South End, Boston

Monday, 9:45 PM

Ethan

“Let me get this straight,” the cop named Briggs said. “You were walkin’ down Mass Ave when the two perps suddenly jumped you?”

“Yeah.” Ethan sat on the curb by the police cruiser, rotating an ice pack between his bottom lip and left eye. “One guy in a black hoodie dragged me into the alley, where the other guy in a Celtics jacket was waiting.”

Briggs, who had buzz cut blond hair and a square jaw, exchanged looks with his partner Rodriguez, who had dark skin, shifty eyes, and the build of a wrestler.

“You’re a med student at Hah-vard,” Rodriguez said with a mocking lilt in his voice.  “And you live in Longwood.”

Ethan shifted the ice pack back to his swelling eye. “That’s right.”

“So then what were you doing in the South End?”

“I was visiting a friend at Boston Med.”

Briggs leaned closer. “What’s his name?”

“Her name’s Dina Shah,” Ethan replied, naming the only med student he knew who was doing a rotation at Boston Medical Center.

There was only a one-in-four chance Dina was on call that night, so the story probably wouldn’t hold up. From the bored look in the cops’ eyes though, he doubted they’d dig any deeper. Muggings happened all the time in the neighborhood around Boston Medical Center. One more reason he’d been an idiot for wandering down there in search of pain killers.

“You sure you don’t need to go to the ER?” Briggs asked. “That eye’s swelling like a friggin’ pufferfish.”

Ethan shook his head. “Nothing’s broken. I just want to get home so I can cancel my credit cards and report my cell stolen.”

Briggs motioned to the white-and-blue Boston Police cruiser. “Hop in, then. We’ll take you.”

*

Five minutes later, Ethan sat in the back of the cruiser as they sped down Huntington Avenue, listening to the chatter over the police scanner. Briggs drove while Rodriguez finished calling in the details of the mugging. When he was done, he looked over his shoulder. The glow from the dashboard computer backlit his profile like moonlight.

“How’s that eye doin’, Doc?”

“Okay, thanks,” Ethan answered warily. The cop’s voice had a mean edge that didn’t go with the innocent question.

“We got a hit on your description,” he continued. “Matches a couple of dealers who’ve been working the neighborhood.” He leaned closer, eyeing Ethan through the partition like a kid thinking of ways to taunt a caged animal. “You sure you didn’t run into them before the assault?”

“No.” Ethan paused for a beat, remembering how Celtic Pride had warned him about the video camera outside the methadone clinic. If the cops checked that footage, he was screwed. Then again, he’d been mugged more than a block away. “Like I said, they jumped me.”

“Right,” Briggs said. “We got that part. Thing is, when we plugged your name into our database, we got a hit. Something about a forged prescription for narcotics. Ring any bells?”

Ethan swallowed. So that’s why they were treating him more like a suspect than a victim. “That happened a long time ago. After a serious car accident, I got addicted to pain killers. That’s got nothing to do with me getting mugged tonight.”

“By two drug dealers,” Rodriguez cut in.

“I didn’t know who they were.”

“Sure.” Rodriguez turned to Briggs and tapped the computer screen. “Says here he pleaded the charge down to a misdemeanor. See, Briggsy? That’s white privilege. Still think it’s all in my head?” He turned to face Ethan again. “Lemme guess. Your daddy hired some hotshot lawyer to get you off, right?”

Ethan glared back at him. “Actually, my sister had just died. Then I got into a life-threatening accident that shattered my knee. Opiates were the only thing that dulled the pain, so I got hooked. Ever deal with the kind of pain that makes you wish you were dead, Officer Rodriguez?”

The cop stared at him, looking dumbfounded.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no.’ When the judge sentenced me, he factored in my circumstances. Plus, it was my first offense, so he gave me a break. I agreed to get addiction counseling and stay clean, and in exchange, he let me plead the charge down to a misdemeanor. That’s the backstory in case you’re interested.”

Briggs turned on the cruiser’s light bar and blew through a red traffic light, laughing. “You got balls, Doc. I’ll give you that. Besides, if you were looking for a fix tonight, then I’d say you got the beat down you deserved.”

Rodriguez shrugged and faced forward again, leaving Ethan alone with his thoughts.

Up until now, he hadn’t been able to figure out how the same source who leaked Callie’s information also knew about his drug problem. That had poked a hole in the hacker theory. But if the cops could dredge up his arrest record so easily, then why would Prime Dirt even need a source inside the med school to get that information?

Maybe Callie’s electronic medical record had been breached from the outside.

He worked his jaw, following that line of reasoning to a new, alarming possibility. Callie had only left Belmont because of that leak.

What if whoever leaked her info hadn't been motivated by money?

*

The cops dropped Ethan in front of his apartment, drawing stares from a couple of classmates who were waiting in the lobby. He ignored them as he hobbled past, gritting his teeth through the pain. The last time things got this bad, his father had to inject his knee with a steroid-lidocaine mixture to blunt the pain. As much as he didn’t want to deal with Dad’s bullshit, he couldn’t think of a better option. It terrified him how close he’d come to using again. The pain had burned through four years of addiction counseling like a brush fire through a dry wheat field.

He limped into the elevator and rode up to his floor, feeling weak and defeated. Fear had driven him away from that dealer tonight. Not fear of using, but fear of meeting the thug in some dark alleyway. But there would always be more dealers. More chances to screw up.

The pain wasn’t going anywhere.

He knocked on the door to his apartment, praying Larry was home.

He didn’t have to wait long. His roommate practically ripped the door off its hinges.

“Finally! I’ve been trying to reach you all evening. Why…”  Larry stopped mid-sentence, jaw dropping as he took in Ethan’s appearance. “Holy shit! What happened to you?”

“Rough night.” Ethan dragged himself into the apartment, dimming the lights to quiet his headache before collapsing onto the couch. “I got mugged.”

“No way! At Brown?”

“No. In the South End, near Boston Medical.”

“Damn.” Larry whistled loudly. “Maybe we should take you to the ER, dude. Your eye’s almost swollen shut.”

“Just needs some ice. And could you bring me the phone? I’ve gotta cancel my cards and report my cell stolen.” He groaned, suddenly remembering Black Hoodie had also stolen the key to Larry’s car. His roommate loved that little red Civic enough to give her an affectionate nickname.

“Shit. They stole Ruby’s key too, but she’s safe. I parked her on Newbury, several blocks away from where I got jumped. There’s no way they could find her. You’ve got a spare key, right?”

Larry handed him the phone. “Don’t worry about Ruby. I’ll bring her home later. I should’ve known there was something wrong when you didn’t answer your cell. I’ve been calling you for the last hour.”

“Why?” Ethan took a deep breath, noticing how flushed Larry’s cheeks looked. “Did something else happen?”

Larry answered him with a nervous smile. “You could say that.” He tilted his head toward Ethan’s closed bedroom door. “You have a visitor. She got here an hour ago. We were talking for a while, but then she seemed wiped out, so I suggested she take a nap. Promised I’d wake her up when you got home.”

“Who? Jess?” He sighed. How the hell was he going to explain away the black eye and fat lip?

Larry shook his head as the bedroom door opened behind him.

Ethan stumbled to his feet, blinking in disbelief. This had to be a dream. She couldn’t possibly be here.

But she was.

“Hi,” Callie said with a sleepy smile. “Surprise.”

And as she stood there waiting for him, all Ethan could think was she couldn’t be real. No one could look this beautiful. Her skin glowed in the soft light, like a girl in a Renoir painting.

Like an angel, come to wake him up from a nightmare.

***

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