The nurse sifted through the papers on her desk and came up with a yellow sticky note. "Yes. You're Jack? She said to take you right in."
She led him through a curtained doorway, past a pair of curtained examining rooms—he caught a whiff of rubbing alcohol from the one on the right—to a tiny office in the rear. A young woman with straight dark hair cut in a bob sat behind the desk. She glanced up and smiled as they entered. She looked very young—couldn't be a day over twenty. Too young to be a doctor.
"You must be Jack," she said, rising and extending her hand. She stood about five-four and had a compact frame, a stocky build—solid without being overweight.
"And you must be Dr. Radzminsky."
"Nadia, please," she said, pronouncing it "Nahd-ja." "Only my patients call me Doctor." She had a big open face, a welcoming smile, and bright dark eyes. Jack liked her immediately. "Thanks, Jasmine," she said to the nurse.
Jasmine closed the door behind her.
Nadia pointed to one of the chart-laden chairs. "Just put those on the floor and have a seat."
She offered coffee and poured him a Styrofoam cupful from a Mr. Coffee on a shelf.
"We've got sugar and Cremora."
"Two sugars'll do."
"My only vice," she said, sipping from an oversize black ceramic mug with nadj printed in big white letters along the side. "An indispensable habit you pick up in residency."
"Can I ask you something straight off?" Jack said.
"Sure."
"No offense, but are you old enough to be a doctor?"
She gave him a tolerant smile. "Everyone asks me that. Yes. I'm cursed with a baby face. A blessing if you're a model or an actress, but not when you're a doctor, especially a woman doctor trying to inspire respect and confidence. But trust me, I'm a fellowship-trained, board-eligible endocrinologist."
"That's hormones, right?"
"Right. I do glands—thyroid, parathyroid, adrenal, pituitary, pancreas, and so on. Diabetes is one of the mainstays of endocrinology, which is why I'm here, but my special interest is in steroids."
"Muscle juice?"
Another smile. "Anabolic steroids are just one kind. Cortisone is another; so is estrogen. Remember what that guy whispered to Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate!"
"Sure. 'Plastics'."
"Right. One of my professors did the same thing for me once. He said, 'Steroids… the future is steroids.' And over the years I became convinced he was right. Even got to contribute some original research to the field. But enough about me, what about you? Whatever did you do for Alicia Clayton to make her recommend you so highly?"
Jack wasn't going to answer that. "How do you know Alicia?"
"High school. We weren't really friends, but we were both A students so we had advanced classes together. She went away to college, but now she's back and we keep running into each other. We're friends now. I told her about a problem I had and she gave me your number." Nadia cocked her head at Jack, a puzzled look on her face. "She said I could trust you with my life."
Hope she didn't give you any details, he thought.
"Is your life in danger?"
"No. But the way she said it—what on earth did you do for her?"
"I'm sure Alicia can fill you in on all the details."
"That's just it. She won't say anything further than it was sometime around last Christmas." Nadia smiled. "She said you were discreet too, and now I see what she meant."
As pleasant as this young woman was, Jack wanted to get to the point. "What can I do for you, Nadia?"
"It's about my boss."
Please, not a sexual harassment thing, Jack thought. A stalker he could handle, but innuendo and suggestive behavior were too slippery.
"The guy who runs this place?"
"No. The clinic is run by a hospital, and I just volunteer here."
"You give these folks insulin shots?"
"No. A nurse handles that. I monitor their charts, test for end organ damage, manage the cases. We treat mostly homeless folk here. Imagine being a homeless diabetic—no place to keep your insulin chilled, no way to check your blood sugar, unable to buy clean needles."
Pretty grim, Jack thought. And now he could see how Nadia and Alicia Clayton had connected. Alicia ran the pediatric AIDS clinic near St. Vincent's, just a few blocks to the west of here.
She went on. "My paying job—which I've only had for a couple of weeks now—is with a pharmaceutical company called GEM Pharma. Ever heard of it?"
Jack shook his head. Merck and Pfizer, yes, but never GEM.
"It's a small company," she said. "Mostly they manufacture and market generic prescription drugs—antibiotics, antihypertensives, and such on which the patents have run out. But unlike most companies of their type, GEM does basic research—not a lot, but they at least make a stab at it. That's why I was hired—for their R and D Department."
"A couple of weeks and already your boss is hassling you?"
"No. Someone is hassling him. At least I think so."
Good, Jack thought. It's not sexual. "And why's that?"
"I saw him arguing with a man in the corporate offices. They were down the far end of a hall. They didn't see me, and they weren't shouting, so I don't know what the argument was about, but I saw the other man shove him, then walk out, looking very angry."
"Not a disgruntled employee, I take it."
"No, but the man looked vaguely familiar. It took the rest of the day before I could place him. Then I remembered. He was Milos Dragovic."
Well, well, well, Jack thought, remembering a guy who'd contacted him recently about a beef with Milos Dragovic. Two customers interested in Dragovic in as many weeks. That boy do get around.
Nadia was staring at him. "I can't believe you haven't heard of him." She must have misinterpreted his silence.
"Oh, I have. Everyone's heard of the Slippery Serb."
That was what the Post had dubbed Dragovic a couple of years ago. And he lived up to the title. He'd faced indictments for gunrunning, racketeering, procuring, even murder, and had walked on every one. A sharp dresser who hobnobbed with celebrities at all the in restaurants and hot nightspots, Milos Dragovic had replaced John "the Dapper Don" Gotti as the city's chic hood.
"You're sure it was him?" Jack said.
"Totally. I dug out an old copy of New York magazine that had a cover story on him. Milos Dragovic, no question."
"And he's pushing your boss around. Any idea why?"
"That's what I'd like you to find out."
"Well, since your guy works for a drug company—"
"He's one of the founders."
"Even better. Doesn't take a genius to figure out that Pharmaceuticals of a less than legal nature must be involved. Why not call the cops and tell them the Slippery Serb is shaking down your boss? I'm sure they'd love to know."
"Because Dragovic may have something on him, some secret he's blackmailing him with. And he may already have coerced him into doing something illegal. I don't want to see him go to jail or get hurt."
As Nadia was speaking, Jack picked up on something: a timbre in her voice, a look in her eyes as she spoke about her boss at a job she'd had for only a few weeks. More than just a professional relationship here?
"Just who is this boss you care about so much?"
Nadia hesitated, chewing her upper lip, then shrugged. "Oh, hell. I've gone this far, I might as well tell you: his name is Dr. Luc Monnet."
"Like the painter?"
"Same pronunciation, but with a double n."
There, Nadia thought. I've told him. I hope I'm not going to regret it.
The last thing in the world she wanted to do was cause trouble for Dr. Monnet. In fact, the very reason she'd called this Repairman Jack was to try to protect him.
Relax, she told herself. Alicia had said she could trust this man. And Alicia Clayton's trust was not easily won.