Mercy

CHAPTER 54

Michelle left the room, but only for a moment. She came back with a first-aid kit and wrapped a towel around Julie’s head wound. Julie was too woozy and disoriented to try and stand, let alone get away. Julie let Michelle get her into a seated position with her back pressed against a wall.

“Don’t worry, Julie,” Michelle said. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. I swear to you it’s true.”

Julie’s eyes brimmed with fresh tears. “You killed Sam. Why?”

“I did it for him,” Michelle said, her voice cracking with emotion. “Because it was what he wanted for himself.”

Julie shook her head in disbelief. Nothing made sense.

“Your work, your mission with Very Much Alive, was to keep people alive and get them the care they deserved.”

Michelle’s gaze traveled to Keith’s dead body and his concave skull.

“Come. Let’s get you into the kitchen. I’ll properly bandage your head and tell you everything.”

Julie let Michelle help her get upstairs and get seated on a kitchen chair. Michelle applied a fresh field dressing to Julie’s head wound. She was practiced at it, the way a nurse would be. Julie had a glass of water on the table, but could not take a drink. Her throat ached too much for anything, talking included. The shock of what had happened proved almost paralyzing, and yet Julie was not afraid. Not in the least. Michelle’s wide eyes were gentle, filled with kindness and sympathy.

“My mission was to prevent the kind of suffering I endured,” Michelle said.

“I don’t understand.” It was hard and it hurt for Julie to speak those few words.

“You see, I wanted my first husband to die,” Michelle said. “He wanted to die, and it happened just the way I said. The way I told you and Sam.”

“But Andrew?”

“Yes, Andrew took his life. That’s also true. But I did tell you a lie. I never stopped believing that what I did for my husband was the right thing to do. Death was his best option. But look at what I lost in the process. I lost my son. I lost my reason for living.

“So I joined Very Much Alive thinking I could make amends. I tried to become a zealot for life at all costs, because what I had done had cost me so much. It had cost me Andrew, my only child. I joined Very Much Alive with the intent of carrying on their mission, but all it did was to put me face-to-face with people like my husband, people who wanted, who needed death with dignity.

“I didn’t believe in the mission of Very Much Alive, I never did. I was lying to myself, fooling myself thinking I could. I thought God took Andrew from me as punishment for what I did, and my penance was to fight for life at all cost. But faced with so much suffering, I couldn’t suppress my true beliefs. In my heart of hearts I believe ending my husband’s suffering was the right thing to do. So after a time, I helped others who wished to die.”

“Helped them?”

“I killed them,” Michelle said. “I did it so their loved ones wouldn’t have to. So their loved ones wouldn’t have to suffer the guilt and maybe even the loss I did. I picked the patients who I believed didn’t want to live anymore, or who in secret confessed this desire to me, and I helped end their suffering.”

“How many?”

Michele’s gaze grew distant. “Ten or so,” she said. “Maybe more.”

“But-Keith-Romey?”

“Keith found out what I was doing. He found the potassium I used, other drugs too. He told me I would get caught eventually. Actually, I thought he was going to turn me in, but that wasn’t his plan. He had been researching alpha-gal. It was a hobby really, but when he discovered what I was doing he thought it over and realized it could be about money, not mercy.”

“Keith went to Romey.”

“Yes, Keith went to Romey. And as a hospitalist, Keith had access to patients all over-different floors, different hospitals too, including West.”

“Keith killed Albert Cunningham?”

“He did,” Michelle said. “We needed to have a real reason for you to go to Suburban West. I was against it, of course, but what could I do?”

“But you killed Sam?”

“Yes, I did. But I wasn’t supposed to do it. Keith gave him the tick bite, but that was before Roman told us he didn’t want anything to happen to Sam.”

“Why?”

“Because Romey knew you would get Lucy to perform an autopsy. As long as nobody saw the pathology of the heart, nobody would ever know how these patients were dying.

“But once you started down the path, you wouldn’t stop. Romey tried to throw you off the trail. He made sure Coffey felt some heat about his department-performance pressure, that sort of thing-so he would become an obstacle, not an ally.” Michelle took a drink of water.

“What about Tommy Grasso and Donald Colchester?”

“I killed them both with cetuximab. But I did it because of mercy, not money. And as for Donald, I had no idea his mother had bugged the room.”

“Weren’t you heard on the recording?”

“No. Donald was asleep when it happened. Keith thought we caught a lucky break that Colchester’s mother listened to the recording after her son was put in the ground. But he knew she would press hard to get Brandon convicted. We had to make a convincing case.”

“Who bribed Sherri?”

“That was Romey. Actually it was Lincoln Cole, Romey’s guy. Cole planted the drugs in Brandon’s apartment, too.”

“Did Lincoln Cole bribe Colchester?”

“No. That was Romey’s doing. He’s skilled at finding the right levers to pull. Same as with Keith, money was Colchester’s motivator, not compassion. It was a win-win all around.”

Julie could not believe her ears. Then she could not believe her memory, because now she recalled Michelle being on the ICU floor when Shirley Mitchell had trouble with her central line.

“It was you who pulled out Shirley’s central line, wasn’t it?”

“And replaced the saline in the room with heparin. So in a way I killed Shirley, too. I felt horrible about setting you up, but not about killing Shirley. By that point, you were too close to the truth.”

“My God, Michelle. What have you done?”

“What I did was listen to Keith.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means I was forced-coerced, I guess, into going along with the scheme he pitched Romey. Moments ago, right before he attacked you, we were fighting about what to do because I was ready to turn myself in. It was never about the money for me, Julie. I promise you that. It was always about mercy. Somewhere on my righteous path, I guess I lost my way. But I’ve found it again. I’ve found it by taking his life to save yours.”

Julie was too numb to feel anger, but it was there, lurking below the surface, wanting to come out.

“What now?” Julie said.

Michelle turned her back to Julie, reached into a kitchen cabinet, and came out holding a pistol.

“Now I have to say good-bye.”

Julie’s eyes went wide with fear. “No, please. My son.”

“We could have been great friends. Please know how sorry I am for everything.”

Michelle raised the pistol. Julie covered her face with her hands, a silly reflex because it was not going to stop the bullet.

Instead of firing at Julie, Michelle put the gun into her own mouth.

And she pulled the trigger.