“When your mind is stolen. Justice is getting it back. It’s her fault. She could have stopped it. I don’t have my mind back. I don’t have Terri. All I have is you. Please help me.”
Scarpetta slipped her gloved hands into the pockets of her lab coat and felt herself slipping deeper into trouble. She didn’t want to be Oscar Bane’s physician. She should tell him right now she wanted no further relationship with him. She should open that beige-painted steel door and never look back.
“They killed her. I know they did it,” Oscar said.
“Who do you think they are?”
“I don’t know who they are. They’ve been following me, some specialized group supporting some cause. I’m their target. It’s been going on for months, at least. How can she be gone? Maybe I am a danger to myself. Maybe I do want to die.”
He began to cry.
“I loved her more than anyone . . . ever in my life. I keep thinking I’ll wake up. It isn’t true. It can’t be true. I’m not really here. I hate Jaime Berger. Maybe they’ll kill someone she loves. See how that feels. Let her live that hell. I hope it happens. I hope someone murders whoever she loves most in her life.”
“Do you wish you could kill someone she loves?” Scarpetta asked.
She tucked several tissues into his cuffed hands. Tears fell, and his nose ran.
He said, “I don’t know who they are. If I’m out there, they’ll follow me again. They know where I am right this minute. They try to control me through fear. Through harassment.”
“How are they doing this? Do you have reason to believe someone is stalking you?”
“Advanced electronics. There are countless unclassified devices you can order off the Internet. Microwave-transmitted voice to skull. Silent sound. Through-the-wall radar. I have every reason to believe I’ve been selected as a mind-control target, and if you don’t think things like this happen, think back to the human radiation experiments conducted by the government after World War Two. Those people were secretly fed radioactive materials, injected with plutonium for purposes of nuclear warfare research. I’m not making this up.”
“I’m aware of the radiation experiments,” Scarpetta said. “There’s no denying that happened.”
“I don’t know what they want from me,” he said. “It’s Berger’s fault. All of it’s her fault.”
“Explain that to me.”
“The DA’s office investigates identity theft, stalking, harassment, and I called and asked to talk to her, and they wouldn’t let me. I told you. They put me on the phone with this asshole cop. He thought I was a lunatic, of course, and nobody did anything. There was no investigation. No one cares. I trust you. I know you care about people. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Please help me. Please. I’m completely unprotected. I have no shields here. No protections.”
She checked shallow abrasions on the left side of his neck, noting that the stage of scab formation looked relatively fresh.
“Why would you trust me?” she asked.
“I can’t believe you’d say that. What manipulation are you trying?”
“I don’t manipulate people. I have no intention of manipulating you.”
He studied her face as she studied more abrasions.
“Okay,” he said. “I understand you have to be careful what you say. It doesn’t matter. I respected you before all that. You don’t know who they are, either. You have to be careful.”
“Before all what?”
“You were brave to discuss Bhutto’s assassination. Terri and I watched you on CNN. You had a long day and night on CNN, talking about it, were so compassionate and respectful about that terrible tragedy. And brave and matter-of-fact, but I could tell what you felt in your heart. I could tell you were as devastated as we were. You were devastated, and it wasn’t for show. You worked hard to hide it. I knew I could trust you. I understood. Terri did, too, of course. But it was disappointing. I told her she had to think of it from your perspective. Because I knew I could trust you.”
“I’m not sure why seeing me on TV would make you think you could trust me.”
She retrieved a camera from her crime scene case.
When he didn’t answer her, she said, “Tell me why Terri was disappointed.”
“You know why, and it was completely understandable. You respect people,” Oscar said. “You care about them. You help them. I stay away from doctors unless I have no choice. I can’t stand pain. I tell them to put me under, give me an injection of Demerol, do anything if it’s going to hurt. I admit it. I’m afraid of doctors. I’m afraid of pain. I can’t look at a needle if I’m injected. I can’t see it or I’ll faint. I’ll tell them to cover my eyes or inject me where I can’t see it. You aren’t going to hurt me, are you? Or give me a shot?”
“No. Nothing I do should be painful,” she said as she checked abrasions under his left ear.
They were shallow, with no sign of epithelial regeneration at the edges. Again, the scabbing was fresh. Oscar seemed reassured by what she said, and soothed by her touch.
“Whoever’s following me, spying on me,” he started on that again. “Maybe the government, but whose government? Maybe some hate cell or some cult. I know you’re not afraid of anyone or any government or any cult or group or you wouldn’t talk about the things you do on TV. Terri said the same thing. You’re her hero. If only she knew I was sitting in this room with you, talking about her. Maybe she knows. Do you believe in the after-life? That the loved one’s spirit doesn’t leave you?”
His bloodshot eyes looked up, as if looking for Terri.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” he said.
“Let me make sure you understand something,” Scarpetta said.
She pulled up a plastic chair and sat close to the table.
“I know nothing about this case,” she said. “I don’t know what you supposedly did or didn’t do. I don’t know who Terri is.”
Shock registered on his face. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying I was called in to examine your injuries, and agreed to do so. And I’m probably not the person you should be speaking to. Your well-being is of my utmost concern, so I’m obliged to tell you that the more you talk to me about Terri, about what happened, the bigger the risk.”
“You’re the only one I should be speaking to.”
He wiped his nose and eyes, and stared at her as if he were trying to figure out something very important.
He said, “You have your reasons. Maybe you know something.”
“You should have a lawyer. Then every word you say is privileged, unconditionally.”
“You’re a physician. Whatever we discuss is privileged. You can’t allow the police to interfere with my medical care, and they have no right to any information unless I give permission or there’s a court order. You must protect my dignity. That’s the law.”
“It’s also the law that if you’re charged with a crime, my records can be subpoenaed by the prosecution or the defense. You need to think about that before you continue to talk to me about Terri, about what happened last night. Anything I say could be subpoenaed,” she emphasized.
“Jaime Berger had her chance to talk to me. She’s nothing like you. She deserves to be fired. She deserves to suffer the way I am and to lose what I’ve lost. It’s her fault.”
“Do you want to cause Jaime Berger harm?” Scarpetta asked.
“I’d never harm anybody. But she’s harmed herself. It’s her fault. The universe repays in kind. If she loses someone she loves, it will be her fault.”
“I’ll try to impress it upon you again. If you’re charged with a crime, I can be subpoenaed and will have no choice but to disclose anything I’ve observed. Yes. I absolutely can be subpoenaed by Jaime Berger. Do you understand that?”
His different-colored eyes stared at her, his body rigid with anger. Scarpetta was aware of the heavy steel door, wondering if she should open it.
“They won’t find any justifiable cause to pin this on me,” he said. “I didn’t stop them from taking my clothes, my car. I’ve given consent to go inside my apartment because I’ve got nothing to hide, and you can see for yourself the way I’m forced to live. I want you to see it. I insist you see it. I said you have to see it or they can’t go in. There’s no evidence I’ve ever hurt Terri unless they make it up. And maybe they will. But you’ll protect me because you’re my witness. You’ll watch after me no matter where I am, and if anything happens to me, you’ll know
