Read Online Boldt 03 - No Witnesses by Ridley Pearson - Free Book Online
Authors: Ridley Pearson
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“If we’re to meet again,” Adler suggested, addressing Boldt and Daphne, “I suggest we arrange it by fax and not telephone, and that we stay with remote locations.”
“How soon can you make the glue change?”
“Overnight. A day at the outside,” Taplin said, his mood improved.
“Is there anything else that might help us?” Boldt asked. Adler glanced over at Taplin, who glared back at him.
Adler said to Daphne, “Perhaps you could show the sergeant the rest of the yacht. A few minutes is all.”
There was an awkward moment of hesitation, after which the two stood.
She led Boldt forward through a deck dining room to a trio of private quarters and Adler’s floating study, equipped with both cellular phone and fax machine.
“What’s going on in there?” he asked.
“Owen can smooth over any flap. Give him a few minutes.”
“Tell me about Taplin.”
“Bright, protective, loyal. Longtime friend of Owen. Runs a lot of the day-to-day. Owen credits him with much of their success, but that says as much about Owen as it does about Howard Taplin. It’s Owen’s baby; always has been.”
He noticed a caller-ID box connected into the fax machine line. The device would display the phone number of any incoming fax. “Fowler,” Boldt said, pointing it out.
“It’s a good idea, isn’t it?”
“If he shares the results with us,” Boldt said, adding, “which I somehow doubt. Taplin would clearly rather handle this without us. And as you said: Taplin is the one writing Kenny’s paychecks.”
“Owen will give you anything you want, Lou.”
“Is that the inside track?”
She did not like his comment.
“Time,” she declared. She guided him back to the meeting, where the others were waiting. Boldt and Daphne sat down.
Adler said, “We had a scare in the mideighties. Not cholera—salmonella. But it was our soup line.”
“A scare? ” Boldt asked.
“Not an intentional contamination—nothing like that. Some bad poultry in our soup. But four people were hospitalized and there were lawsuits.”
Taplin added, “Let me clarify. We were not held liable. It was not us, but one of our suppliers. It was a state health department matter. I see no reason to make any comparison.”
Boldt said, “We’ll want any files you’ve got on this.”
Adler said, “Of course.” But Taplin stiffened. He opened his mouth to object and Adler interrupted him, saying to Boldt, “ Whatever you need.”
EIGHT
Dressed in a dull green surgical smock and wearing a white paper mask over his mouth and nose, Boldt took up a vigil at Slater Lowry’s hospital bedside, his presence approved by both the medical staff and the boy’s mother, whose mask was damp with tears below the eyes.
The boy’s father had collapsed an hour earlier when Slater’s condition had been downgraded from serious to critical, and was presently under sedation in a room down the hall. The woman’s green surgical smock was wrinkled from where her husband had clutched it for hours.
Slater Lowry was dying of organ failure.
It seemed impossible to Boldt that with the boy having been admitted to the hospital, with his having been diagnosed and treated, that his condition could degenerate so quickly. Gunshot wounds, knife wounds, strangulations, and burns—Boldt had learned to live with all of these over his twenty-plus years of police service. But he did not accept what was happening to this boy.
He felt hypnotized by the steady drip of the IV, by the peaks and valleys of the green lines crawling across the monitors. Slater’s skin was a pasty white, and a light sheen of perspiration made it glisten. His mother dabbed him dry, but it did not last long. Slater Lowry was burning up with fever despite the fluids and antibiotics. Slater Lowry was leaving.
“If we could only trade places,” the woman had mumbled to Boldt an hour earlier. He knew that she meant her son and her, though Boldt thought she might have wished that he
“If we’re to meet again,” Adler suggested, addressing Boldt and Daphne, “I suggest we arrange it by fax and not telephone, and that we stay with remote locations.”
“How soon can you make the glue change?”
“Overnight. A day at the outside,” Taplin said, his mood improved.
“Is there anything else that might help us?” Boldt asked. Adler glanced over at Taplin, who glared back at him.
Adler said to Daphne, “Perhaps you could show the sergeant the rest of the yacht. A few minutes is all.”
There was an awkward moment of hesitation, after which the two stood.
She led Boldt forward through a deck dining room to a trio of private quarters and Adler’s floating study, equipped with both cellular phone and fax machine.
“What’s going on in there?” he asked.
“Owen can smooth over any flap. Give him a few minutes.”
“Tell me about Taplin.”
“Bright, protective, loyal. Longtime friend of Owen. Runs a lot of the day-to-day. Owen credits him with much of their success, but that says as much about Owen as it does about Howard Taplin. It’s Owen’s baby; always has been.”
He noticed a caller-ID box connected into the fax machine line. The device would display the phone number of any incoming fax. “Fowler,” Boldt said, pointing it out.
“It’s a good idea, isn’t it?”
“If he shares the results with us,” Boldt said, adding, “which I somehow doubt. Taplin would clearly rather handle this without us. And as you said: Taplin is the one writing Kenny’s paychecks.”
“Owen will give you anything you want, Lou.”
“Is that the inside track?”
She did not like his comment.
“Time,” she declared. She guided him back to the meeting, where the others were waiting. Boldt and Daphne sat down.
Adler said, “We had a scare in the mideighties. Not cholera—salmonella. But it was our soup line.”
“A scare? ” Boldt asked.
“Not an intentional contamination—nothing like that. Some bad poultry in our soup. But four people were hospitalized and there were lawsuits.”
Taplin added, “Let me clarify. We were not held liable. It was not us, but one of our suppliers. It was a state health department matter. I see no reason to make any comparison.”
Boldt said, “We’ll want any files you’ve got on this.”
Adler said, “Of course.” But Taplin stiffened. He opened his mouth to object and Adler interrupted him, saying to Boldt, “ Whatever you need.”
EIGHT
Dressed in a dull green surgical smock and wearing a white paper mask over his mouth and nose, Boldt took up a vigil at Slater Lowry’s hospital bedside, his presence approved by both the medical staff and the boy’s mother, whose mask was damp with tears below the eyes.
The boy’s father had collapsed an hour earlier when Slater’s condition had been downgraded from serious to critical, and was presently under sedation in a room down the hall. The woman’s green surgical smock was wrinkled from where her husband had clutched it for hours.
Slater Lowry was dying of organ failure.
It seemed impossible to Boldt that with the boy having been admitted to the hospital, with his having been diagnosed and treated, that his condition could degenerate so quickly. Gunshot wounds, knife wounds, strangulations, and burns—Boldt had learned to live with all of these over his twenty-plus years of police service. But he did not accept what was happening to this boy.
He felt hypnotized by the steady drip of the IV, by the peaks and valleys of the green lines crawling across the monitors. Slater’s skin was a pasty white, and a light sheen of perspiration made it glisten. His mother dabbed him dry, but it did not last long. Slater Lowry was burning up with fever despite the fluids and antibiotics. Slater Lowry was leaving.
“If we could only trade places,” the woman had mumbled to Boldt an hour earlier. He knew that she meant her son and her, though Boldt thought she might have wished that he
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