Harvest

by Tess Gerritsen

  His gaze moved to the anesthesia cart set up at the head of the table. He went to it and slid open the top drawer. Inside lay a row of glass syringes and needles capped in plastic.

  “What the hell is this doing here?” said Lundquist.

  Katzka closed the drawer and opened the next one. Inside he saw small glass vials. He took one out. Potassium chloride. It was half empty. “This equipment’s been used,” he said.

  “This is bizarre. What kind of surgery were they doing up here?”

  Katzka looked at the table again. At the straps. Suddenly he thought of Abby, her wrists tied down on the bed, tears trickling down her face. The memory was so painful he gave his head a shake to dispel the image. Fear was making it hard for him to think. If he couldn’t think, he couldn’t help her. He couldn’t save her. Abruptly he moved away from the table.

  “Slug?” Lundquist was eyeing him in puzzlement. “You okay?”

  “Yeah.” Katzka turned and walked out the door. “I’m fine.”

  Back outside on the sidewalk, he stood in the gusting wind and looked up at the Amity building. From street level, one saw nothing unusual about it. It was just another run-down building on a run-down street. Dirty brownstone facade, windows with air conditioners jutting out. When he had been inside it the day before, he had seen only what he’d expected to see. What he was supposed to see. The dingy showroom, the battered desks piled high with supply catalogs. A few salesmen listlessly talking on telephones. He had not seen the top floor, had never suspected that a single elevator ride would bring him to that room.

  To that table with its straps.

  Less than an hour ago, Lundquist had traced the building’s ownership to the Sigayev Company—the same New Jersey company to which the freighter was registered. That Russian mafia connection again. How deep into Bayside did it reach? Or were the Russians merely allied with someone inside the hospital? A trading partner, perhaps, in black market goods?

  Lundquist’s beeper chirped. He glanced at the readout, and reached into the car for the cellular phone.

  Katzka remained in front of the building, his thoughts shifting back to Abby and where he should look next. Every room of the hospital had already been searched. So had the parking lot and the surrounding areas. It appeared that Abby had left the hospital on her own. Where would she go? Whom would she have called? It would have been someone she trusted.

  “Slug!”

  Katzka turned to see Lundquist waving the telephone. “Who’s on the line?”

  “The Coast Guard. They’ve got a chopper waiting for us.”

  Footsteps clanged on the stairway.

  Abby’s head snapped up. In her arms, Yakov slept on, unaware. Her heart was thundering so hard she thought it would surely wake him, but he didn’t stir.

  The door swung open. Tarasoff, flanked by two men, stood looking in at her. “It’s time to go.”

  “Where?” she said.

  “Only a short walk.” Tarasoff glanced at Yakov. “Wake him up. He comes too.”

  Abby hugged Yakov closer. “Not the boy,” she said.

  “Especially the boy.”

  She shook her head. “Why?”

  “He’s AB positive. The only AB we happen to have in stock at the moment.”

  She stared at Tarasoff. Then she looked down at Yakov, his face flushed with sleep. Through his thin chest she could feel the beating of his heart. Nina Voss, she thought. Nina Voss is AB positive . . .

  One of the men grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet. She lost her grip on the boy; he tumbled to the floor where he lay blinking in confusion. The other man gave Yakov a sharp prod with his foot and barked a command in Russian.

  The boy sleepily stumbled to his feet.

  Tarasoff led the way. Down a dim corridor, then through a locked hatch. Up a staircase and through another hatch, to a steel walkway. Straight ahead was a blue door. Tarasoff started toward it, the walkway rattling under his weight.

  Suddenly the boy balked. He twisted free and started to run back the way they’d come. One of the men snagged him by the shirt. Yakov spun around and sank his teeth into the man’s arm. Howling in pain, the man slapped Yakov across the face. The impact was so brutal it sent the boy sprawling.

  “Stop it!” screamed Abby.

  The man jerked Yakov to his feet and gave him another slap. Now the boy stumbled toward Abby. At once she swept him up into her arms. Yakov clung to her, sobbing into her shoulder. The man moved toward her, as though to separate them.

  “You stay the fuck away from him!” Abby yelled.

  Yakov was shaking, whimpering incomprehensibly. She pressed her lips to his hair and whispered: “Sweetheart, I’m with you. I’m right here with you.”

  The boy raised his head. Looking into his terrified eyes, she thought: He knows what’s going to happen to us.

  She was shoved forward, across the walkway, and through the blue door.

  They passed into a different world.

  The corridor beyond was paneled in bleached wood, the floor was white linoleum. Overhead glowed a haze of softly diffused light. Their footsteps echoed as they walked past a spiral staircase and turned a corner. At the end of the passage was a wide door.

  The boy was shaking even harder now. And he was getting heavy. She set him down on his feet and cupped his face in her hand. Just for a second their gazes met, and what could not be communicated in words was now shared in that single look. She took Yakov’s hand and gave it a squeeze. Together they walked toward the door. One man was in front of them, one behind them. Tarasoff was in the lead. As he unlocked the door, Abby shifted her weight forward, every muscle tensing for the next move. Already she had released Yakov’s hand.

  Tarasoff pushed the door and it swung open, revealing a room of stark white.

  Abby lunged. Her shoulder slammed into the man in front of her, shoving him against Tarasoff, who stumbled across the threshold to his knees.

  “You bastards!” yelled Abby, flailing at them. “You bastards!”

  The man behind her tried to seize her arms. She twisted around and swung at his face, her fist connecting in a satisfying thud. She spied a flash of movement. It was Yakov, darting away and vanishing around the corner. Now the man she’d shoved was on his feet again, coming at her from the other direction. Together the two men trapped her between them and lifted her from the floor. She didn’t stop fighting and thrashing as they carried her through the doorway into the white room.

  “You’ve got to control her!” said Tarasoff.

  “The boy—”

  “Forget the boy! He can’t go anywhere. Get her up on the table!”

  “She won’t hold still!”

  “Bastards!” Abby screamed, kicking one leg free.

  She heard Tarasoff fumbling in cabinets. He snapped: “Give me her arm! I need to get at her arm!”

  Tarasoff approached, syringe in hand. Abby cried out as the needle plunged in. She twisted, but couldn’t break free. She twisted again, and this time her limbs barely responded. She was having trouble seeing now. Her eyelids wouldn’t stay open. Her voice came out barely a sigh. She tried to scream, but could not even draw the next breath.

  What is wrong with me? Why can’t I move?

  “Get her in the next room!” said Tarasoff. “We have to intubate now or we’re going to lose her.”

  The men carried her into the adjoining room and slid her onto a table. Lights came on overhead, searingly bright. Though fully awake, fully aware, she could not move a muscle. But she could feel everything. The straps tightening around her wrists and ankles. The pressure of Tarasoff’s hand on her forehead, tipping her head back. The cold steel blade of the laryngoscope sliding into her throat. Her shriek of horror echoed only in her head; no sound came out. She felt the plastic ET tube snaking down her throat, gagging, suffocating her as it moved past her vocal cords and into her trachea. She could not turn away, could not even fight for air. The tube was taped to her face and connected to an ambub
ag. Tarasoff squeezed the bag and Abby’s chest rose and fell in three quick, lifesaving breaths. Now he took off the ambubag and connected the ET tube to a ventilator. The machine took over, pumping air into her lungs at regular intervals.

  “Now go get the boy!” snapped Tarasoff. “No, not both of you. I need someone to assist.”

  One of the men left. The other stepped closer to the table.

  “Fasten that chest strap,” said Tarasoff. “The succinylcholine will wear off in another minute or two. We can’t have her thrashing around while I start the IV.”

  Succinylcholine. This is how Aaron died. Unable to struggle. Unable to breathe.

  Already the drug’s effect was starting to fade. She could feel her chest muscles begin to spasm against the insult of that tube. And she could raise her eyelids now, could see the face of the man standing above her. He was cutting away her clothes, his gaze flickering with interest as he bared her breasts, then her abdomen.

  Tarasoff started the IV in her arm. As he straightened, he saw that Abby’s eyes were fully open now and staring at him. He read the question in her gaze.

  “A healthy liver,” he said, “is not something we can take for granted. There’s a gentleman in Connecticut who’s been waiting over a year for a donor.” Tarasoff reached for a second IV bag and he hung it on the pole. Then he looked at her. “He was delighted to hear we’ve finally found a match.”

  All that blood they drew from me in the ER, she thought. They used it for tissue typing.

  He continued with his tasks. Connecting the second bag to the line. Drawing medications into syringes. She could only look at him mutely as the ventilator pumped air into her lungs. Her muscle function was beginning to return. Already she could wiggle her fingers, could shrug her shoulders. A drop of perspiration slid down her temple. She was sweating with the effort to move. To regain control of her body. A clock on the wall read eleven-fifteen.

  Tarasoff had finished laying out the tray of syringes. He heard the sound of the door open and shut again, and he turned. “The boy’s loose,” he said. “They’re still hunting him down. So we’ll take the liver first.”

  Footsteps approached the table. Another face came into view and stared down at Abby.

  So many times before she had looked across the operating table at that face. So many times before, she had seen those eyes smiling at her above a surgical mask. They were not smiling now.

  No, she sobbed, but the only sound that came out was the soft rush of air through the ET tube. No . . .

  It was Mark.

  25

  Gregor knew that the only way out of the ship’s aft section was through the blue door, and it was locked. The boy must have gone up the spiral staircase.

  Gregor peered up at the steps, but he saw only curving shadows. He began to climb, the flimsy staircase ringing with his weight. His arm still throbbed where the boy had bit him. The little bastard. This one had caused trouble from the start.

  He reached the next level and stepped off the staircase, onto thick carpet. He was now in the living quarters of the surgeon and the surgeon’s assistant. To the aft were two private cabins with a shared head and a shower. At the forward end was a well-appointed saloon. The only way out of this section was back down the staircase. The boy was trapped.

  Gregor headed aft first.

  The first cabin he came to was the dead surgeon’s. It stank of tobacco. He flicked on the light and saw an unmade bed, a locker with the door hanging open, a desk with an overflowing ashtray. He crossed to the locker. Inside he found clothes reeking of smoke, an empty vodka bottle, and a secret stash of pornographic magazines. No boy.

  Gregor next searched the surgical assistant’s cabin. It was far more orderly, the bed made, the clothes in the locker neatly pressed. No boy in here either.

  He glanced in the head, then started toward the saloon. Before he reached it, he heard the noise. It was a muffled whine.

  He entered the saloon and turned on the lights. Quickly his gaze swept the room, taking in the couch, the dining table and chairs, and the television set with its stack of videotapes. Where was the boy? He circled the room, then stopped, staring at the forward wall.

  The dumbwaiter.

  He ran to it and pried open the doors. All he saw were cables. He slapped the Up button, and the cables began to move, groaning as they lifted their burden. Gregor leaned forward, ready to snatch hold of the boy.

  Instead he found himself staring at the empty dumbwaiter.

  The boy had already escaped into the galley.

  Gregor headed back down the staircase. This was not a catastrophe. The galley was already secured. Gregor had started padlocking it every night, after discovering that the crew was sneaking food out of the pantry. The boy was still trapped.

  Gregor pushed through the blue door and started across the walkway.

  “I’m sorry, Abby,” said Mark. “I never thought it would go this far.”

  Please, she thought. Please don’t do this . . .

  “If there was any other way . . .” He shook his head. “You pushed it too hard. And then I couldn’t stop you. I couldn’t control you.”

  A tear slid from her eye and trickled into her hair. Just for an instant, she saw a flash of pain in his face. He turned away.

  “It’s time to gown up,” said Tarasoff. “Will you do the honors?” He held out a syringe to Mark. “Pentobarb. We want to be humane about this, after all.”

  Mark hesitated. Then he took the syringe and turned to the IV pole. He uncapped the needle and poked it into the injection port. Again he hesitated. He looked at Abby.

  I loved you, she thought. I loved you so much.

  He pushed the plunger.

  The lights began to dim. She saw his face waver, then fade into a deepening pool of gray.

  I loved you.

  I loved you . . .

  The galley door was locked.

  Yakov tugged again and again at the knob, but the door would not budge. What now? The dumbwaiter again? He scurried back to it and pressed the button. Nothing happened.

  Frantically he glanced around the galley, considering all the possible hiding places. The pantry. The cupboards. The walk-in refrigerator. All of them offered only temporary concealment. Eventually the men would look in all those places. Eventually they would find him.

  He would have to make it difficult for them.

  He looked up at the lights. There were three bare bulbs shining overhead. He ran to the cupboard and plucked out a heavy ceramic coffee cup. He threw it at the nearest light.

  The bulb shattered and went dark.

  He fished out more cups. Three throws and the second bulb shattered.

  He was about to aim at the last bulb when his gaze suddenly fell on the cook’s radio. It was set in its usual place on top of the cupboard. His gaze followed the radio’s extension cord as it trailed down to the countertop, where the toaster sat.

  Yakov glanced at the stove and spotted an empty soup pot. He dragged the pot off the burner and carried it to the sink. He turned on the faucet.

  A radio was playing at full volume.

  Gregor pushed open the galley door and stepped inside. Music blasted away in the darkness. Drums and electric guitars. He felt for the wall switch and flicked it on. No lights. He tried it a few more times, but nothing happened. He took a step forward and his leather sole crunched on glass.

  The little bastard’s smashed out the lights. He’s going to try to slip by me in the dark.

  Gregor pushed the door shut. By the light of a match, he inserted his key in the lock and turned the deadbolt. No escape now. The match went out.

  He turned to the darkness. “Come on, boy!” he yelled. “Nothing’s going to happen to you!”

  He heard only the radio blaring away, drowning out any other noise. He moved toward the sound, then paused to light another match. The radio was sitting on the countertop, right in front of him. As he switched off the music, he noticed the meat cleaver lyin
g on the countertop. Beside it lay scraps of what looked like brown rubber.

  So he’s got his hands on the cook’s knives, has he?

  The match flickered out.

  Gregor took out his gun and called out: “Boy?”

  Only then did he notice that his feet were wet.

  He lit a third match and looked down.

  He was standing in a pool of water. Already it had soaked into his leather shoes, certainly ruining them. Where was the water coming from? In the wavering light of the flame, he scanned the area around his feet and saw that the water had spread halfway across the floor. Then he saw the extension cord, the end sliced off, one coil glistening at the edge of the pool. In bewilderment he scanned the length of the cord as it snaked across the floor and looped upward, to a chair.

  Just before his match flickered out, the last image that Gregor registered was the faint gleam of blond hair, and the figure of the boy, his arm stretched toward the wall socket.

  The end of the cord was dangling from his hand.

  Tarasoff held out the scalpel. “You make the first incision,” he said, and saw the look of dismay in the other man’s eyes. You have no choice, Hodell, he thought. You’re the one who tried to recruit her into the fold. You’re the one who made the mistake. Now you have to correct it

  Hodell took the scalpel. They had not even begun to operate, and already sweat had broken out on his forehead. He paused, the blade poised over the exposed abdomen. They both knew this was a test—perhaps the ultimate one.

  Go ahead. Archer did his part by taking care of Mary Allen. Just as Zwick did with Aaron Levi. Now it’s your turn. Prove you’re still part of the team, still one of us. Cut open the woman you once made love to.

  Do it.

  Mark shifted the scalpel in his hand, as though trying to get a better grip. Then he took a breath and pressed the blade to the skin.

  Do it

  Mark sliced. A long, curving incision. The skin parted and a line of blood welled up and dribbled onto the surgical drapes.