"What were you telling that policeman?"
"Nothing important."
"You two were talking and seemed to be enjoying yourselves."
"I just told him a couple of jokes "
Chapter Forty-Two
Faas did not get sick.
He didn't take care of himself, either. But he didn't get I just want to crawl in bed and die sick. He couldn't ignore the feeling of pressure just above his rib cage anymore, though. There were no more medications in the house for him to take. What he'd taken had no effect. He was starting to think it wouldn't have mattered if Betty had left an entire pharmacy for him.
He was sitting on the edge of the bed. He couldn't bring himself to lie down. There was something wrong with his breathing. It hurt when he took a full breath, as if he had a broken rib.
He grabbed the phone. It was getting light outside. He looked at the clock — 5:13. He figured on a Monday morning Betty was lying in bed but awake. Probably just getting ready to get up. In their twenty-two years of marriage, she'd always been an early riser.
He was happy when she answered right away.
"Faas?" she asked before he said anything.
"Morning," he said.
"I was sleeping."
"Sorry. I didn't know who else to call."
"What's wrong?"
What was wrong? he asked himself. He'd screwed up his marriage, that's what was wrong. They'd been divorced for eight months now, and he missed her. He missed having a house full of his kids and their teenage friends. He missed the smell of something always in the oven. He missed Betty's smell. He missed the way she talked to him like he was one of the kids. The way she looked after him, took care of him, snuggled against him… no matter how late he got home and crawled into bed.
"I'm going through remorse," he managed to say. He tried to lean back against the headboard. The pain was bad. It was spreading to his shoulders, neck, jaw.
"I couldn't take it anymore," she told him for the umpteenth time. "If I'm going to raise our kids alone, I might as well be a single parent."
She was right. His job was demanding. But during the times between crises, he'd taken advantage of her. Baseball games with his friends, poker, golf and fishing trips. There had always been opportunities to do things without his family. He'd been stupid. He'd taken advantage.
They had four children, from eleven to seventeen. When Betty had asked for a divorce, there hadn't been any question who the kids wanted to live with.
"Are you still there?" she asked. "I'm here," he said.
"I'm going back to sleep," she told him. He nodded. It hurt too much to talk. She didn't hang up. A few seconds of silence went by. "Are you okay, Faas?" she asked gently. "I think… I think I'm dying, Betty." The phone slipped through his fingers to the floor. Faas slid from the edge of the bed and hit the floor hard.
Chapter Forty-Three
David's frustration was growing with every person he spoke to.
The nurse on his floor looked at him like he'd lost his mind, but she said she'd pass the information on to one of the doctors. The 911 call had been useless. They'd taken his name and number and said someone would get back to him. He'd tried a direct number to the police station. Also a waste. He'd been put on hold for so long that he'd hung up. He'd tried the special emergency response numbers. All circuits were too busy. Tried 911 again. No use.
He wasn't a hundred percent certain that the Strep-Tester itself was the cause of the spread of the NFI disease, but this couldn't be a coincidence, either. There were a total of five hundred of these samples that had gone out. He wished he had the breakdown of where every one of those testers had gone.
David felt the blood drain out of his face. The ten thousand Strep-Testers were being released this morning.
"Shit." David looked at the clock. It was 6:20 a.m. No one would be in the office yet. He called the number, anyway, leaving detailed instructions for his secretary to call every regional sales manager as soon as she got in. He'd do it himself if he had their home numbers with him. They had to stop the distribution of those testers.
As soon as he hung up, he realized he might not have been too coherent. He called back, and this time directed her to call him at the hospital if she didn't understand what needed to be done. He made it perfectly clear that it was urgent.
One of the nurses going by gave him a nervous look.
"Can you get hospital security for me?" David asked her.
"No, I can't," she replied. "This wing is under quarantine. Nobody is allowed to go in and out of here… and that includes the staff."
She disappeared inside one of the rooms before he had a chance to argue.
David found himself staring at the clock again. The first five hundred pieces had been intended to wave in front of the clientele's face. Some of those testers were probably still sitting in reps' briefcases. And medicine cabinets.
He wasn't the only one who would be checking e-mail this morning. Rushing back to the computer, he quickly began to hammer out an e-mail for mass distribution to the employees. His fingers paused over the keyboard. He couldn't make a statement that might be wrong and destroy the future of the product. He was only going on a hunch. Less than a handful of deaths that might actually be a coincidence. He rewrote the e-mail, directing the sales force not to distribute or use any more of the Strep-Testers until further notice.
He could already be too late, though, David thought. They weren't too much of an "on-time" company. The pieces could have gone out Friday and already be in the hands of the consumers.
In panic, he remembered the two Strep-Testers he'd given Jamie and Kate. He dialed his wife's cell phone again. The recorded message came on that all circuits were busy. David dialed his daughter's number. The same thing. Suddenly, no cell service was going through.
The feeling of helplessness washing through him was cold and numbing. But he'd been here before, David told himself. This was the same feeling he'd experienced when the doctors had told him and Sally that Josh had cancer.
Reading about so many other children like Josh and hearing their stories had provided a turning point for him. There was power in knowing that they weren't going through that crisis alone.
Knowledge was power then, he reminded himself, and knowledge is power now.
David's fingers flew over the keyboard. He e-mailed his daughters first. They were from the generation of PC junkies. They checked their e-mail more times during the day than anything else. He then started a search on who was running the NFI investigation. There was no point in chasing his tail at the bottom of the ladder. He had to go to the top, and the Internet was magic. He had the name in less than one minute.
Faas Hanlon.
Chapter Forty-Four
There were nine regional hospitals tied into Kerrnanshah University of Medical Sciences. Taleghani Hospital was one of their smallest, but it was the best. Fahimah had heard this much from her cousin Ashraf.
The van that had met them at the airport reached the hospital and pulled up to the front door of the 1970s-era brick building. They both thanked the driver and got out.
Fahimah's nerves were getting the best of her. She could feel her knees shaking. Putting one foot in front of the other was a major feat.
"Your cousin mentioned that Rahaf was being kept sedated," Austyn reminded her. He had grown serious the moment they'd left the airport.
Fahimah nodded. She would have to be happy with whatever time she got with Rahaf, even if it were only a chance to look at her. To touch her hand, her face.