Bodily Harm by Robert Dugoni Read Free Book Online Page A

badgering me about work.”
    “I’m not badgering—I just want to help, Albert. You’ve never been like this. We’ve always been able to talk about things. Please, tell me what’s wrong. Is it the stress? What did the doctor say about your rash?”
    He grabbed his jacket from the hook beside the front door and picked up his briefcase, opening the door. “It’s a rash. It’s just a rash. It’s not like I’m dying,” he said and slammed the door closed behind him.
    HALF AN HOUR later, Payne slipped the small white bag with the prescription cream from his briefcase and shoved it in the upper drawer of his desk. He could now add to his list of maladies, which included elevated cholesterol and blood pressure from being overweight, a rash that itched liked hell and dried out his skin until it flaked. The doctor said it was stress related.
    No shit.
    Payne already knew from the lump of reddish brown hair in the bathtub drain each morning and the ever increasing streaks of gray in what was left on his head and his beard. He adjusted his glasses and considered the drab walls of his office, his first after nearly two decades in cubicles. The director of investigations had once been one of the Product Safety Agency’s highest-profile posts, overseeing all agency investigations and enforcementactions against manufacturers of defective products. But with the prior administration’s mandate of deregulation, Payne’s staff had been cut by nearly 70 percent, with those having the most seniority, and therefore the highest salaries, pruned first. Given the continuing recession, they had not been replaced, which pretty much ensured no new enforcement actions, despite the change in administrations. Actions that had been under way came to a screeching halt, or settled with the manufacturer paying a token fine and promising to do better.
    The latest joke circulating the office was that the agency walked small and carried no stick. Manufacturers had little to fear.
    Sitting at his desk, Payne regretted his morning outburst, one of several since his return from China. He’d pick up some flowers on his way home. Maybe take everyone out for pizza. Screw the doctor.
    He shut his eyes and massaged the headache at his temples, but the memory of the bloodied mess on the hotel room pillow forced them open, and he had to take a moment to catch his breath. He picked up the dual picture frame with the photograph of his smiling wife on the right and of his son and daughter on the left. The man had been clear about further consequences should Payne not follow his instructions precisely.
    Payne removed the bottle of aspirin from his desk drawer and just as he popped two in his mouth his office door opened and Maggie Powers stepped in. “How was your trip?”
    Payne choked down the pills. “Sorry,” he said. “Something stuck in my throat. You’ll have my report by the end of the week.”
    Payne’s trip to inspect Chinese manufacturing plants had sprung from public outrage over a series of product recalls and reports of serious deficiencies in the Chinese manufacturing facilities that more and more American businesses favored. Public outrage had led to the predictable congressional grandstanding,which led to inquiries about what the PSA would do about the problem, which was nothing, given the agency’s skeletal staff.
    Powers stuck her reading glasses on top of her head, using the frame to keep her shoulder length, auburn-tinted hair out of her face. “Don’t be so official all the time, Albert. I saw you earlier and you looked like you got some sun. I was hoping it meant you allowed yourself a little play time.”
    Payne forced a smile, not about to tell Powers his red glow was a rash. “They kept me pretty busy,” he said.
    “I wish I could have gone.” Dressed in a cream-colored pants suit, open-toe shoes, and a strand of pearls, Powers looked very much like the wife of a successful McLean, Virginia, attorney. “But a son only gets