Mariposa (17 page)

Having accompanied her across the parking lot, Blake stood beside Rebecca with hands folded as Baumann opened the limo door.

Rebecca paused by the open door. The defense attorney's close presence made her uncomfortable. "So?"

Baumann focused on Blake's shoulders, his arms—what he could see of them.

Blake looked around, then leaned in to speak softly. "Someone's working down a list. I have absolutely no idea why."

"But you know
who
, don't you?"

Blake pulled back. "It's going to come out. It has to."

When Baumann looked away, distracted by a passing car, Blake pressed a folded piece of paper into her hand.

"Do what you can to get Quinn moved back to McNair. He has useful information, it'll just take time. Don't call me or my firm. When it all comes out, this is going to be pure poison and we do a lot of business around here."

Rebecca sat in the limo, lifting her leg and swinging it into the car. She watched Blake return to the visitor's center entrance.

"Anything interesting, Ms. Rose?" Baumann asked as he prepared to close her door.

"I don't know, Roger. Not yet."

"Was that crack he made supposed to be some kind of a threat?"

"Good ears, Roger. I don't know that, either."

"I can have him hauled in," Baumann said, looking back at her in the rearview mirror, eyes narrowed.

"Don't bullshit yourself. You'd be yanked faster than a pit bull in a chicken yard."

"I was on Quinn's detail," he said a few minutes later. "Jesus. A veteran and war hero—a real family man. No marital problems I ever saw. Ms. Rose?"

"Yes, Roger?"

"No more going out on your own."

"I'll let you know, Roger."

She opened the folded piece of paper. All it said was "
Talos
."

The rest of the day seemed routine but Rebecca was looking for any and all connections between the former vice president and Talos Corporation—or CEO Axel Price. She used tailored searches to process millions of archived White House emails, sent over from the National Archives.

Nothing of interest. White bread politics, not even whole wheat.

And nothing about Talos.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Washington D.C.

Rebecca unlocked the door to her hotel room. The clock on the wall glowed 1707.

She took the pot from the hotel coffeemaker and poured a cup before sitting at the desk, leg stretched out to ease the ache. She opened Tom's manila envelope and laid its contents on the desk. One sheet of zip paper.

She thumbed the tab.

The first entries from the dattoo, arranged in indexed pages, were people she had met at the COPES conference. Next, Tom had arranged fragments of degraded files, a mess of keyboard symbols that meant nothing to her. He had annotated some of the lines of code, suggesting, in parentheses, what they might mean. Most were names—again, people she had met at the conference.

But Tom had also written, on the third page, "Sound file encoded and fragmented. Can't reconstruct yet. Still working. But name is recoverable: 'Confession of VP.'"

Rebecca finished her coffee, then touched the zip paper's right arrow to access the fourth page. Tom had prefaced this new list of names, marked off in a matrix of lines, with "Not dattoo files. Separate single Excel formatted file, recovered complete. Analysis of this file gives a machine ID, Microsoft license and serial number, location of store where software was purchased eight years ago—Trig Medical Office Outfitters, Bethesda, Maryland. Name of installer or licensee—Madeline Paris, doctor. Simple hacker shit. You're welcome. Sorry about the delay on the sound file."

Rebecca looked over the names. Tom had underlined two without comment: Edward Quinn, listed on the entry as "Primary, First Patient List, Mariposa 01"; and near the bottom, third from the last, "Rebecca Rose, Fourth Patient List (outlier), Mariposa 03."

She frowned, moved her finger down, scrolling the zip page, and read the thirteenth name: "Nathaniel Trace, Second Patient List, Mariposa 02."

Mariposa
was butterfly in Spanish. By itself, that meant nothing to her. But Nathaniel Trace, Edward Quinn, and Rebecca Rose all had something in common. That something was in—or had been in—Bethesda, Maryland.

Rebecca had only one connection to anything in Bethesda. She had gone to a clinic there to undergo treatment for delayed PTSD.

The same PTSD that had gotten her indefinitely furloughed from the FBI—not retired, not shitcanned, but furloughed, because she knew too much, and keeping 'em on the payroll was standard practice at the time for alcoholic, drug-addled, or otherwise defective agents who knew embarrassing things.

Or who broke into a raging, paper-tossing fury in a case meeting at a simple challenge from the then-director.

She took a deep breath. The meeting with Nathaniel Trace meant that someone had known even before she did that the president was going to ask her to investigate the VP.

The White House had a leak.

Nathaniel Trace was connected with that someone—friend or foe, who could tell? As for the list of names . . .

Quinn had secretly gone for treatment at the same clinic—hush-hush in the extreme. Mariposa. Quinn. Trace.

Rebecca Rose.

Quinn had gone off his nut and killed his wife. Not drugs in his doughnuts, not a surreptitious injection or contact poison. Side effects of Mariposa, perhaps. Very possibly.

Likely
.

Rebecca closed her eyes and sat for a long, long cascade of steady breaths, against the sincere wishes of her ribs.

I'm part of the problem.

This information had to go to the president, delivered personally. But the president was in the Catoctins, at Camp David. She had been there for three days and no one could reach her—not even Rebecca.

The room's old landline phone rang. She never used it. She picked up the wireless handset and searched for the talk button.

"You don't know me, Mrs. Rose," said the voice on the other end—masculine, soft and steady. Her brow furrowed. No one was supposed to know she was staying here. Despite the voice's mildness, something was wrong—and not just because he called her
missus
.

"No, I don't," she said. "Who are you?"

"I hope you've had time to read the documents your young man recovered for you."

"Who is this?"

"Someone is coming to visit, Mrs. Rose." The voice repeated her name as it had the first time—
exactly
as it had the first time. "Please don't get alarmed. He's behaving erratically, which is understandable, under the circumstances. But he means well. Please be careful."

"You can't—"

The connection ended with a swift growl-rising-to musical tone that indicated somewhere along the path, an EPR phone was involved—very expensive, limited to big corporations and just a few government agencies.

She replaced the handset in its charging cradle.

The doorbell rang. She jumped.

Nobody was supposed to be able to do
that
without warning, either.

She slipped the zip pages into a drawer, then thought for a moment, brow still furrowed. Waited to see how long it took whoever was there to ring for a second time.

Ten seconds.

Drawing herself straight, she went to answer.

A gray-haired man in a tweed coat stood in the hall, stooped from worry and exhaustion. He tried to smile, then twitched a look over his shoulder. Baumann usually kept watch this time of the evening at the end of the hall, near the elevator.

He wasn't there.

The gray-haired man withdrew a 9 mm Luger from an inside pocket and pointed it in her general direction, with his finger on the trigger. The safety catch on the left was off. He wobbled the barrel, uncertain what to do next.

Amateurs with guns scared the hell out of her.

"My name is Dr. Terence Plover," he said.

Rebecca had to reassure him before he fired a round out of panic—or several rounds. She stood back, smiled, and said, "Come on in, Dr. Plover. I've been told to expect you. The place is a bit of a mess."

Chapter Thirty-Three

Plover sat in the corner chair beside the counter of the kitchenette, the single pole lamp behind him and his face in shadow.

The barrel of the Luger poked into the cone of light.

He sounded asthmatic. He might be ill. Or just scared out of his wits. "Thank you for meeting with me," he said. "I've been told you have useful connections."

"Blake set this up?" Rebecca asked.

"Who is that?" Plover asked.

"Quinn's attorney."

"He had nothing to do with this."

The silence lengthened.

"My wife has been murdered," Plover said, eyes wandering. "She was very dear to me, and very important. A brilliant woman, too humble . . . but brilliant. I hope you understand my precautions." He tapped the Luger with one finger. "This belonged to my grandfather. He took it from a German soldier who no longer needed it. It was the only gun I had access to when I left Bethesda."

"I've read some of your wife's documents," Rebecca said. "Quinn came to your clinic for treatment. Nathaniel Trace was one of your patients after that. And then—me."

"I don't remember your face, but I remember your name. I didn't meet with you personally. Sorry. I hope we were able to give you some relief."

"It was a short visit. But yes, it helped. So far."

"I have since given up my practice, my clinic, my companies. My wife and I moved . . . After I learned what Quinn was involved in."

"Murder?"

"No, before."

"And that was . . .?"

Plover looked dismayed. "You were given his confession!"

"The sound file?"

"I thought you'd have delivered it to the president by now."

"It's corrupted. I have someone working to recover it."

Plover looked even more distressed. "This is awful," he said. "I wanted it to be over. He found
our home
. And he killed my wife, I'm sure of it. He would have killed me . . . had I been there."

"Who?"

"I made a financial bargain. A devil's bargain," Plover said, and leaned back, pointing the Luger on a wavering line through her chest, her pelvis, her arm. "A bargain with a man who has no mercy, if you cause him trouble—or put his plans in jeopardy."

"I'm listening," Rebecca said.

Plover shook his head, not yet. "As one of my patients, I also came here to warn you. I'd like to warn all my patients, but that isn't going to be possible. Someone arranged this for me. The Quiet Man."

"The voice on the phone."

"Yes."

"Go on."

"Seroprixoline. Madeline first learned about it in
JAMA
,
Journal of the American Medical Association
. It was being used in an experimental program to treat cancer. It's a tightly bound complex of small proteins—no need to bore you with the structural details. It helps reprogram targeted cells. Removes defects caused by environmental conditioning." He swallowed. "Crucial for bringing a cancer under control."

"And what was your contribution?"

"I theorized that seroprixoline might be useful to reverse psychological conditions induced by constant or catastrophic stress. Inappropriate response leads a traumatized patient down a rutted path of behaviors. Conditioned traits sum to many varieties of what we call post-traumatic stress disorder. PTSD. But you know that—personally."

"And you thought you could use this drug right away—on patients?"

"No. I searched for corporate sponsors. Hundreds of thousands of our soldiers have returned from combat situations with PTSD. Treating their symptoms effectively would be a godsend to those soldiers and their families."

"So you approached Axel Price."

That wasn't much of a leap at this point, but just mentioning the name gave Rebecca chills.

A list.

No mercy.

Plover lowered the gun and dropped his gaze as if resigned. "He has money, his corporation has divisions around the world. He supplies universal logistics for our troops. He sells his services to nearly every branch of our government, federal and state. Tens of thousands of his employees work not just overseas, but throughout the government—from the White House to the Pentagon . . . He misses no tricks—leases out a network of funeral facilities that process soldiers when they're shipped home . . . in boxes, under flags, as heroes. Boot camp to grave.

"In the beginning, I thought it was a perfect match. Not only a humanitarian result, but a gold-plated investment model. Great sums of money to be made. I showed Price the results in our animal studies—very impressive. He saw I was given more than sufficient research funds. The program was accelerated.

"Then . . . Price brought me the vice president. He told me the animal results were so good that human trials were in order. And this was an emergency. People were willing to pay very well, and as it would be done in complete secrecy, there would be no risk to me, professionally.

"The results for the vice president were excellent, a great relief to both Madeline and to me. Price was pleased. Using Quinn's results, I made adjustments in dosage. We continued animal trials, and I even believed we might begin human trials soon."

He looked at her as if beseeching her understanding.

"But just weeks after that, before I was ready, Price brought in seven more men—computer programmers who worked for him. Subcontractors. They had suffered through a horrible incident in Arabia . . . Arabia Deserta. He wouldn't take no for an answer, said they were absolutely essential to him.

"I treated them, as well—using the reduced dosage. They all experienced complete elimination of symptoms. Price then suggested that we open our doors to a larger group of clients—mostly rich families whose sons had gone to war. He was eager to start making this project earn money. I could hardly refuse him. We treated dozens. I don't know how, but you became part of that larger group.

"Later, after the vice president killed his wife—when it was obvious Price was going to clean up the mess any way he could—a courier came to me, recommended by the Quiet Man. Somehow, the Quiet Man knew about the president's request for your help."

"Even before I did," Rebecca said.

"During treatment . . . the vice president became briefly vulnerable. He told me things. Awful things. I regret ever hearing those words. The Quiet Man thought you would inform the president. That hasn't happened yet, has it?"

"No. Who's the Quiet Man? What's his real name?"

"I don't know. He worked for Price, too. But he stayed in California—in La Jolla, I believe—and sent his workers overseas. I was scheduled months ago to give a presentation at the COPES conference in Los Angeles—but bowed out the day before the bombing. I was still on the schedule."

"The bomb was meant for you?" Rebecca asked.

"For anyone Price no longer trusts. Or perhaps just as a warning, or a disruption. I don't know."

"You're still pointing the gun at me."

"I am," Plover said, and looked down with wide eyes, flexing its grayish shine in the single light.

"What did Quinn say, when he was vulnerable?"

Plover shook his head. "This room could be bugged."

"It isn't," Rebecca said, but sensed Plover wasn't going to say anymore on that topic.

"What's your connection with the courier, Nathaniel Trace?"

"One of the seven programmers. They've also experienced side effects. Your group received an even smaller dose."

"Are we all going to turn into homicidal maniacs?"

"I want to doubt it, I
need
to doubt it," Plover said. "It would take years to know. Epigenetic testing . . . learning which genes are clamped in which individuals, and how that effects their behavior . . . still at an early stage. I'm tired. I've told you all I know."

"Has anyone in the third group experienced problems?" Rebecca asked.

Plover became even more agitated. Rebecca considered a feint and an attempt to take away the gun.

"I don't know. I don't know! It's like an ocean of sewage, spreading out in a huge wave. And for Price, Mariposa is an atomic bomb smack in the middle of that ocean.
Pwoosh
."

Plover threw out his free hand and flicked his fingers, spattering metaphoric shit.

Startled, she missed her chance to go for the gun. "Someone called to say you'd be coming. The Quiet Man?"

"I don't know who else it could be. He protected me, found me a place to hide and offered me advice I thought was sound. I trusted him. Because of him, I am still alive."

"He didn't protect your wife."

"That was before I trusted him. But I don't trust anyone now. I even regret giving you those files . . ."

He pointed the Luger squarely at her chest. "If you die, now . . . Price . . ."

"You did it to avenge Madeline's murder."

Plover tried to pull himself together. "I wanted to inform you, as one of my patients . . . It's all so tangled. When this is over, if I can continue my research—if the good guys win," and he afforded Rebecca a small, shy smile, "Mariposa will be the greatest boon to humanity since fire. Think of it. Sanity for all. But first . . . we have to climb over this wall and get to the other side. I'm glad I did it. I had to. The Quiet Man was right, bomb or no bomb. You're the one with the connections to stop Axel Price. Please do it. For Madeline."

Plover got to his feet, then backed across the room and opened the door.

He closed the door behind him.

She heard his footsteps going down the hall. After that, silence. She opened the door and looked out. Baumann was still away from his post.

Nobody had replaced him.

She closed the door and sat in the half dark, blinking, bringing her breath under control. She could end up like the broken man she had interviewed this morning. She could end up like the programmers, wherever they were, whatever their symptoms might be—and the odd Mr. Trace, who at least had shown some sort of courage and even, possibly, compassion.

It all sounded incredibly nasty and unpredictable.

How would she feel when . . . if, it began to happen?