Robin Cook - Critical

"I didn't finish my matrix because I found more of those diatom-like objects."

"Really?" Jack said without a lot of enthusiasm.

"Really" Laurie repeated. She then went on to describe how she'd first found more in David Jeffries's slides, and then found them in most of the cases whose slides she was able to get.

"Were they in all cases whose slides you had?" Jack asked. Despite knowing where the discussion was going, Jack found himself interested. He'd convinced himself that the object he'd seen was an artifact of some sort.

"Not all but most. And most interesting is that I discovered with the help of my unseen matrix that the shorter the interval from the onset of symptoms until death, the greater the number of these particles were."

"So you just randomly counted the number on each slide."

"Exactly."

"Well, that's hardly scientific."

"I know," Laurie admitted. "It's just suggestive, but it was consistent, and therefore very supportive."

Jack ran a soapy hand through his hair. "This is all very interesting, but I'm not sure how to interpret it. I mean, neither one of us knows what it is."

"I didn't leave it at that. I called up Dr. Malovar, whom you had praised so highly about your liver cyst."

"How is he? He's a trip, isn't he? I admire the guy. I hope I'm still around at his age, much less still contributing."

"He's fine, but don't you want to know what he said?"

"Of course. What was his diagnosis?"

"He said he didn't know."

Jack gave a short laugh of amazement. "He didn't know at all? I'm shocked."

"He said he thought it was a parasite."

"That's more like it. Then did you get Dr. Wiley to look at it?

"Dr. Wiley unfortunately is in New Zealand at a parasitology conference."

"Well, then I guess we'll have to wait, because Wiley in his field is like Malovar in his."

"Dr. Malovar sent a digital photo, so I'm certain we'll hear when Dr. Wiley gets it."

"Of course, there's no accounting of when that may be."

"I'm afraid not."

"Okay, Laurie," Jack said, sitting up. "What's your real point here? Is this another attempt at getting me to cancel my surgery? If it is, out with it!"

"Of course it is," Laurie said with some heat. "How could it not be, I've found an unknown parasite associated with a rapidly fatal postoperative course. What seems to be happening is a synergism with MRSA, which I have agreed is in every hospital. But this unknown parasite is apparently in only three hospitals, one of which you are scheduled to enter and allow yourself to become a potential victim."

"Laurie, let me remind you that I'm going to have my operation with a surgeon who has not had one case of whatever this is, and he's been operating nonstop at the Angels Ortho Hospital. Well, that's not entirely true. He had to stop when they closed the ORs to fumigate them. But since then, he's been back with a full schedule day in, day out, with no problems whatsoever. Secondly, I do not have a parasitic disease. Maybe that's the basis of this outbreak: These people have visited the backwaters of the Amazon and picked up this parasite unbeknownst to anyone. Hey! I commend your work, and certainly keep at it. If it turns out that this unknown parasite is infectious and you've discovered some new illness, all the power to you. Hell, you might even win a Nobel Prize."

Laurie stood up abruptly. "Don't patronize me!"

"I'm not patronizing you," Jack contended. "I'm just trying to fend off your negativity and prepare myself for this operation tomorrow. You know how I feel about it. What I'd really like is some support on your side, not fearmongering."

Laurie felt a rush of emotion dominated, for the moment, by frustrated anger. Yanking open the bathroom door and slamming it behind her, she stalked down the hall to the darkened living room, where she threw herself onto the couch to brood. Jack had touched the sore spot of her ambivalence.

CARLO NOSED HIS Denali into one of the few parking places along the front of the strip mall. What that meant at nine-thirty on a Wednesday night was that the Venetian was doing a brisk business. Both Carlo and Brennan alighted. The weather had completely cleared up. Despite the garish light coming from a neon gondola on the roof, two stars could be faintly seen in the sky.

Brennan stretched with a few noisy grunts and groans as they walked down the sidewalk toward the restaurant's entrance and passed the open DVD rental store in the process. Brennan's whole body was stiff after sitting in the SUV since five o'clock.

Inside, they had to search the crowd for Louie. Carlo finally found him at a four-top table near the bar. "Wait here!" he said to Brennan and struck off, weaving in and out among the tables. Carlo thought it ironic that the restaurant was doing as well as it was, considering it was in reality a cover for the Vaccarro family's real work. Carlo attributed it to Louie's influence. Louie loved good food and red wine, as was suggested by his body's profile.

When Louie caught sight of Carlo, he excused himself from his buddies, heaved himself to his feet, and took Carlo off to the side. Despite the crowd, it was easy to talk, thanks to the assemblage of black-velvet paintings that crowded every wall and the acoustic ceiling tiles.

"What's up?" Louie asked. "You're early."

"They closed up shop," Carlo explained. "All four of them went back to the Neapolitan, parked the vans, and went inside. We waited a good hour and a half, and when none of them reappeared, we came here to let you know what was up."

"I'm listening."

"Well, nothing, actually. From the moment Arthur and Ted hooked up with Angelo and Franco mid-morning, they've been staking out the medical examiner's office. Except for the one-sided scuffle between Angelo and some unknown guy nothing's happened. They've just sat in their vans, and us in my Denali."

"Any idea why they sat in two vans?"

"No idea whatsoever."

"None of this makes sense," Louie complained. "It's one hell of an effort on their part, but why?"

Carlo shrugged. He had no idea, either, despite the fact that he and Brennan spent part of the afternoon batting around ideas.

"Yet because it doesn't make sense, my intuition tells me it's important," Louie said, and then paused for a minute. "I want you guys to keep up the surveillance, that's for certain. I want to know where Angelo and Franco are and what they are doing. And have Arthur and Ted start early, like at six. I think the reason they didn't hook up with them until the middle of the morning was they went out too late."

"I'll tell them. Anything else?"

"What about the tracking device."

"We got it, and we've got it on the boat. How it works, you'll have to ask Brennan."

"I don't care how it works. I just want to know when the boat goes out and where it goes, so tell Brennan to stay on top of it."

Trying not to wake Jack, Laurie rolled over and looked at the clock. She'd been awake for almost an hour, and she was now convinced that more sleep was not an option. She didn't know if it was depression, frustration, or dread, or a mixture of all three, but she couldn't stay in bed a moment longer. Her mind was constantly going over the same issues, with the same results.

Being as quiet as she could, she slipped from under the covers, gathered up the clothes she had set out for the day by feel, since the only light came from the clock face, and slowly inched toward the open bathroom door. Once she was in the bathroom, she leaned back into the bedroom to listen to the sound of Jack's breathing. It hadn't changed, which pleased her.

Waking up as early as she had and wanting something to occupy her overly busy mind, Laurie had suddenly thought of heading into work early. She thought she could at least finish her matrix, and whether it would have any effect on Jack's thinking was not the point. As the discussion the previous evening had proved, he was not about to be deterred, and besides, it was clearly too late. His surgery was only four hours and fifteen minutes away.