Dead Ringer

by Allen Wyler

  Praise for Allen Wyler’s Thrillers

  “DEAD END DEAL is a medical thriller of the highest order, reviving the genre with a splendid mixture of innovation and cutting-edge timeliness. Neurosurgeon Allen Wyler knows of what he writes, and the result is a thriller that equals and updates the best of Robin Cook and Michael Crichton. His latest is terrifying, riveting, and a masterpiece of science and suspense.”

  —Jon Land, best-selling author of STRONG AT THE BREAK

  “DEAD END DEAL by Allen Wyler is a masterful medical thriller, intelligent, ferociously paced, scary as hell, ripping with suspense, and filled with fascinating (and horrific) details that only a neurosurgeon-turned-writer like Wyler could provide. If you like the medical thrillers of Robin Cook or Michael Crichton, you will absolutely love DEAD END DEAL.”

  —Douglas Preston, author of THE MONSTER OF FLORENCE and co-creator of the PENDERGAST NOVELS

  “The gritty, graphic details of cutting-edge surgical procedures, capped with an exciting conclusion, should keep fans of the genre riveted.”

  —Publisher’s Weekly

  “With its lightning-paced excitement and fascinating science, DEAD HEAD has everything you could hope for in a medical thriller!”

  —Tess Gerritsen, author of THE MEPHISTO CLUB

  “In the tradition of Robin Cook, Wyler takes us behind the scenes to show us things the medical establishment doesn’t want us to see. DEAD RINGER builds a high-speed plot on a startling but all-too-plausible premise. This is the stuff nightmares are made of.”

  —Joseph Finder, New York Times Bestselling Author of PARANOIA and BURIED SECRETS

  “The suspense builds and builds in this riveting pageturner. It’s a skillful merging of the medical thriller and political thriller … Tom Clancy meets Tess Gerritsen!”

  —Kevin O’Brien, New York Times Bestselling Author of THE LAST VICTIM and KILLING SPREE

  “You’ll be asking the nurse to swab your forehead when you’re admitted into this tense medical thriller exposing DEADLY ERRORS. Wyler does for hospitals what Benchley did for the ocean.”

  —Joe Moore, co-author of the international best seller THE GRAIL CONSPIRACY

  “Wyler writes a fast-paced thriller, which reawakens your scariest misgivings about the Medical-Industrial Complex and the profit motive corrupting the art of healing.”

  —Darryl Ponicsan, author of THE LAST DETAIL

  “DEADLY ERRORS has a fascinating and frightening premise that gives it the potential to be a best seller in the Robin Cook mold.”

  —William Dietrich, author of HADRIAN’S WALL

  “This is an ‘up all night’ pass into troubled places that only hardworking doctors know about; a turbulent world of trusting patients and imperfect humans struggling with the required image of perfection. Only a gifted surgeon like Allen Wyler could craft such a wild and wonderful best-of-the-breed medical thriller!”

  —John J. Nance, author of PANDORA’S CLOCK and FIRE FLIGHT

  “Wyler’s debut novel is both an engrossing thriller and a cautionary tale of the all-too-frequent intersection of high technology and higher greed. It’s a message all of us better pay attention to, or face the consequences.”

  —Mark Olshaker, author of EINSTEIN’S BRAIN, UNNATURAL CAUSES, and THE EDGE; co-author of MINDHUNTER, JOURNEY INTO DARKNESS

  Dead

  Ringer

  A novel by

  ALLEN WYLER

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously.

  DEAD RINGER

  Astor + Blue Editions LLC

  Copyright © 2012 by Allen Wyler

  All rights reserved including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof, in any form under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by:

  Astor + Blue Editions, LLC

  New York, NY 10003

  www.astorblue.com

  Publisher’s Cataloging-In-Publication Data

  Wyler, Allen. DEAD RINGER—1st ed.

  ISBN: 978-1-938231-14-8 (paperback)

  ISBN: 978-1-938231-12-4 (epub)

  ISBN: 978-1-938231-13-1 (epdf )

  1. Neurosurgeon Doctor—Thriller—Fiction 2. Body Snatchers—Fiction 3. Corrupt Cops—Fiction 4. Serial Killer—Fiction 5. Harvesting Cadavers for Profit—Fiction 6. Seattle (Wash), Hong Kong (China)—Fiction 7. Doctor-Female Detective–American Love story I. Title

  Book Design: Bookmasters

  Jacket Cover Design: Ervin Serrano

  Dedication

  To Leslie

  1

  HONG KONG

  A DARK, ILL-FORMED premonition punched Lucas McRae in the gut so hard it stole his breath. He froze, aware of something drastically wrong involving someone close to him.

  Laura? Josh? Were they safe?

  A second later it vanished, leaving only a lingering vague sense of foreboding.

  He’d heard of stories like this—a mother suddenly awakened, knowing her son was just killed by an insurgent’s RPG half a world away. He rejected these tales as nothing more than folklore. Mental telepathy—or whatever you wanted to call it—was scientifically impossible. But, Jesus, this thing, this awful feeling in his gut …

  “Dr. McRae, over here!”

  Lucas looked toward the voice. To his right, over the roof of a taxi and beyond the hotel loading zone, Jimmy Wong waved from the rolled-down window of a red compact. A Toyota or Nissan, but a model that isn’t available in the States. Thankful for the distraction, Lucas trotted over to the car. But the freefloating, ill-defined dread returned, burrowing in his gut.

  He slid into the passenger seat, his skin already sticky from the thick tropical humidity and sinus-clogging smog. He buckled in and shut the door.

  Wong Yiw-Wah, or Jimmy to Westerners, extended a hand. “Welcome to Hong Kong.” The president of the Hong Kong Neurosurgical Society had a friendly, oval face of indeterminable age. Wong’s temples had turned to gray, like Lucas’s.

  Lucas shook hands and said, “Thank you. It’s an honor to be here.”

  Wong merged into morning rush hour traffic and accelerated. “Sorry our group cannot afford The Peninsula. Your hotel accommodations are adequate?” He spoke with a slight British accent. Lucas figured he’d probably been schooled in England.

  “Yes, very nice. Thank you.”

  The Harbor View International Hotel was an okay, no frills, three-star place to sleep at night and shave in the morning. With spending the day at the meeting, a fancier place would’ve been a waste of money. It could be quieter, though. A rattling elevator door across from his room woke him repeatedly throughout the night.

  “And your flight over?”

  “Perfect.” That was one of those white lies you tell a host.

  “Sorry I was unable to meet you at the airport, but the operating theater became frightfully backed up and my case dragged on and on. Certainly, I don’t have to tell you how those things go.” Wong glanced over his shoulder, preparing to change lanes. “The car picked you up without a problem, I am told. True?”

  “It did. Thanks.”

  Lucas had rolled in about eight last evening. He was dog tired, coated with a layer of stale sweat, and had eyelids that felt lined with sand. He didn’t bother with dinner, just showered and then poured a minibar scotch to use as an Ambien chaser before hitting the sheets. The combination worked like a sledgehammer to his brain, putting him out within minutes. Otherwise, with the change in time zones, he would have been wide awake until just before time to get up again. Business trips. He hated the fatigue jet lag caused. Especially when you were expected to socialize at cocktail parties and dinners.

  “Very good, then.” Jimmy cleared his
throat. “I hope you are up to demonstrating your skills today. Your audience will be keen to see you work.”

  Lucas nodded, but his mind returned to the god-awful premonition from moments ago. What was that all about? He tried to distract himself by watching the city’s buildings fly by as Jimmy Wong sped down West Kowloon Highway. Hong Kong: a vertical city of breath-stealing Western architecture built to ancient feng shui standards. But hard as he tried, he couldn’t shake it. Something bad had happened. What?

  This wasn’t stage fright. Demonstrating tricky surgeries had become second nature to Lucas. And was a well-earned byproduct of an international reputation. Years ago he experienced little shivers of anxiety at the start of a talk or a demonstration, but not anymore. Besides, this feeling was entirely different. It had nothing to do with the immediate future. Rather, he knew—just knew—something bad happened within the past twenty-four hours.

  Again, he tried to ignore it and concentrate on today’s tasks.

  He had made a career choice years ago. Rather than being good at general neurosurgery, he became outstanding at a few extremely tricky surgeries. His expertise became a double-edged sword; he derived comfort from knowing his chances of screwing up were low because he had mastered the difficult techniques. The price, of course, was monotony from doing the same cases over and over. Not only that, but the subsequent notoriety forced him to become even more specialized. Initially, he took satisfaction in being referred problems no one else would touch. But he quickly learned the downside: fear. The high-risk cases were also the ones to very quickly and unexpectedly blow up in your face, leaving the malpractice lawyers licking their chops.

  Today would be easy because he would be using a cadaver instead of a live person. So why did he feel like something terrible had happened?

  Well, there was Laura. As it turned out, this trip couldn’t have come at a worse time in their failing marriage and decision to talk to their separate attorneys. But this was not something he could have foreseen when invited to be the guest lecturer ten months ago. And truthfully, it was sort of nice to escape the tension for a few days.

  The harder he tried to identify the cause of the foreboding, the more it danced away, like a familiar word on the tip of his tongue. Maybe it was just his imagination. He hoped so.

  For a distraction, he asked Wong, “Your case yesterday, what was it?”

  QUEEN VICTORIA HOSPITAL, HONG KONG

  AFTER THEY BOTH CHANGED into green scrubs, Wong led Lucas down the hall to the lounge of a classroom. A cozy room of blond wood paneling, industrial beige carpet, and two leather couches. Eleven scrub-clad surgeons were milling around, chatting animatedly, most of them holding white Styrofoam cups of steaming tea. The drab sameness of hospitals struck Lucas. This could be anyplace in the world—Cincinnati or Calcutta—and he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. Well, except for the Chinese characters on the plaques covering a trophy wall.

  Wong introduced Lucas to each surgeon, one of whom—an older man with the face of a bulldog—he’d already met. The guy had accompanied Wong to Seattle to watch Lucas in action. Two weeks afterward Lucas received an invitation to be the society’s guest lecturer. Thankfully, Lucas remembered the man’s name before embarrassing himself. Strange how the mind worked. As a premed student he memorized the periodic table, but at parties he forgot a person’s name within seconds of being introduced.

  For the next ten minutes Lucas made sure to spend a few moments chitchatting with each participant, all of whom had been trained with English as their second language. Then Wong ushered everyone into the classroom, a large utilitarian corner room smelling of overheated electronics and formaldehyde. The space had been laid out to optimize this type of demonstration and benefitted from natural light from two walls of windows. At the front was a table on a six-inch riser. The remainder of the room was filled with tables, each with two chairs on opposite sides. Suspended from the ceiling above each table were parabolic surgical lamps and two Sony HDTVs. Except for the televisions, this could’ve been one of his old classrooms in med school.

  Wong led Lucas to the demonstration table where a blue surgical towel covered a cantaloupe-sized mound on a stainless steel tray. This, Lucas assumed, was the cadaver head he’d be using. Three boom-mounted HD cameras were aimed at the tray, one on each side with the third directly overhead. Similar cameras were set to monitor four other tables. Wong explained that the cameras would record the demonstration while providing the audience different close-up views of the dissection. Wong then asked Lucas to sign a recording release.

  Lucas dropped into the chair and inspected the tray of surgical instruments. Central supply apparently provided the ones he’d requested. Like all surgeons, he had preferences. And like all surgeons, this bordered on superstition. Especially when working under the microscope.

  After verifying each camera was sharply focused and recording, Wong nodded for Lucas to begin.

  Standing behind the table, Lucas addressed the group. “The first demonstration will be the anterior approach to the clivus.” A tricky way to reach the base of the brain is by cutting through the back of the mouth. “I assume you’ve all read the articles I emailed Dr. Wong?”

  They nodded in unison.

  “Any questions before I start?”

  They glanced at each other, but no one spoke.

  “As with any craniotomy, it’s extremely important to plan your incision correctly.” Lucas picked up a Sharpie in one hand and a corner of the towel with the other.

  As he withdrew the towel, Lucas said, “We start the incision here,” and looked down at the head. He froze. For three long seconds he was unable to tear his gaze from the gray, bloodless skin. Then he spun away, spewing vomit on the wall and the floor.

  2

  LUCAS CROUCHED ON HIS haunches, the room swirling around him. He fought to keep the stench of his own vomit from triggering another retch. He wanted to move away from the mess he’d made but wasn’t sure he could stand without passing out.

  He felt a firm hand on his shoulder, heard Wong asking, “What’s wrong? Dr. McRae, are you all right?”

  Aw, shit …

  Another gut spasm hit. He dropped his butt onto the floor, put his head between his knees, and thought, Glad I’m in scrubs instead of my suit. In the next instant he realized how inane that last thought was.

  “Are you okay?”

  Lucas raised a hand, silently asking to stay like this for another few seconds. He sucked a deep breath. The room began to settle down. Something was sticking to his lower lip. He brushed at it with the back of his hand, glanced down, saw his hand covered with partially digested food chunks. The sight triggered another spasm. Thank God for gloves.

  He felt stable enough to finally stand and pushed up without looking at the head. Then he was on his feet again, the room back to normal. Carefully, he stripped one glove into the other, forming a ball of latex that he dropped into a nearby wastebasket. After another breath, he stepped away from the pool of vomit.

  The room was stone silent now, every eye on him.

  Wong said, “Lucas, speak to me. What’s the matter? Perhaps you should lie down. You’re white as a sheet.”

  He realized Wong was holding his left arm, steadying him. For some reason Lucas noticed another man, the only other Caucasian in the room, standing in the doorway, watching. Where’d he come from?

  On shaky legs, hands flat against the black soapstone counter, Lucas sucked down two more deep breaths in an attempt to clear the stench from his airway. “Sorry,” he muttered and started to look down at the decapitated head. But stopped. Not yet.

  “Are you all right? Can you continue?”

  “One more second.” Lucas raised a hand and glanced at the exit. “Where’s the nearest men’s room?” An then he couldn’t keep the realization at bay any longer. It was Andy. His friend Andy, whose head he was just looking at.

  “If you don’t mind, I will accompany you.” Wong led him through the lounge
, down a hall to a door with a frosted glass window.

  The lavatory was small with barely enough room for both of them. White tile walls, a stall, a urinal, a sink. Bending over the sink, Lucas splashed cold water over his face and lips. With cupped hands, he rinsed his mouth several times to wash away the foul gastric taste and clear the smell from his nose, but there was little he could do to get rid of the burning at the back of his throat.

  Straightening up, he checked his face in the mirror, found it clean but more haggard than when shaving earlier. Matter of fact, he looked like shit warmed over.

  “What happened? Are you ill?”

  Lucas propped his butt against the sink, said “Oh, man,” and patted his face again with a paper towel. He felt calmer now. How could his eyes play such a trick? He’d seen Andy just days ago.

  “Should you lie down? Shall I take you to the Casualty Department?”

  “No, that’s not necessary. It’s that …” Lucas nodded toward the other room. He couldn’t say the word head. “I thought I knew the person. But it can’t be.” What a huge understatement. He and Andy were best friends—that is, if you could manage to be best friends with someone your spouse hated.

  Wong stared. “The specimen? You know him?”

  The specimen. Jesus!

  It dawned on him. That was what he’d always thought of it: the specimen. Never someone’s head. But it was. And the one in the other room couldn’t possibly be Andy’s. Then again …

  “Surely you must be mistaken,” Wong said incredulously.

  “I know. I know. It’s just he looks so much like him.” He shook his head at the thought. Only days ago they’d been at Safeco Field drinking beer, watching the Yankees cream the Mariners, Andy cracking him up with sarcastic wiseass comments that Laura considered juvenile.

  He felt more stable now but still shaky. Hopefully, he’d be able to think more clearly. “Tell you what, I can do the demonstration … I just can’t do it on that particular specimen. Can you have someone exchange it for me, please?”