Damaged (15 page)

Danny Delveccio tossed the last of the garbage bags into the back of the Santa Rosa Island Authority pickup. He slapped the side door to let the driver know he was finished.

“See ya tomorrow, Andy.”

“Early, dude. Gonna be some killer waves.”

“Seven?”

In reply he got a thumbs-up.

Danny walked to his car, his legs tight from a day of surfing followed by the routine walk up the beach to pick up garbage. Walking in the sand had been hard to get used to, especially the burn in his calves. He remembered the first week he couldn’t even hold himself up on his board. Who knew picking up other people’s crap could be so physically draining.

He keyed open the trunk to his Impala. Everything he owned was back here. He didn’t worry about anyone stealing the car. To a thief it’d be worthless. The tires were bald, the engine had a chronic sputter, and it needed a paint job. But it was his transportation, his home, and his lifeline.

Danny grabbed a clean towel from the stash he had just washed at the laundromat. He’d shower, stop at the vending machine, then
get some sleep. Andy had heard earlier that the hurricane was already in the Gulf, and as the resident expert of such things, he assured Danny that by morning the waves would be awesome.

He closed the trunk and that’s when he saw the guy standing beside him. Scared the crap out of Danny. He jumped but didn’t let on.

“Sorry,” the man said. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Mr. B said you usually get off work about this time. I thought you might be hungry.”

“Mr. B? Coney Island Canteen Mr. B?”

The man held out a container that smelled like heaven: melted cheese, onions, French fries.

“Yeah, I met you there earlier today, remember? I’m a salesman and Mr. B mentioned you do odd jobs for hire around the beach.”

Danny squinted but the man’s face remained partly shadowed. He supposed the guy looked familiar. How could he tell from the hundreds of faces he saw every day on the beach? But if he was a friend of Mr. B’s, he had to be cool.

“I wondered if you might help me load a couple of crates into my van.”

When Danny still hesitated, the guy held out the container again.

“Cheeseburger and fries plus an Andrew Jackson? Should only take about fifteen minutes.”

Danny’s mouth watered. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was. It beat anything he’d get in the vending machines.

“Can I eat first?”

“Sure.”

He accepted the container and popped it open. He hadn’t had a burger and fries in weeks, let alone one like this. And twenty dollars for fifteen minutes of work? Danny couldn’t believe his good fortune.

MONDAY, AUGUST 24

CHAPTER 30

Platt’s vision was blurred. He tried to keep focused. If the clock on the wall was correct, it was just after one o’clock in the morning.

“I’m not a scientist, Ben,” Captain Ganz said as he rubbed his eyes, stood, and stretched behind his desk. “You tell me this bacteria is causing an infection but you don’t know where the bacteria is coming from. I can assure you these soldiers did not contract it from pregnant women.”

“No, you’re missing my point.” Platt slowed himself down. They were both exhausted. He leaned against the wall, but he wanted to pace. “
Clostridium sordellii
is a rare bacterium. Most of the fatal cases that I know of have been associated with gynecologic infections following a live birth or an abortion. But I’ve checked. There have been other fatal cases that have nothing to do with childbirth.”

“Such as?”

Platt suppressed a yawn. He wouldn’t tell Ganz that he had talked to Bix at the CDC, but he could share Bix’s information. “There was a case in Minnesota. A routine knee surgery using donated tissue.”

Ganz shook his head. “Our donors are screened and so is the tissue.”

“You screen for HIV, hepatitis B and C, and probably other blood-borne viruses. But what about bacterial diseases?”

Ganz felt behind him for his chair and dropped into it. “Even so, only a handful of these patients have received donor tissue.”

“But all of them probably received some form of bone transplant.”

“No, that’s not true.”

“The bone paste? The cement?”

“Wait a minute. Just because you found this bacteria in one patient doesn’t mean it’s in the others.”

Platt pulled out of his shirt pocket a crumpled piece of paper where he had jotted down a few notes from his online search. “Does this sound familiar? Two to seven days after a surgical procedure or childbirth the patient complains of severe abdominal pain along with nausea and vomiting but no fever, no hypertension. When the symptoms finally show up, sepsis has already set in. The patient goes into toxic shock. About 70 to 80 percent of patients die within two to six days of developing the infection.”

Ganz continued to shake his head. “Does this infection spread from person to person?”

“It’s not quite known how or if it’s spread from person to person or from the environment to a person. But I’ll give you my best logical guess as to what might have happened in this case.”

Platt waited for the captain’s attention.

“Of course. Go ahead.”

Platt sat down so they would be at eye level. He kept from crossing his arms or legs. He restrained from fidgeting and folded his hands together so he wouldn’t be tapping his fingers on the table.

“Just suppose for a minute that a donor’s body—for whatever reason—wasn’t discovered and refrigerated or properly processed within twelve hours.”

“Eighteen hours.”

“Excuse me?”

“Eighteen hours is the time limit. Our regulations say over eighteen hours is not usable.”

“Okay, eighteen. Once the blood flow stops, you know as well as I do that decomposition starts. Depending on the conditions, it can start almost immediately. My guess is that this bacterium didn’t come from contaminated tools used to process the tissue or even during surgery. I believe the bacterium came from the donor’s body after death when the body started decomposing. And when that donor’s tissue and bone was used to make bone screws and anchors and paste, the bacteria simply got ground up and divided. As soon as it was placed back inside a warm human body, it did what bacteria loves to do—it grew and it spread by way of infection.”

Silence. Ganz stared at him. Platt realized it was a lot to sort through, but he never would have predicted what the captain said next.

“I appreciate your opinion and that you came all this way on such short notice. It’s obvious that you could use some rest.”

Ganz stood again, and this time Platt stared up at him. Was it possible the captain was dismissing him? Dismissing his theory?

“I’ll call my driver for you.”

And with that, Captain Ganz walked out of the room, leaving Platt dumbfounded. He wasn’t just dismissing his theory, he was sending Platt home.

CHAPTER 31

“Don’t take this the wrong way, O’Dell, but you look like something the cat dragged in.”

Maggie didn’t want to tell Charlie Wurth that she felt a little bit like she had been dragged. She’d been up all night with insomnia.

After her helicopter adventure she should have been exhausted enough to fall into bed and sleep. Instead she found herself on the beach from midnight till two in the morning walking the shore and watching the full moon light up the waves. Liz had warned her that it wasn’t safe to be alone on the beach at night. But Maggie figured that advice didn’t apply if you carried a .38 Smith & Wesson stuffed in your waistband.

“Couldn’t sleep,” she told Wurth and left it at that. No sense explaining about leaky compartments in her subconscious and ghosts from past murder cases keeping her awake at night.

Wurth had promised a real breakfast. Now, as he held open the door to the café, Maggie realized that she shouldn’t have been surprised to see a number of strangers waving and saying “good morning” and “hello.” Less than twenty-four hours in the city and Charlie Wurth not only knew his way around but also seemed to know the hot spot for breakfast.

The Coffee Cup in downtown Pensacola was crowded, some clientele in shirts and ties with BlackBerrys and others in boots and jeans with the local newspaper scattered across the tabletop.

Despite the clatter of stoneware, the sizzle of bacon, and the shouts of waitresses to the short-order cooks, several customers immediately recognized Wurth. A businessman at a window table waved a hello and another at the counter looked up from his conversation to nod at him. A tall, skinny waitress called him “hon” like they were old friends and led them to a table that was still being bussed. As soon as they sat, she handed them menus.

“Two coffees?” she said, plopping down stoneware mugs in front of them.

“Black coffee for me, Rita. Diet Pepsi for my partner, here.”

“Diet Coke okay, hon?” But she asked Wurth, not Maggie, while she retrieved the mug in front of her as quickly as she had set it down.

Wurth looked to Maggie and waited for an answer, which made Rita look to Maggie. She had to give him credit. It would have been so much easier to just say yes. But it was a big deal to Charlie Wurth that the people surrounding him were always acknowledged.

“Diet Coke’s fine,” Maggie said.

She waited for the waitress to leave while taking in the café’s surroundings. Then she leaned across the small table. “How do you already know all these people?”

“Had coffee here yesterday. You can meet all the movers and shakers in a community if you find their watering hole.”

He paused to wave at two women who had just come in.

“And believe me,” he smiled and leaned in, “with a hurricane coming, the federal guy who’s promising to bring the cavalry is much more popular than Jim Cantore from the Weather Channel.
You’ll see there’s already a couple of signs telling him to stay the hell away.”

“Who’s Jim Cantore?”

He tilted his head at her, trying to tell if she was serious. “I forget you’re a hurricane neophyte. With the last several storms, anywhere Cantore goes so goes the hurricane. He either has an uncanny ability to predict or he’s a jinx. Either way, nobody wants to see him here.”

“Is he here?”

“If he isn’t, he will be. It’s looking like the Panhandle is Isaac’s bull’s-eye.”

He sat back when he saw the waitress heading to their table. She brought Maggie’s Diet Coke and a pot of steaming coffee to fill Wurth’s mug.

“So what can I get you two?” This time she included Maggie.

“I’ll have a cheese-and-mushroom omelet.”

The waitress kept looking at her like she was waiting for more. Finally she said, “That’s it, hon?”

“You gotta have some grits with that,” Wurth told her. “Bring her some grits, Rita. I’ll have two eggs scrambled, sausage links, wheat toast, hash browns, and the Nassau grits.”

As soon as Rita turned to leave, Maggie raised her eyebrow at Wurth’s breakfast order.

“What? There’s a hurricane coming. Might be the last hot meal I get,” he said.

He glanced around and leaned in again.

“This one’s looking bad. Bulldozed over Cuba like it was a speed bump. Land masses usually slow them down a little. Instead, Isaac’s entering the Gulf as a cat 5, sustained winds at 156 miles per hour. There’s nothing between here and there to slow it down.
Another day over warm waters and this monster might pick up even more steam. If it makes landfall as a cat 5, that’s brutal. We’re no longer talking about damage, we’re talking catastrophic damage.”