Dark Alchemy (Dr. Sylvia Strange Book 5)

by Sarah Lovett

  "We'd been led to believe the project was still active even though Dr. Palmer had completed her work," Sweetheart said slowly.

  "You've been misinformed. Project Nicander is inactive; it has been since Dr. Palmer's departure. In fact, we're in the process of clearing out this office." Watley gestured around the room.

  Sweetheart stepped up to a large metal filing cabinet. Sylvia crossed the room in the opposite direction, reaching a stack of boxes and lifting the lid of the uppermost box. It was packed with files, and she began to select random folders. She found computer printouts that appeared to be test protocols.

  Sweetheart appeared at her shoulder and confirmed her guess: "Someone who worked on the project would have to decipher the data."

  "That could easily be arranged," Dr. Watley said. He had moved to another box, where he lifted the cover to reveal several dozen videotapes labeled in ascending numerical order. He selected a tape—16-32R—and held it up. "Recordings of the preclinical trials," he said. "Nothing revelatory, I'm afraid. But a glance will give you an idea of Ms. Grayson's work on the project."

  "We'd appreciate it," Sweetheart agreed.

  "You're welcome to view them all," Watley said, smiling tightly. "The monitor's in my office. If you're quite finished here, your interviews with project members are scheduled to begin in the next half hour."

  Sweetheart didn't budge. "Before we leave, we need to get a sense of the jeopardy surface."

  "Sorry?" Watley appeared genuinely puzzled.

  "In an inquiry such as this, where large amounts of data are generated, geographical profiling is useful," Sweetheart explained. "The jeopardy surface refers to the area where an event occurred. In this case, an exposure incident."

  Watley hesitated, then flattened his mouth and nodded. "Will a diagram suffice?"

  "Where was Samantha Grayson doing most of her work?" Sweetheart asked once they were viewing a blueprint of the lab's floor plan mounted on the wall of the maintenance office. A small headline at the top of the map read: IN CASE OF AN EMERGENCY EVACUATION.

  Watley frowned, and his thick fingers slid over the embossed chart. "Dr. Palmer's team members pursued several avenues of research." He pointed to one of two BSL-3 labs.

  "What was Ms. Grayson's primary job?" Sweetheart asked.

  "If I'm not mistaken, Ms. Grayson was assisting Drs. Thomas and Cray for most of the project."

  Sweetheart nodded. "Where was Dr. Palmer working?"

  Dr. Watley squinted at the blueprint as if his vision had been abruptly impaired. "I believe she was here." He pointed to the second BSL-3 lab.

  "So Samantha Grayson's work space and Dr. Palmer's work space were separated by a hallway."

  "Correct. In fact, they were in different labs."

  "But wasn't there interaction between researchers in both labs?"

  Watley shook his head. "It may not appear so, but in a lab such as this, schedules and physical security barriers keep interpersonal contact to a minimum." His eyes narrowed, creasing at the corners. "I believe she spent the bulk of her time monitoring and recording test batch data."

  Sweetheart frowned. "You're certain?"

  "Reasonably so." But Watley's voice definitely hitched. "Samantha Grayson worked with Dr. Cray for almost the entire project." He turned to stare at Sweetheart and Sylvia. "Two or three weeks before she died, she moved across the lab to work—here." On the diagram, he indicated the space that would have been directly adjacent to Dr. Palmer's lab.

  "Why did she make the move?" Sweetheart asked.

  "I can't tell you the exact reason. But Dr. Palmer would have final say. She might've requested the move so that she could more closely supervise some of Ms. Grayson's work on test protocols."

  Or to keep an eye on Ms. Grayson. Sylvia stared silently at the diagram. Which meant they were working side by side.

  Dr. Watley's office was located three floors above BioPort's basement laboratories. They found themselves with a few minutes to spare before the first interview. They raided the vending machines, purchasing stale sandwiches and bitter coffee. Sylvia stared dispiritedly at a soggy cheese sandwich.

  "I'd heard the food in England was improving," she whispered to Sweetheart.

  "Sssh, you'll hurt Watley's feelings."

  When they returned to Dr. Watley's office, he was waiting with videotape 16-32R in hand. With a look that said they were wasting his time as well as their own, he slid the tape into the mouth of the machine.

  An image filled the screen. A fixed camera had recorded a test protocol: a small monkey—a sign on the glassed cubicle identified the animal as "(Saimiri sciureus) 16-32R"—gazed at the camera with huge golden eyes.

  The date—approximately eleven months earlier—and the time appeared in the lower right-hand corner of the picture.

  The image jumped, and a woman dressed in a standard lab coat appeared on-screen. She offered a smile and a small wave to the video camera.

  "Samantha Grayson," Dr. Watley said in a hushed tone.

  In the dim light of the office, Sylvia watched as Watley stared intently at the monitor. Then she sat forward, her own eyes drawn to the video image.

  Samantha Grayson looked very much alive: young, attractive, apparently affable, and unremarkable at first glance. But before a viewer might turn away dismissively, a certain intensity drew the eye back. Sylvia tried to catch what it was that made Samantha Grayson intriguing, at the same time tracking the woman's casual dialogue with someone off camera—"You watching the championships tonight? These things never fit . . . Got it . . . Hi, Mom"—that was audible while she donned protective booties and gloves.

  There was something speculative and energized about her interactions—in the voice, in the eyes, in the body, the way she carried herself and managed to look casual, almost earnest. For all her ingenuousness, there was an underlying shading to her personality.

  The camera followed her beyond a door marked DANGER—NO ENTRY—TEST AREA. Through a glass partition she reassured the tiny monkey, "We won't hurt you, Annie." Then she addressed the camera: "She's doing fine, she's relaxed. Time to go undercover."

  The image jumped again: the isolated monkey was the star of the show.

  Directly above the glass cage, a large round clock marked the passing of minutes. As the black hand approached the twelve, Sylvia braced for something to happen.

  There was an audible click, the faintest hissing sound—and nothing else.

  "The test substances were aerosolized," Dr. Watley explained quietly. "Administration was automatic. Through a small valve in the wall."

  For the next several minutes, the monkey actually seemed to play to the camera, smiling and cooing. She appeared energetic, healthy, apparently unaffected by whatever substance had been administered.

  As revealed by the digital numbers in the corner of the screen, the image jumped forward in time.

  Now Samantha Grayson appeared again, speaking to the camera. "We've gone eight hours with no noticeable effects. We're reviewing blood assays."

  One more jump—according to the timer another six hours had passed—and the little squirrel monkey hooted for an invisible audience. The tape ended.

  "They're all like that," Watley said. "The videos were made each time the team administered a compound. But they were testing toxins reformulated for medicinal uses, not deadly bioagents."

  Containing her disappointment at the same time she suppressed a twinge of guilt over what felt like ghoulishness, Sylvia glanced at her watch.

  Watley said, "The interviews will take place in this room, if that's all right with you." Without waiting for confirmation, he said, "You'll be speaking with Dr. Harris Cray, one of our molecular toxicologists, among others. He's been in charge of closing down the project since Dr. Palmer's departure." He paused, then added (a bit disparagingly, Sylvia thought), "Although he's not as well known as Dr. Palmer, Dr. Cray is also a specialist on marine neurotoxins."

  Then Watley looked uncomfortable. "The remain
ing project members have been told these interviews are part of an inquiry into involuntary contamination incidents—hence the questions about Ms. Grayson's death."

  Sweetheart nodded reassuringly. But when only Sylvia was within earshot, he said, "Round up the usual suspects."

  In total, Sylvia and Sweetheart spoke with a half-dozen people who had been connected in some way with Project Nicander and Samantha Grayson.

  One of the first lessons of investigation: there is always some relationship between victim and killer, even when the crime appears to be an act of random violence.

  Sylvia focused on questions about Ms. Grayson—victim. She needed to gain a mental picture of the murdered woman. But Grayson was also her conduit to Christine Palmer—killer—the real subject of the inquiry.

  Sweetheart sat by her side, and together they had their act down, asking an inventory of questions: How strictly were lab standards maintained? Did Ms. Grayson adhere to standard protocols? Did Ms. Grayson seem to have personal problems? How did she relate to others in the project? How would you evaluate her as a professional? What was she like to work with?

  When the mood shifted and the interviewees relaxed: Did she seem happy? Did you ever notice that she seemed dissatisfied with her situation? Did you notice if others were taking extra sick days?

  Important to know if project members were being poisoned,.

  The interviews began with Ole Jorgensen, biologist, molecular chemist—all smiles, loved everyone (including Sylvia, by the look of it) and the fact that the Americans were monitoring the international safety standards in high-level labs.

  Dr. Jorgensen added that he had liked, Ms. Grayson very much. His smile grew larger. "But Dr. Palmer let her get away with murder," he added, shaking his head.

  "In what way?" Sylvia asked, a bit taken aback by the morbid cliche delivered with a strong Scandinavian accent.

  "Samantha Grayson was the toxicologist's pet." Dr. Jorgensen laughed at his own joke, and his eyes twinkled.

  "Was Ms. Grayson's work substandard?"

  "Oh, no." Jorgensen nodded adamantly. "Her work was fine—but she was missing days, staying home, to play hooky, perhaps."

  "Was she ill?" Sweetheart asked quietly; a vital question around the subject of repeated exposure to toxins.

  Jorgensen tipped his head, smiling widely. "She looked healthy to me."

  Next came several interviews with researchers whose work had been peripheral to the project and who had had little contact with team members.

  There was a brief break between interviewees before they got to Julie Talbert. Ms. Talbert was a safety technician who had almost nothing positive to say about anything, including being forced to take time away from her current project. Impatiently, she summed up her views. "It was a case of airborne contamination, aerosolization—pouring liquid from beakers, you get aerosol accumulation of hot cultures—oh, never mind, it's a common enough occurrence in large laboratory settings, just check the data."

  But as she left the office, Ms. Talbert sent a parting shot zinging toward the profilers: "We have an odd sort of tunnel vision, you know—those of us who work here—and we all get very protective about our research. But Samantha wasn't like that. She always seemed more interested in what everybody else was doing than in her own projects."

  Dr. Harris Cray was the last interviewee. Sylvia marveled at his distinctive red hair and goatee. His responses were neutral and unenlightening—until they asked about Samantha Grayson's work standards.

  "She was sloppy," he said bluntly.

  "Can you give us specifics?"

  "She mixed up slides, lost things, certainly didn't keep to safety protocols. No one else wanted to go near her work space." His eyes shifted from Sylvia to Sweetheart. "When I confronted her about her lapses, she denied them."

  "Did those lapses in safety protocol endanger others in the lab?" Sweetheart asked.

  Harris Cray frowned. "Everything you do in a lab affects everyone else."

  "Did you report your observations to administrators?" Sylvia asked.

  "Of course." He nodded curtly. He had a voice that made Sylvia think of dry ice. "I made a full report to the project head, Dr. Palmer."

  "And what was Dr. Palmer's response?"

  "She said she'd take care of it. Said she'd had her eye on Ms. Grayson for several weeks."

  "What's your opinion of Christine Palmer?"

  "She's a brilliant researcher."

  "Did you ever question her integrity?"

  "Never." He squinted through his glasses.

  "Were you familiar with any stories of dissatisfaction among her peers?"

  Suddenly Harris Cray's eyes widened. The internal "aha" was almost audible. "Ever since Christine's father died, there have been nothing but ugly rumors, innuendo—and the press makes money selling grubby little stories, accusing her of—" He broke off.

  "Accusing her of what?" Sweetheart asked quietly.

  Harris Cray was silent for a long beat, then seemed to collect himself and said, "There are politics in any research project. If you collect a dozen people and lock them away each day in a space this size, there are bound to be problems. Competition. Backbiting. Worse than the lab rats." He ran his fingers over his rusty goatee. "The project would never have existed without Dr. Palmer."

  "You feel she was responsible for keeping Project Nicander on track?"

  "Christine deserved a medal. Samantha Grayson was not the sweet little thing she pretended to be. She was ambitious, a party girl who stirred things up when she got—" He again stopped abruptly, as if he'd shocked himself. Finally, he said, "I'm only repeating what the investigators discovered after the trouble."

  "By trouble, do you mean Ms. Grayson's death?"

  He shook his head, looking from Sweetheart to Sylvia and back again. "I mean before her death, the internal investigation. The thefts."

  "Thefts," Sylvia echoed, nodding.

  "It's no secret." Harris Cray shrugged. "It was covered by the press—at least as much of the story as they could get—along with that ancient sarin gas business. Some things went missing from the labs. Files, disks, tapes." He stood to leave.

  Sylvia stood with him and asked, "Was the thief uncovered?"

  "I wouldn't be the one to ask about that."

  "Who would be the person to ask?"

  "Her boyfriend, the one in the spy business. He all but accused Dr. Palmer of murdering Samantha. What's-his-name, Lang. Paul Lang."

  "Why didn't Lang tell us that Samantha was suspected of stealing from the project?" Sylvia asked. They were outside the building, alone. Eddie was waiting beside his car roughly five hundred feet away, definitely out of earshot.

  "There were rumors, but they were never confirmed," Sweetheart said.

  "You knew about it? Why didn't you tell me?"

  "It's not really pertinent to our mission, which is to gather data for the profile," Sweetheart countered sharply.

  Sylvia stared at him in disbelief. "I can't believe you'd even say that—you're not serious. Everything is pertinent. If Christine Palmer felt threatened by someone on the project, that's pertinent. If she felt her research was jeopardized . . ."

  Sweetheart shook his head impatiently. "At the time of the thefts, there were rumors that the Koreans, the Chinese, Iraq—someone—had a fixer in place. On top of that, a top-secret military-based research center is a hell of a place to conduct an investigation. The whole thing blew over anyway—put to bed as a case of carelessness and coincidence."

  Sylvia began to walk away, but Sweetheart called her name and she turned. He waited until she took the few steps back to him, where he could speak in a low voice. "This isn't the first time there have been rumors of theft surrounding Palmer's research." He shook his head. "At the moment you're not here to worry about issues of security. We need to stay focused on the issue at hand—too much irrelevant information can cloud perceptions; too much information can throw us off scent. I'm asking you to trust me when I say the
rumors of theft are not pertinent."

  She stared at him, her mouth a straight line, and then she nodded once.

  The drive back to London was interminable. This round, Sylvia had the backseat. As the miles passed, she fought off car sickness and fatigue; jet lag was setting in. She craved the only accessible remedy she could think of—a coffee or chocolate biochemical boost. She felt cranky and exhausted.

  She closed her eyes, wishing she were home in New Mexico attending to wedding details. She felt a sharp twinge of guilt for running out on Matt; she couldn't wait to call him when she reached their hotel. She'd worked out the time difference and had a good idea where to find her family, at least by satellite transmission. She hungered for a simple conversation based on trust and the normal things of life—nothing to do with theft, murder, and military research projects.

  Finally, the outskirts of London gave way to increasingly busy streets. The rain had settled in to stay. The city was slick with a dark sheen. Pedestrians dodged showers and huddled under umbrellas. On a corner, a raggedy busker was performing an odd song and dance, tapping and shuffling his way from puddle to puddle.

  For some reason, while she watched the dancer fade into the rain, she remembered Dr. Watley, his instant of recognition when he told them about the lab.

  She knew now what Sweetheart had been probing for—what he needed to see with his own eyes: the jeopardy surface, Christine Palmer's physical territory.

  At Los Alamos, the late Dr. Douglas Thomas had worked in the lab directly adjacent to Palmer's.

  And now the pattern had begun to form. Christine Palmer liked to keep her victims close when she moved in for the kill. The better to monitor any suspicion or distrust, Sylvia thought. But more than that, Palmer liked her victims close in order to watch them die.

  CHAPTER

  11

  redrider: the Americans have been to visit