Maryann lurched to her feet. "This has to be Riley's work," she insisted. "I'm going to go confront him. Right now."
Alex grabbed her and shook his head. "Let the police handle this."
"No," she said, pulling free. "I need to see his reaction myself."
She strode out the hospital door toward the parking lot, and Alex followed her.
***
An hour later, Maryann and Alex arrived at the Baltimore Jockey Club.
By now, it was getting late, but the lights were shining, and there were still staff on the premises to serve guests.
Maryann headed straight for the VIP lounge.
She found Norman Fuller there, sitting at a table, playing a game of chess with a lovely young woman.
She strode into the hall and asked, softly but firmly, "Where's Riley?"
Norman raised his head to look at her. "Ms. Robinson!" he said. "How nice to see you. It's chilly tonight, so sit down and have a cup of coffee. Then you can apologize to me. For Riley's sake, I'm prepared to be reasonable. As long as you stop production, everything will be fine. Otherwise, it won't end well for you."
He picked up a black chess piece and moved it gracefully across the board.
"Norman," she said sharply, "knock it off. I asked you where Riley is. Is he hiding from me because he has a guilty conscience about something?"
"Mr. Naysmith is a grown man," Norman replied, shrugging. "I'm not his keeper, so how should I know where he goes or what he's doing? You have his phone number. Call him yourself." He smiled. "As for him hiding from you, that's ridiculous."
"Don't talk nonsense," she retorted. "I need to speak to Riley. I want to ask him if he paid Julie to steal Golden Health's secret recipe and then killed her by sabotaging her car." Her voice grew frosty. "And I want to hear him say it right to my face."
Norman smiled faintly. "He's not here. You say he stole your recipe? Killed someone? That seems unlikely. We're honest businessmen."
"Don't act so innocent," Alex said, confronting him. "You know Riley had that recipe stolen from us and had Julie killed. Don't you feel any shame at all?"
Norman's expression was icy. "I can sue you for slander over this. Do you have any evidence of theft? Have the police made any arrests over Julie's death? On the contrary, we could accuse you of stealing the secret recipe from us."
"You really are shameless," Maryann said.
"If you have evidence, then you can sue us," Norman said calmly. "Otherwise, you should be thinking about how to apologize to Riley. Or else… It might come to light that you actually stole the secret recipe from us and produced thousands of doses of our medication, worth more than a million dollars. If we start an investigation, then not only might you have to compensate us, but you could end up in prison."
He looked at Maryann. "It would be a shame if you got into such trouble. I think a good start would be if you begged for my forgiveness."
Alex found this amusing. He stepped forward to look down at the chess board.
"Norman, you only think you've won this game." He picked up a white piece. "In fact, you are quite likely to lose."
Norman laughed. "I'm sorry. I just can't see that happening."
"Tell Riley that evil never wins." Alex set the piece down. "Checkmate."
After leaving the club, Alex made sure that Maryann was all right to drive herself home. Then, he made a phone call, and a short time later, a white car drove up.
Alex opened the door and got in, and then Donny pulled away from the curb.
"Alex, you're in big trouble," Donny said, obviously having heard about what had happened. "You might not only lose your money, but you could be arrested. Is there anything you need me to do?"
"Oh, don't trouble yourself about such a trivial matter," Alex said casually. "Just drive."
Donny was worried. "Riley pre-empted your patent registration, and there's nothing you can do to get Golden Health back. It's imperative that you preserve yourself. From what I know about Riley, he won't show Maryann any mercy. He'll take all of you down."
"Why are you so sure we'll lose?" Alex asked, smiling. "Maybe I'll turn the tables on him."
"Sorry, but I'm not going to hold my breath," Donny said. "How about this? If you can turn this around, then I will not only be your driver for three years, but I'll also be your manservant and get your coffee for you. If you can't work this out, then you won't need anyone to drive you, so how about you agree to work for my family after you get out of prison?"
"You've got a deal," said Alex. "I drink my coffee black."
Donny drove Alex to the Woodside Clinic. There, Alex took a shower and got some sleep.
The next morning, he saw several patients, and then he handed the rest over to the other doctors. The whole time, he kept his eye on the news about Golden Health, but the situation kept getting worse.
Not only had the factory been shut down, but all their research data had been seized.
Lily had been detained by the police, and Maryann's passport had been confiscated. She had been told not to leave town and to be available for questioning.
Equipment suppliers wanted to be paid, customers wanted refunds of the deposits on their orders, and employees wanted their wages.
A lawyer for Quality Pharmaceuticals sent a letter to the Robinson Group and filed a claim in court, demanding compensation for infringement of copyright.
Many people called for a boycott of all the Robinson Group's products, and the company's shares fell when the market opened.
Alex let Shaun Armstrong deal with it all and had Donny take him to see Lindsey Marvel.
When he went in, Lindsey was leaning back in her chair and watching the news about the Robinson Group and Golden Health.
"I'm surprised to see you here," she said, smiling at him. "I thought you'd be with Maryann."
"She'll be fine on her own for a while," he said. "Besides, she doesn't want people to see her when she's upset. If I stayed with her, I would just irritate her."
"You are very nice to her." Lindsey sounded jealous. She turned and started brewing a cup of coffee. "Why aren't you that nice to me?"
Alex chuckled. "I gave you Baltimore General Hospital and the secret recipe. Is that not good enough for you?"
Lindsey put the steaming black coffee in front of him. "Yes, you are very good to me."
Alex picked it up and sipped it appreciatively. Then, he changed the subject. "How did the takeover of Baltimore General go?"
"It went just fine," Lindsey said. "I pulled in the experts I needed from Washington, D.C., and now the entire hospital is under our control. Your new recipe has been tested and patented, and Fidelity Pharmaceuticals is working overtime." She paused and then went on. "By the way, I needed to give the medication a name, so I've called it Harmony Healing Ointment. Is that okay?"
She looked at Alex's expression and said, "You and I are good friends. You can be honest with me. If you don't like it, I can change the registration. I could change it to Ambrose Ointment if you like that better."
She pouted like a child who had made a mistake.
"No," said Alex. "Stick with Harmony Healing."
He did feel that the name was rather uninspired, but it would be a lot of trouble to change it, and it would make Lindsey unhappy, so he resolved to live with it.
Lindsey brightened. "Oh, about Julie," she said. "I investigated things like you asked, and we know who caused the accident. It was the mechanic who worked on her car."