Rupture Read online

  Adjacent to the elevator was the restroom where he had met Prine. Eli wondered if the old man was in there waiting for visitors. He pushed open the door, but the room was vacant. There were no cheap fragrances, no breath mints on the counter. And Prine’s stool was gone.

  He walked past the elevator and took the single flight of stairs. On the second floor, the hall was empty and the doors to all the laboratories remained locked.

  All except one.

  A plaque on the door signified the new occupant.

  ELI BRANCH, M.D.

  CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER

  Eli closed the door behind him. The office was completely furnished. A solid mahogany desk held a brass lamp. He knew the deep leather chair reclined in multiple positions, because he tried it. But what attracted his attention was a long rectangular photograph framed high on the wall behind his chair. Vaught-Hemingway Stadium at dusk, lights illuminating sixty thousand fans as the Rebels took the field. Below the picture was the date: October 9, 1996.

  Eli felt the muscles around his jaw loosen. This photo wasn’t of just any game. It was a picture of the night game when Eli received the IMHOTEP award, given to the student with the highest potential for success in the medical profession.

  His father had been there for the award presentation, which took place at halftime on the fifty-yard line. Eli had insisted that Henry also be a part of the evening, so he had driven his brother down from the State Home. They arrived just before kickoff. But during the second quarter, Elizer Branch insisted that Henry not take the field with them nor be in any of the photographs. The evening was a bittersweet memory then, just as it was now.

  Highest potential for success. Humph. Considering the events of the last few days, his professors should have been more selective in their choice. Centered on his desk so he would be sure to find it, a glossy brochure advertised Coates Island Home and Resort. The cover showed a large, beautiful building surrounded by oak trees. In the front courtyard two young men sat on a bench next to a duck pond. Behind them, an attendant in a short white coat pushed a wheelchair. Inside the brochure, he found page after page of amenities: tennis courts, horseback riding, trails through the woods for long walks, and a swimming pool with a curved slide.

  A paradise for your disabled loved one—A home away from home.

  The brochure described the private rooms and meal service. The building was locked down each night at nine P.M. Security and safety was assured. Eli imagined his brother living there. Henry would love the open space, the woods. As Eli thumbed through the brochure, there was a knock on his door.

  Three slow evenly spaced knocks.

  Tsarina!

  Eli considered the circumstances.

  It was early, very few if any employees had arrived. They would be alone in his new office.

  More knocks on the door, this time in a playful string. The door handle rattled with a couple of twists, but the door had locked behind him.

  She knows I’m in here. She’s just going to come in and start the whole thing. Right here. Right now. On the floor.

  Eli thought about her legs, sculpted, with an ankle bracelet on the left one. He had always liked those ankle bracelets, he realized now. He readjusted his pants and buttoned his white coat below his waist. His hand shook as he opened the door.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  RBI

  8:56 A.M.

  Tsarina had transformed into a short, elderly black man.

  Prine.

  “Big man done got him an office,” he said with a knowing smile. “See, I told you no one ever leaves this place.”

  Eli’s breathing slowed and he smiled as his fantasy quickly dissolved.

  “Hello, sir,” Eli said and extended his hand.

  “Sir? I ain’t no sir.”

  Prine grabbed Eli’s wrist, turned his hand palm up, and slapped him five.

  “I’m Prinobius Calloway. Mailman, trash collector, airport attendant.”

  He did a little three-step tap dance.

  “You can call me Prine.”

  Eli laughed at the entertaining performance. Prine wore a formal black jacket and a starched white shirt with the collar high on his neck. His black shoes had lost their shine and the pants were frayed at the hem, like a rented tuxedo from thirty years ago. Eli bet he wore it every day.

  Prine shifted through letters in the bottom of his mail cart. “Let’s see here.” He turned and looked at Eli’s name on the door. “Branch.”

  He stopped and said the name again.

  “Branch?”

  He stared at Eli as though trying to place him. “Branch—like at the medical school?”

  Eli was surprised at the question. “Yes, my father.”

  At this, Prine looked down the hall, both ways, as though assuring himself that no one was within earshot. Just as he took a step toward Eli and leaned forward, a door down the hall closed with a slam.

  Startled, Prine backed out of the office and pushed his mail cart down the corridor, hobbling as though his right leg were shorter than his left. Eli stuck his head out the door and watched the old man reach inside the flap of his mail cart, remove a small bottle, and take a long swig.

  The telephone rang in Eli’s office. He located the phone in a drawer and sat down behind his desk.

  “Branch speaking.”

  A confident and proud voice greeted him. “Good morning.”

  Eli had expected the call.

  “Good morning, Mr. Stone.”

  “Harvey, please. How’s the office?”

  Eli looked behind him at his alma mater lit up at night. “It’s fabulous.”

  “Great. Why don’t you come to my office and we’ll chat.”

  Eli wondered when he would be given a job description.What the hell am I supposed to do here?

  “Sure. And Harvey?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How did you know about that night at Ole Miss?”

  There was a short hesitation. “Just a lucky guess.”

  The door to Stone’s office was open just enough for Eli to hear voices. Stone’s and a female’s. With his hand on the knob, he delayed a moment.

  “Need to lay low on device marketing a while,” Stone said. “Ramp up the vaccine line, regain some credibility.”

  The next voice was unmistakably seductive.

  “What would you like for me to do?”

  “We need a patient for the stem cell procedure. That would make big news. Put us back on top.”

  After a pause Eli heard movement coming toward him. He tapped on the door just before Stone opened it.

  “Eli, come in.”

  Tsarina’s back was to him, bare legs crossed with a calf muscle bulging like a hen’s breast. She recrossed her legs, scissor-like, with cinematic speed. Stone motioned for Eli to sit in the chair next to her so they would both face his desk.

  “Hello again,” Tsarina said, rocking her foot in a quick tapping motion.

  “Welcome,” Stone said and leaned forward on his desk with folded hands. “I hope you found things satisfactory this morning.” He repeated this formality for Tsarina’s sake.

  “My parking space could be two spaces closer,” Eli said, also for Tsarina’s benefit. She must have liked it, foot shaking like a puppy’s tail.

  “Gives you something to work for, now doesn’t it.”

  “So it does,” Eli agreed.

  Stone leaned back in his chair. “Let me give you a vision.” His voice took on a prophetic quality. “We need an image boost. Some of this press lately,” he pursed his lips, “not good.”

  “Yeah,” Eli agreed. “I’ve experienced some of that myself.”

  Stone didn’t acknowledge this.

  Surely he’s heard about the murder?

  “RBI built its name on vaccine development,” he continued. “Third World, children, the whole bit. Admirable, right?”

  “Sure.” What else could he say?

  “Problem is,” he pursed his lips again, “vacc
ines don’t pay shit.”

  Eli thought of the flu vaccine, a dime a dozen, all the problems with production. “I can imagine.”

  Tsarina was fidgeting in her seat. She had removed a cigarette from a tiny purse in her lap and held it between two fingers. As though anticipating this, Stone leaned over and flicked a gold-plated lighter. Eli felt as if he were watching a scene from a 1940s movie.

  “Medical devices—they’re our bottom line. Keeps the company afloat.” A grin spread slowly across Stone’s face. “More than afloat.”

  This made Tsarina’s foot tap again and she took a deep drag.

  “Unfortunately, we’ve had a few mishaps. Untimely mishaps. You with me?”

  Eli pictured Gaston’s blood-drained body lying on the operating table. “Yes, I’m with you.”

  “The future, my friend, is stem cells.” Stone looked at Tsarina. “And we’re all over it. In a few days, we’ll be front page news, the envy of every biotech firm in the nation.” Stone leaned forward again. “But these deaths are putting a damper on the party.”

  “I have a feeling this is where I come in.”

  “You’re sharp, Branch, you know that.”

  “So they tell me.”

  For the next fifteen minutes, Stone laid out a plan of immaculate detail and perfectly timed publicity. The resurgence of RBI into the biotech stratosphere hung on the visit of one Sister Frances D’Aquila.

  Stone had met Sister Frances in 1993 on one of his yearly trips to Maseru, in the African country of Lesotho. At the time, GlobeVac was supplying the majority of vaccines to the small country on the northwest border of South Africa. In what turned out to be a very effective publicity campaign, Stone and his team took a series of photographs of the nun holding a vaccine-filled syringe and injecting a toddler balanced on her knee. The images were picked up by CNN and broadcast in an exclusive report on Third-World vaccination. Fortuitously positioned in the background of each photo was the GlobeVac logo.

  Sister Frances D’Aquila held the dying, AIDS-stricken child close to her heart. According to the spin, for her the disease carried no connotation of blame or fault but rather an overwhelming need to care for each patient, one at a time. This impromptu relationship seemed to benefit both Stone and Sister Frances. GlobeVac’s stock saw a steady increase, and humanitarian aid flowed into the poverty-stricken villages of the sister’s beloved country.

  Stone handed Eli a recent photo of the sister. She was sitting cross-legged on the grass outside a small village. Behind her, a beautiful mountain range towered over her and the dying infant cradled in her arms. In the background, and slightly off focus, was a Land Rover with the letters RBI painted on the side.

  Stone continued his story about the unusual joint venture between Sister Frances, his pharmaceutical company, and their yearly vaccine campaign. The sister understood the importance of the company’s support to her mission and she began to cater to the photographers, using the media attention to advance her worthy cause. For the past five years, Harvey Stone had hinted to her about a visit to the United States. “You’re practically a celebrity there,” he told her. But she had always declined.

  Until now.

  She came to realize that while millions lay waiting to die, one child at a time was not enough. So in a totally unexpected offer, she agreed to travel to the United States and give one woman’s plea for help. For RBI, her visit could not have come at a better time. The company planned to take full advantage of Sister Frances’s altruism.

  “Her itinerary is set,” Stone told Eli. “She’ll arrive in Memphis, early morning, and come straight here. A brief press conference will be held outside the front entrance. I want you there at her side, Eli, in a white coat. Say a few words about this being a historic visit, smile for the cameras, and then she’s off to D.C. on the jet for an appearance on Meet the Press.”

  “Meet the Press?”

  “Oh yeah, we’re cooking now,” Stone said proudly. “You’ll escort her in the company Lear. The publicity for RBI will be unparalleled.”

  “I’ve had some rather negative exposure in the press myself.”

  “Eli, that’s nothing for our publicity department. They can turn that around and make you look like a saint.”

  Sisters, saints. This was spiraling into quite the multifarious event.

  “When does her visit take place?”

  Harvey Stone glanced at Tsarina. “Sister Frances arrives early Sunday morning.”

  Eli walked in a dream-like state back to his new office through the sparkling laboratory facility. He tried to fit the pieces together.

  RBI was planning a publicity stunt. That’s what it was, for all practical purposes. Stone was exploiting the credibility of Sister D’Aquila, her years of servitude to the poor and suffering, to justify to the public the use of embryonic stem cell therapy before federal legislation allowed it. And Eli would be the front man for RBI, to add medical credibility to the whole scheme.

  As he sat behind his desk, Eli noticed that one drawer was ajar and the corner of a letter stuck out. Eli removed the envelope, which was embossed with the RBI logo and address. The seal had been torn. Inside was a small piece of paper folded in half.

  Prine’s handwriting, he assumed, was shaky but readable.

  And the message disturbingly simple:

  They’re hurting Henry.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  RBI

  EAST WING

  BIO SECURITY LAB #3

  The cells lined up in a neat little row, one after the other, like school children waiting for recess. They clung together in a cluster, safety in numbers. Other cells, a few, remained apart, isolated, each wanting to fuse with an identical sister cell, yet unable to move. All of the cells had one thing in common—naïveté. Yet each cell was full of life, wanting to express in full scream exactly who it was meant to be.

  Their home was warm and dark, precisely controlled at thirty-eight degrees Celsius. The cells spread out evenly on a playground of plastic and bathed in a wondrous straw-colored potion abundant with nutrients, balanced to perfection, much like the amniotic bath from which they were suctioned a few weeks before.

  “Hello, my darlings.”

  Tsarina stood before an open incubator and spoke to a single petri dish that lay on the metal rack.

  “How was your sleep? I prayed that you were warm.”

  Carefully, with both hands, she removed the dish and sat in a rocking chair in the corner of the laboratory. She cradled the dish, rocking ever so gently, the line of fluid steady in a mother’s calm lullaby.

  “Bring the cells, Tsarina.” James Korinsky was seated behind the microscope as he motioned to her. “Stop being foolish.”

  She eyed him with the jealousy of an estranged parent, but she followed his demand nonetheless. Just before the cells reached the hands of her former lover, Tsarina leaned over with the grace and intention of a goodnight kiss, pressing her lips to the plastic top.

  “Mama loves you.”

  Korinsky reached for the plate. “Tsarina! If these cells get infected, that’s it. What’s left of our child will be gone. You don’t want that, do you?”

  During the transfer, in Korinsky’s agitation, the plate tilted to one side and a stream of warm liquid media ran down the side of the dish and dripped on the floor.

  “See!” he yelled now. “Look what you’ve done.” He slid the plate beneath the microscope lens and moved the platform until a blurred mass of cells was visible through the liquid layer. He focused the scope until the ragged borders coalesced into sharp, clear membranes. Each cell resembled a tiny fried egg, the edge of the white bordering the next cell, the nucleus a central round yolk.

  Korinsky was distracted by escalating sobs coming from Tsarina, who stood next to him. Without moving his head, he glanced sideways at her, then back at the cells.

  “Have you prepared the endothelial cells? I have three new grafts that need to be coated. All scheduled for this afternoon.”
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  Tsarina turned her back toward him.

  “Okay, I’m sorry.” Korinsky said as he put his hand on her hip and caressed it.

  Tsarina walked away, letting his hand drop.

  Korinsky stood abruptly and the stool rolled backward and banged into the wall.

  “I’ve got to have those cells, Tsarina. You know that. Something’s wrong with the aortic grafts. They’re not engrafting like they should. Any more deaths and we could be finished.”

  Tsarina didn’t budge.All you care about is your surgery and your money, she thought.

  Korinsky kept berating her. “If device production shuts down, you can forget your precious stem cell therapy.”

  Tsarina slapped the door of the incubator. “I’ve got your damn cells.” She opened it and removed a T-60 flask. She held it up to the fluorescent light before setting it down on the bench top. “That should be more than enough.”

  Tsarina watched as Korinsky concealed the flask of cells in a leather briefcase. She would never forgive him for what he had done to her.

  To their child.

  It was more than three months ago when Korinsky told her, over and over, that as a surgeon, he could perform the procedure as well as any obstetrician. Tsarina eventually gave in, climbing on the table and lying there with her legs spread while he prepared the instruments.

  The sounds continued to haunt her, the horrid sucking, fluid gushing into the wall canister as though a clogged pipe had burst free, the clog ripped into a million cells, never to rejoin. And then more scraping, dull spoons against the rind.

  Why had she listened to him? Why did she have to be responsible for keeping his family together?His wife,his children?

  In the end, it was her guilt that made her go through with it, the guilt he placed on her that having the child would destroy his marriage, his family, and—as Tsarina knew was most important to him—his career. Now, all that remained was her guilt.

  They had met six months earlier at Bernie Lankford’s house. The senior RBI scientist was building the Division of Stem Cell Therapy. Dr. Tsarina Anatolia was the newest recruit, having finished a prestigious stem cell biology fellowship in Sweden, followed by a position as research scientist at the International Stem Cell Consortium in Singapore.