Lies Left Unsaid

Detective Martìnez

To my great displeasure I had spent the last several nights reading through the daily happenings and thoughts of a whiney hormonal teenage girl. The only thing that made it slightly tolerable was the large glass of bourbon on the rocks with a splash of soda that I sipped whilst reading page after page of Caitlyn's journal, searching for more proof of Dr. Patrick's guilt. It wasn't until I was four days into reading that I discovered what I needed didn't lay on the pages of the journal itself but rather IN the journal, quite literally. 

I had just finished my second drink and was headed into the kitchen for a third with Caitlyn's diary clutched in my hand, when I tripped on a flap of loose carpet and fell to the ground. My fall was rather inelegant; as I have to admit the cocktails I had been drinking were definitely liquor forward. On my way down I smashed my shin into the sharp wood edge of one of my dining room chairs that I had purchased in haste at a garage sale, in an effort to quickly furnish my apartment when I first moved to Highland Park. The wood was cheap and splintered and I cursed myself out for not fixing it sooner or for buying such a piece of shit chair to begin with. But on a beginning detective's salary, I could hardly afford to throw down on expensive furniture. I didn't care anyway; no one really saw my apartment except for me. I had kept to myself mainly since taking the position in Highland Park. I wasn't a very social person to begin with, but mainly I wanted to keep my focus on my first big case. 

I sat on the carpet angered by my stupidity for having one too many drinks and stumbling like a fool, when I noticed the journal underneath the table. It had landed face up and was open to the last page, which was devoid of words since Caitlyn had disappeared before she had been able to finish filling the book. There were a few scribbles here or there, perhaps when her pen had run out and she had tried to get the ink going again, but that's not what caught my eye. It was the back cover of the book, which lay flopped open. The brown leather cover was well worn and appeared to be damaged. The stitching had ripped away near the binding, creating a pocket, out of which, peeked the corner of a small rectangular piece of paper. I gently tugged at the paper and removed it from its secret hiding place. 

It was the size of a business card and on it written in cursive were the words, "I miss you more and more each day. My desire for you grows stronger the longer you are gone." There was no signature but it was obvious that this note was most likely from Caitlyn's secret lover, hence the secret hiding place. I patted the cover and I could tell there were more stuffed inside. I tore at the stitches a bit and stuck my fingers inside trying to gently pry out the rest of the cards and sure enough there were more cards, many more. "Your beauty is like none I have ever seen. I feel light-headed in your presence," read one. "The longer you're gone, the greater my anguish and infatuation. Come back to me," read another. And finally, "Just like this rare blue orchid, our love is a rarity that most search for and never find. I'm so glad you're mine."

They were cards, not greeting, but the type that are put in a flower delivery. The blue orchid had Dr. Patrick's name written all over it, only it didn't actually have his name written on it which posed a problem. He had been smart enough to not incriminate himself, however, unlucky for him, the card had the name of the flower shop imprinted at the top. Orchids by the Lake, it said with an address in Chicago. "Gotcha!" I shouted aloud to myself.

In the morning I nursed my hangover with a concoction of vegetables and juice that my father had taught me, which I blended together and tossed back with a couple ibuprofen before heading out the door for the floral company in Chicago. Unfortunately, when I arrived, I wasn't given the time of day. There were no other customers in the store, yet no one greeted me or asked if I needed assistance. This was a treatment I was accustomed to in the wealthy white neighborhoods of Chicago. But of course, I was given the royal treatment once I showed my badge. It was amazing what that small piece of metal was capable of doing. The woman behind the corner wasn't able to tell me much, but she directed me to the back where a petite blonde woman sat sliding plastic tubes up the stems of the Gerber daises. Her name was Elise and she was in charge of taking the orders for deliveries. As soon as I mentioned the blue orchid, she knew exactly who I was talking about. She said the man who ordered the flowers was older and attractive. He always tipped well and paid in cash. Clever fella, I thought to myself. He never gave her his name and she had no record of his purchases, but she said that he came in regularly to send flowers to his wife who, as part of a teacher exchange program, was spending a year teaching at a private school in St. Louis. The flower shop had another location there and so Elise would take his order and arrange for the flowers to be delivered. With no paper trail, I was about to give up when I thought of something. I took out my iPhone and pulled up a photo of Terry from the hospital's website. "Oh that's him! He was so handsome!" were Elise's exact words. And just like that, Dr. Terry Patrick's fate was sealed. This was it. I was so close to solving my first case. Terry would get what he deserved. If only my father were alive to see this moment. He would be so proud.

I was riding high with this latest piece of evidence and was on my way to share the information with my partner, when I received a rather interesting call from Jane Rivers, the head of Saint Joseph Hospital. I had contacted her a week prior, to inquire about the missing pain medication from the hospital, given Dr. Patrick's accusation that Caitlyn was the perpetrator. I had a hunch that something seemed off, but I didn't tell Brandon because I knew he wouldn't want us drawing attention to the situation until we knew more. But he wasn't the only one who had hunches, and I wasn't going to ignore mine. 

Mrs. Rivers informed me that the hospital did, in fact, have an issue with pain meds disappearing, which they were actively investigating. When she initially said the words, the wind was taken out of my sails and I silently cussed myself out at the fact that Brandon would now know I had gone over his head and I would have to hear him say, "I told you so." I was about to thank her and hang up the phone when a thought entered my mind. "What do you mean actively investigating?" I asked, to which she informed me that the hospital was still having an issue. When I inquired about how long it had been going on, the dates didn't match up. Someone had been stealing pain meds prior to Caitlyn's time interning at the hospital and they were still going missing even now that she was dead. There was no way Caitlyn was the culprit, which begged the question, who was?