3rd Degree - James Patterson [52]
A jolt of rage tensed me. It looked like a flattened .22. Caked with specks of Jill’s blood.
“Something doesn’t fit,” Claire said, puzzled. She looked up at me. “This area ought to be covered in spinal fluid. No swelling of the brain tissue, very little blood.”
Suddenly, Claire the professional clicked in. “I’m going to open up the chest cavity,” she spoke into the mike. “Lindsay, look away.”
“What’s wrong, Claire? What’s going on?”
“Something’s not right.” Claire rolled the body over, took out a scalpel. Then she slipped the blade down a straight line from the top of Jill’s chest.
I did avert my eyes. I didn’t want to see Jill like that. “I’m doing a standard sternotomy,” Claire dictated into the mike. “Opening up the pneumo chest area. Lung membrane is soft, tissue… degraded, soupy… I’m exposing the pericardium now….” I heard Claire take a deep breath. “Shit.”
My heart started racing. I was fixed on the screen now. “Claire, what’s going on? What do you see?”
“Stay there.” She put up a hand. She had seen something horrible. What was it?
“Oh, Lindsay,” she whispered, and finally looked at me. “Jill didn’t die from a gunshot.”
“What!”
“The lack of swelling, blood seepage.” She shook her head. “The gunshot was delivered after she was dead.”
“What are you saying, Claire?”
“I’m not sure”—she looked up—“but if I had to guess… I’d say ricin.”
Chapter 70
THERE WAS ALWAYS something intimidating about meeting Charles Danko in person. Even at a fancy place like the Huntington Hotel in San Francisco. Danko fit in anywhere. He was wearing a tweed jacket, pinstriped shirt, and a rep tie.
There was a girl with him, pretty, with a tangle of bright red hair. He always liked to keep you off guard. Who is she?
Mal had been told to wear a suit jacket and even a tie, if he could dig one up. He had, and he found it kind of funny—bright red with tiny bugles in the design.
Danko stood rather formally and shook Mal’s hand, just another of his odd off-putting gestures. He waved a hand around the dining room. “Could there be a safer place for us to meet? My Gawd, the Huntington!”
He looked at the girl and they both laughed, but he didn’t introduce her.
“Ricin,” Malcolm said, “it’s brilliant. What a great day—we got Bengosian! We can do so much damage here. Hell, we could wipe out this capitalist den in about a minute flat. Go over to the Mark and take out another hundred rich bloodsuckers. Take the trolley and spring death on anybody we passed.”
“Yes, especially because I figured how to make it as a concentrate.”
Malcolm nodded, but he looked nervous. “I thought this was about G-8?”
Danko looked at the girl again. They shared condescending smiles. Who the hell is she? What does she know?
“Your focus is too narrow, Mal. We’ve talked about that before. More than anything else, this is about terrifying people. And we’re going to scare them, believe me. Ricin will do the trick. Makes anthrax look like something only farm animals should fret about.”
He stared hard at Malcolm now. “You have a delivery system for me? For the ricin?”
Malcolm had stopped making eye contact. “Yeah.”
“And more of your explosives?”
“We could blow the Huntington right off the map. The Mark, too.” Malcolm finally allowed himself a sheepish smile. “All right, who is she?”
Danko threw back his head and laughed. “She’s someone brilliant, just like you. She’s a secret weapon. Let’s leave it at that. Just another soldier,” he said, then looked into the girl’s eyes. “There’s always another soldier, Malcolm. That’s what should be scaring the hell out of everybody right now.”
Chapter 71
MICHELLE HEARD VOICES in the other room. Mal was back from his meeting. Julia was whooping it up as if she’d won the lottery. But Michelle felt awful.
She knew they had done terrible things. The latest killing didn’t sit well with her. That pretty, innocent D.A. She had put aside the image of Charlotte Lightower