Disturb (15 page)

“Don’t prolong it, Dr. O’Neil. I have other things to do today.”

His tormentor paced before him, like an expectant father in a waiting room, constantly checking his watch. David. When Mason had let him into his apartment fifteen minutes ago, he couldn’t have predicted this turn of events.

“I’ve done nothing to you. In fact, I always considered you a friend.”

“You conduct experiments on all of your friends?”

Mason’s mouth was dry; his tongue felt like a paper towel. It was getting harder to speak.

“You volunteered. All you had to do was say you wanted out.”

David sneered. “And go back to prison. Some choice.”

The doctor watched the blood run down his fingertips, still flowing freely from the deep wound on his wrist. Drip. Drip. Drip. Like sand in an hour glass, each passing second bringing him closer to death.

“So why are you still taking the drug? If you’re so against the experiment, why are you still using N-Som?”

David appeared confused.

“I’m not.”

“I can see the pill bottle, in your coat pocket.”

David shoved the bottle father down, as if it shamed him.

“You treated us like lab rats.”

“But you’re not in the lab now. Your free. So why are you still taking it?”

David’s face became pinched. He nervously twiddled the scalpel in his fingers.

“It’s addictive.”

O’Neil let out a slow, soft breath. He was getting sleepy.

“We both know it’s not addictive. You’re taking it because you want to. Because the experiment is important to you.”

The MD gently lifted his wrist above heart level, a pathetic attempt to stave the flow. David didn’t notice.

“If the experiment is so important, why am I killing everyone involved?”

Mason’s thinking was becoming blurry, and he couldn’t have made up a lie if he’d wanted to.

“Because you’re out of your mind.”

David laughed. The sound was forced, but it caught and quickly escalated into an hysterical giggle. Mason shifted, again pressing his fingers deep into his brachial artery. His pulse was rapid, weak.

“Okay, Doc. I’m crazy. I’ll admit it. But you did it to me.”

“I didn’t know, David. No one did.”

“Dr. Fletcher knew. Good old Red knew for a long time.”

“He didn’t tell us. If he had, we would have stopped this. No one wanted to hurt you.”

David knocked his hand away. Mason groaned, the blood coursing through his arm and spurting. It sounded like a small squirt gun.

“Do I have to cut off your fingers to get you to stop that? Consider yourself lucky. I skinned Townsend, and Red is hanging by his intestines in the forest preserve. I’m letting you off easy.”

Mason’s head titled forward. His eyes were rheumy.

“I’m going to die.”

“That’s the point.”

“Manny wouldn’t want me to die.”

David bit his knuckle. He paced away from the doctor, then back again.

“Call an ambulance.” His voice was barely above a whisper. “You can still help me.”

“No help!” David pointed at him, his finger accusing.

“Please, David.”

“You know how N-Som is made?”

Mason knew. They all knew. The fact that Rothchilde had somehow passed the FDA’s pharmacological review was amazing. The president of DruTech couldn’t have done it honestly.

“You know how it’s made, and you let me take it anyway.”

“You volunteered.”

“Not for this.” David’s eyes took a trip somewhere. Somewhere horrible. “I’ve seen things, Doc. Things no one alive has seen. Can you imagine?”

Mason couldn’t imagine. Once was bad enough.

“Do you know I’ve died forty-three times? And I remember each time, like movies branded into my head.”

“I’m… I’m sorry.”

His breath was becoming fainter, and consciousness was drifting away. All of Mason’s senses softened, grew fuzzy.

“Seeing things like that can really mess a person up, Doc.”

Mason felt as if he was sinking in a deep, dark pool. A small part of him wanted to protest, but didn’t have the energy.

“Manny… Manny…”

“Manny isn’t here, Dr. O’Neil.”

David cradled the doctor’s head in his hands. Mason only had a vague awareness of it.

But he became fully aware when David began to pound his head against the hardwood floor, over and over, trying to crack it open like an egg.

And he was still somewhat aware when David succeeded.

“D
on’t let anyone into the building except DruTech staff. If the police come, demand to see a warrant.”

“No problem, Dr. Boone. Everything all right?

Theena smiled thinly at the security guard. “No, Barry, it’s not. Has anyone else arrived?”

“Dr. Myrnowski went down to the lab a few minutes ago. She’s the only one.”

“Did the delivery come?”

“It came this morning. I signed for it, but the box looked damaged.”

A flash of fear. “Damaged?”

“Cracked on the side, top kind of messed up.”

“Was it leaking?”

“Didn’t seem to be.”

“Thanks, Barry.”

Theena went into the elevator, Bill a step behind her. If something had happened to the contents of that package…

“I know this is a stupid question, but are you okay?”

Theena put her key card in the slot and looked away from Bill. He was so concerned. She felt a tinge of something in her gut, and wondered if it might be guilt.

From a very young age, Theena realized that men were the ones with the power. Her father had proven it time and again. Men controlled the money, the government, the world. They did it by threatening, bribing, blackmailing, fighting, insulting, extorting, stealing, and killing. None of these were inherent female traits.

But a woman could have power. All she had to do was learn to control men.

Theena was an expert at this. Flirting. Flattery. Seduction. Sex. They were all tools; a means to an end. Her personal taste didn’t interfere with her goals—sometimes she liked the guys she slept with, sometimes she didn’t.

Bill, she liked. She liked him so much it was messing up her game plan.

Theena glanced at him, his broad shoulders, the laugh lines in the corners of his eyes. For the briefest of moments, she forgot about N-Som, and power, and goals. She pretended that she was just a woman, and Bill was just a man, and they were together. No control, no betrayal, no ulterior motives. Just love.

It was a sweet little fantasy, but that was all it was. Real life conspired otherwise.

“I’m fine. This is a lot to handle.”

Bill nodded. He took her hand. She hugged him, unsure if her actions were real or pretend.

“I have to check something in the lab. If you don’t mind, I need to do it alone.”

“Not a problem. I want to look at the N-Som file anyway.”

She forced some crocodile tears and looked at him.

“With all that’s happened, you think the drug can still be approved?”

“If it’s safe, I’ll approve it.”

Theena hugged him again. The elevator stopped and Bill went off to the conference room, a folder tucked under his arm. She had a momentary spike of panic, but then she remembered that there was nothing incriminating in the N-Som file she’d given Bill—it had all been edited.

Her mind drifted to Michael Bitner. Another man she’d liked…

Dr. Julia Myrnowski was in the lab, peering through a microscope when Theena walked in.

“Hi, Julia.”

“Hi, Theena. How are you holding up?”

“Fine. The package is here?”

“In the freezer. I haven’t opened it yet.”

Theena took a white smock from her locker and removed a hair net from the side pocket. She put both on. After snapping on a pair of latex gloves, she went to the freezer.

The box was definitely cracked, and the tape on the lid looked like a repair job. This wasn’t Sully’s work—she paid the morgue attendant too much for him to make mistakes. The courier must have done it.

Theena made a note to change services. If they’d seen what was inside the box, she could explain it away. But dropping important material like this was inexcusable.

“I want to do the biopsy and convert right away. Can you assist?”

“Dr. O’Neil is better at it than I am.”

“Dr. O’Neil isn’t here, and I could use a second set of hands.”

Julia frowned. Theena couldn’t blame her. It was a pretty hairy extraction procedure. But there was no one else, and this had to get done now.

Theena placed the box on the table, next to the surgical vise. She snugged a pre-fitted plastic cover onto the clamps and turned the handle to open them wider.

Then she went to the autoclave and pulled out the sterilized instruments; enlarging burs, dura separator, skull traction tongs, cranial drill, saw blade and guide, and various retractors, curettes, forceps, and rongeurs.

After spreading out the tools on a tray, the moment of truth arrived.

Theena broke the seal on the box, letting out a breath when a wisp of carbon dioxide plumed upward. If there was still dry ice, perhaps the specimen hadn’t been compromised.

She unwound the tape and lifted off the top. The smoke dissipated, allowing her to see the perfectly preserved severed head.

Theena’s lower lip trembled. She pulled the wires out of its tear ducts and gently removed the head from the box.

“Daddy.”

The tears came. Theena gingerly placed Dr. Nikos Stefanopolous’s head in the vice, and after sniffling once, she reached for the scalpel.

B
ill sat in the conference room and leafed through the file he’d found at Mike Bitner’s house. Almost immediately, he began to notice differences between this file and the one Theena gave him. Omissions, mostly. But also some completely different experimental results.

Some of Manny’s CTs and PETs showed abnormalities, which grew as his N-Som usage continued. In the file Bill had at home, the scans were all healthy and normal.

There were also notes that Manny had been put on the antidepressant Prozac and Xanax antianxiety. The doses had continued to go up, rising to levels that Bill thought were toxic. Eventually, Dr. Red Fletcher began giving him Compazine. This was a powerful antipsychotic, given to people with serious mental problems.

Manny’s mental health wasn’t the only irregularity. His diet had become increasingly extreme. He once went without food for a period of six days, refusing to eat. When the fast ended, he went into a phase where he only ate marshmallows and raw meat. Last month, Dr. Nikos came into Manny’s room to find him devouring a box of pencils.

Theena’s story of Manny being on a Stairmaster for nine hours was true, but it didn’t end because the equipment failed. It had ended because Manny began to scream, and was unable to stop screaming for several hours, until his throat began to bleed.

But Manny wasn’t N-Som’s only casualty. The more Bill read, the worse things became. He leafed through one disastrous animal experiment after another. Test subjects would become catatonic, or erratic. They would refuse food and sex. Some became sick, others became violent.

The worst thing that happened was to poor Sam the monkey.

Bill located the missing page, the end of the experiment. After Sam had become lethargic, he’d gone into a rage, attacking Dr. Nikos, biting Theena, and eventually…

Bill read the paragraph again.

Day 241—We found Sam this morning, dead in his cage. Cause of death was a massive hemorrhage. Sam had pulled his own eyes out.

He scanned through the autopsy report. A lesion was found in Sam’s corpus callosum, extending upwards to the cerebrum. Smaller lesions were found on the cerebellum, medulla, hypothalamus, and pons.

The monkey’s brain was almost twenty percent scar tissue.

Bill put down the folder and pushed away from the table. Could Theena have known how dangerous this drug was? Could all of this information have been hidden from her somehow?

He tried to make it work. He wanted her to have been deceived. Her father could have falsified data. Maybe she was kept in the dark. Maybe…

He picked up the Sam report again. The notes were in Theena’s handwriting.

So she knew.

She knew N-Som was dangerous. And she tried to hide that fact.