Chapter Thirty-One Margo Angelhart #3
“Was anyone else hurt?” Rachel asked with concern.
“We haven’t uncovered any other deaths associated with the trial, but there is at least one other person who may have had
a serious adverse reaction. Our colleagues are talking to him now.”
I asked, “Did Christina have any close friends, someone she may have confided in?”
“I was her closest friend,” Rachel said. “But there was someone else she met after she left the military. Not a romantic relationship,
but they bonded in grief counseling. Mike . . . darn, I don’t remember his last name. I’ve talked to him once or twice, and
he came to her funeral. Wait, I have his card.”
She jumped up and left the room. A moment later she returned with a brochure. “This is him, he runs a pool cleaning service.
Works for himself. Mike Zachary. He came to her funeral, but I haven’t talked to him since.”
Mike Zachary was working but agreed to meet us at a coffee shop in Avondale at ten thirty. We waited at a table by the window
and only minutes later he pulled up in an old Ford pickup with pool equipment rattling in the back. A simple stencil on the
door bore his name and phone number.
He was a big guy: muscular, tall, with broad shoulders that made him look like he belonged on a football field.
One arm was covered in a vivid sleeve tattoo, a striking blend of Christian and sports imagery, anchored by a whale at the center that disappeared under his white polo shirt.
I had a small, hidden tattoo myself—only visible in a bikini—and no plans for another, but I admired the artistry.
His ink wasn’t random; it meant something.
He spotted us, nodded an acknowledgment, and headed to the counter with a large YETI tumbler. They filled it with iced coffee.
A man after my own heart, I thought, sipping my own.
Mike joined us a moment later. “Jack and Margo?”
“Yes,” Jack said. “Thanks for meeting us.”
“When you said it was about Christina, it’s the least I could do. Good woman. Crappy hand she was dealt.”
I noticed a simple platinum wedding band on his left hand.
“Rachel said you were friends,” I said. “How did you two meet?”
“Group therapy,” he said without hesitation. “Grief counseling, through a vet program.”
“Honor House?” I asked, wondering if there was a connection between the drug trial and the private charity.
He shook his head. “No, a church group out here. My pastor had been a chaplain in the Army and started a support group for
veterans when he retired. I’d been going for a while. My twin and I enlisted together almost twenty years ago. He didn’t come
back.”
There was a heavy weight in his quiet voice.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I said.
He nodded his thanks. “I was angry for a long time,” he went on. “Took a while to work through it. I was on the other side
of it when Christina came in. She’d lost her fiancé. She was dealing with other stuff too, from before. But she was making
progress. Drugs messed with that.”
“Recreational?” Jack asked.
“No, sir. Christina didn’t want to get high, she wanted to get better.
Grief is slow. Ugly. But if you show up and do the work, you can come through it.
She was doing that. My grief had been hot and angry.
Her grief had been cold and sorrowful. But I understood her, and she was making progress.
Then her VA shrink got her into some new PTSD drug trial. She jumped at it.”
He glanced down at his coffee, swirling it absently.
“We’ve read the investigative reports,” I said. “There was no indication drugs played a role in the crash.”
He looked up sharply. “Don’t care what the report says. I knew her. Before the drug, she was sad, sure, but she was present. She’d been accepted to the fire academy. She had experience and training. She was excited about the future. We had coffee
every week. My wife and I had her over for barbecues. She brought her two oldest nephews a few times, good kids, close in
age to my boys.”
He paused again, and this time the hurt showed.
“Then the meds,” he mumbled, cleared his throat. “First few days, she said it was like seeing the sunrise after being blind.
I was skeptical, but happy for her. Then it changed. Her grief didn’t just come back, it swallowed her whole. It was different
this time. Darker. Her cries sounded like torture.”
I shifted, uncomfortable with the image.
“She came over once after starting the meds,” Mike said quietly. “It was a bad night. She said things . . . well, some cruel
things. Totally out of character. My wife was in tears afterward. I tried to reach out, but she stopped returning my calls.”
A long breath.
“A week later, she crashed.”
Silence settled over our table. I already had a picture of Christina, but hearing Mike’s calm, pain-filled words, her decline
hit harder than I expected.
“Her doctor spoke to Rachel,” I said. “Did he ever contact you?”
“Yeah. I was one of her emergency contacts. He called. I told him what I thought of the drugs he gave her and hung up. Not
my proudest moment, but far as I’m concerned, he legally killed my friend.”