Chapter Fifteen

Both men lapsed into silence, staring around them at the floor and the room without really seeing any of it. After several minutes, the swinging doors burst open and a man in dingy gray scrubs stepped out and looked around. Joe and Brent stood up and the doctor came over to them. Joe extended a hand. "Thanks for coming out here to talk to us, doctor," he said.

"No problem." He shook Joe's hand, then turned to shake Brent's. "I'm Dr. Claup."

"Brent Conner."

The doctor turned back to Joe. "And your name, again?"

"Joseph Urgulano."

"You say you're Ellen's husband, right?"

"Is that the name she gave you?" Joe asked. "Ellen?"

Dr. Claup frowned. "Let's make sure we're both talking about the same woman. Around midnight, a dark-haired woman came in here alone. Young, late twenties. She said she'd been at a friend's house and started having abdominal pains, and one of her friends insisted she get checked out, but didn't want to wait here for her. It was kind of a strange story, because she had an overnight bag with her."

Joe nodded. "That's her. We were at that friend's apartment a couple of hours ago, and they say she was talking to someone and started feeling bad."

"Okay," the doctor said. "So it sounds like we are talking about the same person, then." He frowned at both men. "But she told me her name was Ellen. Is that not right?"

Joe and Brent looked at each other. "She goes by Elise at home," Brent said. "But if she wanted you to call her Ellen, that's fine, too."

"What we want to know," Joe said, "Is if she's still here, and if she's okay."

"Oh, she'll be fine," Dr. Claup said, waving his hands. "There really wasn't much we could do for her. We checked her blood pressure, did a few tests, asked a few questions, but she seemed all right. We finally gave her some juice, observed her for an hour, and tried to reassure her."

"So she's okay, then?"

"Of course," the doctor said. "It's probably just something she ate. She didn't seem in any danger of losing the baby."

"Baby?" Joe's face grew suddenly pale. Brent sat down and gripped the edge of the seat.

Dr. Claup looked from one man to the other. "She hadn't told you she's expecting?"

"No," Joe said. "What... how long..."

"About eight weeks or so." Seeing the look of dismay on Joe's face, he patted his shoulder. "I'm sure she meant to tell you soon, herself. Some women are kind of shy like that, you know. Especially with a first child. They like to wait a little bit, make sure everything's okay before they go getting Dad's hopes up." He grinned.

"But that's impossible," Joe said. "She can't have children. A doctor told her that a long time ago."

"Doctors can be wrong."

"And you're sure you aren't wrong about this?"

"Oh, there's no shade of a doubt." He smiled again. "I'm sorry to spoil her news for you, but you must be very happy."

Joe sat down and buried his face in his hands. Brent glanced at him anxiously. "Where is she now?"

Dr. Claup frowned, displeased at the reaction he was getting. "We discharged her a couple of hours ago."

"How did she leave if she was alone?"

The doctor spread his hands in innocence. "I gave instructions that she be released into the care of a responsible individual, since she seemed anxious and needed to rest for a bit, but I have no idea who she left with."

"Who would know?"

The doctor appeared flustered. "The desk clerk should have all the papers on file."

"We had trouble getting anything out of her," Brent said. "Could you maybe talk to her, or have someone else help us? It's really important that we find Elise... Ellen."

Dr. Claup folded his arms across his chest. "Is there something going on here you guys aren't telling me? Is Ellen avoiding you for some reason? You aren't under any kind of restraining order, are you?"

Joe looked up, angry and incredulous. "I never did anything to her, okay? Why does no one want me to find my wife?"

Brent indicated to the doctor with a jerk of his head they should move out of earshot. "Listen," he said quietly. "We've been looking for this woman all night. We're tired, hungry and frustrated. We're not in any kind of legal trouble. Everything's just sort of tangled up right now and we need to find her and tell her it's okay to come home."

"Where do you fit into all this?" the doctor asked. "Are you her brother or something?"

Brent's ears reddened. "I'm a friend."

The doctor nodded slowly to himself, as if seeing how the different pieces of a puzzle fit together. "Are you the baby's father?"

Brent sighed. "I suppose it's a possibility."

I'll get the head nurse to look up Ellen's... uh, Elise's file. It might have the name of the person we released her to."

"Thanks."

"Just having the name might not be much help," Dr. Claup warned.

"It'll be better than nothing."

The doctor shook his head. "I wouldn't be in either of you guys' shoes for anything."