Jeff Buick - Lethal Dose

“Don’t paint them all with the same brush, Gordon. Marcon, for one, would never push a drug beyond Phase II trials if it was dangerous.”

Kelly returned with their bill. He set it on the table and said, “Sorry about coming unglued there, but what you guys had me look at is pretty scary.”

“It’s okay,” Jennifer said, taking the bill and digging into her pocket.

In his other hand was a newspaper. He held it up, folded in half so the second section was visible. “This is you, isn’t it?”

She glanced at the picture accompanying the story about her car being found at the bottom of the cliff. “Yes, that’s me.”

“Take care,” he said, setting the paper on the table and accepting the money for the bill. It was over by twenty dollars, and he handed her the tip back. “You’ve already given me enough money tonight. Thanks, but no thanks.”

She pocketed the twenty and pushed her plate away. It hit the newspaper and the top section flipped back, revealing the front page. “I’m finished,” she said. “Totally stuffed.” She set her chopsticks on the table and stopped. She stared at the newspaper, the front page of the first section now visible. “Gordon,” she whispered. “Tell me I’m crazy.”

“What?” he said. “What are you talking about?”

“Look at the picture,” she said.

On the front page of the late edition of the Richmond Times Dispatch was a picture of six men, all dressed in suits and standing side by side. The two on the far right were Bruce Andrews and Dr. Chiang Wai. The remainder of the six were the representatives of the four agencies that had formed the task force to combat the threat of the virus.

“Take away Andrews and Wai, and what are you left with?” she asked quietly.

“The guys from the CIA, FBI, NSA-and Rothery, from the Department of Homeland Security. Why?”

“Four men,” she said.

Gordon stared at the picture. He grabbed the translation Kelly had left with them. “ ‘He has someone of great influence and power working with him. I am convinced it is one of the four,’ ” he said. He read the names from the caption under the picture. “Craig Simms, Deputy Director of the CIA, Jim Appleby, Special Agent in Charge with the FBI, and Tony Warner with National Security Agency. And, of course, J.D. Rothery, DHS and head of the task force. All household names these days.”

“One of the four,” Jennifer said.

“Christ,” Gordon said. “This just keeps getting better.”

Two cars sat in front of the White Oak Technology Building that housed the Veritas labs. Inside the front foyer, a man spoke quietly to the security guard while another man cleaned up the mess outside the maintenance room. The body was loaded into the trunk of one of the cars and the injured man was taken to a nearby clinic, where his eyes were flushed, the bones in his wrist set, and his skin stitched.

“You understand what will happen if any word of what happened here tonight leaves this building,” the man said.

The security guard could barely swallow. “Yes, sir, I understand fully.”

“So I can trust that you’ll keep this between us?”

“Absolutely.”

“Then I think we have an agreement and I can be leaving now. Take care, Robert,” the man said. He walked back to the second car and drove out onto Technology Boulevard. What the hell was going on? He had sent two experienced agents in to take care of a female research scientist and a country hick, and he had just collected one dead body and one seriously injured agent. How well the injured man would ever see again was in question. Not that he really cared, just that things like this generated questions and he didn’t need questions right now. He checked his watch and swore under his breath. He needed to get back to D.C. before he was missed. He entered the traffic on I-64, then cut off at the turn to the airport.

Christ, Andrews was going to blow a fuse when he found out they had missed Pearce and Buchanan yet again. But what could he do, short of sending in an entire SWAT team? He dialed Andrews’s private number as he approached the airport.

He was not looking forward to this conversation.

They drove north of Richmond until they found a small motel in Hanover that would take a cash deposit. They thanked Eric for the ride and settled into the small room. It was completely tasteless, with a flowered bedspread, flowered wallpaper, and flowered curtains. And nothing matched. It was like living in a poorly designed greenhouse. Jennifer took one look at the bed and lay down on top of the covers with her clothes on.

“Well, I guess that explains why the car chasing us through Richmond was government issue. Must have been friends of our good guy turned bad.”

“Gordon, we’re talking about four of the most influential men in the country when it comes to law enforcement and espionage. All four of these men are heavy hitters. And the agencies they work for are huge and have unlimited resources. How the hell are we supposed to smoke out the one working with Andrews?”

“If we could get in the room with all four of them, maybe we could get the traitor to make a mistake and give himself away.”

She shook her head. “Getting in the room with all four of them at the same time is next to impossible. And even if we do manage to get in that room, we can’t rely on him cracking. We’re not dealing with an amateur here. These men are all professionals, and any one of them could twist any proof we have in a totally different direction.”

Gordon stared at the picture in the newspaper. “So one of these men knew all along that the virus threat was completely bogus. What a prick. Whoever it is deserves to go down real hard.”

“What have we got?” Jennifer asked rhetorically. “Andrews owns a ton of stock and options in Veritas. He has to exercise those options by mid-December, and from what has just happened, Veritas stock is set to go through the roof. So his three million common shares and his options will make him close to a billionaire. That goes to motive but doesn’t prove anything. He manipulated the company books by moving regular expenditures into the tax-credit column. But trying to pin that directly on him could be difficult. He’s probably insulated himself from the actual fraud by setting up some poor suckers as scapegoats. Elizabeth Ripley at the SEC is working on that, but I’m not sure I’d hold my breath there.

“We’re pretty sure he ordered the deaths of Kenga Bakcsi and Albert Rousseau, but we’re without definitive proof. He tried to kill me. And he probably had that family in Denver killed as well. Again, we have no trail leading directly back to him. We need to nail his accomplice. We need to have whoever it is that worked with Andrews on this scheme implicate him. He’s too well insulated otherwise.”

Gordon looked up from the paper. “We trust these men to keep us safe, Jennifer. We sleep well at night because men and women inside these agencies risk their lives to protect us. And when one of these men in a position of great power abuses that privilege, he has to be brought down.”

“Wow,” Jennifer said, grinning. “A speech. Very good.”

He grinned and fell on the bed beside her. “Sorry, I was getting preachy. But I feel strongly that abuse of power should be dealt with in the harshest possible manner.”

“I do too,” she said. “We just need a way in.”

Gordon flipped on the television and surfed through the channels until he found a Washington feed with late news. The big story for the day was still the early-morning news conference with the leaders of the antivirus task force, and Bruce Andrews and Dr. Chiang Wai. They watched the telecast again, both of them looking closely at each man now that they knew one of them was dirty. But which one? There were no clues. No sideways glances or uneasy posturing. All four men played the part of savior perfectly. Their agencies had cooperated fully and effectively to bring this threat under control. And they had found a cure for a deadly virus as well. Heroes.