“Bromley?” she asked.

The guard nodded. He was pale, but holding it together. “God, oh, God. Yes, it’s Dr. Bromley. He came in this morning real early, right at the beginning of my shift. How could he do this? I don’t understand. He didn’t seem the suicidal type, you know?”

“The man in the anteroom, does he work here, too? He wasn’t wearing lab clothes,” Fletcher said.

“Him, I’ve never seen. I don’t know who that is. Someone really did a number on him. I don’t recall him coming through security today, but I had a break at lunchtime.”

Fletcher stepped back, motioned for them both to do the same, so they were at least less likely to contaminate the crime scene further. “Now you want to get that camera footage rolling for me, buddy?”

“I was checking it out when you called me up here, Lieutenant. There’s a problem with it, like I told you. Everything from this afternoon is erased. It’s almost like we had a power surge. Something weird happened. The metal detector goes down all the time, but this was everything—cameras, the machines, even some of the guys’ phones.”

“That sounds like more than a power surge.”

Sam shoved her hands into the pockets of her pants. “It sounds like a deliberate attack. Like someone needed to get in here and didn’t want to be seen. I wonder who that might be?”

Fletcher nodded at her from across Bromley’s body. “Look.” He pointed at the small piece of paper left carelessly near the body. He took a picture of its placement, then picked it up with a gloved hand and read it aloud.

“‘Do I have your attention yet?’ Yes, by God, you do.”

Sam’s phone rang. She glanced at the screen. “It’s Nocek. Maybe we’ll get some answers.” She stepped into the hall and answered the phone.

Nocek was excited. “Samantha, I have most gratifying news. We know what sort of poison was used on the young men. You were very quick to think of having the samples sent ahead.”

“We’re in a time crunch, Amado, and I have more bad news. Two more bodies related to this case. So thank you for taking me seriously and running the blood. What did you find?”

“Scopolamine and morphine.”

“That’s an odd pairing. An anticholinergic mixed with an opioid? I’d be more inclined to expect that in a 1940s delivery room than now.”

“You are correct. It is not a commonly used concoction now.”

“It would be a painless way to go. Easy to administer, too—no taste, no scent, no color. Just mix it in water and feed it to your victim. It would explain why their mucosa was red.”

“Painless, yes. And simple to acquire. More importantly, if one were an expert in its use, if administered properly, it would also induce a state of well-being, bordering on hypnotic.”

She sucked in her breath. She knew exactly where he was going. “The CIA used to use scopolamine for interrogations. It was one of the first effective truth serums. The renters were questioned before they were killed. Is that what you’re telling me?”

“As always, Dr. Owens, your astuteness astounds even me. Yes, I believe this to be the case. And the sample from Michael Oread registered nearly twice the dosage given to Jared Lanter. I will be paying special attention to each man’s time of death to see if there is a differential that would prove this theory.”

“Do you think Oread was killed first? It would make sense. If you’re trying to get information out of someone, killing the second person would give them incentive to cooperate.”

“I think that may be the case, yes.”

“Thank you, Amado. Call me if you find anything else interesting. And I’m sure you’re going to be getting a call to come here, so I’ll give you the information.” She rattled off the address and suite number. “I won’t be here. I have another stop to make. But be careful, and have your people paying attention. We have someone on a spree, and I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I would extend the same warning to you, my dear. Be very careful.”

* * *

Sam told Fletcher Nocek’s theory. He was already bouncing on the balls of his feet, ready to get out of there and track down Robin Souleyret. When she told him the possible reasoning behind the specific drugs given to the renters, he started shaking his head.

“Should have known we were dealing with Agency crap when Girabaldi dragged us in this morning. This all leads back to her. She’s trying to pull us in to clean up her mess. She’s going to dump this whole case at our feet and blame us for not stopping these deaths. I can already see the press conference.”

The security guard stationed by the door to wait for the crime scene techs gawked at Fletcher. Sam grabbed Fletcher’s arm and pulled him deeper into the lab.

“Whoa there, cowboy. Don’t let anyone else hear you say that. She’s a very powerful woman with a lot of friends.”

“And a rogue agent from her past tying up loose ends.”

“Do you really think Robin Souleyret killed her own sister?”

“I don’t know, Sam, but at this point? We’re five bodies down in a twenty-four-hour stretch, with another clinging to life. We have notes from the scenes that are giving us some sort of message. Talk of cell regeneration, zombies in Africa, tainted vaccines. Pressure from the State Department. Some big muckety-muck out of England helping Amanda Souleyret get into the country. Despite all this information, we don’t know anything more than we did this morning, and I’ve got another four murders to deal with. I am not at all happy.”

“I know. We need someone good to take apart Bromley’s records, see if we can find anything that might help explain what he and Cattafi were doing.”

“I’m thinking it’s time we push Girabaldi a bit. See what we can shake loose. If she’d been clearer with us this morning, we might have gotten ahead of this.”

Sam thought about it for a minute. “I understand the urge, but Fletcher, again, Bromley’s been dead since this morning at least, well before we got pulled into State. I think finding Robin Souleyret is the primary goal right now. Whether she’s our suspect, or she’s working the case of her sister’s death on her own, a face-to-face is imperative. What did Hart tell you about the Honda Accord that was circling the crime scene? Could that have been her?”

“It wasn’t a woman, it was a guy. Hart said he claimed to be looking for ‘companionship,’ trolling the late-night Georgetown scene before heading downtown for some action. He wasn’t sure about him. Said the dude was weird. He’s going to do a background check on him, see if anything pops.”

“All right. Let’s go down and see what the tapes say, see if Robin Souleyret was even here. Then I think it would be smart to hook up with Xander. See what he and his partner, Chalk, have come up with. They have a tie into this case now, too. And Baldwin is flying back as we speak. He has more information for us that he couldn’t share over the phone about Robin’s background. We have a lot of balls in the air, and to be honest, I think it’s time to regroup before we go marching into the State Department and start making accusations. You good with that?”

He blew out a breath. “I’m good with that.”

* * *

Sam hung back while Fletcher and the guards went over the footage from the day. Thought about everything—about the senseless murders, the secrets and lies. Wondered about James Denon. She knew the name, of course; he was in the news often. What was his tie to the tainted vaccines?

She wasn’t an idiot—the pattern was clear. Everywhere they went, they seemed to be just missing the elder Souleyret sister. And in her wake was a deluge of dead bodies, killed in a variety of manners and methods. There was no way they couldn’t consider Robin Souleyret as a suspect, at least until she was caught and questioned.

Something else was niggling at her, and she knew exactly what it was. She simply couldn’t imagine Robin killing her little sister. Yes, the woman was black ops, which meant she followed orders and knew how to keep to the shadows. Yes, she had a record of assassinations longer than Sam’s arm. But it would have to be one hell of a head injury to allow her to stab her own sister in the back.