by Emery Hayes
“Beatrice seemed to know the man. Quite well,” Nicole pointed out.
“Look at her,” the doctor implored. “She is happy. Beaming with it. Why involve my work in this?”
“But you said this was family,” Lars challenged. He glanced at the cell phone, now sitting on the table between them. The man with Beatrice was younger than Esparza, but not by much. He was Caucasian, with dark hair just starting to go silver at the temples.
“It is both.”
“Who prescribed your daughter Augmentin?” Nicole pressed.
“Someone who doesn’t know her very well,” Dr. Esparza returned. “But Beatrice didn’t take it.”
“She was compassionate but not foolish?” Nicole asked. Esparza’s thinking was like a puzzle, and he was spilling the pieces onto the table. It was her job to build the edges, turn the pieces, and make them all fit.
“There’s a difference, and she was growing. Her mind and her emotions maturing.”
“And she was bound to turn your way.”
Esparza nodded. The act was curt, singular, like a period at the end of a sentence. It held arrogance and pride. But not hope.
Nicole shifted gears.
“Is it easy to put another doctor’s name on a prescription?”
“It is one minute at the computer.”
“A computer in your office?”
He nodded.
“We won’t arrest you for the murder of your daughter,” Nicole began. “We don’t have enough evidence for that. But we can arrest you for obstructing justice. And we’ll find out who he is anyway. We always do.”
“And when that happens, we’ll look at him hard,” Lars said. “Interfere and involve won’t come close to describing the scrutiny we’ll put this man through.”
“And we’ll do it because you tried so hard to hide him.”
“We don’t like secrets, Dr. Esparza,” Lars pointed out. “We like answers. That’s how we measure your willingness to cooperate. By the swiftness and accuracy of your answers. And time is running out on this one.” Lars looked at his watch.
“Our tech guys will score a match sooner than later,” Nicole confirmed.
“You’re right,” the doctor said. “Beatrice was not in favor of my recent decisions. She didn’t understand them.” He lifted his hands in frustration. “How could she? She was a child.”
“You’re referring to the sale of your research to the highest bidder?” Lars pressed.
“Yes.”
“Who’s the highest bidder?” Nicole pursued. “Is it this man? Is that why you’re working so hard to keep him out of this?”
“He’s a possibility,” the doctor allowed.
Lars’s cell phone chirped. He looked at the doctor. “What do you want to bet that’s the name we’ve been looking for?”
Esparza’s lips thinned, and a white ring rose up around them.
Lars nodded. “So be it.” He pulled his cell from his pocket, but before he could answer it, the doctor spoke up.
“Dr. Michael King.”
Lars pressed answer and spoke into the phone. He murmured a few words in response and stood up, pacing away from the table. The doctor watched him go.
“Your daughter didn’t come back from Christmas dinner, did she, Dr. Esparza?”
“She went to a party,” he confirmed. His face was beginning to show the stress, fracturing in places so that Nicole could see the fear and ruin running beneath his skin.
“Sofia and Isla too,” Nicole continued. “They went to the party, didn’t they?”
Esparza nodded. He paled, and the tremor she’d noticed earlier turned into a strumming. Nicole heard his teeth clack together and watched his elbows and knees twitch.
“Dr. King,” he whispered. “He had a small party. A few girls over to spend time with his daughter. She isn’t like our daughters. Not as capable. She has a neurodegenerative condition. It’s a slow deterioration of mind and body. She is wheelchair bound and has the intellect of a six-year-old child.”
“Dr. King is here? In town?”
“She wanted a slumber party. For Christmas. A kid like her, he said, didn’t get a lot of invites. And not a lot of girls RSVP’d. That’s what he said. Could Beatrice do their hair, their nails? That’s what he wanted, for his daughter, a small slice of normal.”
“Where is Dr. King staying?” she persisted. “Dr. Esparza?”
“It was the only wish in her letter to Santa.” He opened his hands and laid them on the table, searching his palms for some clue into the future. “Beatrice volunteered for the job. She wanted to do it. She was drawn to kids like that. Kids who are different.
“They wore fancy dresses, and Beatrice did their hair in ringlets and rhinestones.”
“Where are they?” Nicole demanded. She felt her heart race, the breath wispy in her throat. Esparza was unraveling. She didn’t want that to happen with the information still locked inside him. “Where are your daughters, Dr. Esparza?”
“Dress-up. Hair and makeup. All little-girl things to do. Disney movies and popcorn. That was on the agenda. I asked, you know? That’s what a parent does. A good parent asks, and I did.”
Nicole sat forward and snapped her fingers two inches from the doctor’s nose. He blinked and his eyes cleared. His lips trembled.
“Where are your daughters?”
He looked up, and this time his eyes were searching, imploring.
“He has them. But he’s promised to return them unharmed.”
16
Dr. Michael King did not exist. Nicole had used a wide age range in her search, tapped into the Social Security database, and culled 1,117 Michael Kings with assorted middle names living in the United States. Of those, seventeen were doctors. None of them resided in or owned property in the state of Montana. Nicole had an officer working phone and internet. So far, none of the images produced matched the photo on the victim’s cell phone. Nicole had reached across the border and asked for a similar search, with particular interest in the province of Alberta. Communication between the United States and Canada was historically a slow process, so Nicole didn’t break her stride—she next charted territories for the search teams that were already assembling. A kidnapping brought with it an urgency that was universal among law enforcement agencies. Nicole had offers of manpower and equipment coming from as far afield as Texas, Florida, and New York. There was a protocol in place, one Nicole knew to work—she pulled from the agencies closest and kept the others on the back burner to dip into as necessary. An aerial approach would do nothing for them at this point, so she kept the helicopters grounded.
She’d left Esparza in the box with a deputy, allowing him to stew in silence, but returned for one more pass before she left the station and took her position in the search.
Esparza’s face assumed a stillness that she was beginning to recognize. He was a man searching frantically for the seams of the nightmare that had engulfed his life. If given the opportunity, he would peel back the canvas and step into a new reality.
One where he starred as the celebrated doctor and scientist. Where his beautiful daughter stood beside him, but off-center. The proud prodigy. The indulgent father.
“When did you start to worry?”
“I didn’t,” Esparza admitted. “I was there, at King’s. That’s not protocol, and I had to leave before the proofing began, but I met and mingled with some of the bidders. Two had come in person; the others joined by conference call.”
“You saw your daughters?” Nicole pressed. “Sofia and Isla?”
“Yes, and Beatrice too, but she would have none of me. She had agreed to the party the night before but not to the round table.”
Nicole heard the door behind her open, and Lars step in.
“The party was a way to get Beatrice to the proofing?” Nicole asked.
“Yes, but it was for King’s daughter too.”
“And once Beatrice was there, she couldn’t leave,” Lars said.
“Th
at’s right,” Dr. Esparza agreed. “It was the only way to get Beatrice to the proofing.”
“Because she was no longer agreeable,” Nicole pursued. “Beatrice refused to cooperate.”
“Yes.”
“Because once you accepted an offer, Nueva Vida would become a top-shelf cure.”
“It would trickle down, but slowly,” Dr. Esparza explained. “First available only to the wealthiest.”
Silence.
“So maybe you’re right. Maybe Beatrice did hate me.”
“And this was all last night? Christmas night?” Lars asked.
“You were at King’s last night, and each of your daughters were present?” Nicole pressed.
“Yes, last night. But I left at nine forty. I had to. King and Gatling, they would take a tissue sample from Beatrice, package it, and transfer it to the lab. And Beatrice’s job was done.
“Soft-tissue sarcoma,” he explained. “Healthy cells have uniformity. Cancer cells are bigger or smaller, and no two ever look the same.”
“Thanks for the lesson, Doc—” Lars began, but Esparza ignored the intrusion.
“But it didn’t go down that way. King didn’t wait. Why would he? His daughter is dying. He split the sample, after I left. I’m sure of it. One look through the microscope and he would know.”
“Know what?” Lars demanded.
Esparza looked up and regarded them mildly. “Beatrice didn’t have cancer.”
“And she should have?”
“That would have been ideal.”
“Why?”
But Esparza wasn’t finished with his train of thought. “And then I left. King said I should go, and I did. That’s how transactions of this type are carried out. The principal player isn’t allowed near the live tissue sample.”
“You left without your children?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“King insisted.” The words left a gaping wound in Esparza. In them, he saw and acknowledged his inadequacies. His chin trembled, and liquid welled in his eyes. “I left my children but took Nueva Vida with me.”
“Why did Beatrice need to have cancer?” Lars asked.
“So I could cure her, of course.” He sniffed and brought a tissue to his nose.
“How would King and Gatling get a sample from Beatrice if she wasn’t willing?” Nicole asked.
“We’re doctors,” he said. “There are ways of safely assuring compliance.”
“Rohypnol?” Lars asked.
“Yes,” Dr. Esparza said. “That is one way.”
“Did King or Gatling have Rohypnol at their disposal?”
“King. He had everything at his fingertips.”
“And you saw this? The Rohypnol?”
“Last night? No.”
“Because you left?”
“Yes.”
“In fact, you don’t even know if King got the sample.”
Or if a crime had been committed. So far, Esparza had given them nothing to incriminate himself beyond bad intentions and poor parenting, and neither was a cause for arrest.
“I am only guessing, but it’s a good guess.”
“Doctor.” Nicole called for his attention. “You need to tell us. Where is King staying?”
“I told you, I don’t know. He sent a car. It was dark, and I sat in back.”
“You must have seen something. Anything that would give us direction.”
Esparza considered her words, and his eyes cleared as he thought back to the night before. “It was on the lake. More than a mile from town, no more than three.” He nodded. “Yes, I’m sure of that.”
Nicole sent Lars out with orders to change the perimeter of their search. Then she sat down opposite Esparza.
“You have an opportunity to help,” she said. “It’s too late for Beatrice, but maybe not Sofia and Isla.”
He considered her words, and they strengthened him. “What do you want to know?”
“How long have you known King?”
“Two years in February.”
“How did you find him?”
“He found me,” the doctor revealed. “I put it out there. I let the community know I was close, that I had the breakthrough at hand, the one I’ve been working toward my entire career, and they came knocking.”
“By they, you mean the pharmaceutical companies?”
“Yes, the Big Six. And a few others, smaller companies wanting to become giants.”
“Company names,” she demanded.
He listed them, and Nicole recognized most of them.
“These are reputable companies,” she said.
“Of course.”
“Is Dr. King affiliated with one of them?”
“Yes.”
Esparza named the company, Magellan, and Nicole felt her confusion deepen, because she knew the name. She knew Magellan was a trusted company, but she made a mental note to make contact herself.
“What is his position within the company? He must be pretty high up if he’s calling all the shots.”
“Chief executive officer.”
“And is that the norm? Send the CEO to broker the deal?”
Esparza shook his head. “It’s a team approach, usually. The CEO and their top scientists arrive, determine validity, and if they’re encouraged, incentives are doled out accordingly. After that, I would be introduced to the board, tour the facilities where I would be working, and meet their in-house scientists.”
“But with Magellan it was different?”
“It was all King, all the time.”
“Why?”
“He made himself the point man. And he’s the boss.”
“Have you toured Magellan?”
“Yes.”
“Met with the scientists?”
“The initial pass. I presented, they listened, and they were intrigued. Then King and I got to work. But the official meet and greet, that doesn’t come until they put their name in the hat. Tender a serious offer. And I accept.”
She passed a pad and pen to the doctor. “The company’s headquarters. Their physical address, phone number. And King’s cell number too.”
She pushed back her chair and stood over the doctor. She waited until he could stand the weight of her gaze on him no longer and looked up.
“How much?” she asked.
“Bidding closed at midnight,” he said.
Maybe at the precise moment Beatrice Esparza had lost her life. How much had she been worth, Nicole wondered. “The price?”
“Fifty-five million.” A cold chunk of change.
“Did you accept?”
“I have until nine o’clock this evening to decide.”
“What are you waiting for?”
“My children.”
“Was King the highest bidder?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“He can only offer what the board agrees upon. He came up short, and it was significant.”
“And what does that mean to a man like King? Losing you and your discovery after he’d invested so much of his time and resources?”
“It was as much personal as professional for King. Maybe more so.”
“Because his daughter needs what you have?”
“Yes. And she needs it now.”
“Before FDA approval?”
“Now,” Esparza repeated.
“And because you’d used your breakthrough on your own daughter, King thought you would use it on his?”
Esparza ignored her assertion. “He planned to appeal the trial design requirements and open an early phase of clinical studies that would include his daughter.”
“Is that done?”
“Often. More so with cellular and gene therapy products than with drugs.”
“So he had a reasonable chance of success?”
He nodded. “The FDA is pliable.”
“This is a kidnapping, Dr. Esparza. Your daughters for the cure. That’s how we’re working it.” Nicole pushed the noteb
ook closer to Esparza’s hand. “You’re staying here,” she said. “We have a tactical team searching for your wife and son and a trained negotiator on his way from Missoula. We’re preparing a search of the vacation homes along the lake.”
They were starting narrow and close—all homes within a mile of where Beatrice’s body had been found. That put them in the middle of the grid, according to the parameters Esparza had given them.
“The highest bidder,” Nicole said, and nodded toward the pen and notebook. “Company name. CEO. Anything else we should know about them.”
He started writing, and Nicole strode toward the door but stopped and looked back at Esparza.
“Did King kill Beatrice?”
He looked up but shook his head. “She was his only hope.”
17
They made use of snowmobiles and snowshoes, horseback and four-wheel drive. The new snowfall measured four and a quarter inches—any remaining evidence at their crime scene was buried. The tracks leading them to Beatrice’s body were no longer viable. The time on the clock was running thin. King had had the girls nearing twenty-four hours. Numbers showed them that the victims of kidnapping rarely survived to first light.
Civilian volunteers traveled in pairs with instructions not to pursue. If a knock wasn’t answered in a home clearly occupied, they were to report it by radio and move on. If the door was opened to a man resembling the photo of Dr. King, they were to issue an invitation to that evening’s choral presentation of The Night Before Christmas. Show no surprise, no recognition, no fear. The small group of citizens culled for the job were trained military or first responders. There were twenty-four of them, mostly men, many of them retired. Law enforcement worked solo. Nicole borrowed from local and regional departments until she had a total of thirty-eight parties on the search. They fanned out from the Lake Road, a point parallel to their crime scene, and moved east, away from town and into the suburban tracts from which Beatrice had most likely fled. Several homes were known to be empty, the windows dark and the driveways neither plowed nor shoveled in several snows. They checked those off and moved them to a list of least likely. The homes where lights blazed but there had been no answer to the knocking of the searchers, she made her priority. And while she searched, she thought.