Diagnosis: Danger by Marie Ferrarella Read Free Book Online Page A

death—”
    “No.” He meant that. The stricken look on her face when they’d found the body had been spontaneous. The emotion behind it wasn’t something that could have been faked. He’d had dealings with actresses, both the professional variety and the homegrown drama queens, and he liked to think that he could tell a performance from the real thing. There was always some small, telltale sign that set truth apart from fiction. “But I’m supposed to ask,” he leveled with her. “To rule you out.”
    Natalya got her temper under control, realizing it was just the situation and not the man that had made her come close to losing it. Detective DiPalma was being as nice as he could, she thought, especially under the circumstances. She owed him some cooperation.
    “Fine, I can appreciate that. I was at my office theentire day. I worked through lunch. Lots of mothers can testify to that. And if that’s not enough for you, I’ve got a priest who can vouch for me.”
    Was she going to tell him that she ran to confession in between patients? “A priest?”
    She nodded. “Father Gannon. He brought in his niece. Her mother—his sister—was sick.” She smiled. “We go way back. I knew him when he was Alex Gannon. He’s from my old neighborhood,” she explained.
    The woman was getting more and more intriguing. “You have an interesting circle of friends, Doc. No cops in it?”
    She almost laughed, knowing her answer would throw him. “My sister is marrying one. Sasha. The one who delivered your nephew,” she tacked on in case he’d forgotten who Sasha was.
    It would have only been natural to have gone to someone she knew first instead of turning up at the station. “Why didn’t you ask him to look for your friend?”
    “I would have,” she said honestly, “but he’s out of town.” Somewhere in the distance, a door opened and then closed. The sound vibrated down the hall. The morgue was an eerie place at night. “He and Sasha went to Atlantic City.” And then she laughed softly to herself. “Figures.”
    He didn’t follow. “Figures?”
    It was funny how things turned out, Natalyathought. “Her first vacation since she was two and I wind up needing her fiancé—who’s not there.”
    Well, that answered that question. “So you got me instead.”
    In response she smiled at him. It wasn’t a seductive smile or even a sexy one, but if he’d ever seen a more sensual one he couldn’t remember it.
    “I got you,” she echoed.
    His gut tightened. The morgue’s thermostat must have went on the fritz again as he was enveloped in warmth.
    “I don’t believe it,” Natalya insisted.
    On her feet, she was looking up at the tall, thin man in a smudged lab coat. There was blood on it and she tried not to dwell on where that had come from.
    She’d dozed off and had abruptly woken up to the sound of lowered voices. The M.E. had come out and was talking to Mike.
    Jumping to her feet, she joined the twosome immediately, only to hear the M.E. tell Mike that a large amount of the latest designer drug that had hit the market had shown up in the tox screen that had been performed on Clancy.
    Cause of death was being ascribed to a lethal overdose of the drug.
    She caught Mike’s arm, making him look at her. “Clancy wouldn’t have taken them on his own, Detective. I know he wouldn’t. Someone had to havemade him take it.” A thought suddenly hit her. She looked at the M.E. “Was the drug ingested or injected?”
    The M.E. glanced at Mike before answering. Mike nodded.
    “Injected. There was a small puncture wound in his forearm.”
    She threw up one hand, vindicated. “There, that clinches it,” she announced. Both men looked at her skeptically. There was something akin to pity in the M.E.’s eyes. She explained further, “Clancy was pathologically afraid of needles. A couple of years ago, he came down with something and was running a dangerously high fever. The doctor wanted to inject antibiotics to