Tainted

by A. E. Rought

  Suspicion already makes me think she’s involved in more than blackmailing me, even if I can’t prove it. Sure, she has an alibi for the night Emma was killed, but she knows something.

  Paul’s office door stands open, a silent invitation to join him. The hall is short, empty and crowded with the ghosts of things unnamed and unwanted. My footfalls echo off the hard surfaces. I knock once at the threshold, alerting Paul to my presence. He’s wrapped up so tight in something on his computer screen he looks like he could get pulled in.

  “We need to talk,” I tell Paul when he fails to acknowledge my presence. He flaps a hand at me, in the general direction of the chair.

  His distracted behavior sucks the fire out of my anger. Left hollow and burnt out without it, I sink into the chair and watch him scanning over something on the computer. One fingertip hovers millimeters from the screen, tracing across and then down. His mouth moves like he’s reading. Occasionally Paul nods, or makes notations on a notepad.

  When his finger reaches the bottom of the computer screen, he looks up. The man looks like he hasn’t slept in days, dark circles under his eyes, pale skin, beard past grizzle and into whiskers.

  “Hey, kid,” he says. “Did you say something?”

  “Yeah. About two minutes ago.” I hand him the coffee cup he’s fumbling for, even though it’s gone cold. “Are you OK, Paul?”

  “Me?” He blinks, downs the rest of the coffee, then polishes his glasses. “Not sure. Been pulled fifty different ways, twisted, pressed, squeezed. I know you have questions about those videos. And I don’t blame you. I wish you would believe me. I wish I had answers for you other than I didn’t do it and I can’t trace the source yet.

  “But I am making positive strides in eventually regulating your highs and lows post treatment.”

  Post Lazarus Treatment, as Jason suggested.

  “I don’t know what to say,” I struggle for words. Him addressing my doubts, then throwing this kind of curve ball has knocked me on my ass. Especially after what Hailey threatened. The things I came to discuss – his possible guilt, Emma’s personality flips, Hailey’s harassment, Trent and the others dying – fracture against the wall of my shock. I thought my life had hit the skids and slid into the kind of dark it never truly recovers from. Paul, against whom I’ve harbored mistrust and doubt, just offered me a glimpse of hope.

  “I’m still a ways from my goal, on both fronts, but I’m on the right path.” He rolls his chair to the corner of his desk and picks up an unmarked DVD. “The preliminary numbers are very positive.”

  Damn the hope that catches fire in my chest. If he can really stop the weekly dose-to-dose fade in me and Emma, maybe he could help Jason. The possibility of having my girl and my best friend and actually keeping them in my life is at once too sweet and too scary to consider. But, I do.

  “Do you think you could cure a disease, then?” Do I dare ask? It isn’t my place. But, if Paul can help… My voice cracks when I say, “What about Jason?”

  Paul stops every movement, focuses on me. In these moments, he reminds me most of my mother. If I had a problem the world would cease to exist for her until she fixed it. He exhales in a deep sigh. Then he pulls up a webpage of information on Juvenile Huntington’s.

  “This,” Paul indicates the Lazarus Procedure file, “is a lot different than curing that degenerative genetic disease, Alex. This has been in the works for a very long time – decades. It would take many more years, if it’s possible at all, to cure Jason. We might not find a cure before he succumbs. And there is the permanent joint and tissue damage to worry about.

  “Your father worked a miracle in you. I’m not sure I can do the same for Jason.” He must see the disappointment on my face. “But I will try, once we have things under control here.”

  At least it’s a promise to try. “Thank you.”

  “Now,” his expression slips to questioning when he says, “Is there something else I can do?”

  “What Hailey was doing here?”

  “Oh. Um…” he searches the desk, riffles through a couple piles, then picks up the DVD he set down in order to search. “She dropped this off, said it was very important that I watch it.”

  Alarms ring in my head. “And you trust her?”

  “Not particularly.” He removes the disk from the paper envelope, and puts it into a drive set aside specifically for scanning software for viruses and harmful programming. “The scanner says it’s safe.”

  I stand, and join him behind the desk when he puts the DVD into the appropriate tray in his computer. The media program opens automatically, and starts the video. The screen flickers, an image clears and focuses on Katrina, one of the interns my father had hired from the local community college. The animal research lab makes a ghost town of a backdrop. Vacant cages, doors hanging open, metal edges gleam dully behind her. Something feels off about it. Kat’s usually so… perky… and she sits there as empty as the cages.

  “I know,” she says, voice hollow and dead, then looks at a piece of paper in her hands, “that my negligence has caused untold harm. First, I lied about the animals.” Kat refers to the page again. “I lost control of them when an experiment went awry.” She shifts a glance off screen, then back to her script. “Then, I breached protocol by leaving a trial drug unattended. My samples were stolen. The tragedy at the Reindeer Games is my fault, too.” Another peek at her paper. “I’ve failed Ascension Labs. I’ve failed White River. I’m terribly sorry.”

  Except she didn’t sound sorry. She didn’t sound sad, mad, guilty – anything. Katrina didn’t have any emotion for someone admitting to these crimes.

  “This isn’t right,” Paul says when the video abruptly stops. “I just spoke to her today. She maintained everything was normal when she signed out, the animals were in their cages that night. And she didn’t mention anything about the drugs.”

  He replays the video, scrutinizing every frame. Keys clack beneath his fingers with his frenzied typing as he calls up the lab records for the past week. It’s all there, every time someone clocked in or out, the respective lab files coordinated with those times. He scrolls through everything Katrina’s done, then grabs the business phone from his desk and paces after dialing.

  “Hello? Katrina?” Then his lips turn down and he pinches his nose beneath his glasses. “Voice mail,” he mutters, then says, “Katrina, this is Paul Stanton at Ascension. A very disturbing DVD was delivered here and we need to discuss it. Call, or come in, please. I will be here all day.”

  “Here’s the question, though.” Because it needs to be asked. “Why did Hailey bring it here?”

  “She offered Katrina a place to stay for a few nights,” Paul answers, peering at Kat’s files some more, “while Kat’s apartment complex was repainted. Hailey said she found the DVD left behind.”

  “Doesn’t that seem odd to you?”

  “Honestly,” Paul’s glance skims just shy of eye contact with me, “nothing’s seemed right for a while. I thought it was the stress from the shareholders putting me on edge. And I’ve been so busy trying to regulate your fluctuations. And with Emma’s troubles…”

  “That’s what I came here for.” This day has twisted so far past normal that it’s the first chance I’ve had to mention it. “Emma flipped again, Paul. She was at the Reindeer Games.”

  “Oh, good God.”

  An odd tone mingles with his shock, like he might not be as surprised as he wants me to believe. I plow ahead, anyway, and tell him everything from her disappearing to her odd compliant behavior. His expression darkens as he listens, and he rolls to his computer, tapping at the keys and squinting at the screen.

  “I wonder…” he mutters.

  “Wonder what?”

  “There’ve been some odd registry issues with the system, entries and experimental chemicals going missing. It’s making me wonder… Is this all part of the Katrina thing?” He looks at the phone. It didn’t do him any good to call a few minutes ago. “We should ge
t Emma in here to run more blood tests. This time I’ll oversee them myself.”

  The distrust won’t be quiet in my head. Now, they’re screaming at me. “Is there anything else going on I should know about?”

  “Other than the financial backers starting a petition to bring my tenure as interim CEO to the board for a vote?” He lets out a breath and sinks to his chair. “So much, Alex. And not what you might think. I want to save you from it all.”

  He can’t though. Ascension’s infected, the pus is bubbling up through the cracks in its public façade. How deep is the abscess? Can the lab be saved?

  Should I even try?

  I have to for Emma’s sake.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The smell of coffee, cinnamon and bacon fill the air Monday afternoon. Outside, the approaching winds of a blizzard batter the windows. Inside, an unnatural hush takes the place of Mugz-n-Chugz’s normal noisy bustle, especially odd since this is the start of our second week of break. People stare at the notice tacked to the bulletin board asking for anyone with any information on the animal attack, or the Reindeer Games to please contact the local police.

  Flower wreaths, stuffed teddy bears, poems and pictures fill the booth to the far left, the unofficial memorial for Marin Rhodes. Everyone at Shelley High knows that was Marin’s favorite spot in M-n-Cs. Does Sam Ashton have a memorial somewhere? Or Trent? What about the other victims taken from this town in such a short time period?

  Bree and Jason sit across the booth from Em and me. Jason’s messy brown spikes flop forward over his forehead when he slouches toward the table and picks at the collar on his coffee cup. I can’t help stealing glances at his hands, wondering how stiff they are. Bree sips her chai, and pushes around her churro bites. Emma, withdrawn and quiet, snuggles tight to my side, almost wearing me like a piece of clothing.

  “I never really liked Marin,” Bree admits, gaze drifting to the collection of mementos. “But I feel really awful she died like that.”

  News of the crazed dog attack had burned up the phone lines and news wires of White River. Everyone knows how Marin died – whether they wanted to or not.

  “She wasn’t the only one,” Jason points out, tears the collar off his cup completely.

  “And the poisonings at the Reindeer Games,” I add. Misplaced guilt maybe, but the lack of sympathy for the other victims grinds me.

  A shiver runs through Em, she tightens her grip on me.

  “Does anyone think,” Jason asks close to a whisper, “we should discuss why Emma went missing both times?”

  “Can we not talk about me,” she says, voice dark and sulky, “like I’m not here?”

  “You are here, sweetie,” Bree says, reaching over to pat her arm. Em recoils from her touch, looping her arms around me, under my sweater. “We just don’t know how you got there. Or why.”

  “Maybe…” I start, then push Em’s hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. She leans into my hand, her blue eyes focused on me. “Maybe, Paul will catch something in the new set of blood tests this morning.”

  “But what will that prove?” She sounds so lost. A tear forms in her eye. I have the worst urge to pull her into my lap, try to hold the pieces of my broken doll together. “It’s only one piece to too many puzzles. The animals. The lab. The Reindeer Games. And I can’t remember any of it. I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

  “But it’s not constant,” Bree says.

  “Yeah, Em,” Jason agrees. He worries the edge of his bacon sandwich wrapper to shreds. “And we will figure this out. Even I can solve math problems when I have enough numbers.”

  “And if we never get them?” She shoves out of my embrace, and rips a big bite from her bagel sandwich.

  What if Emma’s right? There are so many variables to this equation, we may never solve the problem. Worst of all, what if it’s my fault? Have I created a monster in my girlfriend?

  The same silence infesting Mugz-n-Chugz encroaches on our table, too. A couple glances. One arched eyebrow. A shrug. We’re all lost somewhere on Emma’s downward spiral, and when that subject is closed, conversation dies.

  Winter chill blows in when Scott Morgan, football player for the Shelley High Ravens walks through the left side door. His gaze sweeps the restaurant from the counter to our table. Jason and I return his nod when he gives us a silent greeting. Then his focus shifts to Marin’s memorial booth. His eyebrows sink, and he runs a hand over his hair. Em lets out a breathy noise close to a whimper and resumes her position sheltering under my arm.

  The next blast of arctic chill ushers in Marin’s friend Nikki Cummings. She’s clutching a pink teddy bear, and looks like she hasn’t slept in a week. The entire establishment holds its breath, watching Nikki cross from the door to the impromptu shrine. She nestles the bear in a wreath of fake flowers, and steps back.

  “I miss you, Marin,” she whispers.

  Her bottom lip trembles, her mouth crumples. Nikki buries her face in her hands and bursts into tears. She’s a sobbing wreck by the time Scott settles an arm around her shoulders. Nikki turns into his chest, and he wraps his arms tight around her. After some coddling and shushing, he leads her back out the way they came.

  When I wrench my focus from their misery, I see a ghost of Nikki’s sadness on Emma’s face. She pulls her knees up, spins and tucks into my side again.

  “Is that my fault?” she whispers.

  Possibly. A blond girl ran away from the parking lot that night. Emma was captured on video at the lab’s gates less than an hour before the animals attacked. Still, I say, “No, Em. You’re not capable of causing that.”

  “How do you know?” She slides her hand inside my sweater, and twists her fingers in the neck of my T-shirt. “What if it’s all my fault? It could be. I can’t remember any of it.”

  “I just know, OK?” My gut hasn’t steered me wrong since I woke up. Daniel’s become so integrated, he’s little more than a ghost in my body’s machine, but he’s been a guiding force and I’ve followed. He’s silent now. But I know Daniel would deny Em’s involvement as much as me.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Jason says. “We can take the girls some place and let off some steam.”

  Bree perks up. “We could go shoot some pool,” she suggests, “or walk laps in the mall.”

  And drive past the scene of the animal attack? No thank you. “What about the winter Sports Complex in North Muskegon?”

  “In a blizzard?” Jason scoffs and raises his eyebrows. “How about my house and some video games? Hell, board games if it makes you happy.”

  Jason and I gather the wrappers and empty cups after we stand. Bree stows the tray on the rack next to the napkin dispenser. When I turn from stuffing the trash into the bin, Emma stands rigid, fists furled at her sides. I follow the angle of her face, and see a familiar Audi turn into the parking lot. Crap. There go my hopes for the day. Maybe we can still get out of here in time.

  “Let’s go, Em.”

  Only, Emma’s not listening. She’s frozen in place, a couple tables from Marin’s shrine, a few feet from me.

  Why is Em reacting like this?

  No time to muddle it over. We don’t need a repeat of Christmas Eve. One long stride covers the distance between me and Em and I grab her hand.

  “Hey, Emergizer,” I plead. “Let’s get going before Jason hotwires the car…”

  “He wouldn’t dare,” she says, snapping out of it. “He’s not good with electronics.”

  I give her a smile and squeeze her hand. She returns them both, and follows as I lead the way to the door. Too late to escape Hailey, though. The far side door opens, a gust of wind blowing past and sucking the warmth and comfort from M-n-Cs with it.

  Hailey struts in, pauses to dramatically swish her hair from her face. A fluffy black scarf frames her face, managing to make her eyes glow an icy green behind her glasses. Paper crinkles when she tucks a boutique shopping bag under her arm. Then Hailey removes her gloves with a flourish and aims a
sassy wave at me and Emma.

  Emma bristles. I can’t blame her. The last time she saw my ex-girlfriend was when Hailey kissed me in front of Em and her friends.

  “What is she doing here?” Emma grinds out between clenched teeth.

  “No clue, but I don’t think it’s buying coffee.”

  After waving at us, and I believe waiting until the entire restaurant sensed something was going down, Hailey strides to Marin’s shrine.

  She places the shopping bag on the floor by her feet and makes a big deal of leaning in close, looking at the pictures, reading the poems. Just her presence manages to defile people’s memories. Then she has the balls to rearrange items to make room at the edge of the table. Seemingly pleased, she lifts the shopping bag and pulls something furry and dark from its depths. Her coat shields what it is and what she’s doing, until she steps back.

  A large plush werewolf crouches on the table, Nikki Cumming’s pink teddy bear in its mouth.

  Someone gasps. Bree mutters something foul. Jason, too.

  “Let me handle this,” I say, unwinding Em’s fingers from mine.

  “What?” Emma huffs. “Like you did on Christmas Eve?”

  She could’ve slapped me. The words sting, root me to the spot long enough for Em to stalk up to Hailey.

  “Can you be any more bitchy?” Em snaps.

  Hailey’s expression makes my stomach clench and blood chill. A satisfied bitch smile, the one she uses when she’s going to get her way.

  “Possibly,” Hailey says, all nonchalant. She pulls her smart phone from her purse, captures a picture of her handiwork, then tucks the phone in the breast pocket of her coat. “Why? would you like me to?”

  “This,” Emma says, snatching up the horrid stuffed animal, “is bad enough. What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “Just showing my respect.” Hailey’s smirk never fades as Emma removes the teddy bear from its jaws, and replaces it on the table. She crosses her arms and tips her weight back on one hip while Emma rams the werewolf toy into the paper bag on the floor, then shoves it at Hailey’s feet.