Personalized Murder

By Jeffrey Holt

When the Democratic President and his VP die on Inauguration Day, pathologist Jon Woodlock determines diabetes and heart failure are to blame. The grieving nation revolts when the Republican Speaker of the House is sworn into the highest office. Politicians who protest the stolen election drop dead of natural causes, followed by prominent actors and activists. Jon must find who is causing underlying disease to overtake victims on cue. Many lives, including his own, are at stake. The race is on to figure out what—and who—is behind the deaths before it's too late, and a madman rules the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: World Castle Publishing, LLC
• Release date: May 13, 2019
• ISBN: 9781949812909

Jeffrey Holt

My 30 years as an MD Pathologist shaped this narrative. I have performed hundreds of autopsies and published 85 research papers in the field of individualized medicine from which my invention of personalized murder evolved. I am a Pew Scholar, funded by the National Institutes of Health for over 25 years and have held the rank of full professor at Vanderbilt and University of Colorado Medical Schools.

Book preview

Personalized Murder

By

Jeffrey Holt

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

World Castle Publishing, LLC

Pensacola, Florida

Copyright © Jeffrey Holt 2019

Smashwords Edition

Paperback ISBN: 9781949812893

eBook ISBN: 9781949812909

First Edition World Castle Publishing, LLC, May 13, 2019

http://www.worldcastlepublishing.com

Smashwords Licensing Notes

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews.

Cover: Karen Fuller

Editor: Maxine Bringenberg

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

CHAPTER ONE

Pamela Harrison held the Lincoln Bible and concentrated on being present in the moment. A grayish pallor settled on her husband’s nervous face. She watched his hands tremble as he began.

I, Benjamin Arthur Harrison, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of president of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

The chief justice prompted, So help you, God?

So…help—

Ben fell forward and struck his head on the podium. His body dropped.

A half-second elapsed, and in that bubble of time, Pam imagined babies being born and old people dying. Sounds of shock and disbelief swirled in the air and failed to hit the ground. Men shouted, and women screamed.

A swift jerk yanked Pamela’s elbow, and an intense-faced secret serviceman said, Head down! Run! He did not wait for compliance. Her feet stumbled as a pair of agents in dark suits thrust her forward. Pounding sounded on the staging underneath her and tingled up her spine.

Stop! Let me go! Pamela struggled to return to her husband, but failed to rotate her head. What’s happening? Where is he?

The agents drug her down the stairs and pushed her into an unmarked black Escalade. As the vehicle sped away, Pamela clawed at the locked door.

Ben!

***

Before Benjamin Harrison hit his knees, Axel Blackman, Special Agent in Charge, sprinted towards him. Within three strides he had issued orders. Team One: Evacuate. Team Two: Secure. Team Three: Contain.

Axel clocked six men armed with machine guns forming a human barricade around the fallen leader. Shouts of confusion, horror, and fear rose from the crowd. Dignitaries crouched, afraid of being shot. Others ran, unsure of which direction promised safety. Camera operators focused their lenses with the brave composure of war correspondents.

Get the doctor to the ambulance! Blackman said. He permitted adrenaline free reign, and felt his blood hasten through his body.

Tactical agents dressed in riot gear and combat boots hefted the bleeding Harrison as if he were weightless, and carried him to the emergency vehicle. Blackman ran alongside them, alert for danger from any sector, including the sky. The Capitol steps posed no obstacle to the unit, who moved as if across open ground.

Grizzly and Gisele secure, came the report into Blackman’s ear piece, confirming agents had evacuated Vice President Burrows and his wife, Sylvie. Until his team completed their threat assessments and doctors established Harrison’s status, their location remained classified.

Petunia secure.

Blackman ticked Mrs. Benjamin Harrison, the first lady, off his mental checklist.

The squad wasted no time unloading the gurney from the waiting emergency vehicle. Instead, the men carried the president through the open doors and deposited him on the stretcher. The team exited with rapid, economical movements, and joined the machine gunners in a semi-circle with their backs to the ambulance. Motorcycle cops and bubble-light patrol cars lined up to provide escort.

Blackman spoke into his mic, Polar Bear’s shot. Operating rooms stand by. His eyes scanned for oncoming danger, and his heart pumped full force, providing blood to his brain and body.

He battled fury as Dr. Edwards, the president’s physician, moved without the urgency required of a field medic. His pace belonged to a non-trauma surgeon.

Ninety seconds after Benjamin Harrison pitched forward, Axel Blackman, Dr. Edwards, and two paramedics sped towards the hospital. They all worked with haste in the cramped space.

Pulse 122.

BP 170/100.

Three teams to the hospital. Get all non-emergent cases out of there. Now!

Respirations 24.

Temp 99.

Blackman wiped sweat from his brow. The January day topped forty degrees. Six pounds of Kevlar under his suit did not allow him to breathe. His accelerated pulse and respirations generated heat like a woman after sex.

Axel watched Dr. Edwards behave as if death would wait for him, and clenched a fist. The doctor cleaned the wound on Harrison’s forehead and rolled him over to examine his back. He listened to both sides of the injured man’s chest.

Harrison’s skin shone as sweaty as Blackman’s, but not from Kevlar. Engineers had manufactured a bulletproof suit for the president that withstood a hit from a 9mm. The protective clothing weighed less, and provided more flexibility than Blackman’s vest. It cost more, too.

No gunshot wound, Dr. Edwards said. He hit his head.

Find the shooter? Blackman asked into his radio.

No bullet, said Dr. Edwards with irritation.

The medical man’s lack of battlefield readiness tanked Blackman’s opinion of him and his assessments. Blackman ignored the physician and said into the mic, Maintain containment.

Dr. Edwards said, Are you listening? It’s his diabetes.

Blackman stared hard at the healer. His eyes threatened bodily harm to the doctor if he were proved wrong.

Edwards backed away from Blackman’s challenge and spoke to the EMTs. Get me a glucose. Now.

Axel’s impression of the man slipped another notch. He said, Isolate the emergency room. No one new comes in. Divert all ambulances and walk-ins.

The young male attendant stood and opened one of the metal boxes along the inside wall. The glucometer he retrieved pierced Harrison’s skin and displayed an instant reading.

Blackman failed to read the number from his vantage point. His eyes swung from window to window of the speeding vehicle, watchful for any signs of an ambush. He had coordinated today’s operation, and it had gone south. Someone downed the fucking president.

85 mg/dL.

Axel knew the stats he heard fell within reasonable ranges. The president’s respirations and BP sounded high, but they increased in crisis. Blackman bet his numbers had jacked up to match.

Sirens screeched atonal warnings. The radio sputtered updates every ten seconds. The three medical personnel on board relayed information between them. Sounds overlapped. Blackman’s thoughts held a staccato beat as he concentrated his mind forward. Plenty of time for replay later.

Perimeter contained, said a voice on the radio. DC Metro on crowd.

Draw three vials of blood, said Dr. Edwards to the paramedics.

The radio broadcast, Bomb bitches on scene. Blackman switched to his ear piece to lessen the noise in the box.

Bandaid buddies and fire rolled in, came the next status update.

No GSW? Blackman asked the new president’s physician.

Dr. Edwards gave him a look of disgust. He’s sick.

Blackman could not hold a hundred thousand people hostage because Polar Bear had caught the bottle flu at last night’s party. He would be damned if an assassin walked out unhindered because this moron doc missed something, though.

Blackman assessed the competence of the bowtied physician and made a decision. Let ‘em go. Scan ID’s for anyone dodgy. The ambulance slowed, and Blackman spoke into the mic, Teams prepare to move. Emergency room clear?

A voice in his ear said, Not yet. These people are hurting.

I’ll shoot anyone still in the waiting room, said Blackman through gritted teeth.

Polar Bear’s health remained Blackman’s sole concern. Fuck the drunks and trunks clogging access. Axel’s clenched fist gripped Harrison’s life and held on to it.

A few moments later, he said. ETA one minute. ER secure?

Blackman glanced once more at the pale president, and braced to jump from the vehicle. Prepare to run, he instructed, the picture of a whistle-toting gym coach in the high school from hell.

The ambulance came to a halt under the fluorescent lights, and secret service agents materialized in a swarm. Men wrenched the back door open, and Axel Blackman vaulted from the bumper. The EMTs unclamped the stretcher and rolled it forward into waiting hands.

Automatic doors opened into a hospital free of crowds. Rubber soled boots squelched on gleaming tile floors, and a nurse ran ahead and said, This way.

Blackman’s men pushed the president’s gurney into a spacious treatment room. Dr. Edwards did not run, and emergency room personnel had transferred President Benjamin Harrison to the bed before the slow moving bastard rounded the corner.

Blackman positioned himself in the doorway, eyes out, his back to the commotion behind him. His men set up a generous perimeter, and used DC Metro to restrict floor to floor access within the building. He posted police officers at all elevators and stairwells, as well as at the connecting hallways.

A nurse placed an IV on the first attempt. Staff retook vitals and drew blood without instruction. Each had rehearsed their part in this drama. An oxygen mask covered Harrison’s face, though his O2 saturation remained adequate. Axel understood the need to act, even if the president failed to benefit.

As Dr. Edwards washed his hands using multiple lathers and rinses, Blackman yearned to replace the president’s physician with one who understood urgency. In Blackman’s assessment, this British butler feared the loss of decorum more than the loss of life.

He’s in a coma, said Dr. Edwards to the assembled medical team.

Reports say someone shot him, said an ER physician.

Blackman raised his hands to his waist, palms up. About time someone said it.

He wasn’t, but let’s get a CT of his head. Stat, said Dr. Edwards.

The nurse who directed them when they arrived made a phone call to alert CT.

Blackman spoke into his mic, Empty every hallway between here and radiology.

He’s seizing! said the nurse. The leader of the free world arched his back, collapsed flat, and drummed his feet and arms. His head rotated from side to side.

Fifteen milligrams diazepam, said Dr. Edwards, and a nurse injected the medication, bypassing the IV.

President Harrison reverted to his non-animated state and lay on the bed, too still.

CT, reiterated the doctor.

Polar Bear on the move, said Blackman, and he held the door open.

His men lined the corridors, alert for danger. Transit provided multiple opportunities for attack. Every closed door shielded assassins. The acute crisis had not permitted time to secure the entire facility. Blackman grabbed a side-rail of the bed and determined to set the transport pace at a sprint.

The CT found no slug in the president’s skull, and Axel sagged in relief. No shooter had broken his perimeters.

Dr. Edwards rammed into the secret service agent’s shoulder as he exited the room. Move, ordered the physician, vindicated.

Blackman balled his fist but did not speak. He would not shift focus from the president. Axel still held responsibility for the man.

Harrison’s gurney retraced its course through the gauntlet of armed officers. When they re-entered the examination room, Axel overheard the first lady, demanding to see her husband.

***

Ben! said Pamela as she leaped towards Harrison. Her eyes searched his unresponsive frame. Where was he hit? The room had grown crowded, and Pamela jockeyed for a premium position at the head of her husband’s bed.

He wasn’t shot, said Dr. Edwards.

What then? Diabetic coma? He took his insulin before the ceremony. Pamela struggled to help as her mind sorted through various scenarios.

No, his glucose is fine. Dr. Edwards dismissed her suggestion and addressed the nurse. I need those labs. No fear strained his voice, but Pam trembled with anxiety. This could not happen. She would not allow Ben to die on the day he realized his dream.

Then what the hell’s wrong with him? Pam said. She did not care if she sounded harsh.

Dr. Edwards took off his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose, and said, It’s too soon to tell.

Pamela’s anger flared at his tone. She had never liked the pompous fool, and had insisted on keeping her own physician. Who wore bow ties? Professors? Her husband needed a doctor, the best. The secret service had not allowed her phone in the car as they left the inauguration. They feared someone had compromised it, but she would get it back and assemble the best possible team.

Pulse 144, said a staff member in green scrubs, and Pam turned to look at him. She was no doctor, but that sounded too high. Dr. Edwards should recheck it; Ben was not running on the treadmill at the moment. He lie still as death, his eyes closed.

When did he last eat? asked the doctor.

Breakfast. Nine A.M. Pamela brushed the hair off Harrison’s forehead with a nervous hand. You’re going to be fine, Ben. We have a date, remember? I didn’t wear these shoes for nothing.

Pam’s forced smile wavered, though her unconscious husband did not notice, so she let it crumble.

She heard Dr. Edwards instruct the phlebotomist, Get me a tox screen.

He doesn’t do drugs. Pamela straightened to her full height, and her face reddened in anger. She gripped the bed rails and glared at Dr. Edwards, her offense at the suggestion fierce. The idiot wanted to blame it on the patient.

Not to your knowledge, said the hateful man, and she wished to strike him.

Had Ben confided something to the doctor? Pam batted the thought away with force. She knew everything relevant about her husband. He did not take recreational drugs.

The nurse returned and read the lab results out to the physicians, Serum sodium 148, potassium 6.2, chloride 97, and a bicarb of 12.

Doctors, a moment please? Dr. Edwards excluded the lesser educated in the room. His black dress shoes clicked on the polished floor as he led the trio out.

Pamela thought about following him and refusing to be excluded, but remained hovered over her husband and said to a nurse, All he needs is sugar. I carry it in my purse.

The doctor hasn’t ordered it.

It’ll help him. It always does. She located a packet of honey from a biscuit restaurant and opened it with her teeth. Pam shared intimate knowledge of what her husband’s disease did to him, and stood ready to battle it with him.

The nurse said, Mrs. Harrison, I can’t let you do that.

I’m his wife. She raised her arm and moved to squeeze the packet’s contents into her husband’s slack mouth.

The nurse blocked the advance and said, I’m sorry. You can’t.

This is my call. Not yours. Not Dr. Edwards’. Pamela raised her voice and noticed the secret service agent at the door focused on her. She could not fathom how he might consider her a threat, but it seemed obvious he did.

Dr. Edwards returned and said, You’re incorrect, ma’am. Your husband is incapacitated, and the government entrusts his health care to me.

You’re the one letting him die! Give him the sugar! Pamela Harrison cried for the first time since her nightmare began. Tears in front of strangers humiliated her, and her face felt hot. Life as a politician’s wife had taught her never to break in front of witnesses.

We’re doing all we can, said Dr. Edwards. If you interfere again, I’ll have you removed from the premises.

Like hell, you will. Pamela replaced embarrassment with pure fury. She would replace him with someone who knew what the hell they were doing.

Have a seat, Mrs. Harrison, said Dr. Edwards. Time I spend with you takes me away from your husband.

That worked. Pam would not distract the people caring for her husband. The nurse pulled a chair up for Pamela, and she sat down, defeated.

Help him, she said. She remained unsure if she addressed Dr. Edwards or God.

His anion gap is 39, highly abnormal. I would assume ketoacidosis in a diabetic, but his glucose is normal. I believe someone’s poisoned him. He made the pronouncement in the tone of a dramatic television narrator.

Saliva flooded Pam Harrison’s mouth, and she worried she might puke. Watching Ben suffer tore at her insides. Fear struck her deeper than the day a car had hit her daughter. Holly had been four-years-old and conscious. She had cried when the emergency team cut the party dress off her, which reassured her mother.

Ben stayed in a coma, unaware that his condition worsened. He had promised Pam their family took precedence, but then he made an oath to three hundred million other people. It overshadowed the pledge he made to her from the moment he uttered it.

Pam ran from the room to empty her stomach. On the way back to Ben, she watched the footage from the inauguration ceremony on television. The screen showed it just as she had remembered.

Former President Adams and Gurion Flint both stood stonefaced. Ben had the balls to contend with a sitting president from the same party and win. The useless bureaucrat hated him for it. His poor showing as a US President would haunt Adams in the history books; Pam felt sure.

She thought Adams looked insignificant next to Flint, whose immense torso loomed over everyone in a vague threat. Standard-sized legs somehow supported his barrel chest and broad shoulders. Gurion’s black beard blocked the limited facial expressions he allowed himself. The man bled business, and snuffed out frivolity with a glance. He sometimes cracked the tiniest of smiles, but had never directed one at her.

Gurion had run against Adams four years ago and lost. Flint had believed Adams’s failings would usher him into the White House and unseat the Democrats. He had not counted on Ben Harrison re-branding the party, and convincing the American people to choose him as their leader.

I need to call my daughter, Pam said when she returned to the room. She saw what happened. She’ll be going crazy. Pam knew Holly’s voice would bring her comfort, as well.

No one answered her. The medical team continued to monitor life signs and draw samples of bodily fluids. Technicians performed portable x-rays. Nurses hung several IV bags, including antibiotics. Other efficient medical personnel ran EKGs and EEGs.

I said I need my phone! Pamela did not wish to be exiled from her husband’s side, but thought the fact that they ignored her unreasonable. The president deserved to have his family treated well, not as potential threats.

The secret service agent who had not vacated his spot in the doorway said, That’s not possible, we’re holding her elsewhere.

It’s just my daughter.

No. We’ll keep her informed.

Someone had poisoned Ben and they were keeping Holly from her. In the space of an hour, Pam had lost all control. Insanity bloomed in her brain.

Pam thought about using the pay phone in the lobby, but the secret service agents had likely confiscated Holly’s cell as well. They behaved as if the president’s only child posed a threat to national security.

The transformation of her life once Ben took the oath had blindsided the first lady. She had concerned herself with the move, hosting duties, and protocols of her future. Pam was prepared to be less demanding of her husband’s time. She worried he would feel too tired to give her the affection she craved.

Today, the secret service and doctors informed Pam that her husband had signed away her legal rights as a wife. Ben’s oath to them superseded his vow to her on day one.

He’s coding! came the shout Pam had dreaded. A lifetime of television had taught her the language of hospital deaths, and a knife of fear shot through her heart.

The medical team worked around one another. Too many demanding hands grasped her husband and blocked Pam’s access. Nurses pushed stimulants and applied paddles. A respiratory tech thrust a long tube down Ben’s throat in an obscene oral rape. Men beat his chest, drugged him, and cursed.

People who claimed to be working in his best interests tortured Ben’s frail, unresponsive body. God help him if his enemies attacked, because Pamela could not. She stood, impotent, and let others abuse her spouse.

Pamela’s senses perceived the world as thickened. Transparent and gelatinous space cocooned her, muffled sounds, and made sights unclear. Time telescoped and expanded, elongated then quickened. Natural laws no longer existed in a world without Ben.

Thirty minutes later, Dr. Edwards said, Time of death 3:14. Pamela had failed to say goodbye.

***

Axel guarded the president, so Harrison’s demise meant he now protected Alfred Burrows. He left the hospital and sped to the White House, where his agents had taken the country’s successor to the office.

Two of Blackman’s men had scooped up the VP and his wife the moment the president face planted. Axel learned that Thorguson, the secret service director, had joined the VP’s group in the evacuation. His boss had made a play before the umpire called the final strike. His skill as a fucking fortune-teller had landed him the directorship in earlier days.

Blackman arrived at the White House and strode to the Oval Office, where Thorguson sat with Alfred and Sylvie Burrows. The director waited for Axel to relate his news, then said, Mr. Burrows, Ben Harrison didn’t make it. The chief justice will swear you in as soon as he arrives.

Alfred Burrows put his thin arm around Sylvie, a woman whose appearance reminded Axel of Mrs. Claus. Her vanilla perfume created thoughts of sugar cookies in his mind, an absurdity in the present situation.

He’s dead? asked Burrows.

Mrs. Burrows’ pink cheeks appeared rosier than usual, and she wrung a lace handkerchief in her plump hands. Cock suckers, she said, and the agent guarding the office door looked at her, shock on his youthful face.

Blackman said, Director Thorguson’s correct, Harrison’s passed.

Ogden Parks scurried into the room as if on cue. Haste became the order, as obscenity replaced the day’s decorum. Axel noticed that Sylvie still possessed the family Bible from the morning’s VP oath. Blackman assumed the role of puppet master, and arranged the three characters into their proper stances.

The new president completed the oath, including the invocation, So help me, God, without incident. Axel breathed a sigh of relief.

The forty-ninth president turned to his wife, hugged her, and said, I can’t believe Ben’s gone. Never imagined this.

Son of a cunt, said Sylvie.

Axel contemplated whether the great-grandmother had Tourrettes, and looked to Alfred Burrows to gauge his reaction. The man squeezed his wife’s arm again; whether in an urge to control or comfort, Axel did not know.

A pinprick of blood dotted the elderly man’s hand. He must have brushed his paper-thin skin against something, Axel thought. Anything the size of a blasted gnat caused old people to bruise, and a busted hip posed the biggest danger.

Ten seconds later, Burrows grabbed his chest and issued a guttural noise that Axel heard as the death rattle of his career. The cluster fuck of a day continued.

Thorguson shouted into his mic, Find the Speaker of the House and get him to the castle.

***

Alert Walter Reed, said Axel to the second agent.

Blackman ordered escort vehicles. Someone had failed to reposition an ambulance at the White House. He promised himself to locate and kill them as soon as he found a moment. Axel decided to transport the new president himself. The physician had failed once already today, and remained with Harrison. Leave him to mind the corpse.

Alfred! Don’t you fucking do this, said Sylvie. Her eyes shot deadly blue sparks from their crinkled caves. The disconnect between her puffy exterior and sailor soul unsettled Axel. He felt as if he was witnessing his grandmother in a porno.

Thorguson placed his accountant’s hand on Burrows’ shoulder and muttered a prayer. When the new president’s heart mutinied, fate screwed his legacy as director of the