The Orchid Hunter

by Sandra K. Moore

  Hello, Noah. Do I have a surprise for you.

  I smiled back as I got close. I handed over his duffel, which he set aside to look at me. The little cosmetics shop I’d found had indeed carried a dye that would pass as my original color, and I’d taken the time to become a redhead again. It had also carried mascara and lipstick, which I’d gingerly applied, hoping I didn’t end up looking like Bozo. Rick’s expression said I didn’t. His gaze wandered over the formfitting bodice, the flared skirt and Birkenstock sandals, heat building as it went. Even now, knowing who he worked for, my traitorous body responded, remembering how well we fit together.

  “You look great,” he said over the growing hubbub.

  “How’s our flight?” I eased my duffel to the floor.

  “Nearly booked up.” He handed me my ticket voucher. “You have to go check in yourself. Are you going to check your duffel?”

  “Are you kidding? I’m not letting it out of my sight.”

  “Mine’s too big to carry on.”

  We presented ourselves at the counter for formal check-in. My boarding pass read Row 42. Not very nice, and not useful for my plan.

  “I hope you’re going to be a gentleman and give me your seat if it’s closer to the front,” I said as we walked toward security.

  He looked at my pass, cocked his brow and traded with me. Row 16. That would work out just fine, thank you very much. It meant I could deplane and go straight through customs without waiting for him. I winked and slipped through security without so much as having to take off my Birkenstocks.

  Walking through the duty-free shop, buying a piece of local pottery as a souvenir, standing close to him and feeling his body heat, I managed somehow to radiate serenity instead of the churning anger I felt. I might not be able to save Scooter, but I could slow down Cradion. Old Shoe was going to owe me.

  “I need to call Scooter,” I told Rick as we walked toward our boarding area.

  “I’ll wait here,” he replied, and dropped into a seat near the gate.

  The phone bank was packed with yackers so I wandered around to the kiosks’ backside. I spotted a luggage store on the other side of the terminal walkway. My luck was headed north again.

  I bought a high-dollar wheeled leather case and hauled it and my duffel off to a crowded ladies’ room. I took a stall next to the dingy white-painted wall and quickly transferred everything from the duffel to the new leather case. At the sink, I set the case near some little girls struggling to wash their hands. Water splashed on the case, giving it a nice weathered look.

  Leaving the ladies’, I scraped and bumped the case into every corner I could in search of the terminal’s luggage lockers. Airport lockers had pretty much gone the way of the dinosaur in the States, but here, a nice broad wall of them waited to take my money. I stuffed the deflated duffel into an empty one and stuck my last rials into the pay slot.

  Back at the phone bank, I scored a phone. The not-so-new-looking leather case wedged between my feet. Rick still sat right where I’d left him, people watching.

  Minutes later Scooter yelled feebly, “How you doin’, Ladybug?”

  The landline connection was crap, but good enough for me to hear the fight in Scooter’s voice. “Just fine. You won’t believe what I’m bringing home to you this time,” I said, trying not to yell back.

  “I been worried ’bout you. You comin’ home now?”

  In the background, I could hear Hank’s voice talking to someone. I imagined him and Marian in Scooter’s trailer, Marian’s famous lasagna in the oven while Hank and Scooter played checkers on the woodgrain Formica table. Yeah, I was ready to come home for a while. “I’m getting on the plane in about half an hour. How are you feeling?”

  “Perty good today. Yes’day not so good.”

  I blinked back a sudden rash of tears. “I’m glad today’s better. Hey, is Hank around?”

  “Well, I reckon. I can’t get rid of neither him ner Marian. You take care now.”

  “I love you, Scooter.”

  “I love you, too, Ladybug. Here’s Hank.”

  A chair scraped, then Hank’s voice boomed. “Jessie!” No problem hearing him over a bad connection.

  “How’s Scooter?” I asked.

  “Doin’ all right, considerin’. He has good days and bad days. You know. You headed home?” he asked.

  “I gotta stop off in San Antonio first, but then I’ll be right there. Couple of days, probably.”

  “Well, hell, we’ll be in San Antone tomorra evenin’ for Scooter’s doctor appointment the day after. Why don’t you just meet us there?”

  Things were finally looking up. “Where’re you staying?”

  Hank gave me the motel information. Thank God he’d booked a motel room. Scooter was too sick to make the long trip to San Antonio and back in one day. He’d be exhausted.

  “We’re looking forward to seeing you,” Hank yelled. “I know Scooter’s glad.”

  “Me, too. Keep him around till I get there, all right?”

  “Me and Marian been doin’ our best. See you soon.”

  I hung up and had to stand there for a minute. My heart had just about stopped when Scooter answered the phone at the trailer. And now I’d get to see him sooner than I’d hoped.

  I snatched up the receiver again and swiped my credit card, then dialed my voice mail’s backdoor number. Two messages from Marcus at the San Antonio CIA lab. One told me what I already knew: the stain on Harrison’s note wasn’t blood, but an extremely poisonous extract from the Death Orchid. The second said only that he’d found Harrison.

  Well, damn it. He’d found Harrison, but Harrison alive or dead? If he was alive, where the hell was he? What was he doing? Was he okay? Had he been kidnapped?

  Or could Marcus just not tell me over the phone?

  The intercom system blared over my head, informing me first in Portuguese and then in English that my plane was preparing to board. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rick stand up and look toward the bank of telephones where I was.

  I fished the card Shoemaker had given me out of my dress pocket and dialed the number on it.

  When Rick waved, I smiled and waved back.

  Just as I expected, dark-suited agents swarmed the George Bush International Airport customs and immigration area. Shoemaker had taken my phone call seriously. I just had to get through before they nailed me.

  I wheeled my leather case down the ramp toward the queues, trying to breathe deep and keep my cool. I’d arrived here sooner than anyone else from my plane; they were all stuck collecting their checked luggage. With any luck, I’d look like I’d come off whatever flight had landed before the São Paolo plane. If Shoe’s agents were looking for me, they’d be looking for a brown-haired woman in outdoor clothes carrying a duffel, not a red-haired tourist in a flouncy dress with an expensive leather case.

  Nor would they realize I had two Death Orchids taped to my calves.

  “Anything to declare, Ms. Sutherland?” the U.S. customs agent asked, taking my declaration card.

  I shrugged. “Just a piece of pottery.”

  He studied the dollar amount I’d scribbled in, 72 USD. His raised brow had incredulous written all over it.

  A tingle of fear tickled my stomach. “I don’t like things like that. It’s for Aunt Ella.”

  He glanced at my duty-free shopping bag, then at my business-like leather case.

  I gave him the tired smile of an exhausted tourist wanting to go home.

  “Thank you, Ms. Sutherland.” He waved me through.

  I paused just this side of the double doors leading toward the airport lobby. Behind me, the lines of travelers coming through customs had stacked up with people declaring nothing, which was predominantly untrue, or just a little something, like me, which was almost true. Bored security guards waited at the lobby doors.

  Down near the secured office area, a little flurry of activity suggested the Homeland Security agents were ready to go. I shouldn’t have waited, but I
couldn’t leave. The São Paolo passengers started trickling in.

  Rick looked ragged, his Patagonia shirt rumpled and his hair looking like he’d combed his hand through it too many times. He handed over his passport to the agent. The customs agent did a double take and waved over a plain suit colleague wearing an earpiece. The suit said something. Rick nodded and started to unzip the duffel, but the suit stopped him and gestured to a table off to the side.

  The suit escorted him to the table where he was immediately surrounded by uniformed guards. The suit opened up the duffel bag and pawed around until he took out the Death Orchid specimen. Rick pointed to the CITES certificate. The suit nodded, then took out a single cardboard cylinder. He opened the cylinder, then drew out Cattleya delictabus, carefully supporting its strands of tiny, delectable pink blossoms.

  There was, of course, no CITES certificate for that Appendix One beauty, because I didn’t put it in Rick’s duffel when I put the Cattleya in. Carrying that orchid across an international boundary meant jail time and a one-hundred-thousand-dollar fine.

  Rick’s head snapped around, his gaze searching the crowd until he found me. Even from this distance, our eye contact touched me to the core and the stunned hurt in his eyes brought tears to mine.

  “I’m sorry,” I said aloud. And I was.

  Then I pushed through the lobby’s heavy double doors and lost myself in the crowd going home.

  “Talk to me about Harrison,” I said to Marcus as I wrapped my brand new sweater around my chest. Jeez, did these guys never let the lab temperature rise above forty degrees?

  Marcus pulled a file folder from a steel cabinet and laid it on the examination table between us. My elbows chilled the moment I leaned them on the table. He spread out the folder’s papers and plucked one from the stack.

  Marcus’s deep voice echoed richly in the cold, barren lab. “The cursory test I just ran says the stain on the notebook page you gave me matches the shaman’s poison sample in terms of the basic compounds. We’re definitely talking about the same substance.”

  Dr. Harrison working on a poison? That didn’t sound like him at all. “So what happened to him?” I asked. “You said you’d found him.”

  Marcus’s chiseled lips curved in a classically handsome smile. “As impatient as ever.”

  I shot him an annoyed glance that must have verged on something else because his smile disintegrated. “I don’t have the time for you to tell me how brilliant you are,” I said.

  “Then you probably already know what I was going to tell you.” His voice held almost as much steel as the table. “You don’t need this genius to fill you in.”

  I bit back a sudden spate of tears. Good God, I was weakening by the minute. Ten hours on the flight from hell and then a bone-jarring puddle jumper from Houston to San Antonio had worn my nerves paper thin. Besides, I’d lived my days and nights backward for so long my body clock thought I should be unconscious. “Look, I have to get this stuff sorted out. It’s important.” I pressed two fingers to my temple. “I’m sorry I’m being a bitch.”

  Marcus paused, studying me with his clear blue eyes. “You look like you’ve had a bad two weeks.”

  “I have,” I admitted, and let it go at that. “I’m sorry. Go ahead and tell me what you have. I’ll shut up.”

  His measuring look told me he wasn’t sure whether to take me at my word or not. Then he turned back to his papers, leaving me looking at his virile profile, his dark hair lying longish on his collar.

  Rick’s hair looked just like that. I mentally shook myself and said, “How about the poison’s effects?”

  “They mimic a heart attack, as you suggested. It’ll take me another few days to determine whether the poison is traceable.”

  That made sense. He’d have to poison some mice and study the corpses to figure out the chemical signature.

  Marcus picked up the shaman’s vial. “If this poison is untraceable, the Death Orchid is a far better weapon than the Danube violet. Did you see the shaman make it?”

  I shook my head. “All shaman cooking is secret.” I held out my hand for the vial.

  Marcus watched me pocket it, brow cocked. “You aren’t going to leave that with me for further testing?”

  “You’ve got enough of a sample to play with.”

  “How about leaving me a Death Orchid to study?”

  I shrugged, hoping I was as good a liar as I thought I was. “Daley stole them from me.” I glanced at Marcus. No, I wasn’t a good liar, but he wasn’t going to argue. Yet. “What about Harrison?” I asked.

  Marcus pivoted to face me, leaning his hip on the table. “It’s all here.” He tapped his long fingers on the stack of papers. “You can’t take the report with you.”

  Great. I love reading while freezing my ass off. “Harrison makes an appearance in the report?”

  “More of a disappearance.”

  I sighed. “Well, yeah, he did that a couple of weeks ago.”

  Marcus shifted his weight, crossing his heavy arms across his chest. “He didn’t disappear on his own. He went into FBI protective custody. We’re working with the FBI on this one.”

  My conversation with Shoemaker fast-forwarded through my head. Shoemaker had said a contractor had rolled one of Cradion’s subsidiary labs. That had been Harrison? “Harrison turned himself in to the FBI and implicated Cradion in a bioterrorism plan,” I muttered aloud.

  “How’d you know?” Marcus asked, surprised.

  Harrison was supposed to be working for von Brutten’s lab, Lexicran. Von Brutten’s lab was supposed to be in direct competition with Cradion. A Cradion subsidiary lab had poisoned my uncle in a Parkinson’s drug trial.

  I put the pieces together and didn’t like the picture. Either Harrison was two-timing von Brutten and working for both Lexicran and Cradion…or von Brutten had lied to me about his intentions and was running the whole show: Cradion Pharmaceutical, Harrison, and the deadly drug trials.

  But which?

  The Death Orchid was important enough to send me, Lawrence Daley and Noah down to the Amazon. Somebody—anybody—had to bring it back for the poison to be produced.

  Did Shoemaker or the FBI know about von Brutten’s connection to all of this? Did the CIA? Did anyone other than me?

  Marcus touched my arm. “You okay?”

  I thought of Harrison’s pallid face, his weak eyes. “Why did Harrison turn himself in?”

  Marcus shrugged. “Paranoia. He came in saying his unfinished formula could be the end of the world.”

  “Unfinished?”

  “He was within a week of having it, he said. He’d exhausted his supply of test orchids and needed more, but was afraid to go after them.” He paused. “It’ll be ironic if you’ve got the formula in that shaman’s brew.”

  I couldn’t appreciate the irony because the one-week timeline hammered my chest. Von Brutten had said his lab would take a week to develop its miracle cure. But that was still circumstantial. Von Brutten’s week didn’t necessarily equate to Harrison’s week, not if Harrison was two-timing von Brutten. My boss might still be innocent.

  My voice started to work again. “Did Harrison give you the formula?”

  “He said he’d put it in a safe place and would turn it over when he felt he could.”

  “Who did he think was gunning for him?”

  Marcus shrugged. “That’s where it gets tricky. There’s no record of any wrongdoing at the main Cradion labs. The Cradion directors working on the Parkinson’s drug are clean as a whistle.”

  “There has to be somebody,” I retorted. “Harrison wasn’t a medical research scientist. He had to have been working with someone to develop this poison.”

  Marcus flipped through a folder. “The only Cradion scientist he’s had regular contact with is a Dr. Reginald Thompson. Thompson’s worked for Cradion for eleven years, runs trials, works with patients, relays data and results back to the main labs, that kind of thing.”

  “And he’s clean?”


  “So far.”

  “So nobody at Cradion fits the bill.”

  “Nobody. Which suggests Harrison was working for someone else on the side.”

  And I knew exactly who. Von Brutten. But if Harrison was making both a poison and a cure, which was he making for whom? Please, God, I prayed, let him be making the cure for von Brutten. “He was really scared of somebody,” I murmured.

  Marcus nodded. “He was right to be. Less than forty-eight hours in protective custody…” Marcus made a finger-and-thumb motion of a gun going off. “Got popped.”

  “God.” I remembered Harrison’s wry smile and felt my throat close up. He’d been a good man. A top-notch professor. A challenging mentor. Something must have been very wrong for him to have gotten involved in all this.

  “It was a professional hit. The men assigned as guards were killed at the scene. Internal Affairs is all over it but hasn’t turned up anything yet.”

  “How about his lab? Did your guys look at it yet?”

  “Agents scoured it, dusted for prints, but didn’t find anything.”

  “No formula?”

  “No nothing.”

  “Wait a minute. None of this makes sense,” I said. “Why would Harrison roll Cradion if he was afraid of someone else? If Cradion’s legit, there’s no reason for him to implicate them. There’s got to be someone at Cradion who’s dirty.” I liked that answer. It meant von Brutten was, if not a good guy, at least a neutral capitalist kind of guy.

  Marcus shrugged. “Maybe. Or he just wanted federal protection and didn’t care who he implicated.”

  “But if no one knew where the formula was, why would the murderer kill him? You kill him, you lose the formula for good.”

  “Not if he was working with a bioterrorist on the side. The bioterrorist might have the formula already. And maybe Harrison had become a liability.”

  I could see Harrison losing his cool and going rabbity. I thought of his panicked stare when I’d startled him in his office years before. All he needed was a hint that he was in trouble. Leave him alone in his lab and he was fine. Put some pressure on him and he fell apart.