“Super parasite meets super bug,” said Eddie.
“Dio!” said Izabel. “You must spray and spray more!”
“We are,” Chris said, “but sprays lose strength with sunlight and time. Just twenty-four hours after you spray, the chemicals begin breaking down. Plus, we’ve only got a limited supply of pesticide, you understand.”
“So even if you spray widely…”
“The only way we stop this for sure is to catch whoever is spreading it.”
“Meanwhile, every day the death toll will rise.”
In the heavy silence, Gaines’s eyes shifted left, and I saw that on-screen all eyes were also swiveling. Ray’s tech staff must have put through the appropriate relays. Our on-screen boxes shrank to make room for a new one, live TV. The President was back, in the White House briefing room.
BREAKING NEWS. TERRORIST CAMP DESTROYED.
Eddie gasped a moment later. “Hey! That’s us, Uno!”
It was us, all right, in a shot taken over a year ago, at the awards ceremony at the White House. A happier occasion, as the Chief Exec handed me a Presidential Medal of Freedom. Eddie and Aya received them on that day, too, for our role in the Harlan Maas case.
The President was saying, “A joint raid by U.S. agents and our Brazilian allies destroyed the terrorist camp and laboratory in the jungle. It is now clear that the outbreak here of this new, fatal malaria came from that lab.”
“Guess they couldn’t cover it up anymore,” Eddie said.
“Your ‘ally’ wants to hear. Be quiet,” growled Izabel.
The President said, as a shot of Eddie and me in our old Marine fatigues appeared, “Two former Marine officers — working closely with the FBI — coordinated the assault.”
Izabel guffawed. Ray seemed frozen.
The President said, “We will build on this success. We will hunt down and destroy any person or group behind this heinous attack. And although we are confident that we have eliminated ninety-nine percent of the enemy supply, it remains possible that a few deranged jihadists are still in the U.S. The national terrorism alert remains at red. I’m asking all federal, state, and local agencies to cooperate in the hunt for those responsible. This cowardly assault on American freedoms will not stand!”
“Working with the FBI?” said Eddie. “So that’s what we were doing down there!”
The President said, “Colonel Rush and his team are at this moment returning to the country to remain an active part of the investigation, headed by the FBI. This group has all my confidence. They will help bring a swift, successful conclusion to this emergency.”
Ray’s expression was priceless. He was the one ambushed for a change. By elevating Eddie and me onto national radar, the President had just robbed Ray of his cherished control. Ray would stay in charge of the work. But not of us.
Eddie looked torn between anger that, as usual, we’d not been consulted before an announcement, and glee that Ray was pissed off. A power shift had just happened.
“You are that important?” Izabel said, staring at me.
I knew that like Presidents Clinton and Reagan, our current leader was famed for his off-the-cuff decisions. Late-night TV comedians sometimes showed diagrams labeled PRESIDENT’S BRAIN, presenting new ideas as just-formed balloons in his cerebellum, and shooting out of his mouth at the same time. Gaines looked surprised but pleased.
“Colonel Rush is at this moment on his way to Washington, for consultation,” the President said as Eddie scribbled a note to me.
Izabel said shrewdly, “Ah! Now I see! He makes you a scapegoat if things go wrong! Just like back home.”
Eddie smirked. “Hey, Ray, Joe likes his coffee black with sugar. You better stay on his good side.”
Izabel remarked, “What is the expression? Out of the frying pan, into the microwave oven?”
“Something like that.”
I watched Ray’s face. It was completely neutral again. I told Ray that instead of going to Washington, my “team” preferred to head straight into the heart of the outbreak, New York City. Now.
“Joe, I understand that you feel that way, but a lot of important people want to meet with you.”
And you want to keep them happy, and me away from the investigation, telling the same story again and again.
“New York, Ray.”
He smiled. He had to be seething inside. He listed the VIPs who I was supposed to be sidelined with, talking to. “White House. Senate Committee on Bioterror. Your story needs to be told so—”
So you get credit, which is fine if you end this thing. But you made mistakes in Brazil, and you could make more.
I told him, firmly, “We’ll set up shop at Columbia University. We’ve got Wilderness Med there already, a whole unit trained in work in austere environments. Let us do what we’re good at: tracking disease to a source.”
“Not Aya,” Chris broke in. “I brought her back to Washington. I won’t have her in the middle of an outbreak. She’s sixteen. I don’t care if some medicines work. She’s out.”
“Of course. I didn’t mean Aya,” I said, backpedaling and knowing to never get between a protective mom and her teenage daughter. “Aya can help out over the phone, on her computer. From a safe distance.”
“That is what I told her,” Chris said, steel in her voice. “That is what you will tell her, too.”
Stalemate. Ray saw I would not budge, and that further resistance would demean him. “I suppose,” he offered, trying to limit damage, “we can fold you into one of our local groups. That might work.”
“We stay on our own,” Eddie growled.
Ray had to be agonizingly aware that Chris was watching. And not supporting him. She’s staring down at her desk, as if embarrassed for him, or disagreeing with him.
And then it hit me. Someone must have gone to the President in order for pressure to be applied to get Eddie and me out of Brazil. Ray didn’t have the clout. Or inclination. But I remembered now that Aya had told me when Eddie first disappeared that she was going to ask Chris for help. Ray’s future adoptive daughter and his fiancée may have teamed up to torpedo him, and he probably knew it. Chris had direct access to the White House.
Eddie’s eyes met mine. He saw it, too. Aya? Go girl!
Chris was tough and smart and had never let the frustrating history between us interfere with her professional judgment. Had Ray and Chris argued over us? Chris was hot-tempered. If she discovered that Ray had sent us down there and not backed us up, she would have been furious enough, if she thought we were in peril, to go over her fiancé’s head.
If that’s the case, there will be fireworks in your house tonight, Ray. Blood on the walls.
Ray made one last try to keep me out. “Joe, you know as well as I do that good communication is the cornerstone of any investigation. You can be an invaluable liaison with…”
“It’s personal,” I snapped.
“Yes, personal,” Izabel Santo underlined, half out of her chair, staring into the screen as if into Ray’s eyes.
The word personal hung there. To anyone else present, it seemed as if we meant that we had a personal grudge against whoever had hurt Eddie and Sublieutenant Salazar. But Ray knew that personal included the threat to break my unspoken agreement to protect him. Stick me in meetings at your own peril! Who knows what I might say?