Freaking Camelot, Rye thought. Complete with treachery within.
Brynn was up there. Inside. Doing what? Making her profound apology to the Hunts for her subterfuge? No. No way. Not Brynn. She wouldn’t grovel, but she would honor her professional oath and assist Lambert if he asked her to. She had told Rye she wouldn’t let the precious, single dose of GX-42 go to waste, even if Violet wasn’t the one to benefit from it.
But what really concerned Rye was what would happen to Brynn afterward. He had warned both her and Lambert that once the drug was inside Richard Hunt’s system, he would be more determined than ever to safeguard the secret of his illness and how he’d schemed to get the drug. The only way to guarantee that the secret would never get out would be to permanently silence anyone who was privy to it.
Rye’s blood ran cold. He had to get to Brynn.
Once again, he tried appealing to the deputies. “Listen, guys, there’s a whole lot more at stake here than you realize. Lives are on the line. Dr. O’Neal and Nate Lambert are—”
He was cut off and hurled against the far door when the deputy who was driving gave the steering wheel a sharp turn to the right in order to avoid a head-on collision with a vehicle in the opposing lane that crossed the center stripe.
The deputy overcorrected to keep from plowing into the ditch, but managed to straighten out as he stood on the brakes. The squad car went into a rubber-burning, fishtailing skid before coming to a jarring stop on the narrow shoulder.
The other vehicle backed up and came alongside the squad car. The darkly tinted driver’s window came down. Rawlins’s bellicose face appeared in the opening.
Chapter 36
4:51 p.m.
Goliad ushered Nate and Brynn into the mansion through the front door. Timmy came in behind them.
“I know the way.” Nate struck off in an impatient and self-important stride toward the sitting room in the master suite.
With no enthusiasm whatsoever, Brynn followed.
She had been here twice before, the first being when Nate and she had explained to the couple the application process for compassionate use of an experimental drug, and then again when Nate had laid out his plan to bootleg a single dose.
“For a price,” Brynn remembered him saying. At the time, she had thought only in monetary terms. Now, she was thinking of the real price: Violet’s life.
She entered the sitting room through a set of double doors. Tall, handsome, and imposing, Richard Hunt stood in the center of the room beneath a chandelier, waiting for Nate and her to approach him.
The senator shook hands with Nate and told him he was glad to see him. “Likewise,” Nate gushed. “It’s been a day, to say the least.”
The senator’s American-eagle gaze moved to Brynn. He took in her dishevelment with obvious disdain. “Dr. O’Neal.”
With an equal shortage of warmth, she said, “Senator.”
Standing beside her husband, Delores looked as radiant as a blushing bride. Her cashmere sweater and wool slacks were the color of cream and so well tailored, they looked as though they had been poured over her shapely figure. Her blond mane was shiny, her makeup impeccably applied, jewelry expensive but understated.
The frostiness in her gaze belied her smile. “Dr. O’Neal. I understand that you journeyed all the way to Tennessee today to see Violet.”
“Yes.”
“Such an adorable and precocious little girl. Was she enjoying the special day the senator and I arranged for her?”
The woman’s saccharine tone made Brynn want to grind her teeth. “I don’t know.” She looked at Timmy where he stood sentinel with Goliad in front of the double doors, now closed. “I was waylaid before I could see her.”
“What a pity. A wasted trip, then.”
Delores executed a graceful turn to welcome Nate with a quick hug and air kisses on both cheeks. Then she reached for her husband’s hand and clasped it between hers. “Finally. Let’s do this, for godsake.”
An IV pole had been positioned at the side of an oversize easy chair. Aimed toward it was a video camera already mounted on a tripod. Ancillary lights had been placed around the room, but, after looking through the camera, Nate decided he liked the warmer, cozier, non-clinical nuance created by lamplight alone. He dimmed the chandelier.
The camera set-up belonged to the Hunts, but Nate was both star and director of the video that would document what he referred to as “this monumental moment in medical history.”
Brynn was happy to be excluded. Even if he had invited her to share his limelight or to comment on camera, she would have declined.
The entire scene disgusted her. She felt like a stage prop in a surreal play, and wouldn’t have believed it was actually happening if she couldn’t feel Goliad’s unwavering dark stare on her. It was as though he’d been commissioned to see to it that she didn’t try to abort the infusion. If she made an attempt, he would stop her.
Days in advance, Nate had brought in all the apparatus he would need. A portable table had been set up for his use. He draped it and the senator’s chair with sterile sheets. He pulled on a pair of latex gloves, snapping them against his wrists. He inserted the IV shunt into the vein in the bend of the senator’s elbow.
Delores laughed and said, “We have everything except the drug. Who has it?”
Timmy sauntered forward and took it from his inside pocket.
Upon seeing the small familiar bundle, Brynn’s heart clenched.
Delores reached for it first and held it against her cheek, then handed it to her husband, who said, “There were times when I doubted this moment would ever come.”
Brynn watched as Richard passed it along to Nate. He tore away the bubble wrap and set the vial on the table next to a syringe.
Then, for the benefit of the camera, he explained what would take place next. “It’s remarkably easy. I will inject the syringe of GX-42 into this bag of a compatible IV fluid. It will take approximately an hour to drain the bag. After infusion, GX-42 goes to work.”
He expounded on the remarkable results achieved on laboratory animals. In greater and more scientific detail than she had used with Rye, he explained how the drug worked, and projected that it would be a breakthrough in the treatment of hematologic cancers.
A rumble of thunder drew Brynn’s attention to the shuttered window. The sky had turned dark, although it was only a little after five o’clock, not quite sundown. She wondered if Rye was already airborne.
Nate was putting his heart and soul into his speech, touting himself as a pioneer, willing to gamble on the drug’s efficacy when it hadn’t yet been officially FDA-approved for clinical trials. “Yet, at tremendous risk to my professional reputation, I did what I believed was right for my patient.”
Brynn was curious as to who would ever see this video except Nate himself. How much satisfaction could he derive from viewing it in private and celebrating his accomplishment alone?
The Hunts had been such sticklers for keeping the senator’s cancer under wraps that Brynn was surprised they had consented to Nate’s recording at all. Weren’t they the least bit worried that his ego would compel him to share it with colleagues whom he perceived as competition?
She looked over to where the senator sat in his chair, primed to receive the infusion. His wife sat on an ottoman near him. Each appeared to be listening, but like people who were trapped at a banquet with a boring after-dinner speaker at the podium.
Nate was so caught up in his own elocution, he didn’t realize that their interest was marginal at best. They were indifferent to what he was saying into the camera.
Suddenly, Brynn recalled Rye’s cautionary words about what would happen after Richard Hunt received the drug.