Lincoln Hospital (Trauma #1) (7 page)

Cian circled the warehouse once before rolling his car to a stop and killing the lights.  The second shift break was about to finish at the distribution center and from his surveillance, he knew Darwin Fergus would be slinking out the side door to sneak in an extra smoke break before heading back to work.  He got out of the car and crouched down behind a dumpster a few feet away from where he was sure Darwin would be exiting the building, remaining unseen until the opportunity he needed presented itself. Keeping an eye out for anyone that might spot him, he thought back over the information he’d gathered on him while he waited for his target to appear.

Darwin Fergus, age 42

Arrested on multiple counts of fraud, larceny, and suspected homicide

Released after insufficient evidence brought to the DA to hold the case over to trial

Estimated net worth stolen over $200,000 over the past
ten years.  Victims of choice:

elderly and disabled

So the fucker liked to take advantage of old people with his schemes and lies, ultimately swindling them out of their retirement checks.  He’d crippled dozens of individuals financially and in some cases, it was suspected he’d caused their deaths by overdoses on medications when he was close to being exposed.  The only reason he’d been arrested was in thanks to one of the victim’s grandchildren overhearing part of a conversation and putting the pieces together.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t soon enough and her grandfather had been one of the ones to lose his life. She’d come forward with what she knew, but it wasn’t enough to convict and he’d walked away a free man. 
Until now
.

Like clockwork, the side door opened and Darwin slipped out.  Cian slipped the needle from his pocket and with the stealth of a predator, approached him from behind and pounced, locking an arm around his neck and cutting off his air supply. Darwin was not a small man by any means and outweighed him by almost fifty pounds.  But where Darwin was large and soft, Cian was lean and hard.  His strength won out and he had Darwin down on the ground and the needle inserted in his neck before he could even muster a shout.

“Fuck, you’re heavy,” he complained, panting hard as he looked down at the disgusting excuse for a man at his feet.  Taking him by the ankles, he made short work of dragging him to his waiting open trunk.  It would be a tight fit, but he’d made it work before and he’d do so again.  The interior was lined with plastic, ready and waiting to transport the fucker to the hospital.  Grunting from the exertion, he wrestled Darwin into the trunk and slammed it, satisfied.

“Let’s go for a ride, shall we?”  He got no reply, not that he expected one, and hopped in the driver’s seat. About a block from the hospital he pulled into an alleyway and stopped. Dragging Darwin from the trunk, he smacked him in the face until he came around, groaning from being groggy and out of it.

“Are you with me there, Darwin?  Can you hear me?” Cian peered at him, his pupils were dilated but he seemed to be understanding him.

“Ghaft ahappped?” his words were a gargled mess.  Good.  The drugs were working.

“Oh, not to worry. I’m gonna take good care of you, Darwin.” Relief flashed in his eyes but it quickly turned to horror as he watched Cian pick up an iron bar from the trunk. “Don’t worry, you won’t feel a thing,” his grin was full of malice as he brought the bar down.

Several minutes later, Cian rushed into the ER, with Darwin’s arms over his shoulders, dragging him along as best he could.

“Get me a gurney! This man’s taken a severe beating,” he helped two orderlies lift Darwin onto the gurney when they raced over. He tossed his keys to Jenson who was standing a few feet away, wide-eyed.  “My car is in an alley a block away.  Get it and move it here.  Do not fuck that up, Jenson,” he ordered. Jenson nodded and hurried away to follow instructions.

Reynolds appeared in the hallway and after a slight nod, Cian called out to the nurse behind the desk.

“Book me OR-B, I’m heading up there now with him.  His injuries are extreme and we need to get in there now.” The nurse nodded and grabbed for the phone, barking orders that the OR was needed stat.

Following behind the gurney, Cian’s steps were filled with glee.  Another successful hunt and soon it would be another successful kill and scumbag eliminated.  He should get a goddamn fucking medal for the clean-up work he did for the city.  Vigilante his ass, he was a motherfucking saint.

“Oh!” He whipped his head around at the sound of a startled squeal and locked eyes with Athena who was standing directly in front of him with an armload of charts and a fresh green salad. She took in his appearance slowly, the blood staining his clothes and the manic look in his eyes.  Confusion and then fear flashed across her features as she tried to make sense of what she was seeing.

She took a small step forward, but Cian cut her off before she could speak.  “Out of the way, Dr. Payne.  Can’t you see we have a critical patient here?” he barked, watching her flinch at his tone. Flustered, she stepped back quickly.

“I—I’m sorry. I thought...” she stammered.

“You thought what?  You thought whatever you needed to say was more important than this man getting to surgery?  I’d pegged you for smarter than that,” he stepped around her without another word and ignored the twinge of guilt he felt at seeing the hurt in her eyes his words caused.  It was for the best that she stop idolizing him in more than a mentor capacity.  Nothing would ever come of the connection between them.  It was ridiculous to think otherwise.

He headed into the scrub room to prepare while the team got Darwin prepped for surgery.  A black rage had settled over him, more intense than he’d ever felt before.  The fear he’d seen in Athena’s eyes haunted him. 
Was she afraid of him?
  She was right to be, but he’d never hurt her.  The fact that she might think he would, bothered him more than he liked, turning his anger into a murderous rage.

Entering the OR, he stalked straight to Darwin’s side, satisfied when he saw that he was coherent.  “Mr. Fergus, good evening.  Pleasure to have you here in my OR.” Darwin struggled against the binds holding down his arms and legs, eyes frozen in fear as Reynolds’ approached from the other side and fitted him with the gag.

“Sorry, guess we won’t be hearing much more from you, now will we?  What a shame.  I was looking forward to hearing all about how you weaseled money away from the elderly; how you murdered the ones that were close to figuring out your con.  You’re despicable, you know that?  To rob the elderly is like harming defenseless babies.  Did it make you feel powerful?  Did you enjoy the thrill of taking from another?  Did you get off on it, Darwin?” The more he spoke, the closer he got until they were almost nose to nose.  Darwin’s entire body was quaking in fear; fear that Cian fed off, his terror transported into his blood and gave him the initiative he craved to get the job done.

“Saw,” he demanded.  Patricia complied and handed him the small bone saw.  Fixing on his goggles, he cheerfully got to work, starting with Darwin’s right index finger.  He lowered the blade and applied just the right amount of pressure to torturously cut through the skin and bone, removing the finger completely.  Darwin’s body bucked and thrashed and he screamed with all his might into the gag, but none of that halted Cian’s task.  He removed two more fingers before tiring of the saw and switching tactics.

“Do you know, losing all your money...it’s like dying a slow death.  First, they take your electricity.  Then, you have no money for food.  Not long after that, they’ll repossess your belongings.  Until finally, they take your home from you.  Have you ever been homeless, Darwin?  Ever lost everything that meant something to you?  It’s agonizing.  And you—you caused that for these people.  They trusted you and you took advantage, ruining what little of their lives they had left.  And when they didn’t comply?  Well, then you stole their lives.  I think it’s only fair you feel some agony as well.  Scalpel.”

Lorna passed him the scalpel and he expertly made a small incision in Darwin’s neck, pleasure filling him as he watched the blood seep from the wound and onto the table.  Darwin gurgled and choked, his own blood starting to strangle him.

Cian leaned down to whisper in his ear. “I could leave you like this for hours.  You’d bleed out, or you’d maybe strangle on your blood first, who knows.  What matters to me is that you suffer.”

Darwin’s eyes pleaded with him for mercy, begged for forgiveness, screamed to be released.  None of it mattered, his fate was sealed. He had another flash of Athena’s terrified face and the rage increased tenfold.  Grabbing the scalpel again, he brutally slashed down Darwin’s midsection, determined to rid himself of the vision of Athena.

“O’Reilly,” Reynolds warned.  “Get a grip, we’ve got five minutes.  Finish it.”

Panting, Cian took a breath and looked around.  His team’s faces held expressions of shock, not something he was used to after everything they’d witnessed him do.  He was losing it; needed to get a grip as Reynolds said.

“I’m fine.  I got this.” Shaking his head, he used incision he’d made in Darwin’s midsection to properly open him up.  After a few minutes of “repairing” damage to the kidneys and large intestine, he made the cut that would end Darwin’s life.  He watched as the life drained from his glazed-over eyes, filled with a sick satisfaction that left him feeling more on top of his game than ever.

“Good work, team.  Clean up and I’ll take care of the notes this time.” He left his team staring after him, wondering if the man they followed so blindly was starting to slip off his game or descend too far into the hell he’d created to ever find a way back.

“T
HE CITY IS starting to panic as yet another young woman has gone missing, assumed taken at the hands of the same suspect that’s presumed to have Layla Hunt, the eighteen-year-old girl from Louisiana.  This morning, Cheryl Fuller reported her daughter, Candice missing.  Candice was last seen in Times Square with a large group of friends.  Police are actively investigating and urge any witnesses with information on either young women, to please come forward.” Cian looked up as a photo splashed across the screen of a young brunette in a cheerleader’s uniform.

He was catching a bit of down time in the attendings’ lounge before his next surgery.  It had been one hell of a day already with two emergency surgeries on top of his regular cases.  Dragging a hand through his dark hair he sighed and turned his attention back to the news station just as Rae Kelley came on screen. Her blonde hair was piled on her head in some bun-type thing and her breasts all but spilled out of the black dress she wore as she bounced her step on her blood-red high heels.  Cian rolled his eyes at her image, how she got that job was beyond him.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” she began before pausing and staring at something off in the distance.  “Oh! Good afternoon, I mean...good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.” Her face burned red from her on-air mistake and Cian having no patience for idiocy, was about to switch her off when her next words caught his attention.

“We have an update on
The Watcher
, the vigilante who we believe has been eliminating criminals who have escaped justice in the legal system.  Sources tell us that one, Darwin Fergus, who died just over two weeks ago, was in fact a victim of our unknown protector.  If you’ll recall, Fergus was accused of running a fraudulent con-artist scheme that cheated several dozens of elderly people out of their retirement funds.  There were also allegations raised that a few suspicious deaths may have been at his hand in an attempt to cover up what he’d done.  With not enough evidence to prosecute, he was let go much to the outrage of the community.

After a back alley beating, he died from complications during surgery.  Coincidence?  Or is this again the work of
The Watcher
? We’ll keep you updated as information regarding this comes available, don’t forget to tune in to Channel 15 and check out my blog,
Rae’s Ramblings
.”

Furious, Cian shoved himself up from the leather sofa and paced around the room like a caged cat.  That fucking nosey idiot reporter was getting way to close to finding out the truth.  And who the hell were these “sources” she claimed she got her information from?  Everyone on his team had as much at stake as he did and he knew without a doubt he could trust each of them.  But did he really?  The only people that knew the truth were the six people on his team.  Perhaps it was time he started looking for a mole.

In the hallway, he ran into Reynolds who was just finishing up a conversation with the Chief.  “Reynolds, Chief,” he greeted them as he walked up.

Chief Murphy clasped him on the shoulder and steered him aside.  “Damn good work getting those two transplant cases into our hospital, O’Reilly.  The media attention is just what this place needs and that kind of initiative is what sets you apart from the rest.  Keep it up and you just might be a good candidate for my position one day.”