The Suicide Effect (23 page)

After dragging the masks out to the garbage, he drank a glass of wine, hoping it would help him mellow out enough to sleep. It seemed to have the opposite effect. Rudker fired up his laptop and tried to get some work done, but he kept hearing the voice in his head mocking him, saying “vice-president of operations” over and over. His resentment mushroomed, and he fired off an e-mail to a head hunter he knew, asking if he knew of any executive openings in the pharma industry.

At midnight he went to bed. An hour later he got back up and slipped into some khakis. The Commander fired up with its usual roar. Rudker backed out of the garage and headed down the hill. The fog was so thick he had to crawl along even though no one else was on the road. He had no idea where he was going, but night driving with no traffic often helped him settle down.

Twenty minutes later he found himself parked across from Sula’s little house on Friendly Street. He knew she wasn’t there because Jimmy had watched her board a plane for Puerto Rico.

The PI had called back that afternoon to say he couldn’t find out when Sula’s return flight was scheduled. Rudker had ordered him to stay at the airport until she came back. At first, the little prick refused, then he had demanded double his hourly rate. Rudker was unconcerned with the cost. He didn’t think Jimmy would be at the airport that long. For Sula, it was probably a quick and dirty trip, and she would be back in a day or so.

He wasn’t very worried about what she would dig up either. Dr. Hernandez was no longer at the clinic, and—if things went according to plan—neither were the Rios’ files. Rudker had contacted an acquaintance at Mova Pharmaceuticals and called in a favor. Carlos had, in turn, called in a favor and someone would remove the files from the research center. How Carlos accomplished it, Rudker didn’t know or care. He suspected a clinic employee would simply be bribed to hand over the paperwork. The only question was, did it happen before Sula arrived at the clinic?

Rudker would have preferred to deal with the situation personally, but that simply wasn’t possible. Not only did Sula have a head start in getting to Puerto Rico, Rudker couldn’t leave town. Not with the expansion plans and the merger hanging on the city council’s approval.

A car pulled into a driveway two houses away. Rudker slumped down in his seat. A long-haired woman got out of a mini-van and walked up to the home. He couldn’t see her well, but she looked young, probably attractive. He thought about what he would do if someone noticed him. Or if the police stopped and questioned him. Did his breath smell like wine? Rudker popped a piece of cinnamon gum in his mouth. He would leave soon.

He wondered where Tara was tonight. Had she moved in with Doug? The thought heated his blood. He would have to find out who this guy was.
Teach him not to fuck with Karl Rudker. Teach him to keep his dick out of married women.
Rudker ignored the hostile ranting from the voice in his head. Doug would have to wait his turn.

Rudker knew he should get moving, but still he stayed and watched Sula’s house. He’d never lived alone before. In college, he’d had roommates, then he’d met and married Maribel. When she left him, Robbie had stayed and lived with him until Tara came along.

What was going on with Robbie anyway? His phone call had been so unusual. His son had never been much of a drinker. Like other young people, he preferred to smoke pot, but he’d never called while he was high before. Impulsively, Rudker scrolled through his contact list on his cell phone until he found the boy’s entry. He pushed call and let it ring four times before he remembered that it was one-thirty in the morning. He quickly disconnected. He would try Robbie again in the morning. Maybe they would go to lunch or see a movie this weekend. Rudker suddenly realized he missed his son. He couldn’t remember what they’d fought about the last time they were together.

Young people seemed so much more complex now than the students he’d gone to college with. Like Sula. He could not fathom what was driving her to be so intent on getting the PR suicide files. What possibly did she have to gain? Did she see herself as some kind of hero?

He stared at her tiny little house and wondered if she had any idea who she was up against. If not, she was about to find out. As soon as she set foot in the airport, Jimmy would let him know, then Rudker would put a stop to her nonsense once and for all.

Chapter 28

Friday, April 23, 8:47 a.m

Ruder got the call earlier than he expected. “Sula’s back and headed for the parking lot at the Eugene airport,” Jimmy reported.

“Follow her and call me if she goes anywhere but home.”

“When will I get a break?” Jimmy sounded weary.

“Soon. Once she’s in her house, call me and I’ll relieve you.”

“I’ll tally up my bill while I wait.”

Rudker went back to work on his comments for the company’s Q2 report. He had so much energy perking in his body, he could barely stay in his chair. He’d slept only a few hours, yet he felt hyper and charged with confidence. Today, things would go his way. He would take control of his world again.

Rudker channeled his energy into his quarterly statement, which came out more optimistic than he intended. The PR director would undoubtedly edit the hell out of it. Fine with him. Prolabs’ stock was at an all-time high of $48.76, as of 8:05 this morning. As long as the merger went through, stockholders would stay happy.

At 9:05, Cindy Taylor, his friend on the environmental committee, called. “We’re submitting our report to the commission this afternoon. Overall, we’ve given the project a greenlight. I thought you’d like to know.”

“Excellent. Thank you. Let me know when you kick off your run for mayor. I’ll be the first to donate to your campaign.”

“I’m announcing my candidacy next month at the Cinco de Mayo celebration.”

“I’ll get a check to you soon after. Good luck.”

“Thanks.” Cindy was off the line. That was one of the things he liked best about her. She got things done but didn’t waste time yapping about it.

Rudker felt his fortune turn. If he’d been a gambler, he would have bought a lottery ticket. Instead, he called his broker and bought 1,000 shares of a little nanotech company he’d been investigating. Might as well spread his luck around, give the little guys a boost.

Too excited to wait for Jimmy to call, Rudker buzzed the PI.

“JJ’s Investigations.”

Rudker hated the name, but Jimmy had come highly recommended as someone who could keep private matters private. “What’s the word on the girl?”

“Headed for home. She just turned on Friendly Street.”

“What took so long?”

“She stopped at Safeway.”

“Stay with her. I’ll relieve you later this afternoon.”

“Why do I have to stay? She was on an all-night flight from Puerto Rico. She’s going to crash as soon as she gets home.”

“You don’t know that. Don’t let her out of your sight.”

Rudker hung up before he had to listen to any more whining. Jimmy was probably right, but he wasn’t taking any chances.

She had only been gone for just over forty-eight hours but Sula was deliriously happy to be back on the ground in her little home in Eugene. She was exhausted, but she couldn’t rest, not yet.

She ate the Kung Po Chicken she’d picked up at the Safeway deli, then called Paul and left a brief message. “It’s Sula. I’m back. And I got DNA samples from both guys. A successful trip.”

The next call required courage she didn’t think she had. Sula paced the house with her phone in hand for ten minutes before she finally pressed the numbers. He answered on the second ring, sounding a little breathless.

“Aaron?”

“Yes.”

“It’s Sula Moreno. You called last week and invited me for coffee. If it’s not too late, I’d like to accept.”

“Sure. I’d like that. Hang on a sec, okay?”

She heard a door close, followed by the sound of a faucet. In a moment he was back. “Sorry. I just got back from a run and needed a drink of water.”

“It’s okay. I just got back from Puerto Rico.” Sula laughed. It made her sound like a seasoned traveler.

“Wow. I see why you didn’t call until now.”

“It’s been a crazy week.”

There was a pause. “I’ve got a lot going on over the next few days,” Aaron said after a moment. “What about Sunday afternoon, around three o’clock?”

“Great. Where?”

“Full City Coffee?”

“Sounds good. I’ll see you then.”

When she hung up, she realized she was shaking. It’s just coffee, she told herself. No need to be nervous. Or excited. Just coffee with a guy, an acquaintance.

Running on adrenaline, she unpacked her bag, threw a load of clothes in the washer, then took a shower. At noon she lay down. The two plastic bags with the Rios men’s hair samples sat on her dresser. She couldn’t stop thinking about them. Until they were packaged and in the mail to the FDA, her mission was not accomplished.

Sula got up, turned on her computer, and began a letter to Irene Johnson, an FDA public spokesperson she’d become friendly with while working at Prolabs. She tried to keep the letter simple, but her brain was tired and fuzzy and it took forty minutes to craft. Sula hoped her tone would seem concerned, but rational. In her first draft, she mentioned the disks disappearing from her home. Then she decided to cut that part. It made her sound too much like a wacko with active paranoia.

Finally, she hit print. Sula held her breath. Her printer was a garage sale special she’d picked up for five bucks. Sometimes it worked. Often, it did not.

She got lucky and the letter came out in the first try. The ink was more gray than black because she needed to replace the cartridge and was putting off spending the twenty-three dollars. Otherwise, she was pleased with her effort.

Working at the kitchen table, she stuffed the samples—plastic bags and all—into a small padded envelope, then put the letter and the small envelope into a bigger manila envelope. She scooted back to her computer to look up the FDA’s mailing address, then added it to the front and sealed the package.

Sula lay down again, but her brain kept buzzing from one thought to another. Scenes from her trip to Puerto Rico kept playing in her head. Marta had been so angry, and Lucia had been so helpful. Everybody reacted differently to death. She could see Lucia’s warm face suppressing a smile as she spoke into the tape recorder.

The cassette. Shit. She’d forgotten to put Lucia’s taped statement into the FDA package. Sula jumped out of bed and trotted up the hall. The recorder was still in her shoulder bag on the kitchen table. She dug it out and hit rewind. It seemed to take forever. Which struck her as odd, because Lucia’s statement had been quite brief.

When the machine finally clicked off, she pressed play to see how the recording sounded. All she could hear were muffled voices in the background. Had she accidentally been recording while the machine was in her purse? Sula let it play for a moment, waiting for Lucia’s voice to come on. Instead she heard Rudker say, “Nonsense. The percentage of suicides in the Puerto Rico trial was lower than the national average.”

Sula was stunned. It was the conversation she’d recorded outside the conference room last week. Before, she had only played back the first few minutes, but it had been so bad, she’d written the whole thing off. Rudker’s statement about suicides clearly indicated there had been adverse events in the Puerto Rico trial, and now those files were missing. FDA officials would be interested in the discrepancy.

Sula played out the tape. None of what Warner said was decipherable, but Rudker came though a few more times. Eventually, she heard Lucia’s voice talking about her husband’s lock of hair. While the cassette rewound, Sula wondered if the investigators at FDA would be curious enough about the tape—and her report of the conversation—to have it analyzed. The FBI, or even the Washington DC police, would have the technology to enhance the tape quality and volume. Maybe some of what Warner said could be understood as well. This tape was all that was left of Warner’s personal feelings about her discovery. Someone needed to hear it.

Sula peeled the envelope open and slipped the microcassette in. She resealed it with clear packaging tape, then headed back to the bed. After a minute, she got up for the third time and set her alarm for four o’clock that afternoon. She only wanted to nap for a few hours, so she sleep that night. Tomorrow was her day with Tate and it was time to get her life back to normal.

As Rudker left work, his secretary gave him a sidelong glance. It was his second day of leaving early after six years of staying late.
Fuck her, the ugly bitch. Really, you should fire her for that.
The voice was insistent. Maybe he would.

His first stop was at Enterprise Rent a Car on Garfield. Rudker parked his vehicle on 9th Avenue and walked to the rental. The young man behind the counter ignored him for a moment while he finished something on the computer, then greeted him cheerfully.

“I need a car for the next two days.” Rudker pulled out his wallet as he spoke.

“Small or mid-sized?”

“Mid-sized.” Rudker fingered the driver’s license he’d found in the taxi.

“How about a Ford Taurus?”

“Okay.” Under any other circumstances, he would have said no thanks. But being commonplace would be useful to his plans.

“Would you like to put this on a credit card?”

“No. What’s your daily rate?”

“Forty-seven plus taxes, plus mileage.”

Rudker pulled out four fifties and handed them to the clerk. “This will cover three days.”

The young man hesitated. “I need to see your driver’s license.”

Rudker gave him Richard Morgenstern’s ID. The clerk entered the number into the computer and handed it back without ever looking up to compare images.

“You need to fill it with gas before you return it or we charge for that too.” They went out to the lot, and five minutes later Rudker was driving away.

His next stop was the Wetlands tavern. The place was dark and packed with a happy hour crowd. Perfect. Rudker picked up a beer at the bar counter, then moved around the room, pretending to keep an eye on the basketball game. He was really looking for a cell phone. After a few minutes, he spotted one on a table, where two guys were watching the game. He leaned against a nearby wall and focused on the TV, while keeping an eye on the cell phone three feet away.