Bitter Pill

by Jordan Castillo Price

  I found him there, flipping through a file and snapping pictures on his phone. Watching him in action never gets old. It’s not just the movie star cheekbones and the ridiculously broad shoulders, either. It’s the calculating intelligence behind his eyes. He glanced up and said, “Bertelli’s doing everything he can to get us thrown out of here.”

  I’d figured as much. He’d been far too affable about that stupid tape. “So what’s the plan?”

  “Right now, I’m documenting the oldest records I can find. Maybe some of the earliest patients can tell us something about Dr. Kamal.”

  That group of patients…did it include me? The thought must’ve registered on my face. Jacob met my eyes and gave me a slight nod. I returned it.

  He said, “I’ve got this under control. You should probably focus on re-canvasing the staff to see if there’s any new news about Kick.”

  “Not sure how far I’m gonna get with all the, uh….” I trailed off before I got to “tape on the floor” when he glanced up from his work and raised an eyebrow at me as if to say, seriously? “Never mind. You’ve clearly got your work cut out for you. I’ll leave you to it.”

  I headed out of the conference room. Of course, Jacob wouldn’t be intimidated by a few strips of tape. But he was him and I was me. And striding across the lines in the sand (or the lines tacked down to the linoleum) just wasn’t my style. I relied more on stubbornness, stealth, and passive-aggressive displays to do what needed to be done. I was tracing the perimeter of my taped-off boundaries again when the bathroom door swung open and Erin the pharmacist nearly walked right into me. “Agent Bayne,” she said with some surprise. “How are you feeling today? Beta blockers can take some getting used to.”

  Right. The beta blockers. The ones I’d conveniently forgotten to take, probably because I was worried they’d affect my ability to block a potential possession. “No problem. I’m fine.”

  She peered at me hard. What if she’d lied about being an NP and was actually a telepath? Or what if beta blockers had some kind of telltale sign that only a pharmacist could see? I looked back at her, stony faced, and forced myself to hold her gaze.

  “You’d tell me if you had any problems, right? Even after yesterday.”

  “Sure. I told you, we’re good. And everything’s fine.”

  Her shoulders un-hitched in relief. “Thank God. Because Dr. Bertelli was so worried about you, he made me rotate fresh stock on all your meds, then stood over me and literally cataloged every move I made while I filled your prescription. I think he was even counting the pills to make sure I didn’t screw up.”

  No doubt he didn’t want the FPMP’s favorite medium to die on his watch. Just imagine the liability. But if Bertelli was so concerned about my physical wellbeing, maybe I could turn it to my advantage. “I mean…everything’s basically fine. A little dizziness is par for the course, right?”

  Erin went pale and took me by the arm. Not in a show of companionship, either, but in the way the Police Academy had taught me to escort exuberant drunks off the street before someone mowed them down. “We should probably have that looked at. Just to be safe.”

  Well. That was one way to get past the red tape.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The medical team swooped in and hooked me up to some machines—heart rate, oxygen, temperature, and of course, blood pressure. Only somewhat elevated. Given how much I hated medical facilities, thanks to all the experimentation I’d endured, somewhat elevated was as good as I could hope for.

  Once the heavy hitters were convinced I was in no danger of collapse—the hyperspecialized physicians with a half-dozen medical titles per person—they left me in the capable hands of a physician’s assistant to unhook me from all the stuff. My break room buddy, Gina.

  “Well, look who it is,” she said...but when I expected her to blame me for the two deaths that darkened The Clinic’s doorstep, she added, “Such a relief to have you here, what with everything going on.”

  Well, that was going to take some getting used to.

  “Say, Gina, you’ve been here a while, haven’t you?”

  She took a few pumps of hand sanitizer from a wall mounted unit beside the door, scrubbed the jelly through her fingers, and said, “Eight years now? No, nine.”

  “The precursor to Kick…where do you suppose people are finding it?”

  “It’s really above my pay grade—”

  I pitched my voice low and conspiratorial. Not only did she know something…but I’d bet she was willing to share, given enough stroking. “Come on. You must’ve heard something around the water cooler.”

  “I’m sure it’s just idle gossip.”

  “Isn’t that the best kind?”

  She quelled a tiny smile. “Well, back when Palazamine was taken off the market, where did it go? Normally, when you’re left with extra prescription pills, there are takeback programs in place in hospitals and police departments.”

  Sure. The Fifth Precinct had a box in the lobby that some knucklehead would attempt to break into on a weekly basis.

  “But when Dr. Morganstern managed to get Palazamine recalled—”

  “Hold on. Dr. Morganstern was involved in Palazamine?”

  “Of course. Dr. Morganstern was one of the top psycho-pharmacological clinicians in the country. Such a shame.”

  “Yeah,” I said noncommittally. Because Morganstern had been offed by Roger Burke simply to install crazy Dr. Chance in Morganstern’s place. He’d been murdered to get to me. Calling it a shame was the understatement of the century.

  “If he wasn’t working on that super secret project in Japan, maybe he would have some ideas for you.”

  Wait a minute. Was Japan some kind of euphemism?

  While I was figuring out how to ask, Gina said, “He was such a character…. Sure, he came off a little dry, a little clinical, but that’s just because he was so brilliant. What the patients didn’t get to see was that he could really have a sense of humor about himself. Every Christmas we all chipped in for a new sweater vest, all the PAs and nurses. We found some real doozies. And he actually wore them.”

  “So…Japan.”

  “None of us were surprised. He was such a pioneer in the field. Just a shame he left so suddenly we didn’t have a chance to say goodbye. We always joked about getting him a giant cookie when he retired—you know, the cheap grocery store kind with all the sickening frosting?” She sighed. “He was a good sport. He would’ve gone along with the gag. Let’s hope he’s reveling in all the sushi he can eat.”

  Was there sushi in the afterlife? For his sake, I hoped so.

  Gina glanced down at my chart and said, “You know, I keep forgetting you’re a federal agent—you’re so down-to-earth—but if anyone can track down Dr. Morganstern, it’s you.”

  Me? Not exactly—not since I’d seen his spirit cross the veil.

  But I did know someone who could make a long-distance call on my behalf.

  It was hard not to act too excited—after all, Gina might want another blood pressure reading—but I kept it low-key until she finished telling me about her granddaughter’s tap dance recital and left me alone in the exam room. My phone was out of my pocket before the door had even swung shut. Unfortunately, my call went right to voicemail.

  “You’ve reached Special Agent Darla Davis of FPMP Indianapolis. I’m currently on assignment until further notice and will not be checking my voicemail. If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial—”

  I hung up and wondered, briefly, what kind of emergency, exactly, was likely to land in Dead Darla’s lap. Maybe if I’d listened to the whole thing, I’d discover the message was left specifically for my benefit. Luckily, Darla and I both answered to the same boss…and when it came to ghosts, Laura Kim didn’t screw around.

  I called Laura, who told me, “Unfortunately, Agent Davis is on assignment.”

  “Yeah. Her voicemail said.”

  “I can put in a request….”

  To who? />
  I almost asked—but maybe I didn’t want to know. In matters of Psych, the Director of FPMP Midwest Division ranked pretty high. But no matter how high up the food chain you got, there was always someone above you. FPMP National. The Pentagon. The White House. I was suddenly really grateful that whatever ghost business was going on out there, Darla had been sent off to deal with it, not me. Still. Dr. Morganstern’s input might crack the whole Kick fiasco wide open. “If it doesn’t compromise Darla, I could really use her help.”

  “I’ll do my best. But in the meantime, Vic…please. Figure this out. Before anyone else dies.”

  I didn’t miss working homicide, that’s for sure. But I had to admit, there was a lot less pressure when the victim was already dead. “Say, Laura…do you find it odd that the staff at The Clinic still think Dr. Morganstern is in Japan?”

  She sighed. “That was Constantine’s doing.”

  Sometimes I almost convinced myself that the FPMP wasn’t all that bad—but then I’d be reminded how fast and loose they played with the truth. “What about his family?”

  I must have taken a tone, because Laura sounded defensive when she said, “A body was never recovered, so they’re not going to have much closure anyway. Jennifer Chance and Roger Burke were the ones to concoct the Japan story, and we opted to run with it. Right now, as far as everyone’s concerned, Dr. Morganstern is on a top-secret development team in Okinawa that precludes contact with anyone…and a nice paycheck is hitting his wife’s bank account every other week.”

  “You could’ve achieved the same thing with a life insurance settlement.”

  “Maybe so. But do you really want everyone at The Clinic to know their beloved colleague was murdered solely to gain access to you?”

  No. Damn it.

  As much as I dreaded it—now, even more so—I really wanted to talk to Morganstern, though I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to reach past the veil. Because I’d never tried, or because my talent simply didn’t work that way? I dunno. But I had to try something.

  I had a feeling I couldn’t talk Red into helping me yoga. He’d been pretty clear yesterday about me taking some recovery time after my eye bleed and stabbing headache before he’d be willing to walk me through even the most basic of postures. But who needs Red when you’ve got the internet?

  I headed back to the cannery to make a fool of myself in the privacy of my own home.

  In my opinion, YouTube was made for reruns of old TV shows and bootleg copies of stunningly bad B-movies. Seeing what passed for fashion in the 70’s never got old. But I never realized how much yoga instruction could be found there until I looked. I had so many options, it was hard to determine exactly which YouTuber was right for me. You’d think I would jump at the chance to ogle so many shirtless men. Too bad they all annoyed the ever-loving crap out of me.

  From the young and hip to the old and sinewy, each one was smugger than the last. And every one of them wielded their expression of self-satisfied serenity like a weapon.

  By the time a cab deposited Jacob on the cannery’s doorstep, I’d resorted to geriatric “chair yoga”—the only thing that didn’t send a bolt of pain down my sciatic nerve or make my hamstrings twang like piano wire. He pulled up a second dining room chair in front of the TV set and joined me in twisting around to face the kitchen.

  “Is your back bothering you?”

  “No. I mean, yeah…but that’s not why I’m twisting around like a chair-bound pretzel.” I focused on my white light, my chakras, my chi, but it was no use. If the chair yoga was helping, it was so subtle I couldn’t feel it. I un-twisted myself, grabbed the clicker and lowered the TV’s volume so we could talk over it. “Did you know everyone thinks Dr. Morganstern is in Japan?” I gave a bitter laugh. “He’d know what to do—or at least he’d point me in the right direction. But now that I need to make a long-distance call to the other side, Darla’s gone dark. Can I do it myself? Who the hell knows. Laura must have a few more of those horse pills, but I don’t want to take one—and even if I did, in all likelihood, all I’d accomplish is astral projecting.”

  Jacob twisted the other way so as not to end up lopsided. His back gave off an enviable crack. “Are you sure about that? When the waking projection happened back at PsyTrain, the psyactive wasn’t the only thing in play. You also had a GhosTV tuned to the astral setting.”

  I hadn’t really thought about it that way.

  He glanced down at the floorboards, as if he couldn’t resist thinking about the console that was still in our basement.

  I sighed. “Look, I know you’ve been dying to encourage me to master that thing, and I can only imagine how much self control it’s taken for you to keep yourself from bringing it up. But if that contraption didn’t terrify me before, the knowledge that the personality of Jennifer Chance still exists somewhere out there—with its obsession completely intact—has got me totally spooked. She is out there. We both heard her talk through Darla’s mouth. What if I turn the dial and it sucks her ghost right back through the veil?”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Jacob narrowed his eyes, as if he wanted to reassure me that hauling a ghost back in through the exit door was impossible. But he couldn’t. Not with any degree of certainty.

  “Maybe I do need to let a bunch of blood rush to my head and spike a major headache,” I said. “That’s how I paused the old repeaters in Dreyfuss’s office. That’s how the ghosts claim I really light up.”

  Jacob grabbed the seat of his chair and hopped it sideways until it was directly beside mine. “You’ll figure this out.” He threw a leg over one of mine and hooked his heel around my calf, squeezing gently. “You have the raw ability. We both know how strong you are. But you’re writing the playbook as you go. Literally. So it’s bound to get frustrating.”

  “Playbook? This isn’t a game. People are dying.”

  Jacob looked hard at the side of my face until I met his eyes. Firmly, he said, “And it’s not your fault.”

  Of course it wasn’t.

  “And neither was what happened to Dr. Morganstern.”

  I opened my mouth to tell him that much was pretty fucking obvious…until I realized what had driven me to even attempt something as asinine as chair yoga.

  Guilt.

  Oh, I knew it was Roger Burke who’d done the deed, but it wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t been trying to rope me into their crazy scheme. If you took me out of the equation, the most powerful known medium in Chicago would’ve been Richie. And he’d been safe in the loving embrace of the FPMP.

  Dr. Gillmore might claim that correlation was not causation. Even so, in a roundabout way, Morganstern’s death really was my fault. Not because of something I did, or something I failed to do. But the mere fact of my existence.

  I didn’t need to say it, either. Jacob knew me. He could see the guilt was eating at me. He swung out of his chair and went down on one knee at my feet. His big, strong hands ranged up and down my thighs, as if he could chafe the shitty feelings away. “Vic, look at me. You were drugged and kidnapped. You and Morganstern were both victims. No one would see it any other way.”

  For the most part. Except for a tiny, niggling voice that insisted if I hadn’t been in the picture, Morganstern would still be alive. I could handle a stranger thinking something like that. But, disturbing as it was, now that I’d shared some baklava with the break room gang at The Clinic, I felt alarmingly distressed over the thought of them all hating me once they realized Japan was just a euphemism for dead.

  It was a conversation I wasn’t particularly keen on having, but when I stood up to go do something else—anything else—my pesky sciatic nerve announced that even in a chair, it found yoga to be a real pain in the ass. I winced, and Jacob noticed. Because that guy notices everything. He stood up and held out a hand. “Here, lie down.”

  Well, at least the yoga mat I’d hauled up from the basement was good for something. I’m not really one for back rubs—they felt decadent and a little s
elfish—but Jacob is well acquainted with my physiology by now. And I was likely to feel better once I let him have his way.

  I stripped down to my underwear and assumed the position, face down. He straddled my thighs and dug his thumbs into my back. The TV blathered on in the background as the perky girl on the folding chair did a few more stretches, then implored her audience to come back again tomorrow. “Like all journeys, the journey to a healthful habit begins with a single step.”

  The same could be said of all habits, not just the “healthful” ones. After all, how many Psychs tried a single hit of Kick and found themselves traveling on the journey to addiction?

  Jacob’s thumb found a bright point of pain and I groaned. “Too much?” he asked.

  “A little.”

  He eased up, but only marginally, and kept on pressing the sore spot. Eventually, either my nervous system fatigued itself so I no longer felt the pain so acutely, or some buried trigger point eased up.

  On the TV, the next video had begun playing while I was riding out the torture. I recognized the yoga guy’s voice—I’d dubbed him “Mr. Dramatic,” because every damn phrase he uttered was delivered like it was life or death. Which was a shame, because his shtick, “Vibrational Yoga,” had seemed so promising. At least until he opened his mouth.

  Our chakra system is like an energetic recording device that harbors our emotional and physical traumas. These energetic imprints can alter the proper flow of chi.

  I sighed into the yoga mat, which Jacob took as an invitation to press harder. “You’re gonna leave a bruise,” I said, though not very forcefully.

  Jacob shifted his tactic to running his palms up either side of my spine from my ass to my shoulders and back again.

  “There,” I said, as he hit another knot in my lower back. “Little higher. Yeah.”

  The Muladhara, or root chakra, is located at the base of the spine. It’s associated with our primal needs: food, shelter…sex.