Chapter 44
FORTY-FOUR
The picture was getting clearer by the update. A flood of information seemed to hit all at once, and Sandra wished it had only come sooner.
Sandra had tried seven times in the last hour to reach Ashmore and the two of her collaborators who were still conscious, without luck. None of them were answering her calls whether it be through the hospital lines or trying their personal cell phone numbers.
Now that they knew Mindy Ashmore’s identity, they had her active cell number. It wasn’t doing Sandra any good either. If she didn’t get someone inside to talk to her soon, she expected more pressure to come from Kreiger about moving in. Something had to give, that much she knew.
Neal pocketed his phone. He’d taken a few back-to-back calls from officers he had out in the field.
“All right, people, I’ve got more news. Officer Moore had a talk with Perkins’s mother, and we gained valuable information about the brother and insight into Shane himself.
The brother ultimately died of a drug-induced stroke.
Efforts made by the doctors at Founders Hospital failed, and the treatments resulted in significant debt to the family.
The mother, who assumed financial responsibility, is struggling to keep her head above water. And that’s working two jobs.”
“Let me guess. Shane’s reeling from the loss of his brother and can’t take watching his mother run herself into the ground,” Monica said.
“Bingo.” Neal pointed his finger at her. “It also wouldn’t help that Shane was diagnosed with OCD.”
“Which would explain his ladder routine of two steps up, one back,” Sandra worked in.
“It would,” Neal agreed. “But due to the OCD, he likes order and calm. According to his mother, losing his brother only intensified his condition. He wanted to fix everything, but he’s not in any position to do that either.
She blames herself for not wanting to let go of her son when it was already clear he was brain-dead, and only machines were keeping him alive. ”
“I can’t even imagine making that call,” Brice put in, and Sandra shook her head.
“And that’s what you meant by ultimately died from the stroke?” Sandra asked Neal.
“That’s right. And the second call was from Detective Birch,” Neal said.
Just hearing his name had Sandra sitting up straighter.
“He’s spoken with Tom’s daughter.” Neal filled them in on his findings.
“That confirms that three out of the four hostage takers inside owe great sums of money to the hospital. How much do you want to bet the same applies to Mindy Ashmore?” Brice said.
“Not only that,” Sandra began, “but three out of four lost a loved one in this hospital.”
“Ah, I just received an email from my contact in the billing department,” Luis said.
He picked up when everyone fell silent. “Feeney, we know about. An account for Perkins owes a hundred grand, Sparling owes one hundred and seventy-five K, and Mindy Ashmore owes two hundred and fifty thousand. All the accounts have now been forwarded to a collection agency.”
“Holy hell.” Brice whistled.
“And where do the Ashmores work?” Sandra looked at Gibson.
“Nothing that would make them that much money a year combined. Gross,” he said. “She’s in admin for an office supply company, and he works at a garage.”
There was a knock on the door, and Brice answered as he was the closest.
“Officer Hernandez. I’m here with Dylan Ashmore.”
“Yes, please come in.” Brice stepped back, and a man entered the vehicle. “Thank you for coming, Mr. Ashmore.”
The man’s gaze darted around the vehicle at all of them. “Sure, but I don’t understand why I’m here.”
Sandra glanced at Neal. He must have told Hernandez to just bring him back here without providing a reason. “Mr. Ashmore, I’m Special Agent Sandra Vos.” Then she introduced Brice and the rest of them. “It might be best if you sat down.”
“Here. Have my seat.” Neal got up and walked down the vehicle toward the alcove with the coffee.
Dylan took Neal’s spot at the table, looking at Luis several times. His gaze drifted to the laptop’s screen, and then he scanned more of the vehicle and landed on the markerboard. Gibson had pinned photographs of the four perps on there with magnets. Even if Mindy’s face was obscured.
“Why is Mindy’s picture up there?” Dylan made eye contact with Sandra.
Gibson had swiveled in his chair when Sandra had introduced him, but he grabbed a notebook and a pen. As the information officer, gathering intel primarily fell under his purview. The circumstances made this a little unorthodox, but it wasn’t unheard of in a crisis incident.
“There’s an ongoing situation inside Founders Hospital, and your wife is involved,” Sandra began, dispensing with an appetizer of what was to be a heavy main course.
“In what, exactly?” Dylan’s posture was stiff and closed off.
“This won’t be easy to hear, but she has a gun and is working with three other people.”
“The other photos on the board there?”
“Yes. Do any of them look familiar to you?” They hadn’t uncovered any trail that would make Sandra think he would recognize them, but she had to ask.
Dylan looked past her toward the markerboard. “I’ve never seen them before.” Meeting her gaze again, he added, “This isn’t making sense. Why would Mindy go in there with a gun, with those people? Strangers? They must be forcing her into this.”
Sandra appreciated why he’d want to believe that. It would certainly go down a lot easier than what she had to tell him. “Actually, Mr. Ashmore, it seems your wife orchestrated today’s events.”
Dylan wiped his face and shook his head. “I… I don’t know what to say to that. But Mindy is a kind person, and she wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
Sandra could point out that people, even the ones closest to us, were capable of far more than we could imagine.
Though if his assessment of his wife held merit, it made it less likely that she would shoot anyone.
So far, she’d threatened, spoke of doing what she must, but there was nothing to indicate that she’d followed through and hurt anyone.
Or worse. “We’re aware that you owe Founders Hospital quite a bit of money. Would you tell us why?”
“Mindy was diagnosed with breast cancer three years ago. It made us realize how life can change in an instant. But she recovered and went into full remission. She rang the bell in the cancer ward. We thought it was behind us.” He licked his lips, as his eyes filled with tears, and his chin quivered.
“It came back,” Brice said, in a near whisper.
“Yes. Six months ago. Neither of us were prepared for that.”
“Financially?” Sandra asked.
“In all ways.” He wiped his cheeks. “Emotionally, mentally. We barely got through it the first time the cancer hit.”
Brice angled his head. “Your marriage was affected?”
“Yes and no. Not like you might think. It brought us closer together. We were partners in this battle.”
Except for now it seemed Mindy was taking matters into her own hands. “Then, you’ve been able to handle a payment plan?”
Dylan let out a long, jagged breath. “Not at all. Mindy lost her job through all this. We could fight that, of course, unlawful termination, but with what? We don’t have money to hire a lawyer.
Her boss replaced her. He wrote her dismissal off as poor job performance.
Absolute bullshit. She’s been picking up temp office jobs here and there, but nothing steady or reliable. And she’s getting weaker.”
“She hasn’t begun treatment?” Sandra asked.
“With what? We don’t have any money, and our medical insurance is tapped out.”
“I can only imagine how hard the last year or so has been for you.” Sandra’s heart went out to this man and Mindy.
She might be holding a roomful of people hostage, but part of being a good negotiator was relating to the person with the gun.
Roles reversed, same triggers initiated, same baggage, any human being could be in Mindy’s place.
“Unbearable for the most part. The only light was that brief time when the cancer was gone. We were thinking positively and glimpsed a bright future.” His eyes glazed over.
“We celebrated our fifteenth wedding anniversary the week before the diagnosis came in that the cancer had returned.” Dylan picked mindlessly at his fingernails, seemingly retreating inward. Likely wishing he were anywhere else.
“Do you have any idea what she might hope to accomplish in there?” Sandra asked.
Dylan’s chin quivered again, and a few tears fell.
Everyone let him have this time without speaking.
Eventually, Dylan spoke. “We still owe two hundred and fifty thousand from her first fight against cancer. Neither of us had any idea how we’d pay it off in our lifetimes let alone face more, possibly the same amount, again. That’s if they’ll even treat her.”
“Is the hospital refusing to do so?” Sandra was disgusted by the extent of humankind’s greed. She knew the justification would be the hospital was independently owned and a business like any other that focused on profit.
“Founders is, and since they ruined our credit rating by sending our account to collections, we can’t get a loan and go to another hospital. But I told her we’d figure it out. She told me I would be better off if she was dead.” Tears dripped off his chin as he lifted his gaze to Sandra’s.
This hospital destroyed our lives… Mindy’s words ricocheted in her head, along with so much else that Dylan had revealed.
Mindy sounded suicidal and truly felt she had nothing to lose.
“Did she talk about Founders Hospital, maybe Bright Future LLC?” Sandra recalled the only other person Mindy said she knew was the owner of the pharmaceutical company.
“We both talked about the hospital. It still doesn’t make sense she’d go in there with a gun, and with strangers. But that company sounds familiar, though I’m not sure why.”
“They make chemo medication,” Sandra told him.
“That’s why, then. I must have seen the name somewhere during her treatment.”