Harlan Coben - Miracle Cure

Not flirting, not hitting on, not being hit upon, not fucking. Just talking. And shit, she had to be seriously intoxicated. Under normal, more sober circumstances she would not waste a good spit on this guy.

But the man had been a perfect gentleman. He listened to her, to what she had to say. Oh she had seen men feign interest in order to get in her pants, but somehow she knew that this guy was actually interested in what she had to say.

Strange.

Even stranger, when she finally asked him if he wanted to go upstairs with her, he answered, "Not tonight." "Why not?" she asked.

The man shook his head and smiled.

"Didn't I see this once on the Twilight Zone? The homely man and the gorgeous woman switch places? I can't believe I'm saying this, but here goes I don't want to be just another notch on your belt."

"Excuse me?"

"I know, I know. I don't believe it either. Look, Cassandra, I'd give my right arm to spend an evening with you."

"So?"

He shrugged, holding up his hands helplessly.

"If I go upstairs with you now, that'll be it. But if I refuse, you might be intrigued.

You might want to pursue it though I can't help thinking that once you're sober you ll think this whole conversation was a nightmare." She smiled.

"You're giving away your strategy, Harvey."

"Yeah, well, I never was very good at this stuff and I'm a bit out of practice like twenty-six years out of practice. Do yourself a favor, Cassandra. Stay away from me. I'm trouble." "Now you really have me intrigued," she said.

"Nothing to be intrigued about," Harvey continued.

"I'm just a workaholic who spends every waking and sleeping moment in a hospital in Spanish Harlem. I have no time for a social life.

It was a fun evening, a wonderful distraction, but it's time I returned to Planet Earth." "I wish you'd reconsider," she said.

Harvey pounded the side of his head like he was trying to clear it.

"I'm dreaming, aren't I?" he asked.

"This whole conversation is a dream."

"Maybe. I guess we'll find out tomorrow."

Now it was tomorrow and for some strange reason, Cassandra wanted to see Harvey Riker again. One problem she had spent most of the morning trying to figure out what she should do next and had come up with nothing. Should she wait until Harvey called? Suppose he didn't? And talk about being out of practice it had been years since Cassandra questioned or cared if a man called her or not.

Then a solution had presented itself when her father came home.

"Where were you?" she had asked him.

"At Columbia Presbyterian," John Lowell replied, distracted.

"Michael was rushed there."

"Is he all right?"

"I think so. His friends are taking care of him."

"Harvey Riker?"

Her father nodded.

"They think he has hepatitis."

"I think I'll go visit him."

"Whatever. When are you going to go?"

"In ten minutes," she said.

"Good. I have a meeting in a little while, and I don't want anyone around when my appointment gets here. Understood?"

But that had been over an hour ago, which was why she was tiptoeing.

Her father's private meetings were just that private.

Bathed in secrecy. He would be furious if he found out she was still home. She crept down the hallway toward the garage. As she passed her father's study, she heard his voice come through the thick oak. He sounded very angry.

"Goddamn it, you shouldn't be here," her father shouted.

"Relax," another voice said, a voice Cassandra could not quite place.

"You said no one was home."

"Doesn't matter. I don't want you in my house."

"Stop worrying so much. There's work to be done."

Who the hell...? Cassandra carefully moved away from the door, her mind racing. The voice was so familiar. She had heard it before, she was sure of it. But where? And who did it belong to?

She was at a traffic light about a mile away when the answer came to her.

"What I found in Dr. Grey's note," handwriting analyst Robert Swinster began, "is pretty rare."

Lieutenant Max Bernstein nodded.

"I know. It might just explain everything."

"Like what?" "Later," Max said.

"I have a million things to do."

"I can take a hint. I'm as good as gone."

Max shook Swinster's hand and patted his back.

"Thanks again, Bob. I really appreciate it."

"No problem, Twitch. I'm glad I could help."

Robert Swinster walked away from Bernstein's desk as Sara hobbled toward it.

"Hi, Max."

He smiled at her.

"Glad you could get here so fast. Have a seat."

Sara examined the man and his desk. All the usual signs were there his red eyes, the ragged edges of his fingernails, the thought lines in his forehead, the fingers twiddling with the pencil, the paper clips he had snapped in half lying all over the desk, the hand constantly rubbing his unshaven face.

For two days Max and his men had investigated the sensational murder of young Bradley Jenkins by the now-infamous Gay Slasher. A distraught Senator Jenkins had gone into hiding and would make no comments to the press about the rumors swirling around his son's death. His Senate spokesman continuously spewed a standard line the murder was clearly a ploy by certain subversive groups to destroy the senator's reputation and personal life.

Max had interviewed Senator Jenkins yesterday, after his son's funeral.

Bernstein had seen during his years in homicide what a tragedy like this could do to even the strongest of men, but he was still taken aback by the senator's appearance. His skin was ashen, his eyes wide and uncomprehending, his shoulder slumped, his whole demeanor defeated.

The senator had answered Max's questions in a flat, distant voice, but it seemed that the man knew very little that would help find the killer.

"Who was that?" Sara asked.

"Robert Swinster," Max replied, "a handwriting analyst. He was rechecking Bruce Grey's note."

"Did he find anything?"

The phone on the desk buzzed. Max put up a finger to signal for her to wait and picked up the receiver.

"Yes?"

"Daily News on line five again. ABC-TV on line eight."

"I'm not talking to the press right now," he snapped. He slammed the receiver back into the cradle.

"Damn reporters," he muttered.

"Enough to drive a man crazy."

"Temper, temper."

"Everyone keeps screaming how we're not doing our job. How the hell are we supposed to get anything done with the press breathing down our necks all the time? Bunch of vultures present company excluded, of course. You know something? I think the media hopes the psycho will strike again, the sick bastards."

"Comes with the territory," Sara replied.

"I know," Max said, "but the pressure on this one is unbelievable. At the press conference the other day I felt like fresh meat in front of starving Dobermans. And that's not the half of it. The mayor's demanding answers in that holier-than-thou way of his. Every gay activist is coming out of the woodwork accusing the fascist police department of discriminating against homosexuals. I've had a dozen phony confessions today alone.

Everyone suddenly wants to be the Gay Slasher." He took a deep breath.

"Ah, screw it. So how's Michael?"

"Feeling better. His teammates are visiting him now."

"Good. I needed to talk this over with you right away."

"Bouncing time, eh?" Max nodded and smiled wearily. Several years ago Sara had been instrumental in helping Max find a cop-killer who had randomly gunned down four of Max's fellow officers in one week.

Max had learned from that experience that he liked bouncing ideas off an intelligent listener, and Sara was about as sharp a listener as there was. Very often they said some crazy things to each other, came up with some crazy hypotheses, even called each other crazy, but eventually the irrational statements began to mesh with the more rational facts, often forming solid solutions.