“Before we sign, just one last little thing,” Ronnie added, much to the dissatisfaction of Jim, Henry and David. “I’ve been bothered by two things ever since the surgical deaths. The first is how, from an eight-unit batch, only two vials were involved in death cases—”
“We’ve decided they were not implicated in the deaths.” He was interrupted as they all started to lose their patience.
“That’s right,” answered Ronnie evenly, “but two days ago, I logged in to the company’s ERP system and found out the numerator had reported the production of ten units in the batch we’re examining. But Christian reported to me in our last meeting that only eight had been produced. Jim had also reported to me that no medicine vials remained in the safe, other than the six empty vials from previous trials. To prove his claim, he’d also sent me a photo of the bottles in the safe. So why did the numerator report ten units? There was another thing that subconsciously kept bothering me, but I wasn’t quite able to grasp, until yesterday, when I suddenly realized what I’d found so disturbing. It happened when my friend Gadi, the man standing in front of you here, enlarged the photo Jim had so generously sent me, and turned my attention to the fact that on each of the stickers both Christian’s and Jim’s signatures appear, and only the vial photographed by Brian at Mount Sinai bears a single signature, Jim’s. From there, the road leading to the realization Jim had created two poisoned vials, while destroying the originals, was a short one—”
“Nonsense. And you don’t represent any law enforcement agency!” Jim tried to rise from his chair, but Gadi forcefully shoved him back down.
“Perhaps he doesn’t, but I sure as hell do.” Bukowski entered the room. “Jim Belafonte, you’re under arrest for the murders of Samuel Yoder and Abraham Berkowitz. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”
Epilogue
Newark, November 8, 2013, 8:30 PM
Ronnie and Gadi were sprawled on spacious sofas in the United Airlines business class lounge. Three glasses of beer and a bowl of peanuts were on the table in front of them. They were on their way to Israel and waiting for a flight leaving at ten forty PM. Gadi’s available arm was around the shoulders of a beautiful dark-skinned woman he wouldn’t stop kissing, ignoring all the other passengers in the lounge. Even the casual onlooker could have no doubt he was in love. Ronnie looked at them and smiled.
“What are you smiling about, dumbass?” Gadi pretended to be upset.
“I never thought you’d be in love enough to buy a girl a business class ticket.” Ronnie tried to maintain a serious expression.
“Never gonna happen. I bought both my tickets with your credit card. I thought you owed me at least that. Don’t even think about complaining, because I couldn’t care less what you think. By the way, I bought a third ticket for her.” Gadi waved toward Liah, who was walking toward them. “I told her you asked her to join us. Of course, you can always tell her I lied. On the other hand, this could be a pretty good opportunity for you to grow up and admit how desperately you’ve missed her.” He rose and embraced Liah, kissing both her cheeks noisily. “Liah, I’d like you to meet Juanita. Juanita, sweetheart, this is Liah, the love of Ronnie’s life,” Gadi introduced the two women to each other, a sly, satisfied smile on his face.
Liah took a quick look around, and when she saw the only available seat was next to Ronnie, she sat beside him carefully, making sure she wasn’t touching him.
“Come, let’s grab us something a little stronger than beer,” Gadi said to his new girlfriend in Spanish, lifting her from her seat while hugging her hips, and dragging her after him to the lounge bar.
Ronnie and Liah remained seated, avoiding each other’s eyes. After a long and embarrassing moment, Ronnie turned to her and quietly said, “I’m glad you’re joining us. How are you feeling?”
“Sad. Very sad. Sad for the misery that I’ve caused you. Sad for the way I’ve messed up my life again. Sad for the fact I’m going back to Israel for good, without the man I hoped would one day be my husband.”
“What do you mean going back to Israel for good?”
“I finished my studies. I’ve been approved for an internship in Israel and accepted at Kaplan Hospital. I’m starting next week. I’m going to spend the next year in Israel, then, God only knows.”
“And you never thought…” Ronnie stopped and grew silent.
“No, Ronnie, I never thought of asking you. I didn’t want to add to your misery. I realized I needed to respect your decision to sever all contact.”
Ronnie allowed his hand to search for hers until he finally found it. She raised her head and met his eyes. They both froze for a moment, then she drew nearer and rested her head on his chest.
“Good thing I’m heading back to Israel myself. We’ll have all the time in the world to examine our relationship,” he whispered in her ear, feeling her palms tightening.
Liah drew away from him, questioning him with her eyes. “What about your job? After all you’ve been through, you’re just going to walk away?”
“I already have. The same day word of my resignation spread, I received four tempting job offers, including one from Accord, but I rejected them all. At the moment, I feel like I need time to reorganize the priorities in my life. For starters, I bought a villa in my kibbutz’s expansion area. Perhaps I paid a bit above the market value, but it was important for me to go back and live among the people I love most.”
“But why? You’ve never been one to give up so easily, especially after what I heard from Gadi about the TDO affair ending so well.”
“You don’t know all the details. It turns out, the Chinese guy who broke my leg, the same one who so generously let you take the cab, had also threatened the life of David’s wife. David was the one who’d been pressuring the investors to sell their holdings contrary to reason. He was also the one who’d systematically pitted Henry against me, under various obscure pretenses. After everything blew up in his face, David broke down, admitted his actions and resigned from managing the fund. Henry was elected by the other partners to take his place. As you know, Henry and I don’t really get along. He asked me to stay, but I refused.”
“You don’t need to love someone in order to work with him.”
“True, but you need to respect him. And I can’t respect a man who conceals information from company reports, not to mention that he’s a compulsive gambler. He confessed to the other partners and swore never to repeat his foolish behavior. They’ve all chosen to believe him, perhaps because they realized they wouldn’t be able to raise money for another fund without him and a failure would cost them a lot of money. Money, as I’ve learned the hard way, has a tendency to bend a lot of people’s principles. Not for me. To their credit, they were decent enough to leave me with my shares in the fund. I didn’t say no to that. Even my principles have their limits.” A tiny smile sprouted on his lips.
At the other end of the room, three young men began to cheer together about something. One of them read something off his laptop to his friends, and the three reacted with rowdy joy. Their happiness was natural and enviable. Liah sighed and turned back to look at Ronnie.
“When they offered you the chairmanship of TDO, did they know it was about to collapse?”
“They didn’t. That was just a coincidence. I really matched David’s vision of the buildup of the fund. He knew Henry was very attached to TDO and was afraid he’d change his mind and decide not to transfer the company to me at the last moment. That’s why he forged my signature on the paperwork. After he had sent the paperwork, he informed Henry that I was already listed as chairman in the company’s directors registry and claimed that if we changed it again, it might hurt the company’s reputation.”
“What are you two so serious about?” Gadi cut off their conversation. “Well, at least you’re talking. What are you having? The barman will do anything for Juanita.”
“Well, I do feel like having a g
in and tonic. Get Liah…” Ronnie turned his gaze to her.
“Plain tonic water,” said Liah and got back to Ronnie.
“And what was the turning point that helped you to understand what’d happened in the hospitals?”
“It wasn’t just one point, but rather several things that I was finally able to piece together to form a clear picture. The first was the letter you left in my room, which made me realize for the first time that whoever treated the medicine needed to have in-depth knowledge about its chemistry. Only Christian and Jim had that kind of knowledge. Your hint about the numerator sank in only later. To be honest, I didn’t even know what a numerator was. But when I happened to run across the word in one of the company reports, it set my warning bells off, and when I delved into it, I discovered more vials had been produced than were listed on the clinical trial reports. Furthermore, throughout that period, I’d been receiving confusing text messages. Only when I realized the anonymous sender was trying to protect the fund and its employees did I recognize that one of the messages had been different and was probably sent by someone else. That somebody, so I started to suspect — was Jim.
“The breakthrough took place after Gadi found out the signatures on the older vials were different from the ones on the last two. When I learned that, I realized Jim was behind it all. My only problem was proving a motive. The motive was revealed when I managed to contact Roselyn, the clerk who’d switched the operations at Mount Sinai. Only after Bukowski, the FBI agent, promised her immunity — and, if need be, joining a witness protection program — did she agree to come back to New York, accompanied by agents. The testimony she provided cleared both me and the company of all suspicions. Furthermore, based on the extortion methods applied to pressure Roselyn, the FBI has no doubt a criminal organization was behind the entire plot. An organization that was probably interested in using TDO for money laundering then selling the company at a profit. In a conversation the FBI had with Mentor’s CEO, he broke down and admitted he’d been pressured too and was forced to back out of the deal. He gave them a description of the person who’d threatened his life, an exact match to the one Roselyn and I gave them, a description of the Chinese man. It was clear to me that I couldn’t possibly sell the company, but I needed to put on a show, pretending I was about to sign the contract, in order to make Jim confess he was the one who’d switched the medicine. It turns out the mob had promised him ten million dollars and an equal amount in company shares. The FBI found some of the money in a bank account Jim had opened solely for that purpose. Jim was a number two kind of employee throughout his professional career. He knew they’d never let him run such a company for long. This was a chance for him to prove to the world he was capable of being a good CEO who could lead a company from a crisis to success. When he broke down, he dragged the two investment bankers down with him. According to his testimony, they were the ones who’d given him his instructions all along. The FBI is still looking for them, but it looks like they’ve disappeared, or were made to disappear, off the face of the earth.”
“And what happened to the Chinese man? Are you sure he won’t come after you to make you pay for ruining his deal?”
“I’m sure. They found his body, with a little extra lead in the skull, next to the Jefferson University Hospital morgue. No one has a clue how it got there.”
“Dead?”
“As dead as it gets.”
“How did that happen?”
“I asked Bukowski the same question. He claims it was the work of a professional, nice and clean. No traces of what had happened were found. The FBI’s working premise is that someone followed the Chinese guy in order to eliminate him and took advantage of the fact he followed Brian to a dark place. Because they have no leads to follow, the police and FBI decided to close the case.”
“Gadi?”
“Gadi’s a lot of things, but he’s not a killer. He’s also a pretty messy guy. He didn’t murder the Chinese guy, just like he didn’t kill your husband.”
“What about Gadi? Again you’re talking about me behind my back?” Gadi placed the drinks on the table in front of them.
“Did you hear they caught the drug addict who murdered my husband?” asked Liah, ignoring Gadi’s remark.
“Of course I did,” Ronnie and Gadi answered together.
“I need to ask for your forgiveness, Gadi. I’m sorry I suspected you.”
“There’s no need. I forgave you long ago. Ronnie, on the other hand, will keep paying for suspecting me for a long, long time.”
“Gadi, would you excuse us for a minute, I need to discuss a few private matters with Ronnie,” Liah said.
“And why would you…” Gadi began but then saw her expression. “The bar is a much happier place to be,” he told Juanita, and they both left for the bar laughing.
“I also should have asked for your forgiveness long ago.” Liah’s voice cracked as she said it.
“Forget it. It doesn’t matter. What’s important is that we’re together again.”
“One evening, I missed you so much that I went to the hotel you were staying at. I stood outside for an hour before mustering enough courage to go inside. I saw you sitting in the lobby with a young man, Hispanic. You were both talking excitedly. You seemed so happy and relaxed, it took the wind out of my sails… I just turned around and ran away, praying you wouldn’t see me.”
“That was Javier Rodriguez, the son of the woman who told us about the suspicious changes in the operation dates. Thanks to her, we were able to find Roselyn. He’s brilliant, her son, and I’ve decided to help him.”
“All right. Yes. Maybe. But forget about that. There’s one thing I can’t figure out. Why did Christian kill himself?”
“He believed he had no choice. That was also one of Gadi’s discoveries: The Chinese guy’s men were the ones who’d caused the power outage at Christian’s house. When his wife called to report it, she was actually speaking to his men. They’d managed to connect to her telephone line and impersonated the electric company’s employees. I assume the Chinese man told Christian about it and threatened to kill his wife and twins unless he cooperated. When Christian found out, while speaking with his wife, that the thugs were at his house that very same moment, he realized he had no choice but to swallow the pills the Chinese guy had given him. We’ll never know if he hoped he’d somehow manage to call for help, after his assassin left his room, or if he simply sacrificed his own life to save his family, whom he loved so dearly.”
“It’s frightening,” Liah’s voice turned hoarse, “just thinking we were in the same elevator with that cold-blooded monster! And that he attacked you, and was so close to me when I flagged the taxi…”
“It is really scary, but it’s also behind us.” Ronnie caressed her arm, enjoying the sensation of touching her skin again.
“So what happened with TDO in the end?”
“After it turned out, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the company was not responsible for the tragedy of the final two operations, I went back to Accord and convinced them to invest in the company. Of course, they tried to take advantage of the situation and had a lot of special conditions, but following a brief negotiation process we signed the investment deal. Yesterday, we received the FDA’s approval to continue with the clinical trials, and right after that the money was wired to the company’s bank account. This morning, while preparing for this trip, I got an interesting call from Mentor’s CEO, asking if we’d be willing to sell the company for one point two billion dollars. I must admit, I felt a primitive sense of satisfaction when I rejected his offer.”
Liah caressed the back of Ronnie’s neck, familiarizing herself anew with the rough bristles she’d always liked so much. “And who’s the Latin beauty Gadi’s running around with? Am I wrong, or is Gadi really in love?”
Liah’s touch sent a pleasant shiver through Ronnie. “Do you remember when Gadi disappeared on us for three days? Turns out, he spent them in her bed. Wondrous are the way
s of chemistry. And yes, it looks like they’re head over heels in love.”
“Like us?” asked Liah.
“Like we used to be. Like I hope we’ll be again.” Ronnie kissed her, and for the first time in a month, felt whole again.
Two hours later, as the airplane began to speed down the runway, Evelyn sat in her apartment rearranging the huge bouquet of orchids in their vase, and for the umpteenth time, rereading the note attached to it:
Thanks for all your help and the anonymous messages. Love you forever, Ray.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Amnon Jackont, a wonderful editor and a charming man. Each moment of our mutual work has been one of sheer pleasure.
A huge thanks to Dvora, Tal, Eilam, Liat and Or, my wonderful family members, who had to bravely suffer my ceaseless chattering about the book and were still able to find the strength to share insights and constructive revelations.
Thanks to Betty Ben Bassat, Beni Kopelovitz, Pinni Haviv, Gilad Rosenzweig, Tomer Belkind, Nurit Weis, Israel Hoyda and Pazit Amado for their willingness to serve as the first draft’s “guinea pigs” and for their important contributions to the final product.
Thanks to Yaron Regev for translating my book into English and special thanks to Julie MacKenzie of Free Range Editorial, the amazing creative editor who taught me so much during our work together.
And how could I not thank my parents, Moses and Judith, of blessed memory, for planting the love of the written word within me. This book wouldn’t have been written without them.
* * *
[1] The money raised by venture capital funds is invested by them in start-up companies in return for holdings (shares) in these companies. When a start-up company is sold or goes public on the stock market, the money earned is forwarded to investors until all the monies invested in the fund are returned. For each additional dollar earned, the fund investors receive eighty cents and the fund, twenty cents.
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