Then, with an unpleasant gnawing in his gut, he slid Patricia Moriarity’s business card to the center of his blotter and called.
CHAPTER 10
Six minutes after Will ended his conversation with Patricia Moriarity, two uniformed state policemen, sirens blaring, arrived at the Fredrickston Medical Arts Building and began the process of sealing it off. There were at least a dozen different practices of varying specialties in the building, in addition to a pharmacy, an optician, and a bagel store. Will knew that for at least the rest of the morning, there would be massive inconvenience for all of them.
Susan was doing a case in the hospital, and Jim Katz had the day off. But Gordo had arrived in his office while Will was speaking with Grace Davis. Now he was stuck there, and not at all pleased about it. Arms folded, his bulk threatening to overwhelm his desk chair, he stroked his beard and gaped over at Will in disbelief.
“Willy, now tell me again,” he said, “just what are ye doin’ consorting with a murderer?”
“Hey, you’ve got it backward, Gordo. It’s him. . or her. . or them. . or it-I couldn’t even tell, for chrissakes-that’s consorting with me. Because of the things I said at the forum last night, the bastard has decided that I’m a kindred spirit of his-a brother in the war against managed care is how he put it. In fact, I had this feeling while I was listening to him that he might have actually been there last night.”
“That gives me the willies-or maybe out of deference to you I should say the creeps. How could they have gotten into this building and then into your office?”
“I was hoping you might be able to come up with a theory to explain that.”
“Well, given the crack security company that watches over this place, my guess is an entire terrorist cell could be operating here every night without being noticed.”
“You might be right. Think we ought to try and get in touch with Jim?”
“I can’t imagine something like this happening and him not wanting to know about it. In case you hadn’t noticed, he’s a wee bit of a control freak.”
“I’ll have Mimi try and find him.”
At that instant the receptionist called in over the intercom. “Dr. Cameron, would you tell Dr. Grant that Detective Moriarity is out here looking for him?”
“Consider it done, lass. Do us a favor and see if ye can locate Dr. Katz.”
Her expression businesslike, Patricia Moriarity shook Will’s hand, then motioned him over to the corner of the waiting room farthest from the receptionist. She was wearing a black hip-length leather jacket over dark slacks and a light blue sweater. Will couldn’t help but notice that the only ring she wore was on the third finger of her right hand.
“Dr. Grant, the crime-scene people will be here any moment to go over your office. Is there a place we can speak in private?”
“We have two empty physician’s offices. Either one would be fine.”
“You choose.”
Will led her to Susan’s consultation room, which was on the side of the suite directly opposite Gordo’s. The size and setup of the room were nearly identical to Will’s, but the modern art on the wall and extra touches Susan had added to the basic decor-curtains with a repeating Parisian street scene and a small reading table by the bookshelf-made it quite distinctively hers. Moriarity pulled one of the patients’ chairs away from the desk and motioned Will to the other. Then she flipped open a notepad and slid a government-issue pen from the wire.
“Dr. Grant,” she began, with no pleasantries or even a mention that they had met just twelve hours before, “what on earth were you thinking when you pulled that envelope out of your desk and opened it before calling me?”
Will took a few seconds to stabilize himself.
“I. . I think I was so bewildered and frightened by the call that I wasn’t really thinking straight.”
“And there was nothing about the caller’s voice that you recognized?”
“It was totally mechanical. In fact, whoever it was might have been typing the words into a computer that then read them over the phone.”
“That technology is available.”
Even when she was writing, Patty kept her eyes on Grant. Despite what she had learned of the man-his temper, his history of violence, his suspected though apparently never documented association with an explosion that had killed a man-he had a vulnerability and sensitivity about him that seemed real. She reminded herself that if sociopaths had a major, it was gentleness and genuineness-just ask those who knew charming Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy, who dressed as a clown to entertain hospitalized children. As far as she was concerned, until proven otherwise, this man was a suspect in three violent murders.
Will forced himself to remain calm as Moriarity grilled him about his whereabouts at the time each of the three managed-care executives was killed. He expected the questions-even without a phone call like the one he had just received, others in the Hippocrates Society had been interviewed-but not the icy, disbelieving tone in which they were delivered. Even with the help of his calendar, the firmest alibi he could come up with was that on the nights of two of the murders-Morales and Rising-he was on call in the hospital. Of course, he was forced to admit, with his pager he could just as easily have been outside the hospital as in. If there was an emergency requiring his immediate presence, there might have been a problem, but in most situations he could have bought some time by giving instructions to the nurses and the resident on duty. The morning of Cyrill Davenport’s execution, he was at home, trying as usual when he wasn’t on call to catch up on lost sleep.
After writing down his responses, Moriarity again took him step by step through the minutes preceding, during, and following the eerie call. She was clinical if not cold, and even the most innocent attempt on his part to inject anything light or personal was immediately stonewalled. It did not take long before the fact that she had the sort of scrubbed, earthy good looks that most appealed to him was lost in the chill of her interrogation and in the realization that she did not believe his only connection to the murderer was through the phone call.
“Dr. Grant, tell me again why you think there is more than one killer?” she asked.
Will consulted his notes and read off each time the words we or us were spoken by the caller.
“You have no idea how the killer could have gotten your private, inside line?”
“None at all. It’s not like it’s the combination to Fort Knox, though. People do have the number.”
“And you have no idea how the killer or someone associated with the killer could have gotten into your office?”
“The maintenance people in this building probably make eight-fifty an hour. It wouldn’t take much to get one of them to put the envelope in my desk. Hell, with what I earn, it wouldn’t take much to bribe me into doing it.”
“There’s nothing funny about this, Dr. Grant.”
“And there’s nothing funny about you insinuating that I might have murdered three people,” he snapped back.
“Did you?”
“No. Why would I call you about a phone call that never happened and put that envelope in my desk?”