by Simon Wood
“As much as anyone, I suppose. The place isn’t exactly Fort Knox.” Terry shrugged. “You don’t look convinced.”
“Well, it’s not that I’m not convinced; it’s that I don’t have a clue what’s happening.” Oscar counted off on his fingers. “We’ve got five murdered women who have nothing in common other than the way they died and that they exposed some wrongdoing in their lives. We’ve got a biotech company conducting illegal experiments with children’s tissue. We’ve got a lovesick TV newsman. And we’ve got your wife hiding in the wilds of the San Joaquin Valley.” Oscar raised a finger. “But what we don’t have is a clear-cut, honest-to-God motive that connects it all.”
“You don’t have to make it sound that bad.”
“Unfortunately, that’s the way it does sound.”
Terry hated it when someone made perfect sense and he didn’t.
“When do you get out of here, anyway?”
“When I’ve seen the doctor. Why?”
“Well, I hope he comes soon. We’ve got to find that connection.” He smiled. “And I’ve got to get back to the Gold Rush. Call me when they discharge you.”
Lunchtime came and went with no sign of the promised doctor. Just after two, Terry thought he was going to get his audience with the fabled doctor, but he was wrong. Pamela Dawson walked into his room instead, followed by Frosty and two guys in suits. None of them looked concerned for his health. Frosty closed the door.
Terry’s visitors crowded his bed on both sides.
“You try anything, I’ll raise hell.” Terry picked up his call button. The remark was more in jest than seriousness, but nevertheless, the button could still be used to alert help if necessary.
Pamela ignored his threat. “These two men are Genavax attorneys.” She indicated to the men in suits. “They are here to sort out matters between the company and you.”
One of the suits used the end of Terry’s bed to rest his attaché case on while he opened it. He removed the binder Pamela and Frosty had used to bribe Terry and tossed it to him. “I think you’ve seen this.”
“Wow, you let him speak, Pamela.”
The crack impressed no one.
Terry picked up the binder and glanced at the contents. It was the job offer, but it had been revised. The salary had been scribbled out and a new one had been written in and initialed. The new salary had been hiked another ten thousand dollars.
“It’s Genavax’s last offer,” the other suit said. “It also includes a generous settlement for the pain and suffering you incurred last night.”
“So you’d better take it,” Frosty said.
“What if I don’t?” Terry tossed the binder back at the suit.
“You’d be making a big mistake,” Pamela warned.
“Am I? I don’t think so. I think it’s you who’s making the mistake.”
Frosty leaned on the bed and stuck his face in Terry’s. “We can make life very difficult for you.”
The cheap gestapo act wasn’t intimidating him, and Terry waved a dismissive hand in Frosty’s face. “You and whose army?”
“We don’t need an army.” The first suit returned the binder to his attaché case. “We have the law.”
Terry snorted and crossed his arms. “What law?”
The second suit intervened. “You’ve stolen intellectual property from Genavax.”
“That’s just for starters,” Pamela said. “There’s the ICE to contend with. We can fire you, and you can kiss your visa good-bye.”
“Fire me. Go to the ICE. I dare you. My visa isn’t dependent on my job status. I’m married to a US national.”
“Not if she never turns up,” Frosty said.
The remark ignited Terry’s anger. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Frosty shrugged. “No one’s seen her in quite a while, and maybe no one will.”
Terry tasted metal in his mouth. He wanted to wipe that smug leer off Frosty’s face. “Get out of my room.”
No one moved.
“Didn’t any of you scumbags hear me?”
Pamela nodded to her troops to leave. The suits didn’t hesitate and filed out. Frosty remained until Pamela indicated to him to leave as well. He left reluctantly.
“There’s a good doggy,” Terry said to Frosty’s back. He waited until his colleague closed the door. “You need to put a muzzle on him.”
Pamela sat on the bed next to Terry, her feet dangling over the edge. Her arm slipped around his shoulders and she leaned in close, like a lover.
She whispered in his ear. “What is it you think you can do to us?”
Terry turned to look her in the eye. “Plenty. I can do more damage to you than you can to me.”
She laughed. “You think so, do you?”
“Pam, let’s cut the foreplay. What is it you want?”
“I want all the copies you made of our files, and I want you to leave Genavax. Don’t worry, we’ll keep you on the books. You’ll get a regular paycheck, and you’ll keep your benefits until you find another position.”
“And if I don’t, you’ll get Frazer the lapdog to shut me in the freezer again?”
“I’d watch what you say, Terry. That’s slander.”
“We both know it isn’t. Either you or Luke locked me in that freezer.”
Pamela smiled. “Which is it—Luke or me? You need proof, and you don’t have it. Any accusation you make, I’ll shoot it down.”
Pamela was right, and Terry hated her for it. “Get the hell away from me.”
Terry shoved his boss off the bed. Grabbing the bedclothes, Pamela caught her fall. She snapped to her feet.
“If there’s dirty work to be done, I do it myself.”
“And does that dirty work include stealing tissue from children?” Terry demanded. “Do you wait for them to die or do you help them along?”
Pamela shook her head. She had the expression of someone trying to explain quantum mechanics to a three-year-old. “How long have you been working in the biotech industry?”
Terry didn’t answer.
“Have you learned nothing? Nine out of ten biotech firms fold before ever coming up with a viable drug. Genavax will only survive by being better than the rest and more important, faster than the rest. Animal testing only goes so far—human testing is the final answer. Many times the results from animal tests are misleading. Human testing is what will get Genavax to the finish line first.”
“Have you been practicing that speech long?”
None of what Pamela said was new to Terry. He knew the facts of biotech life, but he knew the rules too, and Genavax had broken them. Human testing without FDA approval was illegal, and if the FDA knew, it would hang Genavax from the nearest tree.
Genavax’s human testing wasn’t there to advance its research, but to keep it on track. It was a parity check, a cheat sheet with all the right answers. If animal testing led them off the straight and narrow, Pamela and Frosty made sure a miraculous breakthrough put them back there. Even in his short time at Genavax, he’d seen Frosty come up with foresight in research that sent them in a different direction.
“So what’s it to be?” Pamela asked. “Are you going to return the copies?”
The doctor let himself in without knocking. He looked sheepish when he realized he was disturbing something serious. He apologized for his intrusion.
“That’s okay, Doctor,” Pamela said. “I was just leaving. Terry, you’ve got until five thirty tomorrow evening.”
The uncomfortable moment passed when Pamela left. The doctor made his examination and duly discharged Terry with express instructions to take it easy and to check in with his primary-care physician. Terry agreed, but had the feeling he wouldn’t be taking it easy for some time.
Two hours later, Oscar was whisking Terry home. Oscar went to make a turn off Solano Dam Road toward Terry’s house, but Terry stopped him.
“Let’s carry on to the Gold Rush. I need something.”
“What is it y
ou want?”
“I want those documents that you hid for me.”
At the Gold Rush Oscar carried a maintenance sign to the fourteenth hole—the windmill hole. He told the disappointed preteens who were about to play the hole to move on to the next one and promised them free sodas when they finished. From the looks they gave him, the compensation didn’t go far enough. Terry put out the CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE sign and Oscar cut the power to the novelty.
Terry looked on incredulously. “You put it in there?”
“Yeah. Why not?” Oscar said. “Who would think to look there?”
Terry couldn’t deny Oscar’s logic and smiled.
Oscar rooted around inside the replica windmill, then handed Terry the envelope. Terry removed the Genavax documents and handed the rest back to Oscar for safekeeping.
Oscar restarted the windmill and asked, “What now?”
“Take me home. There’s something I have to do. Pamela’s waiting for an answer.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The following day, Terry pulled into Genavax’s parking lot for what he guessed would be his last time. He walked into the reception area.
It was five and his coworkers were leaving. A couple of familiar faces said hi and asked how he was doing after his freezer ordeal. Terry made small talk, but not wanting to make a meal of it, he cut his conversations short. He smiled when Frank appeared from the direction of the restrooms.
“Hey. The new Frosty,” he said.
“The one and only,” Terry replied.
“What you doing here? Surely you’re not starting work?”
Terry grinned, shaking his head. “No. I came to drop something off.”
“Go straight through.” Frank indicated to the corridor leading to the research lab.
Terry frowned. “I prefer not to. Can you do me a favor and give this to Pamela?”
“The Ice Maiden? Sure thing.” Frank took the envelope Terry had prepared the night before. The security guard gave the package a cursory exam. “Do you want me to give it to her now?”
“Give me time to get out of range.”
“No problem.” Frank leaned back in his chair. “Don’t want to get dragged into talking shop for the next couple of hours, eh?”
Terry smiled. “You know it.”
“I’m glad to see you’re finally learning the American work ethic.”
“You taught me well, Master.”
Frank held up his wrist to read his watch. “Okay, the clock is ticking. Now, take a hike.”
Returning to the Monte, Terry grinned. He wished he could be there when Pamela opened the envelope. Instead of finding the copied human-testing data she expected, she would find three Polaroids. The photos were a series, each one numbered on the bottom right-hand corner. The first was a close-up of his letter to the FDA, the second was of the photocopied data going into the envelope, and the last was of him dropping the envelope into a mailbox. He didn’t leave a note. Pamela was a smart woman. She didn’t need it spoon-fed to her.
Slipping behind the Chevy’s wheel, Terry’s euphoria leaked away through a hole in his conscience. For his colleagues leaving for home, it was just another day, just one in a long series of uneventful workdays—but not for long. Once his letter hit the FDA, every day after would be a train wreck. The FDA would serve Genavax with a consent decree, allowing it to chain up the facility and throw away the key. The FDA wouldn’t care that its fines would drive Genavax to financial collapse. Genavax wasn’t strong enough to weather the tornado coming its way. By the time the FDA was finished, Genavax would be dust and all of its employees would be jobless—and all because of him. It was going to be bloody, but he didn’t have a choice. He gunned the engine.
He hoped his coworkers would understand that he was doing the right thing, but he doubted it. Principles were a precious commodity that most people were forced to give up for a cheap price—but he couldn’t follow suit. He put the Monte in drive and shook off the guilt. He didn’t have time for it. He had Sarah to meet.
She’d called late the night before when he was tired and chock-full of the hospital’s drugs. She was still paranoid, and kept the phone call brief. He barely managed to get a word in before she hung up, but he did manage to say he’d been attacked. He thought he heard a hint of shock and fear in her voice, but she did her best not to show it in her reply. Her response was simple: “Same place, same time, tomorrow.”
Terry crossed the Sunset Mall’s north parking lot on unsteady legs. He felt like a teenager again, suffering the symptoms of first-date nerves. Adrenaline was pumping and control over his own motor functions was minimal. He was a passenger in his own body. A mom held the door for him after a gaggle of her progeny of varying heights poured out.
The air-conditioned air—a stark contrast to the heat outside—wafted over him and made his frostbite tingle. He stopped and scanned the foyer for Sarah. He half expected a spotlight to shine down on her. But there was no spotlight and no sign of Sarah.
Someone brushed past him, grumbling. Terry followed the grumbling man into the mall. He checked his watch. He was on time. The Mexican restaurant was in the far right corner of the small mall, to the left of the UA Cinema. He did as arranged. Ignoring the other stores, he took a seat at a table outside the restaurant.
He had the SFO jitters again. It was all too reminiscent of the airport incident. He was there and she wasn’t. He kept scanning the mall, from the Barnes & Noble opposite to the Panda Express Chinese restaurant at the entrance, to see if she was hiding. He didn’t notice the waitress until she spoke.
“Welcome to El Tiburon. My name is Kirsten, and I’ll be your server this evening.” She handed Terry a menu he didn’t look at. “Can I start you with a drink—a margarita, maybe?”
“No, I’ll just have a lemonade, if you’ve got it.”
“Of course.” She beamed. “I’ll get it for you right away.”
Kirsten returned in less than a minute, far too efficiently for Terry’s liking. She put the drink before him with a basket of chips and small dish of salsa.
“Have you decided?”
“Er…Um.” He flashed through the short menu without reading. “What are your specials?”
Kirsten ran through them.
Terry didn’t know why he was asking. He didn’t care. All he wanted was Sarah.
“Decided?” she asked.
“Actually, I’m waiting for someone.”
“No problem. An appetizer, then?”
He hesitated for a moment. “What would you suggest?” he asked to get rid of her.
“We have a very nice chicken quesadilla.” Kirsten went on to describe an overelaborate Californian interpretation of the Mexican dish.
“That sounds great.”
She left him alone at last, allowing him to keep lookout. He checked his watch. The numbers meant nothing. All they told him was Sarah was late.
Terry didn’t spot her until she put a hand on his shoulder. He didn’t have to turn around; he knew it was her just by her touch. She smiled. He jumped up and embraced her in a crushing hug.
“Oh, Sarah.” He couldn’t say any more.
“I know,” Sarah said. Her eyes reflected everything he couldn’t say.
She returned his embrace, and he reveled in the contact. After what seemed an eternity, they let go of each other and sat. They held hands across the table. Terry lazily rubbed a thumb across the back of her hand.
He was glad to see she hadn’t come to any harm. She looked the way she had the last time he’d seen her, albeit a little tired. There were rings under her steel-gray eyes, but the keenness wasn’t tarnished. Her hair needed some TLC, but she was still Sarah. He couldn’t stop smiling.
Kirsten returned with the quesadilla. “Ah, your party has arrived. Would you like to order your main meal?”
“No,” Sarah said. “We’ve got some catching up to do. This will be all for now.”
“Would you like a drink? A margarita, maybe?”
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Sarah glanced at Terry’s drink. “Lemonade, please.”
Sarah amazed Terry. She was so collected. He was a wreck.
Kirsten returned in double-quick time with the lemonade. “I’ll leave you guys to get reacquainted.”
“Thanks,” Terry said.
Sarah touched the frostbite on his forehead. She smiled painfully. “Is that from the freezer?”
He nodded and held up his wounded pinky finger. “So’s that.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter. You’re here now. God, I’ve missed you.”
“Me too.”
“Does this mean you’re coming home?”
“No, I’m not coming home.” Her face was apologetic, but her tone was brusque.
“Then I’m coming with you.”
“No. It isn’t safe.”
“I don’t care.”
“What about your job?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does.”
“As of an hour ago, I probably don’t have a job. And in a couple of months, neither will anyone else at Genavax.”
“Why?”
Terry explained in detail what he had done, including his letter to the FDA. “The FDA won’t mess about,” Terry said. “It’ll lock the doors and fine Genavax into extinction.”
“No wonder Genavax was willing to kill you.”
He was still uncomfortable with the idea that Genavax was willing to kill him to ensure word didn’t get out. He didn’t want to believe they could stoop that low, but people had killed for less. He glanced down at the table. Neither of them had touched the quesadilla or lemonades.
“Do you know who closed the door?”
“I think I do. It was either my boss, Pamela Dawson, or a guy called Luke Frazer.”
“I met Pamela.”
“You argued with her. Was it over Genavax’s illegal drug testing?”
“In a way. When you asked me to check out the company to see if it was in good financial shape, I looked beyond its balance sheet. I came across a biotech industry rumor mill on the web. It’s mainly a bitch session for ex-employees to trash their former employers, but some people did post some valuable industry data, like who was in rough financial shape and whose drug wasn’t living up to the hype. Well, there was some dirt on Genavax.”
