Blood Debt - By Tanya Huff Page 0,64

same three, watched their every move.

Unless there was a hidden operating theater in the basement, kidneys were not being transplanted on the premises. However, many of the clinic's patients were the sort of people who could disappear without ques?tions being raised. A number of them had.

"They just never come back." Dr. Seto sighed as she slipped back into her lab coat. "It gets discouraging."

"Do you have any idea where they might have gone?"

"Back East, maybe. Hopefully, home." Her eyes fo?cused on faces he couldn't see. "Unfortunately, I'm afraid that too many of them have ended up as police statistics of one kind or another."

When he pulled out the creased photocopy of the autopsy photo, she shook her head. "No. Not one of mine."

Celluci'd seen liars just as sincere and almost as beautiful, but he believed her.

A clearly stoned woman staggered in, doubled over in pain, and howling for a doctor. Celluci murmured a good-bye he doubted anyone heard, and left. Walk?ing back to the car, he fought a rising melancholy. He and Vicki used to go for dim sum about once a month. They were often the only two Caucasians in the second-floor restaurant and they both towered over the rest of the clientele. The elderly women serving the food would occasionally walk right on by, shaking their heads and muttering, "You don't want."

It was something they'd never be able to do again.

A twenty-dollar parking ticket didn't help his mood.

Traffic didn't ease until he was almost at the library.

Back when he'd been in uniform, an old staff ser?geant at 14 Division had been fond of saying, "You get someone talked about three times during an inves?tigation, and you go for a conviction 'cause that's the son of a bitch that did the crime."

Ronald Swanson's name had come up twice now.

A little digging unearthed the name of the clinic Patricia Chou had mentioned, "... a private clinic where people in the last stages of renal failure can wait for a kidney.... " According to old issues of the weekly newspaper, Business in Vancouver, Ronald Swanson had been responsible for its development, was on the board of directors, and contributed a large portion of its financial support.

Project Hope wasn't listed among the clinics in the phone book, but that was hardly surprising as it proba?bly took a doctor's recommendation to get in.

Rubbing his eyes, Celluci left the microfiche carrel, dug out his phone card, and called the clinic from the library lobby. Without identifying himself, he asked if they had a transplant surgeon on staff. Coolly profes?sional, the duty nurse admitted they did. Celluci thanked her and hung up.

Motive. Swanson's wife had died of kidney failure waiting for a transplant. Swanson could want revenge against the system that failed him. Or maybe her death had pointed out a market waiting to be exploited.

Means. Swanson had access to facilities and the fi?nances to buy any talent he wanted.

Opportunity. Suppose Dr. Seto didn't know she was supplying the donors? Swanson's company had do?nated her computers. Could he access them again for the information he needed? According to Patricia Chou, skilled hackers were a dime a dozen, and past experience proved that one in twelve law-abiding citi?zens could be bought.

"With enough money you have the opportunity to do anything."

A hard point to argue with, but he had nothing that could be called evidence by any stretch of the imagination. Nothing he could give to the police that would justify an arrest and keep Henry Fitzroy from taking the law into his own hands.

But the link, however circumstantial, between Ron?ald Swanson and Henry's ghost was strong enough to make a quick trip out to Project Hope worthwhile.

As he got back into the van, Celluci wondered where the transplant society's computers had come from. In Toronto, where his badge meant something, he'd have grounds enough to make inquiries. Were Vicki and Henry not involved, he'd check out the bar where Vancouver's finest hung out and find out just where their investigation was heading.

Except, of course, that I wouldn't be involved had that undead royal bastard of a romance-writing vam?pire, Henry Fitzroy, not gotten Vicki involved.

"You didn't need to come along," the little voice in his head reminded him.

"Yeah. Right." He snorted as he pulled out into traffic. "Like she'd be accomplishing anything on her own." He deliberately chose not to think about what she may or may not have accomplished between sun?set and sunrise the night before.

Unfortunately, he wasn't in Toronto, vampires were involved, and he couldn't