The Suicide Effect

by L. J. Sellers

  “I’ll give it some serious thought. Thanks for the information, Dr. Gwartney.”

  “You’re welcome.” He abruptly clicked off.

  Sula hung up too and her mind reeled. The information carried a mixed emotional punch. She felt distressed for the young woman who had died unnecessarily, yet she felt fortified in her conviction that she was doing the right thing in trying to stop these trials.

  She returned the phone and promised to meet Hannah at the Steelhead for lunch the next Wednesday, even though she knew there was a good chance she wouldn’t be able to keep the date. She was more determined than ever to track down Warner’s DNA findings. If Paul’s hacking efforts didn’t produce anything soon, she might just have to go to Puerto Rico.

  Chapter 21

  Rudker had arranged to meet Jorgovitch at the Wetlands bar on Chambers. The private investigator had picked the time and the location. Rudker had never left work this early before or set foot in such a place. He’d agreed to the time and place because he was anxious to get the report and preferred to go somewhere no one would notice him.

  Now he was running late and hoped the fat little man had the good sense to wait. Considering the money Rudker had paid him, he’d better. A two thousand dollar retainer had bought him the promise that this job would never be documented or discussed. On some level, Rudker knew it was paranoid to watch the girl to see what she would do, but as long as he kept it in check, suspicion often worked in his favor.

  If Sula had gone so far as to steal a disk from Warner’s office, it was obvious she was out to get him and would not give up easily. Rudker intended to subvert anything she tried.

  He pushed the Jeep past the speed limit, ignoring the pounding rain on his windshield and limited visibility. As long as he kept making the lights, he had no reason to slow down. West 11th traffic had started to thin from the rush hour and he made good time. He pulled into the pub’s parking lot and drove to a back space. He liked to keep his rig away from the reckless masses.

  The bright neon sign announcing the name Wetlands irritated him. What the hell was wrong with the people in this town? Wetlands was synonymous with weed patch. Who the hell would name a restaurant and bar after such a landscape? It was bad enough that the city council was making Prolabs create new wetlands just so they could build on their own damn land. All because a group of kooky environmentalists thought the wetlands should be preserved. He could not wait to get out of this town.

  The stink of burnt grease hit him as he stepped inside. Rudker tried to ignore it. The one good thing he could say about Eugene was that it has passed a no smoking law. At least he wouldn’t have to suffer that offense on top of the grease and moldy carpet aromafest. He glanced around at the noisy blue-jeans-and-flannel crowd. People seemed charged up. Rudker figured it was either payday or Powerball time. He wondered if it was too late to buy tickets.

  Jimmy waved at him from a booth against the window. Rudker pushed through the crowd and slid into the seat without ever looking directly at the guy. He didn’t want anyone to ever connect the two of them. Jimmy greeted him with “Hey.”

  The PI was half-way through a tall glass of beer. Rudker signaled the waitress and ordered a bottle of Henrys, which he would not finish. He did not want to be noticed, and everyone else had a beer in front of them.

  Jimmy started to give his report, but Rudker cut him off. “Wait for the waitress to come back. I don’t want to be interrupted.”

  They sat in silence until his beer appeared. Rudker paid the young woman with cash and tipped her a dollar. Just enough to be fair, but not enough that she would remember him. When she left, he signaled Jimmy to begin.

  “I checked her mailbox early this morning while she was in the shower, and it had nothing in it. Then she came out of the house at eight clock and drove straight to the post office on Tyinn Street.”

  Rudker’s blood pressure bulged. “What did she do there?”

  “She carried in two or three manila envelopes.” Jimmy squirmed. “A few minutes later she came out, empty handed.”

  “Shit.” Ruder said it softly. “Any idea what was in the envelopes? Were they bulky, like they had an object in them? Or flat, like paper only?”

  “Flat, like paper only.” The PI sounded confident.

  “Any idea who they were addressed to?”

  “No.”

  “What else did she do today?”

  Jimmy looked down at a notepad on the table. “She went to the state employment office on Coburg Road and spent two hours and forty-five minutes there.”

  Relief washed over him. Sula was looking for work. The envelopes probably contained resumes and job applications. “By the way, when you’re done reading your notes to me, destroy them. Tomorrow, commit her movements to memory, please.”

  Jimmy squinted at him. “I’ll try.”

  “What next?”

  “She stopped at a place called Oregon Research Center. It’s on Willamette Street.”

  “I know where it is. How long was she there?”

  “About thirty minutes.”

  “Anything noteworthy?”

  “No, but her next stop was kind of odd.”

  Rudker raised an eyebrow.

  “The building on the corner of 4th and High. Haven’t figured what it is yet.” Jimmy tossed back the rest of his beer. “The weird thing is, she went inside for a minute, then came out and sat in her truck to make a cell phone call. Then she went back inside for a minute, then came back out and left.”

  Rudker puzzled over the sequence of events. “Maybe she borrowed the cell phone from someone inside?”

  Jimmy gave him a surprised/impressed look. “Could be. After that she went home. Spent the afternoon in her garage.”

  Rudker wondered why Sula would borrow a cell phone. She must have one of her own. The only thing that made sense was she didn’t want someone to see her name come up. Who would she make an anonymous call to? His greatest fear was that she had made a copy of the disk before he’d taken it back and maybe already sent it to the FDA. Without data, calling the agency would be a waste of her time. They heard from crackpots every day, people who thought pharmaceuticals were evil and blamed the agency for everything from constipation to global warming.

  Had Sula contacted the media? He realized Jimmy was asking him something. “What did you say?”

  “Should I stay on her for a few more days?”

  “Yes. Let me have those notes.”

  Jimmy ripped the top page off his notebook and pushed it across the table. Rudker scooped up the page and shoved it in his jacket pocket. He would run it through his shredder at home. Rudker took a long swallow of his beer, then stood to leave. “Tomorrow, same time.”

  “See you then.” Jimmy made no move to leave.

  “You’re going back out to her house, right?”

  “I thought I’d eat first if that’s all right.”

  Rudker was annoyed by the man’s sarcasm but didn’t let it show. “See you tomorrow.”

  The rain was still pounding down when he stepped outside, so he decided not to go back to the office. Tara would be pleased to see him home before seven for a change. He backtracked the way he’d come, then headed up Timberline. The mortgage on his home was nearly $3,000 a month, but the location was empowering. Rudker liked being at the top.

  He turned left on Meadow View and saw an unfamiliar blue Bronco in his driveway next to Tara’s Mercedes. Damn. He was in the mood for sex, not small talk with one of her charity ladies. He parked on the street because there wasn’t room in the driveway for all three vehicles.

  Rudker hurried up the steps, entered the house, and stripped off his wet overcoat. He tossed the coat on the hall table and called out to his wife as he moved through the foyer into the living room. He was surprised to see it empty. Tara and her guest were not in the family room either. Rudker headed upstairs to their bedroom to change his shoes. Tara and her friend were probably in her office, planning some event.


  As he reached the top of the stairs, his wife came out of their bedroom, followed by a man Rudker had never seen before. At first, the sight confused him. Who was he and why was he here? Had she called a repairman? Then the man’s young age and stunning looks hit him like chest blow. Dear God, this thirty-year-old Adonis was fucking his wife.

  Rudker’s throat went dry and he couldn’t speak.

  “Hi sweetie,” Tara gushed. “This is Doug. He’s a volunteer fundraiser for the food bank.”

  Rudker swallowed, finding his voice. “Why were you in the bedroom?”

  As his wife struggled to formulate a believable response, Rudker took it all in. Tara’s tousled hair and hard nipples pushing through her sweater, unrestrained by a bra. Doug’s flushed face and sockless ankles.

  “We were looking for a list of donors that I’d made out earlier and–”

  “Shut up!” Rudker’s heart valves pounded like a herd of thoroughbreds at the racetrack. His muscles tightened until he thought his chest would explode.

  Doug stepped forward and started to speak. Rudker rushed him, knocking him to the ground. He landed with his knee in Doug’s crotch. The man cried out and Rudker silenced him with a fist to his mouth. The crunch of bone on bone was both painful and rewarding. Rudker pounded the pretty face again.

  Behind him, Tara shrieked for him to stop. Rudker ignored her and hammered the guy again and again. He didn’t stop until his wife grabbed a handful of his hair and yanked his head back. In a flurry of pain, he swung awkwardly at her, striking her softly in the thigh.

  Behind him Doug jumped up and knocked Rudker on his ass. While he lay stunned for a moment, the coward bolted downstairs. Tara stood her ground, biting her lip. The front door slammed as Rudker got to his feet.

  “Jesus, Karl. It’s not his fault. It’s mine. I’m sorry–”

  He lashed out and slapped her mouth to stop the flow of words. Tara’s hands flew to her face, but she didn’t cry out. For a moment, they made eye contact and silently accused each other of a dozen wrongdoings, big and small. Tara conceded first and fled into the bedroom. Rudker slumped on the top step and put his head in his hands. He heard Tara opening and closing drawers, slamming them occasionally to express her anguish. She was packing to leave. He made no move to stop her.

  After a few minutes, she dragged a suitcase by him as she pounded down the stairs, crying softly.

  “Why?” he called out to her retreating back.

  For a moment she kept going, then at the bottom of the steps she stopped and turned back.

  “Because I’m lonely. Because you’re never here.” Her voice gained volume and her face twisted in anguish. “Because you’re not really here even when you’re home. Because I don’t want to move to Seattle.”

  His wife spun around and stormed out the front door. For a second, he heard the rain beating on the front step, matching the fury of his heart. Rudker wished he hadn’t hit Tara; that one slap could cost him dearly. But damnit, she had betrayed him. Totally blindsided him. After several long minutes of waiting for his heart to stop pounding in his ears, he went downstairs and took two Ativan. He thought he might have missed his Zyprexa again that morning, so he took one of those too.

  Blood seeped from his knuckles, so he stood at the kitchen sink and ran cold water on his swelling hand. Rudker vowed to get back on track, to stay in control of himself until his external problems were resolved. He knew he should fight for Tara. He could win her back with the right promises—and he would. But it would have to wait. He was juggling too many critical things right now, any of which could blow up on him. The land rezoning and expansion. The fraudulent accounting, which could surface and derail the merger. And that damn PR person’s obsession with the Nexapra trials.

  Rudker shut off the water and retreated to his study. Sula was his greatest concern and containing her was his top priority. Her visit to the research clinic had unnerved him. He doubted if the girl had learned anything significant, but clearly she was not giving up. He wondered what it would take to intimidate her. The idea of assaulting her was certainly attractive. Punishing offenders could be quite satisfying, as he had just experienced. Yet an anonymous attack would be difficult to pull off, and Sula would probably send the police to him even if she didn’t actually see her assailant. He could not afford to be questioned. Not with his career on the line and with Warner so recently assaulted.

  One the other hand, an accident might be just what Sula needed.

  Chapter 22

  The time Sula spent working on her sculpture was therapeutic. She’d managed to not think about her custody hearing, her unemployment, the theft charges against her, or the Nexapra trials for nearly two hours.

  Of course, as soon as she put down the mig welder, she’d started brooding about all of it. Her custody lawyer still didn’t know she was unemployed, and Sula needed to make that dreaded call. She had decided not to tell Barbara about being arrested. The theft hearing was after the custody hearing, and no one involved in the custody dispute needed to know about it. The only thing she could do to improve her chances of winning custody was to find a job, one that paid more than unemployment. That might take a while. Unemployment in Oregon was over ten percent.

  Recovering the DNA data seemed even more difficult. Paul hadn’t called yet to report how their Trojan horse was doing. On the positive side, she’d learned the last name of a third Nexapra suicide, but wasn’t sure what good it would do her.

  She wanted to get out for a walk but it was too wet. She put on shorts and a Beyonce CD, then worked up a sweat dancing around the living room. Exercise was not a discipline with her. She did it only when she felt like it, and only as long as she enjoyed it.

  Sula showered and changed into jeans. Unable to wait any longer, she called Paul. “Hey. How’s the hacking coming?”

  “Hi. And I’m fine, thanks.”

  “Good to hear. If you’re going to keep me in suspense about it, maybe I should drive over and pick up pizzas on the way.”

  “Excellent idea. I have nothing here but a moldy tomato, a can of peaches, and some cat food.” Paul didn’t have a cat.

  Sula didn’t take the bait. “See you in thirty.”

  She called in two small pizzas from Papas—a Mt. Bachelor classic for her, with pesto, sausage, artichoke hearts, and wax banana peppers, and a Canadian bacon and pineapple for Paul. They had shared this meal a few times. The pizzas were ready when she arrived, and Sula put them on her UO/Visa card. Intuition told her she needed to keep what little cash she had on hand.

  It stopped raining on the drive over. She heard her mother’s voice—a sweet, faint memory—calling it an omen for good things to happen during her visit with Paul. As much as she liked to keep her mother’s memory close, Sula rejected her spirituality. Gods and chants and superstitious hadn’t made her mother happy or kept her safe.

  Paul opened the door as she got there and ushered her in with a string of exclamations about food and love. Sula took the boxes to the kitchen table, while Paul dug out a stack of napkins. They each devoured half a pizza before saying much.

  “What’s happening with our Trojan horse?” Sula asked between napkin wipes.

  Paul grinned, mouthful and all. “I have a password.”

  “Hot damn. Do you know who the user is?” Sula pushed her pizza aside, too excited to eat now.

  “Eric Sobotka.”

  “He’s a scientist. He has access to the clinical trial database.”

  “I know.” Paul was still grinning. “I’ve already been in there.”

  Sula jumped up and went around the table to hug him. “What have you found?”

  “Tons of stuff. But I don’t have any idea what I’m looking for, so that’s why I needed you here.”

  “We’re looking for anything we can find about Miguel and Luis Rios. I should have given you the names.”

  “You probably did.” Paul shrugged. “Let me eat one more piece of this heavenly pie, then we’ll get right on i
t.”

  After forty minutes of searching, the names did not come up.

  “Rudker deleted the files. I knew he would.” Sula slumped into a chair. She’d been pacing Paul’s living room for the last thirty minutes, checking over his shoulder on occasion. “Warner must have expected him to do that, which was why she made the disk. And I lost it.”

  Paul turned to her. “You didn’t lose it. The bastard had you arrested, then broke into your home while you were in jail and stole it from you. Who would have seen that coming?”

  “Certainly not me.”

  “What now?” Paul did not give up easily either.

  “You’re not going to believe this, but I’m thinking of going to Puerto Rico.”

  “Get out.” Paul’s mouth fell open. “You don’t fly.”

  Sula hadn’t let herself think about that part of it. “I have to get that data. A woman in Portland also committed suicide while taking Nexapra during a clinical trail. She was only twenty-eight. Her last name was James, but the clinician said she looked Hispanic.”

  “Jesus. Clearly not a good drug for Latinos.” Paul shook his head. “Can you do it? Get on a plane and fly across an ocean?”

  “I hope so. Maybe with enough Xanax in me.”

  “Can you afford the ticket?”

  “No, but I have a credit card.”

  Paul leaned forward and grabbed her hands. “I have a free flight from years of building up credit card points. It’s good for anywhere on US soil. I’ll get you a ticket with it.”

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  “Of course you can. It’s not a gift; it’s a loan. Without any interest. You’ll pay me back whenever you can.”

  Sula was overwhelmed by his generosity. She tried to refuse again, but he ignored her and turned back to his computer. In a few minutes, the Chase credit card site came up and Paul found the number to call for cashing in his travel points. While he was on hold, he asked, “When do you want to go?”