Resistant (45 page)
Humphrey’s thin chest puffed.
“Can’t believe it,” he said.
“Your life is about to change, my friend. As soon as people find out what you’ve done, you’ll be on the cover of every major magazine and probably get an hour devoted to you on
60 Minutes
.”
Humphrey’s already broad smile brightened even more.
“If I have to speak, they may need rename show ‘Ninety Minutes.’ Good thing government cleaned my apartment. Hope they help Cassie’s family.”
“I believe they will,” Lou said. “Chuck McCall told me that they’re rushing legislation through Congress to establish the One Hundred Neighbors Victim Compensation Fund. The announcement of the fund will coincide with the president’s address. I would suspect Cassie will be included.”
“Terrific. She has kids not much money.”
Lou didn’t bother to explain how much Humphrey would be able to do for Cassie and others once the pharmaceutical companies made good on their pledges to him.
“From what I’ve heard, the fund will be similar to the legislation Congress passed following the 9/11 attacks,” he said instead. “My daughter Emily’s done a great job raising thousands of dollars for Cap, but it should be a fraction of what he’ll receive from this new fund.”
“Great news. You know I’ll be at Arbor awhile longer.”
“But not in the pharmacy.”
Humphrey laughed his most wonderfully joyous laugh and applauded.
For the time being, he would continue working with a technician in his subbasement lab—a tech on loan from Sam Scupman. Soon, though, as promised, he would be moving over to the CDC. Scupman himself, the champion of bacterial power, had taken the position that simultaneously blasting the Doomsday infections with multiple killer viruses gave every reason to believe the germ would be much less of a threat to mutate.
Finally, with promises they would never lose touch with each other, Lou and Humphrey embraced and parted. Lou watched until the remarkable man and his wheelchair entered the freight elevator, and the doors glided shut behind him. Then he headed up to where Cap was waiting.
One last piece of business.
His stump wrapped up and bandaged, Cap still greeted Lou with a high-five. The operation was tragic in its timing, but it had clearly saved his life.
“Good timing, doc,” Cap said.
Cap’s steadily improving demeanor had done more for Lou’s state of mind than anything else could—except that moment when he would again get to hold Emily.
“Tell me,” Lou said, adding a bit to the water already in Cap’s plastic cup.
“A specialist in prosthetics just left my room. She came to talk with me about options for my new leg. Man, the technology today is really something spectacular. She even thinks I might be a candidate for this thing called targeted muscle reinnervation.”
“I think I know a little about that, but fill me in.”
“It’s like redirecting nerves to control the prosthetic using substitute healthy muscle from somewhere else in my body,” Cap said. “She has a friend at the rehab I want to go to in D.C. who does it.”
“Amazing. That would be so cool.”
“From what she told me, I might even be able to box again. Heck, I’d be a willing guinea pig for that alone.”
“I’m ready to take you on,” Lou said. “But you have to promise no kicking.”
“Okay, okay, no kicking. In the meantime, I’ll get fitted for a prosthetic leg when we get home. They say just a couple of more days.”
“That’s really great news!”
“The people from that fund they’re setting up have already come to visit me. When all is said and done, I’m gonna own Stick and Move clear, with enough left over for projects in the inner city that I’ve only dreamed about. I’m going to start working with the disabled, too. Not just amputees, but all disabilities.”
“I’d love to help. So would Emily.”
“Perfect. The more I get to see that gal, the better.”
Lou checked the time on the watch she had given him. “I think our friend should be here any minute,” he said. “You ready?”
“More than I was when I fought Rafael Marquez.”
“And how did you do in that one?”
“I knocked him out in the third.… Crunch!”
He cracked his knuckles for emphasis.
“Well, you don’t have to wait until the third round this time.”
As if on cue, without a knock, the room door opened and Ivan Puchalsky strode in, his white knee-length coat so starched it looked as if it could stand up on its own. He greeted Lou and Cap, and may or may not have noticed that he was not offered a handshake by either man.
“So,” he said, “word from the nurses is that you are continuing to improve. That’s excellent.”
“Thanks,” Cap said.
“So, Dr. Welcome, your message said it was urgent that I meet you here. I have ID rounds in a few minutes, so this really must be brief.”
“Oh, it will be brief,” Cap said. “I promise you that. Doctor, do you know a man named Douglas Bacon?”
Puchalsky’s blank expression may have been legit.
“I’m afraid I don’t,” he said.
“No matter,” Cap went on. “He knows you, and that’s what counts. In fact, in documents signed under oath by him, he names you as one of those hospital employees scattered around the country who was recruited by the group he directed—a group calling themselves the Society of One Hundred Neighbors.”
“I don’t understand.”
But Lou could tell now that he did.
“You were paid and paid handsomely to use your expertise in nosocomial disease,” Lou said, “to slowly introduce the Janus strain, also known as the Doomsday Germ into this hospital.”
“That’s ridiculous. Why would I ever do something like that?”
“The list of possible reasons starts with a boatload of money, and moves on through your suddenly mushrooming importance in the field of hospital-based infection. Bacon says they had no trouble enlisting your services, either—especially when they needed you to help them cure the germ after it began mutating. So let’s add immortality and worldwide fame to our list. Then we should probably include the multiple donations on record that you’ve made to a number of right-leaning organizations, some of which are more or less recruitment fronts for One Hundred Neighbors.”
Puchalsky, his cheeks flushed, could only glare at him.
“You took my leg,” Cap said with far less anger in his voice than the man deserved. “I’d like to meet the person who led you in your Hippocratic Oath, or whatever oath doctors take wherever you came from. Now, get out of my room. I think you’ll find a couple of our friends from the FBI waiting for you just outside the door. I’m looking forward to testifying against you in court.”
Puchalsky looked as if he were about to spit. Then he turned on his heels and stalked out the door.
Lou could see Chuck McCall in the hall waiting for him, handcuffs dangling.
“We’ll take it from here, Lou,” he called out.
“You do that,” Lou replied in a near whisper. “You do that.” He turned to Cap. “Good thing it was your recovery program at work just then, and not mine,” he said. “I would have decked him.”
“And that would have brought my leg back, right?”
“Duncan, you’re the best, do you know that?”
“Besides, I don’t like to think of the leg that’s gone. I’d rather focus on the six inches my surgeons left behind. I keep feeling the rest, though. I keep feeling the phantom limb pains. I’m told this is normal, so maybe the leg will be with me for a long time.”
“Only you would think like that,” Lou said. “You know, I heard there’s a rowing club on the Potomac that allows amputees in their shells. How do you think we’d do as a two-man crew?”
Cap held Lou’s hand in both of his.
“When are the next Olympics?” he asked.
The Boston Globe
An open letter of thanks to the nurses, doctors, and staff at White Memorial Hospital, and all those who played a part in defeating the Doomsday Germ, especially those who helped in the development of PHAGECIL.
My recent infection came close to killing me but all it did in the end was to strengthen my faith and my gratitude.
The death of my patient and friend Becca Seabury, and my own devastating illness and recovery, helped me better appreciate the gift of every single day, and the beauty of being able to care for others. I cannot wait until I am able to return to nursing again.
With all that in mind, I wish to announce my marriage, six months earlier than planned, to ANDREW GULLI of Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the day following my recent discharge from the hospital.
God Bless You All.
—Jennifer Sarah Lowe-Gulli, R.N.
ALSO BY MICHAEL PALMER
Political Suicide
Oath of Office
A Heartbeat Away
The Last Surgeon
The Second Opinion
The First Patient
The Fifth Vial
The Sisterhood
Side Effects
Flashback
Extreme Measures
Natural Causes
Silent Treatment
Critical Judgment
Miracle Cure
The Patient
Fatal
The Society
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
MICHAEL PALMER is the author of seventeen novels of medical suspense, all international bestsellers. His books have been translated into thirty-five languages.
Extreme Measures
was the basis for a movie starring Hugh Grant and Gene Hackman. Visit
www.michaelpalmerbooks.com
.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
RESISTANT.
Copyright © 2014 by Michael Palmer. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
Cover designed by Rob Grom
Cover photographs ©
Shutterstock.com
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to [email protected].
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-03092-4 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-03090-0 (e-book)
First Edition: May 2013