George thought about it briefly, reflecting on the past months.
“I guess I do. I guess I do.”
2
Samantha Louis looked out her second story office window above Haight Street in San Francisco and watched Mark Johansen drive away in his brand new galaxy blue metallic Audi etron. As he turned the corner, sunlight seemed to change the color of the car as reflections of dark teal shimmered on the surface of the exotic vehicle.
Mark had spent their last session evangelizing electric cars and even convinced Sam to drive his new EV. He loved the fact that he could drive wherever he wanted without adding to the world’s climate problems. He was so convinced that electric was the answer that he had installed charging stations at his offices and was encouraging his employees to give up their gas guzzling polluting ICE vehicles with a thousand dollar bonus if they bought an electric car. He’d explained to Sam that ICE stood for Internal Combustion Engine and that in his opinion, this was now obsolete technology.
Sam had to admit, the silence and power of the Audi was impressive. And when she asked about charging on longer trips, Mark patiently explained that the Audi could add nearly two hundred miles in twenty minutes of charging. If the technology had come that far, Sam would seriously consider replacing her ten-year-old Subaru with an EV.
But as far as Mark’s case was concerned, their work together was done. They’d just had their final session together. Sam knew it was coming. Mark had made fantastic progress and now seemed to be ‘normal’. By any standard, he was cured of his mental illness – a condition that had threatened his career and his relationships. It had aggravated the murder case brought against him.
As much as she tried to convince herself to be proud of her success, Sam couldn’t help but feel a sense of loss. This was the case of a lifetime. Weirdly, it was her second case of a lifetime. Much like the previous one, her mentor, Dr. Ken Karmere, hadn’t seen another schizophrenic patient cured in his entire thirty-plus year career.
What were the chances Sam would ever see a case like this again?
So here she was, thirty-eight years old, almost three years into her private practice, still not quite making enough money to quit her part-time job at the inpatient facility of San Francisco Community Hospital. But she had to admit, she was happy with her career choice.
Sam stepped into the small shared bathroom outside her office and examined herself in the mirror. There were a few more strands of gray starting to show, but she was not at all unhappy with her appearance. If anything, she seemed less stressed than she had been several months before. She looked – content.
Her buzzer sounded and she opened her office door to find a smiling Jack Trageser obviously excited about their evening out.
“Come in while I shut down my system and put away a couple of files.”
Jack took a seat in the recliner and watched as Sam worked. She was smart, beautiful, and it finally seemed like she was ready for a real relationship.
As they stepped outside into the chilly winter evening, Jack put his arm around Sam and she moved in close, reveling in the warmth. Jack drove sedately through the busy San Francisco streets and pulled into Fort Mason. Green’s was on the agenda again. Jack had called it a restart.
They were seated next to a floor-to-ceiling glass window that looked out on the Bay towards Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge. If possible, the night was even more beautiful than the previous one.
“So, Mark is cured? Isn’t that kind of unheard of for a patient suffering from schizophrenia?”
“Unheard of, no. Rare? Absolutely. Mark’s case was unusual, and he did some major work. I feel very lucky.”
“I suspect it was a bit more than luck. You’re good at what you do. Are you a bit sad to see him go? I mean, when I finish a project, particularly when a new product goes out the door, I feel like I’ve lost something. Is it similar with patients?”
“Yes. I guess it is. It’s weird. I’ve had two cases of a lifetime, the kinds of cases my mentor, Doctor Ken Karmere, has never seen in his entire thirty-plus-year career.
“Part of it is seeing the patients I’ve come to know so well move on. But the other part is thinking how exciting these cases have been and how unlikely it is I’ll have anything like it again.”
“Well, Brittany Spangler has told me you’re treating her for Borderline Personality Disorder. Maybe this will be your next big case.”
“You know I can’t talk about my patients, but I can tell you that unlike schizophrenia, where there are rare examples of cures, as far as I know, with BPD, there’s never been a cure.”
“And you don’t think you could be the first?”
“No. Not a chance.”
“You should be proud of yourself. Mark has his life back and if you want my opinion, he’s better than ever. Plus, I think he and Sharon may have something more going.”
“I guess I am proud of myself with respect to Mark – at least as far as his schizophrenia is concerned. Not so much with the murders. Don’t get me wrong. I was convinced he wasn’t a murderer. But I thought I could play police detective and that was a big mistake. I’m truly sorry.”
“You really suspected me, didn’t you?”
“I don’t know if ‘suspected’ is the right word. I was scared. Not about being murdered, but afraid of getting into a relationship. I think I was looking for any excuse to try to avoid losing control of my life.”
“And you’ve changed your mind?”
Sam reached across the table and took Jack’s hand. “Absolutely!”
They looked out at the shimmering lights on the Bay and Sam broke the silence.
“Jack, I know that Mark was proven not guilty and that it was Richard who broke into Mark’s computer to frame him, but I don’t think I understand the whole story. Can you explain it to me?”
“Yeah. It took me a while to fully understand it. As you know, Richard and Mark’s company sells security software. Back when they were just starting out, Mark decided that he wanted to do more than create standard anti-virus software that blocked known attacks. He wanted to recognize attacks that had never been seen before. He created a Trojan, software that hides in your system and does nefarious things. He then challenged his team to find it. It took them a while, but they got their software to work and within a few years became the number two supplier of security software. Mark put the Trojan on the shelf and forgot about it.
“But like most startups, well before they saw success, they had financial issues. Richard, who had followed the team’s work and was no slouch as an engineer, raised a big chunk of change by selling the Trojan to Unbreakable, the largest player in the security market. Richard is a shrewd businessman who knew he could raise a lot of money and at the same time keep an eye on his biggest competitor.
“When I found out that Richard was the murderer, I couldn’t understand how he could frame his best friend. I mean I’ve known these guys for years and they’ve been more like brothers than business partners. It just didn’t make sense.
“After talking to the detective on the case and to George Gray, I realized that this was a big competitive play. Richard was going to bring down his biggest competitor by ruining his company and by framing him for murder. He knew that Marcus Jameson, CEO of Unbreakable was using the Trojan to gather information so that he could blackmail people to gain financial and political influence.
“He put the Trojan on Mark’s system and framed Mark, but then he revealed the existence of Jameson’s Trojan to George Gray. He knew that eventually, the Trojan would be found on Mark’s system and it would be clear that Jameson had framed Mark.
“Unfortunately, George Gray’s wife Janey is one of the world’s best hackers. She figured out that the data entering and leaving Mark’s system was not going to Jameson. She didn’t know where, but Jameson was in the clear on that count, and so was Mark. Between some additional work that’s too technical to explain, and the work by Detective McKensey, they found Richar
d.”
“But did he need to murder these women? I have to say that I don’t understand why he did it.”
“Richard is an interesting guy. From what George Gray told me, Richard gave him the stories about Boris Yanofski and his conspiracy theories, Ryan Hamilton and the human trafficking, and perhaps the worst of all, Marcus Jameson. He was a real force for finding criminals who have corrupted the Internet and bringing them to justice.
“But, and I hate to bring this topic up again since it caused us some problems, Richard hated women. You know that Mark, Richard, and I were very tight with Michael James and Marshall Lewis. When Richard saw what Ashima and Julia did, and then what Joyce did to Mark, well, he felt that they were criminals much like the others but who couldn’t be stopped by law enforcement. In his mind, it was morally right to rid the world of these evil women. And although he would never admit it, his own wife leaving him was probably a big trigger.”
“Okay, I hear what you’re saying about him hating women. And I guess I understand the technical side of how he framed Mark and how he thought he had set up Marcus Jameson. But what I don’t get is how he could have sent his best friend to jail.”
“That bothered me too. So, I actually visited Richard yesterday and asked him. The answer goes a bit deeper into Richard and his motivation in killing Janice Johansen. After what she did to Mark, even more so than the others, Richard believed that he needed to rid the world of Janice. In his warped sense of duty, he felt that not only was killing her revenge for what she’d done to Mark, it would help Mark get better if Janice were no longer on the planet. As for the sending him to jail, he knew that if Janice were murdered, Mark would be arrested. He was too obvious a suspect. So, as strange as it might sound, he orchestrated it so that Mark could be completely exonerated. Somehow, he got the impression that a month or two in jail wouldn’t hurt Mark or his recovery.
“I’ll never believe that murder is the right answer, but I can certainly understand where Richard was coming from. In his mind he had the best intentions in all that he did, exposing bad guys and eliminating those that go unpunished. He’s a good man, and a bad one.”
After sharing a decadent dessert and sipping glasses of port, Jack drove Sam home.
“We’re still on for rowing on the Bay tomorrow morning, right?’ Jack asked, hoping he hadn’t gone in the wrong direction again. “What time should I pick you up?”
Sam turned her face up to Jack, pulled him close and gave him what Jack thought was a languorous kiss good night. Then, taking his hand, she said, “You can just nudge me in the morning.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Writer, extreme sports enthusiast, serial entrepreneur, technologist.
Born into a military family, Steve traveled extensively throughout the US and overseas, attending fifteen schools before graduating from High School. After studying mathematics, computer science, comparative literature and French at the University of California, Steve began his career with IBM as a software engineer. He later founded three successful high-tech startups.
A former competition hang glider pilot, Steve continues to surf, ski, kayak whitewater, and dance Salsa with his wife Karen whenever possible.
Steve divides his time between Santa Cruz, California and the Basque Region of France.
Find out more about Steve, his extreme sports, his interests, and his other novels at:
http://www.stevejackowski.com
And check out his blog on entrepreneurship, technology, electric cars, and travel in Europe (especially France and Spain) at:
http://www.stevejackowski.com/blog
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