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any of his business?
    That never stopped me before.
    But in all those cases, there had always been a higher purpose besides indulging his curiosity. He was seeking justice for the dead.
    What higher purpose was there than saving a human life?
    It was a nice, and sanctimonious, rationalization but he wasn't sure he bought it. Even if he wanted to help Rebecca, he had to face some facts. Her problems were probably emotional. He was a doctor and a police consultant, but he wasn't a psychologist. And even if he was, he couldn't do anything for her unless she opened up to him about her troubles. She was in no condition to do that now, and even if she was, he wasn't sure that she would. A woman willing to talk about her problems doesn't hurl herself out a window.
    So where would he start? What was he looking for?
    Those questions were easier to answer in the Winston Brant case. Of course, Mark had much more experience dealing with murders, even ones as perplexing as Brant's.
    Killing a man in midair was quite a magic trick. Although Mark was an amateur magician himself, he didn't have the slightest idea how the killer pulled it off.
    So rather than trying to figure it out, Mark decided to follow the advice he gave Steve. He'd learn as much as he could about Brant and his three fellow board members:
    Clifton Hemphill, Dean Perrow, and Virgil Nyby. He'd also need to know more about Justin Darbo, the skydiving instructor.
    The easiest place to start was with Brant's wile, Dr. Sara Everden. She knew all the people in the plane that day, which meant she already knew who her husband's killer was; she just didn't realize it yet. It was up to Mark to figure that out for her.
    A shrill alarm from one of the monitors intruded on his thoughts. It was the 02 monitor. Rebecca's oxygen saturation had dropped below 92 percent, triggering the alarm.
    Mark didn't have his stethoscope, so he pressed his ear to her chest. There were good breath sounds on the right, none on the left. Her left lung had collapsed. He glanced again at her monitor. Her oxygen level had dropped to 88 percent.
    Dr. Jesse Travis rushed in, trailed by two nurses. He was stunned to see Mark standing there. But before Jesse could say anything, Mark spoke.
    "She's got a pneumothorax," he said. "I need to do a chest thoracotomy."
    "I'll do it," Jesse said. "She's my patient and I'm the doctor on call."
    There was no argument there. Mark stepped aside and let Jesse go to work re-expanding her collapsed lung. Both doctors slipped on rubber gloves. The nurses quickly brought in a surgical tray, from which Jesse selected a scalpel, which he used to make an incision in the space between two ribs on her left side.
    Mark handed him a pair of scissors, which Jesse slid into the incision until he felt them pierce the pleura, the lining of the chest cavity.
    "I'm in," Jesse said, carefully spreading open the scissors and pulling them back, giving himself a wide opening into the chest cavity. He eased a finger inside, feeling around to see if the collapsed lung was stuck to the pleura.
    "Is there any lung adhesion?" Mark asked.
    "No," Jesse said, removing his finger.
    Mark handed him a chest tube, which Jesse slid into the opening, snaking it up to the top of her chest. The other end of the tube was attached to a suction bottle. The procedure would allow the air trapped in her chest cavity to escape, relieving the pressure on the lung that had caused it to collapse.
    Jesse taped the tube in place and glanced at the oxygen monitor. Mark was already watching it and seeing immediate improvement. Her oxygen saturation levels were increasing.
    "Get me a chest x-ray and update me on her 02 until it gets to 95 percent," Jesse said to one of the nurses; then he turned to Mark. "You're going to tell me what you're doing
    here."
    "I am?" Mark asked.
    "Right after you buy me a cup of coffee," Jesse said.
     
     
    CHAPTER SEVEN
     
     
    Mark and Jesse sat at a table in the center of the empty cafeteria.