Miracle Cure

by Michael Palmer

“I’ll bet it wasn’t that long,” Brian said.

  “The key was that the FDA would never conduct their own research.”

  “And as long as no one got hurt by Vasclear, no one would pay much attention to it.”

  “But the cases and the research results had to look good,” Jessup added, a note of proud accomplishment in her voice.

  “And they did.”

  “Reprogramming an EKG machine to print out abnormal stress tests was relatively easy. The caths were the challenge. I chose a storage area that had been built beneath the cath lab. We built an apartment down there for our technicians as well as a sophisticated electronics center linked to the video monitor in the lab.”

  “I know where that room is,” Brian said. “The killer I shot must have been hiding out there, if not living there.”

  “I didn’t know that,” she said. “You have to believe me. I didn’t know.”

  “I believe you. Go on, please.”

  “Well, I put together a set of twenty abnormal caths—enough of a selection so that one of them would come close to duplicating the anatomy of almost any patient.”

  “The one you used for Nellie Hennessey was a very close match.”

  “And it wasn’t even the best we had.”

  “So what was it, an electronic switch somewhere?”

  “Beneath the foot pedal I used to control the camera. With the switch thrown, which I usually did the evening before the cath, the dye injection that was projected on the monitor when I hit the pedal came from downstairs. It had to correspond exactly to the view we were doing in the cath lab.”

  “But it wasn’t the patient’s.”

  Jessup stared out at the water, utterly deflated. But Brian also sensed some relief.

  “No,” she said. “It wasn’t.”

  “Pardon me for asking, but are you and Art still … as close as you were?”

  “He seems to be gradually pulling away, if that’s what you mean. But yes, we’re still lovers. There was a time when I think I would have done almost anything for him. But don’t get me wrong. I was going to benefit, too. Two million or more in just the first year if all went well. I have money, but not that kind of money.”

  Brian rubbed at the strain and exhaustion that were burning his eyes.

  “We have to come up with a plan,” he said. “What do you think we should do now?”

  “Do?” the man’s voice behind them said. “Why, I would expect you to do nothing.”

  Brian and Jessup spun to the voice. Art Weber stood by the edge of the deck, eyeing them calmly through the gloom. Fanning out from him in a semicircle were Leon and two other men, all of them holding guns.

  Brian glanced over at Jessup to see if she was as shocked at the arrival of the intruders as he was. He didn’t have to wait long to find out.

  “Art, he knows everything,” she said hoarsely. “Absolutely everything.”

  Weber stepped forward and smacked her viciously across the face with the back of his hand.

  “He does now, you stupid bitch!” he snapped.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  MINUTES?… HOURS?… DAYS?… FOR BRIAN, time was completely lost within a swirling haze of drugs and pain. He was on a wooden chair in a spare, windowless room, his arms lashed together at the wrist and his legs at the ankles. His ribs, separated if not broken from the pounding he had taken to his abdomen and chest, made each breath a grunting, agonizing effort.

  Now, for the first time, his head was beginning to clear. He remembered being pummeled by Leon in Carolyn Jessup’s backyard—sharp blows with fists and feet to his face and belly. He remembered the sting of the first injection, given deep into the muscle at the base of his neck while he was still lying on the wet grass. He remembered being zipped into a plastic body bag. He remembered his tall frame being folded into the trunk of a car. Then, he remembered nothing.

  He blinked rapidly, trying to focus his vision. His eyes felt puffy, the muscles in his face stiff and swollen. His tongue probed the fleshy cavity where a front tooth had once been. His nostrils were thick with dried blood.

  “Water,” he croaked. “Bring me water.”

  There was movement behind him. Moments later a plastic cup was pushed against his mouth. He drank gratefully, rinsing before he swallowed. His vision slowly cleared. The man holding the cup reeked of bad cologne. He was short and stocky, with a thin mustache and vacant brown eyes—the driver Freeman had confronted outside Brian’s home in Reading. The room was a combination living area and small kitchen, the furniture utilitarian. There were no pictures on the whitewashed walls. A TV and VCR stood over to one corner.

  Even though there were no definite clues, Brian felt certain he was deep in the belly of the hospital, in the subbasement space Carolyn Jessup had helped to create. Somewhere, possibly just beyond the gray-painted fire door facing him, was the control room used to transfer videos to the cath-lab monitor screen one floor above. He wouldn’t be surprised if that room was also outfitted with surveillance screens keeping watch on the corridors, rooms, and clinic areas involved with the Vasclear program.

  Brian thought about his capture by Weber. Carolyn must have been followed home from the hospital by one of the Chechens. No other explanation accounted for Weber’s timely arrival on the scene. Now Weber was determined to learn the names of everyone to whom Brian had given information regarding Vasclear. He had used drugs—Ketamine and something like Seconal, Brian thought. He had used physical punishment—in addition to the aching throughout his body, Brian felt certain the little finger on his left hand was broken.

  Was the torturing finished?… Was Weber convinced he knew all Brian had to tell him?… How much time had gone by?… Was the Vasclear ceremony over?… What had happened to Jessup?… Had he broken down in some dark moment and mentioned Teri?… Freeman and Marguerite?

  The questions roiled in his brain. One thing he knew with certainty. He was never going to leave this spartan little place alive. The door to his left opened, revealing a second room—a sleeping area about half the size of the room he was in. He could see one bed and the edge of another. Seated on the side of the bed was Carolyn Jessup. Her face appeared to have absorbed a battering to both sides, but her hair was neatly tied back, and otherwise she still seemed amazingly composed. At some point she had changed into scrubs—Brian couldn’t imagine why.

  “I’m not going to tie you down anymore, Carolyn,” he heard Weber say, “but you know what will happen to you should you or our friend in the chair out there cause them the least bit of trouble. These men have their instructions, and they will enjoy carrying them out. Is that clear?… Is it?”

  “Yes.”

  “And is that clear to you, Dr. Holbrook?” he asked, backing out of the room, then turning to Brian. “It will be on your head if Dr. Jessup gets hurt.”

  “It’s clear,” Brian managed. “What day is it?”

  “Day? Why, it’s Christmas. My, my, my, it appears you have had a rough go of it. I’m afraid Leon has taken what you did to his friend very personally. Is that so, Leon?”

  The huge killer stepped around from behind Brian and slapped him violently across the mouth. Brian’s lips, already cracked and clotted, split open again. He sucked at the blood and glared up at Leon’s hideously marked face. Feral eyes glared back at him.

  “Stop it!” Carolyn screamed.

  Weber pointed a manicured finger at her.

  “Shut up!” he snapped. “This is a warning. A final warning.”

  He turned back to Brian.

  “I’m afraid I’m not through with you,” he said. He glanced theatrically at his Rolex and for the first time Brian registered that Weber had changed into a beautifully tailored suit and conspicuously expensive silk tie. “However, as you might by now realize, it is the nineteenth of October. I have pressing business with the President of the United States. The names you have given us include two newspapers, and the father of poor, ill-fated Phil Gianatasio. We can handle all of tho
se. But I can’t shake the feeling you’re holding out on us.”

  “You’ve had my phone tapped,” Brian said hoarsely. “You should know everything.”

  “Dr. Holbrook, except for the few minutes we all know about, you haven’t been home in several days. But, rest easy, Doctor. Your little peccadilloes are safe. We’ve never tapped your line.”

  “But—”

  “I don’t have the time to discuss anything with you right now. But when I return, I promise you discussions aplenty, painful and otherwise. In the meantime, Leon, I don’t want either of them harmed unless one of them causes you trouble. Then, take it out on her. She can come in here to watch the show on TV if she wants, even to speak to him. But I don’t want either of them left alone—not for a second. Yes?”

  Leon grunted and nodded.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “Leon’s English speaking leaves a bit to be desired,” Weber explained, “but I promise you, his comprehension is perfect. Right, Leon?”

  “Perfect.”

  Leon’s smile bared cigarette-stained teeth.

  Weber crossed to the TV and clicked on a local station.

  “If my information is correct,” he said, “Channel Seven will be covering the proceedings upstairs live. Our crack Newbury sales force has been very busy taking orders for Vasclear from around the world, and the trucks are ready to roll. Within minutes of the end of the ceremony, they’ll be on the road.”

  “You’re still an asshole and a loser,” Brian said.

  Weber stepped back and allowed Leon another roundhouse, open-hand slam on Brian’s face. His head snapped against the chair back. His broken nose began oozing blood. His eyes glazed over and teared.

  “We’ll see who the loser is,” Weber said. “I’ll be back in a few hours. I’ve got a presidential signing to attend, and some rumors about the two of you to begin spreading. Holbrook, I’ll expect some satisfactory answers from you.”

  He turned, blew a kiss to Carolyn, and left. Brian sat motionless, trying to clear his thoughts. Was Weber telling the truth about not having his phone in Reading bugged? If so, how had—

  “Brian, are you all right?”

  Carolyn had come out of the bedroom. The bruises about her eyes were ugly. Her lower lip was split.

  “I’ve been better,” he managed to say. “How did you get the scrubs?”

  “I … I threw up. They made me watch while they beat you.”

  “I’m glad I wasn’t there.”

  He was about to say more, but he was stopped by a sudden thought. Maybe Carolyn had been given promises by Weber if she could accomplish with Brian what the drugs and the beatings had not.

  She crossed to the sink, wet a towel, and gently cleaned him off. Then she pulled a chair over from the small dining table and set it a few feet away, where he could see her face. Brian sensed her thoughts were scrambling, as his were, for some way to escape. If he couldn’t trust her, he decided at that moment, he had no chance at all. But he wasn’t going to mention Teri or the Sharpes. He noticed a man in the bedroom to his left and another, the man with cologne, behind him and to the right. Leon, now standing close to Jessup, made three of them, all with shoulder-holstered guns. Bad odds.

  “I’m sorry about this, Brian,” Jessup said, maintaining steady, level eye-contact with him, and speaking deliberately—too deliberately, he thought. “I’m sorry about everything. You know, I’ve been thinking, as one physician to another, about how many wonderful medical cases we’ve shared together over the years.”

  What in the hell are you …?

  The intensity in Jessup’s eyes kept him silent.

  “Yes,” he said, still nonplussed. “I remember.”

  “I was especially impressed with that wonderful gentleman you helped me take care of in the clinic one night. Walter something.”

  Louderman. Brian glanced over at Leon, who was leaning against the kitchen counter three or four feet away. He looked indifferent to their conversation.

  “He was a fascinating case,” Jessup went on. “A bit like that Hennessey woman—the woman with the incredible films whose life you saved that time in the cath lab.”

  Louderman … films like Nellie’s … Suddenly Brian understood. All the proof of the Vasclear hoax had not been destroyed in the film-library fire. There was still one set of videos—one that had been carefully hidden from prying eyes—the films of the man who had designs on becoming the next president of the United States.

  Brian nodded to let her know that he understood. He glanced over at the TV, where a game show was on. Nothing happening yet in the Hippodome.

  “Are you sure we saw him in the clinic?” Brian asked.

  “Actually, now that I think about it, it was in my office,” she replied. “We took his cardiogram with that special EKG machine I have there—the one I invented. The one next to the file cabinet.”

  In Jessup’s office. Louderman’s films were in the file cabinet, along with the rigged EKG machine. It was the proof for which he had so frantically been searching—the proof that could stop Vasclear, shut Newbury down, and go a long way toward clearing him of murder charges.

  Leon seemed to be paying more attention to their conversation now, but if he realized the medical aspects of their exchange were total nonsense, he hid it well. Brian had no idea how they might get free, but if he made it upstairs, he wanted to know the keypad entry code to Jessup’s office.

  “I remember that case very well,” he said, wincing at the pain in his chest. “He and I waited for an hour in the hallway because we couldn’t get in.”

  Jessup nodded.

  “Yes,” she said, “I thought he was having trouble with his lowest cervical vertebra.”

  C-7—the lowest cervical vertebra.

  “Yes,” he replied, “but that wasn’t it.”

  “No. And as I recall, we checked all of his EKG leads, too.”

  Twelve leads … 7-1-2 …

  “I’m surprised you remember.”

  “It’s hard to forget. You did a great job on him. Especially evaluating his major coronary chambers.”

  Four … 7-1-2-4 … Brian indicated that he knew the keypad combination and tested the clothesline binding his hands. There was no give. If he bent his knees to his chest, he could probably get off a kick, or he could even use his head to butt, but the rope around his ankles meant there was no way he could stand up straight and keep his balance. And he didn’t know how much more pounding his damaged ribs could take.

  “How is your heart holding up?” Jessup asked, her expression suggesting that he needed to pay attention.

  “Some pain,” he replied.

  “Well, as long as you don’t have any V. fib.”

  V. fib—ventricular fibrillation … It was a lethal heart rhythm, usually accompanied by collapse and a seizure. Carolyn wanted him to be ready to fake a cardiac arrest. But when?

  He watched as she stood and paced around the room. There was a half-filled vodka bottle on the table. She took a sip—no one tried to stop her—then set the bottle back down. A weapon. Next she turned her attention to the TV. Still no ceremony. Brian had once been driving into Boston from the airport at almost the same time as the President. The entire mile-long tunnel into the city had to be closed and emptied of traffic. Two ambulances, half a dozen motorcyclists, several patrol cars, and six or seven limousines made up the motorcade. It was a wonder they ever got anyplace on time.

  Jessup looked in the refrigerator and cupboards, which were virtually empty. Finally, she loosened the drawstring on her scrub pants and slowly, theatrically, tucked her top in. Then she tightened the cord around her narrow waist again. It was a movement that any man with a molecule of testosterone, regardless of his age, would have found seductive. Brian could tell that both the gunmen in the room were paying close attention to her. She glided over to Leon, doing her best to keep him interested in her body, and complained about being starved. Just a doughnut and a cup of coffee, she cooed, brushin
g against his arm. It was an impressive attempt to narrow the odds.

  Not a chance, Brian was thinking, although he gave her points for courage. Then suddenly, Leon broke into a broad grin and patted her on the bottom.

  “Doughnuts,” he said, laughing out loud.

  He snapped off some machine-gun orders in Russian to the man with the mustache, who quickly came around to face Brian. Then he yelled to the man in the bedroom. The third gunman, much younger than the other two, immediately emerged and took a position by the outside door. He was tall and well-built, but looked to be only about twenty, if that. Finally, Leon took Carolyn by the arm and set her down on the couch across from the television.

  “Stay,” he ordered.

  Then, with a final set of instructions to his men, Leon left. They had five minutes, Brian thought. Ten at the most. If it was going to happen, it had to happen right now.

  “Hey,” Brian said to the man now in charge, “do you speak any English?”

  “I speak English good,” the stocky guard said, warning as much as bragging.

  “Well, I’m not feeling so good.”

  Brian waited another thirty seconds. Then he doubled over and began moaning and gasping for breath.

  “What?” the gunman asked. “What is it?”

  “Brian, is it your heart?” Jessup cried out, leaping up from her seat.

  Brian moaned even louder, then threw himself on the floor, shaking his head violently, and doing what he could, within the constraints of his bonds, to look like a man having a seizure. Jessup rushed over to him.

  “It’s his heart!” she exclaimed. “Quickly, untie him so I can work on him.”

  “No. Wait for Leon.”

  “By that time he’ll be dead, you fool! Look at him.”

  “No,” the man said again.

  “You, over here!” Jessup demanded of the young thug. “Turn him on his back.”

  The two guards, more bewildered each second, exchanged rapid-fire Russian while Brian continued moaning and rhythmically jerking his legs.

  Finally, the younger man bent over and turned Brian onto his back. Brian could see that Jessup had stood up, stepped away, and now held the vodka bottle behind her back.