Michael Palmer - The Society

The CEOs were dead-two or three that mattered, one or two that probably didn’t. The mergers, forged in the heat of their blood, were nearly complete. So much misdirection. And now the killer was playing the police like marionettes, sowing the seeds of chaos as he prepared for what was probably going to be his last kill, at least for this operation-the exclamation point on the managed-care murders.

Barely aware of what she was doing, and well beyond considering the consequences of her act, Patty broke past the line of trees and onto the beach, sprinting toward the stairs Brasco had ascended to the porch.

“Brasco, down!” she shouted. “It’s a trap. Get down!”

Totally bewildered, Brasco stood riveted in place as Patty took the wooden stairs two at a time.

“Get down!” she heard herself scream again.

She was just a few feet away when she saw a bright light flash in the darkness across the water. Launching herself at Brasco’s midsection, Patty slammed him backward against the railing at the instant a bullet ripped through her scalp and gouged the bone just above her right ear. The two detectives, one totally stunned, the other barely conscious, exploded through the dry, weakened wood and arced downward, twisting in the air so that when they landed on a rocky corner of the beach, Brasco’s full weight was on top. Patty’s head snapped against a boulder, cracking the already weakened bone in her skull. Instantly, what little awareness she had left was replaced by a deep, impenetrable darkness.

In slow motion, Patty’s rag-doll body toppled off the rock and came to rest facedown in the wet, pebbly sand.

It was two-thirty in the morning before Augie Micelli stopped celebrating his coup with a wide variety of spirits and lurched off to bed. By that time, Will had pulled out the sofa bed and tucked in a rumpled pair of forest-green sheets printed with an armada of mallards. For the past hour he had more or less been a detached observer of the battle between his need for sleep and his desire to share the moment with Micelli. Of course, the moment he finally killed the lights and settled onto the wafer-thin pullout mattress, he became unable to sleep.

With the aromas of Micelli’s alcohol and cigars hanging heavy in the air, Will lay in the darkness, wondering why he hadn’t heard from Patty. He had left a message on her machine trumpeting the find in the ER and asking her to call anytime to share the good news and to explain why he was spending the night with the Law Doctor.

Competing with his concerns for Patty were thoughts about what the day ahead held in store. From the moment he spotted Will’s clothing bag, Micelli had been on his cell phone, wheeling and dealing. He was now optimistic that preliminary results of the analysis of Will’s sneaker insoles might be performed as early as noon. Calls to Sid Silverman and Tom Lemm had brought their promises that if the Chuck Taylors tested positive for any amount of fentanyl, they would immediately urge the Board of Registration to restore Will’s license and would then reinstate him at the hospital and in the Society as soon afterward as possible.

While Micelli was making his rapid-fire volley of calls, Will made two-the unsuccessful attempt to reach Patty and a call to Jim Katz. The older surgeon’s relief was almost palpable. If the killer was true to his promise, he would be off the hook. After that, only time would tell whether or not his frangible relationship with Will could heal.

Beyond Patty and the vast implications of the overlooked clothing bag, Will wondered about Charles Newcomber and how the odd little radiologist would handle a visit from both him and Susan Hollister. Images of the radiologist-red-faced, terrified, trembling, and perilously close to firing a bullet into Will’s chest-brought a fist-size knot to his gut. Susan was as calm and elegant as he was emotional, and if anyone could break through Newcomber’s bizarre paranoia, it was she-especially armed with a notarized release from Grace Davis. Still, dealing with the man would be a test.

Will rolled from his back to his side and finally felt the beginnings of sleep settling in. For a time, the blue plastic clothing bag floated through his thoughts like the Goodyear blimp. Then, quite strangely, he envisioned himself as he would from the dirigible, lying in the bed in the ICU, an endotracheal tube connecting his lungs to a ventilator. It was a sickening vision, but symbolically the scene marked the beginning of the hell he had been through, and envisioning it now, so soon after Augie’s incredible find in the ER supply closet, meant that he had begun the journey back to reclaim his life.

Finally. . finally. .

As his breathing slowed, and the tension in his neck and shoulders abated, two words echoed in the darkness in his mind: Who?. . and Why?. .

Where could she be?. . What’s happened to her?. .

Will awoke the way he had drifted off-bewildered by a torrent of questions. By the time he left Micelli’s apartment to pick up Susan, he was consumed with fear for Patty. She knew where he was staying. Something had to have happened to her last night or she would have contacted him. Worse still, there was no obvious way he could find out if his concerns were founded. Phoning her office got him only an answering service. He left a message for her and then one for Wayne Brasco, as well, feeling that the man now in charge of the managed-care murders would return any call from him.

Will pulled into the lot behind his office, a captive of worry and his own wild imagination. Was there anything else he could do to locate her? What kind of danger did she feel he was in last night? Had it passed? Was it safe for him to go back to his condo? Had she been in danger, too? Would she be angry with him if he tried to call her father?

Susan, looking the total professional in a conservative charcoal-gray suit, kept her phone pressed against her ear and her conversation going as she motioned him to the chair across the desk from her.

“Well, thanks again,” she was saying. “I really never expected to enjoy The Boss as much as I did. It was just great. We’ll talk later, okay? Bye.”

The breathless way she said the last word left no doubt in Will’s mind that she was talking to someone special to her.

“So, you’re a new Springsteen fan.”

“I want him to think so,” she replied, gesturing to the phone, “but if I had just one last concert I could go to, I’d still take Cecilia Bartoli or Yo-Yo Ma.”

“Let’s hope you don’t have to make that choice for a long time.”

“Amen to that. Well, the hospital lawyer stopped by and left a notarized authorization she went and got last night from Grace Davis, so we’re all set.”

“Amen to that.”

“Are you all right?”

“Why?”

“Well, we’re partners and I’ve seen you almost every day for years and you always look exhausted. Don’t take this wrong, now, but today the bags under your eyes are baggier and the droop of your lids are droopier, and you nicked yourself shaving, which you almost never do, and-”

“Okay, okay, enough. The truth is, last night was a real emotional roller coaster that ended at around three or four o’clock this morning with me sleeping on a pullout in the Law Doctor’s living room.”

“The Law Doctor! Will, I forgot to ask. Did anything good come of last night?”

“Well,” he said, dragging out the word and managing a self-effacing grin. “I think you could say that.”

“Yes!” Susan exclaimed, pumping her fist.

Will hurried through the events surrounding the clothing bag. Susan’s expression was one of amazement and excitement.

“Incredible,” she said. “D’you think the insoles will be positive for fentanyl?”