Mercy

by Daniel Palmer

  “I’ll help you get it ready,” Michelle said, rising from her chair.

  Julie stood as well. “May I use the bathroom?”

  “Of course, you know where it is. Down the hall next to the study.”

  When Julie got out of the bathroom, she could hear Keith and Michelle having what sounded like a heated conversation. Marriage was hard, Julie knew, and she wandered into the study to give the couple some space to finish their disagreement. She scanned the bookshelves, noting many medical ethics texts, some novels, a few classics mixed with mysteries and thrillers. Keith had his own section for medical texts, but some remnants from his past life as a bug enthusiast lingered, including a large volume specifically on arachnids.

  Julie took the book off the shelf and turned to the index, where she found an entry for the lone star tick. She opened to that page and a shiver tore through her body.

  The page was marked up, highlighted, words scribbled in the margin. Several loose pages from a notebook were folded up inside. Julie flipped through other pages in the book, but only the entry for the lone star tick had any markings on it.

  Taking care to be quiet, Julie unfolded the loose pages tucked inside. It took her a moment to understand what she was looking at. Gripped with a sudden terror, Julie put her hand to her mouth to silence her gasp.

  The pages contained diagrams of what appeared to be a complex incubation system. There were instructions for light and food sources, specific details on moisture and temperature, along with diagrams of the life cycle of the lone star tick from egg to larva to nymph to adult. There was also an illustration of a very large cage and a crude rendering in pencil of rats in the cage.

  Julie felt sick. She poked her head out of the study and could hear the tense conversation between Keith and Michelle continuing.

  Keith … my God … it’s Keith.

  Julie’s heart went to her throat, her thoughts racing.

  They hadn’t synthesized the saliva at all. He was using real live ticks to make the patients alpha-gal allergic. But how would he harvest them? From the rat cage he kept in the basement, that’s how.

  She recalled snippets of what Michelle had said. “He has rats … a cage he keeps downstairs.” Didn’t she say something about Keith spending hours down there?

  Julie walked silently down the hall. She could hear the discussion between Keith and Michelle a bit more clearly. She closed the bathroom door and left the light on inside, hoping it would look like she was still occupied if anyone came looking for her.

  “Spare me how in touch with my feelings you are, Keith. You don’t get it and you don’t get me, and let’s stop pretending you do.”

  The fight sounded familiar to Julie. It could have been a squabble she once had with Paul. It distracted Keith, though, and allowed Julie to descend the front stairs down to the lower level.

  Just like the time she made her way through Sherri’s darkened home, Julie used her phone as a flashlight to go exploring. The basement was a multiroom design, with a bathroom to her right, and a room directly across from the bathroom that functioned as a wine cellar. One end of the hall had a door that probably opened to the garage. At the other end was a second closed door. It was this door Julie opened. She stepped into a utility room covered in drywall with linoleum for flooring.

  The flashlight from Julie’s phone cut through the darkness. She scanned one side of the room, bouncing her light over stainless steel tables and shelves with various pieces of lab equipment—all very modern looking, like something Lucy would have in her lab at White. Behind her, Julie heard a sound of scurrying feet.

  She whirled and saw a cage on a wooden stand. The cage was far bigger than anything sold at a pet store. Custom built, Julie speculated. Inside were eight rats, crawling over a floor made of moss and grasses. They were playful creatures, all in good health, it seemed. Julie’s nervousness spiked as she opened the top of the cage.

  The rats sensed her presence and the scurrying intensified. With her heart thundering, terror percolating in her throat, Julie reached a hand into the cage and felt around for one of the rats. She had experience in handling Winston, so this was doable.

  The rats lunged at the intruder. One nipped at Julie’s fingers, another brushed the skin of her hand with its taut tail. Julie pulled her hand away in a panic, but reached in again, this time seizing one of the rats by its plump midsection. The rodent’s legs kicked furiously, scraping against Julie’s hand with sharp-clawed feet.

  Julie held the squirming animal with one hand and used the flashlight in her other to check its fur. At first she saw nothing, but a closer examination revealed various protrusions coming up off its body.

  Julie held the light closer and saw a tick embedded in the animal’s skin. But not just one tick, at least a dozen on this rat alone. Julie did not need a field guide to know these were lone star ticks.

  Julie had just dropped the rat back into the cage when her world went dark. A pain exploded on the side of her head and her knees buckled as she toppled to the floor, sprawled on her back at an odd angle. The throbbing in her temple became an intense, searing pain. She felt a gush of warmth as blood poured from the wound to her scalp. A light came on. Her vision returned, but was blurred.

  Julie moaned and tried to stand, but a figure loomed over her and pressed a foot against her sternum to hold her down. Now she could see him clearly. Keith wielded a frying pan in his right hand. He glared at Julie with a look of scorn.

  “Quiet. I don’t want our neighbors to hear you.” He knelt on Julie’s chest, and with his hands to her throat, he began to squeeze.

  Julie’s throat closed. An urgent need for air overcame her. It was like being underwater, swimming for the surface, while the surface moved farther and farther away. She writhed and wiggled to get free, but Keith had her pinned with his knees. He increased the pressure against her throat.

  “I’m sorry, but it will take some time to end you.”

  “Michelle…” Julie managed. “Help…”

  “I’m afraid Michelle can’t help you now,” Keith said.

  Can’t help me because he hurt her, Julie thought. Can’t help me because she’s got a knife in her chest and she’s dead on the kitchen floor.

  Julie tried to scream, but all that came out was a hiss of air followed by a pitiful wheeze. Julie’s life began to race through her mind in flashes, not vignettes, but images coming to her thoughts and leaving in flickers. One thought dominated all others.

  I want to live. Live! Live!

  Julie thrashed and pawed at Keith. She whipped her head from side to side, trying to break free of his hold. Blackness was coming. It was moving toward her like storm clouds swallowing the landscape, like a coming tornado.

  With time, Julie’s struggles abated. She became still, no longer feeling the pressure on her throat. No longer feeling anything but lightness. Peace settled over her like a warming light. A light. The bright light replaced the darkness.

  A sound came, a loud clanging that reverberated from somewhere not far away. A sudden rush of air filled Julie’s lungs, as if powerful bellows had pushed it there. The sound came again. Julie lolled her head to one side, and through dim vision saw Michelle bring the frying pan Keith attacked her with down on top of his head.

  Michelle lifted the weapon and brought it down again, and again, until Julie heard a crack, followed by another. Keith’s skull had collapsed in on itself. His body went into violent spasm before it went completely still. Blood covered the linoleum floor in a wash of red.

  Michelle crawled over to Julie, blood splatter dotting her face in a gruesome design.

  “Oh my God, Julie, Julie, can you hear me? Are you all right?” Michelle caressed Julie’s face, her hair.

  Julie could see her friend’s eyes swimming with worry and fear. She tried to speak, her voice coming out in a rasp.

  “I’m alive.”

  “Yes, thank God,” Michelle said. “You’re alive.”

  “It was K
eith,” Julie said, still on her back, chest heaving, spitting out each word. “Keith—he was killing the patients. He killed Sam.”

  “No, Julie. No.”

  “Yes—it’s true. I found proof. On the rats—the tick is on the rats.”

  “No, Julie. What I mean is, Keith didn’t kill Sam. I did.”

  CHAPTER 54

  Michelle left the room, but only for a moment. She came back with a first-aid kit and wrapped a towel around Julie’s head wound. Julie was too woozy and disoriented to try and stand, let alone get away. Julie let Michelle get her into a seated position with her back pressed against a wall.

  “Don’t worry, Julie,” Michelle said. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. I swear to you it’s true.”

  Julie’s eyes brimmed with fresh tears. “You killed Sam. Why?”

  “I did it for him,” Michelle said, her voice cracking with emotion. “Because it was what he wanted for himself.”

  Julie shook her head in disbelief. Nothing made sense.

  “Your work, your mission with Very Much Alive, was to keep people alive and get them the care they deserved.”

  Michelle’s gaze traveled to Keith’s dead body and his concave skull.

  “Come. Let’s get you into the kitchen. I’ll properly bandage your head and tell you everything.”

  Julie let Michelle help her get upstairs and get seated on a kitchen chair. Michelle applied a fresh field dressing to Julie’s head wound. She was practiced at it, the way a nurse would be. Julie had a glass of water on the table, but could not take a drink. Her throat ached too much for anything, talking included. The shock of what had happened proved almost paralyzing, and yet Julie was not afraid. Not in the least. Michelle’s wide eyes were gentle, filled with kindness and sympathy.

  “My mission was to prevent the kind of suffering I endured,” Michelle said.

  “I don’t understand.” It was hard and it hurt for Julie to speak those few words.

  “You see, I wanted my first husband to die,” Michelle said. “He wanted to die, and it happened just the way I said. The way I told you and Sam.”

  “But Andrew?”

  “Yes, Andrew took his life. That’s also true. But I did tell you a lie. I never stopped believing that what I did for my husband was the right thing to do. Death was his best option. But look at what I lost in the process. I lost my son. I lost my reason for living.

  “So I joined Very Much Alive thinking I could make amends. I tried to become a zealot for life at all costs, because what I had done had cost me so much. It had cost me Andrew, my only child. I joined Very Much Alive with the intent of carrying on their mission, but all it did was to put me face-to-face with people like my husband, people who wanted, who needed death with dignity.

  “I didn’t believe in the mission of Very Much Alive, I never did. I was lying to myself, fooling myself thinking I could. I thought God took Andrew from me as punishment for what I did, and my penance was to fight for life at all cost. But faced with so much suffering, I couldn’t suppress my true beliefs. In my heart of hearts I believe ending my husband’s suffering was the right thing to do. So after a time, I helped others who wished to die.”

  “Helped them?”

  “I killed them,” Michelle said. “I did it so their loved ones wouldn’t have to. So their loved ones wouldn’t have to suffer the guilt and maybe even the loss I did. I picked the patients who I believed didn’t want to live anymore, or who in secret confessed this desire to me, and I helped end their suffering.”

  “How many?”

  Michele’s gaze grew distant. “Ten or so,” she said. “Maybe more.”

  “But—Keith—Romey?”

  “Keith found out what I was doing. He found the potassium I used, other drugs too. He told me I would get caught eventually. Actually, I thought he was going to turn me in, but that wasn’t his plan. He had been researching alpha-gal. It was a hobby really, but when he discovered what I was doing he thought it over and realized it could be about money, not mercy.”

  “Keith went to Romey.”

  “Yes, Keith went to Romey. And as a hospitalist, Keith had access to patients all over—different floors, different hospitals too, including West.”

  “Keith killed Albert Cunningham?”

  “He did,” Michelle said. “We needed to have a real reason for you to go to Suburban West. I was against it, of course, but what could I do?”

  “But you killed Sam?”

  “Yes, I did. But I wasn’t supposed to do it. Keith gave him the tick bite, but that was before Roman told us he didn’t want anything to happen to Sam.”

  “Why?”

  “Because Romey knew you would get Lucy to perform an autopsy. As long as nobody saw the pathology of the heart, nobody would ever know how these patients were dying.

  “But once you started down the path, you wouldn’t stop. Romey tried to throw you off the trail. He made sure Coffey felt some heat about his department—performance pressure, that sort of thing—so he would become an obstacle, not an ally.” Michelle took a drink of water.

  “What about Tommy Grasso and Donald Colchester?”

  “I killed them both with cetuximab. But I did it because of mercy, not money. And as for Donald, I had no idea his mother had bugged the room.”

  “Weren’t you heard on the recording?”

  “No. Donald was asleep when it happened. Keith thought we caught a lucky break that Colchester’s mother listened to the recording after her son was put in the ground. But he knew she would press hard to get Brandon convicted. We had to make a convincing case.”

  “Who bribed Sherri?”

  “That was Romey. Actually it was Lincoln Cole, Romey’s guy. Cole planted the drugs in Brandon’s apartment, too.”

  “Did Lincoln Cole bribe Colchester?”

  “No. That was Romey’s doing. He’s skilled at finding the right levers to pull. Same as with Keith, money was Colchester’s motivator, not compassion. It was a win-win all around.”

  Julie could not believe her ears. Then she could not believe her memory, because now she recalled Michelle being on the ICU floor when Shirley Mitchell had trouble with her central line.

  “It was you who pulled out Shirley’s central line, wasn’t it?”

  “And replaced the saline in the room with heparin. So in a way I killed Shirley, too. I felt horrible about setting you up, but not about killing Shirley. By that point, you were too close to the truth.”

  “My God, Michelle. What have you done?”

  “What I did was listen to Keith.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means I was forced—coerced, I guess, into going along with the scheme he pitched Romey. Moments ago, right before he attacked you, we were fighting about what to do because I was ready to turn myself in. It was never about the money for me, Julie. I promise you that. It was always about mercy. Somewhere on my righteous path, I guess I lost my way. But I’ve found it again. I’ve found it by taking his life to save yours.”

  Julie was too numb to feel anger, but it was there, lurking below the surface, wanting to come out.

  “What now?” Julie said.

  Michelle turned her back to Julie, reached into a kitchen cabinet, and came out holding a pistol.

  “Now I have to say good-bye.”

  Julie’s eyes went wide with fear. “No, please. My son.”

  “We could have been great friends. Please know how sorry I am for everything.”

  Michelle raised the pistol. Julie covered her face with her hands, a silly reflex because it was not going to stop the bullet.

  Instead of firing at Julie, Michelle put the gun into her own mouth.

  And she pulled the trigger.

  EPILOGUE

  A group of them were waiting outside MCI Cedar Junction for Brandon Stahl to emerge from prison. Julie was there, of course, along with Paul and Trevor; Lucy; Becca Stinson; Jordan; his sisters, Teagen and Nina; as well as Jordan’s
mother. Brandon’s family was small, but a scattering of his friends had come.

  Not present, or at least not in any great numbers, were people who supported death with dignity and branded Brandon their ambassador. He had not done what many had believed; he’d played no part in Donald Colchester’s death.

  The most surprising of all the attendees on that March afternoon, gathered under gunmetal skies, was Pamela Renee Colchester, mother of Donald Colchester, wife of disgraced politician William Colchester.

  Pamela, a slight woman with graying hair, dressed in a navy pantsuit, stood quietly, composed. Julie had not spoken with Pamela since her husband’s indictment on bribery charges. The disgraced judge caught up in the scandal had resigned, but William Colchester remained in office. Defiant as he was, an announcement of his resignation was expected any day. A fickle public could overlook many things, but what William had done was not one of them. Pamela had not issued any official statements, but word was that she would stand by her man, and not move out of the Hyde Park home they had shared for thirty years.

  Julie stiffened as Pamela approached. She did not know what to expect. Rage? Sadness? A mixture of both, perhaps? Pamela’s expression revealed nothing.

  “You’re Dr. Julie Devereux, am I right?”

  A breeze came and tussled Julie’s hair. “Yes. That’s right. How are you, Mrs. Colchester?”

  “Pamela, please,” she said. Her manner of speech was a bit clipped, her voice a little plummy. “Is this your son?”

  “Yes, this is Trevor,” Julie said.

  Pamela’s eyes welled up a little. “Nice to meet you,” she said, shaking Trevor’s hand. “May we speak in private?” she asked.

  “Yes, of course.”

  Trevor went with Paul.

  Pamela and Julie stepped away from the crowd.

  “My husband is not a horrible man,” Pamela said. “But what he did was wrong. In his defense, Roman Janowski misled him into believing our son’s killer would go free if they exhumed Donald’s body. He never thought Brandon was innocent, but obviously the money Roman offered clouded his better judgment.”