"Help me make Michael the father of a healthy baby."

"I'll do my best, but I have to be honest with you. This is not going to be an easy pregnancy. Normally, I would tell you to avoid stress, but I realize that would be impossible in your case. I can only urge you to minimize it as much as possible. Try to keep up with your regular routine."

"IT! be going back to work on the show tomorrow," Sara said.

"Now that the treatment is getting more intense, I won't be staying overnight at the hospital anymore."

"Good."

"Doctor Simpson?"

"Carol."

"Carol, what are the chances that I'll carry to full term?"

Again, the doctor inhaled deeply, kept the air in her lungs and her puffed cheeks, and then released it slowly.

"I don't know," she said at last.

"The next month or two will be critical. If we can get past that, it should get easier. Now why don't you lie back and relax?"

Exhaustion emanated from every fiber of Harvey's being.

He wished he could find a way to unwind, to forget this place for just a few minutes, to re-juice his flagging battery. But there was no escape and in truth, it was because he accepted none.

The clinic was just too important to diddle in the mundane or trivial.

He opened the door to his office. The room was dark. No lights on. No windows to offer illumination. He flicked the switch.

"Close the door," a husky voice commanded.

Harvey's stomach dropped to his knees as he stared at Cassandra. She was standing in front of his desk wearing a short white robe whose brightness contrasted beautifully with the dark Mediterranean tone of her upper thigh. Her long, black hair was slightly mussed, with a couple of tight curls reaching down and covering one eye. She smiled a wild, seductive, tantalizing smile that he could feel in his toes.

"I said, close the door."

Swallowing, Harvey obeyed.

She loosened the robe and let it open slightly, hinting at the delights that lay beneath.

Harvey swallowed again.

The robe slid off her shoulders and onto the floor.

Underneath, she wore only a black garter belt and lace brassiere.

"I've been waiting for you," she purred.

With her torrid gaze never leaving his, Cassandra sat on his desk and slowly lowered herself into a prone position. She rolled back, stretching her hands above her head and arching her back.

Then she turned her body to the side, her head leaning against her hand.

She renewed her smile.

Harvey's eyes crawled over every inch of her, over every luscious curve. Her body was utterly fantastic. Mile-long legs to a flat stomach, hourglass hips and waist, and then her bountiful, round breasts and smooth shoulders. Incredible. She was almost impossibly voluptuous.

He felt the familiar, unsettling stir building up inside of him.

He tried to swallow yet again, but his mouth had gone completely dry.

"I thought we agreed to take this slow," he managed.

She laughed, threw her head back, and beckoned him forward with both a look and a demanding finger.

"The slower, the better."

Max drove the rented station wagon across the George Washington Bridge and into New Jersey. In the back seat Theodore Krutzer, Paul Leander, and Arnold Singer sat quietly. They looked, Max thought, amazingly healthy and calm. All three men had been diagnosed with the AIDS virus two years ago, but Max would never have guessed it. He kept turning around and snatching glances at them. Their good health and spirits, in shocking contrast to the many friends and lovers Max had seen ravaged by the virus, were a fresh and constant reminder to him of the importance of solving this case.

As they reached New Jersey, Max's beeper went off. He pulled into a Gulf station on Route 4 and parked next to a payphone.

"I have to make a call," he said to the three men in the back seat.

He got out of the car and dialed the precinct.

"Max Bernstein," he said.

"Yeah, Lieutenant, we have a call from Sergeant Monticelli. I'll connect you."

There was a clicking noise.

"Twitch?"

"Yeah, Willie, it's me. Where are you?" "Bethesda, Maryland," he said.

"Guess what Southern-fried lab technician is visiting the National Institutes of Health?"

Max felt a strange fluttering in the pit of his stomach.

"Winston O'Connor."

"Bingo. So I checked his file real good. About his childhood in Alabama and all that crap. Everything is in order. No holes at all.

Nothing suspicious. Absolutely clean. Perfect."

"Too perfect?"

"Yup. The guy's gotta be a plant."

Max nodded to no one in particular.

"Thanks, Willie. Come on home. No reason to follow him anymore."

"Will do, Twitch."

When Max reached the safehouse, he took Dr. Zry, his best (and quietest) medical man, aside.

"I have some very specific instructions for you."

Dr. Zry prompted.

"I want you to take some blood samples from the three patients," Max said.

"But I thought the guys at the clinic said not to touch " "I know what they said," Max interrupted.

"That's why I want it to remain our little secret."

George entered the clinic's basement at five o'clock in the afternoon.

Despite the cops crawling all over the obvious entrances, George had had no problem getting into the building through a tunnel entrance in the basement. Getting out the same way would be no problem either. He had spent most of the day studying a blueprint of the building and had come up with a plan he was sure would not fail.

Michael Silverman was in a private room on the third floor, no more than ten yards from the stairwell and the elevator. George was not yet sure which he was going to use to make his escape, but he was leaning toward the elevator. No other patients were housed on the third floor, and after 8:00 p. m." the floor should be abandoned unless someone was still in the lab down the other end of the hallway.

Time to recheck the plan.

He took the blueprint out of his pocket and quietly unfolded it. His finger traced along the paper until it arrived at the third floor. He squinted. Michael's room was over here, the lab was way down there, two empty rooms right there, the storage closet on the right, medical supplies locked over on the left. That was it. Nothing had been overlooked. He would just have to watch the nurse, wait until she left Michael's room.

George refolded the blueprint and jammed it into his front pants pocket. He wondered if Michael Silverman was another faggot or if he had really gotten the disease from a blood transfusion. Probably another fruitcake. His marriage to Sara Lowell was for show.

He settled back against the brick wall and waited.

16.

George checked his watch.

7:45 p.m.

He was already on the third floor and ready to move. Just a few more minutes to go.

From his spot inside the lab doorway George watched Sara Lowell and Reece Porter leave Michael's room. Perfect. Right on time. Ten minutes earlier Dr. Harvey Riker had made his exit.

Now Michael Silverman was alone in his room, probably asleep.

George listen closely, but he heard no voices. Sara and Reece were waiting for the elevator in perfect silence. Nothing to be said, he guessed.

Well, they'll have plenty to talk about tomorrow.

The familiar adrenalin rush was beginning to build inside of him, but George remained cool. No reason to rush. Rushing led to mistakes.

He knew he would have to wait a few more minutes until the nurse came by to check on Silverman. When she left his room, George would be able to waltz down the hallway and spend a little quality time with Michael.

And what do you know? Lookie here. George would not have to be patient much longer.