The Leaves in Winter (4 page)

“Wait. You’ve got to listen.”

“I don’t have to do anything. I’ve heard too much already.”

“All right. I know this is hard. The last couple of days have been difficult for both of us. I’m not asking you to talk to him.
I
need to contact him.”

“What for?”

“Didn’t Colin work with you at USAMRIID?”

Rising defenses shot cold through Janis. Her work at the United States Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases in
Maryland
was a long time ago. It might as well have been another life.

“Why are you asking me questions when you already know the answers?”

“Do you know where he was reassigned?”

“Even if I knew, that information would be classified. Of course, if I did know, that would make me a covert asset too.”

“Was he reassigned out of the country? Was that the reason you two split up?”

Janis felt her heart race. The nature of Malcolm’s questions inclined her to suspect the worst. Why else display such passion? Why else explore such topics? “What are you doing?”

“I’m not trying to entrap you if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“You still work for Eugene Mass – you just said so.”

“Listen, we’re on the same side here. I’m the one who’s been locked out.”

“Naturally. It makes sense if you had to get this to look real.”

Malcolm fumed. “What do you think is going on here? You really think I came over here to pretend estrangement from Mass just to see what information you would give up?”

Janis stepped to the front door. “Trying to hide in plain sight won’t help.”

Malcolm stood his ground, hands on hips. “I don’t believe it. You really think I’m playing you.”

“Either way, I don’t want to get involved.” She opened the door.

“Do me a favor.”

“Sure. I’ll forget you ever came over tonight.”

“If you can get into Riya’s office, would you bring me her personal effects?”

Janis didn’t need time to consider it. “You should go.”

Sensing that Janis had reached her limit, Malcolm nodded and stepped over the threshold and into the night. “Thanks for the tea.” He never turned back.

Janis shut the door and turned the deadbolt. She spun around and leaned back with her eyes closed. What was real was lost in a flurry of thoughts. She let the silence settle around her. For a moment, being alone was a comfort. Then a chill set in. Trying to make sense of what just happened left little room to be positive.

Pushing off without finding a sense of relief, she stepped through the living room, turning out lights as she went. She left the food on the table and walked down the hallway. At Alyssa’s door she stopped. The light was on but Alyssa was fast asleep. Even if she wanted to talk to Alyssa now, Janis didn’t have the strength. She decided to put the food away and head to bed.

Maybe in the morning all the nightmares would be gone.

Chapter 3

Kasu Brahmananda Reddy National Park

Jubilee Hills,
Hyderabad

Another redial. Janis pressed the cell phone to her ear. A meandering peacock crossed her path. Late afternoon sun filtered through polluted air and casted an orange-brown sheen over the nature trail.

No answer. Same as a half hour before. This time Janis let it ring.

Steps ahead but within sight, Alyssa aimed her camera at something of interest. It was an animal, not moving. Possibly dead. From spots on its lithe body, Janis guessed it was an Indian civet.

“Don’t touch that.”

“Don’t worry.”

Janis regretted calling out. No doubt Alyssa would take it as treating her like a child. After the interruption of their conversation at dinner the night before, Janis had hoped the dialogue between them would restart. Another terse exchange was not helping.

Why call out to warn Alyssa? Janis scolded herself and fumbled for an excuse. Last night’s mention of USAMRIID by Malcolm had brought back a flood of memories. Maybe she hadn’t realized how much her time working at
Fort Detrick
,
Maryland
impacted her – was still a part of her.

Thoughts of a classified briefing on the 2003 SARS outbreak in
Asia
came to mind. Many at the time believed the causal trail of the epidemic led back to the Masked Palm Civet, a cousin of the dead mammal being photographed. Old news.

Janis restarted her stroll to calm a swirl of emotion. She tried concentrating on little things in nature that otherwise would have gone unnoticed. It was no use. Everything she thought or felt led back to intrusive questions and a need for self-examination. It was exactly what she wished to avoid, but Riya’s murder was fresh in mind. With it came a palpable sense of mortality and the impulse for life review.

Having such a large park so near their house was a luxury in such a sprawling metropolis. Over the last decade, Janis had witnessed a steady urban surge that left open spaces like
KBR
Park
a premium afforded by only the more affluent neighborhoods. The rising promise of available jobs in sprouting tech industries had made the city of
Hyderabad
a mecca for the young, the industrious, the opportunistic.

Time had sped by and this year, Alyssa became a teenager. More than a decade ago, Janis arrived in
India
with a newborn and painful memories of a brief marriage. She clung to the chance to do important work, to understand the bio-mechanisms of life and aging. In actuality, now it seemed more likely she had come to the other side of the world to escape an ethos and lifestyle that clashed with her youthful idealism.

In the decade since, those fires of altruism had been tamped down by the reality she watched taking shape around her. Maddeningly, everyone in her adopted home increasingly wanted what she had run away from. What was once a second world settlement had metamorphosed into a burgeoning city of four million consumers, eerily remote-controlled in many ways by an unquenchable desire for development, progress, and a higher standard of living.

It had been all too easy to watch what was happening and recoil with righteous contempt. Signs of contagion abounded. Everywhere could be seen the virulent symptoms of the disease – cell phone towers, sky-high stacks of corporate cubicles, an insatiable lust to consume and become affluent, the oppressive metastasizing of a mass-produced, global culture taking root, ever more oppressive in its hypnotic insistence to be noticed and define the priorities of life for all.

In many ways, local life had turned into a dreamlike but kitschy reality show whose theme song might feature ancient Hindu and Islamic prayers set to a hip-hop beat. The purist in her reviled the worst parts of it. But now, awakening self-doubt overshadowed her. Rooted in the horror felt at the pace of transformation around her, she had to face a tacit hypocrisy. Strolling through her posh neighborhood, made comparatively rich by the esoteric high-tech arts of genetics, who was she to cast aspersions on the progressive changes enveloping the developing world?

Aged beyond her all-too-easy militancy of youth, Janis could now confront the enemy within. Admittedly, there were undeniable benefits to the encroachment of self-labeled progress that surrounded her. She only had to look to her daily routine to find ample examples, conveniences she wouldn’t want to be without. No longer was it a surprise that those tainted benefits fed into the best and worst of a predictable, universal, and unchanging human nature – even at the cost of Nature herself.

What had she learned in her youth? Ideologues at the Ivy League college had taught her that the American Dream was conjured up by oppressors and exploiters. Pragmatists at USAMRIID had taught her that the rule makers abided by no moralistic convention or measure of restraint. Despite international agreements, the insect politics of expediency and self-interest would prevail. “Dual-use” bio-security projects ensured that anything studied for defense in the light of day would easily find offensive applications under the deep cover of sanctimonious night.

The last couple of days had taught her that nothing, no one was safe or secure.

“Hello?” crackled in one ear.

The familiar voice was discordant to her thoughts yet salve for the soul.

“Mom?”

“It’s so good to hear you.”

“You too. I called a little while back but I guess you weren’t up yet.”

“I was up. I took a walk to the lake. Just got back. It’s a beautiful morning. Crisp but clear.”

“How’s the snow?”

“Not bad. Roger came by yesterday and plowed a path to the road. I didn’t need the snow blower done around the house – not deep enough for that. What about you? How are you holding up?”

“OK. I’m still not sure about Alyssa.”

“Don’t worry. It’ll take time. Like I said the other day, the main thing is – you’re with her. Taking time off, being together; that’s the best thing you can do for her right now. After all, you just got back.”

“I know. It’s still hard to see her this way.”

“So what have you two been up to?”

Janis watched as Alyssa strolled farther ahead with camera swinging by a strap at her side. “We got up late, went out for lunch and a movie. It was a good distraction. Now we’re at the park. We both needed to get out of the house.”

“I know you probably think keeping busy with work is the best thing to do but my offer still stands. If you want to take a leave of absence and come this way for a visit, I’d love to have you two stay with me. It would sure warm up the place.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“It’d be fun for Alyssa. How long has it been since you took her to the snow?”

Janis thought back to a vacation in
Europe
. “It’s been a while…a couple years.”

Walking and talking, Janis noticed the nature trail up ahead bending between thick vegetation. Intruding on her memories of
Switzerland
snow was the uneasy realization that Alyssa was scooting around the bend and out of sight. Janis’ attention drew sharply present with a burst of disquiet, a sour twinge from a sixth sense.

On the phone, Mom was relegated a few time-sliced fragments of awareness.

“Mom – I’ll have to call you back. Love you!”

Janis cancelled the call as her pace quickened down the trail. “Alyssa.”

Sights and sounds from moments before on the periphery of Janis’ attentiveness were singled out. In sudden recall, the tandem jog of two men could be seen. A jogging track ran parallel to the nature trail in this area but it was mostly hidden by plants. The men had paced themselves, neither running or walking. Their footwear was oddly non-athletic.

Janis broke into a run. “Alyssa!” The call went unanswered.

Around the bend, a parent’s worst fear was realized. Through a break in the trees the joggers could be seen hustling a struggling Alyssa to the street and into the back of a waiting car.

“No!” Janis screamed and sprinted into the brush towards them. Her outburst only alerted the kidnappers of pursuit and energized them to move more quickly.

Alyssa cried out and fought them as best she could but the two men flanking her held her by the arms, nearly lifting her off the ground. Her shouts shot flat against the empty expanse of deserted park and indifferent road. The car raced off before the men got the back door closed.

It only took a few moments and she was gone.

Janis ran into the street, her heart bursting, her yelps of disbelief and pain calling out for help to anyone who would listen. In the distance, scooters, cars, and three-wheeled taxis negotiated a far intersection. Accelerating through the traffic maze, the getaway car disappeared around a corner. Janis was left pacing in shock as the horns of oncoming traffic ignored her pleas and demanded the right-a-way.

Dashing in the direction of home, Janis dialed the police. She shouted into the phone while running. The operator demanded she calm down and repeat herself. Neither went well. By the time Janis plunged across her threshold and paced crazily from living room to kitchen, enough had been said to bring the police to her door. Waiting for them was an eternity.

Out loud to no one, she tried to invoke the magic of denial. “This can’t be happening!” Too shocked to cry, she shivered, unable to sit but too overwhelmed to stand still.

When the police arrived, they asked for details about the men, the car, their direction of travel. Trying to concentrate, to remember, only made Janis relive the trauma. Officers checked the house to make sure nothing else was disturbed. They assured her they would do whatever they could to bring Alyssa back. Janis wasn’t convinced it would be enough but she had to act as if she hoped it could. The detective left a patrolman to watch her street and guard the house for a while.

She still felt violated, vulnerable, devastated, heartbroken.

When the front door finally closed, she discovered how unprepared she was to be alone. Surrounded by silence, the crushing certainty of what had happened weighed down upon her. She had to surrender to the truth. Tears filled her eyes. No longer was she able to stand. Collapsing on the couch, she lay limp, the mother’s heart inside of her imploding.

Alyssa was gone.

Even to think such a thing was truth and fiction all at once. She had to admit the reality of what had happened but couldn’t. Hanging onto hope that everything would be fine was unbelievable but necessary. What to do next? All she had left was raw emotion and tormenting questions. Why Alyssa? Why not her? What did this terror have to do, if anything, with the horror that had taken place in the
Stockholm
lecture hall? Why of all people did they target an innocent girl?

A fog of despair ushered in night. Janis fainted, awoke, then fell asleep. At that moment it was the only way to escape the pain. She lost track of time and found herself two hours later in the dark. In a pocket, her cell phone was ringing. She raced to answer, thinking it might be the police with news. Caller-id displayed a lab co-worker’s name. She let the call go to voicemail.

She held the phone with numbing indecision. What to do? The answer came as an impulse more than a decision. Fingers quivering, she dialed the one person who might know something more about what was going on.

Hearing her voice, Malcolm ramped into gear. “Jesus! I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

“You’ve heard?”

“It’s all over the news. Sounds like the police are turning the city inside out looking for her.”

“Can you meet me? We have to talk.”

“I’ll be right over.”

“No – somewhere else. I need to get out of here.”

Malcolm named a spot, a favorite dive – a restaurant with privacy enough for conversation. She hurried out and drove there straight away. Every minute mattered. Anything Malcolm knew might prompt a spark of recognition, a wisp of hope, a crucial clue to help unravel the plots in play.

There was nothing else she could do about the police investigation; it would have to run its course. Given the revelations from Malcolm the night before, maybe she needn’t leave the crisis only in police hands. The thought of it fed her desire to be proactive. Her intuition needled her to focus and pursue anything the authorities either didn’t, couldn’t, or wouldn’t do.