Chapter 16

"Boss, we have a situation," Yvonne said with a gasp as she rushed into Carl Scott's office.

Carl was working late tonight, and his PA typically stayed around whenever he did. Now, as the clock registered the time as close to ten PM, Carl was alarmed. The usually unflappable Yvonne was obviously very upset about whatever 'situation' she had rushed into his office to report. "What is it, Yvonne?"

The young woman caught her breath and started her report. "Just over two hours ago, one of our programs had one of its assets assaulted. It was one of the Pizza Grande people. Initial reports are that she was raped by as many as two assailants after they knocked out her security guy and then beat her up badly and possibly stabbed her."

Carl was incensed. How could anyone do such a thing to a young girl like that? What kind of lowlife would harm a woman? He could possibly understand the sex motive, but to beat or stab a woman in the process ... that was simply not done; especially not to one of... 'MY girls. Shit, ' thought Carl. He suddenly had a vision of Jimmy Stewart charging into a saloon seeking vengeance on a vicious cowboy when one of the prostitutes in Stewart's inherited whorehouse got beat up in the old movie, 'The Cheyenne Social Club.'

"What's the situation now? Is Deuce Hartwell containing this? Is she okay? Where did they take her?" asked Carl rapid fire.

"Deuce seems to be the one keeping things under control at the top, and he's been pretty good at doing that in unusual situations in the past. This one is a little more intense, but he should be able to handle things.

"As for the woman, she's being treated at Brigham and Women's, at last report. The security guy with her got ambushed and taken out of action; then the creeps took her into a dark alley and raped her and then..." at this point, Yvonne sniffed. "Well, the security guy reported in after his ride-along found him and helped him get going again."

"Ride-along; what do you mean... ?" asked Carl, wondering at how much damage control was really going to be necessary to keep the 'special' delivery aspects of Pizza Grande quiet after all the dust settled.

"It was one of those college assets from Middlebury College that we have in training. He's scheduled to be a Delivery Talent Associate, as they call them, in a day or two as part of his apprenticeship during his Spring Break this week. Remember?" Yvonne asked, arching one eyebrow. 'Come on, Boss; show me that you actually pay attention at the board meetings, ' she thought.

"Oh, yeah," Carl twirled his right horizontally extended index finger indicating for her to continue. "What's his name? And do they have this contained so that we don't have a shit storm break out over Pizza Grande being exposed for the sex deliveries?" Carl remembered that his late father had developed a special fondness for this particular program, and had said as much in the files left to Young Carl upon his taking over after the death of Old Carl.

"His name is ... umm ... Lee Summers," said Yvonne, consulting the page she held in her hand. "And initial reports from the Special Call and Delivery Center confirm that the security guy has the story contained, both with this Summers kid and with the customer. Seems that the customer has a vested interest in keeping this situation low-key, if you know what I mean."

"What about the girl? Are we going to be able to get her story straight as well? I mean, once she is able to talk?" asked Carl. "Who is she, by the way?"

"The young woman ... well ... I guess not so young. She's one of those special cases that we get asked to accommodate once in a while, ya know? It's a third-party request for a business arrangement," Yvonne said, only mildly perturbed at Carl's apparent callousness concerning the balance between the girl's welfare and keeping the program's secrets.

'I guess I should not be too critical of him, ' Yvonne thought after a second, 'After all, this is all still relatively new to him and he hasn't had time to develop Old Carl's real capacity to care for all his people as well as his programs.'

Carl nodded, remembering that various clients used the assets or opportunities within his Pearl Foundation programs sometimes to help conduct business or politics at a different level entirely; at a premium cost rendered to the Pearl Foundation, of course. "Keep an eye out and an ear open on this one, Yvonne. Let me know in the morning how it develops and if we need any special intervention, legal or otherwise."

As an afterthought, he said, "And let's try to see what we can do for that girl when this has settled a bit. Maybe we can do something special for her as compensation for her troubles."

'Maybe he has a little bit more of Old Carl in him than just DNA after all, ' Yvonne thought approvingly as she nodded, noting Carl closing out his computer session and reaching for his personal leather portfolio. He was gathering his things to leave as she turned to leave his office and clear her desk as well.

Bob and Lee had answered the questions of the police on the scene as the ambulance had taken Madison away. They had promised the uniformed cop, as well as the plainclothes cop who showed up a few minutes later, that they would report to the precinct to answer additional questions in the morning and sign whatever paperwork was necessary. When they had asked for and were given permission to go to the hospital to check on Madison, they had gotten in their car and had taken off for Brigham and Women's Hospital.

Now, about a half hour later, as they sat and waited in the hospital waiting area, Lee felt the shakes come on. He had never personally encountered criminal violence before and he only now began to feel the fear that had been coated over by his adrenaline up till this moment.

Looking at Bob, Lee was surprised to see the older man sitting calmly with his arms folded and locked over his chest and his eyes closed. The drooping of Bob's lower lip indicated that he was actually dozing. Lee had to admire the way the security man kept his cool. Glancing higher, Lee noted the bandage that had been applied just below Bob's hair line in back. The bruising and the Betadyne ointment that the EMTs had applied when they had treated Bob at the site and by the ER techs here when the two of them had arrived to check on Madison's condition and treatment caused the discoloration around it.

Lee tried to fold his own arms and catch a bit of rest but, when he did, he felt a lump in his shirt pocket. That was when he realized that he still had Madison's Smartphone in his inside chest pocket under the coverall. He had picked it up at the scene of the assault and pocketed it quickly before sweeping the vehicle's passenger compartment for any items that might prove to be embarrassing to Pizza Grande before the first responders had shown.

Pulling out the phone and activating the screen, he touched the actual phone application and opened Madison's personal address book and phone listings out of curiosity. Scrolling through, he found one that was labeled 'Call Him 1st.' Lee knew that more people were adding an item like this to their cell phone address listings for just this type of situation, when next of kin or other family members needed to be informed about a potential traumatic situation and the phone's owner was unable to call for himself or herself.

Lee debated about disturbing Bob, and decided to take a bit of initiative. Standing slowly and quietly, he eased about twenty meters away from the dozing security man and stood looking at the face of the phone for about fifteen seconds before heaving a sigh and touching his index finger to the hotspot icon on the screen.

Carl cursed himself for the thousandth time for not having a hands-free device for his Smartphone as he heard its default ringtone and felt the vibration in his left breast suit pocket as his phone began to sing to him. Pulling his Lexus over to the curb and stopping the car, Carl frowned and pulled out the offending phone and looked at the screen to see the number of who was calling.

Holy shit! That's Madison's old number! It's her! It took him about five seconds and two more rings for the shock to subside enough for him to touch the 'Answer' icon.

"Hello ... Maddy?" Carl spoke her name out loud for the first time in months.

"Uh, no, this is ... her associate," came the male voice from the phone.

"Her associate?" asked Carl, confused at hearing a man's voice on what should have been his ex-wife's cell phone.

"My name is Lee Summers, and I'm calling the number in Madison's cell phone that she had marked for the first call in the event of an emergency," answered Lee.

Emergency! Madison, My Love! Wait ... Lee Summers? Elements of Yvonne's briefing to Carl just fifteen minutes earlier began to come back to him.

"Oh, God! She's not ... you're not..." Carl gulped and took a breath to try to calm himself. "Are you with her now? She's not the one who got assaulted, is she? Tell me she's okay!"

Lee pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at it for a second, shocked at the knowledge of the man behind the voice on the phone. How could he know about the assault? They had only been here less than an hour, and it had only happened fewer than two hours ago. This was getting creepy now.

"Yeah," Lee answered the man. "She's at..."

"Brigham and Women's ... yeah, I know! I'm coming," Carl said quickly and closed out the connection as he peeled out into the street. He was lucky it was late and no one had been driving in the lane into which he had swerved, or else he might have been riding in an ambulance later himself.

Lee looked at the now quiet phone with the closed connection and the Android icon on its screen and shook his head in wonder at how this mystery guy on the other end could know so much about the situation already.

"You should recover okay from the injuries, but I want you to take it easy for at least six weeks and see your own primary care physician when you return to Middlebury. Your own gynecologist should also check you out as soon as possible to see if there are any long term effects of the sexual assault. We are doing a quick check here for..." here the young resident blushed slightly, and despite his professional demeanor, paused, "STDs. We should have the results back from the lab tomorrow; but you should probably abstain or insist any male partners use condoms during intimate relations for the next few months until the HIV screening can be completed."

Madison, even though she was feeling the pain and swelling all over her body, nodded and even smiled a bit, touched by the evident attempt by the young resident to try to recognize, along with her, the possibly embarrassing nature both of her assault and its ramifications. He had no idea of her sexual past and he was just trying to be nice while giving her his idea of the painful truth. Still, the possibility of HIV infection did frighten her a bit.

"Thank you, Doctor," Madison said in a little over a hoarse whisper. "What's wrong with me besides the bruising and swelling that I feel right now?" She glanced to her left and saw a brace of some sort on her left shoulder and upper arm and felt its weight and the swelling that it covered, despite the sling that held her arm across her abdomen.

"You have the obvious bruising to the thighs and groin indicative of a sexual assault," the young doctor began, moving into his clinical mode. "You also present evidence of bruising to the ribs on your left side, indicating of a kick or knee strike there. We had to reset your left shoulder due to a dislocation--it seems that your assailant twisted your arm up behind you rather vigorously at some point while forcing you into that alley. And we treated the cuts to your back and did some quick closure and repair to minimize the possible scarring that may follow from those."

Scarring? Cuts? May follow? Madison's face registered her horror at the idea of being disfigured. The resident noted this and tried to soothe her fears. "It is not so bad as to be permanently disfiguring in a glaring way, but with some good cosmetic surgery after your other injuries heal, you should be able to wear backless dresses and a bikini without much permanent noticeable sign of scarring. Just give it a year or so to heal." The doctor smiled and stood and continued.

"The two gentlemen who were with you after the incident would like to see you now. We will be admitting you at least overnight, and probably for another day or two as well to ensure both that your body is responding to the antibiotics and that we have the possibility of infection from the cuts mitigated. Okay?" the doctor asked with a smile.

Madison gave a little smile in return and nodded to him. Less than a minute after he left the curtained area, Lee and Bob came around the screen to see how she was doing. Lee was smiling in relief to see that Madison was sitting up, but Bob had a serious expression on his face.

Bob wasted no time. "Madison, I'm glad that you are okay--I mean considering what happened and all; and I don't mean to be inconsiderate about your situation--but we need to make sure that your story is straight with what we have already set in motion with the other folks involved before the detectives come in to take your statement. Okay?" Madison was only surprised for a few seconds before nodding for him to continue. She realized, even as tired as she was, that they were going to have to give the police all the pertinent facts--just without the whole truth.

Less than half an hour later, the two police detectives showed up and Bob and Lee beat a hasty retreat to the other side of the ER privacy screen.

The policewoman recognized that Madison was tiring; after all, it was approaching one-thirty in the morning and her body had been stressed significantly as well. Her partner finally nodded and clicked off his recorder and put away his notepad. They arranged for continued conversation the next day and the woman said that a rape counselor would be around to see Madison sometime after she had stabilized more and was better rested.

Madison was exhausted, but she was not able to rest quite yet. As soon as the two police officers had indicated an end to the initial interview, Hurricane Jan, along with Midge and Kari burst through, with a nurse in tow trying to get them to leave Madison alone.

"No," Madison told the nurse, "I need to see these ladies." Hearing that, the nurse admonished all of them to keep it quiet and short. Madison was being admitted and would be moved to a private room on a ward within the hour.