Do No Harm (2002) by Hurwitz Gregg

Author:Hurwitz, Gregg [Gregg, Hurwitz,]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2010-12-26T00:42:16.061000+00:00

Chapter 41

CLYDE'S pate, visible through his thin veil of hair, glistened with sweat. With a final glance to the quiet upstairs window, he stepped from his car onto the curb. He kept his head lowered and moved swiftly to the apartment building entrance.

A kid with a deficient mustache and a blaring Walkman cleaned the floor with imprecise swipes of a mop. He'd propped open the front door, enabling a breeze through the lobby. Clyde waited until the kid made a dancing half turn toward the far wall, then scurried through the lobby and into the stairwell.

Flattening himself against the wall, he caught his breath, the redness slowly draining from his face. He mopped the sweat from his forehead with his T-shirt, leaving a crescent stain on the collar.

He turned and headed upstairs.

David called Diane in the ER on his way back to the hospital and filled her in as best he could. One of her college friends worked at the Drug Enforcement Agency, so Diane promised to follow up the prescription route before meeting David at Carson's.

David stopped off in the cafeteria to grab a sandwich and a Coke. As he waited in line at the cash register, he was acutely aware of the murmuring that seemed to follow him, the quick glances in his direction. The cashier's newspaper was pinned beneath a half-eaten, browning apple on the counter at her side, awaiting the next customer lull. The photograph on the cover was of David, sitting in the backseat of Jenkins's patrol car, looking as if he'd been arrested. The headline: TENSIONS BETWEEN SPIER AND LAPD ESCALATE. The fact that he'd joined the list of nefarious LA last names--Menendez, Furhman, Fleiss--elicited in him a mixture of embarrassment and alarm. It was as if he'd passed some point of no return and found himself suddenly lost.

David paid and went into the adjoining courtyard to eat in peace. A group of male nurses were playing pickup basketball on a worn wooden backboard someone had hammered up. David wolfed down the sandwich and was just on his way to the NPI when he noticed Peter wobbling across the courtyard and waving, holding a lunch tray in his other hand.

David caught up to Peter and walked patiently beside him, resisting the urge to offer to carry his tray. "How are you?" David asked.

"Oh, you know. I'm moving my procedure suite from across the street to upstairs from my office. Getting the damn thing up and running again has been something of a hassle, but aside from that-- " Peter misstepped and grimaced, setting down his tray on a nearby picnic table. An empty wrapper blew from his tray, but he pretended not to notice. "Would you mind resting a moment?"

"No," David said. "Not at all."

Peter released his leg braces and they sat at the table, watching the men leap and pivot and shoot. One of the nurses took a low pass, biceps flexing beneath the cut sleeves of his scrub top, and shot a turn-around jumper from ten feet out.

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