Presidential Donor (7 page)

"He's breathing," Eva said. "What the...?" She picked up an empty vial and a disconnected IV line next to his arm.

"What is it?" Jonah asked.

"Cystomecurium"

"Cys... what?"

"It's a new class of muscle relaxant. It paralyzes the muscles and induces a temporary coma."

"Why would someone give--?" Jonah heard voices outside the door. He opened it an inch or two and peeked out. Two men in green hospital scrubs were talking. Jonah stood motionless as he listened to them.

"Leave him in there for a few minutes, we'll come back."

Jonah didn't have to hear another word. It didn't take too much imagination to figure out who they were talking about. Jonah couldn't remember the man's name, but he did know he'd met him earlier in the morning. He checked for a hospital identification bracelet, but there was none.
Dave Leah was his doctor. Maybe he should give him a call?
Jonah's legs were trembling. Not so much out of standing still, but from astonishment over what he was listening to.

Feeling sick to his stomach, Jonah wondered what he should do.
Those two guys are coming back in a few minutes. The last thing he needed was to confront them.
Jonah didn't have time to run through all the questions in his mind. His common sense told him,
get out of there--fast.

"Eva, what about this Cystomecurium. What's its half life?"

"The bottom line, Jonah, is we need to administer an antagonist drug in the next two hours, or the effects are permanent."

Jonah heaved a sigh. "We need to leave here now! Those guys will be back in a few minutes."

"Maybe we should call security."

"No, we don't know how dangerous these guys are, although judging by what they've done so far, I think it's safe to assume they're not Boy Scouts."

Eva pressed her lips together. "If we can get him to my place, I keep an emergency bag for on-call. I've got some Narcan we can give him. It should reverse the effects of the Cystomecurium."

"How far away is your house?"

"About ten miles."

Jonah looked around as if one of the corpses were suddenly going to sit up and offer some suggestion. "How are we going to transport him without being seen?" he asked.

"Isn't there an ambulance parked near the back door? The one you use to transport bodies."

Jonah slapped his thigh. "Yes, the keys are in my office."

He darted over and flipped on the light to his office. His gray metal desk was littered with paperwork to be processed--
paperwork of the dead
. Jars containing various body parts floated in formaldehyde and stood waiting for analysis.

Spotting the keys hanging on a piece of pegboard, he snatched them off the hook, then flipped off the light switch.

"Got em," he said, as he met Eva at the door. She was already pushing the gurney.

Jonah peeked out the door. The hall was deserted. He sensed time was running out. "All right, let's go."

Eva took the head of the gurney and pushed it through the door while Jonah held it open. As they started down the hall, there was no sign of the two men. Halfway up the hall, near the exit, Jonah froze. Over the sound of his pounding heart, he could hear footfalls behind him.

"Jonah," a voice called out.

Wheeling, he turned to see Simon Burns, a staff internist, heading in their direction.

"Jonah, have you heard what's going on with the President?"

"Yes," Jonah said.

"Aren't you going to the meeting?"

Jonah scowled. "Yes, Simon, in a bit. I've been to more meetings today, than in my whole career. Right now I'm going to get this body to the autopsy room."

"Well," Burns said, "aren't you going the wrong way?"

"Noo--I'm not. The main autopsy room is full, so I'm taking him to the auxiliary one on the second floor."

"Oh. Well, see you at the meeting."

Jonah exhaled silently. "Fine, as..."

"What?" Eva asked.

"Nothing," Jonah said, making an effort to hide his anger.

Through the glass exit doors ahead, Jonah could see the back of the ambulance.

There were approaching footfalls getting closer. With rising urgency, they pushed through the exit and onto the ambulance ramp. Just as the doors banged shut, Jonah saw two men in green scrubs, and a third in a black trench coat. He had a head like a bullet and he was shaking his finger at the other two.

"There they are," Jonah said.

Eva yanked the ambulance doors open. Jonah picked up on the gurney and with one mighty heave, pushed it
and
Eva, inside. It landed with a resounding thump, and Eva slammed the doors closed.

* * *

"Well he was here a minute ago," one of the men in green scrubs, explained to Denton Cogswell.

"A minute ago?" a livid Cogswell asked. "Well you had better damn site find him--and fast. And where is Bahr?"

"I don't kno--"

"Never mind. Just get this place sealed off and check all the exits. We need to find this guy now!"

* * *

Jonah jammed the keys into the ignition and hoped it would start. After a sputter, it sprang to life, and he jerked the gearshift into drive. Jonah checked his rear view mirror and saw a thick cloud of blue exhaust. Behind the smoke, he saw two men throw their hands up as he drove away.

"I'll need some directions, Eva. I have no idea where I'm going."

"Yes, just go straight through town past the bridge, then make the first left. It's a straight run from there."

By late afternoon, Brighton Heart Center's usual quiet ambiance was replaced with a carnival-like atmosphere. Reporters clamored about, stopping doctors, nurses, and anyone who might give them information about the President.

The reporter from CNN who had interviewed Lloyd earlier, now risk being thrown out of the hospital as she tried to get the latest.

Pete Mazur and two Secret Service agents escorted Gwen Lloyd and her daughter back into the hospital. As they entered the lobby, they were bombarded with questions. The younger Lloyd cowered close to her mother as she tried to block the flashes of dozens of cameras. Had it not been for the escorts, she would have been knocked over.

Mazur noted that Gwen Lloyd, usually neat as a pin, apparently had had little time for coifing. In her modest attempt to fix her hair, she had lacquered it with enough hair spray to create a fire hazard. Something the reporters were no doubt taking note of as well.

Questions were still being fired at them as the doors slid shut behind them.

Mazur finally ran out of patience.

"Get these people out of here!" he told a young Secret Service agent.

Reporters attempted to ask more questions, even as they were being pushed out the door.
"Is it true the President needs a heart transplant?"
a reporter from CBS asked.

"No, it's not true," Mazur fired back. "The President is stable and we expect a full recovery," he lied as he ushered Gwen Lloyd and her daughter onto the elevator. After he was satisfied they were settled, he stormed to the conference room. Charlie Lathbury and the Press Secretary were busy preparing a statement when he burst in.

Mazur glared. "Gentleman, do we have a leak?"

"What kind of leak?" Lathbury asked.

"I just had a reporter ask me if the President needed a transplant."

Lathbury frowned. "They probably assumed he did because this is a transplant hospital."

"Let's hope that's all it is. Make sure no one knows anything except what we tell them. Now where is the Vice... er, acting President? I need to speak to him."

It was a well-known fact among the President's advisors that Mazur had a problem with Warren Ritter. He felt that Ritter caused far too many problems for Lloyd with his ultra conservative views. Ritter was popular, though, and that kept him in Lloyd's good graces. Luckily for Mazur, he took his orders from Lloyd--that is--until now. Since Ritter was
acting
President that made Mazur
his
National Security Advisor--a fact he had trouble swallowing.

Well, at least Ritter was on board with the current plan.

* * *

Warren Ritter sat with his feet propped up on Bob Bradley's desk and thought what a fine opportunity this was. The thought of Thomas Lloyd's death didn't bother him at all. He recalled other Vice Presidents who had taken over for their assassinated boss. They never seemed the least bit upset, and those individuals died in a much worse way than Lloyd would. After all, this wasn't assassination he was suggesting.
Maybe for McDermott or whatever his name was
. For Lloyd, it was more of an unfortunate turn of events.

Too bad.

He reached across the desk for the phone when Cogswell walked in.

"Well?" Ritter asked.

"I've taken care of it," Cogswell said.

"Who else knows?"

"Just Bahr."

Ritter arched his eyebrows. "Of course, Bahr, your loyal puppy dog."

"He has no choice."

"Another one of your pocket penguins." Ritter swung his feet off the desk.

Cogswell gloated. "As you said, he's loyal."

"Well I hope you and your puppy can get this done. I can't believe I'm this close. He wouldn't even be President if it wasn't for me."

"Don't you mean
ex-President
?"

Ritter didn't respond. He knew Cogswell was right. Lloyd was weak on the party's ticket until he'd jumped on board. He had all the supporters, and it was widely known he carried lots of clout in Washington. As former head of the CIA, Ritter was credited as being the catalyst that brought the Soviet Union to an end. A Soviet Union he was known to loathe.

Cogswell propped his feet up on the corner of the desk and cupped his hands behind his head. "You know, what you asking me to do is essentially assa--"

Ritter locked his eyes on Cogswell. "I know exactly what I'm asking you to do. Make sure this so-called,
donor
, disappears. Time will take care of the rest. You know you'll need to deal with Bahr after this is over."

"Unfortunately for him, I've already thought of that."

Ritter's face softened. "You cover all the bases don't you?"

"That's my job."

"You're going to make a good Vice President."

Cogswell glared at Ritter. "Don't patronize me, Warren. You won't even have a Presidency unless I want you to."

"You want it just as badly as I do, and you know it."

"Maybe I do, but don't plan on treating me the way Lloyd treated you. It ain't gonna happen."

"Don't worry."

"I'm not," Cogswell said. "Not at all."

Mazur walked in a moment later without knocking. He looked at Ritter.

"Warren, we need to talk."

"Yes,
we sure do
," Ritter said.

On board the morgue ambulance, Eva looked closer at their passenger.

His skin was pale and cold and he could easily stand-in for one of the dead who usually ride in the vehicle. She reached across and felt for a pulse. It was weak and thready--a bad sign. As she looked closer, she had the peculiar feeling she had seen this guy before.

Then--it hit her...

She had been the on call anesthesiologist the previous weekend when he came in. She was skiing at nearby Zogoff Mountain, a local resort she often visited. After a great run down one of the tougher slopes, her beeper started vibrating. She fished it out from under her ski clothes, and read the small message screen. 2578--the number for the ER.

Most of the time, her on-call consisted of a few trips to the hospital to give anesthesia to expectant mothers undergoing Cesarean, or to supervise the nurse-anesthetist covering the emergency surgery patients.

Eva took off her skis and found the phone. She could see inside the ski lodge, and she envied the people already in there enjoying hot buttered rum, and glu vein, her favorite. The big stone fireplace with the blazing fire only added to her disappointment.
Maybe another day?

She punched in the number to Zurich Trauma. After one ring the switchboard operator answered. "Zurich Trauma."

"This is Dr. Smorzak, I was paged."

"Yes, Dr. Smorzak. We have a level one trauma. They need you here as soon as possible."

"I'll be right in."

Level one trauma was the catch phrase for the most serious type of injury, requiring her immediate response. The hospital was ten minutes away. She could ski it in five if the terrain allowed, she mused to herself.

She gathered up her skis and headed to Zurich Trauma. Twelve minutes later she arrived. Her feet now felt light as air after going from ski boots to sneakers. The neurosurgeon on call met her at the ER door.

"Eva thanks for coming so quickly."

"No problem, what do we have?"

"Thirty-five year old white male. Hit a tree with his face, skiing up at Muree. We need to get him intubated, but so far we've been unable to do it. He keeps seizing on us every time we try."

"How are his vital signs?"

"Fine right now, but with his injuries, I'm afraid he's going to crash if we don't get him some respiratory support."

"All right, let's have a look."

Although his injuries appeared less serious than they were, with just some bruising around the eyes and forehead, Eva imagined he had sustained a severe head injury with bleeding to his brain. She barely finished her assessment of him when his back arched violently and he seized.

"I need a number six tube," Eva yelled.

One of the nurses handed Eva the tube, then pulled the man's head into position to allow airway access. She placed the chrome speculum in the man's throat as he continued to seize. A male nurse moved in to help, pinning the man's shoulders down to keep him still. He started to arch again. Eva backed off slightly.

"I need him still, guys," the frustration in Eva's voice growing.

Two other nurses came over to help, and Eva finally guided the tube into the throat, past the larynx and into position just proximal to the right bronchus.

"Got it," Eva said.