The Judas Virus

by Don Donaldson

  “No, but he knew we were going over there. Maybe he went to Fairborn’s home that night to talk to him about it and learned then of its existence. The tape’s missing, isn’t it?”

  “We haven’t finished our inventory of the home’s contents yet. But I’ll tell you what, that paint on Ash’s wrist isn’t going to stay there long, so I’ll just drive over to Monteagle and see it for myself, maybe take a sample for comparison with what’s on the potting table. Where would I find this guy?”

  Chris gave him directions to the virology lab, then said, “Will you let us know what you think after you talk to him?”

  “I don’t know. We’ll see.”

  LENIHAN STEPPED ONTO the elevator in the Monteagle lobby and pressed the button for the sixth floor with the knuckle of his right hand, so he wouldn’t be touching hospital germs with his finger. Damn bugs should be visible, he thought as the doors closed and the elevator started to move.

  Sneaky little shits . . . He inspected the floor and walls of the elevator, wondering if he was riding with whatever killed those people here. And wouldn’t you know Ash would be the director of the virology lab . . . That’s gotta be one of the worst places in the whole hospital.

  The elevator stopped on the second floor, and Lenihan was joined by a nurse and her patient, a comatose-looking old man on a gurney. The only thing that kept Lenihan from bolting into the hall and taking another elevator was the belief that real men don’t do such things.

  IN HIS OFFICE, Ash still couldn’t concentrate. What had made Chris Collins leave the lunch table so abruptly? He thought back to their conversation.

  They’d been talking about Scott selling the rights to the transplant virus, and Boyer had complained about it. In response, he’d said, “Don’t kill the messenger,” and he’d thrown up his hands.

  That’s when Collins left.

  Ash looked at the palms of his hands, then turned them and . . . What the hell was that?

  Paint.

  Where did that come from? Is that what Collins reacted to? Was there a chance he’d bumped into something freshly painted last night at the Fairborns’?

  Damn.

  He got up and went into the lab through the rear door of his office. He crossed the lab, without speaking to either of the techs he passed, and stepped up to a chemical cabinet, where he took down a bottle of acetone. Grabbing a box of Kimwipes, he carried everything to a nearby sink.

  LENIHAN STEPPED OFF the elevator on the sixth floor, looked briefly at the sign on the wall pointing to the virology lab, and walked that way.

  ASH SCRUBBED AT the brown paint on his wrist with a wad of Kimwipes soaked in acetone. Slowly, the stain gave ground. He turned the wipes to a fresh area and went after a particularly stubborn spot, rubbing until his skin reddened.

  There . . . finished. He washed the used wipes under some running water so the acetone wouldn’t dissolve the plastic wastebasket liner, then he tossed them away.

  On his way back to his office after washing the acetone from his hands, he saw a heavyset man in street clothes come into the lab and approach the clerk at the counter. They spoke briefly, then the clerk turned and said, “Dr. Ash, there’s someone here to see you.”

  Ash walked to the counter.

  “Doctor, I’m Tony Lenihan. May we speak privately?”

  “About what?”

  “Privately?” Lenihan repeated.

  Ash pointed to Lenihan’s left. “That’s my office. Just go on in, and I’ll be there shortly.”

  Ash had chosen to enter his office by the back door to give himself a few seconds to think about who this guy might be. With all that had been happening recently, he had to wonder if Lenihan was a cop.

  Was he here to arrest him . . . take him away in cuffs in front of the staff . . . through the hospital like some freak on display? Ash’s mind went back to the day Jimmy Demarco had first taunted him. “T R-ash, T R-ash . . . If you want him, he’ll be there in a flash, cause he’s T R-ash.” Then the others had joined in: “T R-ash . . . T R-ash.”

  The voices raged in his brain.

  He would never allow himself to be humiliated like that again, never.

  But he could see no alternative to going into his office. If he ran, it would be an admission of guilt. And they’d surely catch him.

  But maybe he’s not a cop. He could be anybody. Just calm down and talk to him.

  Ash entered his office by the rear door and found Lenihan studying his picture of Ebola, the office door shut to ensure the privacy he’d requested.

  “What’s that?” Lenihan asked, referring to the picture.

  “One of the most dangerous viruses on earth.”

  Lenihan shivered. “Don’t know how you work around these things.”

  “Carefully,” Ash said, forcing himself to grin amiably.

  Lenihan returned the smile. “I’m a detective with the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office . . .”

  Ash’s heart quickened, but he made sure his face remained calm.

  “Do you know a man named Sam Fairborn?” Lenihan asked.

  “By reputation, certainly, but we’ve never met. I heard he and his wife were killed last night. Terrible. What happened?”

  “I can’t discuss it.”

  “I understand. What brings you here?”

  “I wonder if you’d do me a favor? It’s going to sound kind of strange, but I’d appreciate it.”

  “What?”

  “Do this with your right hand.” Lenihan put his hand out and rotated it slowly back and forth.

  Worried that this might be a ploy so Lenihan could snap the cuffs on him, Ash hesitated.

  “Please,” Lenihan prodded.

  Seeing no cuffs in Lenihan’s possession, Ash did what he asked.

  “Great. Thank you. And now the left.”

  Having survived it once, Ash now willingly repeated the maneuver.

  “Excellent. The things we detectives need to ask . . . I just have one more question for you. And please don’t read anything into this. It’s just a question I have to ask everybody I talk to for my records. It’s like department policy. Whether it’s appropriate or not, I gotta ask. Where were you last night between seven p.m. and two a.m.?”

  “At home. I read until about ten, then went to bed.”

  “I didn’t see a wedding ring, so I guess you were alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “I love a good book. What were you reading?”

  “Gerald’s Game, by Stephen King.”

  “Oh yeah, that one where the wolf eats the guy’s body while the wife is handcuffed to the bed. I read that, too.”

  “It wasn’t a wolf. It was a stray dog.”

  “That’s right, a dog. Grisly book, but good. Okay, that’s it. I won’t take any more of your time. Have a good rest of the day. And . . .” He pointed at the Ebola picture. “Watch out for the little things.”

  What a fiasco, Lenihan thought, heading for the elevators. I got a double homicide to solve, and I’m over here chasing my ass.

  WITH THE DETECTIVE gone, Ash’s legs grew rubbery, and he dropped into his chair. There was no doubt in his mind that Lenihan had been looking for paint on his hands. And him saying the dog in Gerald’s Game was a wolf—it was a test to see if he’d lied about being home last night reading.

  A detective right in his office.

  And there could only be one person responsible for that.

  CHRIS AND MICHAEL would never forget the Fairborn murder scene, but by the time they’d spoken to Lenihan, a translucent membrane was already growing over its memory, obscuring the brittle clarity of the moment, so that they’d remained behind in the restaurant to at least try to eat something. They were just finishing when Chris saw Lenihan come through the front door
and head their way.

  “Did you see him?” Chris asked when he reached the table.

  “Ordinarily I wouldn’t do this, but as I was driving back this way I saw the white Porsche was out front, so I figured you were still here.”

  “How’d you know the car was mine?” Michael asked.

  Lenihan lowered his chin and looked at Michael through the tops of his eyes.

  “Right,” Michael said. “You’re a detective.”

  Lenihan sat down. “I saw no paint on his wrist or his hands.”

  “But there was,” Chris said.

  “That doesn’t help me.”

  “Did you ask him where he was last night?”

  “He was home alone, reading.”

  “So he has no alibi.”

  “For someone who lives alone, having no alibi for a given period of time is the default position. It’s what you’d expect.”

  “So why’d you ask?”

  “Habit, I guess. My point here is that there’s no reason for me to think about this guy anymore.”

  “You’re not serious.”

  “I don’t joke about murder. There’s no proof he was at the scene, and he has no motive.”

  “I gave you a motive.”

  “What you told me was a hypothesis you’d strung together from a lot of guesswork. That’s not a motive.”

  “You aren’t even going to try to find out if he was in Kazakhstan with Lansden?”

  “It’s effort and time I can’t afford. But thanks for the call.”

  When Lenihan was out of earshot, Chris said, “Where were you in that conversation? I could have used a little help.”

  “That wasn’t a mind looking to be changed.”

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  “And maybe the paint on Ash wasn’t from Fairborn’s table.”

  “Ever heard of epidemiologist’s itch?”

  “Sounds like something you’d get in the jungle,” Michael said.

  “It’s the intuitive ability all good epidemiologists have to assemble apparently disparate facts into a cohesive hypothesis that will lead to the truth.”

  “And you’ve got that itch about Ash.”

  “I definitely do. Let’s go to your office. I want to look up some people on the CDC website, see if they’re still on staff and if one of them can help us learn who was with Lansden in Kazakhstan.”

  FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, with Chris working at his computer, Michael said, “I’ll be right back. I’m going to make a pit stop.”

  He left and walked down the hall toward the men’s room. Three doors ahead, Robin Victor, the transplant team’s psychiatrist, came out of his office. “Michael, how goes it?”

  “My practice is still suffering fallout from that transplant virus mess.”

  “Mine, too. People don’t even want to come to this building. I may have to move. But I’m going to give it a few more weeks and see what happens. Did you hear that Scott sold the marketing rights to the transplant virus?”

  “I know. And he took all the blood and tissue samples away from Ash, so we can’t do any more work on the organism. Under the circumstances, I’m surprised any company would want to get involved. The development costs to bring this thing to market will be prohibitive . . . if it’s even possible. I wonder who it was.”

  “I heard it was a small firm in New Jersey, Iliad Pharmaceuticals, I think.”

  Iliad . . .

  That name . . .

  Forgetting for the moment the reason he’d come into the hall, Michael left Victor and returned to his office, where Chris was just finishing the call she’d planned to make.

  “Thanks, Larry, I’ll be waiting to hear from you.” She hung up and looked at Michael. “I found someone at the CDC who’ll help us, but he can’t promise results.”

  “What was the name of that pharmaceutical house Ash worked for just before coming to Monteagle?”

  Chris picked up Ash’s CV and looked for the pertinent entry. “Iliad,” she said.

  “You know all those coincidences you mentioned a few minutes ago? Here’s another one. Robin Victor just said the development rights to the transplant virus were sold to Iliad.”

  “That can’t be a random event.”

  “But what does it mean?”

  “I don’t know. Let’s see what we can find out about Iliad on the net.”

  “I ran into Victor before I made it to where I was headed, so I’m going to try again.”

  As Michael left, Chris typed Iliad Pharmaceuticals into the search box on Michael’s Internet browser and hit the return key.

  The first hit was the Iliad home page.

  Over the next few minutes she got a quick profile of the company, which was located in Newark, New Jersey. In existence for only twenty-three years, its primary income appeared to be from two cholesterol-lowering drugs, whose names she didn’t recognize, and an antibiotic she rarely used because of its potential side effects. The company also sold surgical dressings impregnated with an agent that promoted wound healing.

  Having a feel for the company now, she returned to the first page of the site and studied the picture of the CEO. Paul Danner was blond and not bad looking. But, appearing to be in his mid-forties, he was pushing the age limit on his chosen hair style—casual and loose with a faint part down the middle. He was wearing a smug expression that made him look like a guy who enjoyed firing people. From Danner’s stated tenure as CEO, he’d been in that position when Ash worked there.

  Feeling that she’d learned all she could from the corporate site, Chris went back to the list of hits the search engine had produced.

  The fifth entry caught her attention: “Drug Industry Rogues.” She clicked on the link.

  The page loaded quickly. Under the same title that had drawn her there, an additional line explained the site’s content: “Certain drug companies in the US have a history of unethical and sometimes illegal behavior. Below are the worst offenders.”

  The second company on the list was Iliad. Among the six cited offenses they’d committed was manipulating clinical trial data to downgrade reported side effects of one of their cholesterol drugs. In another instance, they’d paid a large fine for submitting falsified efficacy data to the FDA to get approval for a hepatitis C vaccine. The accounts of the company’s various offenses were written in the style of tabloid exposés, in which Paul Danner’s name often appeared. But there was no mention of Ash. The fraudulent nature of the hep C data had been brought to the FDA’s attention by Frieda Sepanski, a company employee involved in drafting their FDA reports.

  The door opened, and Michael returned.

  “Look at this,” Chris said. “Iliad is on a list of drug companies with a history of unethical conduct. During the time Ash was there, they were slapped with a big fine for falsifying data on a hep C vaccine.”

  “Scott better hope their check clears.”

  “There’s no mention of Ash in the article about the vaccine, but I wonder if he was involved.”

  “Maybe that’s why he left: He was the one who cooked the results.”

  “If that’s what happened, I’d think his references from Iliad would be lousy. And Monteagle wouldn’t have touched him. Actually, Iliad had similar troubles even before Ash joined them.”

  “Even so, I’d sure like to know more about that hep C situation.”

  “Me, too. I wonder . . .”

  “What?”

  “The name of the woman who blew the whistle on the hep C data is mentioned in the article. I wonder if she’d talk to us.”

  Chris went back to the Internet and looked for a people search engine that was free. Finding one, she entered Frieda Sepanski and Newark in the appropriate blanks, chose New Jersey in the state list, and waited for
the search.

  It found only two Sepanskis, a Joseph N. and a Delano S.

  Chris got out her cell phone and looked at Michael. “Here goes . . .”

  The call to Joseph N. was answered on the third ring by a man.

  “May I speak to Frieda, please?”

  “You’ve got the wrong number,” the man said. “That’s my daughter-in-law.”

  “Is she at . . .” Chris recited the other number.

  “That’s her.”

  “Sorry to bother you.” Chris hung up and looked at Michael. “Fifty-fifty chance of getting the right one, and I lose—typical.”

  Her second call rang four times and raised only a machine. She hung up without leaving a message. “I’ll try again later.”

  ASH PACED IN front of the convenience store’s outdoor pay phone, hoping he’d get his call before someone else wanted to use it. As he walked, he replayed once more his movements at the Fairborn house.

  He’d worn gloves, so he couldn’t have left any prints. With the Fairborns both dead, he’d been free to take a lot of stuff to make it look like a bungled burglary, all of which was now at the bottom of Lake Lanier. The gun he’d used was under three feet of dirt. He’d brushed away the tire tracks he’d made when he’d brought his car to the house to load the things he’d taken, and he’d thrown away all the clothes he’d worn, including the shoes. So there was no possibility they could prove he was there.

  Still, there shouldn’t have been any way for that paint to get on his wrist either, but it had.

  Thinking about all this made him so edgy that when the phone rang, it startled him. He hurried to the phone and picked up the receiver. “Ash.”

  Hearing the voice he’d expected, he said, “I’ve got a situation here I can’t handle myself.”

  He went on to explain the nature of his problem. “So this needs to be addressed as soon as possible.” He listened to the voice on the other end for a moment and said, “You know what I mean . . . Look, you could have opted out when I first brought the idea to you, but you didn’t. Now get on the truck, or it’ll run over you as well as me, never doubt that . . . Ask around for a name. It’s New Jersey, for Christ’s sake, how hard could it be to find someone? Just be careful who you talk to. I’ll take a digital photo of her and send it to you. Of course I won’t send it by computer. I’ll overnight it by FedEx. Then you have to move fast.”