Informed Consent (13 page)

S
asha never imagined
that there would come a day when she’d view a trip to Target to pick up laundry detergent and cat food as a romantic getaway. But that day had come, and it was today. She linked her arm through Connelly’s and snuggled into his side.

“It feels weird to be walking through here with my hands free. Your parents are the best.”

She smiled. It
had
been a nice surprise when her father had insisted they leave the babies with him and go ‘do something,’ while her mom put together Sunday dinner. She’d tried to demur and offered to help her mother in the kitchen, but Val had swatted her out of the room with a tea towel.

So here they were, strolling through the store, each with a cup of overpriced coffee in hand. They stopped in the Halloween aisle—Sasha to browse decorations, Connelly to browse family-sized bags of peanut butter cups. He dumped an armload of candy into the basket.

“How many trick-or-treaters do you think we’re going to get?” She cast a dubious look at the pile of bags.

“Who cares? We can freeze the leftovers.”

“We’d better start running again.”

He laughed but didn’t disagree.

She held up two tiny jack-o-lantern costumes. “What do you think?”

“Definitely. I think they have pet costumes, too. Hang on.” He disappeared down the next aisle.

Pet costumes? Mocha, maybe. But if he thought he was coaxing Java into a Halloween costume, he’d better trade some of his chocolates for canned tuna.

She was heading after him to share her perspective when her cell phone vibrated in her bag. She stopped near a display of black-and-orange wreaths and dug it out of her bag. Dr. Kayser’s contact information filled the display.

“Hi, Dr. Kayser.”

“Good morning, Sasha. I’m calling to let you know Adina Chevitz has passed away early this morning.” His voice was tired.

“I’m sorry.”

“She was ready. And she hung in until after the Sabbath had ended, so her family was able to get in touch with their rabbi and the burial society. Her body’s already been removed, and she’ll be buried by the end of the day.”

“That’s fast. Is it because of Allstrom?”

“Not really. Their beliefs include burying the body as quickly as possible.”

She half-listened to his explanation while she considered the ramifications of Mrs. Chevitz’s death on the temporary restraining order.

“Sasha?” he asked when the silence extended a bit too long.

“I’m here. I’m just thinking this through.”

“Do you mean how this development affects the case?”

“Precisely.”

Connelly appeared with a small, satiny devil costume in one hand and a cape and bat ears in the other. She couldn’t suppress a grin at his silliness but put up a finger to let him know not to interrupt her. He nodded his understanding, added the costumes to the basket she’d rested on the floor then picked it up and wandered off—no doubt taking advantage of her call to load up on more candy.

“Will the hearing go forward as planned tomorrow?” Dr. Kayser asked.

“That depends on us. The issue is effectively moot, so the TRO should be dissolved as a matter of course. All it would take is a phone call. But …”

“Yes?”

“We
could
show up at the appointed time and ask Judge Nolan to modify and expand the order to prohibit Dr. Allstrom from harvesting brain tissue from
anyone
without first obtaining specific informed consent.”

“Will the judge do that?”

“Possibly. Technically, she probably ought to dissolve the TRO, dismiss the case, and tell us to file a new motion for injunctive relief. But Judge Nolan is one of the more pragmatic judges on the Western District bench. There’s a decent chance she’d grant the request temporarily and schedule a hearing on that order later in the week.”

“Should we try?”

“I don’t see a downside. We’ve already teed up the issue. The worst she can say is ‘no.’ But there’s no reason for the Chevitz family to come to court tomorrow. I’m sure they have other priorities right now, anyway.”

“They certainly do. But should we try to find another family? I could check in with my patients at Golden Village to see who else might have a religious or philosophical objection.”

“Eventually, maybe. But our trying to replace Adina Chevitz with a new named plaintiff in the existing TRO would definitely tick off the judge—it’s too transparent. Our best move at this stage is to argue the order
isn’t
mooted by Mrs. Chevitz’s death and should be enlarged, not dissolved.” It was a novel argument, but it could work. Maybe.

“Okay. So do I need to come to your office before the hearing to prepare or should I meet you at the courthouse?”

“I’d like to walk you through your testimony. The hearing’s at ten. Can you be at my office by eight o’clock?”

“Of course.”

“Perfect. See you in the morning, Dr. Kayser.” She ended the call and went off in search of Connelly in hopes of checking out and leaving the store before he decided that the adult, human members of their family needed to celebrate Halloween in costume as well.

L
eo heard
Sasha’s light footsteps falling along the hallway between the bedroom where the twins were sleeping and the small room he’d claimed as his home office. He quickly opened a new browser window and clicked on a random
Washington Post
headline as the door eased inward.

“Hey, are you coming to bed?” she asked in a low voice.

They seemed to spend a lot of time stage whispering, he realized. Occupational hazard as parents of twin infants.

“Just catching up on the news before I turn in.” He swiveled to face her and gestured toward the monitor.

She glanced at the screen then perched on the edge of the desk and painted him with a knowing look. “Really? You’re reading about the latest fall fashion trends?” She peered at the article. “I really don’t think you could pull off fringe, honey.”

He examined the screen more closely and tried to swallow a laugh. “Busted,” he conceded.

“So what are you hiding?” She locked her big, green eyes on his and waited.

He moved the cursor over to the tab for the other window, clicked on it to reopen it, and watched her face as she read the title of the article. Amusement melted into worry.

“‘What You Should Know if You’re Considering Becoming a Living Donor?’” She moved her eyes from the screen and back to his face. “You’re really considering it? Does that mean your father checked out?”

He pulled her off the desk and onto his lap before answering. “I’m still running him down, trying to find out more about his background. But, in the meantime, he needs an answer. So I’m learning what I can about the donation and transplant process. I’m working on parallel tracks.”

Her mouth tightened and she stiffened, almost imperceptibly. “That makes sense.” She exhaled shakily. “Okay, tell me about the process.” She shifted in his lap to face him directly.

“Well the first thing I learned is that there’s not a hospital in the state of Maine that performs living-donor liver transplants. There are fewer than a hundred places in the country that do it. But, luckily, one of them is right here in Pittsburgh.”

“UPMC?”

“Right. So, if I were going to do this, I’d tell him that his doctor needs to refer him to UPMC’s transplant program.” It was a stroke of good fortune that one of the leading centers was local. It was almost a sign.

“Will he be accepted automatically?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No. He—and I—would both have to undergo a pre-transplant evaluation. There are specific criteria about how big his tumors can be, how numerous, whether the cancer has spread outside the liver … that sort of thing. But I’d assume that if his treating physicians recommended the procedure, he probably qualifies.”

“Probably,” she agreed. “What about you?”

“I’d have to get a physical and have a psychiatric evaluation. Then I’d meet with a social worker to make sure I had support for when I left the hospital. They seem to require a fairly thorough vetting.”

“I’m sure they do. It’s a serious procedure …”

She trailed off without asking the follow-up question, but he answered it anyway. “There aren’t good numbers available on mortality rates for donors. But death is very rare.”

“What about complications?”

He shrugged. “They happen. They’re more likely to happen when the surgery occurs at a center that does a low-volume of living donor transplants. The surgeons at UPMC are more experienced than most, relatively speaking. And I’m young and healthy. I’m likely to come out of the surgery fine and be back to normal within a few months.”

“It’s still a big risk to take to save a stranger’s life.”

“He’s not a stranger.”

“He may as well be, Connelly.”

He knew she was right as a factual matter. But he found himself viscerally reacting to the words. “He’s not, though. He’s my father.”

She gnawed on her lower lip for a moment as if she was trying to decide whether to say what came next. “It sounds like you’ve already made up your mind. What if he really did kill that missing kid? You’d donate part of your liver to save a killer?”

“I still need to find out what kind of man my father is. Not because I think it changes anything, honestly, in the end. But it informs my decision. I just want to know who I’m doing this for,” he answered. But as he spoke the words he realized she was right. He
had
already decided to agree to the transplant. The question felt settled, somehow.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him for several moments. He could feel the rapid flutter of her heartbeat against his chest. Then she loosened her grip and arched her neck and back to meet his eyes with her own, wet with unshed tears. “If this is what you have to do, I’ll support you. You know that.”

He pulled her close again and stroked her hair with one hand, unable to find the words to reassure her.

S
asha was showering
and Leo was still contemplating getting out of bed when Hank called early Monday morning. Leo grabbed his cell phone before it rang a second time.

“Can you talk?” Hank asked.

“Yes.”

“Sorry to call so early, but I put out some feelers over the weekend. The missing man on the flyer Sasha saw is a Chinese-American petty criminal by the name of Jake Wang. Last known address was an apartment in the Bronx.”

“He has a sheet?” The kid hadn’t struck him as particularly hardened or tough.

“Like I said, petty stuff. Receiving stolen property, a B&E at an auto parts store after hours. He was playing poker at an underground club when it was raided. According to arrest reports, he claimed to be affiliated with the Flying Dragons.”

“Flying Dragons?”

“It’s a Chinese gang that operates—well, used to operate in and around New York’s Chinatown. Asian gangs had a stranglehold on the area in the 1980s and 90s. Flying Dragons, Ghost Boys, Born to Kill. It was before your time, but the feds made cleaning them up a priority. The remnants of the Flying Dragons are still lingering, but they’re a shadow of what they once were. If this kid was mixed up with them, he was likely just a hanger-on. There’s nothing in his sheet that screams gangbanger.”

“Nothing that would make someone want to make him disappear,” Leo agreed. Sasha emerged from the bathroom in her robe with a towel twisted around her wet hair. ‘Hank’ he mouthed.

She raised an imaginary mug to her mouth, asking if he wanted some coffee. He nodded ‘yes,’ and she cinched the robe’s tie tighter around her waist and headed out of the room. Mocha and Java dove off the bed and followed her.

“Right. The kid’s a wannabe. The missing person’s report his parents filed said he told them he was traveling to Maine on business, but they didn’t know any specifics about said business, except that he cadged his mom’s credit card and used it to book a ferry passage to Great Cranberry Island,” Hank continued.

“What about Duc Nguyen? Did anything pop when you ran his name? Any connection to Wang?”

“Apparently ‘Duc Nguyen’ is the ‘John Smith’ of Vietnamese names. I narrowed my search to men born between 1945 and 1955 named Duc Nguyen, still living, who immigrated to the United States between 1970 and 1985, and I got sixty-two hits.”

“Sixty-two?”

“Yep. None of them live in Maine.”

“Well, one of them does.”

“First off, he’s only included in that cohort if he’s here legally. Second, he doesn’t seem to have formally changed his name to Doug Wynn, because I can’t tie the records I pulled on Doug Wynn to any of the sixty-two Nguyens.”

“So, we’ve got nothing.” Sixty-two Duc Nguyens would take weeks to run down. Weeks that one specific Duc Nguyen simply didn’t have.

Sasha returned, walking slowly and deliberately, holding a full mug of steaming hot coffee in each hand. She passed one to him.

“Do you have anything else I can go on? Scars? Deformities? Unusual attributes?”

“He had the usual number of hands and feet. And he looks like an old Vietnamese guy, Hank.”

“I have some other stuff on my plate this morning. If I get a chance, I’ll comb through the Nguyen files and see if any of them are more interesting on a closer look, but don’t hold your breath.”

“Understood. Thanks.”

“You can thank me when I get you some information.”

Leo ended the call and placed the phone on the bedside table.

“Sounds like Hank didn’t turn up anything new on your dad, huh? I’m sorry.” Sasha rested her hand on his forearm.

He stared down at her hand, and an image of another hand that had recently rested in that same spot flashed through his mind—the wrinkled, frail hand of his father. Leo replayed the exchange with Wynn before he’d given Leo the car keys. The admonition not to take too long, and then the gesture with the upturned palms raised. Sitting on the edge of his bed, with his wife watching him with a concerned expression, Leo visualized something that hadn’t registered in real time: A faded tattoo of three candles, a crudely drawn coffin, and the stylized letters ‘B.T.K.’

“Connelly? Are you okay?”

He dragged himself back to the present and ignored his rapid pulse and rising heart rate. “I’m fine. I just had a thought. Hey, good luck today at the hearing.”

She smiled uncertainly but kissed his cheek. “Thanks.” She took her coffee and headed for the walk-in closet to get ready for her day. He took his coffee and tiptoed down the hallway to his office to run down his suspicion before the babies woke up.

“
H
ere’s
where you’ve been hiding,” Sasha said when she finally found Connelly hunched over his computer in the office. “I just fed the kids and changed their diapers. They’re on the floor mat in the nursery working on their rolling skills. I have to run so I can get some work done before Dr. Kayser shows up.” She leaned over the desk and kissed the top of his head. “Have a good day, okay?”

“You, too. Text me after court and let me know how it went.”

“I will. Are you going to come over to the office this afternoon for their feeding?”

“I’ll call first. Hey, do you still have the card that Annabeth woman gave you on the plane?”

Connelly’s voice was casual—a little too casual. But she didn’t have time to cross-examine him at the moment, so she simply dug Annabeth’s card out of her wallet and handed it to him. “Here you go.”

“Thanks.”

She studied his face for a moment, but his expression was deliberately blank. “Connelly—” she began.

“I just have a question for her, Sasha. It’s nothing major. Call it a hunch. I’ll tell you all about it when I have details. Scout’s honor,” he said with an earnest smile.

“You do realize I know you were never a Boy Scout, right?”

He laughed and planted a kiss on her lips. “Go to work,” he muttered with his mouth against hers.

“You’re lucky I have somewhere I have to be. I have ways of making you talk,” she replied.

“Is that a promise?” he countered in a husky voice.

“Definitely.”

“Good.”

“On that note, I’m leaving before I have to start all over again with my hair and makeup,” she said as she headed out of the office on surprisingly unsteady legs.

A
s soon as
Leo heard Sasha pull the front door closed behind her, he picked up his phone and called the number on Annabeth’s card.

“Hello?” she answered.

“Annabeth Douglas?”

“Yes.”

“This is Leo Connelly. My wife and I sat in the same row as you last week on a flight to Portland.”

“Yes, of course, I remember. Sasha and Leo, parents of newborn twins. How was your trip? Did you make it to Acadia National Park?” She sounded genuinely pleased to hear from him, if slightly surprised.

Leo forced himself to engage in the requisite small talk while he laced his shoes and bundled the twins into their one-piece hooded fleece blanket-coat-things, packed up the diaper bag, and found Mocha’s leash.

When Annabeth paused to take a breath, he interrupted her story about her weekend visit with her son. “I see on your card that you live in the North Hills.”

“That’s right,” she answered cautiously.

“Have you ever been to Coffee Buddha on Perry Highway?”

“As a matter of fact, I have.”

“Would you be willing to meet me there in about a half an hour? I’m buying.”

She hesitated. “Leo …”

He plowed forward. “Annabeth, please. I need to know everything you can tell me about the Vietnamese gang trial you mentioned that you covered in New York in 1994.”

“Born to Kill?” Her tone changed from uncertain to intrigued.

“That’s the one. In exchange for everything you can remember, I think I might be able to offer you a scoop.”

“I’m retired, Leo.” He heard her drumming her nails on a hard surface—a table or a desk. “But Coffee Buddha
does
pour a nice cup.”

He smiled to himself. She might be retired but crime journalism was still in her blood.

“I’ll meet you on their porch where they have the pet-friendly tables.”

“Will Sasha be joining us?”

“I’m afraid not. She has a court appearance. I’ll have Finn and Fiona, though. And our chocolate lab.”

“Babies, a dog, the best coffee on this side of the river,
and
an audience to listen to me ramble about my glory days? You’ve got yourself a date with a reporter, Mr. Connelly.”