Special Agent Nanny

Fires like the very successful one that had destroyed the Gilpin Hospital records center.

That task had been a pleasure as well as a duty. The arsonist had enjoyed watching the room burn, all the while anticipating the money to come for that job.

But several weeks later, the job wasn’t over yet. Too many loose ends.

Like Dr. Kelley Stanton.

There were things she knew. Things she didn’t realize she knew…yet.

But she had to be neutralized, in case she recognized them.

If discrediting her was effective, so much the better. It was certainly the least messy way.

If not…well, there were many kinds of accidents that could occur around a hospital.

The arsonist would keep an eye on her. Listen to her, and to what was being said about her.

Report it, when asked.

And, when ordered, the arsonist would act quickly. Efficiently.

Effectively.

Again.

Chapter Four

Shawn had a major need to kick someone’s butt. Preferably his own.

Of course he’d had to visit the scene of the Gilpin fire, and as quickly as possible. He’d done the right thing, waited until it was late and everyone had left—or so he’d thought.

But he’d still nearly blown his cover.

Shawn Jameson, child-care worker, had no business being in that burned-out room. And of all the damned bad luck, his number one suspect, the lovely Dr. Kelley Stanton, had been the one to catch him there.

Since he hadn’t planned his examination of the site, hadn’t been in there long, he hadn’t even gotten much useful information, just initial impressions and the room’s layout.

Not something he wanted to admit to Colleen that night.

One way or another, though, he would talk to his lady boss. Like last night, she’d probably call if she didn’t hear from him soon enough.

He pulled his blue SUV out of the hospital parking lot, spinning his wheels like a demon driver. Out of cussedness, he drove around the block. Past the hospital’s admin wing.

Past the place where he’d nearly blown his damned assignment.

He spotted someone standing on the sidewalk below the area where the fire had been, but he couldn’t make out, in the dimness, whether the person was male or female. Whoever it was hurried away, as if wanting not to be seen.

Damned imaginative fool, Shawn chastised himself. More likely, the person was just being smart, getting out of the way of the loco driver. He took a deep breath, pushed the button to open the window beside him, and slowed down.

Denver was far from a sleepy city. There were popular restaurants in the downtown area, people strolling sidewalks along the Sixteenth Street Mall, enjoying this cosmopolitan western town.

Shawn had enjoyed it, too, when he’d first gotten here and joined the Denver Fire Department as a firefighter. Later, he’d moved into the Fire Investigation Bureau.

“That’s what you do, smart guy,” he told himself aloud as he turned a busy, well-lit corner. “You investigate fires.”

But for the first few minutes in the Gilpin Hospital records room, he’d felt like a scared kid again. He’d stood there. Remembering.

He wasn’t sure whether Kelley had seen him then, all his damnable emotions on display. He prayed now that he’d been alone at that moment. He’d needed to be alone.

But she’d at least seen him start to scrutinize the residue of that scorched room, and that wasn’t much better. It wasn’t something children’s caregivers did. And the impression he made on Kelley was all-important.

On impulse, he pulled into the nearly empty parking lot of a minimall. He pulled out the cell phone stashed in the glove compartment and called Colleen.

“I made some progress today,” he told her, watching a kid walk by eating a hot dog from the nearby convenience store.

It was the truth. Just not all of it.

“I started my examination of the arson site. I continued my inquiries. And I got our number one suspect to agree to talk to me tomorrow.” That was something he looked forward to. A lot.

“Good job,” Colleen said. “I’ll be interested in your next report.”

Me, too, Shawn thought. He was determined it would be a lot better than this one.

THE NEXT MORNING, Kelley visited Jenny after Randall left her at KidClub. Fortunately, Jenny, though teary-eyed, didn’t create a scene when she left.

Unfortunately, Shawn Jameson bulldozed her into setting a time and place for their impending meeting.

If she hadn’t had her mind on that discomfiting situation, she might not have felt so blindsided by what happened later that morning. But when she walked into the room of the third patient on her rounds, she was taken aback to see Dr. Madelyne Younger beside her patient’s bed. The other bed in the room was empty, so there was no mistaking who Madelyne was there to see.

“Good morning,” Kelley said, but her eyes asked her friend and colleague if anything was wrong.

“Hi, Dr. Stanton,” Madelyne said cheerfully. “Just came in to see how Tom’s doing today.”

The patient, Tom Layton, had been admitted for emergency treatment of an aneurysm a week earlier. His surgeon had been Randall.

Occasionally, despite all the care taken at the hospital, surgical patients like Tom developed infections. That was one of Kelley’s specialties—caring for the infrequent postsurgical infection cases. She had put Tom on a regimen of antibiotics that seemed to be working.

“And how are you doing?” Kelley smiled at him.

Tom Layton was a middle-aged man who had indulged too much in his passion for eating and had apparently believed that joining a gym satisfied his need to exercise, whether or not he ever went there. His small brown eyes were morose, but Kelley thought that might be the way he always looked. “Better, but—” He looked toward Madelyne as if for assistance.

Kelley’s heart sank. She knew what was going on. “You’ve requested a second opinion from Dr. Younger,” she said. “An excellent idea.”

It had happened more often than usual in the past weeks…since the fire. She had no idea how the rumors circulating the hospital made their way to patients’ ears, but she could guess.

Yet why would Randall stoop that low? It could bite him in his own wallet. If her reputation disintegrated because of allegations that she had not treated patients properly, her medical practice would disintegrate, too. Then Randall would have to pay more in child support to make sure their daughter was properly provided for.

“Tom’s family has asked me to take over his care.” Madelyne’s voice was uncharacteristically modulated, and the distress in her eyes told Kelley that she felt embarrassed.