Count Your Enemies

Twice, murder had checked in at Westside General Hospital and both times Bert Swain, a former reporter and now Director of Media Relations for a huge medical complex, was pivotal not only in making certain that the media attention had the proper spin but also in solving the crimes. Now, Crile Thomas, an influential member of the hospital's governing board, is demanding Bert's investigatory skills on a private matter, and refusing is not one of the options, no matter how many second opinions Bert goes after. Thomas's sister, Anne DeVilliers, founder and director of the Gaia World Institute, has been receiving threatening faxes, and Bert's orders are simple: Find out who is responsible and make tbem stop. Troubled by the assignment, his too rapidly approaching fiftieth birthday, and things in general, Swain checks in at Gaia only to find that a group dedicated to peace, harmony, and ecological research is rife with discord ... and that an insidious killer is about to strike.