“I’ve never heard that before.”
Patton shrugged. “It’s not like it’s something that we advertise. Go ahead, store your eggs, or come to us if you’re having conception problems, or if you want to make sure your child doesn’t have a treatable cancer. Let’s increase their risks of hepatoblastoma instead. That one kills children incredibly quickly. But who cares? You ask us, we’ll give it to you. But don’t blame us when things don’t turn out the way you wanted.”
“So these weren’t cases of mixed-up samples. Just… mutations?”
“People don’t like what they get, they sue. Your baby is darker or lighter skinned then you are? Must be a mix-up. Baby has blue eyes when both parents had brown? They must have used the wrong sperm. Baby has celiac disease? They couldn’t have gotten that from the parents, so there must have been something nefarious going on at that clinic.”
“Is that why you’re not working there anymore? The lawsuits were just too stressful?”
Patton hesitated. He looked at Zachary, down at his coffee, out the window, thinking through what he wanted to say. “It’s under new management now,” he offered finally. “None of the old gang are there.”
“You were all let go?”
“Eventually, yeah. There were a few waves, you know, a few sets of layoffs, and then once the new management was installed and they knew what they were doing, they brought in their own people and fired the last of the old staff.”
“Was McLachlan let go in the first wave of layoffs?”
“Yes. It was one of those things, you know. Last in, first out.”
“And you too?”
“Yeah. The younger people are always expendable. Easier for them to find new jobs. Yeah, we both were let go in the first set of layoffs.”
“Well, I’m sorry for the rough time you had to go through. You must be a lot happier being out of that business.”
“Yeah,” Patton said after another pause. “Yeah, of course I am.”
23
Not everybody agreed with Patton’s litany of complaints. The women especially seemed to have found Sandhills Clinic a warm and nurturing place to work. The focus on babies and motherhood and miracles seemed to touch them in a way that it didn’t affect the men. They had found the stories in the news disturbing and stressful, but had nice things to say about the clinic itself.
But they didn’t all have nice things to say about McLachlan.
Rose Turner had worked with McLachlan and didn’t agree with what Patton had shared about him.
She pushed a few wild red curls back over her ear and scowled at Zachary. “I don’t know what this has to do with anything. You need a character reference to give him a loan? Or what is this about?”
“I’m afraid I can’t give you details about that. But I appreciate your cooperation.”
“I’m not sure you’re going to like what I have to say. Maybe you should just go on to the next person on your list.”
“If you found Mr. McLachlan difficult to work with, or less than professional, I would like to hear about it.”
Zachary noted with interest that unlike Patton, Rose didn’t correct Zachary’s use of mister instead of doctor.
“Less than professional. Yes, I would say that he was less than professional,” Rose snapped. “The guy was always hitting on us. Other doctors, nurses, even patients. He would flirt with the women who came in for procedures. Like they wanted to be hit on by the doctor? That’s not what people came to us for. It’s just… gross. No one wanted to hear from him. That’s why they tried to keep him and some of the others with… social skills problems… in the lab, where they were away from direct patient contact.”
“He harassed you? And patients too?”
“Have you ever met a man who just didn’t seem to understand when he was being offensive? Like you could tell him right to his face, and he would just laugh it off and say ‘I didn’t mean it that way.’ And then turn around and do it again. He wasn’t intentionally offensive. But he was… odious.”
Zachary nodded understandingly. He could imagine what it would be like to be in a place like that, so focused on babies and reproduction, and to have a hound dog always making inappropriate comments, hitting on the female staff and patients, and generally making a nuisance of himself. It wouldn’t make for a pleasant work atmosphere. They should have made a sexual harassment claim against him. Maybe they had. They could be notoriously difficult for a company to deal with.
“That couldn’t have been easy to deal with. How were his skills? If you kept him in the lab, was he productive? Able to do his job?”
She shrugged and scowled. “It doesn’t take that much skill. Honestly. If I ran you through it a couple of times, you could do it. Yes, he could do the job… though I wondered, sometimes…”
Zachary waited for her to finish, cocking his head slightly. Rose fussed with her hair some more, making up her mind whether she were going to say anything.
“There was some trouble,” she said finally.
“At the clinic? What kind of trouble?”
Since she had brought it up, she didn’t assume, as Patton had, that he had already read the news articles about it. She shifted in her seat and looked away from him. Probably reviewing how it would reflect on her, if it would get back to the clinic or someone else in the industry, maybe impact her future opportunities.
“I don’t know if I should say anything. I mean… there’s no proof.”
“Proof of what?”
“There was some trouble,” she repeated, starting over and trying to get the momentum to move forward. “There were accusations from a couple of sets of parents that there was something wrong with their babies. They didn’t appear to be the right racial profile or had some disease or deformity that hadn’t been seen in that family before…”
“So… what was happening? Were they paranoid? Or was there an issue?”
“I don’t think they were just paranoid. Not with so many people coming forward and asking questions at the same time.”
Zachary noted it was now ‘many’ instead of ‘a couple.’ “And was there any kind of investigation? I mean, a clinic like that must have all kinds of procedures in place to make sure that there aren’t any mix-ups.”
“Yes, of course.” She answered a little too quickly and her eyes still avoided his. “There are procedures, security. Of course.”
“So… nothing could have been happening? It was just a coincidence?”
“I don’t think it was. I think that someone was screwing up fertilizations. Mixing up samples or intentionally sabotaging procedures.”
“How could that happen?”
“On the ‘accidental’ end, maybe someone had dyslexia and was reading numbers wrong. Or was hungover or had poor eyesight. I mean, those numbers are pretty small. A mistake could be made if you were having trouble telling your sixes from your eights, or something like that.”
“Was McLachlan dyslexic?”
“I wouldn’t know. People get really good at hiding it. But mistakes were made. There were settlements. And then the clinic was sold, started up under new management to shake the reputation. A fresh start.”
“So, there was something to it.”
She studied the table, biting her lip. “Yes,” she finally agreed.
“And you think it might have been McLachlan?”
“Not for sure. There were a few guys at the lab that I would have had questions about, if I was in charge. They were messing around… acting juvenile. You know, just not professional. Forest was just one of the possibilities.”
“So you said that it could have been accidental, someone reading a number wrong. And what’s the other option? You think that it could have been intentional?”
This was even harder for her. She cleared her throat a few times. Looked like she wanted to get up from her seat and pace around. He could understand the impulse. He didn’t like to sit for long, especially when he found himself in the hot seat.
> “You want to go outside?” he suggested. “Go for a walk while we talk about it?”
“Oh, no,” she dismissed immediately. “I’m good.”
He waited to see if she would fill in the details.
“Actually, yes,” Rose said finally. “Let’s go outside. Get a breath of fresh air.”
Zachary nodded. They had already paid for their drinks, so they got up and left, wandering down the sidewalk. It was a beautiful day out. Zachary took in the sun and matched Rose’s pace. She was a little taller than he was, her stride a little longer. She was anxious, so she walked fast. Zachary found the speed awkward. His walking pace was usually okay, but he hadn’t quite reached the smooth, automatic stride that he had before his accident if he had to speed up. Hopefully, she would settle back to a slower pace once she got talking. Otherwise, he was afraid he was going to trip or have to tell her to slow it down.
“Do you think that someone was intentionally sabotaging samples?” Zachary pressed.
“I… that’s one of the options, right? I wasn’t in charge, I wasn’t part of the investigation, so I couldn’t tell you. But I didn’t feel like it was something that someone could have been doing accidentally. I just had a gut feeling that… someone was mixing things up intentionally. For kicks? I don’t know why someone would do that.”
“I don’t know why either,” Zachary assured her. “I guess since we’re not the kind of people who would do that, it’s hard for us to understand someone who would. I really don’t know. I guess sometimes it’s ego. Seeing what they can get away with. Or it could be anger or revenge. Maybe he hit on one of those patients, and she rejected him, so he wanted to get back at her.”
“Yeah.” Rose nodded slowly. “I hadn’t thought about that.”
She was slowing to an easier walking pace.
“Did anyone talk to the… whatever you call the owners or managing partners? Someone higher up the food chain. Did anyone ever say that they had concerns about McLachlan or the other guys in the lab?”
“No, not as far as I know. We were all… you know, just trying to keep our jobs. No one threw anyone else under the bus. We hoped that it would just blow over. We didn’t think that even if we stuck together, we would lose our jobs anyway.”
“But that’s what ended up happening when you got new management.”
“Yeah. I guess it would have been smarter to make accusations, to try to get the person who was responsible fired. Then maybe the consequences wouldn’t have been quite so dire. They’d be able to say ‘we found the culprit and everything is good now,’ instead of going further and turning over the whole staff.”
“Maybe. Maybe enough damage had been done that they would have had to do that anyway. You don’t know what would have happened if circumstances had been different.”
“Yeah. I guess. Maybe everything would have happened the same way even if we’d all pointed fingers. I thought at the time that I was being loyal to my coworkers, that we were friends and had each other’s backs. But now… I’m not friends with any of them anymore. Did I think that I would be? We were never really friends, so why would I protect any of them? Especially jerks like Forest. I’m sure he was probably one of them. Maybe he wasn’t the one who messed up the fertilizations. But I bet he knew who did.”
Zachary raised his brows. He juggled out his notebook and they stopped for a moment while he made a note to himself to check into that. Even if it hadn’t been McLachlan, maybe he could point Zachary in the right direction. Maybe there was evidence somewhere still.
“I haven’t been able to get appointments with any of the senior doctors. Did you know any of them?”
“Not well. As well as you know anyone you work with. Which is… pretty much not at all. You learn things like if they’re married and have kids, get familiar with the way that they talk and how they like things to be done, but that’s about it.”
“Do you have any cell numbers that would still be in service? Personal email addresses?”
“No, nothing like that. I got rid of all of those contact details when I left there. I was pretty ticked. Didn’t want ever to have to deal with any of those people again.”
“I’m sorry. And here I am bringing it all up again.”
“It’s okay, actually. I feel like… I’ve never been able to really talk about it before, to process it. I was too busy staying quiet and protecting everyone else. It feels good to talk about it.”
“Good. Can you give me the names of the others who worked with McLachlan and might be involved?”
Patton was one of them. Zachary noted a couple of other names that were new to him. Not people who had come up on their previous checks.
“Is there anything else? You said that there were settlements, so you felt that where there was smoke, there was fire?”
“Yeah. I don’t think they would have paid anyone off if they’d been able to prove absolutely that there hadn’t been any mishandling of genetic materials. Or that if there was, it was entirely accidental.”
“Yeah. You’re probably right. It wasn’t just to make them go away?”
“No. I think they would have taken it to court if they were sure that there hadn’t been any wrongdoing by anyone at Sandhills. They would have wanted to protect their good name. But they ended up not being able to do that.”
24
Zachary met with McLachlan’s ex-wife in her home, not a coffee shop or neutral location like his coworkers. Zachary wanted her to feel at home on her own ground. He wanted to give her a sense of control.
And he wanted to see what kind of place McLachlan had lived in, if they had lived there while they were married. Even if they hadn’t, the ex-wife would have mementos. Pictures, maybe things he’d left behind. Things that would give Zachary a better sense of McLachlan and the kind of person he was. He was already getting a pretty good picture of McLachlan.
His wife was pretty. Blond, shoulder-length hair and a thin face. She appeared younger than McLachlan in the pictures Zachary had seen of him. But it was hard to tell sometimes.
She shook Zachary’s hand, something that not a lot of women did. Her grip was dry and firm. She gave an image of calm competence. He didn’t know what she did for a living, but he imagined that she was good at it and that her clients or customers were happy around her.
“Mrs. McLachlan, it’s good to meet you.”
“I don’t go by McLachlan. I’ve gone back to Hubble. Don’t know why I ever took his name to begin with. I never wanted to be just someone’s wife.”
“Ms. Hubble. Sorry.”
“No, not a problem. You can call me Maureen. Forget about all of the mister and miz stuff.”
“Okay. Maureen. And I’m Zachary, always.”
“Come on in.” She ushered Zachary into her living room. It wasn’t a big, fancy house. Not like the mansions that the bigwig surgeons lived in. Instead, it was a little starter house like couples often got as they finished school and launched their careers. Neat, but small. It probably had all of the usual problems of dwellings in their income bracket. Knocking pipes, a leaky roof, windows that were not adequately sealed.
The living room was pleasantly furnished with a couch, loveseat, and easy chair covered with a do-it-yourself upholstery cover to make it match. The chair that Zachary sank into was comfortable enough. The room was clean, with bright sunlight filtering through the opaque blinds, pictures of Maureen and her family or friends on the walls, and some knickknacks here and there. Nothing that was readily identifiable as having belonged to McLachlan.
“This is very nice,” Zachary said. “Did you move here after the divorce?”
“No. This is where we were living at the time. We still had another year on the lease, and I said that I would pay the lease and keep the place. Forest didn’t want to pay for it, so he didn’t object. Though I imagine he came to regret it later. It isn’t so easy to get a nice place for a reasonable price these days.”
Zachary nodded. “Yes, it’s the sam
e in Vermont. Seems like they cost more than they should.”
“It’s hard to make ends meet if you only have one income. Most people will try to find roommates to split the cost with if they’re not half of a working couple. It’s a tough economy.”
“Very true. Have you seen Forest’s place in Vermont?”
“I’ve seen some interior shots and his view out the window. On social media, you know. Not in person. I wouldn’t have any reason to go out there and meet him in person.”
“Sure. That makes sense.”
“It’s nice, but I think it’s just a one-bedroom apartment. Not something he’d be able to start a family in.”
Zachary glanced around the interior of the house Maureen had kept, estimating the square footage and the number of bedrooms. They had, Zachary figured, intended to start a family at some point.
“Do you have kids?”
“No.” Maureen shook her head. “I figured once everything had settled down, we would be able to start. But things never worked out. I don’t know if Forest ever intended to have a family, or if it was just convenient to have someone helping to put him through medical school. Pay any extra bills, have someone around to make meals and do the laundry. It was a pretty good deal for him.”
“And when he finished school, you figured you would be able to move somewhere nicer and get started on having kids. Let him support you for a while.”
She sighed. “It would have been nice, huh? But I don’t think that was ever what he intended to do.”
“He probably meant to, on some level. But things don’t always work out the way we planned. Sometimes they’re just… wishes, pie in the sky. Not something that we were ever going to put any effort into.”
“Yeah. Maybe. We talked about it once, a long time ago. Seems like a long time ago now.”
“You don’t keep in contact with him anymore?”
“No. No reason to. Best we just go our separate directions.”
“Can you tell me what happened here? When the trouble started at the clinic?”
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