John Lescroart - The Oath

After the explicit threat, did she think he wouldn't act? Could she imagine he wouldn't? Unless he acted swiftly, boldly, without mercy, he was done.

Knowing this and what he had to do, Ross first had to disarm her. He took her hands forcefully in both of his. They were eye to eye. "Carla. First let's get through this. Let's get Tim through it. I have made mistakes and I'm sorry for them. But so have we all. I promise you we'll work it out. If I have to leave, so be it. But never say it has anything to do with our friendship. Nothing can touch that. That's forever."

The plan presented itself full-blown. Potassium would leave no trace, and the hospital's PMs were hopelessly shoddy. If the medical examiner hadn't autopsied Tim-and Ross had never envisioned that-the whole plan would have worked. He realized that if he could make it appear that Carla was distraught enough to kill herself and her family, the police would never even look for a murderer. He would use the gun Tim kept in his home office.

When he got to the house, the upstairs lights were out. He wanted the kids to be asleep so he would not have to see them. He would do that part in the dark. They would feel nothing, suspect nothing. Sleep.

But Carla stood inside the door and at first would not open it to him. "There's nothing to talk about, Mal. We're all exhausted and at the end. We can meet tomorrow."

But he'd worn her down. "Please, Carla. I know Tim must have told you some things, but we were working them out, just like we always have. I loved the man. I need to explain. I need you to understand."

"There's nothing to understand."

"Then I need you, at least, to forgive me."

And she'd paused a last time, then unlocked the chain. As he entered, he took the Walther from his pocket and told her they needed to walk quietly to the back of the house.

Now he would do it again. He had experience now. It had to look like suicide. It had to look as though Bhutan, knowing the police were onto him for all the murders at Portola, including Markham's, chose to take the coward's way out. That would close all the investigations.

He also had to make sure no one heard the shot, which he supposed would be louder with the Walther than Tim's.22 had been.

First he would have to distract Bhutan, then use chloroform to put him out. Except it would stay in the system long enough to be detected. Maybe ether? He had ether in his medical bag right here. That would do, as well. And of course he could simply shoot him as though it had been a robbery attempt or something. But a suicide was far preferable. He'd have to consider his options on the drive over, then play the thing by ear.

Bhutan obviously thought the police were coming to get him at any moment. So he wanted fifty thousand dollars tonight. He was desperate and, being desperate, he was doomed to commit foolish acts, to make dangerous decisions.

Just like Tim, for example. He couldn't get over Tim. When they'd both been humping to get the business up and running and there'd been so many opportunities to make hay under the table-much smaller potatoes than now, of course, and much of it in soft currencies and perks-the weekends in Napa or Mexico, the fine wines, the occasional corporate escorts for the convention parties when the wives couldn't make it. Tim had willingly enough succumbed to those temptations, right along with him. But the first hard money payoff had scared him off. This, he thought, was wrong, where to Ross it was no different than what they'd been doing. In fact, it was better.

But Tim always wanted to believe that somewhere inside he was essentially an honest and good person, the fool. Hence all the agony he'd put himself through over wanting to schtup the admittedly sexy Ann Kensing. Ross couldn't believe that the guy had nearly ruined his life over what should have been at most a playful dalliance. But, no, he'd been "in love," whatever that meant. Stupid, stupid. But not as stupid as letting himself believe that just because Tim had decided not to take anybody's dirty money, Ross was going to do the same thing. Oh sure, Tim had had his little crisis of conscience all those years ago and had come to Ross saying they had to stop-not just because it threatened the health of patients and the company, but because it was wrong. And Ross had pretended to go along. And why not? Why burden the self-righteous idiot? Why split the money with someone who didn't want it? Ross knew the truth was that he wasn't really harming any patients by taking the odious drug money. If Tim was happier living with the fiction that Ross had found the Lord with him, he'd let him enjoy his fantasy.

But then, even while Tim was sleeping around on his wife, he discovered Ross's brilliantly conceived fraudulent billings and could not believe that his longtime partner and medical director still cheated. And took kickbacks. His whining self-righteousness made Ross puke.

What a hypocrite Tim was, coming to Ross in hand-wringing desperation-what should he do? What should he do? It had come to his attention, and so on and so forth. Didn't Ross understand? Tim had asked him. He'd crossed the line where now Tim had to do something, now had to act. And the conflict was ripping him up-Ross had been his friend for so long. Their families, blah blah blah.

But even in the face of this direct threat, Ross remained calm and told Tim that of he felt compelled to accuse him publicly of criminal behavior, that Ross would have no choice but to point the finger back at him. They would both, then, be ruined, and who would that serve?

Stalemate.

But he knew that Tim was a time bomb. Eventually he would force the issue again, and again Ross would parry-it was the same with Ann and Carla and Ann again and Carla again. But Ross would not panic. He would calmly wait while Tim vacillated and if something did not change, as it often did, then Ross would eventually have to find a permanent way out, a permanent solution.

And then Tim was suddenly delivered to him, on the edge of death, needing only a push that no one should ever see to send him over.

He kissed Nancy at the door, told the kids to be good. In the circular driveway, he spontaneously decided to take the old Toyota. Bhutan's address was in the Haight and he didn't want to drive one of the good cars, which would only be magnets for the vandals. The old green heap would get him there and attract no attention, and that's what the situation demanded.

Throwing the briefcase onto the seat beside him, he pulled out into the traffic and adjusted the visor against the rays of the sun as it cleared the thin cloud layer above the horizon and sprayed the street in a golden glow.

As Ross drove by, the door threw him off at first.

What kind of place did this guy live in? If it was just the door and the window down almost at the sidewalk level, the apartment didn't look to be much bigger than a closet. No space to swallow the sound of the shot. Fortunately, there was no lobby. He could simply knock and walk in, take care of his business, then walk out with relative impunity. Nevertheless, his heart was pounding much like when he'd gone to see Carla. This was a necessary business, but he couldn't deny the adrenaline rush.

He finally parked a block and a half down and across the street now in the last minutes of daylight. He tried to envision Rajan Bhutan. He must have met him dozens of times in the hospital, of course, but he hadn't paid too much, if any, attention. If he had any impression of him at all, it was of a quiet man of very slight stature. If so, Ross could subdue him easily if he could maintain an element of surprise.