Ophelia (12 page)

“Who are you trying to fool, Mr. Westbrooke?”

“I have spent more than half my life on the
opposite side of the world from my biological father,”
Ophelia
interrupted, standing up a little straighter.
“My
legal
stepfather has spent the last twenty-one years treating me more like his niece
than his daughter. Conversely, David James Westbrooke has scarcely left my side
since I was six; if he wishes to call himself my father, there are few in the
world who would deny him that privilege.”

The attendant’s gaze lingered on them a moment longer before
she glanced up at the clock. “The pathologist will be here in twenty minutes.”

“The pathologist is here
now!
”

A tall, stern-looking gentleman swept into view and
immediately seized Ophelia’s hand.

“Ms. Osborn? Dr. Carpenter. I knew your father.”

They briskly shook hands.

“What seems to be the problem?”

“Harry was killed last night,” David interrupted before
Ophelia’s voice had the chance to catch or wobble.

Carpenter glanced at the woman. “May I assume you desire an
autopsy, Ms. Osborn?”

Ophelia nodded her assent and the doctor began taking
information. After a few minutes, Dr. Carpenter wrote a number on a slip of
paper and led the way into the morgue.

“Are you prepared to identify your brother?”

“I am.”

David put his arm around Ophelia’s waist as the doctor open
the relevant door and rolled out the slab. The woman gave a soft cry and buried
her head in her bodyguard’s shoulder.

“For the record, Ms. Osborn: do you recognize this man?”

After a moment, she turned back.
“Yes, Dr
Carpenter. That is my younger brother, Harold Ambrose Osborn.”

He nodded. “Very good. I’ll give you a few moments to say
goodbye. Mr. Westbrooke?”

David hesitated, but Ophelia assured him that she would be
fine and he crept uneasily toward the door.

“
Mo dheartháir! Mo stór!
”

The heir to the Osborn line kissed her brother one last time.

~*~

“Dr.
Carpenter said that they would call the funeral home that served your father.”

Unsure of how long they’d be in the morgue, Ophelia’s driver
had agreed to wait in the parking structure. It was an unusually chilly May
morning, but Ophelia did not seem to be in any hurry to return to the
limousine. David spoke again after a moment.

“Are you going to work today?”

Ophelia shook her head.
“When we get back to
the car, I will call Dr Welker and inform him that he is the new president of
Osborn Scientific. He will run the company until I finish my bereavement.”

They had just entered the ramp when a man in his early
thirties brushed roughly past Ophelia and headed for David.

“Give me your wallet!”

“You do not want to do that,”
Ophelia
said.

“Shut up, bitch!” grunted the mugger, keeping his back to
her. “I
said
, give me your wallet!”

He didn’t realize he’d made a mistake in ignoring her until
he felt the muzzle between his shoulder blades.

“Drop whatever you have on you,”
Ophelia ordered.
“Every knife, every firearm, every bag of
drugs and bit of money. Every item that I have to remove from you personally will
be replaced by a bullet.”

The mugger took a great, shuddering breath and made eye
contact with his former victim. “What is it?”

David moved to one side and tried to hide his surprise as he
caught a glimpse of the gun.

“I think it’s a Smith and Wesson nine millimeter…maybe a
compact M&P.”

“One bullet for each thing I forget?” the man repeated.

Ophelia smirked.
“Precisely.”

He waited a beat, then fled at the same time she fired, so
that the bullet only grazed his side.

“I would not have missed if I had not been
out of practice,”
she called to her bodyguard over the sound of
retreating footsteps. As the sound died away, her voice became rueful.
“Alas, I have not been to the range since I fired Andrew.”

Some of the color began to return to David’s face as he joined
her. “
Please
tell me you have a permit for that!”

“Of course,”
Ophelia replied.
“I took the relevant class as soon as I established Carnegie Hill as
my address.”

Although David would never admit it to anyone afterward, his
“daughter” had scared the shit out of him. It had been so long since he had
taught her to shoot that he had nearly forgotten how natural she was with a
gun.

“I don’t think I want to know where that came from,” he said
at last, giving her red sundress a once-over.

“No…I do not believe you do.”

Ophelia stowed the gun in her clutch and took her bodyguard’s
arm
. “Let us go. Wahim is waiting.”

Eleven days later

“Edmund
Chrysler.”

Ophelia gave the psychiatrist a brisk handshake and took the
seat opposite. There was no need to introduce herself—if he read the
New
York Times
or the
Daily Bugle
, he probably knew half her life story.

“Your admission to the Shady Rest Institute is completely
voluntary?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There hasn’t been any coercion? Not even the merest suggestion
that you should take such a measure?”

“No, sir.”

“Why are you committing yourself, Mrs. Miraz?”

“I use my maiden name; please call me Ms. Osborn.”

Dr. Chrysler made a note of this, then looked up expectantly.

“I have been having nightmares since my father
died.”

“When was this?”

“November 2002,”
she replied.
“The nightmares have increased since my arrival in this country.
Occasionally, I have visions—”

“‘This country’?” the doctor echoed. “I was under the
impression that Dr. Osborn was American.”

“My father was born in Connecticut and lived
in the United States his entire life. I was born in Manhattan, but moved to
Ireland at age five when my parents divorced. I had not quite reached the age
of fourteen when I accepted an apprenticeship at Real World Designs and moved
to Australia to attend university. I returned to this country five years ago,
upon the death of my father.”

Chrysler took notes faster than anyone Ophelia had ever seen.

“What happens in these nightmares?”

“My father appears to me and frequently
gives me instructions.”

“And in the visions?”

“The same thing; sometimes clarifying what
had occurred in my dreams.”

“Have you had any other problems other than visions and
nightmares?”

“I lost consciousness after one of the
visions,”
Ophelia replied.
“I have also been
experiencing large gaps in my memory for the last few months.”

“What sort of gaps?”

“More like a complete loss of time,”
she explained.
“Dr Welker believes that I have dissociative
identity disorder.”

“Dr. Welker is your psychologist?”

“Richard Welker is the chief administrator
of the Ophelia R. Osborn Laboratory Complex in New Rochelle.”

“Why are you accepting the diagnosis of a gentleman under
your employ who is not a mental health professional?”

~*~

“Were you aware that several vials of the human performance serum
disappeared after your father’s death?” asked Dr Welker.

“I was unaware of the existence of the
human performance enhancers until I had been with the company for several
weeks,” I admitted.

My husband, my bodyguard and I met in the
parlour of my home upon my release from the hospital to discuss my plans for
the future; eventually, the reason for committing myself came up.

“Few people knew of the serum’s
existence,” Richard replied. “Since your brother was never granted the
necessary clearance to enter the laboratories, I suspect that Harry bribed
someone to steal the serum.”

“How did you find out about it?” Eduardo
inquired.

“When I was named chief administrator, I
was granted each lab’s secrets.”

“Why do you suspect Harry?” asked David.

“As I understand, Mr Osborn was also
having visions.” Dr Welker glanced at me and I nodded.

“How does this correlate with Ophelia’s
loss of time?” my bodyguard pressed.

“Once I became aware of the serum, I reviewed
Dr Osborn’s notes and interviewed everyone who worked on the project or had any
sort of interaction with him in the months leading up to his death. It took me
nine weeks to track down Dr Osborn’s former assistant, Ms Simkins; she admitted
that Dr Osborn had appeared to lose time on several different occasions. She
said his most notable losses were the night his laboratory assistant, Dr
Stromm, was murdered and the afternoon every member of the final OsCorp board
of directors was killed.”

“You believe my father took the serum.”

“I believe
you
took the serum. What did your father say to you before you started developing
blank spots?”

“I…I…oh, Goddess!”

My husband impulsively drew me into his
embrace.

“I…was not thinking,” I confessed.
“Athair had given my brother and me an extremely important message. Harry…Harry
said that he was too afraid to do something. I challenged his manhood and…and I
drank something.”

Richard paled. “You drank the serum?”

~*~

“I
have never heard of chemically-induced dissociative identity disorder,” Dr.
Chrysler declared at the end of her recollection.

“Nor have I.”

“When your other personality was in control, did you have
problems with destroying things?”

“I do not know,”
Ophelia confessed,
reaching for a throw pillow. She squeezed it before continuing.
“I was in the hospital a few weeks before my brother died, but
neither Eduardo nor David would tell me what happened. Even the medical staff
would say nothing more than that I had been unconscious for three days.”

“Do you suspect that you did something terrible during the
time preceding your loss of consciousness?”

“I do,”
the woman replied.
“When I awoke, David was bruised in several places and I counted at
least nine stitches; his left arm was in a sling. I do not recall those
injuries being present before that blank period and he refused to tell me what
caused them.”

Dr. Chrysler was silent for quite a long time.

“I remember seeing your father in the
Times
for his
scientific work, but I don’t remember any of the deaths you mentioned.”

“If the story did not concern a new contract
or a merger, it usually appeared in the
Daily Bugle
. Perhaps they
thought my father was a magnet for scandal.”

~*~

“They agreed to admit me.”

Eduardo blanched, but David’s expression was grave, as if he
had been expecting this outcome.

“Only for a few weeks, though, right?” the younger gentleman
demanded.

Ophelia shook her head.
“Dr Chrysler said
that the minimum stay is usually five months, but since I am reporting
nightmares, visions, dissociative identity disorder and possible schizophrenia,
it could be eight months or longer. Especially if my…condition…does not easily
respond to treatment.

“Tomorrow morning, the two of you will come
back to complete any necessary paperwork. Dr Chrysler hopes that Michael
Laurier and Dr Welker will come by in the afternoon so that we may sign the
temporary transfer of ownership,”
she continued.
“Beginning
next week, you may only see me during visiting hours; however, dependent on the
outcome of my physical and mental work-up, I may not be permitted visitors for
at least three weeks.”

“Physical work-up?” Eduardo sounded faint.

Ophelia put her arm around her husband’s shoulder and—with
the aid of a friendly receptionist—found him some water and got him into a
private room off the atrium. Once David had closed the door, Ophelia sat down
beside her husband and took his hand.

“Do you remember the discussion we had with Dr
Welker after I was released from the hospital?”

“About you coming here?”

“And about
Athair
having dissociative
identity disorder?”

He nodded.

“Do you remember that I said I had drunk the
serum he created?”

“You said you drank something…and then you started crying.”

“It was the human performance enhancers. Dr
Stromm, Norman’s partner on the project, said that psychosis was a major side
effect…Dr Welker said that dissociative identity disorder was likely an aspect
of the psychosis.”

“You were having visions of your father
before
you
drank the serum!”

“I am trying to tell you that Dr Chrysler
and his colleagues have to perform a thorough examination and run a series of
tests in order to determine what effect—if any—the serum had on my body. Severe
biological changes could drastically alter Dr Chrysler’s treatment plan.”