PsyCop 5: Camp Hell Read Online Free Page B

stayed put and stared at Warwick. He’d already dismissed us by looking back down at his computer and starting to type. He had to know we were still there. How could he not?
    Lisa had told me that he didn’t actually know all that much, that Roger Burke was the one who could point fingers and name names. I wanted something more from Warwick, but it didn’t seem like I would get it. Not now, not today.
    “C’mon, Vic,” said Zig. “They’ve got a pretty mean cherry turnover in the cafeteria at LaSalle.”
    Zig drove us over to the hospital. I was quiet and moody, and he was just quiet. The police scanner crackled with distorted words buried in a rise and fall of static. He parked as close as he could to the entrance without blocking an ambulance.
    “Who d’you suppose is watching us?” I asked as Zigler killed the ignition.
    Zig sighed, deflated, and slouched into his seat. “I don’t know. I think we’ll spot them eventually if we keep our eyes open.”
    “Back there in Warwick’s office—why’d you keep trying to shut me up, anyway? What do you care if I ask him about all the extra security? Or did you sign something else that said you’d pretend nothing weird was happening?”
    He cut his eyes to me. “Don’t be a prick. Something weird’s always happening.” He stroked his cop-mustache for strength. “You looked too mad to get what you wanted out of it, that’s all. Do I want you to know what’s going on, who’s authorizing which men, who’s cranking out the next stack of papers to sign? Sure, if it’ll give you some peace of mind. But I don’t think you’ll find anything out by going off half-cocked in Warwick’s office.”
    I could’ve lightened the mood by asking him if he realized how many penis references were contained in his little tirade, but I decided against it. Mostly because he’d stopped me from acting pissy at Warwick because I was mad—and he’d probably been right in doing it. Also, Zigler and I don’t joke about penises. Not with each other, anyway.
    In the course of my day-to-day life, I’d driven by LaSalle General, but I’d never had any reason to go inside. Where the last medical institution I’d spent time at, Rosewood Court, was squared-off and horizontal in a sixties kind of way, LaSalle seemed to tower over us, five stories, huge and solid. The bricks were dark. The windows were small. And anywhere something had been added, changed or repaired, there was a patch of masonry that almost matched, but not quite.
    The exterior doors and fittings were all brand new, huge sheets of plate glass that whisked open while we were still several steps away. Zigler went to the front desk and talked in low tones to the nurse on duty, who wore brightly colored scrubs that looked more like pajamas. When I was an inpatient at the Cook County Mental Health Center, the scrubs were all blue. Medium blue, navy, or sometimes teal, but always blue.
    Times change.
    I vaguely wondered what the staff wore at Camp Hell, and then I wondered why I didn’t remember. My CCMHC memories were older, and soaked in Thorazine. So why couldn’t I picture the wardrobe at Camp Hell?
    Zigler handed me a plastic holder with an alligator clip and a piece of tagboard inside that read, “Security Level 2.”
    “Visitors have security levels?”
    Zigler clipped an identical badge onto his lapel. “Looks that way. We can get into any of the public areas right now, and the guards will let us in to the pharmacy and admin sections whenever, but they’ll need to assign a guide to us for Emergency and the ICU so that we don’t get in their way.”
    I wasn’t really looking forward to visiting any area of the building where people were wheeled around on creaky metal gurneys, anyhow. Although maybe things were done differently now. Maybe gurneys were made of plastic, and you couldn’t hear them coming.
    “You see something?”
    Only in my own mind. I shook my head.
    “So the lobby’s clean.”
    I