ADRENALINE: New 2013 edition (30 page)

Raskin closed his eyes and stilled his breathing. He believed he could hear Jesus speaking. “Your sins are forgiven. Today, you shall be with me in paradise.” He opened his eyes and made the sign of the cross. He smiled and felt his nausea subside. After the unfortunate accident with Melissa, he had visited the study several times—the painting had worked its magic then, too. It was simple, really. You could do all this bad stuff, anything actually, and as long as you asked for forgiveness before you died, you would wind up in heaven—just like the thief.

There was only one catch, however—you couldn’t die too quickly. But what were the odds of that? He’d seen lots of people die over the years. Normally they had time—it would only take a couple of minutes for Chrissakes to say a quick prayer. He figured he’d take his chances. Even Carlucci probably had time to make it right with his maker before he roasted. Raskin felt much better; he always did when he knelt at the foot of the cross. He decided he
was wrong to get all broken up over Carlucci—he was a friend of Landry after all. And Landry was the real evil one.

Landry was probably in league with the nuns. They had no doubt cooked up this whole merger thing along with the Pinnacle deal to force him out. They would throw him out on his ear in disgrace after all he had done for Mercy. It just wasn’t right. Besides, what really galled him was that Landry was such a sleazebag—
he
should get the axe. Didn’t they know Landry was shacking up with that SICU bitch? Whereas, in contrast, he had never cheated on Phyllis in thirty-five long years of marriage. Well, maybe once or twice, but he had been drunk, so they didn’t count.

So, Landry thinks he can call here and play his little game of mind-fuck. Well, it was time to get even, settle the score. No more Mr. Nice Guy. His hands were clenched and he was breathing hard as he stood up, knees creaking. The painting looked ordinary now and no longer captivated him. He left the study and closed the door.

Raskin walked back to the kitchen and sat down at the table, the newspaper picture of the burning wreck in plain sight. It occurred to him that he had been lucky with Carlucci; Midazolam was metabolized slowly and might easily have been detected in Carlucci’s blood. Lucky for the fire. He needed something better—he closed his eyes again and rested his head in his hands, hoping for inspiration.

His mind wandered back to his days at State College, and he saw himself seated in a large lecture hall, noisy and crowded with students. Professor Herbrandson was droning on about some aspect of organic chemistry; Raskin couldn’t quite make out what he was saying. The professor’s head dodged in and out of the powerful light beam coming from the overhead transparency projector; it reflected in bursts off his spectacles and shiny, bald head. Herbrandson wrote the words “Hoffman elimination” in big block letters, and then wrote it again and again. Raskin could even hear his felt-tip pen squeaking over the vinyl sheet.

What the hell does Hoffman elimination have to do with anything? The answer came to him in a flash—Atracurium. He smiled. Atracurium was a devilishly clever molecule. He became excited and quickly ran through what he knew of the drug. Atracurium was of a class of short-acting, non-depolarizing muscle relaxants. Muscle relaxant was a nice way to say it induces a full-blown muscular paralysis. Death by asphyxiation occurs quite rapidly, in the order of three or four minutes, following a paralyzing dose of Atracurium.

But the beauty of the drug wasn’t its neuromuscular blocking qualities; other drugs paralyzed equally well, if not better. Raskin remembered the drug rep, the skinny blond with platform shoes and a short dress, telling them, in her New York accent, why Atracurium was worth such a premium price. She had called Atracurium a “pharmacologic time-bomb.” It was specifically designed for use in people with impaired liver or kidney function. The drug wears off entirely by itself, not relying on any organ function, in about thirty minutes. As the drug heats up to body temperature, it undergoes what’s known in organic chemistry parlance as spontaneous Hoffman degradation. That translates into a heat-sensitive, molecular self-destruction.

Raskin felt his smile stretch wider: even a corpse, at room temperature or above, would clear Atracurium from the blood. He took the stairs down to his office in the basement where he kept his medical bag and some supplies.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Brrring!

Doug stared at his watch as he picked up the phone, but his eyes were too blurry to make out the small numerals. “Hello. Doctor Landry here.”

“Is this anesthesia?”

Doug yanked the receiver away from his ear—the caller’s voice seemed way too loud. “Yes, I’m the anesthesiologist on call.” He hated when they referred to him as anesthesia.

“We need a labor epidural up here.”

Super. “What’s up?” His stubborn eyes finally deciphered the little lines on his watch—11:00 p.m.—eight hours to go. Might as well have been an eternity, the way he felt.

“We have a twenty-two-year-old, Mrs. Concepcion, who’s about four CMs and on pit.”

“OK, I’ll be up. Man, you guys have been busy up there at night. Can’t you give it a rest?” Doug reluctantly threw off the thin, scratchy hospital blankets.

“Whatd’ya mean? Last night we were empty.”

“No, they called down for an epidural last night too. I’m sure of it.” Doug sat up on the lumpy pullout sofa bed and shivered. Normally, he wouldn’t have bothered to argue, but tonight, he felt especially irritable.

“Well, I don’t know who told you that, but I worked last night and I did cross-stitch the whole night long. Quiet as a mouse.”

Doug hung up the phone, again perplexed. Why the hell would Raskin lie about the epidural? The conclusion seemed inescapable, but Doug still didn’t want to believe it; it just seemed too bizarre. Already overwhelmed by the events of the recent days and blunted by the rigors of the call day, he just couldn’t complete the circuit. He was exhausted—he’d go put the epidural in, and then maybe he could catch a couple hours of sleep.

Raskin snuck into the surgeon’s lounge. Good—empty. No cases were going on. It would not be disastrous if anyone saw him—anyone but Landry. He would be incredibly suspicious.

He reasoned Landry must be asleep in the call-room; the door was shut. He pondered his course of action as he patted the special syringes he had brought from home. Should he sneak into the call-room and inject him? What if he was awake? He didn’t relish the thought of taking on Landry physically; he preferred to finesse it somehow.
How shall I do this?

Just then the phone rang. Raskin jumped and realized how on edge he was. He went over to look at the phone and saw incoming Labor & Delivery on the caller ID. He noted this call was going to Landry’s call-room. He gently picked up the receiver and listened.

“Hello,” came Landry’s voice thick with sleep.

“Is this anesthesia?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry to bother you. I know it’s one-thirty, but Mrs. Concepcion’s hurting again. Could you come up and re-inject her epidural?”

“Yeah, sure,” Landry replied with resignation.

Perfect, Raskin thought as he hung up the phone. Ask and you shall fucking receive. The plan formed instantly in his mind. He quickly emptied his syringe into the full pot of coffee. He knew Landry was a sucker for a fresh pot and being the caffeine addict that he was, he’d almost certainly stop here before he went to OB.

He waited just long enough, hiding behind the OR scheduling desk to see the weary Landry emerge from his sleeping quarters and head for the lounge—not the most direct route to OB. He could only be heading there for one reason—the coffee. Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.

Raskin left silently and headed up the stairs to obstetrics, since he figured Landry would never make it.

It was a clear, moonless night; countless stars appeared frozen in the hard, black sky. Rusty zoomed down the Pennsylvania Turnpike passing the Downingtown interchange, halfway back to Harrisburg. He was listening to the eleven o’clock news on the radio when he heard: “ . . . the partially decomposed body of Melissa Draybeck was discovered today in her apartment. Neighbors became suspicious when they hadn’t seen her for a couple of days and began noticing a bad odor coming from her apartment. Police are saying she was strangled to death but aren’t revealing any details. They have no suspects at this time. . .”

Rusty recognized Melissa’s name, but didn’t make too much of the murder. Other thoughts occupied his mind. The Municipal Court had been mostly a waste of time. Rusty had only managed to find one bit of useful information. After hitting a deli and ordering several Philadelphia hoagies, Rusty had proceeded to the Center
City Public Library; this had proved to be much more fruitful. After scanning hundreds of major local newspapers for accidents occurring within a specified time frame, he had finally struck oil. He relived the excitement. Although he had been sitting in the same uncomfortable chair for hours and his eyes had throbbed miserably with strain, he had suddenly sat erect and stared at the microfilm reader’s screen with rapt attention and shouted, “Eureka!” Things had finally begun to fall into place.

Two hours later, Rusty arrived back at his little apartment in Hershey. He was tired of fact-finding and glad to be home. He knew he should go to bed soon so he would be able to function tomorrow when he returned to Mercy. But first, he couldn’t resist the Philadelphia hoagie he had brought back with him. They were legendary after all, and three didn’t seem out of line for a long day. He sprawled on the sofa in his tiny living room, opened a Rolling Rock, and clicked on the TV. He had eaten about three-quarters of the sub and finished the beer when he decided to rest his eyes for a second.

Rusty was in and out of a fitful sleep when something on the news jolted him wide-awake. “ . . . to recap the top stories of the day—Local anesthesiologist Michael Carlucci was killed late last night when a tractor trailer collided with his vehicle on Route 283. State police spokesperson, Chip Zimmer, is saying it looks like Carlucci fell asleep at the wheel in the dangerous construction zone, precipitating the accident. Police are recommending extreme caution through the construction area and urging motorists to follow the reduced speed limits. Fines are doubled in the area, and speed-watch patrols have been beefed up.”

“Holy batshit!” Rusty shouted as he leapt off the sofa, scattering the remains of the hoagie.

CHAPTER THIRTY