Genesis

Chapter 36

May 11th

11:15 A.M.

After the phone conversation with Dr. Jack Stapleton, Carl felt better than he had for almost a month. Figuratively speaking, it seemed as if the clouds were beginning to part to allow at least a tiny ray of sunshine to penetrate through what had been a dark, threatening, overcast sky. The nightmare had started less than a month ago, when Kera turned what he’d hoped to be a pleasant evening into a disaster by informing him that she was pregnant. And not only was she pregnant, but she was happy about being so.

Initially Carl couldn’t believe it and thought Kera was joking. Although she had expressed a distaste for condoms, it had been his understanding that she was very careful about her cycle, which she insisted was as regular as clockwork. On several occasions she’d informed him when it might not be a good time to get together, and he’d understood and respected her judgment by rescheduling their trysts. The fact that there hadn’t been a warning on the evening in question he had to believe wasn’t totally a mistake on her part but rather something she’d half planned.

The affair had started the night of the medical center Christmas party, and from his rendition of the story, it involved Kera’s actively pursuing him. One way or another they had found themselves enjoying each other’s company, exchanging entertaining and self-deprecating stories of their respective childhoods, his in Massachusetts and hers in Los Angeles. They also found that they were both avid skiers in winter and enthusiastic surfers in summer. When the evening had drawn to a close, they had exchanged numbers with the idea that they would have a drink together at some unspecified date.

When they did get together for a drink that had been instigated by Carl a week later, he didn’t hide that he was married, had been for just shy of twenty years, with three children, one in college and two in high school. He also felt he had been up front and entirely honest in explaining that his wife had gone back to her successful career as an advertising executive when their youngest child had entered middle school and that their intimacy had suffered to the point of being almost nonexistent, all of which was true. What he didn’t tell her was that he’d had a series of affairs over the previous ten years. He also didn’t tell her that his wife’s income trumped his and he had no intention of getting divorced as he was literally and figuratively wedded to his lifestyle.

As soon as Carl had been told by Kera that she was pregnant, he offered to arrange and pay for an abortion. Having already had the experience with a previous lover, he expected Kera would eventually see the light and agree and that would be the end of it. But instead of coming around to his way of thinking, Kera became progressively committed to having the child. At the same time, she became progressively committed to the idea that she and Carl had to arrange a meeting with his wife and put it all out in the open despite his having said over and over that he had no intention of leaving his family. It was when Kera threatened to call his wife that Carl had decided he had little choice and that it was either his life or Kera’s life.

Having been successful in keeping the relationship with Kera a secret and out of the medical center’s potent gossip mill, he was certain he could accomplish what needed to be accomplished with the help of the lethal power of fentanyl and with the opioid crisis as a cover. What he hadn’t expected was to be thwarted by Aria Nichols and her unexpected and dogged interest in finding the father of the fetus. That was the beginning of the dark clouds, especially when he realized he had no idea how much Madison Bryant knew about his affair with Kera.

Solving the potential Madison Bryant threat had not been easy, especially when she somehow managed to live through getting run over by a train, which he had managed to make happen. Yet persistence paid off, thanks to potassium chloride, and once again Carl had thought he was in the clear. But instead of the storm clouds dispersing, they re-formed with the unexpected arrival of genealogical family trees that would have fingered him if he hadn’t come up with the story that he was friends with Paul Sommers, the Manhattan district attorney. Carl had known he had been adopted since he was a child and had never had any interest whatsoever in his genetic past until now. At some point in the near future he’d get the family trees Aria Nichols had made from the safe-deposit box, where he had stashed them, and find out about his genetic family. It was heady stuff. The idea his birth mother was living over on Fifth Avenue was intriguing although after Aria’s description, he had little interest in meeting her.

Taking care of the direct threat that Aria Nichols presented had been easy, since she lived alone like Kera. It had also been helpful that she’d used a background story with the genealogical company she’d worked with that couldn’t possibly incriminate him. But the most worrisome part of Aria’s involvement, and the one that frightened him the most, was that she’d shown the family trees to Dr. Laurie Montgomery. When Carl had heard that, the clouds truly thickened and threatened a catastrophic storm. But then, as if manna from heaven, he learned that Dr. Montgomery was to have surgery that very day, meaning she’d be in the hospital and undoubtedly have an intravenous line in place, and it all had just been confirmed by her husband. It was this information that had parted the clouds, allowed a bit of sun to shine through, and made him feel like celebrating.

Glancing at the antique wall clock, Carl thought this was an opportune time to pay a quick visit to the Emergency Department. He stood up and got his long white doctor’s coat. He then checked himself in the mirror mounted on the back of his door. Although he had plenty of syringes, he needed more potassium chloride. Like with Madison Bryant, he planned to visit Laurie Montgomery’s hospital room during that same early-morning time interval when the night shift took their lunch breaks. With Laurie, the task would be considerably easier than what he’d had to face with Madison. As a VIP Laurie would undoubtedly be in a private room, especially if she was in the Kimmel Pavilion, which Carl expected she would be. With Madison, he had to worry about nurses and nurses’ assistants in constant attendance. That was not going to be the case with Laurie. And 3:00 to 4:00 was when most hospital deaths occur.

Confident he looked very much the part of a clinical professional, Carl walked out of his office. He informed his private secretary that he had a short meeting he needed to attend but would be back in about a half hour. She said that she would hold all his calls.