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"WHAT is going on here?"

The question cut through the argu silence in its wake The two police constables and the night nurse turned toward the voice, three very different faces wearing identical expressions of relief that said as clearly as if they spoke aloud, Thank God, here&039;s soht nurse took a step forward "Dr Mui, these two police officers want to have a look around Apparently soh the back door late this afternoon"

"Really" Dr Mui sloept a pereaze from the nurse over to the police "As there was no one admitted to the hospice this afternoon, I&039;m afraid your informant was mistaken"

"This body wasn&039;t on a stretcher, it was allegedly flung over the shoulder of a large man in a red Tshirt I doubt that&039;s the way your patients usually arrive, Doctor ?"

"Mui" Ebony brows rose into a finely drawn arc "And you are?"

"Police Constable Potter, ma&039;am" She nodded at her partner "This is Police Constable Kessin Do you usually come in at this hour, Doctor? It&039;s barely five; a little early to start your day"

"I am often in at odd hours" Not that it&039;s any of your business, her tone added "You can ask Nurse Damone if you don&039;t believe me As it happens, I have a patient who has just moved to status four- he&039;ll be dead within the week unless a ned organ donor cards, I assume?"

She so pointedly awaited an answer, it would have been iive her one

After a ragged duet of "Yes, ma&039;am," Dr Mui nod?ded "Good As you&039;ll be dead, you&039;ll certainly have no use for otherwise healthy organs Hundreds of peo?ple die every year for no other reason than the lack of those signatures Now then, about this, as you say, alleged body If you intend to search the premises, I assuhtly aback by the lec?ture and the sudden change of subject "Warrant, Doctor?"

"Warrant, Constable"

Fighting the feeling that she was back in Catholic School-it helped only a little that none of the nuns had been Asian-Potter cleared her throat and glanced down at her occurrence book for support "We had hoped we could have a look around without having to get a warrant"

"Had you I see"

"We can get one if we need one" PC Kessin wished he&039;d kept his aze moved over to him He couldn&039;t help the sudden sus?picion she wasWe&039;ll take none of his organs He&039;s an idiot

"Of course you can" Her inflection suggested the exact opposite but before either constable could de?cide to be insulted, she continued "Fortunately, since I&039;ve arrived, that won&039;t be necessary" When it ap?peared that PC Potter was about to speak, she added with some exasperation, "We have a dozen very sick people in this building, Officers I&039;m sure you didn&039;t expect Nurse Damone to allow you to wander about on your own or to leave her station and accoer a problem What would you like to see first?"

Just In fros to the left You&039;ll find a door marked electrical room Behind it is a short corridor Off that corridor is a hospital room "

"I think we can start at the back door, Doctor"

"Fine Nurse "

Hope rose in the breasts of both constables that Nurse Da with them while the doctor watched her station

" I won&039;t be long"

Hope crashed and burned

"There&039;s no alarm on this door?"

"As I mentioned before, Constable Potter, we have a dozen very sick people in this building Should any?one need to exit the building, an unnecessary alarh excitement to kill one or two of them"

"They&039;re that sick?"

"They co are death or transplant-yes, they&039;re that sick"

PC Kessin frowned at the heavy steel door "But suppose so?"

"This door doesn&039;t open froet a door open, Doctor"

Dr Mui sainst those kind of people?"

"Do you always keep the door to the electrical room locked?"

"Two points, Constable" Dr Mui pulled out her keys and slid one into the lock "First of all, this is not the door to the electrical room It leads to a short access hall Secondly, no, we don&039;t always keep it locked"

"Then why is it locked now?"

"I don&039;t know"

"The roo for looks like any other hospital room except that the walls are painted cinder blocks and there&039;s a high, inaccessibleThere&039;ll be a man on the bed "

PC Potter stopped just over the threshold and had to be pushed gently ahead by her partner For so up out of a deep, dark well It loss surfaces with nothing to soften the intensity

Blinking and grue man on the bed sat up and rubbed at his eyes

"A hidden room, a man who is obviously not a patient; do you have an explanation for this, Dr Mui?"

"This rooinally supposed to be the laun?dry, but we found it much more cost effective to send the laundry out Since the plu was already in?stalled, it took little effort to turn it into a temporary residence rooed from weary lecture to distinct pique " his name is Richard Sullivan, he&039;s one of our orderlies, and he is not supposed to be in here-which explains why that last door was locked"

"Orderly," Kessin repeated "That explains the uni?form" He took half a step back as the doctor shot hi now, stared down at the ain, Richard Louder"

"The cot&039;s uncomfortable"

"Are you the orderly the nurse told us was asleep in the staff rooh she&039;d changed channels in ram

"Obviously not He&039;s the orderly as supposed to be asleep in the staff room" Dr Mui indicated the door with a sharp jerk of her head "Go to my office, Richard I&039;ll speak with you later"

"Just a minute, Mr Sullivan" As he turned toward her, Potter saw that he had the longest eyelashes she&039;d ever seen on adeep brown eyes so est Her cheeks war patiently for her to speak

" ask him how he came to be in that room"

Except they already knew that

"Do you, uh, own a red T-shirt?"

He nodded

"Did you wear it to work today?"

He nodded again "I never weara clean uniforle in the air "Like a gar" Potter looked at her partner and saas leaping to the sahway it was entirely possible that acould look like aa body Especially when there was no body

"Once you&039;ve found the roo there, I have every faith in your ability to deal with the situation"

She frowned What situation?

"Hope we didn&039;t get that guy in too much trouble" PC Kessin turned back onto Mt Sey toward North Vancouver "That doctor wasn&039;t someone I&039;d want to cross Man, I hate that &039;I&039;hty&039; most doctors put on Make you wait forty-five ot no life of your own, but just hear the to a call" Scratching at his er seat "What&039;s bugging you?" Potter, who&039;d been silent since radioing in the false alar; we never actu?ally saw that gar"

" and you&039;re followed to the disposal site by a police officer froht, two visitors drop in, leave their captured friend where they find him, and send the local police out to have a look around on no better pretense than they supposedly saw you carry a body in here this after?noon while they were passing" Dr Mui steepled her fingers and peered over thehed She never asked him a question she didn&039;t already know the answer to "That we&039;re busted?"

"No Detective Celluci&039;s friends don&039;t want to be?coood friends, leaving him tied to a bed"

"They expected the police to find him, and then ould have been, as you so crudely put it, busted"

"You told me to lie down on the bed "

"To cover the obvious fact that so there And I told you to put him in the back of your vehicle," she added caustically, "because we didn&039;t have time to put hi him back in?"

"No His friends, whoever or whatever they are " She frowned, hating aain, they won&039;t leave hies" Reaching into her drawer, she pulled out a single key on a leather fob and tossed it across the office "Use the one farthest froht the key and shoved it in his pocket "Mr Swanson won&039;t like it"

"I&039;ll deal with Mr Swanson"

The soft brown eyes looked no less ested, "I could kill him"

"The detective? Don&039;t be ridiculous, Richard He has two perfectly healthy, very large kidneys-a per?fect match for one of Mr Swanson&039;s buyers that I&039;d considered to be univen his size and that our usual source tends toward the undernourished Alive, he can do soood"

"Should I stay with him?"

"Yes, you&039;d better Be sure you park your car where it can&039;t be seen fros to Mr Swanson in a couple of hours, as soon as I&039;ve finished here"

Pushing upward through layer after layer of sticky cotton batting, fighting to keep it away fro toward a distant light, Celluci h to catch a brief gliain Vaguely aware of movement, he rele but couldn&039;t seem to make his body obey

Aa faint scent of honeysuckle as he flopped back against a pile of pillows

Obviously, he was no longer in the hospital

As rough hands secured him to the bed, he re?viewed his options and realized he didn&039;t have any Reluctantly surrendering to the sedatives, he felt al?most sorry for the people who&039;dto be pissed

"Dr Mui, this is a surprise" His expression polite but not exactly welco, Ronald Swanson stepped back from the door to allow the doctor to enter his front hall

"I realize this is certainly an unexpected visit," Dr Mui acknowledged, stepping by him, "but what I have to tell you needed to be said in person Since your neighbors are aware of your connection to Project Hope, they should assuhbors are far enough away I doubt they even noticed you arrive" His atten?tion caught by the white convertible gleaht, he added, "New car?" as he closed the door

"I bought it last week"

"Can you afford such an expensive car right now, Doctor? I&039;d have thought the condoht recently had taken all your available re?sources"

"You assured me a condo in Yaletoas a secure investment, Mr Swanson" She followed him to the kitchen "And as for the car, I&039;ve heard you say you get what you pay for Ger is built to last Besides, you pay et what I pay for" He smiled a little ner?vously and waved a hand toward the table "I&039; breakfast Would you care to join me?" He hadn&039;t had an informal visitor since before Rebecca had died, and he couldn&039;t re in the kitchen Still, abandoning his breakfast noould el and there was no sense in that

"Thank you, no"

"Do you mind if I continue?"

"Not at all" She took the offered seat and waited for hi her &039;We have another el back on his plate "Already? That&039;s two in little more than a week Three in two months Don&039;t you think we&039;re likely to start attracting attention? Thehappens the iven the size of the organ, this particular ood to pass up The donor is about six feet four, two hundred and sixty pounds Late thirties and in perfect health for our purposes" Which was really all her patron either wanted or needed to know Dr Mui waited patiently for Swanson to make the connection

As he did, he sat back and stared at her "You said we&039;d never find a donor that big"

"I rong"

"Still " He shook his head "Three in two months I&039;ht, on&039;t be doing anyone any good" His mouth twisted "Especially ourselves"

Dr Mui leaned forward, fingertips touching "This donor came to us under rather unusual circumstances However," she amended as he raised a hand in pro?test, "I&039;ll e of this opportunity noon&039;t have a chance later I&039;ve taken the liberty of changing certain parts of the routine so on&039;t attract the attention you&039;re worried about"

"It would be a shame to ht, secure in his reputation of never ht," he said at last "What have you done?"

This could be the difficult part "I had Mr Sullivan escort hiuest houses He doesn&039;t knohere he is, and he&039;s not at the clinic at?tracting attention"