Syndrome by Thomas Hoover (best ereader for pdf txt) 📕

Wednesday, April 8

3:22 P.M.

As Stone Aimes stepped off the elevator on the sixth floor, his mind was running through his options. This phone call had to be about Winston Bartlett. He was going to step up the pressure. First there was the hellfire meeting in Jane’s office, and now he’d seen a kidnapping. Maybe this was about that. Was Jane going to pass along a threat of legal action if that crime got reported?

The managing editor, Jay, had left a message with the third-floor receptionist, Rhonda, to be forwarded to Stone. Gist: he was urgently required in the office of their corporate counsel.

What does this tell me? he wondered. That they’re going to try to do something to me that could have legal ramifications?

No, more likely it means that I’m going to be given an ultimatum, maybe an injunction. And Jane gets to deliver it with all the legal trimmings.

Still, he was determined to go on. “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you jive.” Right? Well, not necessarily. But at the least, the truth could make a hell of a book. And with that came financial freedom, at least for a while….

The hallway felt desolate and ominous as he walked through the doorway that opened onto the cubicles. Jane Tully was down on the third floor, but he wanted to stop by his desk first and see if there’d been any further communications from Winston Bartlett. Possibly there still could be a deal in the making The room itself was silent, no one meeting his eye. Maybe, he thought, it’s the middle of the afternoon and everybody’s dozing off from a late lunch. But when he got to his cubicle, he realized why he had suddenly become invisible. The top of his desk was bare, and there were three large cardboard boxes sitting on the gray carpet next to it.

“I think I get the picture,” he said to the empty space.

It looked like Winston Bartlett had just provided him with a career decision. For a moment he felt his life passing before his eyes, but then all he could think about was the future. This was not just the end of a wage-slave era; it was the beginning of the next phase of his life.

He saw everyone still avoiding his eyes as he turned around and walked back to the elevator. How much did Jane know about this? She had to know everything, which was why Jay sent him to see her. She would have no qualms about giving someone the ax, including a former lover.

When he stepped off the elevator on the third floor, Rhonda looked at him as though he were a corpse.

“She’s—”

“I know she’s here. Don’t bother buzzing her.”

He strode purposefully down the hallway, realizing it was probably the last time he’d ever walk it, and pushed open Jane’s door. She was on the phone and looked up startled putting her hand over the mouthpiece.

“What—”

“Just came to say farewell. Jay told me to come see you. I guess he was sure you’d want to be part of this important life moment.”

“Stone, for God’s sake”-she turned back to the phone—“let me… I’ll call you tomorrow.” She slammed down the receiver. “You have to know I had nothing to do with this. Bartlett got to the Family. I think it was one of those noblesse oblige kind of things. Old Money meets New Money and needs to placate it. The Sentinel is only marginally a profit-making enterprise and the last thing they need is a lot of shit from their landlord. He wanted you gone. And since your job was a small price for them to pay to ensure domestic tranquility, do the math. Sorry, but that’s how it had to be. For God’s sake, Stone, why did you drive him to this?”

The ironic thing was, she was managing to look vaguely contrite-tugging at a lock of short hair. He wasn’t sure how she had the brass. Apologies from the executioner are traditionally a tough sell.

“Let me tell you something, Jane. I already know more about Winston Bartlett than he wants. He had somebody kidnapped today before my very eyes. I even got slugged trying to stop it. So you can tell his lawyers to tell him he’d better back off. The people who did it were recognized and they work for him. If he wants to play tough, I could have a heartfelt exchange with somebody I know very well at the Sixth Precinct, and also with the tabloids, where I know a shitload of hungry columnists. Winston Bartlett could get real famous, real fast”

“Stone, you brought this on yourself. I tried to warn you, but you’re hell-bent on your own destruction. You’re your own worst enemy.” She picked up her Blackberry and switched it off and sighed. “You never listened to me before and I don’t expect you to do it now, but take some free advice anyway: try not to piss off important people. It is frequently a negative career move.”

“Jane, you know John Kennedy once said, ‘Sometimes party loyalty asks too much,’ and I think that moment for me, is now. From here on, I’m going to be doing what I need to do, not what Bartlett or Jay or whoever tells me to do. I guess that includes you too. There comes a time when I have to do what’s in my heart.”

She was finally focusing, looking at him strangely. “Stone, what did you just say? Bartlett had somebody kidnapped? Today? What on earth are you talking about?”

“Did I secure your vagrant attention? Good. Actually, it was less than an hour ago. There’s no point in going into details, but I’m pretty sure she was the patient terminated from the clinical trials at the Dorian Institute that I had you ask Bartlett’s lawyers about. I think there’s the possibility that something really weird began happening to her out there in New Jersey. But I didn’t get a chance to talk to her because they grabbed her and took off.”

“Well, what do you think happened to her out there?”

“The only thing I’ve heard and that’s secondhand is that she lost some part of her memory. She’s even having trouble remembering her name.”

“How do you know all this?” she asked staring at him. “Were you-?”

“I… know somebody who talked with her this morning. Just a few short exchanges on the phone. That’s all I can tell you. They’re doing something very powerful there at the institute, but in her case it seems to have gone horribly wrong. That’s my best guess. So they dropped her from the clinical trials and gave her a new identity and stashed her someplace incommunicado. But she got away for a couple of hours, somehow, and managed to go back to her old apartment. In her case, it’s a Village town house. But Bartlett nabbed her back.”

“If you really believe all that, Stone, shouldn’t you be worried for your own safety?” It was clear she was finally taking him seriously.

“Bartlett got me fired. That’s probably enough for now. I don’t know enough to be a threat to him. Yet.”

“But what if you find out… whatever it is you’re looking for? Then—”

“Then I’ll know if medical miracles sometimes come with a strange price.”

She was looking at him, pity entering her dark eyes. “What are you going to do for money? The child support you send to Amy?” She hesitated. “I’m so sorry about this, Stone. If you need a little help for the short term, I could—”

“Don’t go there. I can take cash out on a couple of credit cards. And when I turn in the manuscript for the book, I’ll get the other two-thirds of the advance. After that, I’m hoping I might get an actual career.”

“Oh, Stone, I’m really sorry about this,” she said with feeling. “Truly I am. I… I guess I still enjoy seeing you. Having you around. You’re a mensch, you know that? Whatever your other failings, and God knows they’re plenty, you were always kind. You’re even kind to people who don’t necessarily wish you well.”

“Well, tell that to Amy if you ever get the chance. Sometimes she thinks her dad is the meanest guy alive. Particularly when I don’t honor her every whim.”

“You’re a good father too.” She sighed.

For Stone, this was always the moment that he wanted her back-when she let her guard down.

“Dammit, Stone, why couldn’t we make a go of it?”

“We stopped having fun, Jane. That’s all that happened. I started to bore you. Back then I didn’t provide enough excitement, enough Sturm und Drang in your life.”

“You weren’t dull, Stone, but sometimes you could be maddeningly smug.”

“That may be about to change. Now that I’m an unemployed freelancer. And I just ran into a blast from the past. Who knows what my life is about to be like?” He turned to leave. “By the way, give my best to Jay. Hopefully, he’ll be the last managing editor I’ll ever have to suck up to.”

“Take care, Stone.” She was getting up. “You can fight this, you know. They had me write up some kind of bullshit breach-of-contract brief, in case you wouldn’t go quietly. But it’s full of holes. I know, since I deliberately wrote it that way.”

“Hey, thanks anyway. It’s not worth it. I’m not going to fight to keep a job I never liked all that much in the first place. Every time I wanted to do some serious journalism-like that piece about using the Internet to store everybody’s medical records-Jay always found a reason not to run it. I’ve only got so much dignity to lose.”

He turned and strode out of the office, deciding to forego any more farewells. Besides, he had better things to do. Get somebody from the mailroom to carry the boxes-the shards of his erstwhile, so-called career-to the lobby, where he could get a cab. Take the files home, stash them, and then get going.