Jordan’s eyes swept the hallway for Cerino’s man. Stepping across the hall, he peered into the surgical waiting room. He was encouraged when he didn’t see the gaunt man anyplace.
Turning back into the surgical lounge, Jordan sighed. He was relieved that Lou had left. The meeting with him had left Jordan feeling more rattled than ever, and it wasn’t only because of the fear that Cerino’s man would see them talking. Jordan sensed the detective didn’t like him much, and that could mean trouble. Jordan was afraid he’d have to put up with the man’s annoying presence in the future.
Stepping into the men’s locker room, Jordan splashed his face with cold water. He needed to pull himself together to try to relax a moment before going into the OR and doing Cerino. But it wasn’t easy. So much was happening. His mind was in a turmoil.
One of the thoughts that was particularly disturbing was that he’d realized there was one way that the five homicides were related, including Mary O’Connor. He’d realized it while Lou Soldano had been talking with him, but Jordan had chosen not to say anything about it. And the fact that he had so chosen confused him. He didn’t know if the reason he’d not mentioned it was because he wasn’t sure of its significance or because it scared him. Jordan certainly did not want to become a victim himself.
Walking down toward the operating room where Paul Cerino was waiting, Jordan decided that the safest course of action for him was to do nothing. After all, he was in the middle.
Suddenly Jordan stopped. He’d realized something else. Despite all these problems, he was doing more surgery than ever. There had to be another part to it all. As he started walking again, it all began to make a kind of grotesque, malicious sense. He picked up his pace. Definitely playing dumb was the way he should handle it. It was the safest by far. And he liked to do surgery.
Pushing into the operating room, he went up to Cerino, who was significantly sedated.
“We’ll have you done in no time,” Jordan said. “Just relax.”
After giving Cerino a pat on the shoulder, Jordan turned and headed out to scrub. As he passed one of the orderlies in scrubs, he realized it wasn’t one of the orderlies. Jordan had recognized the eyes. It was the gaunt one.
11
* * *
4:30 p.m., Friday
Manhattan
Laurie was hesitant to visit the lab again. She didn’t want to risk another run-in with John DeVries. But attempting any more paperwork just then was ridiculous. She was far too distracted. She decided to find Peter. Surely he had to have more results by then.
“I know you promised to call if you found anything,” Laurie said once she’d found him, “but I couldn’t help but stop by just to check how you were doing.”
“I haven’t found a contaminant yet,” Peter said. “But I did learn something that might be significant. Cocaine is metabolized in the body in a variety of different ways producing a variety of metabolites. One of the metabolites is called benzoylecgonine. When I calculated the ratio of cocaine and benzoylecgonine in the blood, urine, and brain of your victims, I can estimate the amount of time from injection to death.”
“And what did you find?” Laurie asked.
“I found it was pretty consistent,” Peter said. “Roughly an hour in thirteen of the fourteen. But in one of the cases it was different. For some reason Robert Evans had practically no benzoylecgonine at all.”
“Meaning?” Laurie questioned.
“Meaning that Robert Evans died very quickly,” Peter said. “Maybe within minutes. Maybe even less, I really can’t say.”
“What do you think the significance is?” Laurie questioned.
“I don’t know,” Peter said. “You’re the medical detective, not me.”
“I suppose he could have suffered an instantaneous cardiac arrhythmia.”
Peter shrugged. “Whatever,” he said. “And I haven’t given up on a contaminant. But if I find something, it’s going to be in nanomoles.”
Leaving the toxicology department, Laurie felt discouraged. Despite all her efforts she didn’t feel any further along in her investigation of these unlikely overdoses than she had been at the start. Intending to talk again with George Fontworth and have him explain what had surprised him on the autopsies, Laurie descended to the basement level and poked her head into the autopsy room. She didn’t see George, but she saw Vinnie and asked about George.