Allison Brennan - Cutting Edge

“Dammit,” she whispered. “It’s just a damn branch.”

Duke said, “I am taking you home, Nora.”

She didn’t object. She turned back to face him, her chin quivering, and said, “Thank you.”

Nora was grateful she didn’t have to drive back with Pete and listen to details about the case. It was after seven, and she’d been moving nonstop for sixteen hours. The sun was sinking, and so was she.

“Agent English!” a news reporter called out.

She jerked her head up. Everything was dark, but she didn’t take off her glasses. Not until she had her emotions completely under control.

“No comment,” she called, but no one heard her as a group of bystanders started shouting at her.

“Murderer!”

“The ducks didn’t do anything to you!”

“Killer!”

“Bitch!”

She noticed the flying object a second too late to avoid being hit in the chest by an open, partially filled soda can. The dark, fizzy liquid splattered across her chest like dark, watery blood.

She faced the crowd. They had no idea what was going on and why those poor animals had to die.

She saw Duke make a beeline toward the twenty-something girl who had thrown the can, a defiant look on her face. She wasn’t scared-or if she was, she hid it well.

“Rogan!” Nora called. He hesitated. The anger in his face was palpable. It gave her the strength she needed to shake out her memories, to put her mother behind her for the rest of the night. “It’s okay.”

She walked back to the reporter and said, “I have a brief statement.”

She was going to get reamed by her boss for this, but she wasn’t going to let the truth be shoved under the rug by the CDC, who would give no real information, other than that the public was safe. Everyone would believe that the government had overreacted and killed animals without good cause.

The news reporter rushed over, followed by the cameraman. Nora said, “I’m only saying this once.”

“Can I ask-”

“No,” she said emphatically.

“Okay. Okay, fine. I need your name-”

Nora reached into her pocket and handed him a card. She cleared her throat, saw that the camera was rolling, and began.

“The tragic killing of one hundred fifty-seven ducks today-specifically, five different species of ducks and two species of geese-is solely the result of a small group of criminals who broke into a private laboratory and released twelve quarantined ducks. The thieves believed that they were helping the birds by releasing them into the wild. On the contrary, they are responsible for all the dead animals you saw today.” She paused a moment, and when the reporter looked like he was opening his mouth, she added, “But even worse, they set the laboratory on fire and a human being died as a result.”

She wasn’t going into details regarding Jonah Payne’s death. She had some ideas about how to draw out one or more of the arsonists, and she didn’t want to give information that they might decide to keep in-house for the time being.

“Rest assured,” she continued, “the FBI, the domestic terrorism joint task force, the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office, and the Placer County Sheriff’s Office will do everything we legally can to find and arrest those responsible for this tragedy.”

She paused a second, then said, “Cut.”

“Can I-”

“No.”

She turned and briskly walked away. Amazingly she felt better. She’d been so scared earlier that she was going to completely fall apart-her compartmentalization technique hadn’t been working. Every snap, every duck, reminded her …

Don’t think about it, Nora. Don’t think about it .

She shook her head, needing to put it aside, and stumbled.

A strong arm wrapped around her waist. She hadn’t realized she was on the verge of falling until Duke pulled her up and held her against his side for a moment of time that was several beats too long for the chivalry of the act. And she liked it. A lot. His broad chest a perfect resting place for her heavy head; his warm, muscular arm holding her close. Just for a moment, just for a glimpse of what it would be like to have someone to call her own, someone who cared … but she’d given all that up long ago.

“You did good,” Duke Rogan whispered in her ear.

“I’m sorry for-earlier.”

“No apologies.”

Nora took off her glasses and put them in her pocket, then reluctantly took a step away from Duke. “Thank you for being here.”

Duke touched her cheek lightly. “I think I have a shirt in my trunk.”

She’d almost forgotten about the girl who’d pelted her with the open soda can. She glanced over her shoulder, but Duke said, “She’s gone.”

“Just an unhappy bystander,” she said. “I’ll live.”

Sean was sorely out of place at Rose College, especially at the meeting of Leif Cole’s Action Now! group.

Twenty or so students gathered in the student union and talked well into the first hour. Cole was late, and Sean hadn’t seen Anya since he’d followed her to the garden, where he saw her meet up with Cole and behave rather intimately. Though they didn’t kiss, it was the familiar way they had touched, the way they had spoken to each other, that told Sean they were romantically involved. It bothered him, not just because she was Cole’s student but because Cole was twice her age-or more.

What he wouldn’t have given to have bugged the bench and listened in to their conversation. Something had happened, and Anya had gotten very upset. Cole hadn’t looked too happy himself. Had their conversation been related to the arson and Jonah Payne’s death? Duke had told Sean that the FBI felt someone in Cole’s group was responsible. Sean wanted it to be Cole, not Anya, but it had looked to him like both of them had been worried and upset.

A girl ran into the student union and interrupted the “meeting” that hadn’t really started. “Turn on the TV!” she exclaimed. “The news. Channel Ten.”

One of the kids flipped on the television set nearby.

The station was in the middle of a report. The film showed plastic bags full of dead ducks.

One of the students cried out, “What happened?”

“The police,” gasped the girl who’d told them to turn it on. “They killed them all!”

Murmurs. Sean was surprised to glimpse Duke in the background, just for a second or two.

The newscaster was saying, “… related to Butcher-Payne Biotech-”

Several boos came from the students.

“… in a fire early this morning. Sources close to the investigation told News Ten that the arsonists released ducks infected with a genetically altered virus into the lake here, at Lake of the Pines.”

“Genetically altered!” a student exclaimed. “Serves them right.”

“Someone died in that fire,” Cole said, but Sean suspected he was the only one who heard the man.

The newscaster said, “Residents were shocked and upset by the activities.”

Cut to an elderly woman. “I’ve never seen anything like it. They just broke their bodies in two and tossed them into garbage bags.”

A teen boy said, “They were sick.”

An older man said, “My wife had to lie down, she was so upset by this tragedy. We bring our grandchildren to the lake, but neither of us will forget all those little bodies.”

A professional-looking woman commented, “I can’t believe this happened, but I think it’s more shocking that the people who brought them here burned down a business in Auburn.”

The scene cut to the on-site reporter, who said, “Twenty minutes ago, I had the opportunity to talk with Special Agent Nora English of the FBI’s domestic terrorism squad.”