The Bone Collector

stethoscope into his ears, inflated the cuff and let the air out slowly. Staring at his watch. His hands were rock-steady. “Shit. Diastolic’s one twenty-five. Shit.”
    Father in heaven, Sachs thought. He’s going to stroke out.
    Thom nodded at the black bag. “Find the bottle of nifedipine. And open up one of those syringes.” As she searched, Thom yanked down Rhyme’s pajamas and grabbed a catheter from beside the bed, tore open its plastic wrapper too. He smeared the end with K-Y jelly and lifted Rhyme’s pale penis, inserting the catheter gently but quickly into the tip.
    “This’s part of the problem. Bowel and urinary pressure can trigger an attack. He’s been drinking way more than he should today.”
    She opened the hypodermic but said, “I don’t know how to do the needle.”
    “I’ll do it.” He looked up at her. “Could I ask . . . would you mind doing this? I don’t want the tube to get a kink in it.”
    “Okay. Sure.”
    “You want gloves?”
    She pulled on a pair and carefully took Rhyme’s penis in her left hand. She held the tube in her right. It had been a long, long time since she’d held a man here. The skin was soft and she thought how strange it was that this center of a man’s being is, most of the time, as delicate as silk.
    Thom expertly injected the drug.
    “Come on, Lincoln . . .”
    A siren sounded in the distance.
    “They’re almost here,” she said glancing out the window.
    “If we don’t bring him back now there’s nothing they can do.”
    “How long does it take the drug to work?”
    Thom stared at the unresponsive Rhyme, said, “It should’ve by now. But too high a dose and he goes into shock.” The aide bent down and lifted an eyelid. The blue pupil was glazed, unfocused.
    “This isn’t good.” He took the pressure again. “One fifty. Christ.”
    “It’ll kill him,” she said.
    “Oh. That’s not the problem.”
    “What?” a shocked Amelia Sachs whispered.
    “He doesn’t mind dying.” He looked at her briefly as if surprised she hadn’t figured this out. “He just doesn’t want to be any more paralyzed than he already is.” He prepared another injection. “He may already’ve had one. A stroke, I mean. That’s what terrifies him.”
    Thom leaned forward and injected more of the drug.
    The siren was closer now. Honking too. Cars would be blocking the ambulance’s way, in no hurry to pull aside—one of the things that infuriated Sachs about the city.
    “You can take the catheter out now.”
    She carefully extracted the tube. “Should I . . .” Nodding toward the urine bag.
    Thom managed a weak smile. “That’s my job.”
    Several minutes passed. The ambulance seemed to make no progress then a voice crackled over a speaker and gradually the siren grew closer.
    Suddenly Rhyme stirred. His head shook slightly. Then it lolled back and forth, pressed into the pillow. His skin lost some of its florid tone.
    “Lincoln, can you hear me?”
    He moaned, “Thom . . .”
    Rhyme was shivering violently. Thom covered him with a sheet.
    Sachs found herself smoothing Rhyme’s mussed hair. She took a tissue and wiped his forehead.
    Footsteps pounded on the stairs and two burly EMS medics appeared, radios crackling. They hurried into the room, took Rhyme’s blood pressure and checked the nerve stimulator. A moment later Dr. Peter Taylor burst into the room.
    “Peter,” Thom said. “Dysreflexia.”
    “Pressure?”
    “It’s down. But it was bad. Crested at one fifty.”
    The doctor winced.
    Thom introduced Taylor to the EMS techs. They seemed pleased an expert was there and stepped back as Taylor walked over to the bedside.
    “Doctor,” Rhyme said groggily.
    “Let’s look at those eyes.” Taylor shone a light into Rhyme’s pupils. Sachs scanned the doctor’s face for a reaction and was troubled by his frown.
    “Don’t need the nerve stimulator,” Rhyme whispered.
    “You and your lungs, right?” the doctor asked wryly. “Well, let’s keep it going for a little while, why don’t we? Just till we see what exactly’s going on here.” He glanced at Sachs. “Maybe you could wait downstairs.”
    * * *  
    Taylor leaned close and Rhyme noticed the beads of sweat dotting the doctor’s scalp under his thin hair.
    The man’s deft hands lifted a lid and gazed again into one pupil, then the next. He rigged up the sphygmomanometer and took Rhyme’s blood pressure, his eyes distant with that concentration of medicos