‘EvenHealth?’
Felicia stepped forward. ‘Work with us, Doctor.’
Dr Ostermann’s face paled even more and he leaned back against the desk. ‘I wonder. What would your Inspector say to all this? Or perhaps your Deputy Chief. He and I know each other, you know. I am a well-known contributor to the Police Mutual Benevolent Association, and have been for many years.’
Striker grinned. ‘The chief would care as much as the media would if, say, this thing got leaked and they learned we were seizing your patients’ files.’
Dr Ostermann said no more, and a distant, horrified look filled his eyes, as if he was picturing the nightmare that could unfold.
Striker gave Felicia a quick glance, saw the concern in her eyes, and knew she would give it to him later. But for now, he had the upper hand, and he knew it. He met Dr Ostermann’s stare and said, ‘So what’s it going to be, Doctor? Are we going to help each other out, or not? We are on the same team, after all, right?’
Dr Ostermann’s posture sagged and he let out a tight breath. ‘Same team. Yes. Yes, of course.’ He moved gingerly around his desk and sat down in the high-backed leather chair. He opened the drawer. Pulled out the green file folder he had been carrying when he entered the room. He flipped wearily through the pages, then dropped the whole thing on the desktop.
‘His name is Billy Stephen Mercury,’ he finally confessed. ‘As I am sure you well know. He has been a patient of mine for quite some time now, ever since his return from overseas.’ His eyes flitted to the DVD player, then back at Striker. ‘We are off the record here?’
‘Of course.’
He nodded. ‘Billy was a soldier, suffering badly. Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, just like the DVD says. Barely sleeping. And self-medicating to deal with the pain. Delusional. One step away from being psychotic. When he was here, he was a very hard patient to deal with at times.’
Felicia asked, ‘When he was here?’
‘Yes, when. The medications helped greatly. And Billy did progress. He was released because of this – as part of the outpatient programme. And for a while, he was doing quite well on his own. We always kept tabs on him, of course. He had to see one of our psychiatrists regularly. But that was mostly to reassess the medications and make sure they were working. Make sure he was taking them as prescribed. The majority of his healing came through one of the EvenHealth programmes.’
‘Which particular programme?’
‘We called it SILC – Social Independence and Life Coping skills. The programme was designed to help some of our more stable patients gain their independence through what we called the trinity approach – regular counselling, group therapy sessions, and home visits. For some – for most – of the patients, SILC worked quite well. But for Billy, well, there were setbacks.’
‘What kind of setbacks?’ Striker asked.
‘Medication-related, mostly. Which sounds simple enough. But the medication was the only thing controlling his delusions. The group therapy sessions . . . these were aimed at the depression.’
‘And where exactly is Billy now?’
Dr Ostermann splayed his hands. ‘That’s the problem. I can’t get a hold of him. He is supposed to call into the office daily, but I’m afraid to say he hasn’t done so for quite some time. Almost a week.’ The doctor shook his head sadly. ‘This . . . unreliability was one of the reasons why he was removed from the group.’
‘Removed from the group, but not from the entire programme?’ Striker clarified.
‘Of course not, this is a rehabilitative programme, not a punitive one.’
‘You said, one of the reasons?’ Felicia noted.
Dr Ostermann nodded slowly. ‘Well, yes, there were other reasons as well.’
Striker pressed the issue. ‘What were they, Doctor?’
‘Billy had certain . . . obsessions.’
‘With what?’
‘More like with who,’ Dr Ostermann replied. He looked away from them for a brief moment and his lips puckered. ‘Billy was obsessed with Mandy Gill.’
‘Jesus Christ,’ Striker said. ‘You’re only telling us this now?’
Dr Ostermann raised his hands in surrender. ‘It was never in a violent way,’ he insisted. ‘These were completely non-violent obsessions, I can assure you of that. Billy was never a . . . violent person.’
‘He was a soldier,’ Striker pointed out. ‘He is at least familiar with violence.’
Dr Ostermann tilted his head as he spoke. ‘Billy may have been a soldier, but he was a communications officer first,’ he explained.
‘Communications officer or not, he is still trained for violence,’ Striker replied.
‘Did he have obsessions with any of the other patients or staff?’ Felicia asked.
‘Well, yes. There was another, yes.’
Striker felt his blood pressure rising. ‘Names, Doctor. Names.’
‘She was another one of the patients. Her name is Sarah Rose.’
The surname meant nothing to Striker, but the first name made him pause. Sarah? Wasn’t that one of the names written down on the large piece of paper back at Larisa’s home? He looked at Felicia, and she nodded; she too had made the connection.
‘Sarah was the only one who really looked out for Billy,’ Dr Ostermann continued. ‘The only one who genuinely cared for him. I guess she was Billy’s only, well, friend. They became close. Too close. A romantic relationship, I believe – which was strictly against the rules of the therapy. I was forced to remove them from the group. It was for this very reason Sarah broke off their relationship.’
Striker couldn’t believe his ears.
‘Broke off their relationship?’ He swore out loud. This was more than a mental health nightmare, it was a possible drugfuelled domestic. He calmed his mind down and focused on the basics.
‘Were Sarah and Mandy close?’ he asked.
The doctor seemed perplexed by the question. ‘Yes, I believe they were. As close as anyone could get to Sarah – she was quite introverted, you know. Almost a recluse. It was all I could do, at times, to have her attend the counselling sessions. One time, I even had to get my receptionist to—’
‘Hold on a second,’ Striker said. ‘Sarah Rose isn’t one of the in-house patients?’
‘Oh dear lord, no. Sarah’s depression is quite treatable.’
‘So she’s not actually here? She’s out there on her own?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Give me her telephone number.’
‘Sarah does not have a telephone, but I do have her address.’
‘Then give me that, and a photograph of the woman if you have one.’
From his desk, Dr Ostermann pulled out a file and removed a photocopy of a picture of the woman. He also pulled out an old-fashioned Rolodex, found the address, then wrote it down on a yellow Post-it note. ‘This is the most current information we have on Sarah.’
Striker took the photocopy of the woman’s picture as well as the Post-it note. ‘We can finish this discussion later,’ he said. ‘Right now, we have to check on this woman’s welfare. You had better hope, Doctor, that she’s okay.’
Dr Ostermann’s face took on a tight expression, but he said nothing back.
Striker turned and gave Felicia a nod, and the two left the office and made their way down the long dark corridors of the Riverglen Mental Health Facility. They returned to their car, got inside, and headed towards Vancouver. Destination: the Oppenheimer area. More specifically, the violent slums of Princess Avenue.
It was time to see Sarah Rose.
Forty
The Adder sat in the driver’s seat of a plain white van. A GMC with double back doors and no rear windows. It could have been a work van. It could have been a delivery van, or any one of the old privately owned heaps around town. There were a million of them.