Larry Bassett’s Reviews > Fallout > Status Update

“That felt good!” She picked up a can of Sprite, handed me a Coke, and started a little victory dance in front of the vending machine. I high-fived her and handed her two of the antibiotic tablets to swallow. I gave a hysterical laugh, thinking we were like Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove, shooting out the Coke machine to get coins for a phone call: now we had to answer to the Coca-Cola Company.

“Vic, I know you. I know you argue only to get your own way. I am with Cady. We can look after each other without a big sister on top of us.” She cut the connection. I called back but got voice mail. I tried Cady, but she didn’t answer either.

“If anything happens to me, will you call this number in Chicago?” I handed her a note. “Dr. Lotty Herschel will organize someone to come down to collect Peppy, and she’ll also take care of . . . well, anything that needs taking care of.” “You really are expecting trouble?” she asked.

I wrote Aanya’s name in black Magic Marker on a paper bag, stuck the box with the DNA sample in it, and borrowed some electrical tape from behind the bar to seal it shut. Simone tucked the bag in a drawer filled with miscellany—lost glasses and phones, her own shoulder bag, a box of candles. “You ever going to tell me what this is all about?”

In 1983 Spirova had been furious with Kiel. In her mind he’d lured her to Kansas and then abandoned her. Had she switched those organisms in 1983 at the behest of the KGB or out of rage with Kiel?

Anthrax. Biohazard of choice for terrorists. Abortion clinics get threats of it pretty much every week, and of course the whole government mail apparatus was changed because of anthrax attacks following 9/11.

Like Jenny Perec’s Toyota, it was pointing nose-down in the water, but the pickup sat too high to go all the way in. Water rose about half a foot above the running board. I could see the figure in the driver’s seat, head against the steering wheel.

In case they were relying on my devices to tell them my route, I put them all back in my Faraday pack. It would have to be protection enough. I drove east once more, this time taking a side road, where it would be easier to spot a tail.

“I don’t know what is keeping you here, since no one has caught a whiff of Ferring or her cameraman. But something about the land around the silo is causing Gisborne to act more like the Sheriff of Nottingham than the guy we all love to reelect every four years.

This is a conversation that would be better face-to-face, but I don’t know when we will next be face-to-face. Are you still coming at Christmas? Or will crime win out? J. The message left me feeling as though I’d been kicked in the diaphragm. My food arrived, but I’d lost my appetite. I wrote back and sent the message without editing it. IMPENDING BREAK UP?