The Gender Experiment: (A Thriller) (21 page)

“So you gave pregnant women a drug you knew nothing about? Just following orders?” She was feeling something unexpected. Disgust? Because the doctor was immoral? Or just weak? “How much was your bonus pay for the experiment?”

He stood. “It doesn’t matter now.”

Bailey jumped up. “You’re not going anywhere. I need a written statement from you. And I want details. How was ImmuNatal administered? How many patients took it? Did you report their names to your boss? Their babies’ names?” She stepped forward and locked eyes with him. She could outstare anyone and often got what she wanted simply by making the other person squirm. “If you cooperate, I may be able to keep you from being prosecuted.”

Metzler glanced away. “Let me get some paper to write on.”

She followed him down a hallway with dim recessed lighting. He turned at the second door. “Do you mind? I need to use the restroom.” The doctor went in and turned the lock.

He was stalling and probably regretted his confession. She’d seen a shift in his eyes when she asked for written details. Did the bathroom exit into a master suite… one that opened to an attached outdoor patio? Bailey rushed through the kitchen and out a sliding glass door. She didn’t see the doctor, but the yard had staggered sections that followed the shape of the house. She crossed the flagstone, then a stretch of grass, and rounded a corner to the left. Another small patio with a hammock nestled against a master bedroom. Metzler wasn’t in that yard either. She’d probably overreacted. Her heart settled down, and she strode calmly into the house, stopping in the kitchen for a glass of filtered water. She could feel her skin drying out from the plane ride, lack of sleep, and too much coffee.

Bailey took a seat at the kitchen table, expecting the doctor to join her there to write his statement. A glance out the picture window revealed the first few snowflakes coming down.
Oh hell.
Searching for the entrance to an underground facility would be challenging enough. Snow would make it impossible.

The house was eerily quiet. Did anyone else live here? The neighborhood was hushed too, with only the sound of the wind rattling the dead leaves in the tall aspen trees.

A gunshot blasted through the silence.
Fuck!
Bailey bolted to her feet and down the main hall. The bathroom door was still locked. “Dr. Metzler!” She knew in her gut he’d killed himself. A career military man, he probably wore a gun on his body somewhere, or kept several in the house. Why hadn’t she seen this coming? Loyalty and honor were everything in the armed forces. Just because the doctor had cleared his conscience to make himself feel better, didn’t mean he would testify against superior military officers.

Metzler might not be dead. And it was only a bathroom door. Good thing she’d worn sturdy ankle boots in preparation for Denver weather. Bailey brought up her right leg in a tight bend, then extended it with all her body weight. Her foot slammed near the doorknob, and the force splintered the wood around the locking mechanism. She slammed the door again in the same spot, and it popped open.

Metzler was on the floor, slumped against the glass shower. Blood ran down the back of his head and dripped on the white-tile floor. The coward had put a handgun in this mouth and blown out his brain. At least she’d recorded his confession in her phone. She worried about the audibility of the volume, but bureau tech people could do amazing things to enhance recordings. The bigger concern was how to handle this.

Her boss would want to be the first to know. Bailey opened her phone’s short contact list and pressed the first number. No name attached. The director of the Critical Response Team didn’t answer. Maybe that was for the best. Lennard’s idea of how to proceed might slow Bailey down. She left a message: “It’s Bailey, and we have a situation. A retired military doctor just confessed to his part in a secret medical experiment twenty years ago. Then he went into his bathroom and killed himself. I’m looking at his body right now. Please send a Denver agent to handle this. I don’t want to get trapped here talking to the local police. I’ll file a report as soon as I can.”

She signed off, knowing Lennard would call back soon, demanding more information. Bailey started for the front door then stopped cold. What if the doctor was more involved than he’d admitted, and Taylor Lopez was being held here? Bailey turned back. She had to at least check closets for secret doors and scan for breaks in the floor that might indicate a trap door. It wasn’t logical that Lopez would be here, unless this house was a temporary holding place before she was transferred to another facility. Maybe that explained the doctor’s suicide. Plea deals were never offered for kidnapping.

After a fast but thorough search, Bailey called her boss again and left a second message, asking that the field agent take the doctor’s home apart to search for the missing woman. It needed to be done—just in case—but not by Bailey. Instead she would take Metzler’s computer and scan it for contact names.

Someone knew where the underground research facility was, and she was determined to find it. If Taylor Lopez was alive, that had to be where they were holding her. If they were also conducting medical experiments, the girl was likely being treated like a guinea pig. Bailey didn’t feel Lopez’s pain, but she understood it was imperative to stop whatever the hell was still going on.

Saturday afternoon, Stratton Research Center

Taylor paced the room, hating its white walls and fake plants. It was the same size as her studio apartment, but without windows it seemed much smaller. Just knowing she was underground made her feel edgy. How did people work down here, day after day? It wasn’t natural. And what the hell did they want with her anyway? More medical experiments was what she feared. They might give her untested drugs to see what effect they had. Would she develop painful lesions or grow testicles? How long would this last? The thought of waking up every day in this room for years—or decades—horrified her. Why hadn’t she just ignored those bodies and minded her own business? That was how she’d lived her whole life up to that point—head down, no eye contact, no attention drawn. It had worked for her. Mostly. But then she’d decided to look at Adrian Warsaw and see beyond his drowned corpse.

A rap on the door made her jump. Whatever they had in mind was starting. Taylor rushed to the reading chair and sat down. Her only chance of getting out, or at least not getting hurt, was to pretend to go along. She would project as much calm and confidence as possible. She needed them to trust her, so they would drop their guard around her.

Ha! Like she could ever pull that off. Her hands were shaking already.

A young woman stepped into the room and smiled. “Hi Taylor. I’m Marissa.” She had flawless, creamy skin over high cheekbones, a small heart-shaped mouth, and wavy strawberry-blond hair.

Taylor stared. Marissa was beautiful and around her age. Was she one of them too? Taylor finally found her voice. “Hello. You’re not who I expected.”

“I never am. That’s why I’m so good at what I do.” A sly, seductive smile.

“What do you do?”

“Whatever my country needs.” Marissa sat on the bed across from her chair. “You should consider it an honor to be here. The major obviously thinks you have potential.”

“For what?” Taylor’s pulse began to race. She didn’t want to serve her country. Not if it meant spying or seducing strangers for information, or whatever the hell this pretty girl did. Testing drugs would be easier.

“To gather information. Particularly from terrorist young men.”

Dear god.
It was even worse than she’d imagined. Taylor’s throat closed up and she couldn’t respond.

Marissa leaned forward and patted her arm. “Don’t be scared. They won’t send you out until you’re ready. By then, you’ll be eager.” A delicate laugh. Marissa gestured at the solid walls. “And not because of this place. Once you fully understand the threat we face, you’ll want to take action.”

“You’re a spy?”

“That’s an old-school term. And limiting. I’m an operative.”

“Where? Here in America?”

“Mostly. But I went to Bahrain once, a very specialized mission.”

“I didn’t know the military had spies.”

The young woman laughed. “You’re not supposed to. That’s kind of the point.” Marissa leaned forward. “Let’s get to know each other a bit. Tell me what you do.”

Like on a date?
Taylor went along. “Uh, I’m a college student and a death investigative intern.”

Marissa’s mouth opened in mock surprise. “You work in a morgue?”

They obviously hadn’t prepped the operative about her. Did that mean the girl didn’t know about the experiment? She needed to hear it. “I’m the one who discovered the shared intersex features of the men who’d been murdered. Did you know about the assassinations?”

“I can’t talk about our projects yet.” Marissa brushed off the subject with a wave of her delicate white hand. “Tell me about you. What do you like to do for fun?”

This was so weird!
“Uh, I’m pretty busy with my internship and classes, but I shoot pool at the student center on campus sometimes, and I like quirky comedies,.”
Where was she going with this?

“We have a theater here, but we’ll mostly be watching training films.” Marissa’s eyes sparked. “I think we should watch one now.”

Training films didn’t sound bad compared with the other things she’d worried about.

Marissa grabbed her hand. “Come with me.” She led Taylor into the hall. The girl stopped and turned to her with a bright smile. “Don’t try to run, please. I’m fast. And deadly.”

Taylor believed her.

After a few turns in a maze of corridors, they entered a small theater with a couple dozen seats. Marissa told her to get comfortable, then set up a movie from the computer station at the back.

At first the images were peaceful. Families in a Middle Eastern country going about their lives. Shopping, laughing, hugging. Suddenly, a bomb exploded, and their bodies were torn to shreds. Taylor recoiled in horror. Why were they making her watch this?

“Keep your eyes open!” Marissa’s tone was sharp for the first time. “Pretending this isn’t happening doesn’t make it stop.”

Taylor did as she was told, afraid the girl would tape them open if she didn’t. The video showed two more scenes and explosions like the first one. The next image was a group of Americans—or Europeans, she couldn’t tell—sitting in a restaurant. A bomb blast killed them as well.
Dear god
. How often did this happen around the world? But the film got worse. Men in black hoods torturing people. Beheadings and stonings. How could anyone do this? Taylor kept closing her eyes, and Marissa kept shouting at her to watch. But the violence was too horrifying. Taylor broke down into sobs. The terrorists had to be stopped.

Saturday, 4:25 p.m.

His desk phone rang, and Blackburn snatched it up. After the shitstorm yesterday with Seth Wozac’s stunt, he needed some good news. “Major Blackburn speaking.”

“Bruce Montoya.” The deputy director of the CIA. Montoya had been deputy director ten years ago when he had assisted the Peace Project with placing and monitoring personnel in the Middle East.

“What’s the update?” Blackburn knew it wouldn’t be good.

“One of our Saudi Arabia operatives has been arrested.”

“Oh fuck. Who and why?”

“Fatima Syed. I don’t yet know the circumstances.”

The name was like a punch in the gut. “She’s the one who called in yesterday to report her readiness, isn’t she?” The last operative to do so—giving them the green light to launch Phase 2.

“Yes. So it’s likely someone heard or detected the call.”

No!
“They’ll torture her, won’t they?”

“Of course, and all of our operatives could be detained within days.”

Fuck!
This couldn’t be happening.
Blackburn realized they had an even bigger problem. “The security around the region’s water systems will tighten immediately.”

“So we act now,” the director said. “Is the drug ready?”

“It should be. The lab started scaling up batches weeks ago.”

“Better get it shipped out to our people before the door slams shut.”

He realized that.
“Update me if you hear anything further.” Blackburn ended the call. For a moment, a cacophony of emotions overwhelmed him. Twenty fucking years he’d been working on this project, nurturing it along step-by-baby-step. Now the whole thing was about to implode. Their best opportunity to end terrorism was on the edge of disaster because one woman got careless.

Fuck!
He grabbed a stapler and threw it against the wall. It wasn’t enough. He lifted his in-basket and threw it too. The metal container hit the wall, and papers scattered everywhere. The side door opened slightly, and his assistant peeked through. “Everything all right, sir?”

Blackburn got control of himself. “Yes. Close the door.”

The officer obeyed, and Blackburn snatched up his work cell phone, grateful he’d broken himself of the habit of throwing it. He scanned through his contact list for the manager of the lab. He could walk or take a cart down to the facility, but he didn’t want to spend the time.

A pleasant voice answered. “Bill Blessert speaking.”

“It’s Major Blackburn. We need to transport ImmuNatal ASAP. So get it ready to ship.

“But sir, nothing has changed since you called yesterday. We’re still working on the moisture issue with the packaging—we need more time.”

“We don’t have it, and I don’t give a shit about moisture. Our window of opportunity is closing fast.”

“But if the drug degrades en route, it might not be fully effective.”

“Find a workaround and get it done!” Blackburn slammed the phone down before he started swearing.

After decades of watching the offspring to ensure they would be passive adults, plus years of patiently waiting for the operatives to work themselves into positions of accessibility, it was time to carry out the goddamn mission. The production facility should have been ready with the drug a year ago, but he and Rashaud had delayed the scale-up of ImmuNatal to develop another pharmaceutical aimed at suppressing the fear receptors in the brain. The decision had seemed sound at the time because several Peace operatives had seemed a few years from being ready. He couldn’t have predicted they would be in this time crunch now. If the mission failed, he could only blame himself.