Prescription for Trouble - 03 - Diagnosis Death

by Richard L Mabry

Sam Wolfe bit back the retort that was on his tongue. It's Doctor Wolfe. Doctor of Pharmacology. I worked six years to earn that Pharm D, not to mention two years of research fellowship. How about some respect? But this wasn't the time to fight that battle.

  Dr. David Patel rose from behind his desk and beamed, gesturing toward the visitor's chair opposite. "Sam, come in. Sit down. I appreciate your coming."

  Not much choice, was there? Sam studied his boss across the expanse of uncluttered mahogany that separated them. Pharmaceutical companies seemed to be made up of two groups: the geeks and the glad-handers. Patel typified the former group. PhD from Cal Tech, brilliant research mind, but the social skills of a tortoise. Patel had been snatched from the relative obscurity of a research lab at Berkley by the Board of Directors of Jandra Pharmaceuticals, given the title of president and CEO, and charged with breathing life into the struggling company. How Patel planned to do that was still a mystery to Sam and his coworkers.

  Patel leaned forward and punched a button on a console that looked like it could launch a space probe. "Cindy, please ask Mr. Lindberg to join us."

  Steve Lindberg ran the sales team from an office across the hall. Steve could memorize salient scientific material and regurgitate it with the best of them, but Wolfe was willing to bet the man's understanding of most of Jandra Pharma's products and those of its major competitors was a mile wide and an inch deep. On the other hand, he had his own area of expertise: remembering names, paying for food and drinks, arranging golf games at exclusive clubs. No doubt about it, Steve was a classic glad-hander, which was why he had ascended to his current position, heading the marketing team at Jandra.

  Sam hid a smile. Interesting. The president of the company and the director of marketing. This could be big. The door behind Sam opened. He deliberately kept his eyes front. Be cool. Let this play out.

  "Hey, Sam Wolfe. It's good to see you." Sam turned just in time to avoid the full force of a hand landing on his shoulder. Even the glancing blow made him wince. Steve Lindberg dragged a chair to the side of Patel's desk, positioning himself halfway between the two men. Clever. Not taking sides, but clearly separating himself from the underling.

  Patel, the geek. Lindberg, the glad-hander. Different in so many ways. But both men shared one characteristic. Sam knew from experience that each man would sell his mother if it would benefit the company, or more specifically, their position in it. The two of them together could mean something very good or very bad for Sam Wolfe. He eased forward in his chair and kicked his senses into high gear.

  Patel leaned back and tented his fingers. "Sam, I'm sure you're wondering what this is about. Well, I wanted to congratulate you on the success of EpAm848. I've been looking over the preliminary Phase II information, especially the reports from Dr. Ingersoll at Southwestern. Very impressive."

  "Well, it's sort of Ingersoll's baby. He stumbled onto it when he was doing some research here with us during his infectious disease fellowship at UC Berkley. I think he wants it to succeed as much as we do."

  "I doubt that." Patel leaned forward with both hands on the desk. "Jandra is on the verge of bankruptcy. I want that drug on the market ASAP!"

  "But we're not ready. We need more data," Sam said.

  "Here's the good news," Patel said. "The FDA is worried about the killer bacteria outbreak. I've pulled a few strings, called in a bunch of favors, and I can assure you we can get this application fast-tracked."

  "How?" Sam said. "We're still doing Phase II trials. What about Phase III? Assuming everything goes well, it's going to be another year, maybe two, before we can do a roll-out of EpAm848."

  "Not to worry," Patel said. "Our inside man at the FDA assures me he can help us massage the data. We can get by with the Phase II trials we've already completed. And he'll arrange things so we can use those plus some of our European studies to fulfill the Phase III requirements."

  Lindberg winked at Sam. "We may have to be creative in the way we handle our data. You and I need to get our heads together and see how many corners we can cut before the application is ready."

  Sam could see the salesman in Lindberg take over as he leaned closer, as though to drive home his point by proximity. "And I'm going to start our PR people on a launch campaign that will put this drug into orbit."

  "I . . . Well, I'll certainly do what I can," Sam said.

  "Do more than that," Lindberg said. "Jandra Pharmaceuticals is hurting. We're staking everything on this drug."

  "Oh, and stop referring to it by its generic name," Patel added." From now on, the compound is Jandramycin. When people hear the name Jandra Pharmaceuticals, we want them to think of us as the people who developed the antibiotic that saved the world from the worst epidemic since the black plague."

  Lindberg eased from his chair and gave Sam another slap on the shoulder. "This is your project now. It's on your shoulders. The company's got a lot riding on this."

  And so do I. "But what if a problem turns up?"

  Patel rose and drew himself up to his full five feet eight inches. His obsidian eyes seemed to burn right through Sam. "We're depending on you to make sure that doesn't happen. Are we clear on that?"

  "Something wrong, Dr. Miles?"

  Sara opened her eyes and turned to see Gloria, the clinic's head nurse, hovering over her shoulder. "No, just taking a few deep breaths before I have to make a call I'm dreading."

  Gloria slid into the chair next to Sara. The controlled chaos of the nurse's station hummed around them, the buzz of conversations and ringing of phones serving as effectively as white noise to mask her next words. "Is it one of your hospital patients? Got some bad news to deliver?"

  "Sort of. It's Chelsea Ferguson."

  "The teenaged girl? Is she worse?"

  "Yes. The cultures grew Staph luciferus."

  Gloria whistled silently. "The killer. That's bad."

  "The only thing that seems to be working in these cases is that new drug of Jack Ingersoll's."

  "Oh, I get it. That's the call you don't want to make." Gloria touched Sara lightly on the shoulder. "When are you going to stop letting what Ingersoll did ruin the rest of your life? I can introduce you to a couple of really nice men who go to our church. They've both gone through a tough divorce—not their fault, either—and they want to move on. It would be good for you—"

  Sara shook her head. "Thanks, but I'm not ready to date. I'm not sure if I can ever trust a man again."

  Gloria opened her mouth, but Sara silenced her with an upraised hand. No sense putting this off. She pulled the phone toward her and stabbed in a number.

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