Weapon of Choice

by Patricia Gussin

As much as she did not want to be proved wrong and ruin her blossoming career, she hoped she was wrong. Maybe she had sounded a crazy false alarm. She hoped everyone who’d tasted a profiterole, including Charles’s mother, would be just fine. Then she remembered Emma Goode’s grandchildren. The horror if her theory were right and what if one of those cute little kids sitting around Emma—

  The circle of police and security grew as even more officers converged on the Palace ballroom to enforce her quarantine orders. Having observed the quarantine procedure on-site in Tampa earlier that week, Stacy felt confident that what she was doing was right. If the AZ3510 strain from her lab was involved—

  But what if not? She was in way over her head. Earlier in the day, she’d made a discovery that implicated Victor Worth in the staph outbreak in Tampa; this disaster was on a whole other level. With no solid basis.

  Stacy had started to hyperventilate. She felt a tingling numbness and began to go lightheaded. She felt she might pass out, but rallied when a gentleman in a business suit showed her a badge, and escorted her over to a house phone.

  “Director Cox, for you, Dr. Jones.”

  She took the receiver and began to brief the director on why she feared an AZ3510 incident could be an immediate threat to Atlanta.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY

  SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30

  “Mother—” Charles called, sobbing as Banks pulled him into the kitchen.

  “You fucked it up,” Will spat into his ear. “You fucked it up before they ate all the killer germs.”

  “I can’t leave my mother,” Charles protested. “The cream must have gone into her mouth. Even if it’s only on her skin, she’ll be infected.”

  “Then she’s a goner. Too bad. Collateral damage. Only you didn’t think it’d be Mommie, did you, Chuckie. Now, you tell me, what the fuck were your parents doing at an affair for black people? You tell me that.”

  Charles had wondered. His father had mentioned that certain niceties were being expected what with so many blacks with money and in high places. But his parents? Descendants of the Klan? It didn’t make sense.

  Except for Lonnie Collins, the kitchen was empty. All the trays had been returned and stacked on the cart.

  “I doused the trays with alcohol, just to be sure,” Lonnie said, following Charles’s gaze, “except the last one, the one you didn’t do, but what the hell is going on out there? I sent my help home early so I could clean up the way you told me, then all hell started breaking loose. Two security guards started checkin’ out the kitchen. Must not have found anything because they left right off. What’s going on?”

  Banks gripped Charles’s arm tightly with his left hand, while in his right, he held a gun. Charles didn’t know guns, but this looked big for a pistol—or maybe a revolver—and it had an extension. A silencer, he guessed.

  Charles tried to pull away, but Banks held tight and pointed the gun at Lonnie’s chest, and pulled the trigger. A clapping sound. Not very loud.

  Before Lonnie hit the floor, Charles knew with absolute certainty that Banks would kill him, too.

  Charles was left handed, and with his dominant hand, he picked up the syringe he’d dropped on the last tray of profiteroles. With one forceful jab, he discharged the contents into Banks’s left side. Right into the flank, aiming for the kidney.

  There was still enough staph in that syringe to down a roomful. Banks’s hours would be numbered.

  But what about his own hours? Lonnie dead on the floor. Banks staggering around, flailing.

  Charles, syringe in hand, headed back into the dining room to find his mother. He had to tell her how sorry he was. How sorry he was to have killed her. Just like when he’d disappointed her when he was a little boy. “I’m sorry, Mommie, I killed you.”

  At first, no one noticed him amid the pandemonium as he calmly strode to his parents’ table. Again, Stacy Jones stood in his way. His eyes met hers as she turned in his direction with a phone receiver in her hand. For a moment she stopped talking. Then said to a man right next to her, her voice audible but not loud: “Watch it, Officer—” a bit louder. “Behind you, Charles Scarlett. He’s holding a syringe with enough lethal bacteria to kill us all.”

  That bitch, what the fuck. Without hesitation, Charles lunged toward Stacy, syringe poised. If he couldn’t get in close enough, he’d launch it like a dart. She was responsible for all this. If she hadn’t manipulated Stan Proctor to get that promotion, none of this ever would’ve happened.

  Not far behind Stacy, he could see his parents. His father’s face etched in anger, red, stern. His mother’s face flaccid, pale, her eyes looking vacant. But he must focus on Stacy. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his father rise up, move toward him. Is he going to strike me? Stacy had to pay. He took a step closer.

  Charles felt pressure in his chest, like a refrigerator crashing into him. He tried to twist, to see through the door to the kitchen. Banks had a gun; he’d shot Lonnie. Had Banks also shot him? He never would know. The light went out of his eyes before he even saw the bright-red blood saturating his white jacket.

  Stacy stood transfixed, the noise of the weapon discharging echoed painfully in her ears. Charles had been coming at her with a syringe, and she knew what was in it. A large tuxedoed man, a black man—FBI? Cop? Private security?—had fired at close range. Charles was down, lots of blood pouring out of his chest.

  At first too stunned to think, she hesitated. Then clarity. What should she be doing? Chaos broke out after the shot. People were getting up, some running toward the exits, some throwing themselves on the floor, clambering under the tables. How could she be most effective?

  Barefoot, Stacy maneuvered toward the stage, grabbing the microphone from the podium. The same podium where Coretta Scott King had just stood, reading a prayer.

  “Everyone, I need your attention,” she shouted, her tone urgent, but not panicky. “First, do not eat any of the food, but most important,” she drew the microphone closer to her mouth hoping for more volume, “Do not eat the profiteroles, the dessert course. Do not even touch the profiteroles.” Not confident that her voice could be heard over the pandemonium, she repeated the words, three times. “I am from the CDC. Dessert may be contaminated. Poisoned.” She’d heard Charles yell to his mother, “It’s poisoned!”

  The tuxedoed black man, who said he was the Atlanta deputy police commander, took the microphone, introduced himself, and repeated Stacy’s message. The only difference was that his voice thundered throughout the room. Several other men came up onto the stage and the big voice explained in no uncertain terms that no one would leave the ballroom. Quarantine procedures were being put in place. No one comes in. No one leaves. No exceptions.

  Satisfied that law enforcement had things under control, Stacy left the podium and the stage. She needed to do one more thing before someone thought they’d better interrogate her. Had she been justified causing this terrifying chaos? Had she saved hundreds of lives tonight? Or not? She simply didn’t know. What she did know: Charles was dead. What had he been trying to accomplish?

  Stacy hurried toward the head table.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE

  SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30

  Emma clung to the hand of her youngest grandchild, Emeril. The same hand she’d slapped just moments before. The hand that had reached for the profiterole while Dr. King’s wife was speaking.

  “Emeril,” she had whispered, “that’s not polite. We have to wait until the prayer is finished.”

  “No,” her daughter Maxine’s only child had declared. “I want one now.”

  This attitude was new to Emma. His cousins all were deferential, at least to her.

  Torn between not wanting Emeril to fuss and letting him disrespect her, Mrs. King, and God, Emma made a choice. For the first time in her twenty-two years of grandparenting, she struck a child. Not really struck, just a modest slap on the hand. The result had been embarrassing. Emeril hissed, “You’re not allowed to hit me.” Result: stifled sni
ckers from Emeril’s fourteen older cousins.

  Most important result: Emeril had not touched the profiterole. God, once again, had provided guidance, Emma realized.

  And now, Dr. Stacy Jones, who was at the epicenter of whatever was happening, approached under the suspicious gaze of the bodyguards who’d showed up around her table and the tables of all her children.

  “Mrs. Goode, I want you to know that I did what in my judgment was necessary,” Stacy said. “For safety. I am so sorry that I ruined your retirement party. I was having such a good time until I saw my colleague acting suspicious. I believed, though I couldn’t be absolutely sure, still am not, that he was trying to poison all of us, infect us with a deadly bacteria. I had to act. If I am right, anybody who ate those,” Stacy pointed at the pastries oozing with cream, drizzled with chocolate, “would die a very painful death.”

  Emma tried to scan the surrounding tables for any empty dessert plates, but she couldn’t see past the growing contingent of law enforcement and private security people. Her beloved husband, Edward, had told her never to skimp on security. “There are those who don’t want to see us succeed,” he’d warned.

  Emma pulled Emeril onto her lap. He still sulked but gave in and cuddled when she held him. She gazed the length of her table: all the profiteroles looked uneaten and untouched.

  “I just wanted to explain,” Stacy said. “Now I have to make sure that these dessert plates are removed with sterile technique, stored, and secured. Director Cox will be in tonight, and I know she’ll give you an update. I hope I was wrong and that this turns out to be a horrific false alarm. I really do.”

  “So do I, Dr. Jones, and thank you. You did what you had to do. You were brave. No matter how this turns out.” With a sigh of profound despair, Emma acknowledged her fear that Edward had been right. They don’t want us to succeed.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO

  SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30

  Following Stacy’s urgent call, Director Madeleine Cox left Tampa City Hospital a little before midnight. She’d commandeered an Air Force jet to fly her and Stan Proctor to Atlanta, where police met them and escorted them to the Palace Hotel.

  She’d called Stacy from the air, confirming that she’d endorsed Stacy’s initial quarantine orders, locking down the hotel, no exceptions. Not a pleasant task with all the dignitaries in attendance. But security was heavy at the gala, and the Atlanta police commander was a guest. Because Dr. Jones moved quickly to sound a public health alarm and to issue clear directives, the commander said, no one had left the building. One exception the cops knew about: a white male in his late twenties or early thirties, dressed like a Palace busboy, had been seen speeding away from the hotel in a white panel truck. Hotel security had observed the same truck earlier in the evening, parked in the employee lot near the service road exit. Atlanta police said the male driving the white truck resembled Dr. Jones’s description of a busboy who scuffled with Charles at the elder Scarletts’ table, and soon after, assaulted Dr. Jones herself. When she stood on a chair to warn everybody to stop eating, the busboy pushed her to the floor. After that, he managed to flee the scene.

  Stacy had been relieved to see her boss, Stan Proctor, walk into the security director’s office of the Palace Hotel. She was ready to transfer some of the tremendous weight of the evening’s events to his hefty shoulders. But Stan, geared up in the hazmat suit looked ashen and withdrawn. He already bore too much weight. The toxic staphylococcal organism meant to infect hundreds of people came from his supposedly secure labs, carried by his supposedly sane scientist—who also held top-secret clearance. Stan’s CDC program, already in DARPA’s crosshairs, didn’t stand a chance of survival now. Neither, probably, did his career.

  The security suite of the luxury hotel had its quota of leather armchairs. Stacy had collapsed into a burgundy-toned one and stayed there, surrounded by FBI agents, recording devices, and radio receivers. She still was in her party dress, not yet having undergone the decontamination process the CDC had set up for everyone who’d come anywhere near the Goode banquet.

  She answered the agents’ questions as best she could. About the bacteria. About Charles. About herself. But the investigators took turns quizzing her, and she could no longer mask her fatigue. At first, the authorities had praised her fast action, but now they had more questions than kind words. Were they starting to look at her from a different angle? For a moment, she wondered if she needed a lawyer.

  Director Cox’s entrance created a diversion. Stacy got up from her comfortable chair and greeted her big boss. “I need a moment with Dr. Jones,” Cox said, dismissing the cadre of agents.

  “Sit down, Stacy,” Cox said, looking odd in the bulky protective suit. “You’ve had a remarkable evening. How’d you get that tear in your dress? Hair looks good, though. I’ve never seen it pulled up like that at work.”

  The FBI had been harassing and haranguing her, and Madeleine Cox is talking about her hair?

  “On our way in,” Dr. Cox said, “Stan confirmed that the creamy centers of the profiteroles already on the tables were teeming with staphylococci. Our AZ3510 staph, the flesh-eating, resistant one. Lucky we have that rapid ID test. Your idea, as I recall.”

  Until that moment, Stacy had not known for sure what she had so strongly suspected. Charles’s extra incubator minutes—Charles wanted to kill her and her people. The vile, despicable worm.

  “Resistant to all known antibiotics,” Cox continued. “Unlike the Tampa staph that’s responding nicely to ticokellin.”

  “Victor Worth’s ticokellin?” Stacy asked, reminded that she’d set up the experiments to confirm he was implicated in the Tampa toxic staph.

  “Worth had a good day and a bad day,” Cox said.

  “Good?” Stacy could not imagine what about Worth’s day could have gone well.

  “He got a big job at Keystone Pharma, big comp package, lots of perks.”

  “He—?” Then Stacy remembered she had caught that on the seven o’clock news while she dressed for the gala at the Palace. She was so exhausted now, she’d blanked it out.

  “Later, the FBI picked him up and put him in a cell. Next voice he hears will be the U.S. Attorney’s. Intentionally infecting sick, innocent patients. Premeditated. Serial murder. How do you feel about the death penalty?”

  Stacy always had been against capital punishment. But now? She was too tired to think straight, her brain a jumble of ghosts—Natalie Nelson’s boyfriend and the others. Now, she couldn’t be so sure.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-THREE

  TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3

  The quarantine lasted seventy-two hours. Emma’s whole family—all twenty-nine of them—sojourned with her in the large meeting room allocated to them. Each was enveloped by an isolation cocoon, no physical contact, but they could communicate through the high-tech microphone embedded in each of their space suit-like getups. The kids loved it.

  Early in their confinement, Emma had been despondent, appalled by the evil that was Charles Scarlett. She needed Edward to help her understand the depth of the hate and contempt that one human element imposes on another. Of course, Edward wasn’t there, but Emma did feel his spirit reach down, cajoling her, as he always had, to move forward, to leave the past behind, and make a better world. So she’d shaken off her melancholy, encouraged each of her seven children to follow Dr. King’s dream and their father’s road of optimism. Each time her little Emeril strutted into view, a little brat compared to his fourteen older cousins, she thanked God. That child had come so close to the most horrible of deaths. Emma also thanked Coretta Scott King for the prolonged prayer that had kept them all waiting to eat their dessert.

  On Emma’s advice, the family watched one hour of news coverage a day. One hour and they turned it off.

  What they learned: Thirteen known victims in metro Atlanta, of the virulent and disfiguring staph. The Goode family knew three of them: a pleasant white neighbor and a former college roommate of one of Emma’s daughters, along with
her husband. Also, three security detail, four banquet waitstaff, a member of the mayor’s staff, John F. Kennedy Jr.’s bodyguard, and Charles Scarlett’s mother. All dead within thirty hours of ingesting the tainted profiteroles.

  The Goodes and the rest of the world learned more than they wanted to know about the hate groups out there. And there were many, too many. With the segregation battle lost, descendants of the Klan organized the Council of Conservative Citizens. Well-funded and politically connected, these rabid extremists united not only against blacks, but gays and Jews, as well. The council screened its members, who commonly stockpiled arms. They worked alone, lone wolf; or in small cells, strong packs. Speculation was rampant on the airwaves, but the consensus among experts interviewed on the news was that Charles must have been a member of a small cell that had recruited him specifically to discharge the bioweapon-grade staph. But no one knew conclusively. His mother was dead. His father refused all interviews.

  On the last quarantine day, Emma had allowed an exception to the one-hour television rule. They’d be going home the next morning, all healthy, no bacterial growth on the myriad of cultures done on every accessible body fluid and tissue. Local news interrupted normal programming to announce that police had found a body in the driver’s seat of a panel truck pulled off a side road leading to the Middle Georgia Regional Airport near Macon.

  An off-duty flight attendant had noticed the van both coming and going on his commute on two consecutive days. He decided to take a look and persevered despite the intense odor emanating from the truck. Inside he saw a grotesque, melting body. He did not touch the truck; alerted, like everyone, by round-the-clock news about the deadly, flesh-eating staph. He’d pooh-poohed the coverage as hype, but now, he told reporters, it might have saved his life. On camera, the flight attendant described the body. In fact, the staph had liquefied all flesh and muscle, exposing elements of a slimy skeleton.