Date Published: Nov. 7, 2019
Publisher: Jan-Carol Publishing, Inc.
Set in Southwest Virginia and inspired by actual events and the story of the small town's most revered doctor, who may just be a serial killer...
About the Author
Amelia Townsend loves telling almost true stories. She has worked as a newspaper and TV reporter, freelance producer and director, writer, and now PR hack. She is a proud graduate the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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Instagram: @ameliatownsendauthor
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Chapter 1
Patient Love
Lying among the
crumpled sheets on a hospital bed, the dying man gasped for air. Stretching a
trembling hand into the air above him, Joe Blevins struggled to focus his
clouded eyes on the familiar face of the smiling, be-speckled doctor peering
down toward him. The words came hard, pushing through gasps of air.
“Please. Doc
Briggs. Help. Me. I. Have. Never. Been. Sick. I am only 63 years old.” His
chest heaved, and with each exhale, the haggard face deflated.
With a
consoling pat on Joe’s shoulder, Dr. Nicholas “Briggs” Oxenbriggs slowly
increased the drip on the IV that traced down to the man’s withered arm.
“Joe, I love
you. You are my favorite patient. I will take good care of you, my friend, good
care.”
Dr. Oxenbriggs
pulled a slender syringe from the breast pocket of his crisp, white hospital
jacket, and in one calming move, he pushed the clear contents of the cylinder
into a port on the IV line. He carefully lowered Joe’s extended arm to his
side. “It’s okay, Joe. This will help. I assure you. I love you.”
Briggs stepped
back, cocked his head from side to side, watching like a cat waiting for a
trapped mouse to move. Joe struggled, gasped, shuddered, then finally convulsed
and fell backward. Silent. Dr. Oxenbriggs leaned over his now dead patient,
raised Joe’s left hand, and removed the diamond-studded ring from his limp
pinky finger. Studying it for a moment, Dr. Oxenbriggs dropped the glittering
hoop into the breast pocket on his lab coat. For a moment, the tall, muscular
doctor with greying salt and pepper hair rubbed his patient’s placid face, and
then with a sigh, he said, “I loved you, Joe, and you are much better off now.”
Dr. Oxenbriggs
patted the ring resting in his jacket pocket. “I will always have you with me,”
he whispered.
Leisurely, he
pulled the emergency call button, then yelled urgently into the speaker.
“Code Black.
Code Black. This is Dr. Oxenbriggs. Code Black. STAT!”
Almost
instantaneously, the emergency team of nurses, assistants, and medical
residents shoved into the room at the Lone Mountain Medical Center in Big Stone
Gap, Virginia. They found Dr. Briggs frantically pressing his hands into the
dead man’s chest, performing CPR on the lifeless body of Joe Blevins.
“Hurry! I’m
losing him. Joe! Joe! Stay with me!” Dr. Oxenbriggs ordered the bevy of nurses,
medical residents, and assistants who quickly moved into action. No one seemed
to notice that the heart monitors had long-since stopped beeping.
After a while,
Briggs said softly, “Call it.” Another voice responded, “Time of death,
o-eight-hundred.”
Briggs stood,
staring at the body of the man who had been very much alive just a few moments
before. He rushed forward and gathered Joe’s body into his strong arms. He
wept. “Joe, you cannot be gone.”
Several members
of the team tried to pull the doctor back, but he jerked away. Soon, he
reluctantly and gently laid the body onto the bed. Briggs shook his head, wiped
his face, straightened his lab coat, and wiped a single tear from his cheek.
“I’ve done all
I could, all I could. He was my favorite patient. Can someone call the family,
please?”
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