Nowhere to Run Read online

  She smiled and shook her head as she watched Thomas raise his thumb to his mouth in sleep. During the day, her son was trying so hard to break the habit, but he was addicted to the comfort of it. In the whole scheme of things, what did it really matter, she asked herself, watching his gullet move beneath the soft skin of his throat as he sucked. He would give it up when he was ready to give it up. As a matter of fact, sometimes she felt like crawling under the covers and sucking her thumb herself. But she couldn’t. Thomas and Tara needed at least one parent who was acting like one.

  She hated herself for the resentment she had been feeling lately. At first, she had been understanding of and sympathetic to Mike’s uncharacteristic dark moods and long, chilly silences. After what he had been through, it was all too predictable that he’d shut down. He’d been there, seen it, lost close friends, and attended too many funerals to count. The ghosts of the dead hovered in the firehouse.

  But his depression had been going on for too long now. Though Mike was dutifully attending his mandatory counseling sessions, “cuckoo time” he called it, Annabelle didn’t see any improvement. He didn’t want to leave the apartment, didn’t want to ride an elevator, shuddered when he heard an airplane fly overhead. What hurt her most was observing his lack of interest in the children and seeing the puzzled, hurt expressions on their faces when Daddy refused to give them their baths or read them a favorite bedtime story. It fell on Annabelle to plug all the parental gaps and explain to the twins that, while Daddy wasn’t feeling well now, he would surely be better soon, soothing them as she tried to convince herself.

  She hoped the medication would kick in soon. It had been over two weeks since Mike had started on the new prescription. There had been no change Annabelle could observe.

  She bent down and touched her daughter’s thin shoulder. Tara’s round, blue eyes popped open. The child was disoriented for only a moment, quickly recognizing her mother’s face and taking in her surroundings. She sat upright, brushing her fine, tangled brown hair back from her forehead, and reached for the cardboard shoe box she had carefully placed at the foot of the twin bed the night before.

  “There it is, honey. All set for show-and-tell today.”

  “Good,” said the child, opening the lid and inspecting the contents, as she had so many times before going to sleep last night.

  “You did a beautiful job on those, Tara, you really did.” Annabelle reached in to take one of the painted leaves from the box. As she examined it, she uttered a silent prayer of thanks that Mrs. Nuzzo had taken the kids to the playground yesterday afternoon, scouring it for the dried leaves and then supervising the painting activities. Every Thursday’s show-and-tell got to be a real challenge for the parents, coming up with something new for the kids to bring in to share with the first-grade class. Annabelle had been relieved when she got home late from work the night before that this was one parental task she was being spared. Yet another part of her was envious of Mrs. Nuzzo. Gathering leaves with her children and sitting at the kitchen table to decorate them sounded exceedingly sweet.

  “Thomas, big guy, time to get up.” The boy pulled his thumb from his mouth and clamped his eyelids shut. “Come on, Thomas. If you get up right away, we’ll have time to have French toast,” Annabelle cajoled. “Otherwise it’s Cheerios again.”

  “And sausage?” the child asked, keeping his eyes closed.

  Annabelle fought the temptation to lie to him as an incentive to get him out of bed. “No, honey, sausage is for the weekend. But the French toast will be all nice and warm and syrupy. Just the way you like it. Come on now, get up.”

  The child gave in to the inevitable, swinging his pajama-clad legs over the side of his bed and pulling his knit Spider Man–emblazoned top over his head. Annabelle left the kids to dress themselves in the clothes they had laid out the night before as she heard Constance Young’s voice coming from the TV in the living room.

  Blond, expertly made up, and dressed in an electric blue suit, Constance was looking great again this morning. Annabelle was proud of the friend she had made in her first life at KEY News, when they’d both been starting out, Annabelle as a researcher and Constance as a young reporter. Constance had stayed the course, covering long stakeouts, volunteering for the stories none of the seasoned correspondents wanted to do, paying her dues. While Annabelle was home with her kids, Constance had devoted herself to her professional passion. Now she was cohosting the nation’s highly rated morning program and making seven figures a year. Constance was beautiful, smart, successful, and unhateable because she was such a damned nice person.

  If not for Constance, Annabelle doubted that she would be working at KEY News again. It was Constance who, upon hearing what was going on with Annabelle, put in the good word to the executive producer Linus Nazareth to hire her. Annabelle knew the producer had no use for mommy trackers, and she was sure Nazareth had decided to take her on just to keep his popular star happy. If Constance Young wanted Annabelle, then Annabelle was in.

  Annabelle had been working her tail off to prove herself and satisfy Nazareth’s latest ringing directive to “make bioterrorism sexy. Seduce me. Tell me why I should care and what I can do to save myself. Keep me and all the mommies at home riveted to our television sets lest our babies lose their lives.” With those twisted marching orders, Annabelle had been forced to become all too knowledgeable about botulism, smallpox, tularemia, and plague.

  As she cracked eggs over the rim of a stainless-steel mixing bowl, Annabelle listened to Constance’s introduction.

  “Now, in our continuing series ‘What you need to know about bioterrorism,’ KEY News Medical Correspondent Dr. John Lee reports this morning on anthrax. You may be surprised at what he’s found.”

  Annabelle turned to watch as the videotape rolled and a cluster of rod-shaped bacteria lit up the television screen.

  “Anthrax is the perfect killer, invisible and silent,” began Dr. Lee’s smooth voice. “But actually anthrax is a livestock disease and, usually, humans contract it through contact with diseased animals or their hides.”

  The image on the television switched to a medical textbook picture of an ugly, black scab on a human hand.

  “Though anthrax spores can be ingested if infected livestock is eaten, most human infection, ninety-five percent of it, is through skin contact—what we call cutaneous anthrax. A small pimple or ulcer grows into a coal-like lesion. In fact, anthrax got its name because an infection looks like anthracite or coal. The good news is, while potentially deadly, cutaneous anthrax is highly treatable with antibiotics.

  “But by far the deadliest form of anthrax is inhalation anthrax. Once someone has breathed anthrax spores into their lungs, flulike symptoms will appear. A fever, cough, body aches—symptoms that don’t normally send you running to the doctor. But if there is no aggressive antibiotic treatment, the fever will elevate, breathing will become labored, and the body will go into shock.”

  The doctor Annabelle had interviewed the week before at New York Hospital was identified on the screen and offered his expertise: “When this severe stage sets in, it is almost always too late for a cure.”

  Now, Lee appeared on the screen and began walking through a laboratory. “But anthrax, as it exists in nature, is not the perfect weapon. Purifying and concentrating the anthrax spores and weaponizing them, causing those purified spores to separate so they can linger in the air and be inhaled, requires real laboratory skill. There is no way to account for all the anthrax strains that exist. Hundreds of scientists and technicians can get ahold of anthrax, and they know how to weaponize it.”

  The medical correspondent paused to rest his hand on a piece of machinery on the lab bench. “One of the steps in making the powdered, airy form of anthrax is freeze-drying the spores. A tabletop freeze dryer can be purchased for under eight thousand dollars. So you see, the notion that only a state-sponsored biological weapons program could produce weapons-grade anthrax is a misconception.”

 
As the report ended, Thomas came out of the bedroom, shoes in hand. Annabelle bent down to tie his sneaker but looked up in time to catch Dr. Lee, live on the set, holding up a tiny vial of white powder.

  “Constance, we’d all like to think that anthrax is so dangerous, so deadly, that it must be well guarded, impossible, we hope, for anyone with evil intentions to get his hands on. But what I have here is a test tube containing weapons-grade anthrax. I can’t tell you how I got it, but if I could get it, so could other people. This is a weapon you can use and you can hide.”

  Annabelle watched openmouthed, not believing what she was seeing. The camera closed in on the vial, then pulled back to Constance, who shrank back in her seat across from the medical correspondent.

  “What’s wrong, Mommy?” asked Thomas.

  “Nothing, sweetie. But Daddy is going to have to get up and walk you guys to school this morning. Mommy has to get in to work.”

  Chapter 2

  The president of KEY News sat at her kitchen table, drinking her second cup of black coffee and scanning the OpEd page of The New York Times while keeping an ear on the television set playing in the background.

  “…What I have here is a test tube containing weapons-grade anthrax. I can’t tell you how I got it, but if I could get it, so could other people.”

  Yelena Gregory’s head whipped around to view the medical correspondent proudly displaying his booty. Linus had gone too far this time. She grabbed the telephone and punched in the numbers of the Broadcast Center control room.

  “Gregory for Nazareth,” she barked. It took three seconds for the executive producer to get on the line.

  “Linus, damn it, what’s going on? Why wasn’t I informed about this?” she demanded.

  “Don’t worry, Yelena. Don’t worry. We have everything under control here.”

  “So that means you approved this?”

  There was a momentary pause on the line as the executive producer pondered his response.

  “Linus?” Her anger grew as she watched the diaper commercial that was playing on the screen. That’s nice. Real nice. All those mothers at home, scared out of their wits that any nut could get ahold of a tube of anthrax. The diaper company sponsor should love having its commercial airing right after this piece of happy news.

  “No, I didn’t know Lee was going to do this, Yelena,” he answered.

  “Then you don’t have everything under control, do you, Linus?”

  “Yelena, I think you’re overreacting.”

  “Oh you do, do you? That’s rich. Do you have any idea the headaches this is going to cause? The police and feds are not going to be amused at our antics with a weapon of mass destruction, and our employees are going to freak out with worry that they’ve been exposed to spores of death. But that’s nice, Linus, I’m overreacting.”

  Linus was calm. “I’m sure Legal can deal with the cops and the feds, and everyone at the Broadcast Center will take their cue from you, Yelena. If you reassure them that they are in no danger, that will go a long way.”

  “I’m glad you know what I have to do to clean up your mess, Linus. That’s mighty smart of you.” Yelena knocked over her coffee cup, its contents spilling across the newspaper. “Who the hell was the producer on this segment anyway?”

  “Annabelle Murphy.”

  “Did she know about this?”

  “I don’t think so. At least she never told me about it.”

  “Well, she should have.”

  Chapter 3

  Clara Romanski lay beneath her soft handmade quilt, trying to concentrate on the television as a distraction from how miserable she was feeling. The fever was getting worse. But it would pass, surely it would pass. Her immune system wasn’t all it should be. She could count on getting sick several times over the winter months. Cleaning all those houses and being exposed to everybody’s germs contributed to her illnesses, but she had no choice. She had to make a living somehow.

  Actually, she liked all her jobs. The people she cleaned for were usually at their own jobs and their children were in school when she came to vacuum, dust, and polish their homes. She could work at her own speed, with no one watching over her shoulder. It suited her just fine.

  Sometimes, though, as she iced her sore back or sat in a hot tub at night to warm the ache out of her bones, she wondered how long she could go on doing housework. After all, she was fifty-eight years old. But with no husband or children and no Social Security to look forward to, she had to depend on her savings to support her in her old age. She took any extra work she could get to add money to her retirement account.

  Last week, she had overdone it. Now she was paying for it. Yes, that was it. She’d taken on three extra cleaning jobs, shifting her schedule around to fit them all in. By the time she got to Mr. Henning’s house on Saturday, she had been exhausted. Fortunately, the bachelor was quite neat and there wasn’t much to do at his place compared with the other houses, the ones with children. Mr. Henning was fastidious. She’d noticed he even threw out his birthday cards right away, not keeping them propped up on a table for weeks as she would. She found several cards on top of the kitchen trash, and another one in the basket near his desk. That one had been messy; tiny silver confetti sprinkled out when she opened it to see who it was from.

  It was nice to think that Mr. Henning had a secret admirer. He should be married with a family of his own. After all, Mr. Henning had a good job. He worked at KEY News, deciding which authors and books were featured on the network’s morning program. Clara liked to watch KEY to America to see if she’d spot his name on the credits at the end of the show. But this morning’s show was too depressing. All this talk about anthrax and weapons of mass destruction only made her feel worse.

  She pushed herself up to turn off the television set but sank back against the pillow, her breathing labored. Clara worried about all the work she was missing as she sank into unconsciousness.

  Chapter 4

  As Annabelle approached the Broadcast Center, lights flashed from the large blue-and-white HAZMAT truck and the police squad cars that were parked at the curb. Annabelle flashed her KEY ID to get past the bright yellow police tape that cordoned off the sidewalk.

  “Is it all right to go inside?” she asked the uniformed officer who guarded the heavy revolving door. Those hazardous-material guys with their bubble suits were intimidating.

  “You go in at your own risk, lady, but we think it’s all right. The studio is closed off while it’s checked out. So is that clown Dr. Lee’s office. Some doctor.” He shook his head in disgust.

  Annabelle could understand the cop’s reaction. In fact, she shared it. She knew John Lee and was sure his motive for bringing that anthrax into the studio wasn’t the altruistic one of informing the nation that weapons of mass destruction were available for the taking. Lee wanted the attention, the acclaim, the notoriety this stunt would bring. And from the look of things, he was getting his wish. Camera crews from ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN were clustered on the sidewalk.

  Taking a deep breath, Annabelle pushed through the revolving door.

  The portable coffee-and-Danish trolley that was set up in the lobby each morning was strangely absent, and the hallways were quieter than usual. Had employees seen Lee’s segment on the morning show and decided to stay home?

  Annabelle took the elevator to the seventh floor, rehearsing what she would say to Yelena and Linus to convince them she had nothing to do with all this. Passing Jerome Henning’s office on the way to her own, she stuck her head through the doorway, glad to see her friend was back after the two sick days he’d taken.

  “Welcome back. Feeling better?” she asked.

  “Somewhat,” he answered, looking up from the press kit he was perusing and beckoning her to come inside.

  “Close the door,” he whispered.

  Annabelle obeyed.

  “Sit down for a minute,” he instructed, shoving a stack of books aside on the couch to make a space for her.

 
; “What’s all the secrecy?” she asked, unbuttoning the top of her coat and throwing her gloves into her canvas tote bag.

  “Did you know Lee was going to pull this, Annabelle?”

  “Are you nuts? Of course, I didn’t know. I wouldn’t have the stomach for a stunt like this.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, really.” She emphasized the second word. “Come on, Jerome. You know me better than that. Lee had proposed a possible scenario at the morning meeting after he got back from his shoot at the lab. A ‘what if’ about stealing weapons-grade anthrax as proof that you can get it, and wanting to go on the air with it live, remember? You were there that morning.”

  Jerome nodded. “Yeah, and our beloved executive producer vetoed the idea. Lee wasn’t very happy about that.”

  “Well, apparently Lee went ahead with his crazy plan anyway. But I knew nothing about it.”

  “Well that’s good, because the Department of Health and the CDC are here, and the FBI are down the hall looking for you. They have some questions they want to ask you. I’ll bet Yelena Gregory has some questions too.” Jerome walked behind his cluttered desk and sat down while he waited for her to digest the information.

  Annabelle closed her eyes and tilted her head back to rest against the top of the sofa. “Swell. That’s just what I need right now,” she groaned. “I can’t decide which inquisitor frightens me more.”

  “Yelena, definitely.” Jerome shrugged, and the corner of his mouth pulled downward. “Just tell them the truth. You didn’t know what Lee was going to do. You don’t know how he got ahold of the anthrax.” He paused. “Right? You don’t know how he got it.” His voice trailed off, making the statement a question.

  “Right, Jerome.” She was adamant as she rose. “Look, I have nothing to hide. Nothing at all.”

  “I’m glad to hear it, Annabelle. Because this is going to be a mess.” He pulled open the desk drawer and took out a white plastic bottle, snapping open the red lid.