her. “So, can you steal a few pints of blood for me?”

The surprise on her face glowed. Clearly, she hadn’t expected me to ask her to commit a crime. Strange.

“Can I ask why you need them?”

“You probably don’t want to know.”

“Hmmm.” She pursed her lips, pondering her answer, trying to decide how to word it, how to put it as delicately as possible. “No.”

Oh, well, that was easy. “’Kay. Thanks for your time.”

She laughed softly and pulled me back when I tried to walk away.

She leaned close and said, “It’s not that I won’t. It’s that I can’t. Every pouch of blood has to be signed for.”

“Really? Do they get stolen often?”

Nicolette shrugged. “It is what it is. The only way to get blood without getting caught on Candid Camera would be to knock off a blood bank or a mobile collection van or something.”

“That’s it,” I said, my mind racing.

“I was kidding. You know that, right?”

I started backing away. “No, yeah, totally.” I had a heist to plan. “Thanks so much.” I waved as I headed toward the door. “Oh, hey.” I turned back. “Did your mother ever marry you off? Last time we spoke, she was going to take out an ad.”

“Yeah, that didn’t really go well. She’s worried my eggs are going to dry up and I won’t be able to give her grandchildren.”

I snorted. “Aren’t you a little young?”

“That’s what I said. She told me we have a genetic disorder called early onset egg dysplasia.”

That time I laughed out loud. Then I stopped abruptly. “Wait, is that a real thing?”

She folded her arms at her chest and grinned. “No, it is not.”

“Well, good luck with that.”

“Thank you.”

*

I called Cook on my way back to the office. “Hey, Cook. I need you to see if there are going to be any mobile blood collection vans out tonight.”

“You mean like a Red Cross kind of thing?”

“Exactly. I need to knock one over ay-sap.”

“As in rob? You’re going to rob a mobile blood collection unit?”

“Affirmative.”

“May I ask why?”

“Because I figure robbing a mobile will be easier than robbing an established blood collection business. A building would have better security.”

“I’m sure they have wonderful security. But I meant, what has possessed you to steal blood?”

“It’s for a project.”

“What kind of project?”

“A … bloody one.”

“Charley.”

“Look, just trust me. I need blood from lots of different people.”

“Did you ever think that the blood you are planning on stealing was meant for a purpose? What if someone dies because the hospitals run out of their blood type?”

“You did not just put that on me.”

“Damn sure did. Where are you?”

“In Misery, both literally and figuratively, behind Calamity’s.”

Cookie’s head appeared at a window above me. “Why are you just sitting there?”

“Because I don’t want to get out yet.”

“Why don’t you want to get out yet?”

“Because I’m waiting for the angry archangel looking in my driver’s-side window to go away!” I yelled the last two words, hoping beyond hope Michael would get the message. He was a messenger, after all.

Alas, he did not. He stood his ground, towering over me like an ominous statue, the combination of dark hair, silvery eyes, and massive wings breathtaking.

“There’s an angel standing beside your car?”

Another face shone in the window, a round one with a veil and a habit, in the nondrug sense.

“You have a visitor.”

“I see that.” I waved excitedly at my homegirl Sister Mary Elizabeth. She lived at a local convent. The same convent that took Quentin in when he had no one and nowhere to go. He was special, and the mother superior sensed that. I would be forever grateful to them. “I’ll be up as soon as I ditch the cherub.”