Джеймс Паттерсон - The 13-Minute Murder

But he wasn’t fast enough. The barrel of a gun emerged from the SUV’s open window, and Beck watched helplessly as Scott was cut down by a hail of bullets.

Chapter 4

Beck sat on the edge of the sidewalk and looked at the blood on his hands.

It had been a long time since he’d had blood on his hands.

As a med student, still doing his rotations in surgery and emergency medicine, he’d been up to his elbows in it, all the time. He’d seen his share of gunshot wounds in those days.

So when he saw Scott hit the ground he knew two things:

Scott was probably dead already.

He had to try to save him anyway.

The black SUV had peeled away, tires smoking as it rounded the corner. For an instant as the car approached, Beck made eye contact with the shooter. He wore a black ski mask. His eyes, the only part of him that was visible, stared coldly back at Beck, and then Kevin Scott was down and the SUV was gone.

And then Beck was tearing open Scott’s jacket and shirt, desperately trying to stop the bleeding.

But it was no good. Scott’s chest looked like raw meat, with multiple bullet wounds opening holes in his chest so that the life poured right out of him. There was a flicker of life left in his eyes as he looked up at Beck, unseeing.

He said one word. It made no sense.

“Damocles,” he gasped.

Then he choked and more blood poured from his mouth. The flicker in his eyes went out.

His chest stopped heaving.

Scott was dead.

The police and paramedics showed up fast. Beck’s office was on a quiet, upscale block, not far from several embassies. It was not the kind of neighborhood that got a lot of drive-by shootings.

The cops pulled Beck away from Scott’s body and sat him down. The paramedics took a look at Scott and didn’t even go through the motions. They just covered him up.

The police took Beck’s statement and asked him if he’d seen either the driver or the passenger. Beck told them about the ski mask.

But that was all he really knew. He was surprised at how useless he was as a witness. He shouldn’t have been. He knew that severe stress—like seeing a man gunned down in the street—makes it hard to notice details.

Still, he couldn’t remember if he’d seen a license plate, or what was on it. He didn’t know what kind of SUV it was. He couldn’t even remember the color of the gunman’s eyes, and he’d been looking right into them.

The cops left him sitting on the sidewalk while they went to look for other witnesses. And Beck looked at the blood on his hands.

He sat that way for what seemed like a long time. Trying to understand what happened. His mind kept racing. He didn’t like where it was leading him.

In his office, Kevin Scott had been scared. Scott had been anxious. And Scott had been hiding something, even from his wife.

His wife. Jennifer. With a guilty start, Beck realized someone would have to tell her about her husband.

He looked up from his bloody hands, to find one of the cops, to tell them.

But instead, he saw two men in dark suits with serious faces walking toward him.

Federal agents. Beck had met enough of them to recognize the look. They wore earpieces and off-the-rack suits with the jackets big enough to hide their holsters. You saw them all the time in DC—at lunch, in line at Starbucks, standing outside one event or another.

These two, however, were here for him.

“Doctor Beck,” the first one said, offering his hand. “I’m Agent Morrison. This is Agent Howard. We’re with the Secret Service. We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

Beck took his hand, and Morrison hauled him to his feet. He was about a head taller than Beck, who wasn’t short, with cold blue eyes and blond hair spiked straight up. Howard, his partner, was darker and wider—he looked like he put in serious hours at the gym—with his black hair slicked back and frozen in place.

They waved their badges at him. He barely got a look. They both wore grim expressions without a trace of sympathy.

“How did you know the deceased?” Morrison demanded.

Beck tried to shake off his shock. “I told the other officers—”

“We’re not the other officers,” Howard snapped. “We want to hear it from you.”

Beck started again. “He was my patient.”

“You’re a shrink? What was his problem?”

“I’m a psychiatrist, yes. And I can’t say.”

“Not much of a shrink, then, are you?” Howard said. Morrison smirked.

“No. I mean, I can’t say. Doctor–patient communications are confidential. As I’m sure both of you already know.”

Morrison and Howard exchanged a look. “Yeah. Thanks for reminding us, Doctor,” Morrison said. “But the guy is dead, and he was walking out of your office. I think we need to know.”

“And if I had any information that would help someone in immediate danger, I would be ethically bound to offer it. But I don’t. Anything else is private. That’s the law. Why is the Secret Service investigating this, anyway? Isn’t this something for the police?”

“Are you a doctor or a lawyer?” Howard said, his tone sharp and mocking. “You’re making this a lot more complicated than it needs to be.”

“You don’t have the expertise to know what’s important and what isn’t,” Morrison added. “That’s our job.”

“Listen, I have a security clearance,” Beck said.

“How special for you,” Howard said.

“What I mean is, if you just call the coordinator at the Department of Defense—” Beck took out his phone to give them the number. Morrison and Howard reacted like he’d pulled a gun. They stepped back. With one swift move, Morrison snatched the phone from his hand and pocketed it.

“Hey. That’s my phone.”

“Doctor Beck, you’re our sole witness,” Morrison said. “Let’s not get bogged down in technicalities. We need to know what he told you. And we need to know now. ”

Beck wondered where the hostility was coming from. He’d heard of good cop/bad cop, but this was more like bad cop/bad cop.

Then he recognized the technique. They were trying to put him off-balance. Make him more pliable, eager to please, by bullying him a little.

It only pissed Beck off.

“You want to know what we talked about? Try getting a subpoena. He was my patient. Even dead, he has rights.”

Howard looked like he wanted to punch Beck. Morrison sighed and rubbed his face with his hands, then pulled Beck aside. He lowered his voice, as if someone might be listening.

“Look, Doctor. I didn’t want to have to tell you this. We are in the middle of something big, and it involves your client. There is more going on than you know. You have to tell us what he told you. Lives are literally on the line here. I know you’ll want to do the right thing.”

This was even more transparent than the bullying. They were trying to make Beck feel like he was important—inside a big secret. He really didn’t appreciate the manipulation, which wouldn’t work on a first-year psych major.

And, for some reason, he just didn’t trust these guys.

Beck lowered his voice, too, as if he were going to cooperate. “Can you tell me what this investigation is about?”

Morrison shook his head. “Sorry. Classified.”

Beck went back to his regular voice, all pretense gone. “Yeah? Then so is what my patient told me. Sorry.”

“All right then, Doctor. Have it your way.” Morrison stepped back.

Beck thought that would be the end of it. He turned to walk away.

So he was surprised when Howard spun him back around, slammed him against a telephone pole, and slapped handcuffs on his wrists.

Chapter 5

The police didn’t object as the two agents marched Beck across the street and shoved him into the backseat of their SUV. They said they were taking him to their office for further questioning. The cops nodded. Not their problem anymore.