Chapter 9 - The Blue Case
Police arrived at Saint Catherine's three minutes too late.
Hilda had taken a blue evidence case from long-term pathology storage and vanished through a loading dock.
The case contained blood samples from Elena's final admission.
Samples no one had tested after the autopsy.
"Why were they still there?" I asked Detective Lena Ortiz.
"Hospital policy. Certain maternal deaths are retained longer."
"So if we recover them--"
"We may learn whether something was in her system."
Ortiz studied me.
"But understand this, Mr. Mercer. You are no longer conducting a private investigation."
"Someone starved my daughters and may have murdered my wife."
"I understand."
"No, you understand paperwork."
Her eyes hardened.
"And you understand money. Neither one makes us detectives."
I almost snapped back.
Then stopped.
She was right.
For two years I had reacted to fear by buying more control.
More guards.
More locks.
More cameras.
Hilda had lived inside every layer.
Ortiz continued.
"If you want to help your daughters, stop trying to command the investigation."
That was harder than writing a check.
I nodded.
Back at the hospital, Rosalyn refused breakfast until Mara sat beside her.
Mara did not tell her to eat.
She simply ate toast herself.
Rosalyn watched.
Then took one bite.
I had spent a fortune on nutritionists.
A woman with no home understood my child better than I did.
"Why does she trust you?" I asked later.
Mara folded the napkin in her lap.
"Because I never made food a test."
That sentence stayed with me.
Calvin called at noon.
He had found a traffic camera showing Hilda's car after the hospital theft.
It headed west.
Toward an old property Elena owned through the trust.
A closed children's hospice outside Kingston Springs.
Before we could leave, Investigator Cole walked into the room.
His face was grim.
"We have an emergency order."
My heart stopped.
"What order?"
"Temporary protective custody."
"Of my daughters?"
"Until the court determines whether your home is safe."
Rosalyn heard him.
She grabbed my sleeve.
"No cage," she cried.
I looked at Cole.
"What did she say?"
May you like
Mara went pale.
"She thinks you're taking her back to the Iron Cradle."
