by JJ Lamb
“Do you feel that?” the nurse asked, touching her leg.
Kat couldn’t feel anything.
“Close your eyes and rest, Kat. I’m going to get in touch with Dr. Tallent and we’ll see what he has to say.”
“What’s wrong with my leg?”
“Try to rest. I’ll be right back.”
Kat could see Dara speaking on the telephone, asking for Dr. Tallent.
“What do you mean he’s signed out?” The nurse sounded both annoyed and scared.
Kat’s heart was galloping.
“Okay, then please get me Dr. Cantor. Now!”
“Yes, yes, I understand. Don’t bother him if he’s in surgery.”
The nurse came back to her. “Kat, Dr Tallent isn’t available right now, so I’m. going to get Dr. Brichett. He’s here in the office seeing patients. We’ll get him out here to check your leg. Okay?”
“What’s wrong with my leg?”
“It may be nothing, but I think one of the doctors should take a look. Okay?”
Kat couldn’t speak. Why wasn’t Dara answering her question? She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the strange feeling in her leg.
* * *
Jon Brichett was about to walk into an examination room when Dara came running down the hall, her face was red. She looked frightened.
“Jon, wait! I need you to check one of Mort’s post-op patients.”
“What do you mean? For God’s sake, where’s Mort?”
“I don’t know. I can’t reach him anywhere.”
Brichett was stunned. He’d been having such a good day, but a tickle at the base of his neck turned into an alarm. If Dara wanted him to check something, it needed to be checked. “You’ve paged him?”
“Of course I paged him.”
“What’s the problem?”
“I think there’s an occlusion in her femoral. Her leg is cold. I tried for a distal pulse.”
“And?”
“Negative. No pulse. She’s alternating between pain and paresthesia. Used the Doppler—nothing.”
“Okay! Let’s go!”
They’d only gone a couple of steps when he stopped at a wall phone and pushed a button for the receptionist.
“Hi! Please reschedule the patient in Room One. Make certain he gets another appointment as soon as possible.” He started to hang up, then added, “And cancel the rest of my morning.”
The moment they walked into post-op, one of the other nurses said, “I still can’t reach Mort Tallent.”
Brichett turned to Dara. “What’s the patient’s name and how long has she been post-op?”
Dara’s eyes were wide with worry. “Kat Parker. I have her history already up on the monitor for you. She’s about an hour post op.”
“And Tallent’s gone already? Shit!”
Brichett scanned Kat’s chart, turned, and hurried into the recovery room. There were two women on gurneys, but it took only one glance to tell which one was Kat Parker—her face had that look of terror he’d seen on more patients than he cared to remember.
“Hi, Ms. Parker. I’m Dr. Brichett, one of Dr. Tallent’s associates. They tell me your leg is giving you problems. I’d like to take a look, okay?”
She bit her lower her lip and nodded.
Brichett turned the sheet aside and looked at the bone-white leg. Moving to her ankle, he felt around for a pulse. There was none.
“Where’s Dr. Tallent?” Kat said, her voice barely audible.
“He’s been ... uh ... been called away . But I promise, we’ll take good care of you.”
“What’s the matter with me?”
“Did the person who brought you here stay?”
“Yes. He’s my boyfriend, Cal Cortez. He’s in the waiting room.”
“Do you want him to be with you?”
The patient nodded again.
“Dara, please get Mr. Cortez and bring him here so he can be with Ms. Parker.”
* * *
Cal had started a new pacing cycle when the same nurse he’d seen earlier came rushing through the door.”
“Mr. Cortez, please come with me. Ms. Parker asked to speak to you.”
His heart boomed in his chest. “What’s wrong? Is something wrong with Kat?”
“There’s been a problem. Dr. Brichett will explain it to you.”
The nurse’s voice was soft and kind but he imagined the worst as he followed her to the recovery room. The smells in the hallway brought a moment of déjà vu—he was back in the hospital where he’d been taken with a ruptured appendix many years ago. It took him a moment to realize someone was speaking to him.
“Hi, Mr. Cortez. I’m Dr. Brichett. Sorry to meet under these circumstances.”
Cal nodded and looked down at Kat, who looked back with tear-filled eyes. He moved to her side, grabbed onto her hand, and squeezed. “Hi, kiddo. Am I ever happy to see you.”
On the other side of the gurney, Brichett said, “Kat, we’re going to have to take you over to Ridgewood Hospital. It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes after a Cardio Cath a clot develops in the artery that supplies the blood to your leg. That’s what’s happened here and we need to take care of it. Right away.”
Both Kat and Cal were crying.
“We’re calling for an ambulance.” Brichett nodded at the nurse and she hurried out of the room.
“What’s going to happen to my leg?” Kat shouted. “Am I going to lose my leg?”
Shivers ran up and down Cal’s spine.
Chapter 41
Mort Tallent raced into the Time Out Health Club. Rosia, as usual, was sitting at the desk with her breasts half out of her scoop-neck blouse. A big smile was plastered across her face.
“Good morning, Dr. Tallent. How nice to see you again.”
Tallent’s stomach churned, his head was swimming in pain. He wanted to punch her in the face, rip that stupid blouse from her body.
He jammed his hands in his pocket.
“I have to see Vlad,” he said with a forced a smile. “I have a ... a terrible headache. He’s the best at getting rid of them.”
“Vlad is out, doctor,” she said in that maddening saccharin voice she affected. “But we have other experts who can help you equally as well.”
“No. No one is as good as Vlad.”
“I’m so sorry, doctor, but Vlad has been out for a few days recovering from an accident. He won’t be in for several more days.”
What the fuck am I going to do now?
“Is there any way I can reach him?” Tallent said. “It’s really important.”
Rosia leaned over the counter and Tallent had no choice but to look down into the deep cleavage that was now only inches from his face. “There’s a teensy-weensy chance I might be able to get a message to him.”
“I’d rather talk to him in person.”
Rosia straightened up, the wide smile vanishing to only a slight upturn at the corners of her mouth. “I’ll bet you would, doctor, but I’m afraid that’s impossible.”
Tallent wanted to scream at her—his stomach was a roiling volcano and the roaring in his ears had started again.
“Could I write a note to him and maybe you’ll see that he gets it as soon as possible?”
“Oh, I can try,” Rosia said. “But I can’t guarantee anything.”
Tallent pulled out his wallet and removed a $100 bill. He folded the bill twice and slipped it under the edge of her appointment book, the same as he’d done previously when he’d needed a favor.
“Maybe that will cover the cost of your finding him,” he said.
The cleavage retreated and quickly became the repository for the folded bill.
“Yes, it will.” She pulled out a pad from the desk and passed it across to him. “Do you need a pen, Dr. Tallent?”
Stupid cow.
“No, no. I have my own.”
He sat down in a small waiting area for customers, picked up a body building magazine to use for support, and glanced briefly a
t the steroid-happy bodies pictured on the front. With a snort, he covered up a muscle-bound man and wrote a cryptic message:
Vlad,
I need you to permanently take care of that nurse situation we recently discussed.
Please get in touch with me as soon as possible—M.T
* * *
Alex had been sitting in his car the past two days waiting for this Vlad person to show up.
He wanted to get a good look at this man. He’d never seen him as a kid because twenty years ago their Russian gang only dealt with the parents.
Why wasn’t the boy with his mother and father that day when he and his stupid partner went to that hovel of an apartment?
Alexander had gone over that day in his mind a thousand times.
After killing the couple, they’d left the apartment and waited in the car for the boy to come home. He never arrived.
How could that miserable couple have warned the kid to stay away when Alex and Misha had caught the two of them completely off-guard? The only answer: the boy was in the apartment that day, hidden so they wouldn’t find him.
Alex couldn’t understand. How could any child watch or hear the slaughter he and Misha carried out and remain silent?
Around noon, his stomach started growling like a beast.
Idiot! Should have packed some food.
He decided to go someplace nearby, eat, come back to wait. Hope that miserable Vlad did not arrive in the meantime.
Chapter 42
Gina was just back from an early lunch when Gwen, the CCU team leader caught her walking down the hall.
“Gina, I’m going to need you to scrub in with Jon Brichett. Immediately!”
“Yeah, sure. What’s up?”
The team leader was flustered. “An emergency thrombectomy ... post-op Cardio Cath .”
“Brichett must be upset. That kind of thing doesn’t happen to him, at least not very often.”
“He’s more like pissed ... she’s one of Mort Tallent’s patients.”
“Why is Brichett doing the surgery if it’s Tallent’s patient?”
“No one gave me the scoop on that,” Gwen said. “All I know is, the ambulance will be here any minute ... and the clock is ticking. The patient has had negative leg and pedal pulses for almost two hours.”
“Jeez, she must have been on anticoagulants. Shouldn’t that have taken care of the clots in the OR?”
“Tell that to the gods.”
Gina hurried to the CCU emergency OR and started pulling packs of wrapped sterile set-ups. She opened the outer layers, then rushed out to the scrub area, masked up, and started brushing hard at her nails, hands, and arms. Pretty soon she was joined by Brichett.
“Thought I’d be eating lunch by now,” he said. “My stomach’s growling like a trapped bear.”
“What’s up with Mort?” Gina had reached her arms and was scrubbing hard at the skin. “This is his patient, right?”
Even with his mask on, Gina could see the irritation in Brichett’s eyes when he turned to her. “Let’s just say, there’s trouble in Oz these days.”
Gina couldn’t let it go. “He really gave my friend Lolly a bad time.”
“We were sorry to lose her,” Brichett said. “Lolly was a great nurse. I don’t know what happened, but she just up and left. She must have been spooked by something; that’s what it looked like to me. Hope it wasn’t the result of something Tallent did.”
I don’t know yet. But I’m going to find out.
Gina turned away from the sink. “Think I better get moving.”
* * *
Kat was inconsolable. Even with the medications they’d given her, she was anxious and couldn’t get past the idea that she might lose her leg. She clutched Cal’s hand in the ambulance.
“Please try to relax.” He leaned over and kissed her. “It’s going to be all right, Kat. You’ll see.”
“But what if I lose my leg?”
“Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it,” he said, “but Dr. Brichett thinks you’re going to be fine.”
“But where’s Dr. Tallent?” she said. “He’s my doctor. Nobody seems to know where he is.”
“Dr. Brichett is his partner. I’m sure he’ll take good care of you.”
The medication was starting to kick in. She looked at Cal and could swear there was an aura of light around him. All her worry and pain took a step back.
She closed her eyes and said, “I love you, Cal. I really do love you.”
* * *
By the time Jon Brichett finished scrubbing and walked into the OR, Gina had set up for an arterial thrombectomy. He couldn’t help feeling uneasy knowing what the patient had at stake. He would do his best and hope the fates were on their side.
Brichett watched as Kathryn Parker was lifted from the gurney to the table with a steadying sheet underneath to keep her from changing position. He needed her as still as possible.
“Let’s see if we can get by without a general,” he said.
The anesthesiologist nodded and started the IV meds for conscious sedation.
“Hopefully, this will be quick,” Brichett said.
“Her leg is white as snow,” Gina said.
“Still no pedal pulse,” said the circulating nurse.
Brichett nodded. “Let’s just do what we have to do and get blood flowing to that leg.”
To Brichett, it seemed like no time between incision and placement of the Fogarty catheter that stabilized and withdrew thrombus material from the proximal and distal segments of the femoral artery.
“And?” Brichett said to the circulating nurse, holding his breath.
It seemed to take forever until the nurse smiled. “Pinking up.”
Every one in the room let out a collective, “Whoa!”
* * *
Cal was in the waiting room, hyperventilating and dizzy. He hadn’t stopped pacing since the door closed behind Kat. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this frightened.
He and Kat had just found each other and now he might lose her. He tried to sit down jumped back up, looked around the room helplessly, and started pacing again.
When the door opened, he spun around, stopped, and watched the Dr Brichett come into the waiting room, head in his direction with a smile on his face.
Cal covered his face and sobbed.
Chapter 43
Mort Tallent thought everything had gone well with Kat Parker’s procedure ... until the final moments. There was something about the way the catheter hung up at one point that set off an alarm in his head.
No! Got to get out of here. Now! Run!
“Suture her. Finish her up,” he said to his assistant.
He rushed out of the OR to the locker room, stepped out of his scrubs, and all but ran out of the unit.
Hurrying along the hallways, he took the elevator down to the underground parking garage. As soon as he was in his car and hit the ignition, he accelerated out of the building, tires screeching.
Once on the street, he turned off his cell, and took a deep breath. Finally, he could breathe again.
The rain was coming down hard. The sound of it beating on his windshield, along with the slosh and song of the water under his tires began to calm him.
Have to get away. Can’t stand this anymore.
He could leave his practice behind ... as soon as he knew Gina Mazzio was taken out. She knew what was going on. She was the danger. She was the only obstacle standing between him and freedom.
Freedom! A word he hadn’t thought of for many years.
Lolly and Gina.
Nosy nurses who just couldn’t stay out of his business, had to sneak into his computer, try to ruin his life. Well, that wasn’t going to happen.
He drove around the city aimlessly after he left a message for Vlad at the health club. Then he headed toward Half Moon Bay. With each mile that pushed San Francisco farther behind him, he could feel the tension in his neck easing.
He finally pulled i
nto a parking lot near the ocean and got out of the car. He took off his shoes and walked slowly down to the beach. The rain was like sheets of ice water drenching him, but it also cleansed him and made him feel whole.
He walked back and forth along the water’s edge. The sound of the rain and the crashing waves created peace deep inside. He looked around and saw he was surrounded by absolute emptiness. There wasn’t anyone or anything else within sight as the massive waves rolled toward the shore, crashing onto the rocks, smashing into the shoreline.
He screamed, “Freedom.”
His mind was clear again. Everything in its proper place.
He would finish Gina Mazzio, finish the week’s procedures, finish his life in San Francisco, and leave.
* * *
Jon Brichett was flipping angry. No! He wasn’t angry, he was freaking mad.
What the hell happened to Mort? Walking out, disappearing on a post–op patient like that.
Unbelievable! The man’s unraveling right before our eyes.
Brichett tried Tallent’s telephone number again. He called the exchange that handled their calls. Nothing.
Damn it!
Kat Parker was one lucky woman. It gave him a certain pleasure to know that he’d saved her leg.
No thanks to that fucker Tallent
It always amazed him how tough, yet how fragile the human body was. Working in these dire situations always left him with more questions than answers.
Were all the dangers, the hazards that humans endured, acts of vengeful gods? Or were they only the random acts of a disinterested universe?
He’d stopped trying to figure it out years ago. Now he only tried to do the very best he could every single day.
* * *
It was late when Tallent walked into the offices. He headed straight for the post-op holding area.
The rooms were empty. His heart raced at the thought that the worst might have happened. Something had definitely gone wrong. There were no post-op patients—they were all discharged.
Kat Parker should have been there with the nurses, awaiting his further orders.
He went to his office, turned on the lights, and was startled to see Jon Brichett sitting in the chair opposite his desk. Brichett looked wasted.
