The Suicide Effect

by L. J. Sellers

  While the cell phone was still in his hand, Jimmy Jorgovitch called.

  “Hey Karl, it’s Jimmy.”

  Rudker was startled by the man’s use of his name. He hadn’t given it to the PI. “I don’t know how you got my name, but don’t say it again. In fact, forget you know it.”

  “Seems extreme, but I’ll go along.”

  “What’s the girl up to?”

  “You’re not going to like this.”

  “Ah shit.” Rudker couldn’t take much more bad news. “What the hell is it now?”

  “She took a flight first thing this morning. I just spent five bills of your money on a pimply faced kid to find out where. ”

  “Just fucking tell me.”

  “San Juan, Puerto Rico.”

  The air left his lungs and wave of heat traveled through his body. Sula was now up there with Akron on the list of people he would gladly murder if he ever decided to completely let go. “When is she coming back?”

  “I didn’t find out.”

  “Why the hell not? For five hundred dollars, I expect to know exactly when her return flight hits the runway.”

  “I’ll find out and I’ll be there.”

  “Just call me and let me know.” Rudker hung up the phone. “Fucking nosy, pain in the ass bitch!” He was no longer concerned with what Prolabs’ employees thought.

  His cell phone rang again. Rudker was afraid to answer it.

  It was his son Robbie. The call surprised and pleased him at first. Then he realized the boy was drunk and obviously not at work where he should have been. Rudker was in no mood for nonsense, so he put him off until later. The boy was clearly having trouble again, and Rudker wished he knew how to help him. He had never understood Robbie’s problems, and he certainly did not have the time or patience to deal with them at the moment.

  Rudker grabbed his jacket and strode from the office. Alice averted her eyes as he walked by. She was a pain in ass too. He would fire her as soon as he got back. Right now he needed to think and plan and he couldn’t do that in his confining office.

  A company saleswoman stepped on the elevator in front of him. She was in her mid-thirties, with shoulder-length hair, and an attractive face. Rudker recognized her from a recent sales meeting, but couldn’t remember her name. He didn’t care and didn’t return her nod.

  Thoughts and images he could not control flooded his mind. He visualized Sula’s plane crashing into the ocean and killing her on impact before she ever reached the island. He imagined a pack of indigent thieves coming out of an alley in San Juan and stabbing her to death for the cash in her purse. If only he could get that lucky.

  The saleswoman behind him began to whisper. At first he thought she was making a cell phone call and trying to keep her conversation private. Then he realized she was making comments about him. Sleazy crook who runs this business can’t even keep his wife happy. Now he’s after that poor PR girl who used to work here before he fired her.

  Rudker jerked around to face her. “Shut up!”

  The woman drew back in shock.

  Phony bitch. He turned around without further comment.

  She was quiet for a moment, then started up again with her snake-like whisper. Sula’s right, you know, and she may beat you at your own game.

  The elevator jerked to a stop. Rudker turned around again. “You’re fired.” The door opened and he stepped off.

  The saleswoman ran after him, calling, “Why?”

  Rudker ignored her, crazy as she was, and strode through the lobby. A few people glanced up, aware that something was going on, but no one looked him in the eye. He stopped long enough to snap at the security man, “Keep that woman away from me.”

  He stepped out through the glass doors and into the bright sun. The back-stabbing saleswoman didn’t follow. Rudker took in the blue sky and warm breezed and longed for a day on the golf course. He suspected it would be a quite a while before he could relax that much again.

  Taking the wheel of his big rig and powering it down the road helped clear his mind and reinstate his confidence. For a few minutes. Soon the voice from the elevator was in his head. It insisted Sula was dangerous. She went to the clinic in San Juan, it whispered. She traveled halfway around the world to gather evidence against you. She is hell bent on sabotaging Nexapra’s development and will stop at nothing to accomplish her mission.

  Rudker could not silence the voice or ignore it. In his gut, he knew it was all true. Sula was a fanatic. By raising the stakes, she had changed the rules of the game. Now anything was fair. Rudker could play at that level too.

  Cricket was in a funk. He couldn’t believe the city council had voted to amend the zoning regulations. Now the only thing standing between Prolabs and its new chemical-spewing factory was an environmental impact report. That report, which was being produced by a county-appointed committee of three, would not have any real “green” input.

  He sat on his back deck in a canvas chair and stared into the tall pines trees. He wanted to smoke a joint, but he wouldn’t let himself. Not until he had formulated his next step. He was giving some serious thought to quitting pot anyway. A comment he’d heard behind his back yesterday made him realize he had become the very thing he’d run from all his life—a stereotype.

  So much weighed on his mind. The council vote had been close: four to three. The big surprise had been Walter Krumble of district four. He was an old conservative—by Eugene standards—who liked the status quo. He rarely sided with any kind of change, progressive or not. As Krumble liked to say: “Yes votes mean spending more of the taxpayers’ money.”

  Why had the old man gone along? Cricket always suspected the worst of big business and this was no exception. Krumble had been pressured, he was sure. But what could he do now? If the environmental report came back with a watered-down analysis that said, “Go right ahead, the birds can move and the frogs don’t mind the poison,” then the foundation would be poured. They were out there digging it right now “in anticipation” of a green light.

  It was time to get serious. Cricket slowly rose to his feet and stretched his legs from their lotus position. He had to mobilize people who could commit to a long-term camp out. He needed to arrange a support group to bring in food and water. It would take several days to get it all going, but that would give the bulldozers time to finish digging. His Love the Earth group would slip in after hours between the digging and the pouring and make themselves at home.

  Robbie heard the phone ringing but couldn’t wake himself up enough to answer. He felt drugged, unable to think straight. Yet his mind wouldn’t shut down into complete unconsciousness either. He drifted, his brain floating from one scrambled memory to another. Next he was falling down the side of a mountain, rolling and smashing into shrubs and rocks.

  Jason’s voice boomed in his ears. “Robbie! Wake up!” His head was lifted up, but his eyes wouldn’t open. Thumbs pulled back his lids. A bright light flooded his eyes and made the muscles in his temples hurt. He fought to close his lids.

  “Hey. You’re scaring me. Wake up!” Jason pinched his cheeks and dragged him to his feet. Robbie realized he was in their dining room. He felt too weak to stand, but Jason wouldn’t let him go. He sensed himself being dragged, then a blast of cold air hit him. The shivers brought his body to attention. His legs became responsive and began to carry some of his own weight. After walking for a while, the oxygen helped bring his brain around. He realized Jason was asking him the same question over and over: “Did you take any of those pills?”

  What pills? Robbie shook his head.

  “Are you sure?”

  He didn’t know. Random scenes and thoughts from that afternoon came back to him. He had tried to kill himself. Yet here he was, still alive. Robbie began to cry. He didn’t know if it was from relief or frustration.

  Chapter 25

  Thursday, April 22, 3:12 a.m

  Sula woke in the middle of night to the loud repetitive calling of what she later learne
d were Coqui tree frogs. Hundreds of the creatures, all belting out “ko-kee,” over and over, created a cacophony of overwhelming noise. How did people sleep here? She remembered the open window and got up to close it. She gulped down some water from the sink, worried for a moment that it might not be safe to drink, then went back to bed.

  She awoke again at 6:33 a.m. bathed in sweat. With the air conditioning off and the window closed, her stucco-walled room had heated up. She reopened the window, relieved to hear only the faint sound of the ocean and the familiar hum of traffic. The air was just as warm at six in the morning as it was at midnight. She loved it.

  She realized the research clinic would not open for hours, so she decided to wander around and enjoy herself. If she had packed a suit, she would have gone for a swim. Instead, she showered and dressed in the shorts and t-shirt she’d packed after reading that the average year-round temperature in Puerto Rico was seventy-eight degrees.

  The breakfast room offered complimentary bananas, muffins, and coffee and she helped herself to all three. A little later, Sula started down the Isle de Verde, a long business strip that ran parallel to the coast line.

  Nestled among familiar fast food restaurants—Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Taco Bell—were small stucco shops with Spanish names that offered tourist take-homes. Sula checked out a few gift shops, selling mostly t-shirts, towels, and swimsuits. A pair of bright blue nylon shorts with orange dolphins made her think of Tate. She wondered if she and her son would ever take any vacations together. More than anything, she wanted to take him to Disneyland, to see the joy on his face at every ride and every familiar character.

  She turned away from the children’s clothes and selected a pair of sunglasses. She had not thought to bring hers and the sun was brighter than she’d ever experienced.

  Back out on the street, the morning was still quiet and few pedestrians were out and about. As the traffic on the strip picked up, she was surprised by how American the cars seemed. She smiled at the thought. Of course they were American, but were they made here or did they have to be imported? She imagined that many things had to be imported, including food like ice cream. It seemed unlikely that the island had any dairies.

  What it did have were dozens of drug manufacturing plants. For decades, U.S. pharma companies had built factories in Puerto Rico to take advantage of its low wages and status as a commonwealth with no federal tax. At one point, half of all the prescriptions consumed in the United States were manufactured in Puerto Rico. Sula wondered what other industries were here. She checked her watch: 7:46. Time to head back. She intended to be at the clinic when it opened.

  Sula’s taxi pulled up in front of a low-slung stucco building painted a pale creamy yellow. Fernández Juncos Clinica was sandwiched between a Rite Aid and a restaurant offering “carne guisada puertorriqueña” as the house specialty. Sula thought it ironic that a drug studies clinic would be next door to a pharmacy.

  She paid the cab driver and asked him to return in an hour, then sat on a bench across the street. Soon she was sweating. The black skirt and beige suit jacket she’d changed into were too warm for the tropical climate, but fortunately she’d decided to skip the nylons.

  A tall middle-aged woman approached the clinic and unlocked the door. Her red skirt and jacket set off her long dark hair. Sula guessed her to be in her mid-forties, and hoped she looked that good in twenty years. Felisa Quinton was the clinic’s director, a psychiatrist who had been born, raised, and educated on the island. Sula had stayed up the night before her flight, searching the internet and learning everything she could about the island, the clinic, and its staff. The person she really wanted to talk to was David Hernandez, the doctor who had supervised the Nexapra trial.

  Sula forced herself to be patient, to let the woman get settled in with a cup of coffee before she barged in asking questions. After checking her watch for the third time, ten minutes had finally elapsed. She took a long deep breath as she stood. She’d tried to prepare herself for the possibility she might come away empty handed—after borrowing a small fortune and enduring six plane rides. The money would be a setback either way, but the idea that she would fail to find the data she needed to stop the trials was hard to accept.

  Sula had gone back and forth a dozen times about how to approach the doctor and had decided to use the journalist scenario she had used with the clinic in Eugene. It was also mostly true. Her career goal was to be an investigative reporter, and this was her first story. She intended to write about her experience, regardless of the outcome, and hoped to get the story published.

  She stepped toward the street and waited for a pink convertible with a group of young girls to pass by. A minute later, she entered the air-cooled clinic. Cream-colored walls alternated with sage green, and a plush maroon couch invited visitors to sit. The soothing sound of water rippling over rocks served as background music. The effect was quite calming. Sula imagined a fountain in the courtyard, surrounded by big, brightly painted pots filled with ferns.

  “Buenos dias,” Felisa greeted her from the reception desk.

  “Buenos dias.” Sula smiled. “Actually, I don’t speak Spanish.”

  The director smiled back. “That’s fine. I like to practice my English with people who don’t speak with an accent.” She stood held out her hand. “Felisa Quinton.”

  “Sula Moreno. From Eugene, Oregon.”

  “You’re a long way from home. What can I do for you?”

  “I’d like to speak to Dr. David Hernandez.”

  Felisa’s face closed up. “He no longer works here.” Anger flickered in her eyes. “I have no idea where he is or how to contact him. I’m sorry you came so far for nothing.”

  A silence engulfed them, the director lost in an unpleasant memory while Sula reeled with disappointment and paranoia. Had Rudker paid off Hernandez? Or was it merely coincidence that the two people most familiar with the Nexapra suicides—Warner and Hernandez—were unavailable?

  A chill ran up her spine. Did Rudker know she was here? What if he had followed her? For the first time, she realized she might be in over her head. Rudker obviously wasn’t taking any chances in letting the suicide data get out, and he undoubtedly considered her a risk.

  “Did you know David? You look like you’ve just seen a parición.”

  Sula shook her head. “It was very important that I speak to him, but perhaps you can help me instead.”

  Felisa shrugged. “If I can.” She touched Sula’s elbow. “Let’s go into the conference room.”

  Sula followed her through an archway into a short hallway, then into the first room on the left. It seemed more like a cozy kitchen with a small dark-wood table and padded straight-back chairs. Sula glanced at the sink and refrigerator in the corner.

  “Would you like something to drink?” Felisa moved toward the fridge.

  “Please.”

  The director came back with two bottles of cold frappuccino. Sula noticed Felisa’s eyes were light blue, contrasting with her dark skin. She’d read that Puerto Ricans were a racial melting pot of native Taino, Spanish, African, French, German, and Chinese. Her personal observation was that most of the islanders were attractive.

  They sat at the table and opened their drinks. Sula took a long slug before speaking. “I’m a freelance writer, and I’m researching the Nexapra clinical trials. I understand that there were two suicides here.”

  Felisa gave her an odd look. Sula couldn’t read the reaction.

  “Where did you get that information? The trial was discontinued and the data was not released to the public.” Her impeccable English had picked up an accent.

  “Were you involved in that study?”

  “I assisted Dr. Hernandez with intake. What do you want to know?”

  “Are the men’s files still here? I mean, is there a record of their participation and suicides?”

  “Of course, but I can’t release any information to you. It’s very confidential.”

 
“Were you surprised when both Luis and Miguel Rios killed themselves within a month of taking Nexapra?”

  Felisa stopped mid-air with her Frappaccino and set it down. She looked at Sula with a mix of surprise, respect, and fear. Sula decided to tell her everything. She had nothing to lose.

  “I used to work for Prolabs. One day I heard Diane Warner and Karl Rudker arguing about Nexapra. Do you know who they are?”

  “Of course. Dr. Warner discovered the drug when she worked for the Oregon Health and Science University. Rudker runs Prolabs.”

  That was more than Sula had known. “Warner told Rudker she’d found evidence that the men who committed suicide shared a genetic mutation that influenced the way they responded to the drug. She asked him to halt the trials and give her two years to develop a screening test. Rudker said no. He also threatened to fire her if she didn’t drop the idea.”

  “You heard all of this first hand?” Felisa let go of her drink and squeezed her hands together.

  “Yes. I was waiting to talk with them about a press release I was writing.”

  “Go on.”

  “The next day, Dr. Warner didn’t show up for work. She didn’t call either. Two days later, we found out she was dead. Murdered while jogging along a riverside path.”

  Felisa’s eyes flashed with speculation. Sula took a sip of the sweet caffeine and thought, wait until you hear the rest of the story.

  “I became concerned that Dr. Warner’s theory and evidence would die with her and that a lot of people might kill themselves in the large Phase III studies.”

  Felisa made a funny noise in her throat, then signaled Sula to keep going.

  “I went into Warner’s office and found a disk tapped to the bottom of a desk drawer. I took it home. The files were labeled Miguel and Luis Rios.”

  A young man burst into the room. “Hey, there you are. Sorry I’m late.” His dimpled cheeks and curly hair gave him a look of innocence.”