Social Death: A Clyde Shaw Mystery by Tatiana Boncompagni

Author:Tatiana Boncompagni [Boncompagni, Tatiana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tudor City Press
Published: 2014-02-28T06:00:00+00:00

Friday

I woke up at a hospital, screaming, hooked up to an IV and a heart-rate monitor. I’d been dreaming, or remembering, I wasn’t sure which.

“I’m here, Clyde. You’re OK. You’re safe.”

It was Alex. His hand took mine. I felt nauseous as I looked around the room, gathered my bearings. The clock on the wall read half past five a.m. “What are you doing here?”

A small Asian woman in blue scrubs entered the room and stood at the end of my bed. “Good to see you’re awake, Ms. Shaw. I’m Dr. Cho. You’ve been admitted to Beth Israel Hospital.”

“What happened to me?”

She walked toward me and grabbed my arm, feeling for a pulse. “Your blood test confirmed you received a large amount of Ketalar, otherwise known as Ketamine or Special-K. It’s sold to veterinarians as a general anesthesia and sedative, but is also used and sold illegally as a hallucinogenic and a so-called date-rape drug. Do you know how this substance may have been given to you?”

I rubbed my forehead with my free hand. I looked to Alex, hoping he could fill in the blanks. “I wasn’t there,” he said to the doctor. “I was told she passed out at a party.”

“Are you her husband?” Dr. Cho asked.

“A friend,” Alex replied.

“Colleague,” I corrected.

The doctor wrote that down in my file. “Did you have anything to drink at this party?”

I nodded. “I had a couple tonic waters.”

“Without anything else? No alcohol?”

“No.”

She made another note. “Did you ever leave your glass unattended?”

“I can’t remember.”

She put the file down, sidled up next to me and took out a small penlight, which she shined in my eyes, checking my pupils. “The effects are pretty immediate, within five and twenty minutes of drinking the substance, depending on how much food you had in your stomach.”

I turned my head to Alex. “How did you know I was here?”

“Penny saw you carried out on a stretcher and called me.”

“Penny? Who else saw me?”

“I think everyone there. All she said was that you were on a stretcher, passed out, and the paramedics were bringing you here.”

“They just sent me here alone?”

“One of Maldone’s assistants was in the waiting room when I got here at a quarter to midnight.” He ran a hand down the rumpled front of his denim button-down. “Alice, Maldone’s assistant, told me she found you on the bathroom floor and tried to revive you. When she couldn’t, she dialed 911.”

Dr. Cho opened my chart. “Would you like for me to call the police?”

I wanted to speak to Panda. If the hospital called the authorities, I didn’t know whom I’d get. With my luck, it’d be some rookie who would drown me in paperwork. “I can do that. I just need my cellphone. Is my purse around here somewhere?”

Dr. Cho looked around the room. My coat was resting on a chair, but I didn’t see my purse. “Did Ms. Shaw have a bag with her last night?” she asked Alex.

“It wasn’t here when I got here.”

My throat seized.

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