Lethal Measures

by Leonard Goldberg

  “It’s near the end of visiting hours,” she explained.

  “There’ll still be people in the halls and elevators. We’ll blend right in. Nobody will notice us.”

  “Yeah. I guess,” Rudy said, then squinted an eye.

  “But what if the old man has got a visitor?”

  “Then we’ll wait for the visitor to leave.” Eva handed him a white plastic cap and a pair of thick glasses.

  “Put these on.”

  They were wearing white shirts and pants, the mandatory uniform for the cleaning crews at Memorial Hospital. The caps were optional, but Eva thought they helped their disguises. Caps cover hair and alter the way people look. The idea for Rudy to wear glasses came from an article published by a paramilitary commander on the Internet. If the glasses were thick enough, the commander had written, they became the dominant feature people would remember about the individual who had them on. Rudy’s glasses were made of clear plastic, but they appeared thick enough to be magnifying glasses.

  “How much longer?” he asked impatiently.

  “About five minutes.”

  “Maybe now would be a good time for you to lead us in prayer.”

  Eva nodded and lowered her head. “0 Lord, guide us through this mission and let us complete it successfully. Keep us safe as we

  destroy your enemies, in thy name. Thank you for—” Rudy nudged her with his elbow and gestured with his head to the rear of the chapel. An elderly woman was slowly walking down the center aisle. She sat across from them, then stared up at the stained-glass window and fingered her rosary beads.

  ” for your help and mercy. Amen,” Eva quickly finished.

  “Amen,” Rudy added solemnly.

  In his peripheral vision Rudy studied the woman. She was very dark, and he could hear her praying in a foreign language that he didn’t recognize. She knelt and started crying, her soft sobs clearly audible. Then her voice became louder and high pitched and began to grate on Rudy’s nerves. He wished she’d do her crying somewhere else.

  Rudy glanced up at the beautiful stained-glass window. A white archangel looked down at him. Their eyes met and held. Rudy felt the power flowing through him.

  He was being blessed.

  Eva stood, her back to the woman.

  “Keep your head down,” she said in a whisper.

  They left the chapel and walked over to a bank of elevators. The corridor was deserted except for a young woman pushing a stroller with a sleeping child. A nearby information desk was empty.

  “I thought you said there’d be people in the halls,” Rudy said, concerned.

  “On the ward there will be,” Eva told him and pushed the up button.

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because our friend at Memorial said there would be.”

  Rudy didn’t trust their contact at Memorial Hospital. The guy always stayed in the background and never got his hands dirty or did any of the killing. And if the contact was ever caught, Rudy had the feeling he would snitch on the others to save himself. But Eva had vouched for him.

  “We leave by the fire escape, right?” Rudy asked, thinking ahead.

  “Right.”

  Eva checked their appearance in the mirrored wall adjacent to the elevators.

  “With their white clothes and caps, they looked like cleaners down to the smallest detail. Even their ID badges seemed real. And the commander on the Internet was correct about the thick glasses. Rudy now looked like a studious nerd. Eva tucked a red curl of hair under

  her cap as the elevator door opened. At the back of the elevator was a teenage girl in a wheelchair, an IV running in her arm. A big, heavyset man in working clothes stood beside her, his hand on her shoulder. There was the distinct scent of an air deodorizer in the elevator. It was not a fresh aroma but a sickly sweet one. Eva noticed that the floor was damp, as if it had just been mopped. She thought she could detect an underlying odor of vomit.

  “Working late, huh?” the man asked.

  “Yeah,” Eva said, keeping her head turned away from the man.

  “But we’re almost done.”

  Rudy looked over at the girl in the wheelchair. She was a pretty little thing, he thought, no more than fourteen or fifteen. Then he saw the rash on her arms, red and angry with blisters and scabs. Even her feet and legs were affected. And now she was scratching at the sores on her neck. Rudy pushed himself against the wall, putting as much distance as possible between himself and the girl. He hoped that whatever the hell she had couldn’t be spread through the air.

  The elevator jerked to a stop, and the door opened. Eva and Rudy got out on the sixth floor and went directly to a cleaning closet at the end of the corridor.

  After obtaining a bucket on wheels and two mops, they headed back for Room 602.

  There were only a few people in the hall: an old man helping an old woman walk, a young man strolling along next to his mobile IV pole. Eva and Rudy stepped aside as a technician pushing an EKG machine hurried by.

  “Perfect,” Rudy said under his breath.

  “Not so perfect,” Eva said, pointing with her mop.

  “There’s a chair outside the old man’s room.”

  “So?”

  “Look down at the nurses’ station.”

  Rudy squeezed water from his mop and glanced over his shoulder. A cop was standing at the station chatting with a nurse. They were laughing, making small talk.

  “Shit,” he growled.

  “What now?”

  Eva sized up the situation, weighing the chance of getting caught. So what if the cop walked in? she asked herself. So what? He could be killed quickly and silently. With her foot she felt the Beretta with its silencer that was taped to her leg.

  “Well?” Rudy asked, his eyes fixed on the policeman. Now the cop was drinking coffee, still laughing with the nurse.

  “We go for it.” They moved quickly into the room, leaving the door open. An old man was lying in bed, his eyes bandaged. On a movable table beside him was a half-eaten dish of vanilla ice cream. As Rudy moved toward the old man, he bumped into the table, pushing it against the bed.

  “Is that you, Lieutenant Sinclair?” the old man asked loudly.

  “Yeah.” Rudy grunted.

  “I’m glad you came back,” the man said.

  “I just remembered something else. Two of the men I saw going into the house were speaking Spanish. I’m sure they were Mexican. And one of the white guys had a mustache and goatee. Funny how this stuff comes back to you, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. Real funny.” Rudy clamped a hand over the old man’s mouth and reached for the pillow. The man tried to twist away, but Rudy pinned him to the mattress with his weight. Quickly he placed the pillow over the old man’s face.

  Eva peeked out the door and down the corridor. The cop was still at the nurses’ station. But he was standing away from the counter now, and held his head back as he drank from the coffee cup. His break was almost over. She looked back at Rudy and the old man.

  “Hurry it up!” she urged.

  “The old bastard doesn’t want to die.”

  The old man was stronger than Rudy had anticipated. He was clawing at Rudy’s arms, breaking skin and drawing blood. Rudy pushed down on the pillow even harder.

  Now the old man was kicking and making a muffled sound beneath the pillow.

  Suddenly he stiffened and retched and retched again. Then he was still.

  Rudy removed the pillow and studied the man’s face. There was spittle and vomit all about the man’s nose and mouth, but Rudy saw no bubbles. No air was moving.

  He felt for a carotid pulse. Nothing. Rudy placed the pillow under the man’s head and said, “Let’s move it.”

  They went back into the corridor, swishing at the floor with their mops. Out of the corners of their eyes they watched the cop heading toward them.

  Rudy leaned down and reached for the pistol inside his sock.

  “Cool it,” Eva said evenly.

&nbs
p; “Let’s mop our way down the corridor, nice and easy.”

  “I think he saw us coming out of the room.” “If he comes over to question us, kill him.” Eva put a fake smile on her face, nodding as if Rudy had just said something funny.

  “One shot to the head.”

  They swished their mops back and forth, moving slowly away from Room 602, never looking up but keeping the cop in their peripheral vision.

  The cop had his hands on his hips, studying them now.

  “What do you think?” Rudy asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

  “I think he’s going to sit down.”

  A moment later the cop sat in his chair and stretched out his legs.

  “Good boy,” Eva said, pushing the bucket down the corridor toward the

  fire escape. Thursday, March 18, 7.30 a.m.

  Joanna stared at the ringing phone, knowing it was bringing bad news. Early morning calls always did. It was 7:30, and Joanna was just starting her second cup of coffee. She pushed away from the breakfast and picked up the phone.

  “Yes?”

  “Good morning,” Paul said.

  “I hope I didn’t wake you.”

  “I’ve been up,” Joanna said softly.

  “And by now you’re on your second cup of coffee.”

  “Exactly right.” Joanna glanced up at the wall clock.

  “Is anything wrong?”

  “Everything is fine in Montreal,” Paul said.

  “Except for Sasha’s disappointment at not being able to meet you.”

  “You tell her we’ll do it soon, and that’s a promise.”

  “I’ll try, but she may not believe it. You see, her mother is using this as an example of Sasha not being able to depend on me and what I say.”

  Joanna could sense the bitterness in Paul’s voice.

  “Lord! Your ex-wife sounds awful.”

  “That may be the understatement of the year.” Paul lit a cigarette and blew smoke into the receiver.

  “And to make matters worse, I was supposed to have dinner with Sasha tonight, but I have to fly to New York for an important meeting.”

  Joanna wondered what it would feel like to be an only child pulled in opposite directions by divorced, feuding parents. It had to leave emotional scars.

  “I’m certain that Sasha will understand that because of business—” “Children do not understand business,” Paul interrupted.

  “Not when it takes a parent away.”

  “Is your business that important?” “It’s top priority,” Paul said, his voice now very serious.

  “We’re trying to take over an investment bank in New York, and there are problems.”

  “Well, solve the problems as quickly as possible and return to Montreal,” Joanna said.

  “And bring Sasha a surprise present from New York.”

  Paul sighed deeply.

  “I wish it were that easy. But there’s going to be a series of meetings in New York; it could go on for a week or more. I’m afraid we’ll have to cancel our dinner plans this weekend.”

  “Events dictate our lives,” Joanna muttered under her breath.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “When I get back to Los Angeles we’ll have one of our special dinners. How does that sound?”

  “Great,” Joanna said, trying to sound enthusiastic.

  “I miss you,” Paul said warmly.

  “I really miss you.”

  “I miss—” Joanna heard a series of clicks, then Paul’s voice came back on.

  “I’ve got an urgent call on another line,” he said quickly.

  “Can I call you back later?”

  “Of course.”

  “Stay sweet and gorgeous.”

  Joanna stared at the phone for a moment before putting it down. She wondered if she had just gotten a glimpse of the future. Up until now all of her dates and meetings with Paul had been carefully planned. Everything had been moonlight and wine and roses. But their professional lives were coming into play and interfering with their plans. She couldn’t go to Montreal because of her involvement in the West Hollywood bombing, he couldn’t return to Los Angeles because of a bank takeover in New York. And then there were his ex-wife and daughter, who would undoubtedly be mixed into their relationship. Jesus! Joanna groaned. Why couldn’t her life be smooth and uncomplicated, just for once?

  The phone rang loudly, breaking into her thoughts. Joanna smiled. It was Paul.

  She could feel it in her bones. He probably wanted to tell her how he missed her again. Or maybe the meeting in New York was canceled and he was back on his way to Los Angeles.

  Joanna reached for the phone.

  “Yes?”

  “We’ve got a problem,” Jake Sinclair said. “What?”

  “Our only witness to the bombing was found dead in his bed at Memorial this morning.”

  Joanna quickly refocused her mind.

  “Any evidence of foul play?”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” Jake said.

  “You’d better take a look.”

  Joanna edged her way through the crowd of doctors and nurses gathered at the sixth-floor nurses’ station. She ducked under the crime scene tape and walked down the quiet corridor. Most of the doors were closed, but a few were cracked open with curious eyes peeking out. A policeman standing outside Room 602 recognized her and gave her a half salute.

  On entering the room, Joanna first noticed the strong stench of vomit. She glanced at the floor and bed, searching unsuccessfully for the source of the odor. She noted that the furniture was in place, the bed covers unwrinkled.

  Nothing was askew. If there had been a struggle, Joanna saw no evidence for it.

  Jake came over to her.

  “There’s strange business here.”

  “What have you got?” Joanna asked.

  “I’ve got a dead man,” Jake said.

  “And there’s a smudge of blood on his pillow I can’t explain.”

  “Does he have a shaving cut?” Joanna inquired.

  “None that I could find.”

  “Or maybe a nosebleed.”

  “Possible,” Jake said.

  “But there’s no crusted blood around his nostrils.”

  “Or he could have coughed it up,” Joanna suggested.

  “People with blast injuries sometimes have hemorrhaging into their airways.”

  “So it may be nothing after all,” Simon Murdock said, worriedly pacing the floor by a large window. The morning light streamed in and seemed to magnify the lines in his face.

  “The diagnosis here may well be the one made by the attending physician.”

  “Which is?” Joanna asked.

  “Regurgitation and aspiration with acute airway obstruction.”

  Joanna nodded, now knowing the source of the stench.

  “And perhaps he coughed so hard trying to clear his airway he ruptured a small blood vessel.”

  “That would explain everything,” Murdock agreed eagerly.

  “Un-huh,” Jake said, unconvinced, as he lifted up the corpse’s head to

  examine the nape of the neck. “Now look. Lieutenant,” Murdock said, a noticeable edge to his voice.

  “I know it’s your job to investigate, but the evidence here seems quite clear, and I don’t see the need—” “Nothing is clear here,” Jake cut him off.

  “A man who survived a bomb blast and was recovering is suddenly dead and nobody knows why. And he just happened to be the only eyewitness to the bombing.”

  “But a diagnosis of regurgitation and aspiration seems obvious, don’t you agree?”

  “I’ll agree when I see the autopsy that shows his lungs filled with vomit,” Jake said, making no effort to hide his dislike for the clean of the medical school.

  “And I’ll believe the blood on this pillowcase belongs to this guy when we match it against his blood type.”

  Murdock stared back for a moment, then looked away and began pacing again.


  Joanna could sense the lingering tension as well as the mounting mutual dislike between the two men. Whenever they were together it required effort by both to remain civil. And she understood why. Their meetings always involved a criminal investigation at Memorial Hospital. And it was Murdock’s job to protect Memorial’s image at all costs. Nothing was worse for a medical center’s reputation than a blatant crime, and Memorial had had more than its share.

  Drugs, sex scandals, even murder. Just like the outside world, Joanna thought grimly. And each year seemed to bring a new scandal and a new threat to Memorial’s reputation. To Murdock, Jake Sinclair wasn’t just a detective, he was an adversary who could do real damage to Memorial Hospital.

  And Jake couldn’t have cared less. All he saw was a crime that needed to be solved and its perpetrators punished. Joanna wondered if there really was a crime here. Nothing so far suggested it, but, then again, Jake had a sixth sense when it came to murder. He could feel it, and he was rarely wrong.

  Joanna studied Jake as he threw the bedcover and sheet back to expose the corpse’s body. Jake was so damn good-looking, with those gray-blue eyes that could peer down into the pit of your soul. Your nerves tingled while he was doing it, and you didn’t want him to stop. Too bad he was a confirmed loner, incapable of living with another person for any length of time. Jake was meant to be single. She sighed, wondering when would be a good time to tell him about her relationship

  with Paul du Maurier. And she wondered how he’d deal with the news. He would probably just walk off into the night, a loner alone again.

  “Do you want to take a look?” Jake asked. Joanna came over to the bedside and studied the nude corpse. She started at his feet and worked her way up. His toenails were yellowed and misshapen, from a chronic fungal infection. The musculature of his lower extremities was surprisingly well developed for a man who appeared to be in his seventies. He had been a jogger or a walker, Joanna guessed. His genitals were shriveled and barely visible in a mound of gray hair.

  There was a well-healed appendectomy scar and a few large nevi on his chest. The closer she got to his head, the stronger was the stench of vomit.

  Joanna’s gaze went to the man’s arms. The musculature was good there too, but not as well developed as that of his legs. There were venipuncture marks on one forearm, but none of them was bleeding. Next she carefully examined the dead man’s fingers. She reached for the magnifying glass in the pocket of her white coat and studied the corpse’s fingertips and fingernails.