Mutant (8 page)
Yet, where was she?
He stepped briskly toward the aboveground graves, but immediately all hint of her aroma vanished. He returned to the chapel gate where he caught it again, yet the alcove remained empty. He looked around for any other place she might be concealing herself, seeing nothing.
He pulled open the gate and went inside. The traces this time filled his nostrils with an authority that made his heart quicken. They became even stronger as he approached the wooden confessional. Made of dark mahogany, it consisted of two side compartments and a much wider central chamber for the priest. The air intoxicated him now, as he reached to open the middle door.
Enough light spilled into the darkened interior that he could see her sitting sideways on a bench seat, naked, hugging her long legs to her breasts and smiling at him. “What took you so long, my love, and what do you have for me?” she whispered.
He stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind him. The side grates through which the priest would normally speak let in sufficient illumination that he could still see her eyes sparkle as she reached for him and made him bend toward her. “I asked what you had for me,” she repeated into his ear.
He’d carried the vial in a bag, to keep it cool in the night air. He took it, along with the computer disk in his jacket pocket and tucked both items among the folds of her clothes, which she’d placed in a neat pile off to one side.
“What if a priest had come?” he asked her as she stood and started undoing his belt buckle.
“I would have heard his confession.”
When his pants were around his feet, she turned her back to him and ground her hips into his groin. Spreading her legs, bending forward, and extending her arms to lean on the bench, she cooed, “This is how we’ll do it here.” Deftly arching her back, she reached a hand between her legs and glided him into her. Excitedly he grabbed her rear and started to thrust, but she shoved against him, until her hips had him pinned against the door. “You don’t move,” she commanded softly.
When he went still she began to pump him, slowly, expertly, and ever so silently. It was all he could do to control his breathing so as not to make any noise. Just as he felt about to climax, she’d stop her movements, wait, and then start again. She repeated the process several times until he thought he’d faint. “Lean forward, my love. You mustn’t fall now,” she quietly advised, as if she knew the dizzy state she’d aroused him to.
He shifted his weight, placing his hands above her on the back wall of the booth for support. She proceeded to grind him again, but this time with an urgency that told him she would finally let him come. As he surrendered to her control and she brought him ever closer to his release, he barely noticed the door behind him slowly open. The change in light ultimately caught his eye, yet even when he started to turn his head, he got barely a glimpse of the shadowy figures outside the confessional. My God, the priests have found us, he thought in the seconds before one of the intruders grabbed him from behind and snapped his neck with a vicious twist.
As she savored his final spasms, Ingrid smiled and murmured, “Your biggest yet, my love, exactly as I promised.”
The Plaza Hotel, New York
“Happy New Year, Kathleen,” Steve Patton said, raising his champagne glass as revelers all around them blew party horns, threw streamers, and showered the gilded ballroom with confetti.
“Really, Steve?”
“Of course.”
“But that depends partially on you.”
“What do you mean?”
“I can’t continue the way we’ve been.”
He froze, still holding his drink toward her.
“I’m just not able to compartmentalize sex the way you do,” she continued. “That’s not a criticism. It’s simply that I don’t have it in me to be one of your string of women. It messes me up.”
He looked at her as if she were speaking a foreign tongue.
“You didn’t do anything wrong, Steve,” she added. “You are what you are, an elegant rascal and a wonderful lover. What you gave me this last year was exactly what I needed, in a raw sort of way, but now I must move on with my life. I guess I’m old-fashioned enough to require more from a man. Above all, I don’t want to lose you as a friend, and it’s vital we remain close colleagues, especially now, with so much important work to be done—”
He silenced her with a finger to her lips. “Kathleen, I’d welcome a chance to be the man who gives you more. I just thought you wanted room and no commitments. My affairs are dalliances, marvelous interludes between me and consenting women that harm no one, and I don’t apologize for them. But never think what I have with you is so casual. You’re my best friend, and this past year I’ve felt like the luckiest man alive.” He took her hand. “Let’s you and I move in together.”
She pulled back. “Steve, you’re kidding me.”
“I had liaisons because they fit my lifestyle. On the road, traveling around the country, and living most of the year in hotel rooms. My work, I always figured, made it impossible to have anything with a woman. You changed all that, Kathleen.”
“Steve, what are you saying?”
“Come back to my apartment and let me show you.”
He made love to her that night with more intensity and passion than she’d ever known from him. His fierceness liberated her, igniting a shamelessness that she abandoned herself to as she sat astride him and brought them both to the limits of their pleasure, held them there, quivering on the edge, until their ecstasy ebbed enough that she could resume the rhythm and repeat the deliciously slow ascent.
Then his phone rang. To her surprise he answered, yet motioned her to continue.
She hesitantly went on with her movements, suddenly feeling shy about being overheard.
“Hello,” he said in that familiar husky voice, raising his hips and thrusting deeper into her, making her let out a moan in spite of her sudden self-consciousness. Grinning mischievously, he arched higher just as he said, “Why, Mandy, Happy New Year to you, too.” She felt him throbbing inside her, urgent and imploring.
At first she hesitated, then thought, What if Mandy was the one with him the other night? A delicious excitement flooded through her, releasing an impulse to let the woman know what it felt like to be listening at the other end of the phone, and she ground into Patton, withholding nothing, determined to take him to climax in earshot of her rival. This time it was his turn to moan. He let the receiver fall onto the bed, grabbed her buttocks, and they both came noisily together. She then collapsed onto his chest, giggling and thinking, Take that, Mandy, whoever you are.
An hour later as she rode home in a cab, she felt shaken by what she’d done and the feelings she’d experienced. On one level it had been fun, but on another, her electric response to his kinkiness disturbed her, and the prospect of where such games might lead left her uneasy. Though she probably meant more to Steve than she suspected, he was what he was, she told herself, a womanizer, perfect for a “marvelous interlude,” but not much more. Despite his outrageous offer that they live together, she knew she could never expect better than being number one in his string, the way she had been tonight. And that could become a kind of control, especially when fueled by jealousy, she realized, thinking of his eagerness to play Mandy and her against each other. She’d no illusions that his being with the others, especially if she continued to care for him, would make her far un-happier than it already had and eventually consume her. Revulsed by the pall of such sexual masochism, she shuddered, watching the slick blackness of the millennium’s first morning slide by outside the window, and renewed her determination to break off with him. Lisa’s right. I deserve better.
When she got out of the cab at her apartment in the East Village, a cool drizzle tingled against her cheeks. It felt like a cleansing shower.
Chapter 5
Steele’s first days of convalescence didn’t go too badly, for no other reason than the doctors and Martha had laid out his every move in a schedule. Between his twice-a-day walks with regular half-block increases, his carefully planned meals three times a day, and all his follow-up visits for tests and checkups he’d had little time to think, which was fine by him.
Except at night. Then he mostly sat in the living room, staring at the grand piano and nursing a tumbler of scotch. No need to worry about my breath in the morning, he told himself as he switched back from vodka.
“It doesn’t say anything about continuing with alcohol on these sheets of instructions you brought home,” Martha pointed out, scowling at him and shoving the papers in his face after he’d been home a few days.
“Two drinks a day, Martha. It’s good for the heart. Been in all the medical journals for years,” he declared, raising the amber fluid in a toast.
“Oh, really. Then you should have already had the healthiest heart in the land.” Without waiting for an answer, she huffed out of the room and headed off to bed, muttering, “And did they mention the
size
of the glass by any chance?”
The piano had been Luana’s. Whether playing professionally for choirs, teaching at schools, or giving private lessons, she’d possessed a boundless passion for music all her life, including a dream to someday take a master’s program for concert pianists. When diagnosed with inoperable cancer of the pancreas, prognosis six months, she immediately signed up to take the audition she’d so often postponed. “At least I’ll know if I’m good enough,” she explained, submerging herself in the hours of daily practice necessary to prepare her presentation piece— Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 20.
Steele had found the urgency of the playing nearly impossible to bear. Each note, exquisitely poignant to the point of pain, seemed to tick off how little time she had left. As the date of the competition approached, she became too weak to sit at the bench for long periods, and his despair for her deepened. She nevertheless persisted, resting between segments of the score and insisting that he make a tape of her playing. On her behalf he submitted the recording to the judges, along with a letter from her doctor attesting that, for medical reasons, she could not perform in person. A week later she received a telegram announcing that they’d accepted her, conditional on her being well enough to attend classes.
The flash of pride he’d witnessed in her gaunt eyes at that moment seemed as much for her spirit’s triumph over the cancer, despite its destruction of her body, as for her musical victory. When he tried to tell her how much he loved her and that he felt in awe of her courage, she smiled.
“I’m proud of me, too, and that makes me feel sexy,” she’d said. “Come here,” and she pulled him weakly to her for what would turn out to be the last time they made love.
The day she’d died he shut and locked the keyboard cover. She wouldn’t want him to, he knew, but the thought of hearing anyone else play the instrument she’d poured her soul into proved too much for him.
One night Martha asked, “Do you want me to sell it? It’s morbid how you sit and look at it all the time.”
“No!” he’d snapped.
She never raised the subject again.
“Returning to Daily Activity”
was what doctors called the portion of the printed schedule that allowed him more and more leeway. In his case it left him knowing less and less what to do with himself. As a result, he resorted to dropping by the hospital, hoping to chat with colleagues and get caught up on the institutional gossip with the staff of his own ER. At first they welcomed him with open arms.
“Thank God you’re all right.”
“We sure miss you!”
“But we’ll scrape by until you’re back.”
When he started checking files, hovering over physicians’ shoulders, and giving unwanted second opinions, he quickly became such a nuisance that eyeballs shot skyward at the mere sight of him.
“Dr. Steele, you’re here again?”
“We’re managing okay, really.”
“Excuse me, Richard. Gotta run.”
He ended up spending his afternoons strolling in Central Park instead, trying to find warmth in the thin sunshine of midwinter. Failing that, he added a detour to his excursions, dropping by a bar in the Plaza Hotel with an armload of newspapers for a drink. By week’s end, the waiters considered him a regular and even knew his name.
At home, relations between him and Chet remained as strained as ever. It seemed the boy couldn’t get out of the house fast enough as he headed off to school each morning. When Steele did get up sufficiently early to join him for breakfast, the teenager hurriedly gulped the remainder of his food in sullen silence, making it evident that he preferred his father’s absence. Evenings proved no better. The boy routinely arranged to do his homework at a friend’s house, and if father and son did encounter each other at supper, the meal became a repeat of breakfast, Chet staying at the table only as long as it took for him to wolf down Martha’s excellent cooking.
“If it wasn’t for his appetite and your culinary skills, I’d never see him at all,” Steele lamented as he and Martha finished supper one evening after the boy had gone off as usual.
“I’ll keep making the meals to get him here. Getting him to talk, you’ll have to do on your own.”
“And how do I accomplish that?”
“With more of what you said to him in ICU.”
“He spoke with you about that?”
“Yeah. And he also wanted to know if I thought you meant it.”
“Oh, my God!”
“I told him, ‘Of course, he did,’ but Chet needs to hear it from you.”
An hour later Steele had already poured himself his drink and sunk into the overstuffed cushions on the sofa, settling in for his nightly brood, when the doorbell rang.
“I’ll get it,” Martha called out cheerfully. “I forgot to tell you. Your friend Greg Stanton called this afternoon and asked if it would be all right to drop in. I told him, ‘Sure, come ahead.’ That you’d be glad to see him.”
Over the years he’d learned for certain that the woman never forgot anything. “Martha!” he exclaimed sharply. “You deliberately didn’t mention it.”
“Now, why would I do that?” she called over her shoulder, her voice filling with innocent surprise as she made her way to the door.
Because maybe you figured I wouldn’t let anyone, not even an old buddy like Greg, interrupt my nightly feeling sorry for myself, thought Steele, growing surlier by the second.
The tall man who strode into the room wore an immaculate dark suit with a gray shirt and charcoal tie. He also looked fit and lean. Even with frizzy blond hair retreating to the sides of his bare scalp, he appeared younger than Steele, though the two were approximately the same age. His friend, as usual, had the appearance of a vain man, thought Steele, feeling particularly mean-spirited.
Steele had always found him a bit fanatical about looking good. When they’d first met in medical school, Greg had been an avid swimmer, not so much to keep in shape or to win races, but to have a six-pack of muscles on his stomach when he took off his shirt. He became even more obsessed about training when he prematurely lost his hair. “Hey, possession of a flat tummy is the only way I can keep my youthful looks,” he often joked.
“That and great sex,” his wife, Cindy, usually chimed in.
He’d added the high-priced suits to his routine after he’d become dean.
Steele, getting to his feet, absently patted the beginnings of the paunch he’d acquired since leaving work and smoothed his rumpled jersey. “You’re looking great and dressed to the nines, like always, Greg. Even seeing you makes me feel dissolute.”
“Hi, Richard,” his friend greeted warmly. “Is that why you stopped answering my messages? I promise to get fat, if it will do any good.”
Steele winced at the barb. It jolted him into admitting he’d been deliberately thinking the worst of the guy, all part of his ongoing campaign to hold anyone who made him remember happier times when Luana was still alive at arm’s length. Greg Stanton he’d worked particularly hard to avoid.
The man had tried more than anyone to be there for him when she died. That hadn’t surprised Steele. As far back as when they were students together he’d been quick to offer moral support, his acerbic wit and love of excellence a perfect tonic against the discouragement all doctors in training fight off from time to time. Nor was it just as classmates they’d been close. After Steele’s marriage to Luana, Greg and Cindy, both outgoing, quickly made her one of their friends, which led to the four of them spending joyous times together. Following the arrival of children on the scene, Greg’s two daughters, several years younger than Chet, became like sisters to the boy, and he adored playing older brother to them. Devastated as they all were by Luana’s death, Greg and Cindy rallied around Steele and Chet, doing their best to comfort them. But Steele, hell-bent on shutting out all memories of what he’d lost, declined their many efforts to be with him, first rebuffing their overtures with repeated pleas of being too busy—then not returning their calls at all. Eventually Cindy, then Greg, stopped phoning.
“Why don’t you call
them
?” Martha had suggested exasperatedly.
Because they finally got the message to leave me alone, he’d thought to himself, immersed in one of his better wallows.
Yes, Greg Stanton was a vain man, but he’d also been the best buddy Steele ever had. “Sorry, Greg. I’ve been an ass,” he replied, snapping himself out of such painful recollections. “I simply felt too embarrassed, still being so screwed up, especially after all you and Cindy did for me—”
“Hey, I didn’t come over to help you feel guilty,” he interrupted with a dismissive wave of his hand. “That you can do well enough on your own time. The fact is, I’m here in a professional capacity as your dean. I need a favor, for the faculty. I want you to take on a special assignment.”
His abruptness threw Steele off guard. Having been expecting, and dreading, the man’s sympathy, he found his phrase
special assignment
intriguing, doubly so since Greg, Dean of Medicine, spoke as his ultimate boss. All resentment at being ambushed in his own home quickly changed to curiosity. “Oh?” he replied. “Have a seat, and how about a drink?”
Greg nudged his brow up a notch, eyeing the oversized concoction in Steele’s hand. “I’m not that thirsty, thanks,” he said, and then perched on the edge of an easy chair, quickly coming to the point of his visit. “The UN is hosting an international conference about three and a half months from now, in early May, on the risks to human health of genetically modified food. I’ve been asked to designate a physician to accompany the American contingent. I’d like you for the job.”
Steele’s initial tingle of excitement vanished. “That stuff’s all about plants for Christ’s sake,” he protested, dismayed that Greg had even approached him with the offer. “It’s for horticulturists or botanists, not doctors!”
“It’s about food, Richard! Food that we all eat, including our kids.”
“So get a dietitian,” he retorted, increasingly certain he caught a whiff of charity behind the proposal.
Leaning forward, Greg nailed Steele with a hard blue stare. “Don’t be so dismissive. The trouble with the delegation is that it’s already top-heavy with plant experts, bench scientists, and food specialists.” He paused, pursing his lips, as if unsure of what to say next. “I can’t make any public pronouncements because I’ve no hard evidence,” he continued, lowering his voice as if sharing a confidence, “but this stuff scares me. Hell, I think it should scare all physicians. Now, don’t think that I expect you to simply take my word for it. Look up what’s on the Internet about genetically modified organisms, and educate yourself. If by tomorrow you aren’t as alarmed as I am, then I’ll send someone else. One way or another, I’m going to have a top clinician at the conference, and you can rest assured that’s why I came to you—not because you’re sidelined or I took pity on your sorry ass.”
Steele started, taken off guard by Greg’s mind reading.
“Face it, Richard!” his friend went on, sounding impatient. “Despite the hole you’ve dug for yourself and your cutting off from everyone, there are some of us who still think you could be mighty useful to your profession. Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s been a long day, and I’ve got to get home to Cindy and the girls.” He got to his feet, and before Steele could utter a word, added, “By the way, if you can stand more bad news, they’d still really like to see you, and, of course, Chet. They feel you’ve abandoned them, and frankly, I’m tired of making excuses for you.” Without waiting for a reply, he pivoted and strode out the door.
Steele sat staring at the piano for a long time, hardly touching his drink and feeling as if Greg had dumped a bucket of ice water on his head. “Guess I’m out of danger for being pitied,” he muttered, finally getting up off the couch and heading for the den, where he and Chet shared a computer. Laying aside his scotch and pulling up a chair, he logged on to the Internet, entering
genetically modified organisms
into the search engine. The screen informed him that there were over five thousand entries on the topic. Better narrow it down, he thought, adding the proviso
danger to human health
. That gave him only half as many items to choose from.
He immediately saw that a lot of these were declarations from environmental groups involving catchy headlines and little science.
Frankenstein Foods, Deadly
Digestions, The New Killer Tomatoes
—the Web page titles made him chuckle. Some had clever artwork, mimicking horror movies from the fifties. Others mocked the advertising of brand-name food products, showing such icons as a familiar but sickly cartoon lion offering some dubious green-looking cereal, the contents of the box reading like a chemistry set.
At the opposite end of the spectrum he found impossibly mundane articles documenting how plants, immunized with genes from such esoteric organisms as the cowpea chlorotic mottle virus, could pass the new genetic material on to any other microbe that happened to be living in their stems or leaves. Who cares, thought Steele, until he clicked on a link to
horizontal gene
transfer
. The article that popped up drove home why so many scientists were focused on the process.