Deadlocked

Chapter 33

It was close to ten o'clock when Dixon Smith left. Mason and Tuffy walked him to the curb, the dog stretching as Smith drove away. Mason kneaded the back of the dog's neck. The wind came in gusts, raising the rest of her coat. Thick layers of indigo clouds had rolled overhead, blanketing the stars and promising a storm powerful enough to shatter the heat wave.

He lingered at the curb, the dog nudging him to go inside, uneasy at the weather. At least one of them had the sense to avoid the storm.

"C'mon," he told the dog, who leaped out ahead of him. Mason followed slowly, hands jammed into his pockets.

He did a few slow laps around the first floor, cleaning up in the haphazard way of someone who has no one to clean up for, too restless to sit, reviewing the list of things he'd told Dixon Smith to do.

Run down Sandra's cell phone records and Whitney King's. Check local suppliers of stun guns for sales to King. Forget about Internet suppliers. There were too many and they don't employ real people anyway having figured out how to run a business entirely on e-mail and voice mail.

Find Janet Hook and Andrea Bracco, the last two jurors before they turn up dead. If they were still alive. And find Mary Kowalczyk.

Talk to Whitney King's mother, Victoria. Test her son's alibi. Figure out why Sandra questioned whether Victoria King belonged in either a psychiatric hospital or a nursing home and why Smith got fired for asking if she did.

Smith had nodded while Mason rattled off his checklist, not taking any notes.

"Thanks," Smith had told him when Mason finished. "Never would have thought of any of that."

"No charge," Mason said. "I appreciate your courtesy," he added, returning the jab.

"A hundred thousand dollars buys a lot of courtesy," Smith had replied. "Let me handle this, Lou. I know what I'm doing."

"Do I have a choice?"

"You've always got a choice. Not a good one, but you've got it."

Mason sat on the rowing machine's sliding seat, rolling forward and back a few times. He got up, a stationary workout not what he needed. Smith was right to keep him on the sidelines, but Mason didn't know how long he could stay there.

He grabbed his car keys and a moment later was southbound on Wornall Road heading for St. Joseph Hospital. Nick Byrnes was supposed to have had surgery earlier in the day. Visiting Nick wasn't meddling in Smith's handling of his case, Mason rationalized. The kid was probably still sleeping off the anesthetic anyway. It was something to do and that's what Mason needed.

The hospital lobby was brightly lit, though the lack of foot traffic and the faintly antiseptic air gave it an abandoned feel. No one greeted him from the information counter. He leaned over the rail above the food court looking for Nick's grandparents, finding only a young couple hunched over a table, the woman comforting the man.

Large signs directed him toward the Surgical Intensive Care Unit. He passed a few nurses on the way, but no one stopped to tell him that visiting hours were over. He found the double doors to the ICU, passed through them, and ran into his first resistance.

"May I help you?" a nurse said from her seat behind a circular workstation with a raised countertop that hid the desk where she was sitting. She was a stout, middle-age woman whose question wasn't a question. It was an order to get out.

Mason stepped up to the workstation, leaning over as the nurse straightened stacks of patient charts. "I'm a friend of Nick Byrnes. I just stopped by to see how he's doing," Mason said.

"Family only," the nurse said.

The ICU was designed in an outer ring of rooms with curtains instead of doors, the curtains drawn halfway. The nurse's station was an inner circle, giving the nurses a view into each room. The rooms were half-dark, lighted by the glow of monitors tracking vital signs. Patients' names were written on dry erase boards mounted at the entrance to each room. Mason scanned the names, finding Nick's on the far side, the words "Family Only" written beneath his name in red.

"How's he doing?" Mason asked.

"All patients in the ICU are considered to be in critical condition," the nurse said.

"Details only for the family?" Mason asked.

"That's correct, sir."

"I'm not family, but I think I qualify for an exception. My name is Lou Mason. I'm Nick's attorney."

The nurse's eyes fluttered as she caught her breath. He was not only in the news, he was bad news. Dropping his name had the opposite effect he had intended. She picked up the phone, holding the receiver to her breast. In her haste, she pushed several patient charts onto the floor.

"Family only," she repeated. "Please leave or I'll have to call security."

"It's all right," a woman said from behind Mason.

Mason turned, finding Esther Byrnes at his side. She looked up at him, her face worn with worry.

"Are you sure, Mrs. Byrnes?" the nurse asked. "I can call security."

"That won't be necessary," Nick's grandmother said. "I'm not afraid of Mr. Mason."

She slipped her arm around Mason's, tugging him gently. "Let's go see Nick," she said.

Mason smiled at the nurse, who held tightly to the phone, her finger poised, ready to dial if he tried anything funny.

"Was the surgery successful?" Mason asked Esther as she pulled the curtain back and they stood at the foot of Nick's bed. He was asleep, an oxygen line clipped to his nose, IV lines plugged into both arms, heart monitors glued to his chest.

Esther clutched Mason's arm with one hand, her other on the rail at the end of the bed. "The surgeon says he got the rest of the bullet fragments."

"Then he'll be okay," Mason said.

"I don't know what that means anymore, Mr. Mason. The surgeon said Nick's spinal cord was bruised, but that should heal and he'll be able to walk. It just takes time."

She squeezed Mason's arm again. Mason covered her hand with his. "Thanks for not being afraid of me," he said.

"You're no more a killer than that other boy, Ryan Kowalczyk," Esther said. "I can tell. It's that Whitney King. He makes everyone else look guilty. That's who I'm afraid of, Mr. Mason."