Tunnel Vision

like serious business. Not light talk.

When she got up to leave, Roman was tempted to follow her but decided to stay with the kid. He did get a couple shots of her on his cell phone.

As for that younger, good-looking woman from the Grafton Street place, they seemed to be more than friends. He had overnighted at her place last week.

Whoever she was, he’d find out.

57

Tetrodotoxin is a powerful neurotoxin found in puffer fish and is 10,000 times more lethal than cyanide. Twenty-five milligrams could kill a 165-pound man. There are no known antidotes for the toxin, which kills by causing respiratory failure. For 70% of the victims, death follows within four to 24 hours. The toxin works by shutting down electrical signaling in nerves. Nonlethal dosages can produce dizziness, headaches, and hallucinatory effects.

The last two words jumped out at Zack as he glared at his laptop later that evening.

He was staring at three options:

Behind Door One: He was brain-damaged and had hallucinated murder scenes. Door Two: He was an actual killer who murdered two strangers while in a trance. Door Three: He had crossed over and linked up with some homicidal psyche.

In spite of Elizabeth Luria’s pleas, even Morris Stern’s concession that he may have had out-of-the-body experiences, Zack did not buy the supernatural, no matter what their fancy MRI recorded. He didn’t believe in ghosts. And he didn’t think he was nuts.

That left the puffer fish toxin.

And there it was: “Nonlethal dosages can produce dizziness, headaches, and hallucinatory effects.”

He had gotten nearly 470,000 hits from Googling “tetrodotoxin.” Aside from all the data on how it was probably the deadliest substance in the natural world, he learned that the prime source, the puffer fish, though outlawed as a menu item in America, was a coveted Japanese delicacy called fugo that when prepared by an expert sushi chef produced a psychedelic high for the diner. “In the skilled hands of an expert fugo chef, if just enough tetrodotoxin is left in, the preparation of puffer fish flesh leaves the customer with a pleasant tingling sensation to the lips and a slightly mind-altering buzz.”

“A thrill without the kill,” proclaimed one fugo blogger.

Before he logged off, he noticed a link to The Boston Globe. Dated four months ago, the story described a homeless man murdered by another with a baseball bat on the Harvard Bridge. According to a witness, the murder appeared to be a bizarre mercy killing. The Massachusetts State Crime Lab reported traces of tetrodotoxin in his blood. Either the guy had exotic taste and a bad cook or a new drug had hit the streets. Yet a Boston Police Department spokesman said, “I don’t know how a homeless man ended up with puffer fish toxin in his liver. It’s a first for us.”

According to another site, a nonlethal dosage dropped one’s temperature and blood pressure to the point of inducing a deep coma. In a few accidental food-poisoning cases in Japan, victims recovered days later after being declared dead. In Haiti, tetrodotoxin was known as the “zombie drug,” used by voodoo priests to fake the deaths of victims who were revived hours later to the dismay of others.

In the United States, tetrodotoxin was on the “select agents” list of the Department of Health and Human Services, meaning that the drug could be used only by registered research scientists.

58

Mitch turned onto Connecticut Route 84 and headed north for the Vernon exit. It was Saturday night, and he had been at the Outback in Manchester, celebrating his promotion to floor manager at the Buckland Hills Sears. And, of course, he’d had a few beers and was wiped out and dying to get to bed.

He was driving a 1992 Mitsubishi 3000 VR-4—one of the few all-wheel-drive sports cars on the road and one of the best looking. He had bought it used four years ago and had it repainted and detailed. Today it was in mint condition, even though it had seen 162,000 miles. He loved the sculpted design, the wide wheel base, the low-slung macho look. And with three hundred horses under the hood, the Mitsu had balls.

He was maybe two miles shy of the exit when he heard a deep rumble. “Shit!” he cried, and slammed his hand on the wheel. His muffler had blown a hole. He growled down the highway, sounding like something out of a NASCAR race. He had gone maybe half a mile when he heard the connector pipe hit the ground and drag, no doubt leaving a trail of sparks. “Fuck!” The car began filling with fumes.

He opened the window and took the next exit down Bolton Road to a clearing among trees. There were no streetlamps in this area, but he had a flashlight and some rope in the hatch to tie up the pipe. Luckily it had happened a few miles from home.

He pulled the flashlight and a fishing knife from the glove compartment and got out. He looked under the car. The muffler was still intact, but the pipe was on the ground. He opened the hatch and removed the jack, then raised the car maybe a foot so he could slide under.

The hangers that held the pipe to the muffler had come loose. But it had cooled enough to be roped to an opening. Unfortunately, the pipe had rusted through and would have to be replaced. By the time the Midas people got through with him, he’d be talked into a whole new exhaust system, putting him back at least a thousand bucks. And given the year of the car, it might take a week for parts to arrive, which meant he’d have to get a rental. Hell, he didn’t need this.

Even though the air was cool, it was hot and cramped under the car, and his arms tired working the rope. Worse, he was exhausted and yearning to be in bed.

He had worked for maybe twenty minutes when he heard something. He didn’t know if it was the wind or the traffic, but it sounded as if someone had approached the car. He looked down the length of his body, then to the right and left. Nothing. He squirmed to face the rear of the car, maneuvering the flash in the tight space. Still nothing. Just the underbrush and shadows.

Yet he had a sensation that he was no longer alone.

After a few moments, he dismissed the feeling and continued tying the pipe to the car’s underside.

A minute or so later, he again thought he heard something. And again he looked around, half expecting to see feet out there. Nothing. Probably the sound of the engine cooling, the metal contracting in the cool night air.

He was just finishing the last makeshift rope hanger when he heard some scuffling just to his right.

“Who’s there?”

Nothing.

Mitch waited until he was sure it was only in his head. He continued securing the rope to the pipe.

“Mitchell.”

His name. Someone had whispered his name. But it was so soft, it could have been the wind in the trees.

The next moment, he heard the jack cranked down a notch. The sound shot through him like a bullet.

The car had lowered on him.

He turned the flash toward the jack, expecting to see a pair of feet, but only the jack lit up. Before he could move to squirm out, another snap of metal, and the underside of the car came down an inch closer to his face. He could feel the searing heat of the engine. He could smell oil and rust. He could taste terror.

Before the car came down another notch, he squirmed out from under. He fanned the flashlight around, but no one was there. Just the trees and scrub, making shadows against the light. He pulled himself to his feet, then moved around to the other side of the car. Through the passenger window he reached into the glove compartment, where he kept a loaded .38-caliber Smith & Wesson. “Okay, you son of a bitch.” He turned a complete circle, holding the gun straight out.

Nothing. Nobody was there. A couple of sets of headlights came down the road, and he lowered the gun so