Page 15 of The Perfect Crime

She was certain that it was all a ruse designed to either win sympathy from a jury or get her security contingent to let down their guard.And as she stared back at the woman who had almost killed her, she resolved that if the criminal justice system didn’t do its job, then when the time came, she would.

CHAPTER TEN

Jessie didn’t like waiting, but in this instance, she didn’t have much of a choice.

She looked at the clock on the wall again.It was 4:08.They’d been sitting in uncomfortable chairs in the hospital waiting room for over forty-five minutes now.The nurse had told them that Dr.Ethan Blackwood should be out of surgery by 3:45, but they’d blown through that time.

From personal experience, Jessie understood all too well that sometimes these procedures ran long, but that hadn’t stopped Ryan from checking in at the nurse’s station twice in the last twenty minutes.Both times, he was told that Blackwood had been alerted to their presence and would join them as soon as he got out of surgery.

“I’m starting to wonder if maybe he’s using this operation as an excuse to make a run for it before we know he’s gone,” Ryan said conspiratorially.

“Don’t you think that if he’d done that, one of the nurses would have told us?”Jessie asked.“They know we’re with LAPD.Are they really going to cover for the guy like that?”

Before he could reply, the door opened.Out stepped a man that Jessie immediately recognized as Blackwood.He was better looking than his hospital website photo suggested.Tall and lean, with short black hair and a few days’ worth of stubble, he looked the part of a physician on one of those doctor shows.He was 42 but appeared half a decade younger.

He walked over to the nurse's station and whispered something, after which a nurse pointed in their direction.He strode toward them with a broad smile on his face.

“Ethan Blackwell,” he said, extending a hand.“I apologize for the wait.I understand you’ve been here a while.But when an extra tumor is discovered during a procedure, things tend to run long.”

“We understand,” Jessie said.“Maybe we can talk outside so as not to disturb the other folks here.”

Jessie was actually less concerned with the people waiting for word about their loved ones than she was that Blackwell might not be very forthcoming if he had an audience.He nodded his assent, and they headed out through the automatic doors to a small courtyard.

“What’s this all about?”he asked once the doors closed.

"I'm Detective Hernandez," Ryan said."This is Jessie Hunt.We're investigating an incident involving one of your financial advisors, and we were hoping you could shed some light on an issue that came up."

Blackwell’s smile remained frozen in place, but his eyes lost their warmth, turning suddenly cold and wary.

“Who’s the advisor?”he asked.

“James Whitaker.”

“He’s not my advisor anymore, and I recommend that if you’re thinking about using him, you reconsider.”

“Why do you say that?”Jessie asked innocently.

“Because he cost me—” he started to say, before pausing to properly calibrate his response for his audience, “well, let’s say that he cost me a great deal of money.”

“Did he cheat you in some way?”Jessie pressed.

“Is that what this is about?”Blackwell asked, sounding convincingly like he had no idea of the purpose of their visit.

“If you could just answer the question, Dr.Blackwell,” Ryan said politely but firmly.

The man looked slightly put out, but still answered.

“He didn’t officially cheat me, but his investment advice was catastrophically bad,” he said, his voice tightening in anger.“Then, when I tried to get him to acknowledge his failures, he was incredibly dismissive.Detective, I do quite well for myself, but even in my position, these losses were difficult to swallow.”

“It sounds like you were pretty upset,” Jessie said sympathetically.“How did you resolve the situation?”

He sighed and shrugged.

“According to my attorney, there wasn’t anythingtoresolve.Apparently, I assumed the potential for risk when I signed on with Whitaker.There’s all kinds of fine print to that effect.So I just had to take my lumps and move on.”

“Did you?”Ryan asked with a little edge.

“Did I what?”Blackwell demanded, starting to lose his cool.“Did I accept that I lost over three million dollars in a matter of weeks?What else was I supposed to do?Go to the media or something?That would only make me look like some rube and probably cause potential patients to wonder whether they should put their lives in my hands.”

---