“Bitch,” Wendy said, and spat.
Alexis wiped the gob of saliva from her forehead, triggering a flash of recollection: Susan, nearly biting her face when Alexis had tried to calm her down.
“Do it,” Roland said. “She’s no help in this condition, anyway.”
Alexis wrapped the scarf around one palm and aimed toward Wendy’s thrashing head. Roland was still perched atop her in an odd position that suggested sexual domination, but Alexis shook the image away and concentrated on her task. Wendy emitted one last scream before Alexis wriggled the impromptu, clumsy gag in place.
“Okay, now get me some duct tape,” Roland said. “Look in her art stuff. She always has some around.”
By the time Alexis had found the roll of gray tape and returned to the room, Wendy was a little more subdued. Roland took the tape from Alexis and held it close to Wendy’s wide, dark eyes. “You know I’ll use this if I have to,” he said, a startling menace behind his words. “I’ve done it before.”
Wendy closed her eyes and fell still, her chest rising and falling rapidly in her exertion.
“God, Roland, it’s all happening again,” Alexis said. “We’re not like this, are we? Please, God, don’t let us be like this.”
“That never happened,” he said, getting off the bed. “No matter what anybody says, we could never commit murder.”
“She fell, didn’t she?”
“Sure. That’s what I heard. What about you?”
Alexis felt herself nodding, although it was the motion of a marionette directed by high, unseen strings. “It was an accident.”
He glanced at his watch. “I’m fifteen minutes past due. Better take my medicine. Or else.”
Wendy’s phone rang in the living room. They both looked at her, restrained on the bed. The trials had barely begun and already she looked a manic wreck.
She might be the next Susan, Alexis thought, relishing a shiver of triumph. Not me.
“Should we answer it?” Roland asked her.
She was pleased at the deference. Despite his male strength and suppressed anger, she was the acknowledged leader. The graduate assistant all over again. The responsible one. She only hoped she could do a better job this time.
“Sure,” she heard herself say. “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”
“And each other.”
She let that one pass.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“We lost our man,” Burchfield said, closing his cell phone. “So much for eyes on the ground.”
“What happened?” Wallace Forsyth said, only half-listening. He’d been staring off at the tip of the Washington Monument in the distance, wondering why no terrorist had ever targeted it.
They were on their way along Pennsylvania Avenue to a caucus meeting, and since Forsyth was not yet a registered lobbyist, he was free to wield his influence as he wished.
He was a little old for a cabinet position, but if Burchfield took the White House, Forsyth wouldn’t mind an advisory role. Somebody had to keep an eye on the Supreme Court, after all.
“He touched base after shaking down Mark Morgan, said he was heading for reconnaissance of the Monkey House posing as a jogger,” Burchfield said. “It must have gone bad. Either that, or he got some goods and jumped ship.”
Forsyth snapped alert. “You mean, he stole Halcyon?”
Burchfield nodded. “You never served on the health committee, but these companies run high-stakes con games on each other all the time. That’s why there’s so much pressure to beat everybody else to a patent, because usually everybody’s neck and neck. There are more spies in the corporate world than in the world of political espionage.”
“Your own staff member would double-cross you like that?”
“Sure, if the price was right. And he’s not just on my payroll, he’s officially on the books as a CIA consultant. We’re not the only ones who work both sides of the fence. It’s a pain in the ass, but we’re all grazing the same pasture.”
Wallace grunted. “That’s what’s wrong with Washington these days. You can’t even buy loyalty anymore.”
Burchfield thumbed his phone, clicking out a text message. “Riordan probably had some loyalty that ran deeper than a dollar. These agents sometimes forget which side of the fence they’re on.”
“What would he do with Halcyon if he had it?”
“The CIA would hustle it over to whichever company they’re in bed with this time. CelQuest, Genesis Laboratories, BTDM, could be any one of the majors. They crack the compound and roll it into whatever they are already doing, so it looks like a new discovery. No proof that the formula was stolen, because it’s a new formula.”
“You don’t sound too worried about it.”
“Riordan will be easy to find. When a donkey breaks out of its pen, it usually stands around just beyond the fence, not understanding it’s now free. The fence is what defines him, no matter which side he’s on. Riordan will jump back through the same old hoops again and he’ll turn up before you know it.”
“And the other option?”
Burchfield concentrated on his text, hit “Send,” and looked at Forsyth for the first time since they’d left his Georgetown condo. “That would be the one I’m worried about. It means Briggs is on the ball and won’t be so easy to maneuver. He knows what his drugs can do…and that this is a legacy-maker.”
“I thought this Briggs fellow was damaged goods. He doesn’t have any career.”
“That’s why he’s dangerous. He has nothing to lose. And Riordan is a desk jockey, a corporate snoop, not a muscle guy. His cover might have been blown, and he wouldn’t have been prepared for violence. Maybe we’re all underestimating Briggs and CRO.”
“I thought Mark Morgan was in your pocket,” Forsyth said. “That gives you CRO.”
“Maybe, but it doesn’t give me Briggs. If the CIA is in on the rage drug, the lid may blow off the volcano.”
“Dear Sweet Lord Almighty,” Forsyth said, instantly grasping the implications. A part of him had thought Burchfield’s Afghanistan plan was a little pie-in-the-sky, but maybe other people were having similar ideas, only with different targets and agendas.
“We need this before any other agencies get their hands on it,” Burchfield said. “I just don’t think we can trust anybody to do the right thing anymore.”
The gleaming dome of the Capitol Building loomed ahead, and despite the traffic, Winston was making good time. Dark limousines slid through the tide like sharks skimming through schools of lower members of the food chain.
“How many other people do you have on the job?” Forsyth asked. He didn’t think Burchfield would trust a lone operative on something this important, though every additional person involved meant a doubling of the risk factor.
“One more, but he’s working through CRO. He flushed Roland Doyle back to the Triangle, just to make sure he didn’t take a detour.”
“You said half a dozen were tied up in this. How come Briggs needs all of them?”
“Everybody reacts differently. Briggs needs to understand the range of reactions if we want any degree of predictability. And I don’t want to let this stuff loose in Al-Qaeda country until I know what’s in Pandora’s box.”
“Hardly seems American, dosing our own boys with this stuff.”
“Think of the greater good, Wallace. Afghanistan will blame Pakistan, and India has to do something. China’s
