“How did it go last night?” Misha demanded. “Needless to say, we need to know.”
“Taking out the anesthesiologist went like a dream. No problems whatsoever.”
“I know about the anesthesiogist,” Misha snapped. “I’m referring to the damn medical students. I talked with Timur Kortnev, and he filled me in about their strange activities last night and that she ended up in Vandermeer’s house. I need to know if you think what you did was adequate so I can tell Fyodor, who wants to brief the hospital CEO.”
“I suppose I’d have to say it went reasonably,” Darko said.
“Reasonably doesn’t sound adequate, my friend, especially coming from you. Did she get the message?”
“I warned her. I even slapped her around a bit, but I never got to scare her as much as I planned.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Her friend showed up in the middle of things and got the jump on me. To make matters worse, she got ahold of the gun, and I had to get the hell out of there before I had the chance to do her.”
Misha stared at Darko with his mouth agape.
“I didn’t have any choice. If I had stayed, I would have had to kill at least one of them, if not both. I left for the good of the program.”
“Maybe it would have been better if you had killed them.”
“I wasn’t going to do that unless I knew that was what Sergei or Fyodor would have wanted. Anyway, we know she got the message.”
“How do we know?”
“Because they didn’t call the police. I told her we’d do her sisters and mother if she did, and obviously she didn’t. We would have heard.”
“Do you have any idea why she was at Vandermeer’s house?”
“She and Vandermeer were lovers.”
“Shit!” Misha snapped. “Security should have found that out before we chose him as a test subject. Getting one of our goddamned medical students involved is a fucking big-ass mistake. Now she and her friend may have to be eliminated like Wykoff to clean this up.”
“No problem, if that’s what you and Fyodor want.”
“The trouble is that eliminating a couple of socially connected medical students will ignite a hell of an investigation, something we don’t want or need.”
“That’s why I didn’t kill them last night,” Darko said.
“I’ll talk it over with Fyodor,” Misha said irritably. “But for now we will just need to keep a close eye on them. I’ll leave it up to you and Timur. She will not recognize you, will she?”
“What do you think I am, a fucking amateur?”
41.
Wednesday, April 8, 12:38 P.M.
There’s a bunch of free tables back against the far wall,” Michael said, nodding his head in the general direction. He and Lynn had just met up in the cafeteria after she had texted him to meet there. She had just come from parking Carl’s Cherokee in the garage. He had come from the ophthalmology clinic. Once again he could tell she was juiced about something.
“I see it,” Lynn said. “Let’s take it! We’ll have some privacy.” She was carrying a large manila folder under her arm while holding on to her cafeteria tray with both hands. The cafeteria was in full swing with the usual lunchtime crowd. Just getting through the cafeteria line had taken almost a quarter of an hour. Surrounded by people, some of whom they knew, they hadn’t talked about anything serious. Lynn had had to bite her tongue to keep from telling him what she had done.
Just as Michael and Lynn were sitting down, Ronald Metzner appeared out of nowhere, having spied them from the checkout. “Hey, guys,” he said, sliding his tray onto the table. It was a four-top. “You are both in luck. Wait until you hear the joke of the day. Did you ever hear the one about...?”
“Ronald,” Lynn said, interrupting. “I know this is going to come as a surprise to you, but maybe later for the joke. Michael and I have something private to discuss. Would you mind?”
“It’s a quickie,” Ronald said, almost pleading. “It’s really funny.”
“Please,” Lynn persisted.
“Okay, okay,” Ronald said. He hoisted his tray back up and scanned the room for a more receptive audience. “Catch you later,” he added, and walked off.
“I hated doing that,” Lynn confessed, watching Ronald head to the sitting area outside. “There is something forlorn about Ron.”
“I know what you’re saying,” Michael offered.
“Anyway, I want to show you what I got.” Lynn slipped the copies of the building plans out of the folder. They had been reduced to standard paper size, eight and a half by eleven inches. “I went down to the Charleston Building Commission to see if I could find plans of the Shapiro. I hit pay dirt.”
Michael took the sheaf of printouts, which was stapled in the upper left-hand corner. He glanced at the first page. “My God, you need a damn magnifying glass.”
“It’s small but legible,” Lynn said. “You have to hold it close. They couldn’t copy them without reducing them.”
Michael did as Lynn suggested. “Okay, what am I looking at?”
“The first six pages are the floor plans of the Shapiro. From the outside the building looks like it’s a bit more than two stories tall, but actually it is six, with four floors under grade. The floor you went in on and the one connected to the hospital is actually the fifth floor.”
“That’s odd. I wonder why.”
“I guess the designers felt the inmates wouldn’t be interested in a view,” Lynn said, making a stab at humor. “I suppose from the standpoint of heating and cooling, it is a lot more efficient. Maybe they also didn’t want the institute to stand out too much. I mean, it looks big enough the way it is, especially with so few windows, but no one can imagine how big it really is.”
“There’s more than six pages here,” Michael said, leafing through the entire collection before going back to the first page for a closer look.
“There are twelve pages,” Lynn explained. “The last six are the HVAC plans.”
“HVAC plans?” Michael asked with a crooked smile and an exaggerated quizzical expression. “Now, that’s going to come in handy.”
“Don’t be a wiseass,” Lynn snapped. She snatched the plans out of Michael’s grasp and put them down on the table. “You can be as sarcastic as you like, but mark my words: this little treasure trove is going to be a big help when we get in there.”
“If we get in there,” Michael corrected. “There’s still the hurdle of the thumbprint touchscreen.”
“I’m going to work on it right after lunch.”
“The hell you will!” Michael said. “You were assigned patients today in the ophthalmology clinic. I had to see mine and yours this morning. I’m not going to cover for you this afternoon in dermatology. I hate dermatology. We’re lucky you weren’t missed this morning.”
“Okay,” Lynn said soothingly. “We can talk about it.”
“Bullshit!” Michael said. “We decided you’re going back to being a medical student. That means coming to the lectures and the clinic. You know what I’m saying?”
“Okay! All right,” Lynn said. She put her hand on Michael’s forearm to calm him down. “Don’t get so bent out of shape.”
“I won’t get so bent out of shape if you hold up your end of the bargain. We have a lot of powerful people who are on our case.”
“Okay, okay, enough already,” Lynn said. She motioned back at the floor plans and pointed out the two relatively large rooms labeled CLUSTER A and CLUSTER B. “That’s where I think the patients are kept on each floor.”