Too Near the Edge (22 page)

It was about 6:00 by then, Miguel had
finished his mango and gone off to the playground, and the family
had started to pack up. We said goodbye and followed the pedestrian
path along the bridge over Boulder Creek, through the tunnel under
Canyon Boulevard, and across another bridge over the Farmers Ditch
back to my house.

I had a new Merlot I’d been wanting to try,
so we took the bottle and a couple of glasses out to the patio. I
told Pablo I needed to tell him about what had been going on with
Sharon’s situation and with my involvement. I made it clear he
didn’t have to believe in Tyler or any of Sharon’s contact
experiences, but that I needed to tell him the whole story. He took
a big drink of wine, and agreed to listen.

I went through it all, trying not to leave
anything out—even the parts that could make me look flaky. Pablo
was much more concerned about what was going on with Dr. Ahmed, and
about Erik’s plant-growing business than he was about what might
have happened to Adam. Strangely, he didn’t know about the
complaint Waycroft had made about me. Of course, Pablo lives in
Longmont, doesn’t get the Boulder paper—actually he’s usually too
busy to read any paper. Still, you’d think someone would have told
him about it. But maybe they thought it was too much of a ticklish
situation.

After he heard all I had to say, Pablo was
full of warnings. “Cleo, you’re in way over your head with this Dr.
Ahmed situation,” he said, using his overbearing police-detective
voice. “You have no idea how dangerous he may be. You should steer
clear of him and anyone connected to him.”

I tried to keep it light. “That could be a
little hard to do. He is Gramma’s doctor after all.”

“Come on, Cleo. You know what I mean. It’s
one thing to talk to him about Martha’s care, but you’d be better
off not prying into his other activities. And that guy Erik is
beginning to sound more and more like some kind of con artist after
whatever money he can get from anyone.”

No surprise there. Pablo had disliked Erik
from the get-go. I tried to get him to rethink that reaction. “I
know you don’t like Erik, Pablo. But I’m wondering how much of the
way you feel about him has to do with his spending time with
me.”

“Mostly, I just don’t see why you would want
to get involved with someone who’s out to rip people off with
sleazy business deals.”

“I haven’t invested any money in his
business. He gave me the plants as a gift.”

“Whatever, Cleo. I guess he’s not as
important to you as this situation you’ve gotten into with Sharon.
You should let that go. You’re not a detective. If the police think
there’s anything to investigate, they’ll do it. But your
involvement is creating trouble for you and for Sharon. Now you’ve
got this complaint against you, and who knows what else her father
may come up with if you keep on.”

I knew everything he said came from a place
of concern for me. I didn’t like hearing it, but I listened to what
he had to say. I didn’t agree I should back off of helping Sharon,
but I decided not to get into it with him about that. I simply
said, “You’re right that the whole thing has turned out to be more
complicated than I expected.” Most likely he thought I would take
his advice, but of course I had no intention of doing that.

All in all, Pablo wasn’t a lot of help. He
did say he’d see what he could find out about Adam’s stolen
computer and the strange phone message on Adam’s machine.

I figured that was pretty much all he was
going to offer, so I decided to move on. My mind’s eye flashed back
to the young couples kissing in the creek that afternoon. I wanted
that tenderness and intimacy with Pablo, but we weren’t going to
get there with the discussion we were having. So I said, “Thanks
for listening, Pablo. And I appreciate your suggestions. But I
don’t think there’s much more to say about it right now.”

I asked him about a few friends we’d known
back in college when we were all art majors and we talked lazily
for a while about who’d gotten their art into shows and how they
were doing. Pablo told me how excited he was about a conference on
marketing for artists he was going to in Oregon the next week, and
we fantasized about finding ways to make good money from our art.
Then I got up, walked over to his chair, leaned down, and gave him
a soft kiss. He pulled me on to his lap for more kisses. When
tenderness gave way to passion, we made our way to the bedroom. For
a minute I had the strange feeling Tyler was watching us, but I
quickly got caught up in our lovemaking and forgot about it.

Before Pablo left in the morning, he reissued
his warnings. I smiled sweetly and ignored the lot.

On Monday I had a busy morning with clients.
By noon voice messages were piled up on my phone. One was from
Sharon, asking me to drop by her office if I came over to Shady
Terrace to visit Gramma. I was already feeling guilty about not
visiting Gramma over the weekend and had planned to go over after
my 1:00 client.

When I got there, I noticed a police car in
the parking lot. I went by Sharon’s office to see what was up. Her
door was closed, but looking through the glass side panels, I saw a
policeman and two men in suits talking with her. I decided to go on
to visit Gramma and stop by to see Sharon after. But she noticed me
walking by, and came out and got me. The men in suits turned out to
be drug enforcement agents investigating Dr. Ahmed. Sharon wanted
me to tell them what I had overheard in the hall outside Dr.
Ahmed’s office a week ago Saturday. They had a bunch of questions,
but I didn’t know anything other than what I’d heard in the
conversation between Ahmed and the unidentified woman in his
office, so they didn’t keep me long.

Over on the Alzheimer’s unit, staff were
whispering to each other in corners. Tanya pretty much ignored me.
The residents were agitated, as if picking up the bad vibes
somehow. I found Gramma in her room. As soon as she saw me, she
asked, “When will James be here? I need to see James.” Her eyes
darted around the room and she fidgeted with the buttons on her
blouse.

“He’s not going to be able to come today,
Gramma. Maybe I can help you.”

“No, I need James. Tell him it’s important.”
Her eyes pleaded with me.

Gramma, I’m here now. Is there something I
can do to help?”

“No, I need to talk to James.” Gramma grabbed
my arm and pulled me closer. “I need James.”

We went on like that for a few more minutes,
getting nowhere. I would have liked to ask her what bothered her,
but I knew she wouldn’t be able to tell me and talking about it
would have only frustrated her more. So I sat with her, held her
hand and calmed her down by playing one of her favorite CDs until I
had to leave to get back to my office for a late client.

I was on my way out of the parking lot when
Pablo called. “Cleo, you need to stay away from that Dr. Ahmed, and
don’t be talking about him either,” he said in his police
voice.

“Actually, I’m at Shady Terrace. The police
are here, and they’ve already asked me about him. So what’s the big
deal?”

“It’s a big undercover drug trafficking bust.
I can’t tell you any more, but you should check tomorrow morning’s
paper.”

“So, do they have Ahmed in custody now?” I
asked, momentarily forgetting that Pablo had just told me to stay
away from Ahmed.

“I told you I can’t talk about it, Cleo. I
just wanted to tell you to stay out of it—okay?”

“Fine. Thanks for the heads up. I’ll talk to
you tomorrow.” I had to hurry to get back to my office, and I
figured Pablo wasn’t going to tell me any more anyway.

That evening, I called Sharon to see if she
could fill me in. She said Ahmed wasn’t at Shady Terrace that day,
but everyone was talking about him and a couple of the nurses. No
one really knew what was happening, except it had something to do
with drugs. All the resident charts were being audited. I told her
what Pablo had said about tomorrow’s paper.

“So things should be popping tomorrow over at
Shady Terrace,” I said.

“Actually, we’re going camping tomorrow up in
Rocky Mountain National Park—with Erik,” Sharon said. “The surprise
Erik had for Nathan on Saturday was a tent! Nathan was so excited,
he could hardly wait to go camping. It turned out that Erik had
already reserved a camping site for this week, hoping we could go.
I decided a break would be good for me and Nathan, so we’re going
tomorrow.”

“Wow, I’m surprised you could get time off
from work on such short notice.”

“I had already been planning to take most of
this week off to spend some time hanging out with Nathan, once
soccer camp ended. Actually, Erik knew that—so that’s why he made
the reservation for this week.”

That didn’t surprise me. Erik seemed to be
good at knowing everything about everyone. I began to think we were
all part of some master plan of his.

“So, tomorrow is Tuesday,” I said. “When will
you be back?”

“Don’t worry. We’ll be back in time for my
Contact session Friday afternoon. I have a strong feeling that I’m
going to reach Adam this time.”

First thing the next morning, I got the paper
off my porch. Sure enough. There it was on the front page.

Local Physician Accused of Drug
Trafficking

(DENVER) – Colorado U.S Attorney Morris
Maxwell today announced the arrest of pain clinic owner Dr. Fahim
Ahmed and pharmacy owners Todd and Samantha Hadden, all of Boulder
County, on 12 counts of trafficking in OxyContin and other
controlled substances, and other charges involving improper
narcotic drug prescriptions that resulted in more than $1 million
in Medicaid fraud.

The felony criminal charges allege that the
Boulder physician and pharmacy operators provided the controlled
narcotic oxycodone to patients unnecessarily and in potentially
lethal doses at high cost to taxpayers.

“We have shut down a medical practice and
pharmacy kickback scheme that our investigators found was
fraudulently billing the state Medicaid program over a million
dollars,” Maxwell said. “We are prosecuting a sophisticated
drug-dealing operation. By taking this action, we are shutting down
suppliers of a highly addictive drug that has been improperly
distributed.”

The lawsuit charges Ahmed with prescribing
Schedule II and Schedule III controlled drugs without providing
good faith medical examinations and without need or medical
justification. Drug Enforcement Administration and Colorado Bureau
of Investigation investigators found the physician to be running a
patient mill with patient examinations typically being cursory at
best and lasting no more than a few minutes. After these exams, he
routinely prescribed a mix of Lortab, Oxycontin, Soma and Xanax
that local pharmacists dubbed the “Ahmed cocktail.”

The DEA and the CBI estimated that Ahmed’s
prescription pads were used to deliver more than 10,000 illegal
doses of OxyContin, sometimes for resale on the streets. As police
were taking him into custody, Ahmed said he only prescribed pain
killers to people who genuinely needed them.

But undercover agents said that when they
went into Ahmed’s We Feel Your Pain Clinic, they were able to get
out quickly with a potent painkiller. “They would go in with old
MRIs or old x-rays. Most of the time he didn’t even look at the
x-rays, and he would write them a script for OxyContin or
methadone,” explains Lt. Gary Absher.

Some of Ahmed’s patients have also been
arrested in this investigation. Police say they were cashing in on
the painkillers by selling them on the streets.

The felony complaint also alleges that the
physician pursued an illegal kickback and referral scheme that
directed business for drugs prescribed for residents of Shady
Terrace Health Care Center to Todd’s Pharmacy, owned and operated
by the Hadens. The scheme facilitated improper drug billings to the
state Medicaid program totaling more than $1 million.

Shady Terrace employee, Penny Easterbrook,
LPN, was arrested yesterday on a warrant while leaving Todd’s
Pharmacy. She had with her owe sheets—a list of people to whom she
had fronted drugs, who still owed her money.

Also involved in the investigation were the
Colorado department of Health and Environment, the Boulder County
Drug Task Force, the Boulder Police Department, the Longmont Police
Department, and the Boulder District Attorney’s Office.

Ahmed’s Colorado physician’s license was
suspended under an emergency order. Administrators at Shady Terrace
Health Care Center, where Ahmed is the medical director, refused to
comment for publication.

I had almost finished reading the article for
the second time, when Sharon called. “Can you believe it? This must
be what Jenny was talking about. Remember I told you that when Adam
was working on that website for Ahmed, he was kind of suspicious
about all the drugs? I’ll bet he confronted him and Ahmed realized
he knew too much and had him killed!”

“You could be right,” I said. Do you think he
would have known that Adam was going to the Grand Canyon?”

“Absolutely! Adam talked about the trip to
anyone who would listen before he went. After he died, I can’t tell
you how many people told me how much he’d been looking forward to
being at the canyon. Everyone knew. And he did that work for Ahmed
not long before he went.”

“I wonder how we can find out how much Adam
knew about him. If you can actually reach Adam, maybe he can tell
us. Of course we’d still need proof. No one is going to accept a
dead man’s word.”

“I’m going to talk to the police this morning
before we go camping,” Sharon said. “I want to be sure they
question Ahmed about what happened to Adam.”

At about 10:00 that morning, Sharon called
again. The harsh reality of police department procedure had crushed
her earlier excitement. She sounded as frustrated as a rat running
circles in a maze.