Read Online The Nitrogen Murder by Camille Minichino - Free Book Online

Putting it lightly , she thought. She offered the skirt to Robin.
    Robin relaxed a little, a very little. “No, it’s okay. Take it. But you know I don’t like anyone messing with my things.”
    “I’m really sorry,” Dana said again. “I have all these interviews today, and”—she threw up her hands—“nothing to wear.” Risking a little humor.
    Robin dropped her shoulders further and nearly smiled. “It’s okay, really. I know you’re stressed. I overreacted. Are you going to see that counselor?”
    “Yeah, and the police after that. You didn’t happen to see that briefcase I had in the living room, by the way, did you?”
    “I thought you already talked to the police.”
    “They need a formal statement, plus I guess they have more questions.”
    Robin moved toward her closet, making room for Dana to walk past her, out the door.
    “See you later,” Dana said. She heard Robin’s door click shut. She went into her own room, sat on the bed, and took a deep breath, the first one since Robin had walked in on her. She’d forgotten to return to the question of whether Robin had seen the briefcase, but no way was she going back to that room.
    Dana felt the card in her pocket carve a huge question mark on her butt.
     
    Dana sat on a broken rocker in Valley Med’s employee lounge waiting for her boss, Julia Strega, who’d sent word that she’d been delayed. She stared at the walls of the faux apartment, filled with schedule spreadsheets and posters. Her favorite was the staple of EMS rooms everywhere: WE DON’T WANT YOUR BUSINESS. A few hand-lettered notes around the coffeepot and the bathroom doors made futile pleas for cleanliness. The water-cooler, sink, and refrigerator that lined one side of the room, the
couch and broken easy chairs, were all as familiar to her as the furniture in her own house, except this furniture made hers look like Ethan Allen. Dana was tempted to stretch out on a cot in one of the small bedrooms. More than occasionally a nap in this area was her only break in thirty-six hours.
    “Hey, Dana.” Tom Stewart, not her favorite Alameda County EMT, and not just because of his pimply skin and ugly Adam’s apple. No chance for a nap now. Just as well, since she didn’t want to mess up Robin’s skirt.
    “Hey, yourself,” Dana said. Go away was what she wanted to say.
    “Nasty business with Tanisha, huh?”
    Dana closed her eyes and ignored him, hoping he would get the hint or think she was napping.
    Tom had been an EMT longer than anyone else at Valley Med—no one knew exactly how many years, but longer than anyone in history, Tanisha used to say. An EMT stint was not usually a permanent vocation unless you bought the company as Julia had done. The job was physically too demanding and paid too little for any but the very young; most EMTs were on their way to other careers in emergency services—paramedics, cops, ER doctors and nurses. Tanisha had applied for her Fire 1 exam. Dana’s chest constricted at the memory of her ambitious, hardworking friend. And here she was, procrastinating on her own alleged plans to apply to med school.
    “So what happened? Did you see it all?” Tom asked, moving a chair close to Dana’s rocker. He shook his head in an it’s-unbelievable gesture. Dana caught a whiff and wondered when was the last time he’d washed his thin brown hair. “Must have been a totally confusing scene, huh?”
    More confusing than you know , Dana thought, still trying to process the most recent scene, the one in Robin’s bedroom. She had thought that Robin had taken the briefcase, or at least arranged for someone to remove it from their house, though she couldn’t imagine why. Someone in so much of a hurry they left
the front door open. Now who’s overreacting? she asked herself. But the Dorman Industries ID card threw her—what was that about? Such a big company, with international consultants flying back and forth every day, most likely her dad had no clue who