“Chris is right,” Jordan said. “If Vincent’s people are willing to go after a senator and vanish into the night, we don’t stand much of a chance if they want us dead.”
Robin looked down for a moment as if soaking in those words. “What were you saying before about the police?” she asked Jordan. “About Dellaporta?”
“I tried calling her. I tried her personal number, her work line. I tried the department and begged for them to transfer me to her, to locate her or something.” Jordan pinched his eyes closed. “I’m worried she was part of the escort. The news streams aren’t reporting the exact number of casualties, but the stories are saying no one left without being taken away in a body bag or on a gurney.”
Her hand over her mouth, Robin gasped. Chris felt sick. Dellaporta had once brought him in to the department and questioned him as a potential suspect in a murder case. Over time, she’d gotten to know him and stood up for him when the Bio Unit again suspected Chris of a crime he didn’t commit. She’d put her job on the line—hell, she’d put her life on the line—for him, for an ex-con. She’d almost lost it all because she believed in his innocence.
And the detective wasn’t the only person Chris feared might be hurt. He opened his mouth to speak.
Jordan shook his head as if he could read Chris’s mind. “I couldn’t get in contact with Veronica, either.”
“I’ve got to make sure she’s okay. She needs to know what’s going on.” He stood, and Robin’s hand fell from his lap. He felt her eyes on him as he paced around the living room and tried Veronica’s number. She didn’t pick up. “You didn’t try her family, did you?”
Jordan shook his head. “Don’t have their numbers. They’ve smartly taken everything off the public databases.”
Veronica had revealed she’d been manipulated by Vincent’s men to keep tabs on Chris. They’d also used her as bait one last time to force Chris into helping them. By making threats against Veronica’s sister in Manhattan and her parents in Chicago, the Tallicor thugs had kept Veronica silent until she’d cracked. Now her family was under constant protective watch, though they’d decided against complete off-the-grid witness protection.
Chris tapped on Veronica’s parents’ numbers, but neither picked up. Chewing his bottom lip, he found Veronica’s sister’s number and called. Each time the line rang, his heart sank deeper into a pit of worry.
“Chris?” a tired voice answered. “Chris Morgan? What the hell are you calling about?”
“Sorry, Krysta, but is Veronica okay?”
“Jesus, she’s sleeping.” A hint of irritation rang out in Krysta’s voice. “Why shouldn’t she be okay?”
“We just found out Senator Sharp’s been killed. We think it might have something to do with the same people who manipulated Veronica.”
The line went silent for a moment.
“Krysta? Are you still there?”
“Yes, yes. So you think...You think they’re after Veronica again?”
“I don’t know.” Chris pulled his hand through his hair.
“What do you think we should do?”
“I don’t know,” Chris said again. On one hand, they were already under protective surveillance by the NYPD and FBI. He wondered if they might actually be okay. Staying put and where the police could keep an eye on them might keep them safer than Jordan, Robin, and Chris could. Then again, the senator had been murdered while part of a police escort. “As soon as we find something out, we’ll let you know. Be careful, okay?”
“We will,” Krysta said.
After the call with Krysta ended, Chris stood in the middle of his living room. Robin and Jordan stared at him from the scarlet couch. “What should we do?” he asked.
“Move on,” Robin said. “I’m not about to run away and hide from some crazy terrorists. We don’t even know if they want us dead. After all, if they wanted to take us out, they could’ve done it a while ago.”
“Maybe,” Jordan said. “But they might’ve placed a higher priority on the senator’s head. If we all disappeared before they killed Sharp, it might raise too much suspicion and could put the police on high alert, making it harder for Vincent’s gang to carry out the hit.”
“I don’t know,” Robin said. “They had no problem kidnapping me before straight out of the hospital. If they’re going to make their move, there’s not much we can do to stop them, right?”
She looked up at Chris for support.
“You’re probably right,” he said. “The only way I imagine we can stay away from them is to get the hell out of the country for a while. Wait for the feds to take care of this. There’s no way they’re going to sit by and let a group like that make such a brazen assault on a congressman—disgraced or not, it’s a huge insult to national security.”
“I think you’re right,” Jordan said. He folded his arms across his chest. “Let’s all get away. I can get us a private jet, scrub our flight from air traffic records or at least divert our real flight plan, and disappear on an island somewhere.” His gaze turned almost dreamy. “I can finish writing my book, you guys can enjoy the beach and do whatever you children do.”
“No,” Robin snapped. Her anger caught Chris off guard. “I can’t disappear. The kids need me.”
Chris had heard that line before. He admired her for it, too. Her dedication to the children in her cancer ward was unrivaled by anything else in Robin’s life. At times, he caught himself wondering what would happen if their relationship progressed. He accepted that he would always come second to her patients.
“All right. I didn’t mean to offend.” Jordan’s brow furrowed, but his voice remained calm. “I’m thinking of our best interest here.”
“And I’m thinking of theirs,” Robin said. “There are always suffering kids at the medical center and never enough doctors.”
Chris sat next to Robin and put a hand on her bare knee. He squeezed it. “She’s right. I don’t want to go anywhere. Not yet, anyway. I want to know where Dellaporta is. I owe her at least that much. Hell, we don’t even know Vincent’s group is responsible.” He pointed at Jordan. “You said it yourself before. These organizations are like weeds. You pull one and three more pop up.”
Robin nodded. “We have no idea who else might’ve wanted the senator gone. The man, crooked or not, proposed a law to make it much harder for enhancement manufacturers to obtain their biological goods, so it makes sense there’d be a bevy of groups out for his head.”
“Exactly,” Chris said. “And besides, Robin and I are going through with our plans to set up a clinic for enhancers. We’ve got a meeting with the Institutional Review Board to begin clinical trials for our therapies to reverse genetic mods.”
“But—” Jordan started.
“I’ve got to see this one through,” Chris said. “It’s the right thing to do, and it’s probably the best way I can help to clean up this city.”
Jordan held up his hands in defeat. “Fair enough, you two. We stay.” He prodded Chris in the chest. “But you’re getting a goddamned gun whether you like it or not.”
Chapter 4
Bookshelves full of thick medical texts lined the walls of the cramped conference room. The small space at the University of Maryland Medical Center was allocated for clinicians to hold meetings in. Chris pulled out one of the leather-bound books and blew the dust off. He wiped the rest clean with his shirt sleeve and traced his fingers over the words etched into the cover.
“Modern Subcutaneous Interventions?” He raised an eyebrow at Robin. “These so-called modern interventions are almost forty years out of date.”
Seated at a conference table barely the size of a desk, Robin shrugged. “It’s not like anyone reads these books anyway.”
Chris laughed. “That’s reassuring. Doctors keep around a bunch of old books to show off, huh? Why not stock it with actual reading material and have something people can learn something from?”
“Comm cards. Why keep updating a library full of hardback books
when you’ve got a constant stream of journal articles and case studies sent directly to your card? No need to kill whole forests trying to keep this little library up to date.”
“Fair enough,” Chris said. “Too bad the only things filling my comm card are news streams on last night’s attack.”
Robin stood and rounded the table toward Chris. She grabbed his arm and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Still worried about Dellaporta?”
“Of course. She stuck her neck out before for me, and now I have no idea if she’s alive, or if she’s stowed away in the hospital. Hell, if she isn’t dead, if she isn’t in a hospital, she could be in their custody.” He glowered at Robin. “They might have taken her hostage, they might’ve—”
Robin squeezed his arm again. “Don’t let your mind wander down a path of ‘what ifs.’ There’s nothing you can do now, and there’s nothing more dangerous than riling yourself up over something you cannot possibly control. The full force of Baltimore PD, Maryland State Troopers, and the feds are going after these people. There’s no way they’re going to let this group get away with what they’ve done. I mean, all you see in the news streams are promises from every politician and law enforcement agency in the nation that the hammer of justice is going to crush these guys.”
“Is that how you stay so calm? You can rationalize everything away?”
“No,” Robin said, shaking her head.
“You seem as if last night’s news didn’t even shake you. Like Dellaporta, the woman who pretty much saved our lives when we escaped Tallicor, who could be dead or something worse, doesn’t even affect you.”
“That’s not it at all, Chris.”
He could see a flash of hurt in her eyes, and his own expression softened.
“How do you think I get by every day at this job? I’m a pediatric oncologist.” Her eyes narrowed. “I mean, damn it, do you know what I deal with? I see kids come in, and some never make it out. I’ve learned how to overcome that and move on, because there’s always someone else who needs me, and I’ve got to be there for them.”
For the first time, a tear budded at the corner of her eye before rolling down her cheek. Chris enveloped her in a hug. He expected her to remain in his embrace for a while, but instead, she pulled away. Wiping her face with the back of her hand, she stood tall and grabbed his shoulder.
“We can’t keep wallowing,” she said. “We’ve got to forge ahead.”
It was like a switch turned off again, and she appeared stoic. Chris’s brow furrowed, but he said nothing as he followed her back to the conference table. She took out her comm card and gestured over it until an array of documents projected in the air between them.
Before them glowed the contents of the experimental protocol Chris and Robin had submitted to the University of Maryland Medical Center’s Institutional Review Board. The board, or IRB, served as an ethics committee to approve any trials or experiments involving human subjects at the hospital.
They needed the IRB to support their upcoming clinical trials of human DNA excision treatment—HDXT for short. They’d designed HDXT to remove the unnatural, modified genes found in enhancers’ cells. If the procedure succeeded, the enhancer would return to life as a normal, natural human being.
Chris thought of it as an opportunity to give people a second chance. Whether they had bought and implanted an unlawful enhancement causing health issues instead of benefits or they had decided a life of unnatural abilities and illegal activities was not for them, this treatment would offer a remedy that so far had not been commercially available.
And Chris thought it an apt way to do penance for his own involvement in the black market. He might be able to help enough people to rectify the guilt that reminded him he’d sold and distributed products with the potential to cause uncontrollable cancer, grotesque physiological deformations, or intense immune responses that could send his patients into a coma or death.
But he and Robin were also aware that anytime they played with medical therapies affecting a patient’s genes, they faced rightful scrutiny. Failure in their clinical therapy could result in the same terrifying results that came from a malfunctioning enhancement. Unlike the black-market wares Chris had sold, their novel treatment would be subject to the stiff regulations of governing regulatory bodies like the FDA and the local IRB. There was no room for error if they wanted to succeed.
“Where is David?” Chris said as he drummed his fingers on the table. As one of the hospital’s representatives on the IRB and an anesthesiologist at the hospital, Dr. David Reed had reviewed their protocol before its presentation at the board meeting and assured them he’d join them afterward for a celebratory champagne toast. David knew Chris’s personal stake in developing HDXT to help enhancers, and Chris hoped the man had pushed hard for the clinical trial approvals.
Robin glanced at the projection clock hung above the bookcases. “He said he’d be here as soon as the IRB meeting was over.”
“If the meeting’s run long, do you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing?”
“I wish I knew.”
Chris leaned back in his chair and stared at the glowing hologram documents. He feared they both knew the answer to his question. A long meeting meant there was likely intense debate. Fiery debate meant stalwart disagreement and didn’t bode well for ensuring the approval of their application.
The door to the conference room opened, and a lanky man wearing a white coat rushed in. David Reed bounded to the table and slid into one of the chairs. Wrinkles creased his wide forehead as he scratched the stubble along his chin.
“What’s going on?” Chris asked.
David shook his head. “I’m afraid we’ve tabled the protocol for next time.”
Robin exhaled and pinched her eyes closed. “I thought you said we were airtight.”
“I thought so, too,” David said. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have been so optimistic going into this meeting.”
“So give it to us straight,” Chris said. “How many people are against it?”
“It’s hard to gauge since not everyone talked. You know how Fincher and Palms are. You never have any idea what their cards are until they lay them out on the table.”
Tucking in a loose strand of hair, Robin readjusted her ponytail. “A meeting doesn’t last that long without somebody being vocal, though.”
“No, you’re right,” David said. “Our biggest opponent in passing this protocol is Murray.”
“Conrad Murray? The unaffiliated rep?” Chris asked.
Each IRB comprised members representing both the research institution and the community at large. This meant boards recruited individuals without a medical background to provide input into the ethical questions the IRB faced when approving human experiments.
“That’s right,” David said.
“Never liked that guy,” Robin said. “You ever watch those old movies?”
“Old movies? You could be a bit more specific,” Chris said. “But either way, I’m not sure cinema history is relevant to the IRB review process.”
Robin ignored him. “I’m talking about late-twentieth-century films.”
“I like my movies like I like my women,” David said. “Young and three-dimensional. None of this flat, boring crap.”
Chris raised an eyebrow at the anesthesiologist, and Robin rolled her eyes.
“Aren’t we getting a bit off topic?” Chris asked.
“My point is that I think our unaffiliated rep on the IRB, Murray, looks like Danny DeVito.”
Both Chris and David stared at her.
“Can’t say I know the name,” Chris said.
David shrugged. “Must not be a real pretty chap, huh?”
“Never mind,” Robin huffed. “What does Murray have to say?”
“Well, your friend, Danny DeVito, is concerned about the moral issue of helping enhancers.”
“How the hell does that figure?” Robin curled her fingers into a fist. “He thinks this treatment is a bad thi
ng?”
“I can’t say I agree his arguments are relevant to the issues at hand, but he believes providing an escape for enhancers will actually make their problems worse.”
Chris scrunched his eyebrows together. “What’s his argument there?”
“Keep in mind these are his words, not mine.” David held up his hands. “He seems to believe if potential enhancement users think there’s a remedy for modifying their genes, if they think there is a way out, then they’re more likely to use an enhancement. So he contends our city’s little problems are going to be made worse by hosting a study in one of our hospitals to alleviate people’s regret regarding their genetic experimentation.”
“Don’t tell me he’s one of those conspiracy theorists who also believes that’s why there’s not a pill to instantly cure hangovers.” Robin adopted a garish accent. “The gosh-darn government don’t want people to think there ain’t consequences to their actions, so they’re buying out all the science-folk who came up with the magic pill.”
Chris sighed. “Whatever Murray might believe, none of it is directly related to any ethical considerations of our experiments. I mean, we’ve covered the whole gamut of patient privacy and FDA concerns over treatment efficacy. Murray sounds like a crackpot.”
“I’m in agreement there,” David said. “I’ll need to talk to a few of the other board members to get a read on their thoughts and see if we can’t stifle Murray’s soapboxing at the next meeting.” He slapped his hand on the table. “I want to see this passed. I believe in you guys. You’ve got a solid proposal, and this research is worth pursuing.”
“Thanks,” Robin said. “If only you could convince everyone on the board to be as enthusiastic.”
“Don’t worry. I’m giving it my best.”
A glaring red message from Robin’s card replaced the projected documents on the table. “Shoot. I’ve got to go. Patient needs me.” The hologram disappeared as she slipped her card into her pocket and ran to the door. “Call you later, Chris.”
The Black Market DNA Series: Books 1-3 Page 54