Her mother. Of course. A woman in need accepted what she could get, even if they were scraps.
A week earlier, this very man had paid Minnie Stanton a meager sum for any information on why her daughter would be caught up in a forged ledger scandal. Desperate for money and naïve when it came to journalists, the clueless widow spilled everything about her husband’s heart condition, the Nosartin he was taking, even what he had for breakfast that morning.
“Well, no, that’s not exactly how it happened—”
“And didn’t your father enjoy a grapefruit each morning with his cup of coffee,” he glanced down at his notes, “with two sugars and a splash of cream?”
“I don’t see how that’s relevant.”
“Oh. Of course you don’t. That’s because you’re not a real doctor, are you?” He shook his head. “If you want to play with the big boys, maybe you should read more of this,” he handed her that month’s January 1971 issue of American Scientist, “and less gardening books, Ms. Stanton.”
How dare he! Sam wanted to shout at him everything about the corruption she had uncovered, but she knew this man had no intention of reporting on the facts, or helping her expose Big Pharma. All he cared about was making her look bad.
She skimmed the cover of the magazine, staring curiously at a picture of a grapefruit next to a prescription bottle. When she opened up the magazine to the page number associated with the article, she gasped, horrified.
“The truth hurts, doesn’t it?” He was watching her as she pieced together a whole new story. A story that made her the worst villain of all.
How could she have missed it?
Without another word Sam turned and marched through the revolving door into the Art Deco lobby, partly because she was done with this farce of an interview, and partly because she didn’t want this cruel, ruthless, but very shrewd reporter to see her cry after discovering what she had done.
Chapter 27
“It’s my fault my father died, Raul.” The words vomited out thick and toxic.
The American Scientist magazine sat on Sam’s lap while she wept on Raul’s shoulder as he comforted her the following day. She had told him about the vulturous reporter, but she had been too ashamed to bring up the grapefruit. But Raul had a way of drawing the awful truth out of her, no matter how hard it was to face. She wondered if her mother knew.
“How can you say that? It was the medicine, Sam. We both know that.”
“No,” she said through tears. “I’ve been blaming Cook Pharmaceuticals and Nosartin all this time, but it was me.”
Raul’s face screwed up in a question he was afraid to ask. “What are you talking about?”
The guilt pressed heavy on Sam’s chest like a swollen balloon. If only she could pop it. “I told Dad to eat grapefruit to help lower his blood pressure.”
“Oh, Sam…” Raul had dreaded this day for years. He hugged her tighter. “I had hoped you would never find out.”
Leaning away from him, she looked up at him and gasped. “You knew?”
Raul nodded. “I figured it out when I started researching Cook Pharmaceuticals years ago. I had cornered Thomas Cook for an interview right after your dad’s death, telling him I was going to expose the deadly side effects of his heart medicine. That’s when he told me to do better research—that 3% of the patient deaths related to Nosartin were all connected to grapefruit. I guess you weren’t the only one who discovered the health benefits of the fruit. It was the new rage. Anyway, as soon as he told me that, I remembered you mentioning grapefruit in your dad’s diet as part of your health plan to get him better, so I dropped my investigation.”
“Why didn’t you say something sooner?”
“I didn’t want you to blame yourself.”
Raul remembered all too vividly how dedicated Sam was to helping her dad get better. But this kind of revelation—finding out your best intentions ended up killing the person you were trying to save—was the type to crush a person, heart and soul. Raul knew firsthand how devastating personal blame for losing a parent could be.
“I do deserve the blame. I should have known that grapefruit makes it harder for medicine to metabolize! If I would have done even the tiniest bit of research, I would have known that scientists were already studying the effects of grapefruit on medicine absorption. They published all of these findings right here!”
She tossed the copy of American Scientist on the coffee table.
“Dad probably overdosed on the heart medicine without realizing it because the medicine was staying in his system too long, building up—all because of the grapefruit! How could I be so reckless?”
Noticing the grapefruit on the magazine cover, Raul picked it up and scanned the article. His gaze flicked over facts and figures, dates and data.
“Sam, this study only began a year ago.”
“So?”
“So—so your dad died years before any of this information came to light. And the research isn’t even definitive yet. Those were only their preliminary findings. Besides, you can’t possibly know everything there is to know about this stuff.” Raul turned her question on its head, hoping to redirect her blame from herself.
