Read Online Scratchgravel Road by Tricia Fields - Free Book Online

teenager with a rotating shift and no family in town to help.
    *   *   *
    By the time Josie and Otto arrived back at the Trauma Center the rain was coming down in sheets. Josie parked just outside the emergency room door and she and Otto made a run for the building. Standing inside, shaking the rain off, they watched as Cassidy walked down the hallway with Vie on her heels. Josie was relieved to see she had apparently made a full recovery, aside from the angry red burn covering her arms, legs, and face. Josie had talked with Vie about thirty minutes prior to tell her they were coming back to talk with Cassidy. She must have decided to make a quick getaway, and Vie was determined not to let it happen.
    Vie threw her hands in the air when she saw Josie and Otto. “I told her you needed to talk to her!”
    Cassidy was dressed in the same yellow shorts and brown T-shirt she had been wearing when they carried her out of the desert that afternoon. She looked as if she were ready to cry.
    “Hold on a minute. What’s the rush?” Josie asked.
    “My boyfriend’s on his way to get me. I have to go.”
    Josie turned from Cassidy and gestured back toward the entrance door. “I’m sure he’ll come in. Nurse Blessings can explain we’re talking.”
    “He called a few minutes ago. He’ll be here any minute.”
    “You’ve been here all day. Surely he can wait a few minutes while we talk,” Josie said.
    Her lips quivered and she squinted through tears. “He doesn’t want me talking to you. I told him you were coming back and he said he was coming to get me. I can come by your office tomorrow.” Her voice had grown shrill.
    Josie motioned to the brightly lit patient waiting room. “Let’s sit down for a minute. We need to ask you some questions today. I don’t think you want to come down to the police station later, do you?”
    She shook her head no and sat on the edge of a plastic chair with her hands underneath her thighs. Her eyes darted around the room as if searching for an escape route, and her forehead was creased in worry. Josie wondered if it was an act to get her way, or if she was truly fearful of the boyfriend. She considered taking Cassidy in to the station just to remove her from the boyfriend’s influence so she could try and talk sense into her.
    Otto sat in the seat next to Cassidy and passed her a digital camera that he had turned on and queued up. “Take a look at that picture.”
    Cassidy looked at the camera, then back at Otto.
    “Recognize it?” he asked.
    She shook her head no.
    “It’s a wallet.”
    “Okay. But I’ve never seen it,” Cassidy said.
    He took the camera back and advanced to the next picture. “Recognize that?”
    She leaned forward to look at the picture and looked confused. “Is that the backseat in my car?”
    Otto nodded, his expression grave. “You recognize it now?”
    Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “That’s not my wallet,” she said, pointing at the camera screen.
    “What do you see in the picture?”
    Cassidy frowned. “A wallet, in the backseat of my car.” She looked up at Otto.
    “Whose is it?” he asked.
    “I don’t know. I’ve never seen it.”
    “Does it belong to the dead man?”
    Her eyes widened. “I told you, I don’t know. I’ve never seen that wallet.”
    “Is it your boyfriend’s?” he asked.
    “No. He doesn’t carry a wallet. He carries a money clip.”
    Otto glanced at Josie, who remained impassive.
    A horn honked several times outside of the emergency room doors where Josie’s police car was parked. She assumed it was Leo.
    Cassidy looked toward the door but didn’t speak.
    Josie said, “Did you see any other cars drive by while you were in the desert?”
    “No.”
    “Would you have noticed someone driving by while you were walking?”
    She shook her head. “From where the dead man was I couldn’t see the road at all.”
    The driver of the car outside the Trauma Center lay on the horn.
    “Please. I have to go,”