Page 87 of Tough Justice

Thor stretched his neck out to sniff the sweater, uttering a soft woof. Even his dog missed her. He dropped the sweater on the seat, gave Thor another quick scratch on the head, then went inside the hospital.

On the way over, he’d tried calling Tori back three times. She still wasn’t answering. The message she’d left him said she was at work, but he hadn’t seen her car in the spots reserved for ER doctors. He was a half second from calling Brett and Evan for backup to help him look for her. First, he needed more information.

The main desk was swamped with people. Deck badged his way into the restricted ER area. At the nurses’ desk, he recognized Suzie Torres sitting in front of a monitor. When she caught sight of him, her eyes lit up.

“Have you seen Tori?” she asked. The skin over the bridge of her nose wrinkled in concern. “I can’t find her anywhere, and she’s not answering pages or her phone.”

“I haven’t seen her.” Warning flags waved in the back of his head. “She left me a message saying she was at work. That was about an hour ago.”

“This isn’t like her to disappear in the middle of a shift.” Suzie pressed her lips together. “I’m worried something’s wrong.”

That makes two of us. “Do you know Dr. Neil Shibowsky?”

“Yes. He’s a cardiac surgeon.” She tipped her head to the examining room across the hall. “He’s in ER 3 on a consult.”

“Thanks.” He looked inside ER 3 where Dr. Shibowsky was talking to a patient. While he waited, he heard Tori being paged repeatedly, along with another doctor, Wil Barnett.

It was all Deck could do to stand still and not pace. Waiting had never been his thing. Finally, Dr. Shibowsky finished with the patient and came out of the room.

“Dr. Shibowsky?” Deck caught him before he could rush off. “I’m Special Agent Decker with the DEA. Do you have a minute?”

“Uh, sure.” Shibowsky’s eyes narrowed to gray slits. “What’s this about?”

“Do you know where Tori Sampson is?” Deck scrutinized the man’s face for any signs of bullshit.

“No. They’ve been paging her for a while now.”

He paused to give Shibowsky time to squirm. He didn’t. “When was the last time you spoke with her?”

Shibowsky thought for a moment. “About an hour ago. Right before they started paging her. She was coming out of the doctors’ lounge.”

“What did you talk about?” he asked, still scrutinizing Shibowsky’s body language and not picking up on anything suspicious.

“Nothing, actually. I wanted to ask her about a patient, but she said she didn’t have time. She was going outside to get some air.” The doctor’s eyes narrowed further. “What is this about? Did something happen to her?”

He hoped not. “What patient did you want to talk to her about?”

Shibowsky hesitated.

“What patient?” Deck repeated.

“Well, since you’ve already met her, I guess it’s okay if I give you her name. Leslie Batista, the young woman you spoke to with Tori and Dr. Barnett.”

Now they were getting somewhere. Tori had mentioned Leslie in her voicemail message. “Specifically, what did you want to talk to Tori about?”

Shibowsky started shaking his head. “I can’t get into the specifics of Leslie’s medical condition. That would be a breach of her privacy.”

Something about this guy started pinging Deck’s radar. “You’re a cardiac surgeon. Leslie came into the hospital as an overdose. What were you and she talking about the day I saw you in her room? What were you doing in her room?”

Shibowsky let out a frustrated breath. “Fine. She’s my next-door neighbor’s kid. She didn’t want her parents to know she’d been brought in, but I happened to see her in one of the rooms. We were just having a frank discussion about her addiction.”

Deck could easily verify if Shibowsky was lying. All it would take was for Sammie to run a quick address check on Shibowsky and his next-door neighbors. Frankly, the guy hadn’t exhibited any signs of lying. “Thanks, Doc.”

“You’re welcome.” Shibowsky began walking away.

“Doctor,” Deck called out, and Shibowsky turned. “What kind of car do you drive?”

“A Ferrari. Why?”