The Confession Artist

Chapter 1 Tim

Tim

Tim Mooney’s stomach felt queasy. He couldn’t wait to sweat out the alcohol from the night before as he walked from his hotel in Missoula to the path that paralleled the Clark Fork River. The playfully swirling water helped lift his hangover.

So, he hoped, would a jog.

He started out slow, his feet heavy, his head aching. His stomach flipped a little. He considered turning around and going back to the hotel to take a hot shower, but he wasn’t a quitter.

He’d gotten this colossal headache from the champagne and vodka he’d consumed at Piquero’s, a site he’d chosen for the big event because it was one of the highest-end restaurants in town.

He’d had the duck confit, and it was to die for.

He’d known the ambience of the place, with its rich, wood-fired smells filling the room, would put everyone in a festive mood.

That was the plan: Throw a good party for their quote-unquote Speaker Program. Get them used to la dolce vita. Make them think they can’t live without the extra riches flowing their way.

As he ran closer to the university and started encountering college students, he picked up his pace despite the nausea.

His breath flowed, maybe a little too raspy.

He tried to settle it down. He didn’t need to be wheezing like a middle-aged man when he passed young, fit women.

He hoped they thought he wasn’t so many years out of college himself.

His mind drifted to the previous night. He’d thought about canceling the “Speaker Program,” given the sketch business that had cropped up out of nowhere.

A drawing of a person had appeared on the internet with a warning that whoever was depicted had exactly six days to confess something or else they’d die.

The drawing strongly resembled him, but emphasis on resembled.

It wasn’t him. And here it was, the sixth day, and all was fine. He wasn’t worried.

Besides, he had thrown out on Facebook a mildly self-deprecating line to be on the safe side, joking about sometimes feeling like a glorified drug peddler. He was keeping his fingers crossed there’d be no blowback from his company on it. So far, he didn’t think they’d even noticed.

It all felt like nonsense, though, and for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out how—among all the people in the world—he could possibly be targeted. It would be different if he were a CEO or board member, someone with beaucoup bucks and power. Tim was far from that.

Plus, it seemed like a stretch to him that the cops or the public would make the connection to the two other people who were killed after the first two sketches came out.

How many people are murdered on any given day in the US?

Were they comparing, nationwide, all the victims to these random sketches?

He’d read that the guy in Snohomish had been singled out because a local headline-seeking reporter who’d spotted the similarity hopped on the story and sensationalized it.

But what about the woman in Santa Monica? How were they even sure it was her?

Maybe the first two did look exactly like the sketches, as so many on the internet claimed. But he figured there was still no solid proof that it was either of them.

Besides, only his wife, Mary, their teenage daughter, a few friends, and one of his coworkers had pointed out the resemblance between himself and this latest sketch. But still, he wondered if he should confess more seriously and sincerely than what he had posted so far.

What more would he divulge? The sordid details of his job that he wasn’t super proud of, his rationale for sticking with it? Maybe the fooling around?

Nonsense. He had no desire to confess to anything more on any front.

Besides, at the party the previous night, no one had even brought it up.

And hot damn, even though he was looking over his shoulder a bit, he’d still had fun.

He was certain the new physiatrist from Missoula he’d lured in was showing all the right signs of interest.

The speaker programs were, in theory, designed to gather health care professionals who could prescribe the drug and educate them about it.

But all Tim had to do was get a bunch of friends and coworkers together, regardless of whether they had the ability to prescribe.

Then pay his old standby, his main doc, Dr. Winnipeg, a large sum to attend, all from his company spending allotment.

With all the scrutiny and lawsuits over the past decade, it wasn’t like the good ol’ days of mega parties, but the wining and dining at this level still paid off.

He’d been bummed a few more health care professionals hadn’t shown, but at least Dr. Winnipeg and his crew made it, despite having to drive an hour from the reservation to get to Missoula.

It was a good deal for everyone. They all got to invite friends and he got to have some of his buddies from Missoula and Arlee.

All Winnipeg and his PA had to do for their kickbacks was prescribe the fentanyl inhalant over similar medications.

And why not? It was a highly effective product.

That he knew. The FDA had approved it for cancer patients.

So there was nothing to feel guilty about.

It was designed to relieve breakthrough pain, and who would argue that alleviating such god-awful pain caused by cancer wasn’t a decent thing, even if it was used for other ailments it wasn’t approved for?

So what if some of the docs he induced to prescribe sometimes also wrote scripts for non-cancer patients?

He could claim they went rogue, got greedy. Not his fault, even if the company did encourage him to suggest it on the sly. He couldn’t be held responsible if they did it. If he told them to jump off a bridge, would they?

A few suggestions about titration didn’t hurt.

In other words, all they needed to do was up the dose here and there on each patient, just a hair.

Maybe, if they felt like it—he often suggested—they should search their patient records for others who might benefit from the drug, even if they weren’t cancer patients.

Pain is pain. Does it matter which disease causes it?

And for Dr. Winnipeg, Lord knew that folks on the reservation were riddled with every ailment under the sun. What were they calling it these days? DNA hangover? Okay, maybe not that, but intergenerational trauma or something along those lines?

His superiors made it clear: Escalating doses fetched higher prices, which translated to higher commissions for the sales reps.

And he needed more commission money. Mary was always nagging him about their credit card debt.

They needed a loan to get a condo on the lake in Coeur d’Alene, but their debt-to-income ratio was too high.

She insisted they change that. But Jesus, interest alone on those cards made it impossible to get ahead.

But damn, yeah, he had to admit, a part of him thought about the titration part more and more these days.

Yes, yes, he thought as the trail led him away from the river into a forest, he would admit it: It pulled a twinge of guilt out of him.

But again, the executives all said it was safe. It wasn’t his job to question it.

Nope, no regrets. But he couldn’t stop wondering if all these dealings had something to do with this sketch business. But if they did, why him? Why not his superiors? Again, it made no sense.

Focus on your run, he thought. Enough about this nasty confession stuff.

He huffed and puffed and sent sweat rolling down his chest so he didn’t need to regret the $120-a-glass aged Rémy Martin he’d splurged on, either.

He couldn’t even recall the full name of it now.

He was sure it had had Louis in the title, but he didn’t remember the roman number.

The sixth, or maybe the eighth? He’d have to google it, for bragging rights.

His buddy Charlie, a brandy aficionado, would be impressed. He’d say, “Wow, Mooney, you must be rollin’ in it these days. How can I become a rep, too?”

So yeah, Tim might have woken up with his conscience niggling him a little, but knowing he now was sweating out all the damage done, he was beginning to feel better.

Plus, he couldn’t believe what had happened at the very end of the night, when he and Doc Winnipeg’s RN, Brin, stumbled out to her car.

How he stood in the dark with her under the huge dome of the big sky and pointed out the Milky Way and the Little Dipper.

How when they both lowered their heads from peering up, they almost tipped over. They’d both giggled.

When he’d leaned in, she pressed even closer, so he could feel her breasts.

That was a bonus. He wasn’t even sure if he found her pretty, but he’d enjoyed it, all right, the fullness of her lips and the smell of her hair.

Something musky and calming. He brought her back to his hotel room.

After all, he considered through his drunken haze, it wasn’t wise to be alone when there was a bizarre threat with a face that looked at least a little like his on it making the rounds on the big wide web.

Brin left before the sun came up. He couldn’t remember if they’d traded numbers or not, but he did recall that she knew he was married. It didn’t seem to bother her. He needed to be careful if she ended up texting him.

He planned to be more cautious about his phone in general. Mary was getting a little more suspicious when he was on the road. The other day when he’d come in after going to the mailbox outside and had left his cell in the kitchen, she’d hastily dropped it when he’d entered.

He slowed his jog and stopped to do a quick stretch before returning.

His trainer back home said his hip flexors were too tight.

Too much driving for your job, she’d suggested.

And when you run, she reminded him, make sure you stretch.

He crossed one leg in front of the other and reached for the sky to open one of his hips.

He wondered if Mary could have something to do with this sketch thing. Would his own wife do this to him? Could she be Machiavellian enough to hop on the bandwagon of this insane national phenomenon to taunt him somehow, to get back at him?

No. He shook his head and looked around at the dense forest. He was just being paranoid. He was certain she didn’t know about the others he sometimes slept with while on the road.

The trees surrounded and towered above. It felt as if the silent pines were all looking down at Tim, judging him. And that frightened him, too. He wasn’t the type to notice trees. It meant, despite his hangover, that his senses were triggered. Again, he thought, paranoia. Stupid thoughts.

He peered up and away from the coarse bark to the late-morning summer sky.

It was bursting with color, so full of promise.

Life was chock-full of opportunity. You had to be willing to seize it.

That’s all. That’s all he’d been doing for Carssen, the drug company he worked for.

Hawking the stuff wasn’t wrong. It was just his job.

Just because the sketch resembled him didn’t mean it was him. And judging by how many people were already confessing their sins to the world, a lot of people out there thought they were the ones in the drawing. What were the chances it was actually him?

You have six days to confess or die. What kind of bullshit was that anyway?

He was about to start running again, to head back the way he’d come, when he heard the shuffle of leaves behind him. He whipped around but saw nothing. A deer maybe? Or perhaps someone else out jogging or walking?

He stood dead still, scanning the trees beside the path. Then he heard it again, a shuffle. A snap of a twig. Behind one of the tree trunks, he saw a flash of dark, like a navy sweatshirt or jacket, and something metal, like the barrel of a gun.

What the hell? His heart banged against his ribs. He was too frightened to call out to whoever it was. Electricity coursed through him, propelling him into a full-throttle run, his legs pumping faster than they ever had before.

With his running shoes slapping the gravel path, his own breath sharp in his ears, he made up his mind. His one-liner was not sufficient. As soon as he got back to his hotel room, before checkout, he’d confess more thoroughly, more sincerely.

It was still the sixth day. It wasn’t too late.