“I assure you, in my bed you wouldn’t be getting any sleep,” Steele chortled.
“Bastard.”
“The thought of being with a real man excites you, doesn’t it?” Steele smiled at Katy’s outburst, his feral gaze blazing a trail across her body. “I can see it in the flush of your cheeks and the rapid beat of the pulse in your neck. We have chemistry, kitty, and I know all about chemistry.”
“Enough.” Mark crossed the room in three long strides and stood toe to toe with Steele. His body shook with the effort of containing his fury. He drew his arm back, but Steele held his hands up, palm forward and took a step away.
“Are you sure you want to add assault to your growing list of misdeeds?” Amusement laced Steele’s tone. “I’m just playing with your little kitty, but you don’t seem to have fully grasped your situation. You have a serious problem—an undeclared professional conflict of interest. I should really call the Law Society and file a complaint…unless…” his gaze settled on Katy and he beckoned her forward, “…I get what I’ve always wanted.”
A surge of anger coursed through Mark, electrifying his body. “You can’t have her.”
Steele snorted a sigh and shook his head. “You’re thinking with the wrong part of your body. I don’t want her. Well I do, but not at the cost of billions of dollars. What I want is the fucking case off my desk and her nose out of my business. You…” he pointed at Katy, “…are going to bring me a settlement agreement, signed by your client, and we’ll finish this case once and for all. Tonight.”
Katy shook her head in confusion. “What kind of game are you playing? You know I can’t force my client to sign anything.”
Steele’s eyes hardened. “By the time you’ve drafted the agreement and made your way to her house, I can assure you she will sign anything you put in front of her.”
Son of a bitch. Mark let loose. One fist found Steele’s jaw and the other pounded into Steele’s gut. One. Two. Back away. Just as he had learned on the streets.
But Steele was no lightweight. Although his head snapped to the side and he hissed out a breath, he didn’t move. Instead, he put a hand to his jaw and rubbed it over his chin. “Now that was uncalled for. Here I’m trying to save two promising legal careers and I’m assaulted for my efforts. I just hope kitty’s client isn’t as…recalcitrant.”
“Gordon,” Mark growled. “You’re going to send Gordon after her.”
Steele spat blood on the concrete floor and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Mark felt a faint twinge of pleasure. His punch had had an effect after all.
“Gordon lacks the finesse for this kind of work. Saunders and I have a few things to discuss. Private things. I’ll be paying the little troublemaker a personal visit.”
Katy bristled. “You stay away from her.”
Mark’s fingers twitched at his side, but he leashed his anger. Beating Steele to a pulp would achieve nothing and instead would only prove to Katy that her fears about his past resurfacing were true. He would have to find another way.
Steele fixed his gaze on Katy. “You will bring the signed agreement to my office tonight at eight o’clock. Mark, you will be there to ensure it all checks out and to witness my signature. I want it all legal. No loose ends.”
Mark clenched his teeth so hard he was surprised they didn’t crack. Legal? Steele didn’t know the meaning of the word. But at least Katy wouldn’t be alone. He gave Steele a curt nod.
“Excellent,” Steele continued. “And just in case our kitty gets any ideas about double crossing me or sticking that little nose into my affairs ever again, I’ve got these.” He held up two photos. Mark recognized them right away and his heart thudded into his stomach.
“Melissa and Justin, I believe.” Steele tucked the photos into his breast pocket. “They look like you, kitty, but they both have Steven’s nose.”
Mark had no idea how Katy crossed the room so quickly but within seconds she had her hands around Steele’s thick neck.
“If you ever touch my children…” she shrieked, “…if you ever hurt so much as a hair on the heads—”
Mark grabbed her and pulled her away. “Leave him,” he whispered urgently in her ear. “He wants you to make it worse. We’ll find another way.”
“Let me go.” She wriggled in his grasp, frantic to get at Steele. Mark wrapped his arms tightly around her, grimacing when her heels hit his shins.
Steele opened the door, but paused on his way out. “As I said before, that kitty needs to be tamed. It’s a shame you’re not up to the task.”
The door slammed closed. Mark released Katy and thudded the wall with his fist.
All. My. Fault. He had endangered Katy when all he wanted was to keep her safe.
Katy’s sobs wrenched him back to the present. Crimson splotches scored her cheeks. “I hate him. I wish I’d never met him. I wish I’d never taken this case. I wish I hadn’t asked Ted keep me on it.”
Mark put his hand on her shoulder and tried to draw into his arms. He ached with the need to comfort her. Hold her. Protect her. “We’ll sort it out, sugar. Together.”
“No.” Katy slapped his hand away. “You’ve done enough. I don’t need your kind of help. I’ll deal with it on my own.”
“You can’t take him on by yourself.”
She grabbed her briefcase and pulled open the door. “The hell I can’t.”
“Hunter.”
“Keegan.”
“Fancy meeting you here in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery. I didn’t know cops appreciated art.”
“We read it every day in the newspaper.”
A group of tourists ambled past, following meekly behind a woman with a collapsible umbrella.
“I hope you’re not suggesting my stories are anything less than total fact.” Keegan pulled out a cigarette and lit it with the casual grace of someone well practiced in the art of self-destruction.
“I might be able to help you with that problem.”
“So you’re the fairy godmother now?” Keegan flicked his ash into the air.
James sighed and leaned against the smooth brick wall. “Talk to me, Keegan. Tell me a story. I’ve got bodies coming out my ears and no way to connect the dots.”
Keegan blew three smoke rings in quick succession. “I went to an interesting lecture the other day down at the Fairmont. Darkon Steele spoke about bringing new drugs to market. Apparently it can take up to fifteen years and cost millions of dollars, but a successful drug can net over a billion dollars a year.”
“Are we going somewhere with this?” James saw a flash of red and for a split second he thought Lana was at the art gallery too. But no. Just a mother and her two kids, all with shocking red hair.
“Good stories start with a prologue,” Keegan said. “If you miss the prologue, you won’t understand the story. Where was I? Oh yes, Steele said drugs have to go through lots of testing: lab testing, animal testing and then at least three levels of human testing. All strictly regulated, of course. A company can’t progress from one level of testing to another if the drug doesn’t meet certain safety thresholds.”
“Why don’t you go back to school, Keegan? Sounds like you missed your calling. You’d make a good scientist.”
Keegan looked up when a helicopter thundered past overhead. “Nah. Too dangerous.”
“I’m still waiting for the story.”
Keegan dropped his cigarette butt and twisted it into the ground with his toe. “Do you have your blankie, Hunter? It’s a scary story. Once upon a time, a company developed a fabulous new drug, but when they tested it on animals, bad things happened. But they were so convinced of its potential they decided it would probably still be okay in humans. They fudged their numbers and got approval to test it on human subjects. The drug did work amazingly well, but in a few people, terrible, terrible things happened. They tried to cover it up. Paid out a lot of money. Signed a lot of agreements. Came down heavy on the victims to keep them quiet. They knew they would
never get approval for the next phase of testing, but the drug was just too fabulous to give up on and they still thought they could iron out the kinks.”
Keegan paused to light a new cigarette. “If I was illustrating my story, at this point I would draw my characters with dollar signs in their eyes. Billions of them.”
James snorted. “They obviously don’t work in public service.”
“Or for a newspaper.” Keegan chuckled and took another drag on his cigarette. “So the company tweaked the drug, fudged some more numbers and drafted some fake authorizations. Then they went to a country where no one would look too hard at their documents as long as they greased a few palms along the way. An impoverished country with many illiterate people who were desperate for money and willing to do anything or sign anything to get it.”
“They don’t sound like nice guys.”
“They’re businessmen. They wear fancy suits and drink expensive lattes while they sit in leather-clad comfort in steel and glass towers making decisions that can destroy lives.”
“So what happened?”
“I’m glad my story has captured your attention. Sort of like a well-endowed red-headed investigator.”
James stiffened. How the fuck did he know about Lana? Where the hell did he get his information?
“Something bothering you?” Keegan brushed imaginary fluff off his sports jacket. “Did I get the color wrong?”
“Get on with it,” James growled.
“Well again some people suffered terrible side effects and some people died, but in the grand scheme of things, the testing was a resounding success. The drug worked amazingly well in many people, so the company pretended the bad reactions didn’t happen. Documents disappeared. People were paid off. They weren’t worried. After all, who would find out? It all happened in a land far, far away.”
James raked his fingers through his hair. “Let me guess the rest. They came home with their fake results, bribed a few regulators and put it on the market. Everyone lived happily ever after, except the handful of people who suffered and the relatives of those who died.”
“And the employee who got fired when she tried to pre-empt my Pulitzer Prize winning story by going to the regulators. The same guys who had just returned from their all-expenses-paid vacations.”
James nodded. “So what’s the drug?”
“It isn’t on the market yet. Top secret. But maybe you’ve picked some up on the street?” He raised an eyebrow and gave James a questioning look.
James shook his head. “We only got traces of an unidentified compound.”
“Good thing.” Keegan blew a smoke ring. “Can you imagine how angry they would be if they discovered someone had misappropriated samples of their secret product and given them to a low-life drug dealer to sell on the black market? The risk of a competitor getting hold of the product and stealing away the billion dollar prize would make anyone—”
“Angry enough to kill.” James mentally cleared Jimmy’s case file off his desk and made a note to send a patrol car to Saunders’s residence. “Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be much substance behind your story, enjoyable as it was.”
“The proof’s in the pudding, or should I say, the pharma.” Keegan raised his eyebrows, a silent request.
Damn. He had hoped Keegan had dug something up. “Judge wouldn’t give me the warrant.”
Disappointment creased Keegan’s face. “Someone needs to get inside.”
James scrubbed his hand over his face. It could take weeks to set up an undercover operation. But if he could find someone who already had access to the office, and no love for Steele…
“I have an idea. When is the launch?”
“Three days from now—Monday.”
“Fuck.”
Keegan grinned. “That, my friend, is what the story is really about.”
“Should I ask?” Tony handed Mark a glass of bourbon and poured one for himself before replacing the bottle on the shelf behind the bar. Except for the splash of amber liquid and the clink of glassware, Carpe Noctem was eerily quiet. It wouldn’t last. But by the time the crowds started to trickle into the club, he would be long gone.
“No.” He wasn’t in a mood to talk, and especially not to the man spearheading his removal from the firm. He shot back the bitter whiskey, barely tasting it, and pushed his glass across the counter. Tony filled it up again.
Where was Katy? He had tried her cell, her office, even her home, but she hadn’t returned his calls all afternoon.
Damn. If Katy had just trusted him, he could have sorted everything out. But she had made it very clear trusting him was the last thing she would ever do.
He slammed his glass on the table, amazed it didn’t break.
“Bad day at the office?”
The low, calm rumble of James’s voice in his ear and the steady hand on his shoulder did nothing to soothe the anxiety ratcheting through his veins.
“You could say that.”
“I’ve been looking for you,” James said. “Your secretary told me I would find you here.” Mark shoved the glass across the counter and pushed himself off the stool. Tony was already at the door greeting the first client of the evening.
“I’ve got a meeting at eight o’clock. What do you want?”
James frowned. “What the hell is up with you? You look rough and you sound worse.”
“Steele found out about Katy, ironically after everything fell apart between us. He used the professional conflict as leverage to orchestrate a settlement of the case.”
“Blackmail.” James scowled. “Since it’s a criminal offence, did it occur to you to contact the police? Maybe you know someone…”
Mark scrubbed his hand over his face. “I thought about it, but it would just bring the professional conflict to light. I wanted to talk it over with Katy, but she disappeared after our altercation with Steele. She’s planning something and I’m worried she’s going to get hurt. It’s fucking killing me. I want to help but she’s made it clear she doesn’t want me to interfere in her life.”
“I might have a solution to your problem.” James poured himself a glass of whiskey. “Sit down. I have a story to tell you.”
For the next twenty minutes Mark’s worries took a backseat to disbelief while James spun his incredible tale of illegal clinical trials and fatal drugs. If James had it right, Steele’s concern about Katy’s investigation and his insistence on tying up loose ends from the earlier clinical trials made sense. Still he had trouble believing Steele had finally crossed the line from dangerous to deadly.
“What I don’t understand is what he’s planning to do after people start swelling up and dying after the launch.” James drained his whiskey glass and spun it on the counter.
Still reeling from the disclosure of just how far Steele was prepared to go, Mark said, “He’ll conduct very controlled secret post-clinical trials to show the drug is safe. He’ll explain away any bad reactions as being due to outside factors. So long as the deaths or serious side effects stay below a certain percentage, the regulators will just slap on a warning sticker. If the numbers get too high, he might just send people out with blank checks and settlement agreements to keep it all quiet.”
James raked his hand over his head. “I need to get inside. Dig up some proof. I tried for a warrant but the damn judge probably plays golf with Steele. He said I didn’t have enough evidence to make a connection.”
Mark snorted. “Katy and I are meeting him at his office tonight to finalize the settlement agreement. Maybe you could come disguised as an articling student.”
“I have a better idea,” James said. “Have you ever worn a wire?”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Martha?”
Katy rang the doorbell of Martha’s False Creek townhouse for the third time. Was Martha inside? Had Steele visited her? Was she hurt?
She contemplated breaking in, but that would just add fuel to the Law Society fire after Steele reported the conflict.
She had no doubt he would report it. Once he had the settlement agreement, he would have no reason to hold up his end of the bargain.
“Katherine?”
Katy spun around. Martha had just pulled up in front of the townhouse in a shiny, red Porsche.
Porsche? How could she afford a luxury car without a job?
Katy walked down the sidewalk and peered in the open window. “I need to talk to you and I couldn’t get through on any of your numbers.”
Martha shrugged. “I had them all cancelled. I’m leaving town.”
“What about the case?”
Martha’s bitter laughter took Katy by surprise. “The case? Are you serious? You were shot. Martin is dead. I read in the paper that one of the men on the list, McIntyre, was killed. I appreciate your dedication to the case, but come on. It’s not worth it. At least not to me.”
“But…we’re so close to finding out the real reason behind your dismissal and what happened to those men.”
With an exasperated sigh, Martha pushed open the door. “Get in. It’s dangerous out there, even with your police tail parked a block back.”
Katy slid into the black leather seat. “Where are we going?”
Martha peeled the car away from the curb. “Nowhere. You want to talk, then talk. You have ten minutes before I head out of the city. I’ll amuse myself by trying to lose your escort.”
Katy tightened her grip on her briefcase as Martha shot through a stop sign. “Did Steele visit you today?”
“I haven’t been home,” Martha said. “I knew Steele would come looking for me. He’s not the only one. I’ve got Jimmy’s friends on my tail and I’ve got a scary psycho cop riding my ass because of my relationship with Jimmy. I just came by to see if it was safe to pick up the last of my stuff.”
Katy stifled a gasp. “I didn’t know you were with Jimmy. When you said he recommended the firm, I thought he was just a friend or an acquaintance. I heard what happened to him. I’m really sorry. No wonder you want to get away.”
Martha’s face tightened. She took a sharp corner and headed west on Fourth Avenue. “Yeah, well he knew what he was getting himself into when he started dealing again. He wasn’t a…good guy, if you know what I mean. He stole from me, cheated on me and used me. I should have left him at the beginning, but when we were together, it was so good. He told me…he loved me.”
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