Nerves of Steel

by CJ Lyons

  "A doctor? What's she doing with all that FX?" The sunbeam lost its battle as sullen gray clouds scudded through the small patch of sky visible in the window behind Miller.

  "Says she found it on a patient she was life-flighting last night," Kwon put in.

  "Who's the patient? Maybe we can trace the source from them."

  Miller's drumming stilled. She scrutinized the Mont Blanc as if it were the Holy Grail. "The patient is a juvenile Jane Doe, in a coma."

  "I'll get someone over to Three Rivers to get her prints and photo," Kwon said.

  Drake thought about the scenario as the clouds continued their dance in the stiffening breeze. Things just weren't making sense. "How does a kid get her hands on that much FX? And why would a doctor bring it here herself?"

  "More to the point," Miller said, "how does that much FX disappear from a hospital without anyone realizing it is gone?"

  He straightened at that, shot an inquiring look at Kwon. She arched an eyebrow and nodded. "That's what Hart says. See for yourself."

  She skidded the bag of drugs across Miller's desk to him. He snagged it, examined the pills more closely. The doctor, Hart, had sealed the original baggie in some sort of lab bag and Kwon had deposited the entire thing in an evidence bag. He held it under the light of Miller's banker's lamp, saw the markings on the back of the pills.

  "According to Hart," Miller continued, "she had Three Rivers' pharmacy track the lot numbers. They're from their own inpatient stock."

  "According to Hart." Kwon's voice was colored with disbelief. "She could still be covering something--maybe she never came here to tell us about the FX at all. Maybe Drake was right, she came to rat out whoever gave her those bruises. Then when she dropped the pills, knew that people had seen her with the FX, she made the story up."

  "There's too many what ifs," Miller conceded. "I don't like the idea of Hart ignoring hospital protocol to come here herself. Everyone over there knows to call us to secure evidence. What I really don't like is that the police bureau has already publicly cleared the area hospitals as being sources of FX. Last thing we need is to look like fools."

  "That was the narcotics guys who checked the hospital inventories," Kwon protested. "Before the task force was even formed."

  "Then I guess you all have your work cut out for you, checking again. But at least we finally have a lead on the FX source. I want you and Drake in Three Rivers by tonight, monitoring the wards. See how the drug distribution works, who could have opportunity. And someone needs to keep an eye out for this Hart woman. Who does she associate with? Can anyone back up her story about what happened last night? By tomorrow morning I want to know everything there is to know about Dr. Cassandra Hart."

  Drake left Chen doing Hart's background check. He retrieved his coat and service piece and jogged down the steps leading away from the Major Crimes Squad, eager to get going. Because of Hart, they had their first good lead, now that Lester was dead.

  He turned the corner onto the landing at the second floor, and a stocky man wearing a gray fedora blocked his way.

  "Hey, Jimmy," Drake greeted his partner from Major Crimes. "Thought you were in court this week."

  Jimmy Dolan stopped, brushed the rain from his wool overcoat. "In recess for motions. Where you going in such a hurry?"

  "Nowhere, just over to Oscar's for a hair cut." Drake buttoned his worn navy pea coat, but not before noting Jimmy's disapproving glance at his T-shirt and grease stained jeans.

  "Heard about Lester Young. Tough break. So how much longer's Miller gonna keep you with the task force?"

  "Aw, you miss me. Didn't know you cared."

  Jimmy snorted and moved up onto the landing to slouch against the wall opposite from Drake.

  "Miller's sending me over to Three Rivers to work undercover on the night shift. Kwon, too."

  Jimmy arched an eyebrow at that. "Three Rivers? I thought you guys already cleared the hospitals."

  "So did I. But some doctor from the ER convinced Miller someone there's stealing FX. And Miller, being Miller, suspects everyone, including her." Drake ran his fingers over the three-day beard that was beginning to itch. At least he thought it was about three days old. He couldn't remember the last time he'd bothered to shave. "So now I've got to go get cleaned up so's I don't scare the patients."

  He started down the steps, then turned back to his sartorially superior partner. "You ever get a shave over at Oscar's?"

  "You mean like with hot towels, fancy lotions, all that jazz?" Jimmy removed his fedora, exposing the flat top Oscar kept close shorn for him. "This doctor, do you think she's behind the FX thefts?"

  Drake thought a moment, remembering the way he'd been able to con a cup of coffee from Hart. He hadn't had to work very hard, and he didn't think that was because Hart was a soft touch, either. "I'm not sure. She doesn't seem the type, that's for certain."

  "Is she your type?" Jimmy gave him a stern, remember-what-happened-last-time, look.

  If it had been anyone but Jimmy asking, Drake would have just shot him the bird. But Jimmy had taken a chance, still partnering with him after last summer. "Don't worry. She's about the exact opposite of my type. Besides, nothing's gonna happen. She's a suspect."

  CHAPTER 7

  Six-forty that night and the ICU bustled with activity. Flocks of white-coated students and residents wearily followed their attendings from bed to bed, trying to put out any fires before leaving their patients in the care of the on-call doctors. Two shifts of nurses crowded into the small dictation area behind the nurses' station, the day shift giving report to their night colleagues. In the middle of it all, there was one island of solitude.

  No one approached Jane Doe's bed. She lay there, pale and unmoving, IV tubing and monitor leads her sole connection to the outside world. The only sound from her was the faint whoosh of the ventilator filling her lungs.

  No friends or family--so she was probably still Jane Doe, Cassie thought as she pulled the chart from the rack at the ICU nurses' station and sat down beside Adeena Coleman, the social worker assigned to the case. Cassie pushed her sweater sleeves up and flipped through the already thick binder, finding the neurology consultation. As usual, they were hemming and hawing, taking a wait-and-see attitude. She turned to Adeena.

  "Anything?" she asked the social worker.

  Adeena shook her head, rattling the copper beads woven into her braids. "Not yet. The police are working on her fingerprints. I'm sending her information to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children."

  "The milk carton people."

  Adeena nodded, then pointed her ballpoint at Cassie's forearm. "Nice bruise. Should we talk?"

  Cassie smiled and twisted her arm over to admire the latest patch of purple forming there. It was a nice bruise, almost as nice as the move that had followed when she twisted beneath Mr. Christean's guard and cut his legs out from under him with a sweep kick. First time she'd been able to best her instructor. "Kempo. I'm testing for my brown belt next month."

  Adeena's eyes narrowed in concern. "Maybe you should give yourself a break," she suggested. "No karate belt is worth getting hurt over."

  Hurt? This was nothing. Cassie knew real pain--Richard had taught her that. She yanked her sleeves back down and focused on Jane Doe's chart.

  They sat in silence for a moment before Adeena surrendered. "Right, I keep forgetting you're superwoman. Able to kick butt, then patch them up afterwards. Tessa was asking why you haven't been by to take her to Mass."

  Cassie sighed. Between her boss, Fran, and Adeena's Aunt Tessa, she had more people anxious to meddle in her life than any one person deserved. She glanced at Jane Doe's bed and choked down her sarcastic reply. At least she had people in her life who cared for her. At least she would never be alone and anonymous like her patient.

  "Tell her I'll be there Sunday."

  "Great. You know she makes her fried chicken whenever you come over."

  "Why's everyone always trying to fatten me u
p?"

  "Because," Adeena reached out and laid her own plump hand over Cassie's, "Tessa promised your Gram that--"

  "She'd take care of me." Cassie rolled her eyes. Even from beyond the grave, Gram Rosa somehow still managed to interfere with her life. Love is stronger than death, Rosa would say. Right before telling Cassie everything she had done wrong with her life and exactly how to fix it. "One of these days you guys will figure out that I can take care of myself."

  Adeena didn't take the bait and instead turned back to the data sheet from the Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Cassie looked over the social worker's shoulder, reading the scant information collected on Jane Doe.

  Adeena jangled her braids in impatience, shifting so Cassie no longer blocked her light. "Am I in your way?"

  "Yeah, thanks." Cassie took the paperwork and scanned through it. "There's so little here. How can we know next to nothing about her?"

  "One good thing. As far as the police can tell so far, she hasn't ever been arrested."

  "Is that the only thing they care about?" Cassie scoffed. "Idiots. They practically accused me of stealing the FX I took it to them this morning."

  Adeena looked up at that. "What were you doing with FX? You're lucky they didn't arrest you or something."

  "Tell me about it. I think they would have liked to. Seems they had no idea where all the FX flooding the streets is coming from or how to stop it."

  "They're doing the best they can."

  "Right." Cassie focused on her patient once again. "It really burns me that people get more upset over a beached whale than they do about homeless kids on their own streets. Look at her, she was somebody's beautiful baby, but they all abandoned her."

  "More likely she abandoned them," Adeena reminded her. "She's probably been out on the street for a while now. Long enough to get hooked on FX at least. Who knows what kind of life she ran away from."

  The monitor above Jane Doe's bed traced a regular, green wave across the screen. Family members sat beside loved ones at all the other beds, except bed space four where the stark glare of the overhead lights made Jane Doe's pale skin appear transparent. As if there wasn't a real girl there, but only the too-thin ghost of one.

  "Still, it's wrong. She shouldn't have to lie there without even a name to call her own."

  "I'm doing the best I can."

  "I know." But that wasn't enough.

  Leaving Adeena to deal with the paperwork, Cassie crossed over to Jane Doe's side. What could have caused this girl such pain that she was willing to throw her life away before it really even began? She thought about her own life. By the time she was fourteen, she had already seen both her parents die.

  If not for people like Gram Rosa, she might have run away from her own future, just as Jane Doe had. She remembered her morbid thoughts when the helicopter almost crashed last night, her fears that no one would mourn her. Hiding her face from Adeena, she blinked hard, suddenly ashamed of her own weakness. She'd been so very wrong to feel that way.

  Cassie ran her fingers through the girl's pale hair. Some kind soul had taken the time to comb it out and wash it, she noted with a small smile.

  "I'm not going to let anything happen to you," she promised the comatose girl. Maybe Jane Doe couldn't hear her, had no idea who this strange woman standing over her was. Didn't matter. Cassie was not going to allow Jane Doe to lie here unmourned and unloved. "You're not alone anymore."

  CHAPTER 8

  Cassie left Adeena and jogged down the steps to the ER. Ten till, she had just enough time to change. In the ER locker room, she grabbed a pair of cotton scrubs and inventoried her equipment: radio at her waistband, hemostat holding trauma scissors and tape cinched beside it, penlight and name tag clipped to her shirt pocket, stethoscope around her neck. Ready for battle.

  She knew she was no general waging a war against disease, certainly no genius like her boss, Ed Castro, the best physician she knew. Just another grunt in the trenches, trying to get the job done. Since leaving Richard, it seemed like the job was all she had. It was safe to focus on work, avoiding the rest of the world—until she'd met Jane Doe. Now she felt like she was being pulled in, against her will, that she was risking herself by becoming emotionally involved.

  Which scared the hell out of her. Richard had overcome her defenses, swallowed her whole, and she'd barely survived.

  She plodded through the first half of her shift determined to remain objective and professional and refusing to think about the nameless girl lying alone in the ICU. Well, not much, anyway.

  "Med Five coming in code three." Her trauma radio sounded the alert. "Overdose victim."

  "Room Two," Cassie instructed the dispatcher. "What's their ETA?"

  "Three minutes."

  Typical Med Five, the hotshots liked to cut it close. They were the best in the city, so they got away with it. As she wrapped her yellow Tyvek gown around her, Cassie felt her heart rev into high gear, savoring the familiar jolt of adrenalin. Just enough to keep her focused as she readied her team.

  The two critical care nurses prepared IV lines on both sides of the gurney, the respiratory tech had her vent setup and ready to go, the lab tech jogged into the room as the paramedics arrived with her patient. One of the medics glanced at his watch and flashed the recording nurse a smile.

  "Must be the A-Team on tonight, Tony," he said to his partner.

  "What's the story?" Cassie asked.

  "Name's Brian Winston. Nineteen years old. Found at a rave over by the West End Bridge," he told Cassie amidst the tangle of arms involved in transferring the patient, monitor and lines to the ER personnel. "Tried high dose Narcan, but no change."

  Cassie bent over her patient. His eyes were open, but he was unresponsive, his pupils pinpoint. "Any idea what he took?"

  "Nope. The cops are right behind us with his friends."

  "Get me a tox screen, blood gas and set of lytes." The heart rate and blood pressure alarms shrieked. She glanced up, absorbing the overall picture in one quick look. It wasn't good. None of the FX overdoses had presented like this. She needed to figure out what Brian took and come up with a plan to counteract it.

  A third alarm added its strident voice to the chorus. She didn't have much time--neither did her patient.

  She stepped out into the hallway, and spotted an uniformed police officer towering over two teenaged girls sitting on the plastic chairs arranged along the wall.

  "I'm Dr. Hart. I'm taking care of your friend." Both girls had streaks of fluorescent color in their hair and body makeup to match. One of them had been crying.

  "Is Brian gonna be all right?"

  Cassie squatted and met the girl's eyes. "I don't know. I'm trying to help him, but I really need to know what he took." The girls exchanged glances.

  "Don't tell them anything," the second one said.

  Cassie glanced up at the police officer. "I think there's fresh coffee, Officer Rankin." He hesitated, then nodded and moved down the hall. "What's your name?" she asked the first one.

  "Linda."

  "I need to know what Brian took," she insisted, locking her gaze on the girl. "Don't you want to help save his life?"

  The girl sniffed, then reached into her designer jeans and pulled out a single square shaped pill. She handed it to Cassie.

  "Hey, where'd you get that?" her friend asked. "Brian said he didn't have enough dough to buy more than one. Not at fifty a pop."

  "Well, he bought me one. Said it was an early birthday present."

  "What is it?" Cassie examined the pill. The only markings on it were two large X's.

  "It's Double Cross."

  "What's in it? Is it a new form of Ecstasy?" But Ecstasy alone didn't explain her patient's symptoms.

  "It's FX times X, double crossed. Don't you get it?"

  Cassie did, all too well. She returned to the trauma room just in time for all hell to break loose.

  CHAPTER 9

  Drake leaned against his mop handle, eavesdroppin
g. He beckoned to Rankin, the uniformed officer, who joined him in an empty suture room.

  "What's up?" Drake indicated the trio across the hall with a terse nod of his head.

  "Kid overdosed at a rave. Those two were with him. Wouldn't tell me nothing."

  "They gave it up to the doc. Said he was doing a new combo of FX and Ecstasy."

  Hart finished talking with the two girls and shook their hands before returning to the resuscitation room.

  "Get their particulars for me," he asked Rankin. "Miller will send someone from the task force to interview them."

  "Sure thing."

  With the help of the ER's director, Dr. Castro, it had been easy to infiltrate the department and hide amidst the shadows and chaos—the guy cleaning the trash was always a non-entity. A bit harder to stay out of Hart's sight all night. But thankfully the ER provided plenty of hiding places and Hart was too focused on her patients to pay attention to anyone else.

  Drake pushed his mop over the linoleum until he stood at the door of the trauma room. Hart's patient had taken a turn for the worse. She barked out commands, somehow managing to be everywhere at once. She shoved a plastic tube down the kid's throat, then started a special IV up near his collar bone. Every few seconds she would whip her hair back and glance up at the monitor, her eyes blazing with fury at the bad news she found there.

  It wasn't compassion that drove this physician, Drake realized, but passion pure and simple. Her expression forced a smile from him, despite the grim circumstances. She didn't look like someone who would accept failure gracefully.

  He stood, riveted by the battle raging in the small room. At least six people crowded around the boy's still form, moving in a choreography of controlled chaos. He gripped the mop handle, his fingers growing sweaty, frustrated by his inability to do anything but watch.

  "Some idiot got out his chemistry set and combined FX with Ecstasy," Cassie told her team. "As if one alone wasn't lethal enough."

  A new alarm on the monitor clamored for attention. "Temp's 105 and climbing, oxygen level dropping."