Dead Wrong by Allen Wyler Read Free Book Online Page B

Both men knew damn well terrorists never admitted everything. Oh sure, they might divulge enough to get you off their ass, but whenever possible, they held back or lied. To them, misinformation was their last small victory in a lethal endgame. And sure as shit, if arrested and sent to trial, McCarthy would look respectable enough to only receive a slap on the wrist. So he and the colonel shared an unspoken understanding. If Sikes did the right thing, Cunningham would make sure nothing came of it. This understanding saved everybody a ton of hassle.
    Sikes aimed directly overhead to where McCarthy had to be and yelled, “Big mistake, motherfucker.”

6
     
L AKEVIEW M EDICAL C ENTER , S EATTLE
    B ERTRAM WYSE’S MOOD this morning was especially foul. Surgery—repairing a skull defect on a skateboarder with more adolescent self-confidence than skill—turned out trickier than anticipated. Not only that, but the start of his case had been delayed because of a three-car accident south of Tacoma on I-5. Two critically injured patients arrived via helicopter for surgery at 1:10 AM , which, in turn meant that the night shift hadn’t had time to put together the instruments for the start of the elective cases. Which sucked. To make matters worse, the case itself ended up taking ninety minutes longer than he’d anticipated.
    Now, 1:13 in the afternoon, he was behind schedule.
    Stripping off his gloves, he stepped away from the operating table to admire his work. Once the kid’s hair grew back, you’d never be able to tell that the right side of his skull had been rearranged into a jigsaw puzzle of bone fragments held together with titanium struts and screws. A perfect cosmetic result. Yes, he shamelessly admitted, his surgical skills were superb. He doubted another neurosurgeon could match, much less improve on, such an excellent result.
    He checked the wall clock. Being behind schedule by more than one hour would cut into his professor rounds. He told the resident assisting him, “Go ahead, finish and take him to recovery. I’ll check him later,” before pushing through the heavy swinging doors into the hall.
    This inability to maintain a predictable schedule was the biggest obstacle of developing any sort of elective private practice at a trauma center. It sucked.
    When leaving Philadelphia to take this job as chief of neurosurgery, Wyse had dreamed of developing a high-end, lucrative, elective service in addition to his research. He envisioned a practice competitive with those nose-in-the-air carriage-trade clowns at the premier downtown Seattle hospital, Doctors Medical Center. And the concept had sounded so good, the Lakeview search committee bought it hook, line, and sinker. After all, most of those old geezers over at DMC were just a few heartbeats away from retirement or the grave. Why not make a serious play for their territory?
    The problem he and the administration had overlooked was a very basic business principle—cater to your customers. And the customers of a regional trauma center like Lakeview are all unscheduled trauma victims. Usually major thrashes. Well, duh. Severe burns, major vehicular crunches, multiple UZI wounds couldn’t wait for an operating room to open up after a long day of elective cases. So, of course, elective surgeries were delayed until all emergent cases had been accommodated. Which could take forever. Hence, the problem: Mr. Moneybags wasn’t about to lie on a rock-hard gurney for twelve hours in a surrounding that held about as much charm as the county lockup. The trauma center’s meat-house ambience simply didn’t compete with DMC’s Architectural Digest interior of muted colors and whisper-soft carpet.
    On the bright side, a trauma center did offer him a perfect opportunity for clinical research. Especially if you had enough chutzpah to take advantage of it. Which Bertram Wyse did.
    Even as a child he always saw the bright side of a situation, believing that being a pessimist