Page 51 of Nica
The room was dead silent now, tension thick enough to cut.Gabe let his breathing become ragged, his hands shake slightly—the picture of a man on the edge.
“Dr.Summers, maybe—”
“Melissa Carpenter,” he said, not allowing Susan Jones, the nursing director, to interrupt.Watched as recognition flickered across several faces.“That’s what this is about, isn’t it?You think I killed her.You heard the rumors, the lies people spread about me.I know somebody checked up on me after I moved to your precious town.You think I was drunk, high, whatever B.S.story you’ve been fed.”
“Gabriel, please—” This from Dr.Morrison, the head of surgery.
“I was cleared!”Gabe’s voice cracked, and he was surprised to find that part of his anguish wasn’t entirely manufactured.“The investigation cleared me completely.No malpractice, no negligence, nothing.But that doesn’t matter to you, does it?You’ve already made up your minds.A patient died and I must be guilty.It had to be my fault.It wasn’t!”He made sure his voice was almost screeching at the end, a tinge of paranoia slipping in—exactly how he’d practiced repeatedly.He began pacing, running his hands through his hair, letting his appearance become more disheveled with each step.“She died on my table, and I’ve been living with that every single day since.Every night I see her face, hear the monitor flatline.But I didn’t kill her.I tried to save her, just like I try to save everyone who comes through these doors.”
“Of course you do,” Dr.Henley said soothingly.“Gabe, no one here thinks—”
“Liar!”The word exploded from him with such vehemence that the nursing supervisor nearest him recoiled.“You’re all liars.Someone’s been feeding information to the medical board of Texas, trying to get my license revoked.Just like they did in California.Spreading rumors, planting evidence.And now look what’s happened—my wife nearly died because somebody has a baseless vendetta against me!”
His voice broke on the last words, and he could see the shock on their faces.Perfect.This was exactly the reaction he needed.
“Dr.Summers, I—have no idea what you’re talking about.I’ve never heard of anybody named Melissa Carpenter.Don’t know anything about a malpractice case against you.”He could almost hear the ‘but you can bet I’ll be checking up on everything you’ve said’ lingering beneath the words Dr.Henley spoke.
“The cases in California—they were clean.Every single one.But someone’s been digging them up, twisting the facts, making it look like I’m some kind of butcher with a scalpel.Well, congratulations.You got what you wanted.You’ve destroyed my reputation, turned this entire town against me, and now my wife is lying upstairs with a bullet wound because of it.I hope your delusions, your quest for some type of vindication is worth it, because she almost died.I hope you can sleep at night with what you’ve done.I could still lose my wife, because she’s terrified of me now.And who can blame her?She’s been stalked, terrorized in her own apartment, and now somebody hired a hitman kill her.All because you hate me.”He pounded his fist against his chest.“Come after me!Leave Nica alone.Act like a man and come at me!”
Dr.Henley stood slowly, her face pale.“Gabe, I think you need to take some time off.Go home—”
“Home?”Gabe laughed bitterly.“Where’s that?Here, where everyone thinks I’m a murderer?Or California, where I can’t practice medicine anymore because of the lies you people have been spreading?Did you know the World Health Organization offered me a job?”He heard the gasps around the table.“Yeah, I had to kiss that goodbye, too, because of your lies, the forged documents you sent them.”He swayed slightly, as if the weight of everything was finally crushing him.“I can’t sleep.Can’t eat.Every time I close my eyes, I see patients who trusted me, who died despite everything I did to save them.And you vultures just keep circling, waiting for me to fall.”
The conference room door opened, and Gabe wasn’t surprised to see two security guards enter.Someone must have pressed the panic button.Good.Things were going according to plan.
“Dr.Summers,” the lead guard said calmly, “we need you to come with us.”
“Get away from me!”Gabe backed toward the window, his movements erratic.“I know what this is.You’re all in on it, aren’t you?Trying to have me committed, take away everything I have left.”He turned to face the room full of his colleagues, letting desperation flood his voice.“I dedicated my life to helping people.I took an oath to do no harm.And this is how you repay me?By destroying everything I’ve worked for?”
The security guards moved closer, and Gabe let them.He needed to be removed from the hospital.It was crucial to the plan.
“Please, Dr.Summers,” the guard said.“Let’s just step outside and talk.”
Gabe allowed them to escort him from the room, but not before turning back to deliver his final lines.“When the truth comes out—and it will—I hope you can all live with what you’ve done.My wife almost died because of your lies.If she doesn’t make it…” He let the threat hang in the air, unfinished but unmistakable.
As the guards led him down the hallway, Gabe could hear the explosion of voices from the conference room behind him.Good.They’d be talking about this for hours, calling their friends, spreading the story.By noon, everyone in Shiloh Springs would know that Dr.Gabriel Summers had finally snapped.
In the lobby, Douglas and Liam were waiting.Douglas’ face was a mask of concern that Gabe knew was only partially fake.His father-in-law was a good man, and this couldn’t be easy for him to watch.
“Gabe,” Liam said, grabbing his arm.“What was that?We got a call to head over here fast, that you’d snapped.”
“That was me finally telling everyone in this lousy town the truth,” Gabe said, his voice still carrying that edge of instability.“Finally telling these holier-than-thou people what I really think of them.”
The security guards released him to his family, and Douglas immediately wrapped an arm around his shoulders.“Come on, son.Let’s get you some coffee, somewhere quiet where we can talk.”
Gracie’s Grounds was only a few blocks away, and the morning crowd had thinned out, but there were still enough people seated at the tables or milling around for the plan to work.Perfect.More witnesses to his breakdown.Gabe let Douglas guide him to a corner table, but he couldn’t sit still.The performance had to continue.He had to convince everybody who saw him that he’d finally snapped—that he needed professional help—or more.
“I can’t do this anymore,” he said, his voice carrying across the coffee shop.Several heads turned in their direction.“I can’t keep pretending everything’s fine when it’s not.When my wife is lying in a hospital bed because someone in this town wants me destroyed.”
“Wife?”Gabe heard somebody whisper.“I didn’t know he was married.”
“Yeah, that’s right, I’m married.And my wife, my bride, the woman I love more than life itself, is lying in a hospital bed after having a bullet dug out of her chest.”
Okay, maybe that was a little over the top, but I need to make this look good.
“Nica?”
“He’s married to Nica Boudreau?”
