by Dale Mayer
Jax was not surprised that they were here early. As Jax scanned the room, he first saw the head of security eating breakfast across from him.
The woman looked up, and everybody could see the worry in her eyes, but, more than that, the uncertainty too as she shuffled in place, dressed in a dark burka, and kept pushing her sleeve up and then pulling it back down again. She was almost as uncomfortable as Abby was. Abby reached out and introduced herself, shaking the woman’s hand.
The woman nodded gratefully. “My son,” she whispered, “can you help my son?”
Abby looked at him and said, “I don’t have his full medical file. Do you?”
The woman glanced around, up in the corners, as if looking for a camera. And then she quickly handed over a small USB key. Abby turned it around in her fingers for a moment and said to Beau, “I need my laptop.”
Beau disappeared.
Jax asked the woman, “Where is your husband?”
“With his security team.”
“Do you know where exactly?”
The scared woman shook her head. “No, but he is inside the hospital somewhere, nearby, in case he is needed.”
In the meantime, in a small private room, Abby did a full physical exam, checking the little boy’s chest, lungs, eyes, throat, and heart. It was obvious that the child was somewhere around four or maybe five years old, but he didn’t speak English, adding a language barrier to the interview. Finally, when she was done, Beau returned with her laptop. She opened it up, put the key in, and transferred the information. Then she sat here for a few minutes, studying the results. “Do you know what treatments have been done?”
The woman took a deep breath and shook her head. “My husband doesn’t let me see such things.”
“Interesting,” she said.
Jax watched the look on Abby’s face as he perused everything going on. He could tell from the stillness in her face that she didn’t understand what she saw. She opened up several more files and then looked at the mother and said, “I need to pull some blood and run some more tests.”
The woman nodded immediately. “But I don’t know what else you could possibly test for. He’s very ill.”
“And the doctor told you it was cancer?”
The mother nodded.
“I don’t see any scans. I don’t see any biopsy reports,” Abby asked. “Do you know what kind of cancer?”
“Stomach cancer,” the mother said. And then she stopped, frowned, and said, “I think, but I’m not sure.”
“Well, let me draw some blood,” Abby said. She looked at Beau. “I need the equipment to pull some or a nurse to pull some blood.”
The mother shook her head. “You must do it.”
“Why is that?”
“My husband says so. Nobody else must touch his son.”
She nodded, looked at Beau, and said, “Tell one of the nurses I need a kit.”
He returned a moment later with a blue plastic kit, several vials and syringes and plastic containers. He handed it over and said, “I didn’t know how much you needed.”
“This will be fine,” she said. She quickly took a sample of blood, filling one and a half vials, and then wrote up a lab order.
And from what Jax could see, she was asking for extensive testing from all the check marks he saw her making.
Then, Abby turned, halted, added one more note at the top: Rush on Arsenic Presence.
Jax frowned at her note.
“I don’t need to tell you,” she said to Beau as she handed everything back to him, “but this takes top priority, as in everybody drops everything now. And either you or one of the MI6 security team must stay with the sample and the tester at all times.”
“We’re on it,” he said, and he walked out again.
At that, the mother seemed to relax slightly.
As soon as Abby had downloaded all the material, she ejected the USB key and handed it back. The key disappeared into the folds of the mother’s burka without any sign of it ever having been here.
Jax had to wonder if the mother had taken that and had handed it over without the father’s permission.
“What I still don’t have are the files from Abdul’s current doctor. With his notations, suppositions, and analyses,” she said, looking at the mother. “Do you have any of that?”
The mother shook her head. “He doesn’t tell me. My husband does not tell me.”
“So you don’t have it, or you don’t know about it, or the doctor won’t tell you?”
“The doctor does not tell me.”
“Okay,” she said. She walked over to the little boy and smiled down at him.
The child did look pretty sickly, as far as Jax was concerned, and looked like he’d lost some hair. His skin was pale too. Abby checked his eyes over again a second time and then slowly palpitated his stomach. Even Jax could tell she didn’t find anything. The little boy made no cry of pain and had no distress of any kind. He just lay here, almost comatose.
Abby looked back at the mother and asked, “How long has he been so lethargic?”
The mother’s shoulders shook. “Weeks now,” she whispered brokenly. “Every day, it gets worse.”
“Right,” she said. “What I don’t know is whether we’ll be in time to save him.”
At that, the mother started to cry.
Jax spoke up, “Do you know what’s wrong with him?”
“Not for sure until the testing comes back,” she said. “But I think he’s been poisoned.” The mother shrieked. Immediately the little boy rolled over and reached out a hand, wanting his mother.
Abby said to the mother, “Calm down, please. We don’t want anything to upset him.”
Sniffing noisily, the woman tried hard to stop her tears, and Abby went back to study the boy’s fingernails and his hair and his lips. “I can start treatment right away, but I need the results back to make sure that we’re not going down the wrong pathway.”
“What kind of a pathway?” Jax asked.
She tilted her head toward the mother so that Jax was supposed to get a message of some kind. He realized that Abby didn’t want the mother to know. He didn’t understand that because it was likely already well past the point of keeping it from her. “Is there an antidote?”
“Not if too much has been given for too long,” she said. “It’ll be touch-and-go. He’s showing pretty severe signs.”
“But the other doctor, wouldn’t he have known?”
At that, the mother looked at her and said, “Yes, would he not have known?”
She hesitated. “It’s not something that presents itself very often,” she said slowly. “It’s honestly not even my expertise. But I have seen one other case like this.”
Jax stood closer and asked, “What kind of poison?”
She looked at him and whispered, “Arsenic.”
Chapter 12
Abby hoped she was wrong, but the child was presenting with those symptoms. She pulled out her phone and contacted a physician she knew. Quickly she explained what she had found and that she was waiting on the blood work to come back.
“You should have that within four hours,” he said. “Depending on how severe it is …”
“I know, but you have no idea how much trauma other people have been through because of this. If there’s anything we can do to help this little boy …”
“There’s a couple really radical treatments we could try,” he said. “I am in London.”
She straightened and smiled. “Can I get you over here then, please?”
“It’s not like I have any rights to work there,” he warned.
“I can clear that instantly. Anything to save this little guy.”
“I’ll be about thirty minutes.”
She turned back to Jax and said, “I need you to get him cleared to be here.”
His eyebrows shot up.
She shook her head. “He’s an American doctor with no rights to work here, but he does have colleagues here. He’s
at a workshop. I need him here because he’s the one who could treat this poisoning if anything might work here. He said there’s only a couple radical options.” She turned to look back at the mother, who now sobbed silently in place, then turned to Jax. “I need the blood work back immediately too.”
He nodded, opened the door, and there was Beau, standing outside. They spoke quickly, and then Jax shut the door and sat back down again. She frowned at him. He shrugged and said, “I’m not leaving your side.”
She glanced at him and then gave him a small smile. “Thanks.”
“You realize that, regardless of what happens, we must find out who has been poisoning him?”
She nodded. She turned back to the mother and said, “We need to talk.”
It was all the mother could do to contain her emotions, but eventually she calmed down enough that, with a box of tissues in her hand, she could speak.
“Do you know anybody who would have been poisoning your little boy?” She named off a bunch of foods where the arsenic came naturally and said, “It’s also found in various medications. Also in a lot of poisons, like to use in the garden or for eliminating nuisance rodents, such as rat poison,” she said.
The mother just stared at her.
“Do you know if Abdul would have come into contact with any of that?”
The woman shook her head.
“And what about in the boy’s food? Who arranges his food?”
“I do,” she says. “We have a cook as well, but I supervise all his food.”
“Why?” Jax asked.
She turned to look at him. “Nahim has only one son and five daughters. He has wanted a son for a very long time. He makes sure that his son is okay.”
“And does he have very many enemies?” Jax asked.
She just stared at him in growing horror. “Yes, yes,” she said. “My husband does. But that’s why I prepare his son’s food. To make sure that nothing happens.”
“And yet, you said this has been going on for a couple months?”
“He started getting sick over three months ago,” she said.
“And yet, the doctor said it’s cancer?”
“Yes, he’s been vomiting lots, and he can’t keep food down.”
“And do you trust the cook who’s been looking after him?”
A small smile crossed the woman’s face. “Yes, it’s my mother.”
Abby thought it was pretty unlikely that a grandmother would do anything to hurt the obviously well-loved grandson. She nodded. “Okay, that makes sense.” She tossed a glance at Jax. They both knew it would be Benjamin, who she hated so much. Somehow he gave the little boy just enough arsenic to keep him sick and to ensure Benjamin’s services were needed. But, over time, it had taken its toll on the little boy. “How long has the doctor worked for you?”
“He worked for others in the family,” she said, “but he’s only been with us for a few months.”
“And did you bring him on because your son got sick?”
“Abdul got sick first, and then we brought the doctor to him.”
Abby sat down, stumped. “Interesting,” she said.
“We would have done anything,” the woman murmured, tears collecting again in her eyes. “Anything.”
Abby nodded. “But you should also look after the baby you’re carrying,” she said gently.
The woman’s hands immediately went to her belly. “Am I?”
Abby’s eyebrows rose. “Are you not?”
She shrugged. “I’ve been so worried about Abdul that I haven’t had any time to even think about it.”
Abby studied her. “I would have said at least thirteen or maybe fourteen weeks along.”
The woman nodded. “But that’s how long it’s been since Abdul got sick. He’s been on my mind all the time.”
Abby nodded, got up, went to the door, and spoke to Beau, asking him for a pregnancy kit. His eyebrows shot up. She shrugged and closed the door in his face. When he came back a few minutes later, she handed it to the woman and said, “Go to the bathroom and do this test.”
The woman hesitated, but Abby said, “Go. We need all the information that we can gather.”
The woman disappeared into the bathroom, leaving Abby standing beside Abdul. As soon as the door closed, Jax hopped to his feet and motioned Abby closer, then whispered, “What does Abdul’s mother have to do with this?”
“Nothing maybe,” she said. “But we must make sure that, if she is pregnant, the father knows, in case she gets punished for not looking after Abdul properly.” When Jax sucked in his breath, she nodded. “There’s a reason why she’s been the one preparing Abdul’s food. If somebody else has slipped Abdul something, the mother gets blamed. If she’s pregnant, it might save her life.”
“Jesus,” Jax said, standing at her side, reaching up a hand to gently stroke her back. “How are you doing?”
She shrugged. “Every time I hear something, I think it’s Benjamin coming,” she said. “As far as I’m concerned, he poisoned this little boy. And somehow we must find out how he did it and stop him from doing it again.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Find out who else in the family Benjamin worked for and ask them, did anybody else suffer, get sick, or die while he was there?”
Just then the bathroom door opened, and Abdul’s mother stepped out. The look on her face was both joy and shock. She held out the pregnancy test. “It’s positive.”
“Good,” Abby said with a big smile. “Congratulations.”
The woman sank down beside Abdul. Yet she hadn’t smiled once.
“Is there any reason your husband won’t be happy to hear this?” Jax asked.
The woman looked at him in surprise, not understanding the question.
Abby gently questioned her. “Jax wants to make sure that Abdul’s father is the father of this child.”
Immediately the woman nodded. “I would not dare,” she said. “He’ll be very happy.”
“Good,” Jax said, subsiding into his chair.
While they waited for the blood tests to come back, and she knew that the lab would do everything they could to make it happen as fast as possible, doing the arsenic test first and foremost. She didn’t like anything about the condition of the boy, but she also needed Danny to get here fast. When a bunch of noise sounded in the adjoining waiting room, Jax hopped to his feet and went to the door right when Beau knocked. Jax opened it, and another man stepped forward.
The man walked over to Abby and gave her a big hug. “Damn, it’s good to see you,” he cried out.
She smiled, kissed him on the cheek, and said, “You too. But this is our focus right now.”
He nodded, his gaze already on the little boy on the examination table. Then he walked forward, his frown already taking over. He looked at her and said, “Is he your patient?”
“He’s just come from Dubai,” she said, trying not to explain too much. “But I’m right, aren’t I?”
“You are. We’ll do a couple biopsies to see how far along it is and start blood transfusion treatments immediately. We can work on setting this up right away.”
And as soon as he said that, the mother jumped out and reached out for Abby’s hand. “My husband said only you.”
“But your husband didn’t know your son was being slowly murdered by poison,” Abby said carefully. “Danny here, he’s the best there is for this.”
The woman looked at Danny, her eyes already filled with dread. “Can you help him?”
He smiled at her and said, “I don’t know if we can save him, but I’ll do my best.” He looked at Abby. “Do you want to stay here or come with me?”
She smiled and said, “I must stay with Abdul.”
“And your guard?”
“He—”
“—goes where she goes,” Jax interrupted.
Danny nodded. “In that case, let’s go for a hell of a ride.”
Jax was amazed at the efficiency of the two doctors
as they worked on the boy. As soon as they got the confirmed diagnosis of arsenic poisoning, they already had everything ready and went into action. Treatments were started; IV drips were set up; and biopsies were taken. Stem cells were next. Jax looked at Danny and said, “Do you know for sure how bad it is?”
“No,” he said. “And the thing is, with a child, there is no bottom line. They have an incredible ability to heal. This little guy’s had a hard time, but then the travel would have added to that too. It won’t be a fast or easy solution, so it’ll take a few days before we see if anything’s improving.” He looked at Jax and asked, “Can you do anything about the paperwork?”
“It’s already in progress,” Jax said. “Nobody here will argue.”
“Well, that’s a first,” Danny said. “Most of the time, there’s nothing but arguments.”
“Entirely different scenario right now,” Jax said.
“I’d love to hear the why of it.”
“It’ll make you sick to your stomach,” Jax said. “And we really don’t want the word getting out right now, so we appreciate everything you’re doing without asking any questions.”
Danny snorted. “All you military guys are the same.”
“How do you know he’s military?” Abby asked.
He glanced at her sideways. “Seriously?”
She nodded.
“You don’t need a buzz cut to see that military bearing in his shoulders, that take a step out of line and I’ll kill you look in his eye or the way he follows you like a hawk. You are his mission right now,” Danny said with a big grin. “I just wonder if you’re his mission at nighttime too.”
She smacked him on the shoulder for his teasing.
But Jax wondered that too. No doubt she was his mission. No doubt that he had gotten closer to his mission than he should have. And, not for the first time, he thought about all the things about her that he really liked. He really liked a lot of other women too, but the difference here was that undefinable spark between them. That connection. He could sit down and talk with twenty different women he respected. They could all be gorgeous bombshells. But, if they didn’t have that something, that special zing that went off whenever he touched her, then it was a completely different ball game. And with Abby, there was definitely that zing. And he was pretty damn happy about it himself.