Damaged (20 page)

Sunday, May 13, 3:00 p.m.

J
udge Carson swung open the door to her condo. The afternoon sun blazed behind her. It took a second for Ethan’s eyes to adjust to the brightness. When they did, he saw she gazed at him with a glacial expression that was designed to establish who was in charge.

“This better not take long,” she said. “I’m extremely busy.” She stepped back reluctantly, her hand still on the doorknob. Ethan walked past her. He breathed in deeply. Was that a hint of Scotch on her breath?

Judge Carson crossed her arms. It had the effect of tightening her blouse against her breasts. Her shirt was a white fitted number, buttoned right at the spot where her breasts swelled. She had tucked the shirt into a pair of dark jeans that cupped her curves.

Her tawny eyes flickered over him.

And over him again.

He shifted away from her.

“Have a seat, Detective Drake.” Judge Carson turned toward the sunken living room. The view from the two walls of windows was stunning. The Public Gardens spread before
him. Budding greenery and spring tulips swayed in a light breeze. Couples drifted through the meandering paths. He and Kate had done the same thing less than a year ago.

He settled himself on a chair, his back to the windows. He wanted to check out the rooms, not the view. Judge Carson sat diagonally opposite him on the sofa. She raised her brows inquiringly. “You said you had an old case you wanted to discuss with me?” Her voice was brusque.

“Yes—”

“The Arnold case, I presume?”

There she went again. Trying to wrestle control of the interview.

Ethan leaned back and crossed his legs. He was going to set the pace. Not her.

His eyes traveled slowly around the room. Everything was the same as last time: bare, white. Not much had changed except what was on the long granite counter separating the living area from the kitchen. A crystal whiskey decanter sat on a small tray. The matching crystal glass was visible behind a pile of files on her stylish computer desk. The glass looked empty. Recently? He couldn’t tell from where he was sitting if it was clean or used.

Judge Carson watched him from the sofa. Her face was expressionless. She leaned back, mimicking—or mocking?— his body language, stretching her arm along the back. Shadow and light played on the curve of her breast. “I’d offer you a drink, Detective Drake, but I know you’re not staying long.”

He smiled and laid his notepad on the table. His leisurely appraisal of her home had unnerved her. It surprised him. He thought she was cooler than that. His mind swung back to the lion’s head on her door. He could think of no better symbol for her desire to guard her home. But from what?

“No problem. As you guessed, I’m here about the Arnold case.”

Mark “the Shark” Arnold was the only ex-con that Ethan hadn’t been able to track down and eliminate from his list. He’d served his full sentence with no chance of parole for a grotesque murder fifteen years ago, when he was nineteen. His victim had been his girlfriend. He’d raped her, strangled her, then cut her up and thrown her body into the Atlantic Ocean. The only problem was, he hadn’t gone far enough out to sea to dump her remains. Some of her body parts got caught in a fishing net. In a morbid postscript, a shark had also been caught in the net. His girlfriend’s torso was found in its belly. Hence, Mark Arnold’s nickname.

It was a gruesome case, and he had been punished to the full extent of the law. It had been the most sensational murder in Nova Scotia until now. Ethan looked it up and discovered a disturbing fact: Judge Carson had been Mark Arnold’s defense lawyer. Had he been angered at the harshness of his sentence? Did he blame Judge Carson, fresh out of law school? Or did he harbor a hate toward teenage girls?

Now he was back on the streets. His prison records indicated that he had received training in the plumbing trade.

Judge Carson’s gaze sharpened. “You think he did it?”

Ethan raised a brow. “I don’t know. But I wanted to make sure you knew he was out.”

She gave a bitter laugh. “Oh, yes, I knew, Detective. I checked it myself.”

When? Before she killed Lisa? It would be a perfect deflection away from her. Maybe Brown had been on the wrong track.

“Has he been in contact with you?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Do you know if he was in contact with Lisa?”

She paled at the mention of Lisa’s name. Her glacial demeanor was a lot thinner than he had thought. Was it the booze chipping away at it?

Or guilt?

Guilt could seep through the iciest hearts, weakening resolve in the most unexpected places, until the right question made the guilty crack and fall through the hole. They spent the rest of their lives drowning.

“Not that I am aware.” Her voice was steady, clipped.

“Did he ever threaten you?”

“Yes.”

Ethan picked up his notepad. “When?”

“The day he was sentenced. He thought I hadn’t argued forcefully enough for him. He told me that when he got out, he’d make me pay.”

Ethan searched her face. Her eyes met his. Strong, fierce, but not evasive. He’d be damned, but he believed her. “Did he give any specifics?”

She gave that harsh laugh again. “No. But he had lots of time to devise something.”

“You knew him.” Ethan leaned forward. “Do you think he was capable of carrying out this kind of crime?”

She looked away. Ethan followed her gaze and saw that it was on the whiskey decanter. She glanced back at him. She had seen his eyes following hers. She straightened. “I don’t know,” she said flatly. “He wasn’t that bright. He killed his girlfriend in a fit of anger.” She snapped her fingers. “It was a classic crime of passion. But for some killers, once they do the first kill, the next one is easier. He already had experience with dismemberment. And he had fifteen years to formulate a plan. I think it’s possible.”

She spoke in a dispassionate tone. She could have
been arguing the facts before a judge. Ethan watched her closely. Again, there was no artifice. Her body language was open.

Despite himself, he was beginning to doubt his suspicions about her.

“Do you have any idea where he might be? He was released over a year ago. He stopped reporting to his parole officer three months ago.”

“Figures.” Her mouth twisted. “No. I have no idea. I seem to recall he had some family on the south shore, but who knows? It was fifteen years ago.” She shrugged. Her blouse gaped a little. Ethan kept his eyes on her face.

She rose to her feet in a fluid motion. “You’ll forgive me, but I have work to do.”

Ethan stood. “Would you mind if I had a look around before I left?”

She crossed her arms. Her eyes, which had lost their hostility over the course of Ethan’s visit, hardened. “I’ve had enough police digging through my house. Check the reports, Detective. It’s all there. Hair samples, fingerprints, photos.”

His jaw tightened. He knew it was all there. It wasn’t the same as looking at Lisa’s room with a fresh set of eyes, two homicides later. “Right.”

She headed to the door. He walked the long way around her sofa so that he’d cross by her computer desk. He scanned the stacks of files. He found the whiskey glass.

So she had been drinking before he came.

He turned toward the door, giving the desk a final sideways once-over. A letter caught his eye.
Department of Justice, Government of Canada
was scrolled across the top. He made out the words
We are pleased to confirm…
before Judge Carson’s voice interrupted him.

“I asked you to leave, Detective.”

He turned smoothly toward her. “Of course, Your Honor. Or should I say, Madam Justice?”

She flushed.

That’s a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence
.

“Don’t be impertinent.”

He slid his notebook into his pocket. “I’ll call you if I track down Mr. Arnold. Please let me know if you see or hear from him.”

“Don’t worry, Detective. I’m not a fool.”

“Don’t worry, Your Honor,” he ever so gently mimicked her tone. “You would never be accused of that.”

He closed the door behind him and left the building. He hadn’t been able to read it all, but he was sure that the letter had confirmed Judge Carson’s appointment to the Supreme Court Division.

He bet she wasn’t the first drunk judge to grace that bench.

Tuesday, May 15, 10:00 a.m.

K
ate eyed the three-foot-high pile of binders on her desk. Melinda Crouse had kept her word. The screening and tissue processing procedures were now awaiting her.

But what she wanted was in a thin kraft envelope on top of the pile. She picked it up and pulled out a sheaf of reports. A Post-it note was stuck on top, with a note written in a rounded hand:
The donor reports and blood-screening reports you requested for B.G. and D.R., M.C.

There were twelve sets of reports, two pages each. The first page of every report was the donor eligibility report, headed with the name BioMediSol. Kate had never heard of BioMediSol before, although it had a postal-box address in Halifax. From what the client had told John, BioMediSol was a tissue supplier or harvester, a company that literally removed the tissue from donors and sent it to TransTissue to process. They sent the tissue with a donor eligibility report and a blood sample.

Establishing donor eligibility was the first stage in screening whether the tissue could be harvested for biomedical purposes. The report determined the donor’s
medical status and cause of death. If the donor had a chronic disease, or had died of cancer or an infectious disease, then he or she would not be eligible to donate tissue.

Kate skimmed the first donor eligibility report. The donor’s name was blacked out, but the rest of the information was intact: gender, age, preexisting medical conditions, risk factors, cause and date of death.

She studied each of the twelve donor eligibility reports carefully. So far, so good. The donors had passed BioMediSol’s eligibility criteria with flying colors. None were too old, all had lived pretty healthy lives, none had died of diseases that would render their tissue useless.

It ruled out BioMediSol as the cause of Brad Gallivant’s hep C. They’d done their end of the screening.

She flipped to the second page of the reports. These were the blood-screening reports filled in by TransTissue. Their private lab tested each blood sample that accompanied the tissue for hepatitis B, hepatitis C, HIV and syphilis. The screening measured the antibodies or antigens in the blood for each virus. The count was recorded in a numeric value, referred to as a titer in the medical profession. For HIV, a positive result would be any titer over 1.0. So if a donor’s titer was 0.23, he would be HIV negative. The donor’s titers would need to be within the acceptable range for each of the four viruses in order for the tissue to be eligible for processing.

Kate studied the blood-screening report for the first donor. None of the first donor’s titers was above the acceptable range. In fact, all were well below normal. Reassured, she examined the next. And the next. All fine.

The fifth donor’s HIV titer startled her. It was 0.53—a higher value than the titers of the previous four donors, whose titers were in the low double digits. But still accept
able. She flipped to donor number six. Back to a low double-digit HIV titer. Same with donor number seven.

When she reached the report for the eighth donor, she stopped. The donor’s HIV titer was 0.53. Just like donor number five.

She checked the ninth donor. The HIV titer was also 0.53. Puzzled, she flipped through the remaining three reports. Those donors’ HIV titers were also 0.53.

How could they all have the exact same titer, not off by even one one-hundredth?

Her pulse accelerating, she compared the hepatitis B titers for each of the five donors. They were identical. So were the hepatitis C titers. And the syphilis titers.

She stared in disbelief at the reports.

How could five donors’ titers be exactly the same for four different viruses?

They couldn’t.

It wasn’t possible.

She flipped through them again. She hadn’t misread them. Five donors had the exact same titers for all four viruses.

Why hadn’t TransTissue noticed this?

She picked up the phone to call Melinda Crouse. Then she put it down. It was time to visit TransTissue in person. Because if she was wondering about what the hell was going on over there, she had no doubt Morris MacNeil would be, too. Good thing he didn’t have the blood-screening reports yet.

She glanced at her watch. It was 10:30 a.m.

“I’ve got a couple of client meetings,” she told Liz. “I’ll be back at lunchtime.”

TransTissue was located in a new building in an industrial park in Dartmouth, Halifax’s twin city. Kate drove over the bridge connecting the cities. The deep blue water of the
Bedford Basin on the left side of the bridge gleamed today with the full promise of May sunshine. She headed onto the highway, taking the exit ramp to the industrial park.

There was probably a very good explanation for the reports, but she couldn’t think of any as she sped through the endless intersections of the industrial park, looking for Blue Ridge Crescent. Something niggled at her.

She made a wrong turn. She’d never been this far into the industrial park before. Blue Ridge Crescent was on the farthest side of the park, bordering a pine forest. She turned down the road. It was long and curving. Empty. A paved road surrounded by evergreens. Just when she was starting to wonder if she had the wrong address, she glimpsed a large, four-story building fronted with reflective pink-tinted glass windows. She drove toward it. As she got closer, she noticed a separate square building squatting behind its counterpart, two tall metal chimneys spouting grayish smoke into the sky. The smoke plumed lazily against the blue, then dissipated slowly through the upper reaches of the pines.

She parked her car in the area marked Visitors’ Parking. Grabbing her briefcase, she walked into the main building’s foyer. It looked more like a hospital than an office, with pale blue and green furnishings set against spotlessly white walls. A set of framed posters were placed predominantly on the main wall, showing the range of TransTissue products. One caught her eye: NextGeneration Bone Filler. That was the product used in the plaintiffs’ knees. Even though she’d done extensive research on the use of bone fillers, it still blew her mind that cadaveric material was being used in so many medical procedures.

Kate walked over to the security desk. The guard watched her approach. His eyes flickered over her. No bantering with this guy.

“I’m here to see Melinda Crouse. In public relations.”

He nodded, looked up the number and dialed. Kate waited, glad she hadn’t called ahead of time. She wanted an element of surprise.

The guard spoke for a minute into the receiver, then hung up the phone. “She’ll be right out.” He handed Kate a visitor’s tag on a lanyard. “Please sign in.”

She was disappointed to see she was signing a fresh page of the visitors’ log. She’d hoped to scan the list of visitors to see if Morris MacNeil had already “dropped by.”

“Hi.” Melinda Crouse’s perky voice materialized at Kate’s shoulder. She turned around to see a young woman in her mid-twenties greeting her with a warm, if puzzled, smile.

“Hi, Melinda.” Kate held out her hand. Melinda grasped it limply. “Sorry to drop in on you, but I received the information you sent me and had a couple of questions.”

“Sure, no problem,” Melinda said, with a smile as perky as her voice. “We can talk over here.” She pointed at a small reception room just off the foyer.

“Great.” Kate followed her, studying her from behind. She wore an off-the-rack tailored navy suit, with pointy-toed shoes that were worn at the heels. Her blond hair was carefully streaked and pulled off her face.

The reception room looked like one of those rooms the hospital set aside for family members to pray or grieve. It had several comfortable armchairs in pale green velveteen, with an oak side table. A water cooler was tucked in the corner.

Kate settled herself in one of the chairs and pulled out the reports from her briefcase.

Melinda sat opposite her. “Did you get everything you needed?” she asked.

Kate smiled. “Yes, thank you. I wanted to run through
a couple of things with you. First of all, were there only six batches of NextGeneration tissue filler made on the same day as the plaintiffs’ batches?”

Melinda nodded. “Yes. We traced the batch numbers for the knee filler to the donor records I sent you.”

Kate held up a donor record. “Is there any chance the donor records were filled out by TransTissue instead of BioMediSol?”

Melinda shook her head. “No. We require the tissue supplier to fill in the form.”

“Who reviews these forms?”

Melinda straightened, a look of uncertainty on her face. “Um…it goes to the screening division. They check all that stuff and then the product is sent to processing.” She smoothed her skirt. “It’s all in the manuals I sent you.”

“Great.” A movement in the foyer caught her eye. A brown-haired man with broad shoulders straining his suit turned the corner and was gone.

“Is that where the processing division is?” Kate asked, pointing in the direction of the disappearing man.

Melinda nodded. “Yes.”

“I’ve always been curious about it. Do you think you could give me a tour?”

Melinda smiled and jumped to her feet. Her relief at no longer having to answer questions was palpable. “Sure thing!”

Kate shoved the reports into her bag and followed the young PR woman. They walked past the security guard and around the corner. Melinda swiped her security pass through the sensor, pulling open a set of white-painted metal doors.

Kate walked through them. The doors fell closed behind her. There was a hum in the air, almost visibly shirring the fluorescent lights overhead.

“We can’t go to the part where they make NextGen, because you need to be suited up and stuff,” Melinda said. “But I can show you how they make some of the pure bone products.”

“All right.” She was disappointed. She wanted to watch how the filler was made, see if there was a weak link in the chain that Morris would undoubtedly hammer at. “Can I come back and see it?”

“Um…you need to get approval from the CEO. It’s a restricted area.” Melinda gave Kate an apologetic smile.

Kate frowned. “Why?”

“Oh, because of the sanitation protocol. You know, everything has to be kept germfree and all that.” Melinda paused in front of a large window, which overlooked a room that looked like a laboratory. “Here’s the FADAL.”

“The what?” Kate stared at her. It sounded like she said, “The fuh doll.”

Melinda smiled and pointed to an eight-foot-tall rectangular machine with a long steel table running through the middle. A large drill was mounted over the table. “The technician uses CAD software to program the FADAL, so the bone is precision cut.”

As Melinda spoke, a woman in a white lab coat lined up a bone on the steel table. She ignored Kate and Melinda staring through the window. After punching some buttons on the machine, she lowered the drill. White dust floated around her masked face. When the dust cleared, Kate saw that the bone had been cut into even dowels.

“I presume the bone has already been screened for disease?” Kate asked.

Melinda nodded. “Yes. We take the blood sample that’s sent with the tissue and test it. Once it’s cleared, the tissue is cleaned off the bone, and then it’s sent here for processing.”

“What are the bone dowels used for?”

“These ones will be used for lumbar fusion.”

At Kate’s questioning look, Melinda added, “It’s a common spinal surgery. We also make dowels that are used for ACL surgery to aid in graft-to-bone healing.”

The technician placed the dowels in a container.

“What happens after the product is made from the bone?” Kate asked.

Melinda smiled proudly. “All of our products go into our debug system afterward.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s like a big washing machine. It cleans the bone really well and it comes out free of germs. Some of the products are freeze-dried after that. Then they are ready for shipping.” She glanced at Kate. “We label each product with the batch number so we can trace it to the donor or donors.”

“Can the debug system get rid of HIV or hepatitis?”

Melinda nodded. “I think so. But it’s not really an issue because we screen the blood for it before we process the tissue. And the broker screens the donors to make sure they don’t have the disease before they harvest tissue from them.” She smiled brightly. “So that’s the tour. Any more questions?” She turned and began walking back to the foyer.

Kate heard footsteps behind her. She glanced over her shoulder. It was the broad-shouldered man.

“Just one,” she said to Melinda. “But I think we should finish our discussion in the conference room—”

“If I may,” the man behind Kate interjected.

He stepped next to Kate, studying her with shrewd brown eyes. Melinda threw him a flustered look. “Oh, Mr. Duggan, I didn’t see you—”

Kate met the CEO’s gaze. He was youngish, in his forties, with football-player features that had aged well.

“It’s quite all right, Melinda.” Mr. Duggan gave her a brief smile.

Kate held out her hand. “Mr. Duggan, I’m Kate Lange.”

He took her hand in his. His handshake was firm and warm. “Ms. Lange, I’ve heard a lot about you.” He smiled. His teeth were even and white. “You come highly recommended. I understand you are helping John mount a watertight defense for us.”

Kate smiled. “I hope so. I wanted to see the bone filler processing facility.”

He nodded. “We’ll try to arrange that. Now, what was the question you had for Melinda? Perhaps I can answer it for you.”

“I received the donor reports for the plaintiffs’ knee fillers. Five of the donors have the exact same serology results. Same titers. I’m wondering how that is possible.”

He could not hide his shock, although he tried. “The exact same?”

“Yes. Do you think it’s possible that BioMediSol might have sent you the same blood sample for five of the donors?”

Melinda gasped. Bob Duggan threw her an irritated look, then turned to Kate. “I shall look into it. This is extremely unusual. I can assure you that our screening director reviews every serology report prior to the tissue being processed. Perhaps there has been a paperwork error…”