I called Rachel when I arrived at MetroVista. She was parked down the street from Denise Vanech’s house. We were both ready to go.
I’m not sure what I expected to happen here. I guess I figured that I would explode into Bacard’s office, stick my gun in his face, and demand answers. What I hadn’t foreseen was a regular, state-of-the-state office setup—that is, Steven Bacard had a well-appointed reception area. There were two people waiting—a married couple, by all appearances. The husband had his face stuck in a waiting-room-laminatedSports Illustrated . The wife looked to be in pain. She tried to smile at me, but it was as if the effort would wound her.
I realized how shoddy I must look. I was still in my hospital scrubs. I was unshaven. My eyes were undoubtedly red from lack of sleep. My hair, I imagined, was probably sticking up in a textbook case of bedhead.
The receptionist was behind one of those sliding glass windows I usually associate with a dental practice. The woman—a small nameplate readAGNES WEISS —smiled at me sweetly.
“May I help you?”
“I’m here to see Mr. Bacard.”
“Do you have an appointment?” She kept the tone sweet, but there was a rhetorical twang there too. She already knew the answer.
“This is an emergency,” I said.
“I see. Are you a client of ours, Mr. . . . ?”
“Doctor,” I snapped back automatically. “Tell him Dr. Marc Seidman needs to see him immediately. Tell him it’s an emergency.”
The young couple was watching us now. The receptionist’s sweet smile began to falter. “Mr. Bacard’s schedule is very full today.” She opened her appointment ledger. “Let me see when we have something available, okay?”
“Agnes, look at me.”
She did.
I gave her my gravest, you-might-die-if-I-don’t-operate-right-away expression. “Tell him Dr. Seidman is here. Tell him it’s an emergency. Tell him if he doesn’t see me now, I will go to the police.”
The young couple exchanged a glance.
Agnes adjusted herself in the chair. “If you’ll just have a seat—”
“Tell him.”
“Sir, if you don’t step back, I’ll call security.”
So I stepped back. I could always step forward again. Agnes did not pick up the phone. I moved to a nonthreatening distance. She slid the little window closed. The couple looked at me. The husband said, “She’s covering for him.”
The wife said, “Jack!”
Jack ignored her. “Bacard ran out of here half an hour ago. That receptionist keeps telling us he’ll be right back.”
I noticed a wall of photographs. Now I took a closer look. The same man was in all of them with a potpourri of politicos, quasi celebrities, gone-to-flab athletes. Steven Bacard, I assumed. I stared at the man’s face—pudgy, weak chinned, country-club shiny.
I thanked the man named Jack and started for the door. Bacard’s office was on the first floor, so I decided to wait by the entrance. This way, I could catch him unawares on neutral ground and before Agnes had a chance to warn him. Five minutes passed. Several suits came and went, all harried from their days of printer toner and paperweights, dragged down by briefcases the size of car trunks. I paced the corridor.
Another couple entered. I could tell right away by their tentative steps and shattered eyes that they, too, were heading for Bacard’s office. I watched them and wondered what path they had taken here. I saw them getting married, holding hands, kissing freely, making love in the morning. I saw their careers begin to thrive. I saw them feel the pang and segue toward the initial attempts at conceiving, the wait-till-next-month shrug when the home tests were negative, the slowly blossoming worry. A year passes. Still nothing. Their friends are starting to have children now and talk about them incessantly. Their parents are wondering when they’ll have grandkids. I see them visiting the doctor—“a specialist”—the endless probing for the woman, the humiliation of masturbating into a beaker for the man, the personal questions, the blood and urine samples. More years pass. Their friends drift away. Making love is now strictly about procreation. It is calculated. It is always tinged with sadness. He stops holding her hand. She rolls over at night unless it’s the right time in her cycle. I see the drugs, the Pergonal, the ridiculously expensive in-vitro fertilization, the time off from work, the checking of calendars, the same home tests, the crushing disappointments.
And now they were here.
No, I didn’t know if any of this was really the case. But somehow I suspected that I was close. How far, I wondered, would they go to end this pain? How much would they pay?
“Oh my God! Oh my God!”
I jerked my head toward the scream. A man banged through the door.
“Call nine-one-one!”
I ran toward him. “What is it?”
I heard another scream. I ran through the door and outside. Yet another scream, this one more high pitched. I turned to my right. Two women were running out of the lower-level parking garage. I sprinted down the ramp. I slipped past the gate where you pick up your parking ticket. Someone else was calling for help, begging people to call 911.
Up ahead, I saw a security guard shouting into a walkie-talkie of some sort. He broke into a full gallop too. I followed him. When we turned the corner, the security guard pulled up. There was a woman next to him. She had her hands on her cheeks and was screaming. I ran next to them and looked down.
The body was jammed between two cars. His eyes stared open at nothing. His face was still pudgy, weak chinned, country-club shiny. The blood flowed from the wound in his head. The world teetered again.
Steven Bacard, maybe my last hope, was dead.
Chapter 41
Rachel rang thedoorbell. Denise Vanech had one of those pretentious chimes that ring up and then down the scale. The sun was all the way up now. The sky was blue and clear. On the street, two women power-walked carrying tiny mauve dumbbells. They nodded at Rachel, never missing a step. Rachel nodded back.
The intercom sounded. “Yes?”
“Denise Vanech?”
“Who is this please?”
“My name is Rachel Mills. I used to work with the FBI.”
“Did you say, used to?”
“Yes.”
“What do you want?”
“We need to talk, Ms. Vanech.”
“About what?”
Rachel sighed. “Could you please just open the door?”
“Not until I know what this is about.”