Alexis trotted off to her room as she was told.
After she heard the bedroom door close, Kathy played back the message on the machine. She began to cry softly while it was playing. When the message was over, she pressed the “erase” button and went into the bathroom to collect herself.
Afterward, she walked to the master bedroom and softly knocked. There was no response. She partially opened the door and poked her head in. Then she opened it all the way and entered the room.
Katrina was lying on the bed, facing the opposite wall. She didn’t turn over.
Kathy sat down on the bed and began to gently rub her sister’s lower back. “Trina,” she said quietly, “the police called. They caught him.”
There was no response.
The older woman sat in silence for a few moments, continuing to rub Katrina’s back. “Trina,” she said again, “I need to talk to you. Please look at me.”
Katrina still did not roll over.
“You’re my only sister, and you know I love you and I’d do anything I can for you. But I have to go home soon. I’m going to lose my job.” She paused for several moments before adding, “And Tom is seeking full custody.”
Katrina finally rolled over and looked at her sister. “What?”
She had lost a noticeable amount of weight over the last two months, and her face looked pale and sallow.
“Look, I know he’s a bastard and doesn’t even deserve the right… ” Kathy stopped as her voice began to catch. Then she cleared her throat and continued authoritatively, “You have to go to court. You have to be able to prove you can take care of yourself. He’s marrying that home-wrecking whore, which—believe it or not—will demonstrate parental stability to the court. I know, it’s backward, unfair, and basically ridiculous, but that’s how it is.”
She was interrupted by the distant ring of the living room phone.
Annoyed, Kathy grabbed the receiver of the phone on the nightstand next to her. Its ringer had been turned off since that night two months ago. “Hello!” she said angrily. “Tom? No, Tom doesn’t live here anymore. He left his beautiful, intelligent wife to go boink a bottle-blond piece of trailer trash with an unbelievably fat ass! So if you’re trying to reach him, I’m afraid you’re going to have to dial 1-800-HUGE-ASS. Thank you very much and have a nice day!” She slammed the phone down.
Katrina only gaped at her sister.
“Sorry,” Kathy said, and shrugged.
Through her tears, Katrina smiled slightly and shook her head. But the smile quickly faded. She closed her eyes and moaned. “God, what am I going to do?”
Kathy cleared her throat. “First, you’re going to get custody and child support, because you need both to survive. Then you’re going to pick yourself up and move on. Look sweetie, I know it’s hard to hear this. But I’m your sister, and I’m telling you that you need to get it together, quick, or you’re going to lose everything you have left.” Kathy swallowed at the brutality of her own words and rubbed the smeared makeup from her lower eyelid.
Katrina took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She reached down and switched on the ringer of the nightstand phone. She then picked up the receiver and dialed a number.
“Shenanigan’s,” the voice on the other end said.
“Shawna?”
“Katrina?! Yeah it’s me! Oh God, how are you, hun? We’ve been watching the news… it’s just awful… we’re all pulling for you down here at the bar… oh, God, I just can’t believe it… you know, is there anything I can do? God!”
Katrina sighed. She still wasn’t used to these conversations and never knew what to say. “I’m… uh… you know… look, Shawna, do I still have a job? ‘Cause I need one, bad.”
“Matt’s not here right now, but trust me, he’ll be happy to have you back. The regulars keep asking where the smart chick is. I’ll tell him to give you a call ASAP.”
“Thanks, Shawna,” Katrina said and hung up the phone. She looked at Kathy and shrugged. “Well, if I can’t handle the pressures of fighting infectious diseases, or afford to do it, for that matter, I guess I can always tend bar for a living. How’s that for parental stability?”
5:35 P.M. PDT
Sean McMullan jumped when the door connecting his hotel room to his partner’s was flung open.
Gilman barged in and threw his copy of the file onto McMullan’s bed. “I knew it!” Gilman spat.
“Shhh, I’m reading,” McMullan said, panting from the start he had just been given.
“Well let me save you the trouble, McMullan! Stone got a faculty appointment as soon as she graduated, which James Johnson said is practically impossible nowadays, remember? So she’s unusually smart, but young and inexperienced. I gather that there are a lot of people who are jealous of her success. I’m sure she has a lot of enemies. Sure.”
He paused for a breath and then puffed it out harshly. “Nonetheless, there’s one enemy that stands out in my mind as being maybe the one she might possibly have the biggest problem with. Lawrence Naden. Picked up in ’07 in Ensenada. And sent to San Quentin.”
Katrina polished off the last three swallows of her second pint of beer and turned the conversation back to her meeting with the FBI. “If any of you are uncomfortable with this work, I want you to speak up,” she said.
Todd and Josh exchanged a look that said they were both overwhelmed.
“I’m serious,” she continued. “I don’t want to go forward with this without your full support, nor do I want to force you into something you aren’t comfortable with just because I’m your boss.” She paused while the waitress collected their empty glasses. “That being said,” she said then, “I have to add… I think that if you choose not to participate in this, you will be blowing the chance of a lifetime. Very few people make a contribution of this magnitude in graduate school. So please consider that in making your decisions.
“As your advisor and friend, I highly recommend proceeding with this in the best interest of your careers. We can really make a major impact with this work, and your careers would be set for the rest of your lives.”
She paused and looked at each of them. “If you think you’re tired of working like donkeys and barely scraping by, you’d better believe that I’m even more so. And this could be our break.”
5:39 P.M. PDT
Jason Fischer shifted his position on the hard plastic emergency room chair, trying to find a position comfortable enough for sleep. His efforts were useless. His head was throbbing, and the thin flannel shirt he had on over his T-shirt was not offering any protection from the violent chill currently seizing him. Jason pulled the shirt more tightly around his torso.
A few minutes later, wracked with fever, he removed the flannel shirt altogether and used it to wipe a fresh outpouring of perspiration from his face. Not really caring if anyone was looking, he reached down and readjusted his boxers through his blue jeans to allow his throbbing genitalia a bit more space. Someone needs to teach that chick the “no teeth” rule, he thought.
Paranoia was slowly forcing its way in, and Jason struggled to mentally relive every step of the safety procedures. He had done the decontamination thoroughly. He always did. The ethanol. The gloves. The booties. The biohazardous waste. He had touched nothing on the way out of BSL-3. He was clean when he entered the clean room.
But the fever was clouding his thoughts.
It only took one spore. And he had been in a terrible rush.
The news had been excellent—the inhibitor worked wonders. But for use against anthrax infection in humans, it was not even close.
After what seemed like hours longer, his name was finally called.
Jason stood, painfully and slowly, and shuffled through the doors behind the nurse.
“I see you’ve been here twice in the last year,” the emergency room doctor commented with a slight slur as he examined Jason’s chart.
Jason, in turn, examined the doctor, who looked about his own age. “Yeah, that was differe
nt,” he said. “Those other times were for broken bones and cuts and stuff that I got during gigs with my band. I’d be rich if I could get paid for time spent in your waiting room. This place is a colossal pain in the ass. I’ve been here for an hour and a half this time. ”
“Only an hour and a half?” the doctor remarked. “We must be having a slow night. Now, what are your symptoms?”
Jason finally placed the reason for the slur in the doctor’s speech. The young man’s tongue had recently been pierced.
“Fever, chills, muscle aches, and the worst fucking headache I’ve ever had. I’m exhausted, run-down, and my lymph nodes are swollen. And so is my dick, by the way, but I think that’s someone else’s fault.”
The doctor raised an eyebrow without looking up from his clipboard. He finished his notes and then placed the clipboard onto a tray next to the gurney Jason was sitting on. He reached forward with both hands and felt the glands beneath his patient’s jaw. “You’re right, they’re swollen pretty badly. Let’s see the other.” He motioned for Jason to drop his pants.
Jason stood up to oblige, gritting his teeth while the doctor performed the examination.
“Well,” the doctor said, “other than a few teeth marks that are probably causing the pain you’ve got there, everything looks pretty normal. I’d venture to suggest you probably have the flu. There is a nasty one going around this fall.”
“I’d have said so, too,” Jason said, “except that I work with live anthrax.”
The doctor took a step backward. “I see.” He flipped through Jason’s medical record. “I assume you’ve been vaccinated… oh, yes, there it is. When was the last time you were working with the live bug?”
“Last night, about nine forty-five.”
“And before that?”
“Before that it had been a few weeks.”
To Jason’s surprise, the doctor now laughed heartily. “Well then, of course you have the flu! As an anthrax researcher, you should know there is no way you’d be this symptomatic in twenty-four hours, and if you were exposed weeks ago you would certainly have already known it before now! You can’t have anthrax. The incubation period doesn’t match.”
5:45 P.M. PDT
Roger Gilman looked as if he had been slapped. He sank miserably into one of the chairs of Sean McMullan’s hotel room. “Life?” he groaned. “Naden got life? Not death? How can that be?”
An annoyed McMullan pointed to a page of the Homeland Security file in his hand. “It’s right here, dumb shit. You were so excited about bustin’ Katrina Stone that you didn’t read far enough.
“Lawrence Naden had to be extradited from Mexico, and the Mexican government wouldn’t release him if the death penalty was on the table. He’s serving life without the possibility of parole. He never would have been in any of the death row wings at San Quentin. On top of that, he was transferred to a prison in Texas in 2010.
“So instead of going off half-cocked again, maybe you oughta double check that he’s still there. You can also make yourself happy by confirming that he’s not on the list of dead inmates at San Quentin. My guess is he’s alive and well and singing Deep in the Heart of Texas.”
“I saw the sparks between you and her.”
McMullan looked up from his paperwork. “What are you talking about? There’s nothing between me and her.”
His partner wordlessly pursed his lips. He paused for a second, but then prodded, “You sure?”
“Of course I’m sure!” McMullan laughed. “You think I wouldn’t know? Come on, you must not know me very well. I wouldn’t jeopardize an assignment like that. Period. I’ve met the woman once, and you were there.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that there’s something there, whether you realize it yet or not. I hope it doesn’t interfere with your ability to do a thorough investigation.”
McMullan changed the subject. “What exactly is your problem with her? I mean, you’re obviously a bit old school when it comes to science, but you also seem like a reasonable guy for the most part. So I don’t get it… It’s like you’re hoping she’s the bad guy.”
After a long pause, Gilman said, “Frankly? I think for an attractive, allegedly brilliant, thirty-four-year-old doctor, she seemed a little bit interested in my scabby old battle-scarred partner—no offense. And I wonder if there’s a motive behind it.
“And I trust James Johnson for the same reason that I trust God and tradition, because both are tried and true. And I think Guofu Wong is way too eager about the technology and way too trusting of his fellow researchers to be objective.
“And, most of all, I can’t get past the coincidence of Stone’s preliminary data being so closely aligned with the Death Row strain of anthrax. I can’t believe it is really a coincidence.”
OCTOBER 17, 2015
2:34 P.M. EDT
USPIS Assistant Forensic Director Teresa Wood sat in front of an ultraviolet light box in the physical sciences unit of the National Forensic Laboratory in Dulles, Virginia. In gloved hands, she tenderly cradled a one-inch-thick gelatinous square. Sliding one hand out from under the gel, she allowed the corner, and then the side, to contact the light box. Gently holding it in place, she removed her other hand, and the gel sat freely upon the glass.
Teresa closed the door to the small room and then switched off the overhead light. In the near-complete darkness, she found a face shield and pulled it over her face. Then she switched on the light box before her.
Bright purple ultraviolet light flooded the room from the small box. Where nothing had been visible in the overhead light, she could now clearly make out patterns of solid pink lines in the gel. Each represented a unique piece of DNA from her PCR analysis.
Teresa only had to glance at the patterns to see that the DNA fragments retrieved from the White House greeting card and its envelope were different from any of the biological toxins she had incorporated into her assay.
Along with other toxins, DNA samples from both normal anthrax and the Death Row strain had been included in her experiment. Neither strain was present on the greeting card. Nor were any of the other toxin controls. There was absolutely no infectious material on the card.
Goose egg, Teresa thought.
Katrina felt ill prepared for the scheduled meeting with the FBI agents. Jason had helped her hide the activator data in the liquid nitrogen tank, but he had never exactly consented to the project. And today, he was not in the lab.
Reflecting on how sick he had looked, Katrina was not surprised by his absence. Jason rarely got sick, but when he did, he was a baby about it, and it seemed to last forever. She blamed the fact that he didn’t ever seem to lay off the partying long enough to get well.
Katrina had been hoping it would be the tall agent, McMullan, who would be meeting with her. When the other agent arrived at her office, her spirits sank.
Roger Gilman entered Katrina’s office with the flustered appearance of someone who had already had a long day. His morning comb-over’s attempt at hiding male pattern baldness had now been surrendered, and the shiny dome of his skull reflected the fluorescent light in Katrina’s office. Gilman’s eyes were red, and his suit looked as if he had been sleeping in it for days.
Katrina put forth her best effort at a sincere, pleasant smile. “Good afternoon, Agent Gilman. How are you today?”
“I’m fine, thank you. How are you?” Gilman answered with equal cordiality.
The two sat across from each other over Katrina’s desk.
“Have you considered our offer, Dr. Stone?”
“Yes, sir, I have considered it in depth, and this is my position. Obviously, I am more than happy to take the government’s money to finally be able to do my work the way it should be done. I mean, what scientist would not wish for that? However, I have one very important condition—”
“You want total scientific freedom,” Gilman interrupted. “We understand.”
Katrina chuckled. “That goes without saying. But, no. The conditi
on is this: if I am to work on the Death Row project, I must insist that I keep all of my own people. The government may provide additional staff—in fact, I will require them—but my original lab members have seniority and will answer directly to me. Additional staff will answer to them, with no questions asked.”
“They’re students!” Gilman protested.
“They are graduate students and one postdoc. They’re very good. I have handpicked each and every one of them, and they know the work better than anyone. I need them.
“If I were forced to let them go, not only would it be detrimental to their careers, it would also be fundamentally damaging to the project. I would be forced to train new people by myself from scratch. It would take months—years, in fact—for me to bring a whole new staff up to speed. This condition is simply not negotiable.”
Gilman sighed. “OK. I will include your condition to the contract we will be drawing up. However, your staff will be subject to the same scrutiny as you. I need a list of your people. We will be performing very thorough background checks on every single one of them before we involve them in this. You have not discussed the situation with anyone, correct?”
“Of course I haven’t,” Katrina lied.
“Good. Are all of your people American citizens?”
Katrina laughed out loud.
“What’s so funny?”
“I’m sorry,” Katrina said. “It’s just that American citizens are actually pretty rare in this line of work. In most labs, foreign students and postdocs outnumber Americans about ten to one.”
She pulled a small notepad out of her desk and began writing down information as she spoke. “My staff is as follows. My postdoc’s name is Jason Fischer, and he is an American citizen. My students are Joshua Attle, also an American citizen, Oxana Kosova, who is Russian, Li Fung, who is Chinese, and Todd Ruddock, who is English. You may get any other information you need from our human resources department.”
The Death Row Complex (The Katrina Stone Novels Book 2) Page 7