Chapter Six
Nadia stands in the corner of what looks to Maggie like a spare office. She wears a plush white terry cloth bathrobe that seems to be swallowing her whole and makes her look even more petite. Her jet-black hair is wet. Her skin glistens.
Maggie smiles at her. Nadia is expressionless.
Speaking very slowly, Maggie says, “Let me see if one of the nurses can translate for us.”
“No.”
Maggie watches as Nadia crosses in front of her and closes the door.
“I speak English,” Nadia says. “I just don’t want them to know.”
“Oh.”
There is no examination table. Maggie had debated bringing her into the operating room for a full exam, but it seems more important to do a private consultation—just talk to her alone—than do a physical yet.
“Is it okay if I call you Nadia?” Maggie asks.
“Yes, of course.”
They both take a seat. Maggie isn’t sure how to begin.
She wants to say, “My God, you’re gorgeous, don’t do this to yourself,” but that would be wrong and unfair and judgmental.
But none of that lets Maggie off the hook as a physician and, well, a woman.
There could be disturbing issues around this procedure involving consent, coercion, and power dynamics.
“How old are you, Nadia?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Do you understand what Oleg has hired me to do?”
“Augmentation mammoplasty,” Nadia says. Maggie tries to place her accent. There may be Russian or Eastern European, but she also hears something else. “In short, a boob job.”
“Are you okay with doing this procedure?”
“Yes.”
“I should go through the risks—”
“No need. I know them.”
Maggie nods slowly, leans forward. “Anything you discuss with me is between us. I will keep it in the strictest of confidences. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
“You can trust me, Nadia.”
For the first time, Nadia smiles—and it’s radiant. “I do already, Doctor. You’re the only one who knows I speak English.”
“Thank you for that.” Maggie shifts a little more toward her. “I need to make sure you’re okay, Nadia.”
Nadia says nothing.
“If someone is pressuring you to have this surgery—”
Nadia laughs. “You can’t be serious.”
“—I can refuse to do the surgery.”
“Then Oleg would bring in someone else.”
Maggie lowers her voice. “If you don’t want to stay—”
“Who says I don’t want to stay?”
“—I can get you out.”
Nadia looks almost amused. “Do you really believe that, Doctor McCabe?”
“Believe what?”
“That you can get me out.”
“I’ll find a way.”
Nadia mutters something in a foreign tongue.
“How? You, like me, are totally at their mercy. You can’t call anyone.
Your phone won’t work. Oh, and your bedroom?
It will be bugged. Just so you know—this is one of the few rooms in the house that doesn’t have cameras and listening devices.
So how do we make our escape? Will you hide me in your suitcase? ”
“Listen to me,” Maggie says, moving closer. “I can find a way.”
“You’re being naive.”
“Nadia—”
“And I don’t want you to,” Nadia says, her tone firm now. “I am here by choice. I can leave anytime I want. I understand the surgery. I know the risks. They are minimal, no?”
Maggie nods. “Most studies report a one to five percent chance of a complication.”
“Between one and five percent,” Nadia repeats. “That’s an average.”
“Yes.”
“But I don’t have an average doctor, do I?” Nadia says. “Oleg only hires the best.”
They lock eyes.
“It’s an easy choice for me,” Nadia says. “I want to do it.”
Maggie nods, giving herself time to think. “That’s fine. It’s up to you, of course. I just want you to know that I’m here for you. That I want to help you.”
“Many girls,” Nadia continues, “beautiful girls, would give anything to be in my place.”
“I understand,” Maggie says.
Nadia flashes the smile again. “I know what I look like, Doctor McCabe. I know the effect I have on men. But after this surgery, I will be, let’s be honest, irresistible.”
“You already are, Nadia.”
“Don’t be patronizing.”
“I don’t mean to be.”
“You heard what Oleg likes. That’s what I need to be.”
“Got it.”
“Will you help me?”
Maggie sighs but she also nods. “If that’s what you want, I will, yes.”
Then Nadia drops a truth bomb on her: “You don’t know me,” she says. “You don’t know my life.”
Which is fair. Maggie knows that. But she can’t just let it go either. “You’re right. I don’t. But know this: I’m here for you. I’m on your side.”
“I know,” Nadia says. “Tomorrow you will operate on me. You will keep me safe.”
“I will,” she says.
“That’s all I need.” Nadia walks to the door. Then she says, “I bet you’ve made sacrifices for the man you love, haven’t you, Doctor McCabe?”
Maggie feels the too-familiar pang.
“Doctor?”
“I have,” Maggie says. Then she adds, “But not something like this, no. He would never…” She stops and reminds herself of an obvious truth: They aren’t the same, Maggie and Nadia. As Nadia so aptly put it, “You don’t know my life.” It’s condescending to compare. Maggie gets that.
But then Nadia asks, “Are you married?”
Maggie feels the tears push into her eyes.
“I mean, you have someone special in your life, right?”
Maggie still doesn’t reply.
“Doctor?”
And then, because Nadia deserves the truth, Maggie gives her the honest, heartbreaking answer:
“No,” Maggie says, “I’m not married anymore. There is no one special in my life.”
Nadia leaves. Maggie stays in the office.
She checks the door for a lock. There is none.
No matter. She turns off the light and moves over to the couch against the far wall.
She sits on it, pulls her knees up to her chest, hugs herself.
Tears run down her cheeks. She lets them.
She isn’t crying, not by the medical definition.
Crying involves facial muscles like the orbicularis oculi and mentalis.
Crying involves the release of oxytocin and endorphins.
Crying is usually accompanied by shortness of breath or increased heart rate.
But this is just tears sliding down her face.
For a few minutes Maggie doesn’t move. She can’t move. She just sits in the dark and hopes no one will knock on that door. This is her life now. The self-pity makes her sick. Still, she takes out her phone.
She hates this.
With a shaking hand, she clicks the blue icon.
Marc’s face appears.
“Why is it so dark?” he asks.
“I’m sitting in a dark room.”
“Why? I can barely see you.”
She moves her face closer to the screen.
“You’ve been crying.”
“I’m fine.”
“Where are you? What happened at your meeting with Barlow?”
She stares at his face, scrutinizing his expression, as she often did, for a tell.
“Mags?”
Her eyes close. “He offered me a job.”
“Oh, great.”
“Not so great,” she says. “I’m supposed to do surgery tomorrow.”
“Hold up. Where are you?”
“Not sure exactly. Somewhere in Russia.”
“Show me,” he says.
“What do you mean?”
“Wait,” he says, “I can’t see your phone’s location. How come I can’t see your location?”
“I don’t know. They blocked everything. There is no way for me to call out or be tracked—”
The door bursts open. Maggie startles back, almost dropping her phone.
A voice bellows, “What’s going on here?”
Maggie looks up and sees the hulking form of Ivan Brovski standing in the doorway.
“Who are you talking to?” he shouts.
He steps into the room, flicks the light on, and closes the door behind him.
“You’re not allowed to call anyone!”
Maggie backs up.
“Stay away from me.”
“You made a promise! No contact with anyone!”
“It’s not what you think.”
Ivan is furious. He starts counting off on his fingers. “No phone, no email, no messaging app—”
“That’s not what this is.”
“I don’t understand. How could you even call someone?” His face is red. “The Wi-Fi is set so nothing can go out or in or…”
Without warning, Ivan’s hand shoots out with cobra-like quickness and snatches her phone away.
“Hey! Give me that back.”
Maggie tries to grab the phone from him, but Ivan holds her off with one massive, powerful hand. With his other hand, he brings the phone up toward his face so he can see the screen.
“It’s not what you think,” Maggie says.
“I heard a man’s voice.”
“It’s not—”
“Who were you talking to?” he demands. “What did you tell him?”
Maggie stops struggling. She sighs and gestures for him to have a look for himself. Ivan appears puzzled. He lowers his hand away from her. When he stares at the screen, his eyes widen.
“How…?”
“Press the blue icon,” Maggie says.
“What?”
“Just”—she lets loose a breath—“press the blue icon.”
With a thick thumb pad, Ivan Brovski does as she asks. Then he looks a question at her. “Do you want to explain?”
“You know about my husband.”
Of course he does. They investigated her financial situation, her sister’s, her malpractice suit. They’d know everything about her.
Ivan nods. “Doctor Marc Adams, renowned cardiothoracic surgeon.”
“And you know,” Maggie continues, trying very hard not to let her voice crack, “about his death.”
Ivan nods again, more solemnly this time. “He was on a humanitarian mission in Ghadames when a militia group raided a refugee camp. Your husband stayed behind to help a patient. It cost him his life.”
“Yes.”
Ivan lifts the phone. “But I just saw your husband on your phone.”
“No.”
“No?”
“You saw,” Maggie says, “a griefbot.”
He makes a face. “A what?”
“A griefbot. You’ve probably heard of rudimentary ones.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Maggie wonders how to explain this without sounding insane.
“When a loved one dies, and when someone misses that loved one, misses them so much that…” Maggie shakes it off, channels her sister, and tries a more analytical approach.
“A griefbot is an artificial intelligence app that mimics a dead person via their digital footprint—for example, their social media content, emails, maybe videos online or photographs on their phone, whatever. The software then creates a lifelike avatar of the deceased, and a mourner can”—she hesitates—“a mourner can actually converse with it.”
“You mean talk to it?” Ivan says.