Page 30 of Gone Before Goodbye

“I’ll be gone for a week, maybe two.”

“Doing what, Mags?”

“Don’t worry, okay?”

“Good thing you said, ‘Don’t worry,’ because no one ever worries after someone says that.”

“I can’t say more.”

“Why not?”

Maggie switches the phone from her right hand to her left. “It’s confidential. There are privacy clauses and HIPAA and all that.”

“So, wait, you’re working as a physician again?”

“What part of ‘it’s confidential’ is confusing to you?” Maggie half snaps. “Look, it’s all fine, trust me. Please just let me do this.”

Sharon has more questions, but Maggie dodges and weaves and gets her off the phone. When she hangs up, she tells Ivan, “I need to go back to the hotel to check out and pack—”

“Done.”

“That ‘done’ stuff,” Maggie says. “It’s getting annoying.”

Ivan Brovski sits back and smiles. The car turns north on the Henry Hudson Parkway.

“Suppose I change my mind,” Maggie says.

He tilts his head the smallest amount.

“Suppose I want out.”

“Your phone,” Ivan says, pointing at it with his chin.

“Yes.”

“You have your banking app, no? Check your balance.”

Maggie knows or at least suspects what’s coming when she uses facial recognition to open the app, but her eyes still bulge.

The five million dollars are already there.

“Call your financial advisor before we get to the airport,” Ivan says. “He may have to report such a large deposit.”

“She.”

“What?”

“Shemay have to report, nothe,” Maggie says. “My financial advisor is a woman. I would have thought your research would have told you that.”

“The first name Leslie threw me off,” Ivan says.

Man, they really do know everything.

“Also call your attorney,” he says. “The suit against you is being settled as we speak.”

Maggie sits back. The implications are overwhelming. No more malpractice suit. Wow. “You didn’t answer my question,” she says.

Ivan glances out the window, then back at Maggie. “The ‘suppose I change my mind’ question?”