Rizzoli 01 - The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen

Rizzoli 01 - The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen

Author:Tess Gerritsen
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2010-06-14T18:32:36+00:00


thirteen

Rizzoli stared across the crime scene tape, into Nina Peyton’s hospital room. Spurted arterial blood had dried in a celebratory pattern of tossed streamers. She continued down the corridor to the supply room, where the cop’s body had been found. This doorway, too, was crisscrossed by crime scene tape. Inside was a thicket of IV poles, shelves holding bedpans and basins, and boxes of gloves, all of it zigzagged by blood. One of their own had died in this room, and for every cop in the Boston PD the hunt for the Surgeon was now deeply, intensely personal.

She turned to the patrolman standing nearby. “Where’s Detective Moore?”

“Down in Administration. They’re looking at the hospital surveillance tapes.”

Rizzoli glanced up and down the hall but spotted no security cameras. They would have no video footage of this corridor.

Downstairs she slipped into the conference room where Moore and two nurses were reviewing the surveillance tapes. No one glanced her way; they were all focused on the TV monitor, where the tape was playing.

The camera was aimed at the 5 West elevators. On the video, the elevator door opened. Moore froze the image.

“There,” he said. “This is the first group to come off the elevator after the code was called. I count eleven passengers, and they all get off in a rush.”

“That’s what you’d expect in a Code Blue,” said the charge nurse. “An announcement goes over the hospital speaker system. Anyone who’s available is expected to respond.”

“Take a good look at these faces,” said Moore. “Do you recognize everyone? Is there anyone who shouldn’t be there?”

“I can’t see all the faces. They step off in one group.”

“How about you, Sharon?” Moore asked the second nurse.

Sharon leaned toward the monitor. “These three here, they’re nurses. And the two young men, at the side, they’re medical students. I recognize that third man there—” She pointed to the top of the screen. “An orderly. The others look familiar, but I don’t know their names.”

“Okay,” said Moore, weariness in his voice. “Let’s watch the rest. Then we’ll look at the stairwell camera.”

Rizzoli moved closer until she stood right behind the charge nurse.

On the screen, the images backed up, and the elevator door slid shut. Moore pressed Play and the door opened again. Eleven people stepped out, moving like a multilegged organism in their hurry to reach the code. Rizzoli saw urgency in their faces, and even without sound the sense of crisis was obvious. That knot of people vanished to the left of the screen. The elevator door closed. A moment passed, and the door re-opened, discharging another gush of personnel. Rizzoli counted thirteen passengers. So far a total of twenty-four people had arrived on the floor in under three minutes—and that was just by elevator. How many more had arrived by the stairwell? Rizzoli watched with growing amazement. The timing had been flawless. Calling a Code Blue was like setting off a stampede. With dozens of personnel from all over the hospital converging on 5 West, anyone wearing a white coat could slip in unnoticed.



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