Cure by Robin Cook Read Free Book Online Page A

being any part of this.” He glanced at his watch. “Five minutes, then we’re outta here. They can find their own way back to the city.”

    Both men fidgeted, keeping their eyes on the ostensibly peaceful little house. A few minutes later there was the muted sound of a gunshot followed quickly by several others. Both men jumped at each of the reports, guessing what each meant: a person was being killed in cold blood, and they, Brennan and Carlo, were accomplices.

    During the next minute there were three more shots, for a total of six, causing Brennan and Carlo’s fears and anxieties to skyrocket. The problem was that neither knew what they should do, meaning exactly what would their boss, Louie Barbera, want them to do. Would he want them to stay and risk getting caught and charged as accomplices, or should they get the hell away from there to avoid putting the whole Vaccarro organization in jeopardy? Since there was no way of knowing the answer to this question, they stayed frozen in place until Carlo suddenly had the idea of putting in an emergency call to Barbera.

    With the sudden movement of getting out his phone, Carlo caused Brennan to start anew. “Jesus!” Brennan complained. “Give me some warning!”

    “Sorry,” Carlo said. “I’ve got to talk to Louie. He has to know what’s going down here. This is crazy.” Intent on dialing, Carlo didn’t even feel Brennan tapping on his shoulder until Brennan increased the force to a near punch.

    “They’re coming out!” Brennan said anxiously, pointing out his side window.

    Carlo looked. Both Susumu and Yoshiaki were charging down the porch steps and running toward the idling Denali, carrying loaded pillowcases over their shoulders. Carlo flipped his phone shut just as the men reached the vehicle and piled into the backseat. Without anyone speaking, Brennan put the SUV into gear and pulled away. He waited almost a block to turn on the headlights.

    Brennan and Carlo didn’t speak for about ten minutes, whereas the two Japanese men had been carrying on a progressively animated conversation in Japanese. It was obvious they were not pleased with their accomplishments inside the house. By the time they reached the George Washington Bridge, Carlo 28

    had relaxed enough to talk.

    “Did something go wrong?” Carlo questioned. He made it a point to sound disinterested.

    “We were looking for some lab books, which we didn’t find,” Yoshiaki said.

    “I’m sorry,” Carlo responded. “We heard what sounded like a number of gunshots. Were they?”

    “Yes. There were six people in the house, more than we expected.”

    Carlo and Brennan exchanged worried glances. Their intuitions told them that Louie was going to be surprised, and it wasn’t going to be in a good way.

    1

    MARCH 25, 2010
    THURSDAY, 5:25 a.m.

    L aurie Montgomery rolled over onto her side to look at her alarm clock. It wasn’t quite five-thirty in the morning, and the alarm wouldn’t go off for almost another half-hour. Under normal circumstances she would have been pleased to be able to roll over and go back to sleep. All her life she’d been an incurable night person who couldn’t fall asleep and had even more difficulty waking up in the morning.
    But this was not going to be a normal day. It was going to be the first day back to work after an unexpectedly long maternity leave of nearly twenty months.

    After glancing briefly at her husband, Jack Stapleton, who was sound asleep, Laurie gently slid her legs out from beneath the down comforter and placed her bare feet on the ice-cold wood floor. She thought briefly about changing her mind and climbing back under the warm covers. But she resisted and instead clutched Jack’s T-shirt more tightly around her midsection and ran silently into the bathroom. The problem was that there was no way she’d be able to go back to sleep, as her mind was already going a mile a minute. She felt great turmoil stemming from her ambivalence about