Sixteen

   2:07 P.M., Friday, March 1, 2002
   Leaving Spencer to go up to his expansive office, Paul took the stairs and descended into the basement of the central building after the two of them had said goodbye to their guests. Paul often wondered what Spencer did all day, rattling around in that huge room, which was four times the size of Paul’s neighboring office and ten times more sumptuous. Yet Paul did not begrudge the situation. It had been Spencer’s only demand during the building of the new clinic. Other than insisting on a ridiculously large personal space, Spencer had otherwise given Paul relatively free rein—most important, in regard to the laboratory and its equipment. Besides, Paul had a second office, albeit tiny, in the laboratory, which he used a hell of a lot more than the one in the admin building.
   Paul was whistling as he opened the fire door on the basement level of the stairwell. He had reason to be in a good mood. Not only was he anticipating a serious enhancement of his legitimacy as a stem-cell researcher by collaborating with a potential Nobel laureate, but more important, he was looking at the prospect of a significant and needed financial windfall for the clinic. Like the mythological phoenix, Paul had again risen from the ashes, and this time there had been literal ashes. Less than a year before, he and the other principals at the clinic had to flee Massachusetts with barbarians in the form of Federal marshals at their former facility’s gate. Luckily, Paul had anticipated problems because of what he had been spearheading in the research arena, although he envisioned the problems would come via the FDA, not directly from the Justice Department, and he had been making detailed plans to move the clinic out of harm’s way offshore. For almost a year, he had been siphoning off funds behind Spencer’s back, which had been easy, since Spencer had essentially retired to Florida. Paul had used the money to buy the land in the Bahamas, design a new clinic, and begin construction. The unexpected raid by law enforcement in the wake of a couple pesky whistle-blowers merely meant he and his cohorts’ departure had to be precipitous and prior to the new clinic’s completion. It also meant they had to activate a preplanned doomsday protocol, burning down their old facility to eliminate all the evidence.
   The irony for Paul was that this recent rise from the ashes had been his second miraculous recovery. Only seven years before, his prospects had appeared dismal. He’d lost his hospital privileges and was poised to lose his medical license in the State of Illinois only two years after he’d finished his ob/gyn residency. It was over some stupid, diddly-squat Medicaid/Medicare billing scam he’d copied from some local colleagues and then refined. The problem had forced him to flee the state. Pure serendipity had taken him to Massachusetts, where he’d taken a fellowship in infertility in order to avoid the Massachusetts Medical Board’s finding out about his problems in Illinois. His luck continued when one of the fellowship instructors happened to be Spencer Wingate, who was contemplating retiring. The rest was history.
   “If only my friends could see me now!” Paul mumbled happily, as he walked down the basement’s central corridor. Such musings were a favorite pastime. Of course, he used the term friends loosely, since he didn’t have many, having been forced to be a loner most of his life after being the butt of jokes throughout his formative years. He’d always been a hard worker, yet he was destined to continually come up short by society’s usual criteria, save for getting a medical degree. But now, with a superbly equipped laboratory at his disposal and without even the threat of FDA oversight, he knew he was positioned to become the biomedical researcher of the year, maybe the decade… maybe even the century, considering the Wingate’s potential to have a virtual monopoly with both reproductive and therapeutic cloning. Of course, for Paul, the idea he was to be a famous researcher was the biggest irony of all. He’d never planned on it, had no appropriate training for it, and even had the dubious honor of being the last in his class in medical school. Paul laughed silently, knowing that in reality he owed his present position not only to luck, but also to U.S. politicians’ ongoing preoccupation with the abortion issue, which had effectively kept oversight from the infertility business as well as handicapped stem-cell research. If that hadn’t been the case, researchers on the mainland would be where he was at the moment.
   Paul rapped on Kurt Hermann’s door. Kurt was the clinic’s head of security and one of Paul’s first hirelings. Soon after his arrival at the Wingate Clinic, Paul had sensed the enormous profit potential of infertility, particularly if one were willing to push the boundaries and take full advantage of the lack of oversight of the field. With that in mind, Paul had assumed security would be a big issue. Accordingly, he had wanted to find the right person for the job, someone without a lot of scruples, in case draconian methods became necessary, someone highly chauvinistic in the nonsexist sense of the term, and someone with some serious experience. Paul had found all of the above in Kurt Hermann. The fact that the man had been discharged from the U.S. Army’s Special Forces under less-than-honorable circumstances following a series of prostitute murders on the island of Okinawa did not trouble Paul in the slightest. In fact, he had considered it a plus.
   Hearing a “Come in,” Paul opened the door. Kurt had designed his own basement office complex. The main room was a combination office with a couple desks and a couple chairs, plus a small gym with a half dozen exercise machines. There was also a mat for tae kwon do sparring. In addition, there was a video room with an entire wall of monitors showing feeds from cameras sprinkled all around the complex. Down a short interior corridor were a bedroom and a bathroom. Kurt had another, larger apartment over in the laboratory building, but on occasion he would stay right there in his office for several days on end. Across from the office’s bedroom was a holding cell, complete with a sink, a head, and an iron cot.
   The sharp metallic clank of weights caught Paul’s attention and directed it toward the gym section of the room. Kurt Hermann sat up from a bench press. He was dressed as usual, in a tight-fitting black T-shirt, black pants, and black cross-trainer shoes, all of which contrasted sharply with his closely cropped, dirty blond hair. At one point, Paul had casually inquired why Kurt insisted on wearing black, considering the radiant power of the Bahamian sun. Kurt’s response was only a slight shrug and an arching of his eyebrows. For the most part, he was a man of few words.
   “We need to talk,” Paul said.
   Kurt didn’t answer. He peeled off his Velcro wrist straps, ran a towel across his forehead, and sat down behind his desk. His bulging pectoral and triceps muscles strained the fabric of his T-shirt as he placed his forearms on the desktop. Once he was seated, he didn’t move. Paul likened him to a cat ready to pounce.
   Paul took hold of one of the side chairs, positioned it in front of the desk, and sat down himself.
   “The doctor and his girlfriend have arrived on the island,” Paul said.
   “I know,” Kurt responded in a clipped monotone. He turned around the monitor on his desk. The image was of Daniel and Stephanie, frozen in their approach to the front entrance of the administration building. Both their faces were plainly visible, as they squinted in the morning sun.
   “A good shot,” Paul commented. “It certainly shows to good effect that the woman is downright attractive.”
   Kurt turned the monitor back around toward himself but didn’t respond.
   “Any information about the identity of the patient since the last time we talked?” Paul asked.
   Kurt shook his head.
   “So a repeat visit to their apartment back in Cambridge and one to their office didn’t reveal anything?”
   Kurt shook his head. “Nothing!”
   “I hate to beat a dead horse,” Paul said, “but we need to know who this person is as soon as possible. The longer we have to wait, the less chance we have of maximizing our compensation. And we do need the money.”
   “Things will be easier now that they are here in Nassau.”
   “What’s your strategy?”
   “When will they be starting their work here at the clinic?”
   “Tomorrow, provided they get a FedEx package they are waiting for.”
   “I need possession of their laptops and their cell phones for a few minutes,” Kurt said. “To do that, assistance from the lab people may be needed.”
   “Oh?” Paul questioned. It was rare for Kurt to ask for help from anyone. “Sure! I’ll arrange for the assistance from Ms. Finnigan. What is it you’d want her to do?”
   “Once they are working here, I need to know where they keep their computers, and hopefully phones, when they go over to the cafeteria.”
   “Well, that should be easy,” Paul said. “Megan will surely provide them with some sort of lockable compartment for their personal effects. Why would you want their cell phones? I mean, I understand why you’d want the laptops, but why the phones?”
   “To check their Caller IDs,” Kurt said. “Not that I expect to learn anything, considering how careful they’ve been up to now. Nor do I expect anything from the computers. That would be too easy. These professor types are far from stupid. What I really want to do is insert a bug in each of their phones to monitor their calls. That is what is going to give us what we want. The downside is that the monitoring has to be close, within a hundred feet or so, because of power limitations. Once the bugs have been planted, Bruno or myself will have to stay within range.”
   “Now, that’s going to be a chore!” Paul exclaimed. “I hope you remember that discretion is the key here. We can’t have any type of scene over this; otherwise, Dr. Wingate will be apoplectic.”
   Kurt gave one of his signature inscrutable shrugs.
   “We found out they are staying at the Ocean Club on Paradise Island.”
   Kurt nodded his head ever so slightly.
   “We did learn something else today that might be helpful,” Paul said. “This mystery patient might be someone high up in the Catholic Church, which could work nicely in our favor, considering the church’s stand on stem cells. Maintaining the secrecy might be worth a lot of money.”
   Kurt didn’t respond in the slightest.
   “Well, that’s it,” Paul said. He slapped his knees before standing up. “Let me emphasize again, we need the name.”
   “I’ll get it,” Kurt said. “Trust me!”

   “What’s going on?” Daniel questioned, with an edge to his voice. “Are you giving me the silent treatment or what? You haven’t said boo since we left the clinic twenty-some minutes ago.”
   “You haven’t said much yourself,” Stephanie responded. She was staring broodingly out the front windshield and didn’t bother to turn her head in Daniel’s direction.
   “I said it was a beautiful day when we got into the car.”
   “Oh, wow!” Stephanie remarked with unmistakable derision. “That’s a stimulating conversation-starter, considering what we’ve experienced this morning.”
   Daniel cast Stephanie a quick, irritated glance before redirecting his attention to the road. They were driving along the north shore of the island, heading back to their hotel. “I don’t think you are being fair. In front of our hosts, you carry on like a banshee, which I don’t want you to do anymore, and now that we’re alone, you’re as quiet as a mouse. You’re acting as if I did something wrong.”
   “Yeah, well, I can’t understand why you’re not outraged about what’s going on at the Wingate Clinic.”
   “You mean about their supposed stem-cell therapy.”
   “Even calling it therapy is a gross misnomer. It is a pure, unadulterated medical scam. Not only is it bilking desperate people out of money and appropriate treatment, it will give stem cells a bad name, because it’s not going to cure anything, except as an elaborate placebo.”
   “I am outraged,” Daniel said. “Anybody would be, but I’m equally outraged about the politicians who are making it all possible and at the same time forcing us to deal with these people.”
   “And what about the Wingate’s putative trade secret that enables them to supply human eggs on demand with only twelve hours notice?”
   “That is equally as ethically worrisome, I have to admit.”
   “Worrisome!” Stephanie repeated scornfully. “It’s a lot more than worrisome. Did you happen to see that there is an article about oocytes in the journal they gave us?” She unrolled the magazine, which she had clutched in her hand. She pointed. “Article number three’s title is ‘Our Extensive Experience with In Vitro Maturation of Human Fetal Oocytes.’ What does that suggest?”
   “Do you think they get their oocytes from aborted fetuses?”
   “With what we know, that would not be an outlandish supposition. And did you notice all the pregnant young Bahamian women working in the cafeteria, none of whom, I might add, had any of the usual signs of being married? And what about Paul flaunting their experience with nuclear transfer? These people are probably offering reproductive cloning on top of everything else.”
   Stephanie exhaled forcibly while shaking her head. Instead of looking over at Daniel, she turned and looked out her passenger-side window. She had her arms tightly folded over her chest. “Just being there and talking with these people, much less working there, makes me feel like an accomplice.”
   They drove in silence for a few minutes. Daniel spoke up as they reached the outskirts of Nassau and had to slow because of traffic. “Everything you are saying is true. But it is also true that we had a pretty damn good idea of what these people were like before we got here. You’re the one who checked them out on the Internet, and to quote you, you said, ‘These people are definitely not nice, and we should limit our interaction with them.’ Do you remember saying that?”
   “Of course I do,” Stephanie snapped. “It was at the Rialto restaurant in Cambridge, not even a week ago.” She sighed. “My word! So much has happened in the last six days, it seems like a year has gone by.”
   “But you get my point,” Daniel persisted.
   “I suppose, but I also said I wanted to be sure that by working at their clinic, we wouldn’t be supporting something unconscionable.”
   “At the expense of being ridiculously redundant, we’re here to treat Butler, and nothing else. We agreed on it, and that’s what we are going to do. We’re not on a social crusade to expose the Wingate Clinic, not now and not even after we treat Butler, because if the FDA finds out what we’ve done, there could be trouble.”
   Stephanie turned around to face Daniel. “When I initially agreed to participate in treating Butler, I thought the only compromise we would be making was in regard to experimental ethics. Unfortunately, it seems as if we find ourselves on the proverbial slippery slope. I’m worried where this is going to take us, conscience-wise.”
   “You could always go home,” Daniel said. “You’re better at the cellular work, but I suppose I could muddle through it.”
   “Do you mean that?”
   “I do. You have a far better technique with nuclear transfer than I.”
   “No, I’m asking if you would mind if I leave.”
   “If the ethical compromises we have to make are going to make you miserable, morose, and unpleasant to be with, then no, I don’t mind if you leave.”
   “Would you miss me?”
   “Is this a trick question? I already implied that I’d much prefer you to stay. Compared with you, I have two thumbs on each hand when I’m working with oocytes and blastocysts under a dissecting microscope.”
   “I mean miss me emotionally.”
   “Of course! That’s a given.”

   “It’s never a given, especially since you’ve never said as much. But don’t get me wrong; I appreciate you saying it now, and I appreciate your willingness to let me leave. It means a lot to me.” Stephanie sighed. “But as much as I’m conflicted about working with these morons, I don’t think I could leave you here to carry on by yourself. But I’ll think about it. It makes me feel better to know it is an option, and such feelings are appreciated. After all, from day one, this whole affair has been against my intuition and better judgment, and this morning’s experience hasn’t helped.”
   “I’m aware of your misgivings,” Daniel said. “And knowing them makes me even more appreciative of your support. But enough is enough! We know they are bad news, and what we’ve seen this morning just confirms it. Let’s move on to another subject! What was your take on the Pakistani neurosurgeon?”
   “What can I say? I liked his English accent, but he’s kind of short. On the other hand, he’s cute.”
   “I’m trying to be serious,” Daniel said, with an edge returning to his voice.
   “Well, I’m trying to be humorous. I mean, how can you evaluate a professional after meeting him for lunch? At least he’s had good training at recognized academic centers in London, but whether he’s a good surgeon, who’s to say? At least he’s personable.” Stephanie shrugged. “What do you think?”
   “I think he’s terrific, and I think we’re lucky to have him on board. The fact that he had experience doing fetal cell implants for Parkinson’s disease as a resident is an extraordinary plus. I mean, he’s going to be doing the same procedure for us. Implanting our cloned dopaminergic neural cells will merely be a rerun, with the exception that it will work. I sensed a true frustration on his part that the results of the fetal cell study he was involved in were so poor.”
   “He is enthusiastic,” Stephanie agreed. “I have to give him credit for that, but I wasn’t totally convinced it wasn’t because he needs the work. One thing that surprised me was that he thought it would only take him an hour or so.”
   “I’m not,” Daniel said. “Setting the stereotaxic headgear in place is the only step that’s time-consuming. The burr hole and the injection will be quick.”
   “I suppose we should be thankful to have found him so easily.”
   Daniel nodded.
   “I know one other reason you were upset this morning,” Daniel said suddenly, after a short break in their conversation.
   “Oh?” Stephanie questioned, feeling herself tense up after finally relaxing to a degree. The last thing she wanted to hear was another upsetting detail.
   “Your faith in the medical profession must now be at a new nadir.”
   “What are you talking about?”
   “Spencer Wingate is hardly the short, fat, and warted individual you’d hoped, although, as I already said, he could still be a chain-smoker and have bad breath.”
   Stephanie gave Daniel several playful swats on the shoulder. “After all the things I’ve said lately, it’s just like you to remember that.”
   In an equally playful fashion, Daniel pretended to be terrified and pressed himself up against his window to get out of her reach. At that moment, they were stopped at a traffic light just short of the bridge to Paradise Island.
   “Now, Paul Saunders is another story,” Daniel said, righting himself. “So maybe your faith hasn’t suffered an irreversible blow, since his appearance certainly makes up for Spencer’s matinee-idol good looks.”
   “Paul is not that bad-looking,” Stephanie said. “He certainly has interesting hair, with such a striking white forelock.”
   “I know you have trouble saying anything bad about someone’s person,” Daniel said. “Not that I understand it, particularly in this instance, considering how you feel about these people, but let’s at least admit that the man is an odd-looking duck.”
   “People are born with their faces and their bodies; they don’t choose them. I’ll say Paul Saunders is unique. I’ve never seen anyone with two different-colored irises.”
   “He has an eponymous genetic syndrome,” Daniel explained. “It’s fairly rare, if I remember correctly, but I don’t recall its name. It was one of those arcane diseases that would occasionally get tossed out during internal medicine rounds.”
   “A hereditary disease!” Stephanie remarked. “Well, that’s exactly why I don’t like to criticize people’s basic appearances. Does this syndrome have any serious health consequences?”
   “I can’t remember,” Daniel admitted.
   The light changed, and they motored over the bridge. The view of the Nassau harbor was engaging, and neither spoke until they got to the other side.
   “Hey!” Daniel blurted. He veered into a lane for making a right-hand turn across traffic and came to a stop. “What about heading over to this shopping plaza to get ourselves some more clothes? At the very least, we need bathing suits so we can visit the beach. After the FedEx package gets here, there’s not going to be much opportunity to take advantage of Nassau’s pleasures.”
   “Let’s go back to the hotel first. It’s time to give Father Maloney a call. By now, he should be back in New York, and maybe he has some information about our luggage. What clothes we buy will depend on whether we’re going to get it or not.”
   “Good point!” Daniel said. He changed his turn signals and looked over his shoulder as he drove back into the line of traffic heading east.
   A few minutes later, Daniel drove the car past the hotel’s parking area and directly up to the front of the hotel. Liveried doormen came to both sides of the car and opened the doors simultaneously.
   “You’re not going to park it in the lot?” Stephanie questioned.
   “Let’s leave the car here with the doormen,” Daniel said. “We’ll give Father Maloney a try, but whether or not we get him, I want to go back and get us bathing suits.”
   “Fine by me,” Stephanie said, as she slid out of the car. After the stress of the morning, a little shopping plus a relaxing visit to the beach sounded glorious.

   As if he’d had a shot of speed, Gaetano felt his pulse quicken and the hairs rise up on the back of his neck. Finally, after lots of false alarms, the two people coming in through the front doors of the hotel looked like the pair he was searching for. He quickly withdrew the photo he had in the pocket of his flower-print shirt. While the couple was still in view, he compared their faces with those in the photograph. “Bingo,” he said under his breath. He replaced the photo and glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to three. He shrugged. If the professor cooperated by either going for a long walk or, better yet, heading back into town, where the two of them must have been, Gaetano might make the evening flight to Boston after all.
   The couple disappeared from view to Gaetano’s right, apparently walking through the lobby, past the registration desks. Without causing a scene by hurrying, Gaetano replaced the magazine he’d been perusing, picked up his jacket, which he’d draped over the back of the sofa, smiled at the bartender, who’d been nice enough to engage him in chitchat, which had kept the hotel security from becoming suspicious, and headed after the couple. By the time he got outside, they were out of sight.
   Gaetano headed along the serpentine walkway that wended its way among flowering trees and high bushes. He wasn’t concerned that he couldn’t see the couple, since he assumed they were headed to their room, and he knew exactly where room 108 was located. As he walked, he regretted his instructions not to confront the professor in the hotel. It would have been so much easier than having to wait for the man to leave the premises.
   Gaetano caught sight of his quarry just as they were entering their building. He walked around to the ocean side, and found a strategically situated hammock stretched between two palm trees. After draping his jacket over one of the ropes, he gingerly climbed aboard. From that convenient vantage point, he would see them if they went to the beach, the pool, or any other of the hotel attractions. There wasn’t much more he could do but wait and watch and hope their plans took them away from the hotel.
   As the minutes passed, Gaetano’s heart rate settled back to normal, although he was still titillated by the anticipation of imminent physical action. He was about as comfortable as he could imagine, with his head propped up on a little canvas pillow attached to the hammock and one foot out on the ground to gently sway himself. Only a smattering of sunlight sifted through the palm fronds overhead, which was a godsend. If he’d been in the direct sun, he would have broiled.
   A woman in a skimpy bikini and a see-through cover-up walked by and smiled. Gaetano gave a wave in return, which nearly upended him. As far as he knew, he’d never been in a hammock before, and since it was stretched rather tightly between the trees, it wasn’t as steady as he imagined. He felt better gripping both sides.
   Gaetano was about to risk checking his watch when he saw the couple. Instead of going to the beach, they were on the walkway, heading back to the lobby. More important, they were dressed as they had been earlier. Gaetano didn’t want to jinx himself, but attired as they were, they weren’t going to the pool for damn sure, and just maybe they might be heading back out of the hotel.
   In an attempt to get out of the hammock quickly, Gaetano caused it to flip completely over, resulting in his being ignominiously dumped face-first on the ground. He scrambled to his feet and was further embarrassed when he discovered that two toddlers and their mother had witnessed his fall.
   He brushed off blades of grass adhering to the front of his slacks and picked up his sunglasses. It irritated him that both kids had smirks on their faces at his expense, and for a second, he thought about teaching them a lesson about respect. Luckily, the family moved on, although one of the brats looked back over his shoulder, with a mocking smile still plastered to his face. Gaetano gave him the finger. He then grabbed his jacket and took off after the couple.
   This time, Gaetano ran, since it was now important to keep them in sight. He caught up with them before they reached the central building, and he slowed to a walk. He was breathing heavily. When they entered the lobby, Gaetano was right behind them. He was close enough to hear them talk. He was also close enough to appreciate that Stephanie was even more comely than her photograph suggested.
   “Why don’t you have them pull the car up,” Stephanie was saying. “I’ll be out in a second. I want to check with the concierge whether we need a reservation for dinner tonight in the courtyard.”
   “Fine,” Daniel said agreeably.
   Suppressing a smile to hide his delight, Gaetano reversed course and exited the lobby area through the door he’d just come in. Walking quickly, he beat it out to the parking lot and jumped into the Cherokee. After getting it started, he drove back toward the front of the hotel, positioning the car so he could see the roundabout and the porte cochere. Directly in front of the hotel entrance was a blue Mercury Marquis with its engine idling. Stephanie appeared from within and climbed into the front passenger seat.
   “Score!” Gaetano happily said out loud. He looked at his watch. It was a quarter past three. Suddenly, things seemed to be falling into place.
   The Mercury Marquis started forward and passed directly in front of Gaetano. Gaetano fell in behind, close enough at first to commit the license plate to memory. He then dropped back.

   “What did you think about my conversation with Father Maloney?” Stephanie asked.
   “I’m just as confused about him as I was the day we left Turin.”
   “Me too,” Stephanie agreed. “I was hoping he’d be a bit more forthcoming than he was back in Italy about divine intervention and his merely being the Good Lord’s servant. But, hey, at least he’s supposedly arranged for us to get our luggage. With us being fugitives and with what I know about lost luggage, that’s got to be evidence of divine intervention.”
   “Maybe so, but without having any idea when it might arrive, it’s not much help in the short run.”
   “Well, I’m going to think positively about it being soon, so my shopping is going to be restricted to a bathing suit and a few basics.”
   Daniel pulled into the strip mall’s parking area and drove along the storefronts, pausing in front of a woman’s clothing store immediately adjacent to a men’s shop. Both window displays were tastefully done. The clothes looked European.
   “Isn’t this convenient?” Daniel commented as he parked the car. He looked at his watch. “Let’s meet back here at the car in half an hour.”
   “Sounds good to me,” Stephanie said, as she stepped out of the vehicle.

   With his heart rate back up to where it had been when he first saw the couple coming into the hotel, Gaetano nosed into a parking space that afforded a direct route back onto the street and hence directly over the bridge to Nassau. It was always important to provide a quick getaway in his line of work. He turned off the engine and looked back over his shoulder. He watched while the couple split up, with the professor going toward a men’s haberdashery, while Tony’s sister headed for an adjacent woman’s shop.
   Gaetano couldn’t believe his luck. The question of how to deal with the woman while he took care of business with the professor had been a nagging concern, since by decree, she was supposed to be left out of the action. Now she wouldn’t be a problem, as long as the professor provided an appropriate opportunity while he was alone. Unsure how long he would be alone, Gaetano leaped out of the Cherokee. As he quickened his step to a jog, his anticipatory fervor soared. For him, the necessary maneuvering as he closed in on a mark was like foreplay in a self-fulfilling cycle of excitement, while the resulting violence was very nearly orgasmic. In fact, for him, the entire experience was similar to sex but better.

   It was a relief for Daniel to be by himself, even for only thirty minutes. Stephanie’s carping about her conscience was getting on his nerves. Finding out Spencer Wingate et al. were into questionable activities was hardly a surprise, especially after what she had reported learning during her Internet search. He hoped that her current bothersome self-righteousness wasn’t going to cause her to lose sight of the big picture and get in the way. He could do without her, but he’d been truthful when he admitted she was better than he when it came to cellular manipulation.
   Daniel did not like to shop, and as he entered the haberdashery, he intended to make the visit quick so he could go back out to the car and just sit and relax. All he wanted to buy was a few pairs of underpants, a bathing suit, and some appropriate clothes for work, such as khaki pants and short-sleeve shirts. In London, Stephanie had talked him into buying slacks, two dress shirts, and a tweed jacket, so he was fine in that arena.
   The interior of the shop was surprisingly large, despite its modest storefront, since it was deep. Just inside the door was a sizable golf and smaller tennis section, while everyday apparel was farther back. The temperature was pleasantly cool. The air was scented with cologne mixed with the odor of new fabric. Classical music issued from a multitude of wall speakers. The décor was decidedly clubby, with lots of dark red mahogany, horse prints, and dark green carpeting. There were a half dozen other shoppers, all of whom were in the golf area. Each was being helped by a salesperson.
   No one came to greet Daniel, which he preferred. Officious haberdashers had always put him off with their condescending manner, as if they were paragons of good taste. When it came to clothes Daniel was Ivy League conservative. He essentially wore what he’d worn in college. Unaccosted and unaccompanied, he passed through the sports section and headed into the depths of the store.
   Since he knew it would be easy, Daniel started with the bathing-suit quest. He found the appropriate section and then his size. After flipping through a few on the rack of dozens, he pulled out a solid, dark-blue, medium boxer. He thought that would do just fine. Immediately adjacent to the bathing suits was the underwear section. He was a classic brief man, and he found his size with ease.
   With only a few of his thirty minutes of reprieve gone, Daniel went to the shirt section. He passed up the majority, which were flower prints in bright, tropical colors, and zeroed in on button-down oxfords with short sleeves. He found his size and took two in blue. With the bathing suit, underwear, and shirts in hand, he walked to the pants section. It was equally hard to find plain khakis, but he did, although with the pants, he wasn’t sure of the size. Reluctantly, he took several of varying lengths and looked for the dressing rooms. He found them at the very back of the store beyond the deserted suits and sport jackets section.
   There were four changing cubicles arranged along the back of a mahogany-paneled fitting room. The fitting room was reached by pushing through a pair of swinging doors. Three-way mirrors graced the end walls. Each cubicle had a paneled door that stood open. The first dressing room on the right was twice the size of the other three, and Daniel headed there.
   Inside, he found a single upholstered chair, several clothes hooks, and a floor-to-ceiling mirror. Daniel closed and locked the door, put his intended purchases on the chair, and hung the pants on the hooks. After kicking off his shoes, he undid his belt and slipped out of his slacks. Taking the first pair of pants, he was about to pull them on when a reverberating thud preceded the changing-room door being rudely kicked open with such force to cause it to smash against the wall hard enough to drive the doorknob through the plasterboard. Daniel’s heart leaped into his throat as a feeble moan escaped from his lips.
   Literally caught with his pants down, Daniel merely stared at the hulking intruder, who closed the door despite the splintered casing. The man then stepped over to the startled Daniel, who looked up into a pair of dark, metallic eyes peering out of an oversized head capped with black hair in a buzz cut. Before Daniel could respond, the pants he was holding were ripped from his grasp and tossed to the side.
   At the exact moment Daniel found his voice to start to protest, a fist came out of nowhere and smashed into the side of his face, rupturing capillaries in his nose and crushing others in his lower right eyelid. Propelled backward, Daniel slammed against the mirror before collapsing to a sitting position with his legs crumpled beneath him. The image of the attacker swam before him. Only partially aware of what was happening and offering no resistance, Daniel was yanked upright before he was sent sprawling into the upholstered chair on top of the clothes he’d intended to buy. He could feel blood trickle out of his nose, and he could barely see out of his right eye.
   “Listen, asshole,” Gaetano growled. He poked his head close to Daniel’s face. “I’m going to make this short. My bosses, the Castigliano brothers, in the name of all stockholders in your freaking company, want you to get your ass back up north and put the company back on track. You hear me?”
   Daniel tried to talk, but his vocal cords wouldn’t respond. Instead, he nodded his head.
   “It’s not a complicated message,” Gaetano continued. “They feel it’s disrespectful for you to be frolicking down here in the sun while their hundred-grand investment is on the rocks.”
   “We’re trying…” Daniel managed, but his voice was a high-pitched squeak.
   “Yeah, sure you’re trying,” Gaetano scoffed. “You and your hot-ticket girlfriend. But it doesn’t look that way to my bosses, who would much prefer you do your trying back in Beantown. And whether the company tanks or not, my bosses are going to expect their money back, no matter what kind of fancy lawyers you might employ. You understand?”
   “Yes, but…”
   “No buts,” Gaetano interrupted. “I’m making this crystal clear. You gotta tell me you understand! Yes or no?”
   “Yes,” Daniel croaked.
   “Good,” Gaetano said. “But just to be sure, I have something else I want you to think about.”
   Without warning, Gaetano hit Daniel again. This time, it was on the left side of Daniel’s head, but in contrast to the first blow, Gaetano used an open hand. Nonetheless, it was a powerful whack that landed with enough force to propel Daniel out of the chair like a ragdoll and onto the floor.
   The side of Daniel’s face was stinging, and a high-pitched ringing sounded in his ear. He felt Gaetano nudge him with his foot before grabbing a handful of his hair and yanking his head off the carpet. Daniel opened his eyes. He squinted at the backlit image of his assailant hovering over him.
   “Can I feel confident you have gotten the message?” Gaetano demanded. “Because I want you to know I could have hurt you bad. I hope you understand that. But at the moment, we don’t want you hurt so bad that you can’t get your company back on its feet. Of course, that might change if I have to fly the hell back down here from Boston. You catch my drift?”
   “I get the message,” Daniel squeaked.
   Gaetano let Daniel’s hair go, and his head bounced down on the carpet. Daniel kept his eyes closed.
   “That’s all for now,” Gaetano said. “I hope I don’t have to come and visit you again.”
   A moment later, Daniel heard the door to the changing room creak open and then shut again. All was quiet.

Seventeen

   3:20 P.M., Friday, March 1, 2002
   Daniel opened his eyes after lying perfectly still for a few minutes. He was alone in the changing cubicle, but he heard muffled voices beyond the door. It sounded as if a salesperson was directing a customer into one of the other cubicles. Daniel pushed himself up to a sitting position and looked at himself in the mirror. The left side of his face was beet red, and a trickle of blood went from his nose to the corner of his mouth before running down to the edge of his jaw. His right eye was beginning to swell shut and had a slightly bluish cast.
   Gingerly, Daniel felt his nose and his right cheekbone with the tip of his index finger. Everything was tender, but there was neither pinpoint pain nor suspicious bony edges to suggest he had suffered a fracture. He got to his feet and, after a fleeting moment of dizziness, he felt reasonably well, except for a dull headache, wobbly legs, and a pervading sense of nervousness, as if he’d just drunk five cups of coffee. He held out his hand; he had a tremor to beat the band. The episode had terrified him; he’d never felt quite so vulnerable in his life.
   Despite uncertain balance, Daniel managed to pull on his pants. He then wiped away the blood from his face with the back of his hand. In the process, he realized he’d suffered a gash inside his cheek. Carefully, he explored the area with his tongue. Luckily, it wasn’t large enough for him to believe he needed any stitches. Then he smoothed out the thinning hair on top of his head by raking it with his fingers. He opened the door and stepped out into the fitting room.
   “Good afternoon,” a snappily dressed, African-Bahamian salesman said with a strong English drawl. He was dressed in a pinstriped suit accented with a colorful silk pocket square that appeared to have exploded out of his breast pocket. He was leaning against the wall with his arms folded awaiting his client to emerge from his changing room. He gave Daniel a quizzical look with arched eyebrows but said nothing more.
   Afraid of how his voice might sound, Daniel merely nodded in reply while managing a tentative smile. He started forward on unsteady legs, acutely aware of his tremor. He was afraid he might appear intoxicated. But the more he walked, the easier it became. He was relieved when the salesperson didn’t confront him. Daniel wanted to avoid any conversation. He merely wanted to get out of the store.
   By the time Daniel got to the door to the street, he was confident he was walking normally. He opened the door and stuck his head out into the sunny afternoon heat. A quick glance around the parking area convinced him that his muscular attacker had long since departed. He peeked through the window of the women’s store and caught a glimpse of Stephanie happily shopping. Confident she was okay, Daniel made a beeline for the Mercury Marquis.
   Once inside the car, Daniel rolled down the windows to allow the breeze to siphon off the ovenlike heat that had developed during the short time he’d been in the store. He sighed; it felt good to be sitting down within the familiar surroundings of his rent-a-car. Bending the rearview mirror in his direction, he examined himself more closely. He was particularly worried about his right eye, which was now practically shut. Still, he could tell the cornea was clear and there was no blood in the anterior chamber, although there were some petechial hemorrhages on the sclera. Having spent time in the emergency room as a medical resident, he knew something about facial trauma—in particular, a problem called a blowout fracture of the orbit. To make sure that hadn’t happened, he checked to see if he saw double, especially when he looked up and down. Thankfully, he didn’t. So he repositioned the rearview mirror and sat back to wait for Stephanie.
   About a quarter of an hour later, Stephanie emerged from the women’s clothing store with several shopping bags in tow. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she looked in Daniel’s direction. Daniel responded by sticking his hand out his open window and waving. She waved back and came running. He watched as she approached. Now that he’d had a few minutes to think about his assault and its probable origin, his mental state had changed from anxiety to anger, and a significant portion of it was directed at Stephanie and her screwed-up family. Although he’d not had his knees smashed, the modus operandi smelled suspiciously Mob-related, which immediately brought to mind Stephanie’s indicted brother. Who the Castiglianos were he had no idea, but he was going to find out.
   Stephanie came first to the passenger-side back door, opened it, and tossed her bundles onto the backseat. “How’d you make out?” she questioned happily. “I have to say, I did better than I expected.” She slammed the back door and proceeded to get into the front while babbling about her purchases. She closed her door and grabbed her seat belt before she looked at Daniel. When she did, she stopped her ramblings in midsentence. “My God! What happened to your eye?” she blurted.
   “It’s good of you to notice,” Daniel said scornfully. “Obviously, I got beat up. But before we get into the distasteful details, I have a question to ask. Who are the Castigliano brothers?”
   Stephanie stared at Daniel, taking in not only the puffy eye, but also the red swelling on the side of his face and the crusted blood along the edges of his nostrils. She wanted to reach out and touch him empathically, but she held back. She could see the anger reflected in the one visible eye and heard it in his tone of voice. Besides, the Castigliano name and the significance it engendered momentarily paralyzed her. She looked down at her hands, limp in her lap.
   “Is there some other little important tidbit you didn’t feel like talking to me about?” Daniel continued, with equal sarcasm. “I mean, in addition to your brother being indicted for racketeering after becoming an investor. I repeat, who the hell are the Castiglianos?”
   Stephanie’s mind was racing. It was true that she’d not shared the news that her brother had farmed out half of his investment. She had no excuse for not being more forthcoming, especially since the news had disturbed her, and this second and related lapse made her feel like a thief caught twice in the same felonious act.
   “I was hoping we could at least have a conversation,” Daniel said, when Stephanie didn’t respond.
   “We can, and we will,” Stephanie said suddenly. She looked at Daniel. She’d never felt quite so guilty in her life. He’d been hurt, and she had to accept that a significant amount of the responsibility was hers. “But first, tell me if you are okay.”
   “As well as can be expected, under the circumstances.” Daniel started the car and backed out of the parking place.
   “Should we go to a hospital or see a doctor?” Stephanie asked.
   “No! There’s no need. I’m going to live.”
   “What about the police?”
   “An even more emphatic no! Going to the police, who might actually investigate, would risk derailing our plans to treat Butler.” Daniel drove to the parking area exit.
   “Maybe this is another omen about this whole affair. Are you sure you don’t want to give up on this Faustian quest?”
   Daniel flashed Stephanie an angry, scornful look. “I can’t believe you’d even suggest such a thing. Absolutely not! I’m not about to roll over and give up everything we’ve worked for because a couple of lowlifes send down their Neanderthal henchman to give me a message.”
   “He talked with you?”
   “In between blows.”
   “What exactly was the message?”
   “To quote the muscleman, I’m supposed to ‘get my ass back to Boston and get the company back on track.’ ” Daniel pulled out into the road and accelerated. “Some of our stockholders, having learned we’re in Nassau, believe we’re on vacation down here.”
   “Are we going back to the hotel?”
   “Seeing as I’ve lost my enthusiasm for shopping, I want to get some ice on this eye of mine.”
   “Are you sure we shouldn’t go to a doctor? Your eye looks pretty bad.”
   “It will probably come as a surprise if I remind you that I’m a doctor myself.”
   “I’m talking about a real, practicing doctor.”
   “Very funny, but excuse me if I don’t laugh!”
   They drove in silence the short distance back to the hotel. Daniel parked the car in the parking lot. They got out. Stephanie collected her parcels from the backseat. She didn’t quite know what to say.
   “The Castigliano brothers are acquaintances of my brother, Tony,” Stephanie finally admitted, as they walked toward their building.
   “How come I’m not surprised?”
   “Other than that, I don’t know them, nor have I ever met them.”
   They keyed open the door to their suite. Stephanie tossed her shopping bags to the side. As guilty as she felt, she didn’t know how to handle Daniel’s rightful anger. “Why don’t you go in and sit down,” she offered solicitously. “I’ll get the ice.”
   Daniel stretched out on the couch in the sitting room but quickly sat upright again. Lying down made his head throb. Stephanie came in with a towel, which she wrapped around a handful of ice cubes she got from the ice bucket on the counter over the minibar. She handed a makeshift ice pack to Daniel, who gingerly placed it against his swollen eye.
   “How about some ibuprofen?” Stephanie asked.
   Daniel nodded, and Stephanie got several tablets, along with a glass of water.
   While Daniel took the pain reliever, Stephanie sat on the couch and tucked her feet underneath herself. She then told Daniel the details of her conversation with Tony the afternoon of the day they left for Turin. She concluded by abjectly apologizing for not having mentioned it. She explained that with everything else that was happening at the time, it seemed to be of minor importance. “I was going to tell you when we got back from Nassau and when the second-round financing came through, because I want to treat the two hundred thousand from my brother as a loan and return it with interest. I don’t want him or any of his associates involved with CURE in the future.”
   “Well, at least we agree on something.”
   “Are you going to accept my apology?”
   “I suppose,” Daniel said, without a lot of enthusiasm. “So, your brother warned you about coming here?”
   “He did,” Stephanie admitted, “because I couldn’t tell him why. But it was just a generic warning, and certainly without threats. I have to say, it’s still hard for me to believe he’s involved with your assault.”
   “Oh, really?” Daniel said sarcastically. “Start believing it, because he has to have been involved! I mean, other than your brother telling these Castiglianos, how would they know we are here in Nassau? It can’t be a coincidence this thug appeared here the day after we arrived. Obviously, after you called your mom last evening, she called your brother, and he called his pals. And I don’t suppose I have to remind you how mad you got when I brought up the issue of possible violence when dealing with people involved in racketeering?”
   Stephanie blushed at the recollection. It was true; she’d been furious. With sudden determination, she reached for her cell phone, flipped it open, and began dialing. Daniel grabbed her arm. “Who are you calling?”
   “My brother,” Stephanie said hotly. She sat back with the phone against her ear. Her lips were pressed together in angered determination.
   Daniel leaned toward Stephanie and took the phone. Despite Stephanie’s flash of anger and apparent resolve, she didn’t offer any resistance. Daniel closed the phone and tossed it onto the coffee table. “At the moment, calling your brother is the last thing we should do.” He sat back upright, keeping the ice pack pressed against his eye.
   “But I want to confront him. If he was truly involved, I’m not going to let him get away with it. I feel betrayed by my own family.”
   “You’re angry?”
   “Of course I’m angry,” Stephanie retorted.
   “So am I,” Daniel snapped. “But I’m the one who got beat up, not you.”
   She lowered her eyes. “You’re right. You’re the one who deserves to be a lot more upset than I.”
   “I need to ask you a question,” Daniel said. He adjusted his ice pack. “An hour or so ago, you said you’d been thinking about possibly going home to appease your conscience about working with the likes of Paul Saunders and Spencer Wingate. With this new development, I have to know now if you intend to or not.”
   Stephanie glanced back up at Daniel. She shook her head and gave a short, embarrassed laugh. “After what’s happened, and as guilty as I feel about it, there’s no way I could leave.”
   “Well, that’s a relief,” Daniel commented. “Maybe there’s good in everything, even getting beaten to a pulp.”
   “I really am sorry you were hurt,” Stephanie said. “I truly am. More than you know.”
   “All right, all right,” Daniel repeated. He gave Stephanie’s knee a reassuring squeeze. “Now that I know you are staying, here’s what I think we should do. I think we should pretend this little episode of me being pummeled never happened, meaning no nasty calls to your brother or even your mother, for that matter. Future calls to your mother will emphasize that you and I are not vacationing here but rather hard at work on a job to save CURE. Tell her it’s going to take three weeks and then we’ll be home.”
   “What about this hooligan who attacked you? Don’t we have to worry about him coming back?”
   “That’s a concern but apparently a risk we have to take. He’s not from the Bahamas, and my educated guess is that he’s already on his way home. He said that if he had to fly the hell back down here from Boston again, he’d, and I quote, hurt me bad, which leads me to believe that New England is his usual hangout. At the same time, he said he didn’t want to hurt me so bad that I couldn’t get the company back on its feet, meaning they have a vested interest in my well-being, despite how I feel at the moment. But most importantly, I’m hoping your phone conversations with your mother, which will undoubtedly get communicated to your brother, will convince the Castiglianos it’s worth waiting three weeks.”
   “Should we change hotels, since I told my mother we’re staying here?”
   “I thought about that while I was sitting in the car, waiting for you to come out of the store. I even thought about taking Paul up on his offer to stay out at the Wingate Clinic.”
   “Oh, God! That would be like going from the frying pan into the fire.”
   “I wouldn’t want to stay there either. It’s going to be bad enough putting up with those charlatans during the day. So I think we should just stay here, unless it’s going to drive you crazy. I don’t want a repeat of our night in Turin. My feeling is that we should stay put but not leave the hotel, except to go to the Wingate Clinic, which, starting tomorrow, is where we are going to be most of the time anyway. Agreed?”
   Stephanie nodded a few times as she absorbed everything Daniel had said.
   “Do you agree or what?” Daniel asked. “You’re not saying anything.”
   Stephanie suddenly threw up her hands in a burst of emotional frustration. “Gosh, I don’t know what to think. You getting attacked just adds to my uneasiness about this whole Butler affair. From day one, we’ve been forced to make assumptions about people we know little or nothing about.”
   “Wait just a second!” Daniel growled. His face, already red, got redder still, and his voice, which had started out low, began to rise progressively. “We’re not starting the debate again about whether or not we’re going to treat Butler. That’s been decided. Our current conversation is about logistics from this point on, period!”
   “Okay, okay!” Stephanie said. She reached out and put a hand on his arm. “Calm down! Fine! We’ll stay here and hope things work out for the best.”
   Daniel took a few deep breaths before saying, “I also think we should make it a point to stay together.”
   “What are you talking about?”
   “I don’t think it was an accident the muscleman assaulted me when I happened to be alone. Your brother obviously doesn’t want you hurt; otherwise, we both would have been slapped around, or at a minimum, I still would have borne the brunt, but you would have had to witness it. I think the man waited until I was by myself; ergo, I believe our staying together at all times away from our room would provide a certain amount of safety.”
   “Maybe you’re right,” Stephanie mumbled equivocally. Her mind was a jumble. On the one hand, she was relieved that Daniel wasn’t making a negative reference to their relationship when he mentioned staying together, while on the other hand, it was still hard for her to admit to herself that her brother could have had anything to do with the violence Daniel had experienced.
   “Can you get me some more ice?” Daniel asked. “What I’ve got is just about melted.”
   “Of course,” Stephanie said. She was relieved to have something to do. She took the soggy towel and exchanged it for a fresh one in the bathroom. Then she revisited the ice bucket on the bar. When she handed the fresh ice pack to Daniel, the phone on the side table suddenly sprang to life. For a few moments, its repetitive jangle inundated the otherwise silent room. Neither Daniel nor Stephanie moved. Both stared at the phone.
   “Now, who the hell could that be?” Daniel questioned, after the fourth ring. He positioned the ice pack on his eye.
   “Not very many people know we are here,” Stephanie said. “Should I answer it?”
   “I suppose,” Daniel said. “If it is your mother or brother, remember what I said earlier.”
   “What if it’s the person who attacked you?”
   “That’s highly unlikely. Answer it, but be nonchalant! If it is the thug, just hang up. Don’t try to engage him in any conversation.”
   Stephanie went to the phone, picked it up, and tried to say hello normally while looking back at Daniel. Daniel watched her eyebrows raise slightly as she listened. After a few moments, Daniel mouthed, “Who is it?” Stephanie held up her hand and motioned for him to wait. Finally, she said, “Wonderful! And thank you.” Then she listened again. Absently, she twirled the phone cord with her finger. After a pause, she said, “That’s very nice of you, but it’s not possible tonight. In fact, it’s not possible any night.” She then said goodbye in a clipped tone and replaced the receiver. She returned her eyes to Daniel’s but for a moment didn’t speak.
   “Well? Who was it?” Daniel demanded. His curiosity was getting the best of him.
   “It was Spencer Wingate.” Stephanie shook her head in amazement.
   “What did he want?”
   “He wanted to let us know that he located our FedEx package, and he’s arranged to have it delivered first thing in the morning.”
   “Hooray for small favors. That means we can start creating Butler’s treatment cells. But that was a rather long conversation for such a short message. What else did he want?”
   Stephanie gave a mirthless laugh. “He wanted to know if I would come to his house in Lyford Cay Marina for dinner. Strangely enough, he made it clear that the invitation was just for me and not for us as a couple. I can’t believe it. It was like he was trying to hustle me.”
   “Well, let’s look on the bright side; at least he has good taste.”
   “I’m not amused,” Stephanie countered.
   “I can see that,” Daniel said. “But let’s keep the big picture in mind.”

Eighteen

   11:30 A.M., Monday, March 11, 2002
   Occasionally, Daniel had to give credit where credit was due. There was no doubt in his mind that Stephanie was far better at cellular manipulation than he, and that reality was underlined by what he was presently watching through the eyepieces of a double-headed dissecting stereomicroscope. He and Stephanie had placed the instrument on the corner of their lab bench at the Wingate Clinic to allow Daniel to watch while Stephanie worked. Stephanie was about to begin the process of nuclear transfer, otherwise known as therapeutic cloning, by extracting the nucleus of a mature oocyte whose DNA had been stained with a fluorescent dye. She already had the human egg cell fixated by suction with a blunt-tipped holding pipette.
   “You make this look so easy,” Daniel remarked.
   “It is,” Stephanie responded, as she guided a second pipette into the microscopic field with a micromanipulator. In contrast to the holding pipette, this pipette’s hollow end was as sharp as the finest needle, and the pipette itself was only twenty-five-millionths of a meter in diameter.
   “Maybe it’s easy for you, but it’s not for me.”
   “The trick is not to rush things. Everything has to be slow and even, and not jerky.”
   True to her word, the sharp pipette moved smoothly yet decisively toward the fixated oocyte to push against the cell’s outer layer without penetrating it.
   “This is the part I invariably screw up,” Daniel said. “Half the time, I go clear through the cell and out the other side.”
   “Maybe because you are too eager, and therefore, a bit heavy-handed,” Stephanie suggested. “Once the cell is adequately indented, it just takes a slight tap with the index finger on the top of the micromanipulator.”
   “You don’t use the micromanipulator itself to do the puncture?”
   “Never.”
   Stephanie carried out the maneuver with her index finger, and within the microscopic field, the pipette was seen to enter cleanly the cytoplasm of the hapless egg cell.
   “Well, you live and learn,” Daniel said. “It proves I’m just a rank amateur in this arena.”
   Stephanie pulled away from her eyepieces to glance at Daniel. It wasn’t like him to be self-deprecating. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. This is busywork, which you’ve always had skilled technicians to do. I learned how to do it when I was a graduate-student grunt.”
   “I suppose,” Daniel said without looking up.
   Stephanie shrugged and directed her eyes back into the microscope. “Now I use the micromanipulator to approach the fluorescing DNA,” she said. The tip of the pipette approached its target, and when Stephanie applied a tiny amount of suction, the DNA disappeared up into the pipette’s lumen as if the pipette were a miniature vacuum cleaner.
   “I’m not good at this part either,” Daniel said. “I think I suck up too much cytoplasm.”
   “It’s important to get just the DNA,” Stephanie said.
   “Every time I watch this technique, I’m even more amazed that it works,” Daniel commented. “My mental image of the submicroscopic internal structure of a living cell is akin to a miniature glass house. How can it be that we can tear out the nucleus by its roots, essentially throw in another nucleus from an adult differentiated cell, and have the whole thing work? It boggles the imagination.”
   “Not only work, but cause the adult nucleus we toss in to become young again.”
   “That too,” Daniel agreed. “I tell you, the process of nuclear transfer truly defies belief.”
   “I couldn’t agree more,” Stephanie said. “For me, the improbability of it working is evidence of God’s involvement in the process, which rattles my agnosticism even more than what we learned about the Shroud of Turin.” While she spoke, she guided a third pipette into the microscopic field. This pipette had within its lumen a single fibroblast cell from Ashley Butler’s fibroblast culture—a cell whose ancestral nucleus Daniel had painstakingly manipulated, first with HTSR, to replace those genes responsible for the senator’s Parkinson’s disease with those derived from the shroud’s blood, and second, with an added gene at Stephanie’s suggestion for a special surface antigen. This fibroblast’s nuclear DNA was going to replace the DNA Stephanie had removed from the egg cell.
   As Daniel watched Stephanie’s artful manipulations, he marveled at what he and she had been able to accomplish in the week and a half since his assault by the thug from Boston. Luckily, his physical injuries had healed and were for the most part a mere memory, save for some residual tenderness along his right cheekbone and the now yellow-and-green remainder of his resolving shiner. Unfortunately, Daniel still struggled with the psychological damage. Burned into the retina of his mind and appearing in recurrent nightmares was an image looming over him of the hulking attacker’s huge head, small ears, and bulbous features. Most disturbing was the man’s crooked smile and cruel, beady eyes. Even after eleven days, Daniel still suffered repetitive nightmares of that awful face and the feeling of utter defenseless vulnerability it engendered.
   In the daytime, Daniel had fared considerably better than during sleep. As he and Stephanie had discussed immediately after the episode, they had made it a point to stay together practically like Siamese twins and not leave the hotel grounds, except to go to the Wingate Clinic. As it turned out, such a plan was hardly an imposition, since they had spent sunup to after sundown in the laboratory each and every day. There, Megan Finnigan was most helpful, providing them with a small office in addition to their own laboratory bench. Having room to spread out their paperwork and flow sheets was a godsend and a boon to their efficiency. Even Paul Saunders had helped by acting true to his word and producing ten fresh human oocytes twelve hours after they had been requested.
   At first, there had been a convenient division of labor between Daniel and Stephanie. Her job initially was to work with the fibroblast culture sent by Peter. She got it thawed and growing with only minor glitches. Concurrently, Daniel attacked the buffered solution containing the shroud sample. After a single pass through the PCR machine to magnify the DNA present in the fluid, Daniel determined the contained DNA was primate and probably human, although decidedly fragmented, as he had expected.
   Following a purification trick using microscopic glass beads, Daniel ran the isolated shroud DNA fragments through the PCR several more times before utilizing his dopaminergic gene probes. He was immediately successful, but with only parts of the required genes, a situation that required sequencing the gaps. After several sixteen-hour days, Daniel succeeded in attaching the appropriate fragments with nucleotide ligases to form the genes. At that point, he was ready for Ashley Butler’s fibroblasts, which by then Stephanie conveniently had available.
   HTSR was the next step, and it went practically without a hitch. Having developed the procedure, Daniel was intimately aware of its subtleties and pitfalls, but under his sure hand, the enzymes and viral vectors worked perfectly, and he soon had a number of the fibroblasts ready. The only problem had been Paul Saunders, who had insisted on shadowing Daniel’s every move and frequently got in the way. Paul unabashedly admitted that he planned to add the technique to the Wingate’s stem-cell therapy regimen, with the idea of charging the patients significantly more. Daniel doggedly tried to ignore him and bit his tongue to keep from ordering the quack out of his own laboratory, but it was difficult.
   Once the HTSR had been completed, Daniel thought they were ready to do the nuclear transfer, but Stephanie had surprised him with the suggestion that they also transfect the HTSR-altered cell with an ecdysone construct, meaning several combined genes, capable of creating a unique nonhuman surface antigen on the ultimate treatment cells. Stephanie had argued that if there was ever a need or an interest to visualize the treatment cells within Butler’s brain after the implant, it could be done with ease, since the treatment cells would have an antigen that none of Butler’s other trillion cells had. Daniel had been impressed with the idea and had agreed to the additional step, especially after Stephanie told him she’d had the foresight to ask Peter to send the construct and its viral vector down from their Cambridge laboratory along with the Butler tissue culture. Daniel and Stephanie had used the same technique when they’d successfully treated the mice afflicted by Parkinson’s, and it had been a valuable addition to the protocol.
   “I always use the micromanipulator for this step,” Stephanie said, pulling Daniel back from his musings. The pipette containing Butler’s altered fibroblast pierced the oocyte’s envelope without piercing the underlying cell membrane.
   “I have trouble with this part too,” Daniel admitted. He watched as Stephanie injected the relatively tiny fibroblast into the space between the egg’s cell membrane and its comparatively thick outer covering. The pipette then disappeared from view.
   “The trick is to approach the oocyte’s envelope tangentially,” Stephanie said. “Otherwise, you can inadvertently enter the cell.”
   “That makes sense.”
   “Well, I’d say that looks just dandy,” Stephanie said, after viewing her handiwork. The appropriately granular enucleated egg cell and the comparatively tiny fibroblast were locked in an intimate embrace within the oocyte’s envelope. “Time for the fusion process and then the activation.”
   Stephanie pulled away from the microscope’s eyepieces and extracted the petri dish from beneath the microscope’s objective. Slipping off her stool, she walked over to the fusion chamber, where she would subject the paired cells to a brief shock of electricity to fuse them.
   Daniel watched her go. Along with the recurrent nightmares subsequent to his beating by the Castiglianos’ henchman, Daniel struggled with other psychological sequelae from the experience. During the first few days, he had experienced continuous anxiety and fear that the man would reappear, despite what Daniel had reassuringly told Stephanie immediately after the event. It was also despite what the hotel did after Daniel had informed the administration of what had happened. To his credit, the hotel manager had voluntarily stationed a security person within Daniel and Stephanie’s building for a week. Every night, the man had accompanied Daniel and Stephanie back to their room after they’d finished their dinner in the hotel’s Courtyard Terrace restaurant, and the intimidatingly large individual had remained on guard in the hall until Daniel and Stephanie departed for the Wingate Clinic in the morning.
   As Daniel’s fear abated during the passing days, his anger at the event waxed, and a significant amount of the anger was redirected toward Stephanie. Although she had apologized and had been sincerely sympathetic initially, Daniel fumed at her lingering doubt about her family’s role in the event. She hadn’t said as much directly, but Daniel had gotten that sense from indirect comments. With such a screwed-up family and lack of judgment in dealing with them, Daniel couldn’t help but question whether Stephanie would be too much of a liability over the long haul.
   Stephanie’s self-righteousness was also a problem. Even though she’d promised not to make waves with the Wingate people, she was constantly doing so with inappropriate comments about their supposed stem-cell therapy and even inappropriate questioning of the young, pregnant Bahamian women who worked at the clinic, which was an extremely sensitive issue with Paul Saunders. On top of that, she was embarrassingly dismissive of Spencer Wingate. Daniel recognized that the man was being progressively forward in expressing his social interest in Stephanie, a fact that might have been influenced by Daniel’s passivity in the face of Spencer’s comments, yet there were less rude ways for her to handle the situation than she was choosing. It irked Daniel to no end that Stephanie just couldn’t seem to understand that her behavior was potentially jeopardizing everything. If she and Daniel got kicked out, all bets were off.
   Daniel sighed as he watched Stephanie work. Although he felt conflicted over her long-term contribution, there was no question that she was needed in the short term. There were only eleven days left before Ashley Butler’s arrival on the island, and in that time, they had to develop the dopamine-producing neurons from the senator’s fibroblasts to treat the man. They were making progress with the HTSR and the nuclear transfer already done, but there was a long way to go. Stephanie’s expertise with cellular manipulation was sorely needed, and there just wasn’t time to replace her.

   Stephanie could feel Daniel’s eyes on her back. She recognized that her sense of guilt and her confusion about the implications of her family’s role in his being attacked made her acutely sensitive, yet he was not acting like himself. She could only guess what it must have been like getting beaten up, but she had expected him to recover more quickly. Instead, he was still acting distant from her in many subtle ways, and although they continued to sleep in the same bed, there had been no intimacy whatsoever. Such behavior raised an old concern of hers that Daniel was either incapable or unmotivated to offer the kind of emotional support she felt she needed, particularly in periods of stress, no matter what the cause or whose fault it was.
   Stephanie had followed Daniel’s suggestions to the letter, so that couldn’t be the explanation for his behavior. Despite an aching urge to call and confront her brother, she didn’t. And on the relatively frequent conversations she had with her mother, she made it a point to stress that she and Daniel were in Nassau to work, and they were working very hard, which was certainly true. To back it up, she said they had not gone to the beach to swim even once, which was also true. In addition, on multiple occasions she had emphasized that they would be finished soon and would come home about March twenty-fifth to a financially stable company. She had studiously avoided bringing up the subject of her brother with her mother, although on a call the previous day, she had finally yielded to temptation. “Has Tony asked about me?” she had asked in as casual a voice as she could manage.
   “Of course, dear,” Thea had said. “Your brother worries about you and asks about you all the time.”
   “What exact words does he use?”
   “I don’t remember the exact words. He misses you. He just wants to know when you are coming home.”
   “And what do you say in return?”
   “I tell him just what you tell me. Why? Should I say something different?”
   “Of course not,” Stephanie had remarked. “Assure him we’ll be home in less than two weeks, and I can’t wait to see him. And tell him our work is going extremely well.”
   In many respects, Stephanie was thankful about how busy she and Daniel were. It reduced her opportunity to anguish over emotional issues as well as lessened her chance to question the appropriateness of treating Butler. Her misgivings about the affair had increased, thanks to the assault on Daniel and her need to turn a blind eye to the depravity of the Wingate principals. Paul Saunders was by far the worst. She felt he was conscienceless, devoid of even rudimentary ethics, and dumb. The compiled results of the Wingate stem-cell therapy program, which he had touted, were a bad joke. They were merely a collection of descriptions of individual cases and their subjective outcomes. There was not one iota of scientific method involved, and the most disturbing part was that Paul didn’t seem to realize it or care.
   Spencer Wingate was another story, but he was more annoying than scary like the mad pretend-scientist Paul. Still, Stephanie would not have liked to be caught unaccompanied in Spencer’s house, as his persistent invitations proposed. The problem was that his lechery was bolstered by an ego that could not fathom his overtures being rejected. At first, Stephanie had tried to be reasonably polite with her regrets, but eventually she had to be blunt with her refusals, especially after it seemed Daniel was indifferent. Some of Spencer’s more blatantly randy invitations had come in Daniel’s company, with no response from him.
   As if the personalities and behavior of these maverick infertility doctors wasn’t enough to make Stephanie question the propriety of working at the clinic, there was the issue of the origin of the human oocytes. She tried to make discreet inquiries but was rebuffed by everyone except the lab technician, Mare. Even Mare was hardly forthcoming, but at least she said the gametes came from the egg room run by Cindy Drexler, located in the basement. When Stephanie asked for clarification about what the egg room was, Mare clammed up and told her to ask Megan Finnigan, the lab supervisor. Unfortunately Megan had already echoed Paul by saying the egg source was a trade secret. When Stephanie approached Cindy Drexler, she was politely told that all egg inquiries had to be directed to Dr. Saunders.
   Switching tactics, Stephanie had tried talking to several of the young women who worked in the cafeteria. They were friendly and outgoing until Stephanie tried to turn the conversation around to their marital status, at which point they became shy and evasive. When Stephanie then tried to talk about their pregnancies, they became withdrawn and reticent, which only fanned Stephanie’s curiosity. As far as Stephanie was concerned, one didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to guess what was going on, and despite Daniel’s edict to the contrary, she intended to prove it to herself. Her idea was that, armed with such information, she would anonymously inform the Bahamian authorities after she, Daniel, and Butler had long since departed.
   What Stephanie needed to do was get into the egg room. Unfortunately, she had not had an opportunity, as busy as she and Daniel had been, although over the next few hours, that was going to change. The current egg she was fusing with one of Butler’s HTSR-altered fibroblasts had been a replacement for one of the original ten eggs that Paul Saunders had supplied. The replaced egg had failed to divide after nuclear transfer. Honoring their warranty, Paul had provided an eleventh egg. The other original nine eggs were dividing fine after receiving their new nuclei. Some were now at the five-day point and beginning to form blastocysts.
   The plan that Stephanie and Daniel had devised was to create ten separate stem-cell lines, each comprising cellular clones of Ashley Butler. All ten would contribute cells to be differentiated into dopamine-producing nerve cells. The tenfold redundancy was to serve as a safety net, since only one of the cell lines would ultimately be used to treat the senator.
   Perhaps later that afternoon, or more likely in the morning, Stephanie would begin the process of harvesting the multipotential stem cells from the forming blastocysts, but until then she would have some free time. The only problem would be getting away from Daniel but staying within the safety of the Wingate Clinic, and thanks to his emotional detachment from her, she didn’t think that would be an insurmountable problem, although outside the clinic, he refused to let her out of his sight.
   “How did the fusion go?” Daniel called out from where he was sitting.
   “Looks good,” Stephanie said, peering at the construct under the lens of a microscope. The oocyte now had a new nucleus with a full complement of chromosomes. Following a process that no one yet understood, the egg would now begin mysteriously reprogramming the nucleus from its duties as the controller of an adult skin cell back to a primordial state. Within hours, the construct would mimic a recently fertilized egg. To initiate the conversion, Stephanie carefully transferred the artificially altered oocyte into the first of several activation mediums.
   “Are you as hungry as I am?” Daniel called out.
   “Probably,” Stephanie responded. She glanced at her watch. It was no wonder. It was almost twelve. The last time she’d had anything to eat was at six that morning, and it was only a continental breakfast of toast and coffee. “We can head over to the cafeteria once I get this egg into an incubator. It’s got only another four minutes in this medium.”
   “Sounds good,” Daniel said. He slid off his stool and disappeared into their office to get out of his lab coat.
   As Stephanie prepared the next activation medium for the reconstructed egg, she tried to think of some excuse to return by herself to the lab during their lunch. It would be a good time for a bit of sleuthing, since most everyone ate lunch between twelve and one, including the egg room technician, Cindy Drexler. Lunch hour was a major socialization time for the clinic staff. Stephanie’s first thought was to blame her need to return on the activation process of the eleventh egg, but she quickly discarded the idea; Daniel would be suspicious. He knew that once the egg was in the second activation medium, it was to sit undisturbed in the incubator for six hours.
   Stephanie needed some other excuse and seemed to be coming up blank until she thought of her cell phone. Particularly after Daniel’s beating, she’d been compulsive about keeping it on her person, and Daniel knew it. There were several reasons for her compulsiveness, not least of which was that she’d told her mother to use the cell number rather than the hotel’s. But having just talked with her mother that morning and hence being assured of no imminent emergency with her health status, Stephanie wasn’t concerned about missing a call over the next half hour. After glancing back toward their tiny office to be certain Daniel wasn’t watching, Stephanie pulled the tiny Motorola phone from her pocket, switched it off, and placed it on the reagent shelf over the lab bench.
   Satisfied with her plan, Stephanie returned her attention to the activation process. In another thirty seconds, it would be time to move the egg from the first medium to the next.
   “What do you say?” Daniel questioned, as he reappeared without his lab coat. “Are you ready?”
   “Give me another couple of minutes. I’m about to transfer the egg and put it into the incubator, and then we can be on our way.”
   “Sounds good,” Daniel responded. While he waited, he stepped over to the incubator and looked in at the other containers, a few of which had been in there for five days. “Some of these might be ready to harvest stem cells this afternoon.”
   “I was just thinking the same thing,” Stephanie responded. Gingerly, she carried the newly suspended reconstructed egg over to the incubator to join the others.

  Kurt Hermann let his feet fall to the floor in an uncharacteristically sudden, uncontrolled movement. They had been perched on the countertop in the video room. At the same time, he sat bolt upright, causing the desk chair to roll backward a short distance. Regaining the serenity developed over many years of martial arts training, he scooted himself forward in a slow, deliberate fashion to get closer to the screen he’d been watching for the last hour. He couldn’t believe his eyes. It had happened so quickly, but it appeared as if Stephanie D’Agostino had just taken the cell phone Kurt had been trying to get his hands on over the previous week and a half out of her pocket and had deliberately placed it behind some reagent bottles on the shelf over the laboratory bench. It was like she was hiding it.
   With the button on top of the joystick that was currently connected to operate the minicam he was watching, Kurt zoomed in. Using the joystick itself, he kept the camera directed at what he hoped was the phone. It was! Its black, molded plastic tip was just visible as it protruded from behind a bottle of hydrochloric acid.
   Confused at this unexpected but promising development, Kurt zoomed back out, only to realize that Stephanie had disappeared from the camera’s angle. Using the joystick again, Kurt panned the room and quickly found both Stephanie and Daniel in front of one of the incubators. Increasing the gain on the volume control, he strained to listen in case she mentioned the phone, but she didn’t. They were continuing their talk about going to lunch, and within minutes they left the laboratory.
   Kurt’s eyes rose to the screen just above the one he’d been watching. He saw the couple emerge from building number one and start across the central courtyard, toward building number three.
   During the construction of the clinic, Paul Saunders had given his head of security carte blanche to make it secure, in hopes of avoiding a catastrophe similar to what had happened to the clinic in Massachusetts, when a couple whistle-blowers had penetrated the clinic’s database. Because they managed to gain unauthorized access to the computer server room and avoid apprehension after their trespass, Kurt had made sure the entire new complex was bugged with audio and video. Both the cameras and the microphones were the latest stealth technology, integrated by computer and completely unobstrusive. Unbeknownst to Paul, Kurt had had them included in the restrooms, the guest apartments, and most of the staff living quarters, where they were concealed in various and sundry electrical fixtures. Everything could be viewed from the monitors in the video room off Kurt’s office, and in the evenings, Kurt found watching some of them entertaining, even when security wasn’t necessarily an issue. Of course, Kurt could make an argument to the contrary, for it was important in an organization like the Wingate Clinic to know who was sleeping with whom.
   Kurt continued observing Daniel and Stephanie until they entered building number three, although his eyes were mostly on Stephanie. Over the last week and a half, he’d become addicted to watching her, despite the ambivalence she evoked. He was both attracted and repulsed by her innate sensuality. As with women in general, he appreciated her beauty yet at the same time he recognized her Eve-like qualities. Kurt had watched her make and receive calls in the laboratory, and although he could frequently hear her side of the conversation, he was unable to hear the caller. Consequently, he’d not been able to provide Paul Saunders with the name of the patient as Kurt had promised, and Kurt liked to keep his promises.
   Kurt’s attitude toward women had been set in stone by his ultimate betrayer, his mother. She and he had had an intimate relationship fostered by long absences of his undemonstrative strict disciplinarian father who had demanded perfection from both wife and son but who only acknowledged failure. His father had preceded Kurt into the Army’s Special Forces, and like Kurt, who had ultimately followed in his footsteps, he had been a trained covert-operations killer. But when Kurt was thirteen, his father had been killed in a classified operation in Cambodia during the final weeks of the Vietnam War. His mother’s reaction was like a lovebird released from a cage. Ignoring Kurt’s emotional confusion of grief and relief, she indulged a flurry of affairs, the intimacies of which Kurt had to endure audibly through the thin drywall of their army-base house. Within months, Kurt’s mother consummated her frantic dating by marrying a prissy insurance salesman whom Kurt despised. Kurt felt that all women, particularly the attractive ones, were like the mythologized mother of his youth, plotting to lure him in by seduction, sap him of his strength, and then abandon him.
   As soon as Daniel and Stephanie had disappeared inside building number three, Kurt’s eyes moved automatically to monitor twelve and waited for them to appear in the cafeteria. When they joined the line at the steam table, Kurt got to his feet and walked out into his office. From the back of his desk chair, he took his lightweight, black silk jacket and slipped it on over his black T-shirt. He wore the jacket to conceal the holstered pistol he always carried in the small of his back. He pushed the sleeves up above his elbows. From the corner of his desk, he picked up the box containing the tiny cell phone bug he’d been eager to implant in Stephanie’s phone as well as its monitoring device. He also grabbed his jeweler’s tool kit, which included a delicate soldering iron and a binocular watchmaker’s loupe.
   Moving catlike, he emerged from a basement door in building two with the equipment and tools in hand and headed for building one. Within minutes, he was at the lab bench assigned to Daniel and Stephanie. After a quick glance in all directions to be certain he was alone in the laboratory, he retrieved the phone, put on the loupe, and set to work.
   In less than five minutes, the bug was in place and tested. Kurt was in the process of replacing the phone’s plastic cover when he heard the distant door to the lab bang open. Expecting to see one of the lab personnel or possibly Paul Saunders, he bent over and looked beneath the reagent shelf back toward the entrance some eighty feet away. To his utter surprise, it was Stephanie who’d arrived and was approaching with a quick, determined step.
   For a brief, panic-filled second, Kurt debated what to do. But his training prevailed, and he quickly regained his customary composure. He finished with the phone by snapping its cover into place, then slipped it back to its original position behind the hydrochloric acid bottle. Then he lent his attention to the jeweler’s tools, the monitoring device, and the loupe. As silently as possible, he got them into a drawer and pushed it closed with his hip. Stephanie D’Agostino was now a mere twenty feet away and closing in rapidly. Backing away, Kurt intended to keep the lab bench and its overhead shelving between him and the researcher. It was not much cover, and she would surely see him, but there were no other options.

   In truth, Tony was mostly pissed that he had to forsake a nice lunch, which was one of the high points of his day, while he made yet another visit to the freaking Castigliano brothers’ crummy plumbing supply store. The rotten-egg smell of the salt marsh didn’t help matters either, although with the temperature in the twenties, it was less of a problem than it had been on his last visit a week and a half earlier. At least it was easier visiting the stinkhole in the middle of the day rather than at night, since he didn’t have to worry about tripping over any of the crap littered around the front of the place. The good part was that he had reason to believe this would be the last visit, at least concerning the problem with CURE.
   Tony went through the entrance door and headed for the rear office. Gaetano looked up from dealing with a couple customers at the front counter and nodded a greeting. Tony ignored him. If Gaetano had done his job right, Tony would not be walking at that moment between dusty plumbing-supply shelves, with the smell of rotten eggs lingering in his nose. Instead, he’d be sitting at his favorite table at his Blue Grotto restaurant on Hanover Street, sipping a glass of ’97 Chianti while trying to decide which pasta to have. When underlings screwed up, it irked him to death, since it never failed to mess up his life. As he’d grown older, he’d become a progressively firmer believer in the old saying, “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.”
   Tony opened the door to the rear office, stepped in, and pulled the door shut with a bang. Lou and Sal were at their respective desks, eating pizza. A fleeting shiver of nausea went down Tony’s spine. He hated the smell of anchovies, especially combined with the residual aroma of rotten eggs.
   “You people have a problem,” Tony announced, pressing his lips together in a wry expression of disgust and bobbing his head like one of the dog figures some folks put in the rear windows of their cars. But to ensure that he wasn’t implying any disrespect to the twins, he approached each of them for a quick, slapping handshake before retreating to the couch and plopping down. He unbuttoned his coat but left it on. He only intended to stay for a couple minutes. There was nothing complicated about what he had to say.
   “What’s wrong?” Lou asked through a mouthful of pizza.
   “Gaetano screwed up. Whatever the hell he did down in Nassau had no effect at all. Zero!”
   “You’re joking.”
   “Do I look like I’m joking?” Tony wrinkled his forehead and spread his hands widely.
   “You’re telling us that the professor and your sister didn’t come back?”
   “It’s more than that,” Tony said scornfully. “Not only didn’t they come back, Gaetano’s shenanigans, whatever they were, didn’t even warrant a single word from my sister to my mother, and they talk almost every day.”
   “Wait a second!” Sal questioned. “You’re saying that your sister didn’t say they had a little problem or anything like her boyfriend got hurt? Anything at all?”
   “Absolutely nothing! Zilch! All I hear is everything’s going hunky-dory in paradise.”
   “That doesn’t jibe with what Gaetano said,” Lou said, “which I find hard to believe, since he usually overdoes the physical stuff.”
   “Well, in this instance, he surely didn’t overdo anything,” Tony said. “The lovebirds are still down there, frolicking in the sun and insisting, according to my mother, that they are going to stay the three weeks or month or whatever they’d originally planned. Meanwhile, my accountant says nothing’s changed with their company’s downward spiral. He insists in a month they will be broke, so goodbye to our two hundred K.”
   Sal and Lou exchanged glances of disbelief, confusion, and escalating irritation.
   “What did Gaetano say he did?” Tony asked. “Slap the professor’s wrists and tell him he was being bad? Or did he not even go to Nassau and say he did?” Tony crossed his arms and legs and sat back.
   “Something’s screwy in all this!” Lou declared. “None of it adds up.” He put his slice of anchovy-and-Italian-sausage pizza down, ran his tongue around the inside of his lips to loosen the debris on his teeth, swallowed, and leaned forward to press a button protruding on the surface of his desk. A muffled buzz sounded through the door connecting the office to the store proper.
   “Gaetano went to Nassau!” Sal said. “We know that for damn sure.”
   Tony nodded, a grimace of disbelief on his face.
   He knew he was pushing the twins’ buttons, since they liked to believe they ran a tight ship. The idea was to inflame their passions, and it worked. By the time Gaetano poked his head through the door, the twins were ready to take it off.
   “Get the hell in here and shut the door,” Sal snapped.
   “I got customers out at the counter,” Gaetano complained. He motioned over his shoulder.
   “I don’t care if you have the President of the United States out there, you moron,” Sal yelled. “Get your ass in here!” To make his point, Sal pulled out the center drawer of his desk, grabbed a snub-nosed thirty-eight revolver, and tossed it onto his blotter.
   Gaetano’s broad brow knotted as he did as he was told. He’d seen the gun on a number of occasions and wasn’t worried because getting it out was one of Sal’s quirks. At the same time, he knew Sal was pissed about something, and Lou didn’t look much happier. Gaetano eyed the sofa but, with Tony occupying the middle, he decided to remain standing. “What’s up?” he asked.
   “We want to know exactly what the hell you did down in Nassau!” Sal barked.
   “I told you,” Gaetano said. “I did exactly what you asked me to do. I even managed to do it in one day, which was a ball-breaker, to be honest.”
   “Well, maybe you should have stayed an extra day,” Sal said contemptuously. “Apparently, the professor didn’t get the message we intended.”
   “What exactly did you tell the dirtbag?” Lou demanded with equal venom.
   “To get his ass back here and fix his company,” Gaetano said. “Hell, it wasn’t complicated. It’s not like I could have gotten it mixed up or something.”
   “Did you push him around?” Sal questioned.
   “I did a lot more than push him around. I clocked him with a good one to start, which turned him into a rag doll such that I had to pick him up off the floor. I might have broken his nose, but I don’t know for sure. I know I gave him a black eye. Then I walloped him the hell out of his chair at the end, after our little talk.”
   “What about a warning?” Sal questioned. “Did you tell him you’d be back if he didn’t get his ass back here to Boston and get his company back on track?”
   “Yeah! I said I’d hurt him bad if I had to come back, and there’s no doubt he got the message.”
   Both Sal and Lou looked at Tony. They shrugged in unison.
   “Gaetano doesn’t lie about this kind of thing,” Sal said. Lou nodded in agreement.
   “Well, then it’s just another instance of this professor flipping us off,” Tony said. “He certainly didn’t take Gaetano seriously, and he obviously doesn’t give a damn about our two hundred K.”
   For a few minutes, silence reigned in the room. The four men eyed one another. It was obvious everybody was thinking the same thing. Tony was waiting for someone else to bring it up, and Sal finally obliged: “It’s like he’s asking for it. I mean, we already decided if he didn’t straighten up, we’d whack him and let Tony’s sister take the reins.”
   “Gaetano,” Lou said. “It looks like you’re going back to the Bahamas.”
   “When?” Gaetano asked. “Don’t forget, I’m supposed to push around that deadbeat eye doctor from Newton tomorrow night.”
   “I haven’t forgotten,” Lou said. He looked at his watch. “It’s only twelve-thirty. You can go this afternoon via Miami, get rid of the professor, and be back tomorrow.”
   Gaetano rolled his eyes.
   “What’s the matter?” Lou demanded mockingly. “You got other things to do?”
   “Sometimes it’s not that easy to whack somebody,” Gaetano said. “Hell, I got to find the guy first.”
   Lou looked at Tony. “Do you know where your sister and her boyfriend are staying these days?”
   “Yeah, they’re in the same hotel,” Tony said, with a dismissive laugh. “That’s how serious they took Gaetano’s lame message.”
   “I’m telling you,” Gaetano insisted. “It wasn’t lame. I clocked the guy good several times.”
   “How do you know they’re at the same hotel?” Lou asked.
   “From my mother,” Tony said. “She’s been mostly calling my sister’s cell phone, but she told me she’d also tried the hotel once when she couldn’t get through on the cell. The lovebirds are not only at the same hotel, but they’re still in the same room.”
   “Well, there you go,” Lou said to Gaetano.
   “Can I do the hit at the hotel?” Gaetano asked. “That will make it a hell of a lot easier.”
   Lou looked at Sal. Sal looked at Tony.
   “No reason why not,” Tony said with a shrug. “I mean, as long as my sister’s not involved, and as long as it’s done quietly, without a scene.”
   “That goes without saying,” Gaetano remarked. He was warming to the idea. Heading all the way down to Nassau for an overnight might involve a lot of traveling, and it would be hardly a vacation in the sun, but it could be fun. “What about a gun? It’s got to have a silencer.”
   “I’m sure our Colombian friends in Miami can arrange that,” Lou said. “With as much of their junk as we push for them up here in New England, they owe us.”
   “How will I get it?” Gaetano asked.
   “I imagine somebody will come to you when you land in Nassau,” Lou said. “I’ll work on it. As soon as you know the number of the flight you’re going to take over to the island, let me know.”
   “What if there is a problem, and I don’t get a gun?” Gaetano questioned. “If you want me back here for tomorrow night, everything has to go smoothly.”
   “If you arrive and no one approaches you, give me a call,” Lou said.
   “Okay,” Gaetano said agreeably. “I’d better get my ass in gear.”

Nineteen

   12:11 P.M., Monday, March 11, 2002
   The sign’s message was clear. It said:


RESTRICTED ACCESS, AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY, PROHIBITION STRICTLY ENFORCED.

   Stephanie paused for a moment, gazing at the framed, glazed sign. It was attached to a door next to a freight elevator. It was from this door that Cindy Drexler routinely emerged, most interestingly, when she’d brought the oocytes for Stephanie and Daniel. Stephanie had seen the sign obliquely from a distance but had never gone over to read it. Now that she had, it gave her pause. She wondered what it meant for the prohibition to be strictly enforced, considering the Wingate principals’ tendency toward overkill in the security arena. But she had come this far and wasn’t about to turn around and give up because of a generic printed warning. She pushed against the door. It opened. Beyond was a stairway leading downward. The reassuring thought went through her mind that if they were so concerned about intruders in the egg room, they would have locked the stairwell door.
   With a final rapid glance over her shoulder to make sure she was alone in the lab, Stephanie stepped through the door. It closed behind her. Immediately, she sensed a contrast from the dry coolness of the air-conditioned lab. Within the stairwell, the air was considerably warmer and moister. She started down the stairs, moving quickly, aided by her flat shoes.
   Stephanie was rushing as best she could because she had planned to give herself a mere fifteen minutes—twenty, tops—to be away from Daniel. She checked her watch as she descended; five minutes had already been consumed just getting from the cafeteria to where she was at that moment. Her only minor detour had been to grab her cell phone. She didn’t want to forget and get back to the cafeteria without it, since it was her excuse for being away. Daniel had given her a strange look when she’d jumped up, saying she’d forgotten it, just after sitting down with her meal. She knew he’d be irritated if he knew what she was up to.
   At the base of the stairs, Stephanie skidded to a stop. She found herself in a short, dimly lit corridor with access to the freight elevator along one wall and a shiny, stainless-steel door totally devoid of hardware at its end. There was no door handle or even lock. Stephanie approached the door and put her hand on it to push. It was warm to the touch but entirely immobile. She put her ear to it. She thought she could detect a slight whirring noise from beyond.
   Stephanie leaned back and glanced around the blank door’s periphery. It sealed against a metal jamb with a machinist’s precision. Getting down on her hands and knees, she noted it was the same at the door’s base. The care with which the door was fashioned fanned her already considerable curiosity. She got back on her feet, and with the side of her fist, she thumped quietly against the door. She was trying to gauge its thickness, which she surmised was considerable, since it was rock-solid.
   “Well, so much for my mini-investigation,” Stephanie whispered out loud. She shook her head in frustration while allowing her eyes to trace around the periphery once more. She was surprised there was no bell or intercom system, nor any obvious way to open the door or communicate with anyone within.
   With a final sigh of exasperation accompanied by an expression of disgust, she turned back to the stairs, recognizing she’d have to conjure up another strategy if she intended to continue her clandestine sleuthing. But she only took a single step when her eye caught something she’d missed. Barely protruding from the wall opposite the freight elevator and quite inconspicuous in the dim light was a tiny, three-inch-long by three-quarters-of-an-inch-wide card swipe. Stephanie had not seen it earlier, because her attention had been overwhelmed by the gleaming door itself. Also, the swipe was the same neutral color as the wall and was more than six feet from the door.
   Megan Finnigan had made sure Stephanie and Daniel had Wingate Clinic identification cards. Each had an ugly, mugshot-style Polaroid photo laminated on the face with magnetic strip on the back. Megan had said that the cards would be more important for security purposes when the clinic was up to strength personnel-wise, at which time they would be coded for the bearer’s individual needs. In the meantime, Megan told them the cards were necessary to get into the lab’s storeroom for basic supplies.
   On the odd chance the ID card might work for the egg room at this early stage of the clinic’s existence, Stephanie gave it a try. She was immediately rewarded by the stainless-steel door retracting to the side with a muffled whoosh of compressed air. At the same time, Stephanie noticed that she was enveloped by a weird glow emanating from the room beyond, which she guessed was a mixture of incandescent and ultraviolet light. There was also an accompanying waft of moist, warm air, and the whirring noise she’d thought she’d heard earlier with her ear to the door was now a definite presence.
   Pleased at this sudden but welcome reversal of fortune, Stephanie quickly stepped over the threshold and found herself in what appeared to be a giant incubator. With the temperature in the vicinity of 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or body temperature, and the humidity close to one hundred percent, she felt perspiration break out all over her body. Although she was wearing a sleeveless blouse, she had a short, white laboratory coat over it. She now understood why Cindy wore a special lightweight cotton jumpsuit.
   Racks similar to bookshelves but containing tissue culture dishes formed a gridlike floor plan similar to the stacks of a library. Each was about ten feet long, constructed of aluminum with adjustable shelves and extended from the tile floor to the rather low tile ceiling. All the tissue culture dishes in Stephanie’s immediate view were empty. Ahead of her was a lengthy aisle, the shelving of which made it appear to be a study in perspective. It was so long that a dim, humid haze obscured its distant end. From the size of the facility, it was obvious the Wingate was preparing for significant production capacity.
   Stephanie started forward at a rapid walk, glancing from side to side. Thirty paces into the room, she stopped when she found a rack that contained actively growing tissue cultures, as evidenced by fluid levels visible through the clear glass containers. She lifted one out. Written in grease pencil on its cover was OOGONIA CULTURE, accompanied by a recent date and an alphanumeric code.
   Stephanie replaced the dish and checked others throughout the rack. They had different dates and different codes. Learning that the Wingate was seemingly successfully culturing primitive germ cells was both interesting and disturbing for a variety of reasons, but it was not her goal. What she was hoping to do was to ascertain the origin of the oogonia and the oocytes they were culturing and maturing. She thought she knew, but she wanted definitive proof that she could pass on to a Bahamian authority after Butler’s treatment and after she, Daniel, and Butler had returned to the mainland. She glanced at her watch. Eight minutes had now gone by, which was about half her allotted time.
   With mounting anxiety, Stephanie pressed ahead, quickening her pace while peering down the side corridors as well as cursorily glancing at each rack of shelves she passed. The problem was that she didn’t know what she was looking for, and the room was enormous. To make matters worse, she began to notice a mild sensation of air hunger. It then dawned on her that the atmosphere in the egg room probably had an elevated level of carbon dioxide for the benefit of the tissue cultures.
   After another twenty paces Stephanie stopped again. She’d come to a rack with unique and apparently customized tissue culture dishes. Stephanie had never seen anything like them. Not only were they larger and deeper than usual, but they also had a built-in internal matrix on which the cultured cells could grow. In addition, they were set on motorized bases to keep them in continuous, horizontal, circular motion, presumably to circulate the culture medium. Wasting no time Stephanie reached in and lifted out one of the dishes. On its cover was written MINCED FETAL OVARY, TWENTY-ONE WEEKS GESTATION; OOCYTES ARRESTED IN DIPLOTENE STAGE OF PROPHASE, followed again by a date and a code. Stephanie checked the other dishes in the rack. As with the oogonia cultures they all had different dates and different codes.
   The next few racks were even more interesting. They housed tissue culture dishes, which were larger and deeper still, but there were fewer per shelf. Most of them were empty. Those that weren’t contained a fluid growth medium that was being circulated by a complex of tubes to central machines, which appeared like a miniature kidney dialysis unit and which collectively made the background whirring noise that filled the room. Stephanie bent over and peered into one of the culture dishes. Submerged in the contained fluid was a small, ovoid, and ragged piece of tissue, approximately the size and shape of a manila clam. Vessels that protruded from the tiny organ were cannulated by minute plastic tubes leading to another, even smaller machine. The tiny organ was being internally perfused as well as being submerged in continuously circulated culture medium.
   Stephanie stuck her head into the rack so she could look at the top of the container without disturbing it. Written in red grease pencil was FETAL OVARY, TWENTY WEEKS GESTATION along with a date and code. Despite the implications, she couldn’t help but be impressed. It seemed that Saunders and his team were keeping intact fetal ovaries alive at least for a few days.
   Stephanie straightened back up. Although hardly definitive proof, what she was finding in the egg room was certainly consistent with her suspicions that Paul Saunders et al. were paying young Bahamian women to be impregnated and then aborted at about twenty weeks to harvest fetal ovaries. With her embryology training, she knew something most laypeople didn’t know, namely that the diminutive ovary of a twenty-one-week-old fetus contains about seven million germ cells capable of becoming mature oocytes. Most of these eggs are destined to disappear inexplicably prior to birth and during childhood, such that when a young woman begins her reproductive years, her germ cell population has been reduced to approximately three hundred thousand. If obtaining human oocytes is the goal, the fetal ovary is the mother lode. Unfortunately, Paul Saunders seemed to know this as well.
   With her fears at least partially substantiated, Stephanie shook her head in dismay at the utter immorality involved in aborting human fetuses for eggs. To her, it was worse than pushing ahead with reproductive cloning, which she also suspected was part of Paul Saunders’s game plan. Stephanie recognized it was maverick infertility organizations like the Wingate Clinic that had the power to cast a pall over biotechnology and its promise by engaging in such unconscionable activities. It also passed through her mind that Daniel’s ability to turn a blind eye to such a reality in this current instance said something about him that she would rather not have known, and that knowledge, combined with the emotional distance he was currently displaying, made her question the future of their relationship more than she’d ever done in the past. Impulsively, she decided as a bare minimum that when they got back to Cambridge she would move out on her own.
   But there was a lot to be done until then. Stephanie checked her watch again. Eleven minutes had elapsed. She was running out of time, since she would have only four more minutes, at most, on her current visit. She needed to find a true smoking gun so Saunders couldn’t claim the abortions were therapeutic. Although she could theoretically return to the egg room another day, she intuitively knew it would be difficult, especially coming up with another credible excuse to be away from Daniel. He might not be emotionally supportive, but he was certainly staying close by physically.
   Four minutes was not much time. Out of desperation, Stephanie elected to race the rest of the way down to the end of the room, go laterally, and then return to the open door along another of the numerous lengthwise aisles. But after she’d gone only twenty feet, she came to a sudden stop. On a glance to her left down one of the side aisles, she saw what appeared to be a laboratory or an office separated from the main room by floor-to-ceiling windows. It was about twenty feet away from where she was standing. Bright fluorescent light emanated from within and inundated the immediate area. Stephanie changed direction and hurried toward it.
   As she approached, she saw that her initial impression had been correct. It was most likely Cindy’s office/lab positioned conveniently midway down the length of the egg room and tucked against the building’s foundation. The room had a shallow, rectangular shape no more than ten feet deep but some twenty-five to thirty feet long. Running along its back wall was a laminate countertop with drawers below. In the center was a kneehole to form a desk. At the extreme left was an in-counter sink with a typical laboratory faucet. Cabinets were above. The bright fluorescent light was coming from hidden, under-cabinet fixtures, which flooded the countertop with blue-white illumination.
   The counter itself was cluttered with tissue-culture dishes, centrifuges, and all sorts of other laboratory paraphernalia, but none of it interested Stephanie. Her attention had been immediately drawn to what looked like a large, open ledger book positioned at the desk area. It was partially obscured by the high back of the office chair.
   Knowing that time was slipping away relentlessly, Stephanie’s eyes darted up and down the length of the windowed office, searching for a door. To her surprise, it was right in front of her, and except for its recessed handle, it looked like the other glass panels. Its hinges were on the inside.
   With a keyhole suggesting the door could be locked, Stephanie prayed it wasn’t. She lifted the door handle from its socket and gave it a twist. To her relief, it turned, and the door effortlessly opened inward. As she stepped into the long, narrow room, she could feel a breeze of the egg room air coming along with her, suggesting the egg room was slightly pressurized, probably to keep out airborne microbes. The interior of the narrow office was air-conditioned to a normal temperature and humidity. Letting go of the door and leaving it ajar, Stephanie moved over to the ledger and was immediately engrossed; she sensed that she had found what she was looking for.
   She pushed the office chair aside to bend over for a closer look at the handwritten entries. It was indeed a ledger, but not for finance. Instead, it was a list of all the women who had been impregnated and aborted including the dates of both, along with other information. Flipping back a few pages, Stephanie could see that the program had begun well before the clinic had opened its doors. Paul Saunders had been planning his egg supply well in advance.
   Stephanie picked out a few individual cases, and running her finger along individual entries, she learned that the women had been impregnated following in vitro fertilization. IVF made sense, since only female fetuses were wanted, and IVF would be the only way to guarantee such an outcome. She noticed the X chromosome sperm involved in the cases she was looking at were all from Paul Saunders, which testified to an abiding, conscienceless megalomania.
   Stephanie was entirely captivated. Everything was duly recorded in a bold script. She could even tell what type of tissue culture was done from each case as well as the respective cultures’ current status in the egg room. While some fetuses contributed whole ovary preparations, others had their ovaries minced and cultured, and others were reduced to providing disaggregated germ cell lines.
   Returning to the original page displayed when she had come into the room, Stephanie began counting how many women were currently pregnant. She couldn’t help but shake her head that Saunders and company not only had the temerity to carry out such a program but also the audacity to record all its sordid details in black and white. With such a discovery, all Stephanie would have to do was inform the Bahamian authorities of the ledger’s existence and leave it up to them to confiscate it.
   Suddenly, Stephanie froze as a thunderbolt of fear descended her spine. She hadn’t quite finished counting the pregnant women when her heart leaped in her chest. With no sound or any warning whatsoever, a circle of cold steel had insinuated itself through her hair and pressed against the back of her perspiring neck. Instantly, she knew without a modicum of doubt that it was the barrel of a gun!
   “Don’t move, and put your palms on the desk,” a disembodied voice threatened.
   Stephanie felt her knees weaken. She was momentarily paralyzed. All the anxieties attendant to her snooping and aggravated by the press of time had coalesced in a maelstrom of sheer terror. She was bent at the waist over the ledger book, with one hand on the desk and the other poised in the air. She’d been using her index finger to help with the counting.
   “Put your palms on the desk!” Kurt repeated with uncamouflaged anger. His voice quivered. He had to restrain himself from an urge to pistol-whip this shamefully provocative female who’d had the nerve to enter the egg room.
   The gun barrel pressed in against Stephanie’s neck just short of pain. Finding the strength to move, she did as she was told and put her right palm on the countertop. Having both hands on the desk kept her from possibly collapsing. She was shaking from fright to the point that her leg muscles felt like jelly.
   Thankfully, the barrel of the gun was withdrawn. Stephanie took a breath. Vaguely, she was aware of searching hands going into her jacket pockets. She felt her cell phone and the clutter of pencils and papers removed and then replaced. She was beginning to recover to a degree, when she felt hands come up under the lab coat and reach around to fondle her breasts.

   “What the hell are you doing?” she managed to demand.
   “Shut up!” Kurt snarled. His hands dropped down to pat along the sides of her thorax. Then they dropped further to her hips, where they momentarily stopped.
   Stephanie held her breath. She was mortified and humiliated. The next thing she knew, the hands were cupping her buttocks. “This is an outrage!” she sputtered. Anger began to crowd out her fear. She started to straighten up, with the intention of confronting her tormentor.
   “Shut up!” Kurt shouted again. A hand pressed into her back, hard enough to collapse her on top of the ledger with her arms splayed to the sides. The gun was again pressed against the nape of her neck, this time painfully. “Don’t doubt for a second I wouldn’t shoot you here and now.”
   “I’m Dr. D’Agostino,” Stephanie managed, despite the crushing weight on her back. “I’m working here.”
   “I know who you are,” Kurt snarled. “And I know you are not working here in the egg room. This is off-limits.”
   Stephanie could feel Kurt’s hot breath. He was leaning over on top of her, pressing her down onto the desk. It was hard to breathe.
   “If you move again, I’ll shoot you.”
   “Okay,” Stephanie squeaked. To her relief, the suffocating weight was released. She took a deep breath, only to feel a hand thrust between her legs to fondle her further. She gritted her teeth at the outrage. Then two hands patted down one leg and then the other, but not before her crotch was again groped. Next, the man’s weight pressed back down on top of her, but not quite as forcibly as earlier. At the same time, she felt his hot breath on her neck as he rubbed himself lustfully against her and whispered in her ear: “Women like you deserve what they get.”
   Stephanie resisted the urge to try to fight back or even scream. The man on top of her had to be deranged, and her intuition silently shouted for her to be passive for the moment. After all, she was in a medical clinic and not in some isolated location. Cindy Drexler and perhaps others would be appearing shortly.
   “You see, bitch,” Kurt continued, “I had to make sure you were not carrying a camera or a weapon. Intruders tend to do that, and there’s no telling where you could have hidden them on your person.”
   Stephanie stayed quiet and immobile. She felt the man straighten up again.
   “Put your hands behind your back!”
   Stephanie did as she was told. Then, before she knew what was happening, she felt herself being locked into handcuffs. It had happened so quickly that she didn’t comprehend until she heard the second metallic click. A bad situation was deteriorating. She’d never been in handcuffs, and they bit into her wrists. Worse yet, she felt even more vulnerable than she had before.
   Stephanie was then yanked upright by the scruff of her neck and spun around. She eyed her assailant, watching as the man’s thin lips twisted back into a cruel, taunting smile, as if he were flaunting the fact that he was under marginal control.
   Stephanie immediately recognized him. Although she’d never heard his voice until now, she’d seen him around the clinic grounds and in the cafeteria. She even knew his name and that he was the head of security. It had been in his office that she and Daniel had been photographed and had obtained their ID cards. He’d been at his desk at the time but had not said a word. Stephanie had purposefully avoided his silent, beady stare.
   Kurt stepped out of the way and gestured toward the open door to the office. The gun had disappeared. Stephanie was only too happy to leave, but when she started walking back in the direction from which she’d originally come, Kurt grabbed her arm.
   “Wrong way,” he snapped. When she turned to look at him, he pointed in the opposite direction.
   “I want to go back to the laboratory,” Stephanie said. She tried to imbue her voice with authority, but it was difficult under the circumstances.
   “I couldn’t care less what you want. Move!” Kurt gave her a forceful shove. Without her arms to help keep her balance, Stephanie nearly fell. Luckily, her feet stayed underneath her after the brush of a tissue-culture rack against her shoulder. Kurt gave her another push, and she stumbled ahead in the direction he’d indicated.
   “I don’t know why you’re making such a big deal out of this,” Stephanie said, after regaining her composure somewhat. “I was just looking around in here. I was merely curious about the origin of the oocytes Dr. Saunders had provided us with.” Her mind was now churning in an internal debate whether she should follow Kurt’s orders or just collapse and refuse to move. If they weren’t going back to the lab, she wanted to stay in Cindy Drexler’s office, where there was the comfort of knowing the woman would be returning. Having no idea where they were headed terrified her, but she didn’t stop. What kept her moving was Kurt’s threat to shoot her. As crazy and wired as he seemed, she took it seriously.
   “Trespassing in the egg room is a big deal,” Kurt responded scornfully, as if privy to her thoughts.
   At the end of the room, they turned ninety degrees and continued to a door similar to the one Stephanie had entered, but at the opposite end of the room. Kurt pressed a button on its jamb and the heavy, safelike door whooshed open. Kurt gave Stephanie a rude shove through it. Unaccustomed to her arms being secured behind her back, it was all Stephanie could do to keep her footing. Stumbling ahead, she found herself in a long, narrow, stuccoed corridor that curved off to the left. It was meagerly illuminated with infrequent fluorescent fixtures mounted on the outer wall. It was also a stuffy, un-air-conditioned space.
   Stephanie stopped. She tried to turn around, but Kurt shoved her forward with such force that she fell. Unable to put her hands out to break her fall, she landed on her shoulder, scraping her cheek on the cement floor. A moment later, he lifted her like a rag doll by grabbing a handful of her lab coat and blouse in the middle of her back. Once she was upright, he propelled her forward. Stephanie reconciled herself to walking. She recognized resisting was going to invite immediate disaster.
   “I demand to speak to Dr. Wingate and Dr. Saunders,” Stephanie said, in a second attempt to be authoritative. Her fears were mounting as she wondered where this man was taking her. The damp warmth of the corridor suggested it was subterranean.
   “In due course,” Kurt said, with a lecherous laugh that gave Stephanie a shiver.
   It didn’t take Stephanie long before she guessed they were traveling in the same direction as the arcaded walkway that connected the laboratory building with the administration building. They just happened to be underground. Within a few minutes, they came to a regular, insulated fire door. When Kurt opened it, she saw that her assumption was correct. They were in the admin building basement. Stephanie remembered it from when she and Daniel got their IDs. With some relief, she now guessed they were heading to the security office, which also was soon confirmed.
   “Down the hall!” Kurt commanded when they entered his office. He stayed behind her, out of her sight.
   Stephanie passed a partially open door and caught a glimpse of a wall of television monitors. Kurt urged her on. At the end of the corridor, she stopped.
   “You’ll notice we have a jail cell to the left and a bedroom to the right,” Kurt said mockingly. “It’s your choice.”
   Stephanie didn’t answer. Instead, she stepped into the open cell. Kurt swung the barred door shut. It locked with a click that echoed off the concrete walls.
   “What about the handcuffs?” Stephanie demanded.
   “It’s best they are left on,” Kurt said. His cruel, thin-lipped smile had returned. “It’s for safety’s sake. The management doesn’t look kindly on prisoners doing themselves in.” Kurt laughed again. It was obvious he was enjoying himself. He started to turn back up the corridor but hesitated. Instead, he came back to stare in at Stephanie. “You’ve got a head in there, so feel free to use it. Don’t let me bother you.”
   Stephanie turned to glance at the toilet. Not only was it completely exposed; it didn’t even have a seat. She looked back at Kurt and glared. “I want to see Dr. Wingate and Dr. Saunders immediately.”
   “I’m afraid you are not in any position to give orders,” Kurt said mockingly. He glared at Stephanie before breaking off and disappearing back up the corridor.
   Stephanie let out her breath and relaxed a degree with Kurt out of sight. She could only see a short distance up the hallway. Unable to look at her watch, she wondered what time it was. Daniel would have to start wondering where she was and start looking for her. In fact, maybe he was already. But then a new fear entered her mind—what if he was so angry at what she’d done that he didn’t care if she’d been locked up?

   Kurt Hermann sat down at his desk and put out his forearms. He was quivering from unconsummated desire. Stephanie D’Agostino had turned him on excruciatingly. Unfortunately, the pleasure of having his hands on her firm yet soft femaleness had been all too fleeting, and he wanted a repeat. She’d acted as if she hadn’t enjoyed it, but he knew differently. Women were like that—one minute being provocative and the next minute pretending they didn’t like the consequences. It was all an act, a put-on, a joke.
   For a few minutes, Kurt tried to think of ways to put off calling Saunders. What he would have liked most to do was not to call him at all. Dr. D’Agostino could just disappear. Hell, it was what she deserved. But he knew it wouldn’t work. Saunders would know, because Saunders understood that Kurt was aware of everyone who came in and out of the compound. If the woman doctor disappeared, Saunders would know Kurt was responsible or at least knew what had happened to her.
   Calling on the discipline of his martial arts training, Kurt calmed himself. Within minutes, his muscles began to relax and his quivering stopped. Even his heart rate slowed to less than fifty beats per minute. He knew, because he frequently checked it. When he was fully in control, he got up and went into the video room.
   The clock on the wall said it was twelve-forty-one. That meant that Spencer Wingate and Paul Saunders would be in the cafeteria. Kurt sat down and looked up at the bank of monitors. His eyes went to number twelve. Using the keyboard in front of him, he connected the joystick to minicam twelve and began to pan the room. Before finding his bosses, he found Daniel Lowell. Kurt zoomed in. The man was reading a scientific journal while feeding his face, completely oblivious to his surroundings. Across from him was Stephanie’s untouched tray. A slight sneer played on Kurt’s face. He had the man’s girlfriend locked up in his private jail cell after feeling her up, and the man had no clue whatsoever. What a pompous jerk!
   Kurt zoomed back out and continued looking for Spencer and Paul. He found them at their usual table and with the usual bevy of female employees. They were jerks as well, since Kurt knew for the most part whom they were screwing, although more for Paul than Spencer, since Paul lived in the compound. To Kurt, most of the men of the world were jerks, including most of his commanding officers when he’d been in the service. It was a burden he had to bear.
   Kurt reached for the phone and put in a call to the cafeteria supervisor. When he got her on the phone, he told her to tell Spencer and Paul there was a security emergency that necessitated their immediate presence in his office. He told her to say specifically, “It’s a major problem.” Within seconds of his replacing the receiver, Kurt saw the woman appear on the monitor. She was frantic. She tapped Spencer and Paul on the shoulder in turn and whispered in their respective ears. Both leaped up and, with worried expressions, made a beeline for the exit. Spencer was slightly in the lead, since he was the first one the cafeteria supervisor had approached.
   With a few clicks on the keyboard, Kurt brought up the image of the jail cell on the monitor directly in his line of sight and switched his attention to it. Stephanie was pacing back and forth like a caged cat. It was as if she were purposefully taunting him with her body.
   Unable to watch another second, Kurt abruptly stood up. He retreated to his desk to rely again on his training to calm himself. By the time Spencer Wingate and Paul Saunders breathlessly arrived, Kurt was back to his stoic self. All he moved was his eyes, as the two fertility doctors rushed up to his desk.
   “What’s the major problem?” Spencer demanded. As the titular head of the clinic, Paul yielded to him. Spencer’s complexion was slightly flushed, as was Paul’s. The two men had run all the way from building three, which was more exercise than they were accustomed to. Both were panicked, because Kurt’s message had been the same one he’d communicated back when Federal marshals had besieged the Wingate Clinic in its Massachusetts incarnation.
   Kurt enjoyed their anxiety as payback for the scant recognition they gave him for all his efforts with getting the new clinic’s security in line. He gestured for his bosses to be silent, then motioned for them to follow him as he led the way down to the video room. Once they were inside, he shut the door. He gestured for them to sit down in the two chairs present while he remained standing. He eyed them while basking in their anxious, undivided attention.
   “What the hell is the emergency?” Spencer demanded, losing patience. “Out with it!”
   “We had a break-in involving the egg room,” Kurt said. “An obvious espionage situation that has compromised the egg-procurement program.”
   “No!” Paul exclaimed. He sat forward in his seat. The egg program was pivotal in his plans for the future of the clinic and his reputation.
   Kurt nodded, enjoying drawing out the moment.
   “Who?” Paul demanded. “Was it an inside job?”
   “Yes and no,” Kurt responded ambiguously without elaborating.
   “Come on!” Spencer complained. “This isn’t a goddamn guessing game.”
   “The perpetrator was caught perusing the Oocyte Register and apprehended.”
   “Good God!” Paul blurted. “This person was actually looking at the Register?”
   Kurt pointed to the central monitor just above the counter. Stephanie had retreated back to sit on the iron cot. Unknowingly, she was looking almost directly into the minicam. It was clear she was distraught.
   For a few minutes, silence reigned in the video room. All eyes stared at Stephanie.
   “How come she’s not moving?” Spencer asked. “She’s all right, isn’t she?”
   “She’s fine,” Kurt assured him.
   “Why is her cheek bleeding?”
   “She fell en route to the cell.”
   “What did you do to her?” Spencer demanded.
   “She wasn’t being cooperative. She needed a bit of encouragement.”
   “Good Lord!” Spencer exclaimed. All in all, this was less of an emergency than he had feared, but it was still bad enough. “How come her arms are behind her back?” Spencer asked

   “She’s handcuffed,” Kurt said.
   “Handcuffed?” Spencer questioned. “Isn’t that a bit heavy-handed? Although, with your history, we should be thankful you didn’t shoot her on the spot.”
   “Spencer,” Paul said. “We should be thankful for Kurt’s vigilance, not critical.”
   “It is standard operating procedure to cuff an individual when they are apprehended,” Kurt snapped.
   “Yeah, but she’s in a jail cell, for Christ’s sake,” Spencer said. “You could have taken the handcuffs off.”
   “Forget the handcuffs for the moment,” Paul suggested. “Let’s worry about the implications of her behavior. I don’t like the fact that she was in the egg room, much less having her looking at the register. She’s been less than complimentary about our operation, particularly in regard to our stem-cell therapy.”
   “She is a bit high and mighty,” Spencer admitted.
   “I don’t want her upsetting our oocyte program, not that there’s a lot she can do here in the Bahamas,” Paul said. “It’s not like we’re back in the States. But she could still make waves and get us some bad publicity, which might impinge on our uterine-rental recruitment efforts and then our bottom line. We’ve got to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
   “Maybe that’s why Lowell and she are here,” Spencer suggested. “Maybe this treatment rigmarole they are doing is all an elaborate ruse. They could be industrial spies, intent on stealing our thunder.”
   “They’re for real,” Paul said.
   “How can you be so sure?” Spencer said, looking away from Stephanie’s image on the monitor and directing his attention to Paul. “You’re rather gullible when it comes to dealing with real researchers.”
   “I beg your pardon!” Paul snapped.
   “Oh, don’t be so sensitive,” Spencer responded. “You know what I mean. These people have real Ph.D.s.”
   “Which might account for their lack of creativity,” Paul responded. “You don’t need a Ph.D. to do groundbreaking science. But, be that as it may, I can assure you that these people are not faking what they are doing. I’ve seen with my own eyes that this HTSR is impressive.”
   “They could still be fooling you. That’s my point. They are professional researchers, and you’re not.”
   Paul glanced away for a moment to keep from getting mad. Spencer was the last person in the world who should be suggesting he was an authority on who was and who wasn’t a researcher. Spencer knew nothing about research. He was a mere businessman in doctor’s clothing—and not even that good a businessman.
   After a calming breath, Paul looked back at his titular boss and said, “I know they are doing real, honest-to-goodness, goal-directed cellular manipulations, because I took some of the cells into which they had patched some of Christ’s DNA. The cells are amazing and extremely viable. I’ve used them myself to see if they work, and they do.”
   “Wait a second,” Spencer said. “You’re not going to sit there and say you’ve proved these cells have Christ’s DNA.”
   “Of course not.” Paul struggled to keep his composure. At times, discussing biomolecular science with Spencer was like talking with a five-year-old. “There’s no test for ‘Christness.’ What I’m trying to tell you is that they brought with them a culture of fibroblasts from the person with Parkinson’s disease whom they are planning on treating. Within these cells, they have swapped out the defective genes with genes they have been able to construct from DNA they’ve extracted from their sample of the Shroud of Turin. They’ve already done all this, and now they are on their way to make the actual treatment cells. It’s true. There’s absolutely no doubt in my mind this is what they are doing. I’m one hundred percent certain. Trust me!”
   “All right, all right,” Spencer repeated. “Since you have been in the lab with them, I suppose I have to take your word they’re here for a legitimate therapeutic mission. But that accepted, it begs the issue of the patient’s identity, about which I also took your word. You said you were going to find out who the patient is. Here we are a little more than a week away from our visitors’ scheduled treatment D-day, and we’re still in the dark.”
   “Well, that’s another problem.”
   “Yeah, but it is associated. If we don’t have a name soon, we’re not going to have a financial windfall in this affair, that’s for damn sure. What’s the problem with finding out the identity? That’s not asking that much.”
   Paul looked at Kurt. “Tell him!”
   Kurt cleared his throat. “It’s been a more difficult assignment than I had anticipated. We had their apartment and place of business searched before they even got to Nassau. While they have been here, we’ve gotten ahold of their laptops and had our computer nerd check their hard drives—nothing. On the positive side, just today I got a bug in the woman’s cell phone. I’ve been trying to get ahold of it from day one, but she has been uncooperative. Never once did she let it out of her sight.”
   “You planted the bug while she’s been in your custody?” Spencer asked. “Aren’t you worried she’d be suspicious?”
   “No,” Kurt said. “The bug went in before I apprehended her. Today, for the first time, she left her cell phone in the lab when she went to the cafeteria. I’d just finished when she returned unexpectedly to break into the egg room. I was following her when she entered.”
   “Then why didn’t you stop her before she got in?” Spencer asked.
   “I wanted to catch her flagrante delicto,” Kurt said, as a lewd smile formed at the corners of his mouth.
   “I suppose I wouldn’t mind catching her flagrante delicto myself,” Spencer said, with an equivalent smile.
   “With the bug in the cell phone, we should be in good shape,” Paul said. “From the beginning, Kurt felt monitoring the cell phone was going to give us the patient’s identity.”
   “Is that true?” Spencer asked.
   “Yes,” Kurt said simply. “But we have another option. With her in our custody, we could demand she tell us the name as a condition of her release.”
   The two Wingate Clinic principals eyed each other while they pondered Kurt’s suggestion. It was Spencer who responded first with a shake of his head: “I don’t like the idea.”
   “Why?” Paul asked.
   “Mainly because I don’t think they would tell us, and it would tip our hand about how much we want the name,” Spencer said. “Obviously, keeping the patient’s identity a secret is mighty important to them; otherwise, we’d know it already. At this point, with as much progress as you’ve said they’ve made in the lab, they could possibly pack up and go somewhere else for the final treatment. I don’t want to jeopardize their second twenty-two-and-a-half-K payment. It’s hardly a windfall, but it’s something. Besides, they’ll know we’re bluffing. We can’t keep her in jail unless we throw him in there as well, which we can’t do, and he’ll be yelling bloody murder as soon as he finds out where she is and how she’s been treated.”
   “You’ve made good points,” Paul responded. “I agree with you, and I’d prefer the condition of her release simply to be centered on a promise of confidentiality, which is reasonable under the circumstances. She can have her own opinions, but she should keep them to herself. My sense is that Dr. Lowell will back us on this. I’ve felt he’s always trying to tone down her arrogance.”
   Spencer looked up at Kurt. “So, you’re optimistic about finding out the patient’s identity with the bug in the phone?”
   Kurt nodded.
   “I think we should stick to that,” Spencer said. “And we’ll press the confidentiality issue.”
   “Agreed,” Paul said. “And speaking of Dr. Lowell, where is he?”
   “He’s in the cafeteria,” Kurt said. His eyes rose up to monitor twelve. “At least, he was a few minutes ago.”
   “I think it is significant that Dr. D’Agostino was by herself when she went into the egg room,” Paul said.
   “How so?” Spencer asked.
   “My guess would be that Dr. Lowell had no idea what she was doing.”
   “You might be right,” Spencer said.
   “Dr. Lowell is on his way to the lab,” Kurt said. He pointed to the appropriate monitor, and all eyes went to it. Daniel was walking with a quick, determined gait from building three to building one, with a hand clasped against the collection of pens and pencils in his breast pocket. He reached building one and disappeared through the door.
   “Where is the lab monitor?” Paul asked. Kurt pointed. They watched as Daniel appeared stage left. Spencer commented that he appeared to be searching for Stephanie. Kurt used the joystick to follow him. After checking the lab bench area that he and Stephanie used, Daniel looked into their assigned office. He even stuck his head into the ladies’ room. He then made a beeline toward Megan Finnigan’s office.
   “I think he would have gone down to the egg room if he knew that’s where she went,” Paul said.
   “A point well taken,” Spencer said. “I bet you’re right.”
   Paul picked up the phone on the counter and punched in Megan’s extension. “I’ll tell the lab supervisor where Dr. Lowell can find his collaborator.”
   “Or whatever the hell their relationship is,” Spencer said scornfully. “I can’t figure it out. By the way, Kurt, how was she able to get into the egg room?”
   “She used her Wingate ID,” Kurt said. “Access has yet to be restricted, even though it was on the security punch list I presented to the administration a month ago.”
   “That’s my fault,” Paul said, hanging up from his terse conversation with Megan Finnigan. “It slipped my mind getting the clinic up and running. Besides, we never planned on outsiders using the lab, and it didn’t cross my mind when doctors Lowell and D’Agostino got here.”
   Spencer got up out of his chair. “Let’s go down and have a chat with the alluring Dr. D’Agostino before Dr. Lowell gets here. It might help smooth the negotiation. Kurt, I want you to stay away for the moment.”
   The two doctors stepped out into the hall and started down toward the cell.
   “This is a weird turn of events,” Spencer whispered. “But it is certainly a lot better than I feared when we were running over here.”

Twenty

   7:56 P.M., Monday, March 11, 2002
   When push came to shove, Gaetano was a realist. As much as he was looking forward to arriving in Nassau on this second visit to complete what he’d started on his first, he was nervous. Mainly he was nervous about getting a gun, and it had to be a decent gun, because without a good gun, trouble was inevitable. There was no way he was going to club the guy to death or drown him in the bathtub or garrote him, like they occasionally did in the movies. Whacking a guy was not as easy as it was portrayed. It required planning. The method had to be decisive and fast, and the location moderately remote, to expedite a speedy getaway and for quickness, there was nothing better than a gun. A good, quiet gun.
   For Gaetano, the problem in the current situation was being dependent on people he didn’t know and who didn’t know him. Somebody was supposed to meet him when he landed on the island, but there was no guarantee it would happen. Since the trip had been patched together so quickly, there was no plan B or contacts to call, except Lou back in Boston, and Lou could be hard to get ahold of after-hours. Even if the mystery man showed up at the airport, there was always the chance he and Gaetano wouldn’t hook up in the inevitable confusion, since neither knew what the other looked like. To make matters worse, Gaetano was supposed to be back in Boston the next day, so it wasn’t like he had the benefit of a lot of time.
   The other reason Gaetano was nervous was because he didn’t like small planes. Big ones were okay, since he could talk himself out of believing he was up in the sky. Little ones were another story altogether, and the one he was on at the moment was the smallest he had experienced. To make matters worse, the plane was vibrating like an electric toothbrush and bouncing around like a billiard ball. Gaetano had nothing to hold on to, except the seatback in front of his nose. There wasn’t much room in the cabin. With his bulk, he was literally wedged in against the window.
   Gaetano had caught an American flight down to Miami, where he’d transferred to the plane he was currently on. The sun was setting when he took off on this second leg, and now it was pitch dark outside his window. He tried not to think about what was below the bobbing aircraft, although every time the engines sounded as if they were slowing down, the mental image of a vast, black ocean involuntarily popped into his mind’s eye to add to his anxieties. Gaetano had a secret—he couldn’t swim, and drowning was a recurrent nightmare.
   Gaetano glanced around at the other passengers. There was no conversation, as if everyone were as terrified as he. Most were blankly staring ahead. A few were reading, with individual, narrow beams of light coming from over their heads to form isolated shafts of illumination in the general murkiness. The cabin attendant was seated facing her charges in response to a directive from the pilots about turbulence. Her bored expression provided a bit of reassurance, although it was partially trumped by her considerably more substantial seat belt with shoulder straps, as if she expected the worst.
   A particularly solid thump followed by the plane quivering made Gaetano start. It was as if they had struck some airborne object. For a minute, he didn’t even breathe, but nothing happened. He swallowed to relieve a suddenly dry throat. Resigning himself to his fate, he closed his eyes and leaned against the headrest. The moment he did so, the pilot’s voice came over the intercom to announce that they would be landing shortly.
   With a burst of optimism, Gaetano pressed his nose against the window and looked down. Instead of a black void, he now saw twinkling lights ahead. He exhaled with relief. It seemed that he was going to make it after all.
   The plane landed with a welcome, distinctive thud. A moment later, the whine of the engines magnified, accompanied by a sensation of rapid braking. Gaetano supported himself against the seatback in front of him. He felt so good about the plane being on the ground that he smiled at the passenger seated to his right. The man responded in kind. Redirecting his attention out the window, Gaetano was now able to concentrate on his worries about the gun.
   With relatively few passengers on the plane, disembarking was rapid, and Gaetano was among the first on the tarmac. He sucked in the warm, tropical air while luxuriating in the sensation of being on terra firma. When everyone was out of the cabin, he and the rest of the passengers were herded into the terminal.
   Clutching his small carry-on, Gaetano paused just inside the door. He didn’t quite know what to do. He thought his size made him stand out, but no one approached him. He was wearing the same upscale clothes he had worn on the last visit, which included the short-sleeve Hawaiian print shirt, light tan slacks, and dark blue jacket. Pressure from people behind him made him move forward. It was like being carried along in a river flowing toward passport control. When it was his turn, Gaetano handed over his document. The agent was about to stamp it when he caught sight of the notations of Gaetano’s recent visit. Not only was it a short time ago, it was only for a single day. He looked up at Gaetano questioningly.
   “I was just checking the place out the first time,” Gaetano explained. “I liked it, so now I’m back for vacation.”
   The man didn’t respond. He stamped the passport, pushed it toward Gaetano, and reached for the next person’s.
   Gaetano pressed on, past the crowds at the baggage carousels and then approached customs. With his American passport in his hands and his carry-on, the agents waved him by. He walked out through a pair of double doors that were propped open. An attentive crowd of people stood behind a flimsy metal movable railing. They were all eagerly trying to see family and friends through the open doors. No one expressed any interest in Gaetano.
   Unsure about what to do, Gaetano kept going. Initially, he had to move laterally to get beyond the railing before merging with the boisterous crowd. After walking a short distance, he stopped and scanned the terminal, hoping to make eye contact with someone. No one paid him the slightest heed. He scratched his head, wondering what to do. For lack of a better plan, he made his way to the car-rental area and waited in line.
   Fifteen minutes later, he had keys to another Cherokee, although this time it was supposed to be green. He wandered back to the international arrivals area and was about to try to call Lou when someone tapped him on the shoulder.
   By reflex, Gaetano spun around, ready to do battle. He found himself staring into the dark eyes of the blackest, baldest man he had ever seen. There were enough gold chains around his neck to make bending over a resistance exercise, and there was enough light reflecting off his scalp to make Gaetano squint. The man responded to Gaetano’s overreaction by stepping back and holding up both hands as if to parry a blow. One of the hands held a wrinkled brown paper bag.
   “Easy, man!” the individual said. He spoke with the same colorful, Bahamian accent Gaetano remembered from his first visit. “I don’t mean no harm.”
   Gaetano was embarrassed about his aggressiveness and tried to apologize.
   “No problem, man.” The voice had a definite lilt. “Are you Gaetano Baresse from Boston?”
   “Speaking!” Gaetano said, with a smile of relief. For a second, he felt like hugging the stranger, as if he were a lost relative. “You have something for me?”
   “If you’re Gaetano Baresse, I do. The name is Robert. Let me show you what I have.” With that, the man unrolled the top of his paper bag and reached in with the intention of lifting out the contents.
   “Hey, don’t whip that thing out here!” Gaetano forcibly whispered. He was horrified. “Are you crazy?” Gaetano’s eyes made a nervous sweep around the terminal. There were several armed but bored policemen in the immediate area. Thankfully, they weren’t paying any attention.
   “You want to see it, don’t you?” the man asked.
   “Yeah, but not here in the middle of everything. Did you come in a car?”
   “Sure, I came in a car.”
   “Let’s go.”
   With a shrug, the man led the way out of the terminal. A few minutes later, they climbed into a pastel, vintage Cadillac with huge tail fins. The man switched on the overhead light and handed Gaetano the bag. Gaetano was expecting some sort of Saturday night special, but what he pulled out surprised him considerably. It was a nine-millimeter SW99 equipped with a LaserMax and a Bowers CAC9 suppressor.
   “Okay?” Robert asked. “You happy?”
   “More than happy,” Gaetano said. He admired the unmarred, black melonite finish, which suggested the gun was brand-new. It was an imposing weapon. Although it had only a four-inch barrel, the attached silencer made it more like ten inches.
   After making sure no one was in the immediate area, Gaetano aimed the handgun out the windshield at a nearby car and briefly activated the laser. Fifty feet away, he saw the red dot flash on a car’s back bumper. He was thrilled with the weapon until he noticed the magazine was missing in the butt.
   “Where’s the magazine?” Gaetano questioned. Without a magazine and ammunition, the gun was worthless.
   Robert smiled in the car’s semidarkness. Against his burnished ebony skin, his teeth were truly pearly whites. He patted his left pants pocket. “I got it safely right here, man, all loaded up and ready to go. There’s even an extra one for good measure.”
   “Good,” Gaetano said. He stuck out his hand. He was relieved.
   “Not so fast,” Robert said. “It seems to me this is worth something to me personally. I mean, I did come all the way out here instead of sitting home with a cold one. You catch my drift?”
   For a moment, Gaetano just stared into the man’s eyes, which in the darkness looked surprisingly like two bulletholes in a dirty white blanket. He knew it was a shakedown of sorts, and probably the man’s idea. Gaetano’s first thought was to grab the guy’s head and bounce it off the steering wheel to let him know exactly with whom he was dealing, but clearer thoughts prevailed. The guy could have another gun, which could make things dicey and was certainly not the way this current trip should start. More important, Gaetano had no idea of this guy’s relation to the Miami Colombians who Lou had contacted to set everything up. The last thing Gaetano needed or wanted while he was in Nassau on business was to have a group of guys after his own ass, especially the Colombians.
   Gaetano cleared his throat. He was carrying a significant amount of cash, since on such a foray, everything he did was for cash. “Robert, I suppose you deserve a small token of appreciation. What do you have in mind?”
   “A c-note would be nice,” Robert said.
   Without another word, Gaetano leaned forward to get his free hand into his right pants pocket. While he did so, he didn’t take his eyes off Robert. He peeled off a bill from a roll, pulled it out, and handed it over. Robert then produced the magazines. Gaetano slipped one into the butt of the handgun. It clicked home. Discarding a fleeting fantasy of trying out the gun on Robert, Gaetano stepped from the car. He put the second magazine into the side pocket of his jacket.
   “Hey, man!” Robert called. “You need a ride into town?”
   Gaetano leaned back inside the vehicle. “Thanks, but I have my own wheels.” Standing back up, he slipped the gun into his left pants pocket, which had a customized, hemmed opening at the bottom to accommodate the automatic’s silencer. Having the hole was a trick he’d learned from a mentor when he’d first started working for the New York family. The permanent hole’s only drawback was having to learn never to put anything else in the pocket, like coins or keys, which would tumble down his pant leg. As Gaetano walked toward the rent-a-car’s lot, he could feel the cold steel of the silencer moving against his bare thigh. For him, it was like a caress.
   Twenty minutes later, Gaetano directed his rented Cherokee into the Ocean Club’s hotel parking lot. The drive had given him time to calm down after Robert’s mini-extortion episode. The crunching sound of the tires on the gravel was particularly loud with all the vehicle’s windows down. Enjoying the summerlike, evening air, Gaetano had opted to leave the air-conditioning off. Once in the lot, he took a full loop around. He wanted a spot that was not only close to the hotel but also afforded a direct shot out to the driveway. After whacking the professor, he wanted to be able to leave with dispatch.
   Before getting out of the car, Gaetano flicked on the interior light and checked himself in the rearview mirror. He wanted to be sure he was presentable in the posh hotel. He smoothed his rather bushy eyebrows and adjusted the lapels of his jacket. When he thought he looked the best he could, he got out of the car. The car keys went into his right pants pocket, and he patted them through the fabric for good measure. The last thing he wanted when he was leaving was to have to search for the keys. Thus prepared, he started off.
   Following the same approach he’d used on his first visit to the hotel, Gaetano headed for the building that housed suite 108. It was eight-thirty at night, so he expected the professor and his girlfriend to be at dinner, but he still wanted to check the room first. He walked at a leisurely pace and passed several smartly dressed guests going in the opposite direction.
   At the appropriate location, Gaetano cut between two buildings to reach the lawn on the ocean side. He continued, almost to the tangle of sea grapes that covered the steep slope down to the beach. There, he turned to stroll parallel to the front of the appropriate building. He was close enough to the water to hear the gentle lapping of the waves on the beach to his right. The weather was glorious, with fast scudding clouds racing across a canopy of stars partially obscured by a bright gibbous moon. Soft ocean breezes rustled the palm trees. It was not hard for Gaetano to understand why people liked the Ocean Club.
   As Gaetano came abreast of suite 108, affording a view into its interior, a shiver of excitement raised the hairs on the back of his neck and sent a chill up his spine. Not only were the lights blazing and the curtains wide open, but the professor and his girlfriend were there in plain sight! He couldn’t believe his luck that his mission was to climax so easily and so quickly, and for a moment, he merely watched while his pulse quickened in anticipation of the imminent violence. But then his arousal plateaued as he questioned what he was seeing. He blinked a few times to make sure nothing was wrong with his eyes. Something weird was going on with the professor and Tony’s sister, scurrying around like a couple of chickens and then flapping a blanket in the air. In the background, the door from the room to the hall was wide open, and a TV was turned on.
   Irresistibly drawn toward the confusing spectacle, Gaetano advanced across the dark lawn. His hand had instinctively slipped into his left pocket to grip the handgun. Suddenly, he stopped, with a disappointing realization. The people he was watching were not his quarry but rather maids doing a turndown service. “Crap!” He groaned. Then he sighed and shook his head dejectedly.