The Society

CHAPTER 16

“Careful there, Jennifer. Handle that suction with care and never, ever forget, that’s brain you’re suckin’ on.”

“Yes, sir,” the med student said grimly.

To keep the nervous tremor in her hands at bay, she braced them against the patient’s skull.

Standing across the table in OR 4 of Boston’s prestigious White Memorial Hospital, Richard Leaf noted the protective maneuver and smiled beneath his mask. The kid, a Harvard senior, was bright and witty and had a better than decent body. Now he could see that she was resourceful, as well. The potential for something interesting was very much there. He could tell from the way she had been looking at him on morning rounds since she started her neurosurgical rotation. He had Tuesday free next week and his wife had a board meeting scheduled at some society foundation or other. Maybe something could be set up for then. Tonight, though, he had another fish to fry-a fish by the name of Kristin O’Neill. His mouth grew dry at the prospect.

“Be gentle, there, Jen. That’s it. That’s it. You’re doing great. We’re almost done.”

It had been a tricky piece of surgery, but the patient’s cancer, a low-grade malignant astrocytoma, was gone. In all likelihood it would be cured after a course of radiation and chemo.

The legend grows, Leaf was thinking. The legend grows.

“Take over, Jeff,” Leaf said to his resident. “Let Jennifer help as much with the closure as you feel comfortable with. You’ve all done a terrific job. Thank you. Thank you all very much.”

He stepped back from the table to allow the resident to take his place, then dramatically stripped off his gown and gloves and strode out of the OR, reveling in the gazes he knew were fixed on him.

Leaf was as talented a surgeon as he was flamboyant, and as handsome as he was talented. From his earliest days of awareness in grammar school, he knew he was special. Through his years as class president and all-state athlete, he had come to know that he was destined to do great things. Now, at forty-five, wealthy by most people’s standards and world renowned for his skill as a neurosurgeon, his remarkable life was becoming even more so.

Hub Health Care, the HMO he and three other physicians had started just six years ago, was on the verge of making a public offering. The moment the stock went public, Richard Leaf would instantly go from wealthy to rich. Hub Health’s money people were estimating that, for starters, each of the founders would increase his net worth by thirty to forty million-and that was a lowball projection.

Leaf showered. Then, breathing deeply just to keep himself in check over what his life held in store, he entered the busy main corridor of the hospital and headed for his office. Just two days ago, in about this very spot, he was leaving the OR when he literally collided with the library cart being pushed by Kristin O’Neill. Nothing-not the ugly salmon-colored volunteer’s jacket, not her conservative skirt and loose-fitting blouse, not the barrettes with which she controlled her reddish-blond hair, not her wire-rimmed glasses-could negate her natural beauty. As she presented herself, there were some who might pass her by without even noticing how rarely fine her features were, how sensual her movements, or how incredibly full her breasts, especially compared to her narrow waist. But that group would certainly not include Richard Leaf.

She was in her twenties and wore no wedding ring-no jewelry of any kind, in fact; not that adornment was needed on this woman. By the time they had laughed over the incident and had spoken a bit, she had accepted Richard’s invitation to coffee. His fantasies at that moment would have put a July Fourth fireworks display to shame. Over coffee he learned that she was home in Boston helping to care for her invalid mother while taking some time from a Hollywood acting career that was about to break through. The idea for her to do some volunteer work at the hospital had come from her mother, who had been a salmon-coated information lady for years before her diabetes and kidney failure made it impossible to continue.

By the time he had handed a twenty to the waitress for their six-dollar bill and waved off receiving any change, a rendezvous had been set at the Scandinavian Motor Inn south of the city. With Kristin’s gaze threatening to set his white coat on fire, Leaf went through information to call the manager of the hotel and book a room.

“It sounds like you do this often,” she said, her expression suggesting she might be even more intrigued if that were true.

“No way,” Leaf lied, unwilling to take any chances. “Taking out people’s brain tumors is my style. It just so happens that Maury Gross, the manager, is a former patient of mine. A few years ago he had a tumor the size of a golf ball. Couldn’t walk. Had trouble speaking. Now he runs and does the Sunday Times crossword in ink.”

“It must be really wonderful to be able to cure someone of cancer,” she sighed.

Eyes closed, Leaf stretched out on the king-size bed in room 181 of the Scandinavian Motor Inn and imagined what it would be like to see Kristin O’Neill ease open the door and step inside. The woman was perfect in every respect-and an actress to boot. It would be really something to have slept with her and then to have her become a big star. She had the looks, so it certainly seemed possible. He checked the time and then took the painkiller-and-tranquilizer combination that experience had taught would keep him from coming too soon.

The room was candlelit in exactly the way it had been for the other trysts he had arranged there. Champagne was chilling in a silver ice bucket on the desk. Velvety-voiced Morgana King was singing “A Taste of Honey” on his CD player. On the bureau, sandalwood incense was smoldering alongside an envelope containing a couple of tabs of ecstasy, just in case Kristin wanted it at some point. He surely didn’t need anything, even ecstasy. Of all the women he had ever slept with, this one was possibly the hottest. His marriage wasn’t in any trouble, and Cindy was certainly decent enough in bed, but she wasn’t nearly enough. John Kennedy had been quoted as saying that he got a terrible headache unless he had a woman every other day-or maybe it was every third? No matter. Kennedy was a remarkable, powerful man, and so was Richard Leaf. And for Kennedy, even Jackie wasn’t enough.

Leaf slipped his hand down his boxer briefs and gently massaged himself while he waited. Time passed, during which he thought about the night ahead but also reflected on the incredibly rapid rise of Hub Health. Exclusion was the key, he had told his partners when they were first starting out-careful screening of applicants and their lab work, and rejection for any reason of those likely to cost Hub significant sums in the short or long haul. Preexisting condition was their watchword. The finance people had told him that Hub stock absolutely couldn’t miss, and he was going to have a bundle of it.

At precisely the time they had agreed upon, there was a light knock on the door. Leaf’s lingering fear that the young beauty might not show instantly evaporated.

“Come in, it’s open,” he said, trying for a cadence and tone of voice that was something of a cross between Bill Clinton and Sting.

The door swung open. A man slipped into the room and closed the door quickly behind him. He was wearing a black motorcycle jacket and a baseball cap with the brim pulled low enough to obscure his eyes, and he was carrying a small orange pillow.

Leaf, hardened against panic by years in the neurosurgical OR and convinced that, whatever the situation, money could cure it, glared at the intruder.

“What the fuck is this? Where’s Kristin?”

“Kristin is back where I found her, turning tricks for rich, horny men like you.”

“So what is this, some sort of shakedown? How much do you want? Take what’s in my wallet, then get the fuck out of here.”

“What this is, you self-centered jerk, is payback time.”

“Wait. . do I know you?”

The man merely shook his head.

“You do now,” he said. “That’s for sure, and I don’t think you’ll ever forget me.”

Calmly, he withdrew a pistol from his waistband and jammed it into the pillow.

“No! Please, wait. I can pay you anything-anything y-”

The three rapid shots, from eight feet, were deadly accurate. Heart, throat, forehead-straight up the line.

Leaf saw the hole materialize in the pillow and felt the scalding heat of the shots as they entered his body. But slumped back against the bloody pillow, his head twisted grotesquely to one side, he never saw the man extract a plain white business envelope and carefully set it beneath the palm of his right hand.