True to the Game III Read Free Page A

caused.
    “Ben and I repaired most of the damage already,” Hartley told her.
    “I see; you guys did a fantastic job,” she told him, assuaging their egos. Dr. Hopkins reconnected a severed artery, suctioned the blood from the wound, and monitored her patient for several moments before turning to a nurse. “What’s he looking like?”
    “Blood pressure has climbed to 112 over 70 and is holding steady. Everything looks good.”
    “Close him up for me, get him into ICU, and page me in an hour with his vitals,” Hopkins told them. She lifted the chart from the bottom of the bed. “Deceased” had been scrawled across it. “Get him a new chart. The patient’s name is John Smith. Everybody clear on that?”
    Dr. Brant peered over at his colleague.
    “I’ll alert the authorities and his family,” Dr. Hopkins told them. “Until I or the authorities say otherwise, Mr. Richards is deceased. Mr. Smith, however, is alive and doing quite well.”
    “I signed the death certificate,” Hartley told her.
    “I’ll take care of that, too,” Hopkins said. She turned to the orderly, who had watched the whole thing from the corner of the operating room. “Come with me.”
    Amelia Hopkins led Stan out into the hallway and maneuvered him into a corner. “Stan, what I am about to say to you is very important. And I need to have your undivided attention. Do I have that, Stan? Do I have your undivided attention?”
    Stan nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
    “Good. Stan, I have a patient in there who had a whole lot of bullet holes inside of him. Somebody doesn’t like Mr. Richards, and thought it best that he not remain with us in this life. My job, as a doctor, is to see to it that he does. But in order to do that, I am going to need your help. Can I count on you to help me?”
    Stan nodded again.
    “Good. Now, how many John Does do you have down there in the morgue?”
    “Right now, about four or five, but the weekend is coming up. We should have a shitload of ’em coming in.”
    Amelia Hopkins nodded. “Any of the ones we have fit the description of Mr. Richards in there?”
    Stan smiled and scratched his chin. “One, maybe. A buddy of mines works over in the morgue at the County Hospital. I’m sure I could get you a John Doe close enough to match.”
    It was Dr. Hopkins’s turn to smile. “You do that. You get me a John Doe to match, and you put this chart on him. Make sure that John Doe becomes Quadir Richards. And you let no one in to see it. He’s already been identified by his family, and you tell them that the authorities are not allowing anyone else to see the body at this time. You got that?”
    Stan nodded. “Dr. Hopkins, in a few years, I’ll need a surgeon to intern under.”
    Amelia shoved the chart into his hand. “You want to be a surgeon, I’ll get you there. But you better have the grades and the stamina to keep up with me.”
    Stan nodded. “Deal.”
    Dr. Hopkins walked to the nurses’ station. “That patient in the OR. I need for you to get me his family’s address and telephone number. You’ll probably have to look it up. You know what, see if you can cross-reference the information that you find and get me the name and telephone number of his parents.”
    The nurse nodded and lifted a large telephone book from beneath the nurses’ station.
    Dr. Hopkins knew that one thing was for certain: a mother would do anything to keep her child alive. A wife or girlfriend could be after an insurance policy, or her jealous lover could have been the gunman. But a mother, she would kill or die to protect her offspring. She needed the mother’s address.
    The nurses and a couple of ICU orderlies wheeled Quadir out of the operating room, heading for the elevator.
    “What’s he look like?” Hopkins asked.
    “Vitals are stable. Blood pressure is 118 over 80.”
    “Good job, Amelia,” Dr. Brant told her, exiting the operating room.
    “Thanks, Benny.”
    “I’m heading over to the cafeteria. Want to join