Sykes frowned. “Actually, Muriel owes him. I just have to break the news to her that she’ll be the guest of honor at their next fund-raiser,” he said. “I’ve done my part. What’s next?”
“We do ours,” Kylie said. “A mammogram machine that is 40 percent more effective at detecting breast cancer is newsworthy. We’ll have our PIO reach out to the media to spread the word. Then we’ll meet with ESU and the head of security at Hudson to work out the logistics. Do you want us to keep you in the loop as we go along?”
“Nobody likes a micromanager,” Sykes said. “You don’t have to report back to me till you’ve got those people locked up. But before I bow out, I have one message to pass on to the two of you from Phil Landsberg. He said, ‘You can let those bastards into my hospital, but whatever you do, don’t let them out.’”
By four p.m. the plan was in full swing. All we needed was for the gang to take the bait and move Hudson to the top of their hit list. At six we left the office.
“Did you tell Cheryl where we’re going tonight?” Kylie asked as we slogged through rush hour traffic on the FDR.
“Not exactly.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I told her you and I would be working late, but she didn’t ask me for the details, so I didn’t volunteer. Plus she’s going out to dinner and the theater with her mom, so she won’t be home until eleven. If we’re lucky, I’ll be back by then.”
Traffic opened up after 34th, and we got to the Downtown Manhattan Heliport by 6:35. Rodrigo was waiting for us in the VIP lounge.
“When we get to the hotel, go to the front desk and ask for your key,” he said. “Just say ‘Mrs. Harrington, room 1178.’ Your name is in the computer.”
“I don’t have an ID with my married name,” Kylie said.
“Don’t worry. They won’t ask,” Rodrigo said. “It gets pretty noisy once we’re in the air. Any more questions?”
“Just one,” Kylie said. “I’ve had my IT people monitor Spence’s credit cards, but so far we haven’t gotten a hit. How did he check into the Borgata?”
“Corporate card. Silvercup Studios.” Rodrigo was not the chatty type. “We good?” he asked, signaling an end to the conversation.
Kylie nodded, and he led us across the tarmac to a waiting Sikorsky S-76C. According to the brochure tucked in our seat pockets, the Borgata was the biggest hotel in Jersey, with a 161,000-square-foot casino, a 54,000-square-foot spa, and a 2,400-seat event center.
“Spence should be easy to find,” Kylie said. “He’ll be holed up in his room.”
Thirty-seven minutes after liftoff we set down on the Steel Pier in Atlantic City. A car was waiting to drive us the two miles to the Borgata. Q had covered all the bases.
Walking into the main entrance of the hotel, my senses were bombarded by the over-the-top grandeur of the decor and the nerve-jangling flashing lights and clanging bells of the slot machines.
There were three clerks at the reception desk. “The one on the left,” Rodrigo directed.
Kylie walked up to him, said a few words, and the clerk responded with a broad smile and a flat plastic room key.
“Smooth as silk,” Rodrigo said as the three of us walked toward the elevator.
There was a Do Not Disturb sign hanging on Spence’s door. Kylie looked at me and silently mouthed two words: Thank you. Then she took the key card, slid it into the lock, and pulled it out. A green light flashed, and she pushed the door open hard.
Spence, wearing nothing but boxer shorts and a single sock, was lying on the carpet, faceup, a trail of wet vomit trickling from the side of his mouth.
His drug kit had spilled onto the floor, and an empty syringe was only inches from his motionless body.
Chapter 51
The number of heroin overdose deaths among young white males has skyrocketed in recent years, and from the looks of him, Spence Harrington was well on his way to becoming the latest statistic.
His lips had a blue tinge, his pupils were black pinholes, and the ominous death rattle that came from the back of his throat was a sure sign that his respiratory system was shutting down permanently.
Kylie dropped to her knees and tried to breathe for him, but he was unresponsive. “Narcan!” she yelled. “My bag.”
I grabbed her black leather handbag, turned it upside down, and everything poured out: money, makeup, tampons, keys, and then a small blue pouch with large white letters printed on it.
In the war against drugs, Narcan — naloxone hydrochloride — is saving lives one junkie at a time. Normally it’s issued to 911 responders, but Kylie had had the presence of mind to grab a kit at the station before we left.
I tilted Spence’s head back while she loaded the syringe, inserted one end into Spence’s nostril, and sprayed half the liquid up his nose. Then she switched to the other nostril, gave another short, vigorous push on the plunger, and shot the rest of the naloxone toward his brain receptors.
It worked instantly, and Spence bolted up, coughing, cursing, and fighting us off. There was no gratitude, just anger — the addict’s natural reaction when you screw up his high.
“Rodrigo,” Kylie said, “this stuff wears off in less than an hour. We’ve got to get him to a hospital.”
“I’m already on it, boss,” he said, cell phone to his ear. He swept his hand across the room. “This is nasty shit to leave for the chambermaid.”
Kylie grabbed Spence’s overnight bag from the closet and began picking up the drug paraphernalia.
I bent down to give her a hand.
“Don’t!” she said.
I backed off. She was destroying evidence at a crime scene, and she didn’t want me to help. “But you can put my stuff back in my bag,” she said.
There was a loud knock at the door.
“Housekeeping,” a deep male voice said.
Rodrigo opened the door, and three stone-faced men in dark suits entered, one pushing a wheelchair. Without a word, two of them lifted Spence up off the floor, plopped him down in the chair, and seat-belted him in tight.
I retrieved Kylie’s belongings while the extraction team helped her scoop up Spence’s shoes, pants, and whatever might connect him to the makeshift drug den. Less than thirty seconds after they arrived, they ushered us out the door. Dark Suits One and Two led the way down the long corridor, followed by the man pushing the wheelchair, then Kylie, then me. Rodrigo brought up the rear.
Spence was ranting about his rights, but none of the suits cared enough to shut him up. A young couple passed us in the hallway and barely looked at us. I got the feeling that seeing a phalanx of people remove a crazy man from an Atlantic City hotel was not all that unusual.
The entire operation was perfectly choreographed: service elevator to an underground garage to an unmarked van for the two-mile drive to AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center. As soon as they handed Spence over to the ER docs, the rescue team from housekeeping disappeared, and Rodrigo escorted us to a VIP waiting room.
Forty-five minutes later, a bleary-eyed young resident walked in and said, “Harrington.”
Kylie stood up. “How is he?”
“Lucky to be alive,” the doc said, his tone clearly unsympathetic to those who clutter up his ER with self-inflicted wounds. “He has bilateral pneumonia. His lungs were compromised by the vomit he aspirated, so we’re keeping him on an IV antibiotic drip for the next seventy-two hours.”
“But he’ll be okay,” Kylie said, looking for reassurance.
The doctor shrugged. “This time around.”
“Can I see him?”