. 05

From The Case Files of Dr. Randall Herringwick

The Case of the Devil's Advocate

Chapter Five: One-Time-Only Deal

CASE FILES - PERSONAL NOTES - PATIENTS 333 & 334 - DAY SEVEN

I followed the enticingly swaying ass of Gladys Rothman up the long flight of stairs toward the top floor of the theater. She had an instinctive way of translating each step she took into a sensuous swing of her hips, an almost serpentine motion that made me think of Lily's first story. I wondered if Gladys had worked at that or if it came naturally to her.

At the top of the steps, she paused and used her keys... the same keys that had gained us entrance to the building... and she open the hardwood door and led me boldly, confidently down the short, narrow hallway and into a large room that seemed to meet the requirements of all rooms at once: a kitchen and dining nook to my right, a couch and TV to my left. Ahead of us and to the left, beyond the couch, in a spot that commanded a view of two sides of the building plus the entirety of the room, sat a man at a large oak desk. The view was impressive through the huge windows behind him, as well as to his left and across the room; though the other buildings around us were either abandoned or in disrepair. Some of them were taller even than this, and I judged us to be two or three stories above the street below.

I was several steps behind Gladys, and he didn't notice me at first, so I had the opportunity to observe his facial features as they went through a dramatic range of changes... recognition, surprise, impatience, anger... each more emphatic than its predecessor. Frankly, I couldn't see the resemblance. He was dark haired while his sister was blonde. He was stout and muscular while Gladys was lithe and graceful. He was also obviously pissed off.

"You BITCH!" he screamed. "Where the hell have you been!? There's a gathering tonight! I've had to make all the plans on my own! I had to hire a cleaning service to...." He paused, flustered, as he finally noticed me while I stepped around her. "Who the goddamn hell are YOU?!" he screamed.

"You are Franklin Bonkowski, I presume. I am Randall Herringwick, your sister's doctor. How do you do?"

"Doctor? What kind of doctor?"

I gave a small shrug. "Psychiatry."

He gave a dismissive laugh, then seemed to disregard me altogether and gave all his attention to Gladys. "You brought your goddamned SHRINK here? You think that's going to make any fuckin' difference? Christ, sis! You're a real piece of work, you know that? Now, get this asshole out of here! We have work to do!"

She blanched at his rebuke. "Actually, I have an offer for you," I interrupted. "A rather generous offer, at that."

He cast a smirk in my direction. "The cost of joining us for an evening's entertainment is a thousand dollars per. That's two grand for you and your wife or girlfriend. Hetero only. No exceptions. No discounts. We're full tonight, but we might be able to squeeze you in next Saturday."

I found that my hands were clenched, and I consciously flexed my fingers at my sides. "As I said," I continued, hoping that I was portraying only professionalism, "a generous offer, but a one-time-only deal. If you agree to have no contact with either of my patients...."

"Patients? Plural?"

"Lily Randolph is also under my care."

He sat back in his desk chair and steepled his fingers. "Ah. Little Lily. The girl with the wimp-husband. The girl who will do anything... and I mean anything... that I tell her to do. No, doctor" (he turned the word into a sneering epithet), "I think that you're going to find that young Lily might be under your care, but she is firmly under MY control. In point of fact, she should be coming here very soon. I hired someone to drop by and pick her up."

"Someone has gone into the apartment building to get her?" I asked, startled. I thrust my hand into my jacket pocket and pulled out my cell phone, then stabbed at it with a fingertip.

My shaken expression clearly pleased him. "Go ahead. Call her. She's not there."

I listened for a moment, then I touched the screen again dejectedly and took a deep breath. "My final offer still stands. If you agree to have no contact with my patients, I won't insist that they press charges against you."

He threw back his head and laughed. "WHAT charges? No, doctor... we will make no deals, now or ever. I control them, and you have no proof of any wrongdoing."

I was still holding the cell phone in front of me, and I regarded it sourly. "There's proof of drugs in their systems."

"But you have no proof that I provided them."

"I could call the authorities and have them search this building."

He barked another laugh. "You really think some judge is going to issue a search warrant based on no evidence? And... even if you convinced somebody in the DA's office to get one somehow, I can guarantee you that they would find nothing. By the time they got here with the proper paperwork, there would be nothing TO find."

I looked uncertainly at him, then steeled my resolve. "I will not abandon my patients! I will not let this matter rest!"

His right hand went down behind the surface of the desk for a moment, then reemerged holding a short, silver-plated revolver. "On the contrary, I think you will."

"Oh, shit," I groaned, raising both of my hands, which was awkward, because my right was still holding the phone. "I thought you said he didn't have a gun!" I took a big step to my left, putting myself between Gladys and the man with the pistol.

"He didn't!" Gladys exclaimed earnestly, straining to peer around my shoulder. "He's never owned a gun in his life! He HATES guns! Frankie, what the hell are you doing!?"

"I never owned a gun because I never had anything worth protecting," he said matter-of-factly. "Now, I do. This is a sweet gig, sis. I'm not about to jeopardize it just because you think you need a little help from a sleazy headshrinker. Only I can give you what you want, kid. I can give you what you need. He can't. You don't need anything from this bozo."

"But he HAS helped me, Frankie! I'm never going to smoke that shit of yours again! Ever!"

"You don't need to worry about that, Gladys. I'll take good care of you. I was about to take you to the next level, anyway. I've got something even better right here in the desk. You're going to LOVE how this stuff makes you feel! And after this stunt of yours, I see that I should have done it a lot sooner. Trust me. You won't need this buffoon, or your asshole husband, or anybody else but me." He saw that she wasn't going to respond, and he turned his attention back to me. "And now to deal with you, fuckhead. Any other brilliant comments?"

I shrugged. "Well, yes, actually. You have a spot on your shirt."

His face took on an incredulous look, and he barked a single laugh. "Say what?"

But Gladys craned her neck around me, gaping at her brother. "You... you really DO have a spot," she affirmed. "What IS that?"

He issued another laugh. "I'm about to shoot a trespasser in my apartment, and you're both trying to divert my attention? Really?"

"He's not looking at the spot, Jasper," I said evenly.

"Not a very bright man," my cell phone's speaker said succinctly. "Still, a spot on a shirt might not be viewed with the proper degree of criticality. Perhaps if the spot was on his forehead, instead."

The bright red spot in the center of Franklin Bonkowski's shirt slowly rose up past his chin, then climbed along the bridge of his nose and between his eyes. Reflexively, the man raised his free hand up in front of him, shielding his eyes and squinting at something through the window in front of and above him, to his left. "What the fuck?" he muttered.

I shrugged and acted nonchalant. Then I was surprised when I understood that it wasn't actually an act at all. I really DID feel that way. My inner demons had been kept at bay in recent months. Daphne Ludwig had helped me do so. For this little adventure, however, she removed the hypnotic safety instructions that had been keeping them in check. For THIS fiend, she told me, my demons might just come in handy. I suddenly realized that I'd missed them very much.

"You have a gun," I said, smiling; "and we have a gun."

Bonkowski took a step to his right, still keeping the pistol trained on me. Nervously, he glanced down at the red dot that had shifted back to his center mass. The muscles of his face twitched a couple times, then locked into a stern frown. I realized that this wasn't going to end well.

"Bullshit!" he growled. "It's all bullshit! A fucking head-shrinker and a dude on the roof across the street with a cell phone and a laser pointer!" Again, he seemed to falter, and again he appeared to make up his mind. "You're bluffing! You don't have the balls! Record it on your phone, if you want, asshole!" he commented loudly. "The fact remains. I have the right to protect myself and my apartment! Fuck you all!"

"Cover!" the cellphone barked.

The guy on the roof across the street was Jasper Reynolds, a man from a detective agency I had employed during one of my little illicit case studies. He was also a good friend. And... I relied completely on his professionalism. He had briefed me what to do when he used that particular code word, and I move swiftly and confidently. However, everything seemed to happen all at once; and since I was facing the action, I got to witness it firsthand. I will describe it to you in three easy pieces, because the entire process took three brief seconds.

Second One: The red dot shifted downward and to the right (my right, that is), and settled on the surface of the desk near its edge, where it appeared to waver slightly. At the same instant, Bonkowski pulled the trigger of the revolver that was aimed at my chest. It made a distinct noise, unlike anything I'd ever experienced: a small, loud "pop." It scared the bejesus out of me. I had started spinning my body to my left, toward the girl, but I was still looking at the man holding the gun.

Second Two: A large portion of the tall window on my right side suddenly became milky-opaque. In point of fact, it had dissolved into about a thousand tiny shards; but, since we are discussing Second Two only, the window appeared to momentarily remain in its given place. The right portion of the oak desk exploded. That's really the only word for it. If dynamite had been used, I don't think anything would have been different; at least not from my perspective. My left hand (the one not holding the cellphone) had grabbed Gladys' right arm, and I was pulling her toward me as I continued to spin to my left.

Second Three: I can't be a good judge of what was going on around Bonkowski, because I had completed my turn. My head was down next to the girl's face, my arms were wrapped protectively around hers, trapping her arms at her sides. My back was to the desk. The sounds around us were deafening. The distinctive noise of breaking glass seemed to provide a background to the cacophony of clashing noises: breaking wood, crumbling masonry, the hiss of tiny particles whizzing all around us; and finally, at long last, the roaring bang of a rifle. The one thing I remember most vividly of the whole thing, is the shock of how far removed that bang was from the bullet that had previously done all the damage.

Long seconds later, the cellphone inquired: "Are you two okay?"

I straightened up from the girl, searching her shaking, shocked face, then the luscious body beneath it. My back hurt. "Jasper!" I said, probably too loudly over the ringing in my ears. "What the fuck was THAT, Jasper?"

The phone's speaker was still perfectly audible above the noise of debris settling on the floor all around us. "That, my friend, was the Barett M82A1, the most powerful sniper rifle in the world, firing a special steel-jacketed fifty caliber BMG round of depleted uranium. I could tell you more later; but right now, I think I might be having an orgasm. I ab-sol-ute-ly LOVE this weapon!"

Checking the woman again, I determined she could stand on her own, and I left her and walked toward what was left of the desk. It was hard to believe, but the thing was still standing, though a fourth of it was missing. Franklin Bonkowski was on the floor, leaning against the wall behind the desk. His eyes were open, staring and darting frantically at everything around him. They suddenly focused on me.

"Help me," he whispered.

I ignored him. He was sitting beneath yet another window, but it remained intact. About two feet to his left, there was a hole in the spot where the floor met the wall; and the hole made a tunnel, through sheetrock and plaster and wood and brick and mortar and out into the late-afternoon air where birds had just started singing again. If the bullet had remained on this particular trajectory, I discovered, staring through the tunnel, it would have impacted at the base of a deserted building that sat across a vacant lot from the theater. Jasper would have thought about that, of course. As I've said, he's a professional.

I turned and looked up along that path in the other direction. Each of the windows consisted of three tall panes, and only the middle one was now a layer of splinters at my feet. I saw movement. Then an arm extended from the rooftop across the street and waved.

"Holy fucking shit, Jasper!" I said.

"I LOVE this weapon," the phone repeated. "I bet that with a dozen well-placed rounds, I could take down the whole fuckin' building."

I ignored that. "He fired his gun. I thought you said you'd removed the bullets."

"I did, doc. I couldn't very well remove the casings, though. It's a revolver. He'd have seen it wasn't loaded. I pried out the slugs and dumped the powder. The caps were still there, of course. I didn't have any thirty-eight casings to replace them with, so I just put them back. And, even if he'd found us out, he was still aiming at your chest. That Kevlar shirt you're wearing underneath would have stopped a thirty-eight. I got you covered, doc. Is our perp still alive?"

I looked at the quivering form sprawled on the floor. "Would it matter to you if he wasn't?"

"Not really," Jasper replied. "Sounds like a real dip-wad to me. World would be better off without him."

"Yes," I said matter-of-factly. "He's alive. I told you I just wanted to scare him... and you've certainly accomplished that. Don't phone emergency services yet."

"I won't phone it in until I see you're both clear of the building. I'm going to start packing up now. Call if you need me."

I stabbed a finger to the phone's screen and disconnected the call. With utmost calm, I knelt beside the man on the floor and took stock of his wounds. There were about a hundred of them, most adorned with oak splinters protruding from the lacerations. The vast majority were on his left side. At least a couple small slivers had found his left eye, but I didn't think they would cause blindness. Since that wasn't really my field, I just shrugged it off. I was most concerned with several large pieces of wood that were dug into the side of his neck; but if they had found the jugular, they were obviously stemming the bleeding themselves. There was a lot of blood, but no spurting.

Frantic eyes looked up at me. "Help me. Please. It hurts. It really hurts. You're a doctor. You have to help me."

"Sorry," I told him. "Your one-time-only deal has expired. I'm here on my patients' behalf, and you are not one of them. In point of fact, you are the disease. I am the cure." I reached down and slapped him a few times on the right cheek. "Stay with me, Frankie. Don't faint yet. I need you to hear this."

He forced his eyes wide and looked up into mine. Whatever he saw there frightened him immeasurably. "Please!" he whispered.

"That 'wimp' of a husband you were talking about is not just Lily's husband, he's my friend. He's also the friend of the State Attorney General. They work in the same wing of the capitol building. After a special investigation determines that this was a meth lab explosion, which will easily be borne out by the chemical evidence that they're going to find in this apartment, you will say goodbye to your freedom for a while. You will be joining the two goons you sent to pick up Lily at the apartment. They're under arrest for criminal trespass and attempted kidnapping; and those charges will probably be added to YOUR indictment, as well.

"I have your 'guest lists' from the little parties you throw, and one of the women on those lists is also a patient of mine. I'm going to provide a detailed account... to everyone on the lists... of every chemical found here, and what symptoms, long and short term, they should be looking for in the event you mixed them before they consumed your little treats. You will find no comfort from that quarter.

"Still, you WILL get out of prison sooner or later. And when you do, I will still be here. Waiting for you. Watching you. Remember: you will not feel or hear anything the next time a little red dot appears on the front of your shirt. I don't think you will ever be able to get rid of that mental picture, though."

I stood and glance down at him like he was a piece of refuse. "If you try to move, those splinters are likely to do substantial damage. And, if you try to pull any out yourself, you could very well bleed to death. Or go blind in one eye."

I stood and walked to Gladys, who had heard everything. "He's my brother," she said plaintively. "I... I can't just leave him."

I grabbed her upper arm and turned her toward the door. "Yes," I said evenly. "You can. The sooner we leave, the sooner an ambulance crew will get here. In the meantime, your husband is waiting at home for you. You need to start giving your love to those who love you back. Your brother never has."

I walked to a suitcase I'd left by the door and hefted it back to the kitchen counter. It held all the ingredients necessary for a large, commercial-level meth lab, and it only took about thirty seconds to transfer everything to the countertop. Then, carrying the empty bag and leading the dazed satanic apprentice, I walked out the door and down the stairs. The further we got from that apartment, the fresher the air smelled.

CASE FILES - PERSONAL NOTES - PATIENTS 333 & 334 - EPILOG

I walked into my apartment, set down my briefcase, and fell into an easy chair. "You're late!" Loretta chastised. She held a glass in her right hand, empty except for a single large, skewered olive, which she passed to me; then she made a show of placing the cocktail shaker into violent motion. She was wearing a nightshirt with a hem that hit about mid-thigh, and it raised enticingly as her hands came up. Her over-abundant breasts seemed to have individuals minds of their own. I held out the glass gratefully while she poured the martini.

"Rough day," I complained. "The DA's men needed another interview after my class. It's been almost four weeks! It looks like Brother Frankie might get to strike some sort of plea agreement. Par for the course. There were some pretty powerful people attending those parties every week that will do just about anything to keep from being mentioned in social media. But... so many different illegal drugs were found in that building in such great quantities, that they simply can't ignore it. They tell me that he'll do at least three years. That's SOME consolation, anyway. The official count is one hundred thirty-one splinters that were removed from his body. He's still one very sore Prophet Dude."

"And how is your sultry blonde patient?"

"If you mean Sister Gladys, she's doing okay. It took her a while to realize that hypnosis wasn't a simple one-time addiction cure-all, but she has a lot of support from her husband... and that gives her all the motivation she needs to beat this. I'm starved. What's for dinner?"