Shadow of Eden (15 page)

“Do you still want me to intubate?” the resident asked Steve, who was still holding the glass Ativan syringe. The resident had stopped inserting the tube when she started breathing on her own.

“Wait a minute.”

“Left peripheral I.V. in.” The nurse working on the other arm announced as she plugged the tube from the old intravenous bag into the hub of the catheter.

“Hang seven hundred milligrams of Cerebryx to run in over ten minutes,” Steve ordered. “And monitor her blood pressure as it’s going in.”

He capped the Ativan needle and leaned over to check Shirley’s pupils. They both constricted to light as he opened and closed her lids.
Good.
He pinched her right thumbnail and the arm pulled away. He looked up at the resident. “Don’t intubate now, but stay close.” Steve watched the EKG monitor and her vital signs until he was satisfied.

“Thanks, everybody.” He stood up to leave.

Turning, he saw Edith’s tear-streaked face pressed against the glass window.

Chapter 29

T
he stairs seemed longer and steeper than normal to Dixon as he walked up to the residential floor of the White House. His head ached and his arms and legs felt unusually heavy. It was almost like being back on the campaign trail. He was thankful he had cancelled tonight’s dinner with the Daughters of the American Revolution, excusing himself because of the Chinese massacre. There was nothing, really, for him to do, but his heart wasn’t into the political chitchat, not while the China thing hung over him.

He found Elise in the bedroom curled up in an overstuffed chair reading a book. He smiled. It was the most relaxing thing he had seen in a day filled with meetings, briefings, and reports delivered by overly attentive bureaucrats and staffers. She looked soft and feminine, dressed in a beige cashmere turtleneck sweater and taupe woolen skirt, colors that set off her short ginger hair. In contrast to so many presidents and their wives who had slept in separate beds, Dixon and Elise refused to part. They were still young in their mid-fifties and their passion for each other was still strong—a frequent topic of the tabloids. Elsie did keep the First Lady’s bedroom for her clothes, as the closet in the master suite was too small for both of their wardrobes.

“What are you reading?” he asked.

Elise looked up, smiling. “Something mindless.”

Dixon fell into the chair next to hers. Side by side, the chairs faced opposite directions so he and Elise could talk to each other while they relaxed. Elise slid her slender hand over to hold his wrist as it lay on the cushioned arm. “Long day?”

She unerringly sensed his moods, he mused, although today he had probably telegraphed it to the entire White House.

“Yeah.” He slid deeper into the overstuffed chair to rest his head.

“China?”

“Yeah.”

“Feel like talking about it?” Her voice was gentle, supporting. He found that he did want to talk to her about his mounting anger and frustration. While he eagerly anticipated the Taiwan President’s visit—whatever his name—he knew the visit alone wouldn’t really satisfy his desire to punish the bastards ruling China. His profound frustration would remain.

“Guess so.” As he answered, the soft supper-bell chime came from the next room.

“Why don’t we talk over dinner?”

“Sure. Know what’s on tonight?”

“I ordered your favorite. Red bell pepper soup. Come on.”

Inside the private dining room and comfortably seated at the dinner table, Dixon picked up his spoon as he eyed the hot soup with a tendril of steam curling up. Suddenly, he realized he wanted to say grace. “Let’s pray,” he said.

Elise glanced at him curiously, but bowed her head. Dixon prayed silently, sensing how much the weight of his job had pushed him closer to God. “Amen,” he said and dipped his spoon into the soup.

“It’s good.” Elise pronounced.

Dixon cocked his head as he tasted. “Not really much flavor.”

Chapter 30

“P
aul came by my office yesterday and asked if we had had any human encephalitis cases,” Oscar Perera reported. Trident’s Chief Safety officer sat in a heavy leather chair in front of Victor Morloch’s massive desk. “He got a call from a doctor friend of his, a Dr. Ari Brown, who has a case that sounds like ours. Apparently Brown had suspicions linking Eden with his patient and called Paul directly. Paul seemed pretty bothered by it.”

Morloch frowned at the news. Paul Tobias, a longtime member of Morloch’s inner circle, had been kept in the dark about the human encephalitis cases already reported to Perera over the last year—a mandate to Perera from Morloch. “What do you think?”

Perera considered a long moment. “I think he’s getting cold feet. His daughter, you know.”

Morloch had already decided that, but needed to feel Perera out since Paul was his colleague. “I agree,” he said slowly. “What would you do?”

Perera took a long moment to reply. Morloch could guess what was running through his Safety Officer’s head. After all, he and Paul had worked very closely together to make Eden possible, and true to Morloch’s promise, they had been hugely rewarded for their efforts as well as their discretion. It would be hard on Perera, Morloch knew, but there could only be one answer.

“Keep an eye on Paul.”

“You sure?”

Perera nodded, looking unhappy.

“Tell me about Dr. Brown.”

“Neurology faculty at UCSF.”

“And the particulars?”

Perera slid a CD across the desk to Morloch. “Right here.”

Morloch rested his elbows on the desk, tenting his fingers. “Okay. Thanks, Oscar.”

Perera nodded and walked out, closing the door behind him.

Morloch pushed his chair back and swung around to face the Delaware River, easily seen from their high-rise office building. This Dr. Brown was the latest doctor questioning a connection between their drug and a patient with encephalitis—the second in the last thirty days. It was all still containable—but for how long? The FDA had Trident’s new weight loss medicine, Paradise—without Eden’s encephalitis risk—under review, but it could still take months before they approved it for marketing. Only then could they replace Eden and stop more deaths caused by Eden.

Only Paul and Oscar knew of the encephalitis risk and fortunately Perera had proven his discretion. Tobias still might be salvaged, but that remained to be seen. Morloch had Mallis and Associates monitor virtually everybody in the company to prevent loss of sensitive materials and this included Paul and Oscar. He would convey his new concern about Paul to Kirk Mallis and he needed Mallis’s risk assessment of Dr. Brown. Reaching back to his desk, he picked up his cell phone and punched in a number he had by now memorized. It rang twice before it was answered. The scrambler clicks preceded the muscular voice. “Mallis.”

“Kirk? Morloch. I have another project for you.”

Chapter 31

D
r. Harold Goldstein walked into the ICU and sat down in the chair next to Steve. “Hi,” he said. “Welcome back.” Dr. Goldstein was a slight man who always wore his Yarmulke. He had on a brown tweed jacket with leather elbow patches over a white shirt and his signature floral bow tie. A neurologist in solo practice, he shared weekend call with Steve and Steve’s partner, making each of their lives a little saner.

“Hi, Harry. Thanks for coming.”

“Sure, no problem.” Peering at Steve over his horn-rimmed glasses, he smiled. “I see you’ve become famous. And to think I knew you when.”

“That and two bills get me a Starbucks.”

“Indeed. I can’t imagine being famous. I treasure my privacy. Must have been terrifying, though.”

“Harry,” Steve asked, “can you look at a scan with me? It’s on a young woman with myoclonus and severe delusions. I could use your help.”

“Of course. I’ll try.”

Steve put up Shirley’s MRI scans and stood back. Dr. Goldstein bent forward to get a closer look. He carefully looked at every image while Steve chewed the inside of his lip. After evaluating the last image he straightened up with a sad look on his face. “I’d say it looks just like one I had last spring.”

The Medical Records Department resided deep in the bowels of Good Samaritan Hospital, stale and musty and filled with row upon row of metal shelves crammed with patient charts. At the counter, Steve turned in his requisition form. As he waited for the attendant to find the chart, he recalled Dr. Goldstein’s story of his patient, a young woman named Rhonda Fowler. In the recounting, Dr. Goldstein had become more animated than Steve had ever seen him, almost agitated, the story laced with his professional angst and regret.

Ms. Fowler had been an eighteen-year-old who presented to the emergency room with bizarre delusions of bees or wasps attacking her. Brought in by her boyfriend, she was actively hallucinating with dreadful shrieking and sobbing apparently reliving a longstanding childhood phobia of stinging insects.

Leading up to the emergency room appearance, Dr. Goldstein related that Rhonda had become hypersexual, actively soliciting intercourse from all her male friends and even strangers from the street. After awhile, her headaches had curbed her predatory sexual desires and she later began twitching in her arms, face and trunk. Soon afterwards, the fears of bees and wasps had exploded into delusionary terrors. “And,” Dr. Goldstein had concluded, “her MRI was almost identical to this one.”

“What happened to her? Steve had asked.

“She died and not a damn thing I did helped.”

“Did you ever find out what caused it?”

“No.” Frustration, even now, had colored his answer.

“No post?”

Dr. Goldstein had raised his arms in a gesture of defeat. “No. Nothing.”

The young medical records assistant plopped a thick manila hospital chart on the counter. “Here it is, Dr. James.”

Steve picked it up, seeing the ‘deceased’ scrawled in thick black magic marker across the front. Sitting down at the Formica table, he opened the chart and started reading. After an hour, he rubbed his eyes and stretched. He now felt as if he knew Rhonda personally and her MRI was as exactly as recalled by Dr. Goldstein. Reading through the notes, he could sense Dr. Goldstein’s distress as Rhonda failed to respond to his treatments, which were virtually the same as Steve’s own efforts with Shirley. In fact, the chart was eerily like Shirley’s in virtually every detail. Dr. Goldstein even mentioned consulting with colleagues about her clinical course.