After the Fall (41 page)

All of a sudden, Laura rushed out of her embrace toward a tall man with red hair walking straight toward them, a wide smile on his face.

“Tim!” Laura pulled him into a hug, kissing his cheek. “You came? What about your patient?”

“Had to postpone,” he said. “You were great, Laura. I watched it all.”

The man turned toward Addie, “And, Dr. Abdul, you were fantastic. Laura's been telling me a lot about you.”

“Tim, meet Addie—Doctor Adawia Abdul. Addie, this is Tim Robinson, my fiancé.”

Tim looked ecstatic to see Laura and slung his arm around her left shoulder. Pointing to the Keystone contingent, he said, “I wanted to say hello to Paul Parnell. Thank him for convincing you to stay in Philadelphia.”

Laura grinned. “Okay. Come on. Addie, you come too.”

Again, Addie looked around, expecting to see Jake, fearing having to face him. Maybe she should ask Laura for a ride to the airport. There'd be room in that stretch limo. Once she got to National, there'd be plenty of security, and she could blend in with the passengers at the crowded airport.

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Jake watched the press conference from the seclusion of the small utility closet off the lobby. The acoustics were perfect, as was his angle of vision to the podium. He heard each of Addie's words. He realized her remarks would have been written by her superiors at Replica, but even so, he was extremely disappointed that in her acknowledgments, she hadn't mentioned him. An easy matter to just slip his name onto the prepared list. But she hadn't. While she'd been speaking, every nerve in his body screamed for him to go to her, to stand beside her, to gather her up, and to escort her to the waiting Blazer. But he'd grasped the edge of the door and held back. Soon.
Very soon
, he told himself.

Jake scoured the crowd for Detectives Booker and Finley. He knew they were looking for him. Why else would a cop car be stationed outside his house on each of the two occasions he'd risked a drive by? Cops hanging out around his Jeep and his home were not a good sign. And if they'd found that Arab's body where he'd stashed it in Addie's apartment building, all the more reason for Jake to be cautious. The cops knew about him and Addie, and they knew about Addie and the Arab; they must be close. So far, Jake hadn't spotted them, but he did notice a man and a woman lingering close to the podium, their attention on Addie. After she completed her statement, he noticed the dark-skinned woman take a step toward Addie, but the man's hand shot out to pull her
back. Those two did not look like reporters. They looked like law enforcement.

Jake glanced at his watch. This would be all over in a half hour. Tonight, he and Addie would be bundled up in their campsite, eating dinner by an open fire.

Next up was Dr. Laura Nelson. The source of his grief.
Just let it go
, he told himself. Don't let the Nelson bitch alter your focus. Concentrate on Addie. Yes, he'd vowed to make Nelson pay for humiliating him and for trying to turn Addie against him, and he had already had decided on a time and a place.

Nelson droned on about what a wonderful job her predecessor, Fred Minn—God rest his soul—had done, and so on and so forth. The wonders of Immunone—She put on an air of false modesty, but self-promotion was her game. Couldn't fool him. His hand reached into his jacket pocket, felt the Glock, ached to pull it out, aim at the bitch, and pull the trigger. “No, not now. Wrong place.” When he heard his own whisper, he realized he'd spoken aloud.

After Nelson, it was time for the FDA Commissioner to do his own version of self-aggrandizement, and then the FDA public relations machine fielded press questions and answers. Never once in the entire press conference was he, Jake Harter, mentioned, the project manager for the wonder drug Immunone. Kudos to Sid Casey, his boss Charles Sloan, acclamation for the medical review officers—the obnoxious Susan Ridley and the wimpy Karl Hayes—but none for Jake, who'd directed the entire prolonged process, from the drug's Investigational New Drug submission to today's approval of the New Drug Application.

Again, his hand went to the Glock. This time, he clutched the handle. Laura Nelson had taken his job, his dignity, besmirched his reputation. He should be sharing the podium, but here he was, cowering in a closet.

Then the press conference ended and the bright lights extinguished. Jake stayed put, letting the media trickle out. Naturally, the speakers were surrounded by their supporters.
The big shots at the FDA were accustomed to the ass-kissers, wanting a word, a chance to push their causes with the upper echelon, not understanding that at the FDA, the project managers were the real seat of power. Nothing goes anywhere unless the project manager gives the green light. Except this time, when Laura Nelson had stepped all over him. “Fuck it,” he muttered, as he stepped out of the closet and moved with the crowd toward the lobby exit.

Jake hung by the exit leading from the lobby, through a short hall to the outer door of the building. Since the FDA staff would head inside toward offices upstairs, he wasn't worried about being recognized. Monitoring the diminishing circle of well-wishers still at the podium, Jake saw a tall, redheaded man in a brown suit approach Nelson. When she noticed him, Nelson rushed to hug him, and then to Jake's dismay, she turned to introduce him to Addie. They appeared to chat, then the three of them made their way to the Keystone group gathered around the guy Jake recognized as the company CEO. Jake fumed at the sight of Addie with Laura Nelson. What kind of pull did Nelson exert on her? Whatever it was, the woman soon would regret it. Five minutes later, the three of them left the group and strode together toward him and the exit, talking, but not loud enough for him to hear. Not wanting to intercept Addie while they were still inside the building, Jake stepped out the door ahead of them. This was where he had decided to take Addie, but according to his plan, she should be alone.

“I appreciate the ride to the airport,” Jake heard Addie say as she stepped through the door.

The sight of Addie with Nelson, acting chummy, like girlfriends, so infuriated Jake that he yanked the Glock out of his pocket. Driven by a white rage he could no longer subdue, he pointed the barrel at Nelson.

They were so busy chatting they hadn't seen him, walked right past him. Wearing a bulky jacket, a black knit cap pulled down close to his eyes, and wearing dark sunglasses, he'd not so
much as caught Addie's eyes as she passed within six feet of him, where he'd stood on the sidewalk, just off their path.

“The driver can drop you at the main terminal just after he leaves us by the private jets' field,” Nelson was saying, “but won't you come back to Philly with us? You can meet my son and…”

Jake passed the trio as they walked toward a black stretch limo. With the gun trained on Nelson, he stepped in front of them, blocking their path. Not seeing the gun at first, not recognizing him, they came to a stop.

Gun in right hand, now held behind his back, Jake grabbed Addie's arm with his left. “Let's go, Addie.”

Jake's plan hadn't included the use of weapons on the street, but the notion of Addie going anywhere with Nelson incensed him beyond tolerance. “Now!” he repeated.

“Jake?” Addie looked up at him, her eyes clouded with something he feared was betrayal.

“Addie, come,” Jake said, catching her coat sleeve.

“No.” Addie tried to free her arm. “Jake, I can't go with you. I'm sorry.”

“Mr. Harter,” Nelson said, “Addie's with us. Come on, Addie, just keep walking.”

“You are coming with me.” Jake's heart beat faster now. He meant to keep his tone normal, but his words came out a command. “You are with me.”

“The lady doesn't seem to want to leave with you,” the redheaded man butted in. “So—”

In an instant, Jake swung the gun toward Nelson, who didn't seem to flinch.
What, she wasn't afraid of bullets? Didn't think he'd have the balls to terminate her worthless life? Well, she was about to
—

The gun in his right hand, within point-blank range of Nelson, Jake saw the redhaired man start to move. He had to kill the bitch, now. He pulled the trigger, but not before Addie pulled out of his grip, flinging herself in front of his target. As the bullet tore through his beloved's chest, Jake felt his life implode. His body started to fold, the gun almost slipped from his hands, but
within a millisecond, a surge of adrenaline restored his strength. Again he took aim at Nelson, who now was on the ground beside Addie, kneeling in a pool of bright red blood.
I can't let Nelson's be the last face Addie sees
. Aiming at Nelson's chest, Jake pulled the trigger just as a force hit his knees. The gunshot reverberated as Jake hit the pavement, landing on his side. On top of him now, the man with the red hair delivered a powerful blow to his jaw. He felt bone shatter. When he looked up, he no longer faced the redhaired man, but looked into the faces of the black woman and the white man he'd made as law enforcement. Each held a firearm inches from his face. “Federal Agent,” the woman said, “Jake Harter. You are under arrest.”

Jake's garbled, “Addie?” was drowned out by a man's shout. “Laura, no! Get an ambulance! Now!”

Pinned to the ground, facing away from Addie, tears flooded in Jake's eyes. “Addie? Are you—”

“Mr. Jake Harter.” The familiar voice of Detective Booker. “We've been looking for you. Been wanting to pin a murder charge on you. Doctor Fred Minn? Name sound familiar? Outside the Four Seasons Hotel in Philadelphia? And maybe we could make the case for your wife too. But hey! Now we got you cold. Killin' your fiancée. Didn't you say you and the beautiful young doctor were planning to marry? And so soon after losing your wife Karolee?”

“Addie?” Jake called in anguish through the pain in his busted jaw. As the handcuffs went on, he struggled for a glimpse of Addie. What had Detective Booker meant? “Addie!”

Jake's head throbbed as he kept trying to turn and look at the spot where Addie had fallen. Sirens screamed, the sound closer and closer. “Hurry,” Jake yelled. “Addie, you have to be okay.” He wanted to call out to Nelson, a chest surgeon, to beg her to help Addie, but when he tried to talk, his efforts were thwarted by blood flooding in his mouth. That guy had hit him hard, very hard.

Despite the cuffs, despite the searing pain in his jaw, the thumping in his head, despite a pair of guns still trained on him,
Jake managed at last to turn far enough around to see the ground where Addie lay drenched in blood. But she was not alone on the blood-soaked pavement. Beside her lay Laura Nelson. The redhaired man leaning over her, talking to her. Jake's field of vision was not clear enough for him to see whether either Addie or Nelson were moving, whether they were breathing, but the intermingling blood where they lay was profuse. Onlookers stood around, mostly wringing their hands, waiting helplessly for the ambulance that was now screaming its arrival.

“I need to be with Addie,” he begged.

“Too late,” pronounced Detective Booker.

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When Tim leaned across the gurney to kiss Laura's forehead, she saw dark red stains on his pale yellow shirt, and an irregular pattern of darkness on the dark brown suit jacket. So much blood had soaked his jacket she could smell the acrid odor.

The Georgetown University Hospital doctors wanted her admitted right there, right then. Laura intended to keep her appointment with her children that evening in Philadelphia. She would not take no for an answer. The compromise: Georgetown ER physicians would stabilize her. The Gulfstream, which Keystone Pharma often volunteered for medevac missions, would take her immediately to Philadelphia. She promised to remain at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania until doctors there signed her medical release.

She'd been shot through her left shoulder. A lucky shot, if a gunshot wound could be considered lucky. Damage to muscles and tendons, but they would heal. Among the doctors, including Laura, no one could agree whether, given a choice, it would be better to be shot in her bad arm or her healthy one. Fate picked the good arm. When she went down, she'd landed on the site of her injury, but Addie's body, already bathed in the blood of her mortal chest wound, absorbed much of the impact.

An ambulance had taken Addie to Georgetown, too, but
she had been dead on arrival. The first bullet had torn into her friend's left ventricle, destroying it on impact. The second time the gunman took aim, he might well have killed again, if Tim's tackle had not deflected the bullet. Just before Laura's morphine injection, her last conscious thought was grief over the loss of a promising young medical researcher and a charming friend.

Having slept four hours, Laura awoke in a hospital room. Tim sat in the chair next to her bed, still wearing the brown tailored suit he'd worn to the press conference. While in the emergency room at Georgetown, they'd removed her contact lenses and, without her glasses, she couldn't make out much detail.