Placebo (10 page)

Communication of neural linguistic information.

Now she wasn't so sure that was all the study concerned.

Riah draped her necklace around her neck.

Began to brush her hair.

She might've felt used by Cyrus and the twins, might've felt that her research was part of a big picture that she'd never been told about, and that was essentially true, but to a certain degree that was true about all the research at the R&D facility.

After all, the financial implications of an information leak were so devastating that just like in any sensitive government or private-sector medical research project, nearly all the researchers at RixoTray did their work strictly on a need-to-know basis. Progress was more often than not about one person piggybacking on the work of another to answer a question neither of them fully understood.

After the discussion about the center in Oregon, the conversation had shifted away from the Lawson Center's research, and Darren turned to Cyrus. “I was told you have the video.”

“Not yet. But I will. Tomorrow. A courier will be delivering it.”

Daniel addressed Riah: “When you see the video, you'll know what we mean. What the research concerns.”

“Kabul?” she asked, referring back to what he'd mentioned earlier in the evening, when she and Cyrus first met up with them.

“Yes.” Darren sounded pleased that she'd made the connection.

After that they discussed her findings at length, and it was almost as if she was the one who'd been brought in to do the briefing, even though she was the only person there who hadn't prepared for it at all.

Honestly, Riah didn't understand why the twins' conversation with Cyrus couldn't have all happened over the phone, but apparently they
were the ones who'd called for the meeting, and their motives were not always easy to decipher.

At last when Cyrus stood to go, Darren had asked him, “So tomorrow, the video. What time will it arrive?”

“In the afternoon. Sometime between five and six.”

“We'll see you at six then. In your office. And we would like Riah to be present as well.”

A pause. “Alright.”

“Williamson will be there?”

“She won't land in Philadelphia until six thirty. She's coming in at seven.”

“Well, let's come at seven then too, so we can watch it together, make sure we're all on the same page. Everything happens when the president—”

“I know when it all happens.” Cyrus was looking at Riah, and she understood that he was cutting off Darren to keep something from her.

“Alright,” Daniel said. “So, seven?”

“Yes,” Cyrus said coolly. “Seven.”

So now, Riah decided to start an online search of journal articles concerning the findings of the center in Oregon. Even though she had until this evening to look into things, if the research was anywhere near as complex and detailed as hers, it might take at least that long to sift through it all.

She put on a pot of coffee, positioned herself in front of her computer. And began to type.

I'm anxious to get started with the study, anxious to get moving. But still, my early morning walk had left me famished, and I was glad there was a substantial breakfast laid out for us.

Now we're almost done. Charlene is finishing her plate of fruit, and I slide my empty bowl of oatmeal aside, then polish off the last of my cheese-smothered hash browns. “Too bad Xavier isn't here. I have to say, this food is amazing.”

“By the way, what's the deal with him and cheese anyway?” She's looking at the smear of melted cheddar cheese left on my plate.

I shake my head. “I have no idea. About a month ago he just started eating it in some form every couple hours.”

“That's so random.”

“That's so Xavier.”

“Good point.”

The dining hall has nearly a hundred people in it, but since there'll only be ten or eleven couples in the study, the rest of the retreatants must be here for the yoga and centering conference that's going on at the same time on the other side of campus.

I gaze around, curious if the man who attacked us last night might be here. I hadn't seen his face well enough to identify him, so the only
way I could hope to find him is by his limp, especially if he was limping
and
missing a watch.

From what I can see, there's no one here who fits the bill.

After dropping off our trays at the cafeteria's conveyor belt to the kitchen, Charlene and I cross the campus toward the Prana building.

The quiet fog hovers around us, and it reminds me again of my dreams, my family, of that day at the shore when I watched the divers bring up the bodies.

Fog.

And a chill.

And a cloud-covered sky.

And the terrible questions that have never gone away.

Why, Rachel? Why did you do it? Why did you kill my boys? Why did you kill yourself?

Perhaps the timing is coincidental, but Charlene reaches for my hand, and it seems like she's reading my mind and trying to reassure me, but in this case I don't hold on. It's almost like I want to dwell in my pain for a while alone.

Yesterday Xavier told me that there're always going to be holes in my heart in the shape of my wife, in the shape of my sons. Now his words come back to me: “Stop feeding your pain and it'll dissipate.”

But maybe I don't want it to dissipate. Maybe I want it to cling to me, to remind me that if only I'd been more astute and attentive—if only I'd noticed what was going on in Rachel's heart or what was troubling her so much that death seemed like the only option, if only I'd been able to see her desperation—maybe I could've intervened and stopped things before they went as far as they did.

But I had not.

And it had happened.

And now she is dead and so are my sons.

Charlene doesn't say anything, and even though she isn't moving any farther away from me, I sense the distance between us grow slightly wider.

We enter the small retreat center that Serenity had told us was named after the Hindu word meaning “life-sustaining force.” The reception desk is empty, but I tap a set of chimes hanging beside it and hear a male voice call from the back room that he'll be with us in just a moment.

As I think of a life-sustaining force, I have to admit that it sounds like something I could really use, but I also can't help but think of the
Star Wars
movies: “May the Force be with you.” I'm not sure what I believe about unseen forces altering the universe, but gravity and magnetism seem to do alright, and even when you're in the debunking business, you have to keep an open mind.

However, disappointingly, George Lucas killed the whole Force idea in
Episode 1
when Qui-Gon Jinn referenced a connection with the Force depending on your midi-chlorian count. In the end even Lucas shied away from allowing the unexplainable to remain unexplained and came up with a scientific reason for why some people rather than others could live more in tune with the Force.

It was more scientific-sounding this way, of course, but from a storytelling perspective, a lot less satisfying.

Prana.

A life-sustaining force.

“Hope” would be a better name for it, for the force that really sustains us.

My thoughts cycle through my dreams and then land back in this moment.

The reception room is adorned with well-coordinated earth-tone furniture, a small conference table, and windows that offer a broad view of the fir and pine forest that stretches out of sight in the ethereal, otherworldly fog that has engulfed the campus.

When we were preparing for this assignment, I'd anticipated that Dr. Tanbyrn would do a general briefing this morning with all the couples who'd be taking the test today, but no one else is here. As I consider that, a man with thick 1970s sideburns emerges from the back and
introduces himself as Philip, a grad student from Berkeley who was “honored to be one of the great Dr. Tanbyrn's research assistants.”

“Brent Berlin,” I tell him, using the name I'd registered under here at the center. “And this is Jennie Reynolds.”

We shake hands, then he gestures toward three of the chairs.

“Have a seat. Let's get started.”

Glenn Banner was high.

It helped with the pain, but it made his thoughts curl around each other in odd ways, as if they were made of elegant colors all dancing across the needles of discomfort that bristled up his leg.

That's what he thought of as he sat in his motel room and sharpened his knife: dancing pain.

Did he feel the stab wound in his quadriceps?

In the sense of pressure, of a tingling sensation, yes—but did he feel it as acutely as he should have for a deep-muscle puncture wound like that? Absolutely not.

Drugs can be wonderful things.

Still, he couldn't help but think that he should've gone after that man and woman last night. Should have killed them both and then gotten photos of their bodies to remember the night. Act on his impulses.

But what's done is done. You can't change the past.

But you didn't find what you were looking for either. You didn't find the files.

No, he hadn't.

Leaving right after he'd been stabbed had meant not having the opportunity to find the information he'd gone in there looking for, the data he'd planned to use against his employer to pick up a little extra cash.

The information he was interested in concerned the military's involvement in the study. The connections were still fuzzy, but while researching his employer before taking this job, he'd come across
evidence of meetings between him and Undersecretary of Defense Oriana Williamson, as well as mentions of Project Alpha, which included amorphous references to two men, “L” and “N,” whose existence—let alone identity—Glenn hadn't been able to confirm.

Since early this morning, he'd been trying to reach the man who'd hired him, but so far had been unsuccessful.

The guy just wouldn't answer his phone.

Glenn tried the number again.

Nothing.

It was supposed to've been an easy gig: take out an old man who didn't have long to live anyway, pick up the payment, buy some little gift for his daughter, Mary Beth, in order to keep up the appearance that he loved her, then get back to Seattle and blackmail the guy who'd hired him.

But now everything had gotten more complicated.

Glenn had been wounded, had failed to dig up the dirt he wanted to find on his employer, and had ended up with two special people he wanted to pay a visit to.

He tried to shift his focus to the task he needed to accomplish today.

Killing the doctor.

Honestly, he had no idea why the old man needed to die, but he doubted it was revenge, which left the most common reason you would hire someone like Glenn—the guy knew something he was not supposed to know.

Perhaps something to do with Akinsanya, the man who seemed to be behind everything? The one who'd connected his employer with him in the first place?

Glenn wasn't sure.

It was too much to think about.

He closed his eyes and disappeared into the swirl of euphoria and irritation and adrenaline that the wound and the OxyContin gave him.

Dancing pain.

After a long moment he drew in a breath that seemed to be made
of liquid air, opened his eyes, collected himself, and pulled out the manila folder his employer had given him, then flipped through the sheaf of papers until he came to the doctor's schedule.

Personally, he would've preferred taking care of the old geezer this morning while he was asleep in his cabin, get the photo of the body, and get out, but for whatever reason the man who'd hired him wanted it done this afternoon at three, during the doctor's office hours.

Just another odd demand in a series of odd demands. This guy was obviously used to micromanaging his people, and Glenn did not like being micromanaged.

He was tempted to leave a message that he was going to take care of this assignment on his own time frame, in his own way. But admittedly that might not be the most prudent way to get paid, so although it was tempting, Glenn decided to stick to the original plan.

Three o'clock this afternoon.

Tanbyrn's schedule: the doc would begin the day at his cabin, get breakfast at the dining hall, head to the Prana building for a meeting with the people in his research study, then spend the rest of the morning and the early afternoon working with them before heading to his office from two to six.

Where he would die.

At three.

Yes, there might be other people in the building, but the place had a state-of-the-art design, and considering the method Glenn was leaning toward in regards to taking out the doctor, he was sure that collateral damage wouldn't be a problem.

Well, okay, not
sure
, but at least
reasonably
sure.

Glenn tried the guy's number again.

Still nothing.

Alright. Enough.

He'd gotten a pretty good look at the couple in the chamber, and he didn't figure it would be that hard to hack into the LRC's computer files, see if they showed up on any surveillance footage, see if—

So then why'd you even go there last night, Einstein? If you could've just hacked in? Why did—?

The anger he was feeling at himself was eclipsed by the subtle shift in the way he was experiencing his limbs, his legs, his hands, the stab wound in his thigh.

It felt like the drugs were beginning to wear off. He was tempted to take more OxyContin but was hesitant to do so. He needed to be on top of his game today.

Focus.

See if you can find the files, then find out who those two people are.

Start with the staff and current retreatants—that shouldn't take too long—then move out from there.

Focus.

He went to find his laptop to see if he could hack into the Lawson Research Center's video surveillance archives. To find this couple he'd decided to kill for free.

A little pro bono work.

Two photos to add to his collection.