CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

Marianna watched Dr. Forester lift his daughter onto his lap and smooth the little girl’s hair. She thought of her own childhood, of how her mother and father’s nearness would erase the ugliness of the world. The gift of parents is to hide the real world until one is old enough to cope. He is clearly a good father to Julia, but from what she’d seen and what the talkative Zoë had told her, the bond between him and his niece was broken. That was not good for either of them. It saddened her to think of a fatherless girl like Kaitlyn having a stepmother with many problems. Her roots had been torn away. It would be hard for her to grow strong. She may not.

A song her mother used to sing at bedtime came to mind. Oi Khodyt Son Kolo Vikon. She still knew it by heart. Why not share now? She began singing. Dr. Forester and the little girl looked over at her with surprise. She smiled at them and kept singing.

“What do the words mean, Daddy?” Julia wondered aloud. He put a finger to his lips.

For some reason the melody always reminded Marianna of a river twisting by bare trees under a moon. As she sang, she thought of Anatoly, praying he would survive, forgiving him if he betrayed her. And she thought of Olesia, how they had sung this one night in harmony to their mother before she died. Three times Marianna sang the verses for Julia, each one a little softer. By the last, the girl slept.

Jack smiled over at her, which was nice to see for a man with much weight on his back, a man of many layers. He was a person made to help others; she could see that. A person who would sacrifice. Maybe too much. She had known some doctors like that. Their need to give became almost a sickness, a death wish.

He carried the little girl to bed, then returned and asked if he could freshen her drink. She accepted.

“Thank you,” he said, returning from the kitchen and handing her the glass. “That was lovely. You have a very nice voice.”

“Not as good as my mother or sister.”

“What was the song?”

“In English the name would be ‘The Dream Passes by the Window.’”

“The melody was very soothing,” he said. “It almost made me forget all the puzzles we’re dealing with.”

“Yes. We have more questions than answers. Most true.”

“One of my big questions is this,” he said. “If the impostor they sent over here was involved in Chad’s death—why did she do it?”

“I was thinking this too. I believe it was nothing personal against the young man. We have an old saying that when the wolf is hunting for sheep, he attacks the nearest lamb to make them all run. That way he can see which ones are too slow.”

“I’m feeling dense,” he said. “I’m not sure how that applies to this situation.”

“Maybe she wanted to see what would happen because he died. He was just the lamb. But I don’t know.”

He gazed ahead and took a deep breath. “Interesting. A murder of opportunity. His death certainly ruined our best chance to avoid being taken over by HWA.”

“I met the leader of this company—Dr. Haines is his name?”

“You did?” he said, surprised.

“By accident. He was in your office when I first arrive today. Very tall man. When you were talking with him, your assistant Tré told me who he was. You mention while we drove home that for HWA to get your hospital would be like Russia devouring Ukraine.”

“Yes. That’s a comparison the impostor gave me.”

She sipped and felt the liquid warm her chest. “She came to spy on you, this I know because they told me. Could it be that the oligarch had her kill him to help the HWA people?”

He looked up at the ceiling and seemed to turn this idea over in his mind as he swirled his drink. Then he shook his head. “That seems far-fetched. Too complicated. Why would a Russian oligarch be in cahoots with a thriving American health care company? Nope, I think HWA was just a lucky bystander.”

“I do not know the word cahoots.”

“It means to be in association with. To be partners with.”

“I see. Cahoots. Nice word. I will remember it.”

“Marianna, who exactly is this oligarch, Potemkin? Tell me more about him.”

“I believe the one involved is Mikhail Potemkin, the most open criminal of them all. That is saying much. I wrote a story about him when he had a witness against him murdered in Kyiv, and again when he created his own country. I know he was unhappy about me because I make it harder for him to do business in Ukraine.”

“He created his own country?”

“Not of land. He turned his very big yacht into a floating nation with him as leader. A mobile state. Gives him much impunity from laws. The process was blessed by Vladimir Putin, his old friend. They are all old friends, the oligarchs. That’s how people become rich there, and this Potemkin is beyond dreams wealthy.”

“Where does his money come from?”

“Many businesses. Some of them not criminal. But his main work is with—what’s the phrase—cyber . . .?

“Cybercrime?” Jack offered.

She nodded. “Yes. He is a computer genius with advanced degree in computer science from what Americans call ‘MIT.’ He helped create some famous spyware programs there, like Pegasus. He worked on the Stuxnet worm, the one that attacked Iran. His ship is full of computers, a floating factory for these crimes. Lots of money.”

“You’re a brave person to take on someone like that.”

“Brave maybe, but more than anything, I am an angry person. These people follow no humanity. Life is all a jungle to them. Kill and prosper. Kill to get what you want. Potemkin has killed many people. One of his favorite ways to assassinate inconvenient people is to hack the computer of cars and cause accidents. He uses poison too. And old-fashioned bullets.”

“I didn’t know cars could be hacked.”

“Anything that connects with internet can be hacked, Dr. Forester. Don’t you know this? Cars, phones, refrigerators, all these things. They tell me that cars are not that difficult. They plant a worm in the car that lets them follow with GPS and take over brakes and steering when the car is at the right place. Then bang. Very cruel.”

She watched him frown thoughtfully.

“The university comptroller died in an accident last week,” he said. “After the medical center’s financial crisis was discovered. It made it look as if she felt responsible.”

“This is something Potemkin could do. Maybe he wanted people to think that she felt guilty. We don’t know anything right now. And anything is possible.”

His cell phone began chiming. Taking it out, he looked at her. “It’s Investigator Dirkens. Maybe she has news about the DNA.”

Out of the speaker came the same female she’d heard over the phone in his office. After apologizing for the lateness of the call, she hesitated a moment, then said she had some unwelcome news.

“What’s that?” he asked.

“You’d better sit down. I need to let you know that Bryson Witner escaped from the Patterson Institute this evening.”

“I don’t believe it,” he said, sagging back in the chair.

“Neither did I at first,” she said. “But it’s true, and given that you were once a target of his, we’re sending out a car to keep an eye on your place twenty-four seven until he’s caught.”

He shook his head and sighed. “How did he do it?”

“It looks like he killed a counselor and used the man’s clothes and ID to waltz out. Then he stole the counselor’s car. The state police suspect he had inside help. The CCTV in his room failed at just the right time. A patrol car should be arriving at your place right about now. Please confirm.”

He strode to the deck doors and looked out. “There’s a car. It’s blinking its lights.”

“That’s them. Doctor, you and your family need to remain in place until this is over. I don’t need to tell you how smart and dangerous he is.”

“No, you don’t. By the way, do you have anything on new DNA samples from Kyiv or the fingerprints from England?”

“Not yet. We should have results tomorrow or the next day. I’ll contact you. Listen, if you step out of the house for any reason, let the officers know. I’ll text you their cell number.”

The call over, he sat staring at the wall.

“Dr. Forester,” Marianna said, “who is this person who escaped?”

“A ghost from the past,” he said. “Do you like Stephen King novels?”

“I am not the best fan of those books, but I have read a couple, yes. He makes the pages turn with fear. He is skilled at frightening.”

“I’m not sure that even he could have invented a villain like Bryson Witner.”

She leaned forward and listened as he talked. Bryson Witner was a brilliant physician who, after leaving a position at Harvard, had joined the endocrinology department faculty at the New Canterbury Medical Center. That was about seven years ago. He was very charismatic and charmed many people at the medical school. When the previous dean was killed in a scuba diving accident shortly after Witner arrived, he became the acting dean and tried to bring about ambitious innovations, obviously aiming to take the place over. But there were some, including Dr. Forester and his wife, who felt that things were not right with Witner. They became suspicious that Witner was behind the death of the previous dean, which turned out to be true. Turns out Witner was a high-functioning paranoid schizophrenic and a serial killer. He’d also murdered one of his colleagues at New Canterbury and killed his own lover.

“Nobody thought him insane before he came?” she asked.

“He’d had a nervous breakdown while working at Harvard and was hospitalized for a good while. But, in hindsight, it was more than just a generic episode from overwork. It was a full-blown case of psychosis, and he may have been responsible for the death of a patient, though it was never proven. In any case, Harvard was happy to see him leave and didn’t go into great detail on their reference letter.”

“The investigator said you were his prime target. Why is this, Dr. Forester?”

“Witner never liked me from the beginning, and the feeling was mutual. At first I just thought he was overly ambitious and arrogant. But my wife was a journalist then, and when she interviewed him for an article she picked up the fact that he was a master manipulator. She thought he was hiding something. We weren’t married yet, had just started seeing each other. Meanwhile, it turned out he tried to kill one of my mentors, who was also putting two and two together.

“She must have been a very good journalist.” He looked away and appeared to lose himself in thought. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It is still hard for you to talk about her.”

“It is,” he said, clearing his throat. “But in any case, I went to Boston and managed to get a look at the records from his hospitalization. What I saw was very scary. He’d had this whole bizarre delusional worldview where most people were infected by some sort of virus, and it was his duty to take them out. While I was gone, Zellie put herself at great personal risk by visiting his home before I had a chance to tell her what I’d learned. To make a long story short, we finally flushed him out into the open. But just before he was finally arrested, he tried to kill us both. With a shotgun. Almost succeeded.”

“My God. He really is like a villain from Stephen King. Or the Inferno of Dante. The investigator was smart to send protection for you. I hope they catch him soon.”

“I’m sure they will.” He caught her eyes. “I hate to drag you into this.”

“No—it is me who drags you into trouble,” she said. Then, unable to hold back a yawn, she set down her drink and yielded to it. Exhaustion swept over her.

“You should get some sleep.”

She stifled another yawn and stood. “Yes. I will sleep. Thank you for everything.”