The Protector

18

The word seemed to linger in the air. It was so unexpected that Cavanaugh didn't react to it at first. He was certain he hadn't heard correctly. "Fear?"

Cavanaugh's muscles tightened and his palms became moist as he felt a premonition about what Kline was going to tell him next.

"Fear," Kline whispered hoarsely, repulsed by the pressure of the syringe's tip against his artery. "Prescott was in charge of biochemical research designed to create fear in any opponent the U.S. military confronted. My neck." Kline tensed. "You're shoving harder."

"Prescott. Tell me about Prescott."

Kline's brow was beaded with sweat. "He created a synthetic hormone that triggered adrenaline in such massive doses that panic was an immediate result."

Prescott's lie about trying to stop addiction and instead discovering how to increase addiction had been partially based on truth, Cavanaugh now realized. All that needed to be done was to substitute the word fear for addiction. His mind flashed back to the stairs in the abandoned warehouse and the pungent odor he'd smelled as he'd gone up to meet Prescott. He'd become more and more uneasy as he'd mounted the stairs, his body more jittery with each step.

"Prescott's military controllers were thrilled." Unable to turn his head, Kline strained his eyes sideways toward where the syringe pricked the artery in his neck. Sweat dripped from his face. "If the synthetic hormone could be modified into a gas and delivered in canisters dropped from planes or via rockets, it would render opposing armies helpless during an attack."

"Politicians tend to get a little nervous when they hear about chemical-weapons research, but why should that hold back a good idea?" Cavanaugh said, barely containing his anger.

He recalled how Kline's men had suddenly panicked when they'd invaded the warehouse's stairwell. Responding to an unseen threat, they had fired uncontrollably up the stairs, unable to force themselves higher. Prescott must have had canisters of the gas concealed in the stairwell. Traces of it had escaped, which explained Cavanaugh's jittery reaction.

He recalled something else-how Prescott had worked dials on a panel when Kline's team invaded the stairwell. But as frightened as Kline's men had become, their reaction had apparently not been strong enough, for Prescott had murmured in alarm to himself, as if something was wrong. Perhaps the canisters had developed a slow leak so that by the time Kline's team attacked, the full force of the weapon wasn't available.

"Prescott experimented with it on animals," Kline said. "Rats went berserk. Cats and dogs became so afraid of each other, they cowered in corners. On one occasion, it drove a dozen goats into such a panic that they raced around the walls that contained them until they dropped in shock and died."

Cavanaugh thought of Karen's basement, of the pungent smell that he now realized had caused him, for the first time in his life, to suffer fear, the effects of which continued to linger. He thought of the panic that had almost destroyed him in the fire. He thought of seeing Karen slumped motionless in her wheelchair, her hands clamped to her chest, her face contorted rigidly with horror. Now he understood what had killed her. Wanting to avoid a wound or a strangle mark that would alert a medical examiner to Karen's murder, Prescott had used the hormone to terrify her to death. Her heart and arteries must have ruptured from the massive force of terror.

"The syringe. Your hand's shaking again," Kline said.

"Tell me everything."

"Eventually, the temptation became too great. Prescott tried it on humans. Inner-city gangs ran in panic when a lone victim wandered onto their turf and defended himself from their attacks by throwing a small hissing canister at them."

"Then there must be a neutralizer," Cavanaugh said. "Otherwise, the person throwing the canister would become terrified also."

"Yes." Kline cringed from the pressure of the syringe against his neck.

Prescott must have used the neutralizer on himself when he was in Karen's house, Cavanaugh realized. Otherwise, the hormone would have overpowered him.

"Without the neutralizer, they couldn't have managed what happened at the World Trade Organization riots in St. Louis," Kline said.

All Cavanaugh remembered about the riots was that after three days of chaos, the authorities had finally overwhelmed the rioters and forced them into the Mississippi. "The tear gas?"

"Contained the fear hormone." Kline shut his eyes in an attempt to relieve his tension. "The gas masks, supplied by the military, had the neutralizer in their filters. The experiment was a success.

"Except that only a few military officers and Prescott knew what had really happened," Cavanaugh said.

"And a few powerful civilians with strong ideas about how your country should protect itself. They decided to try another secret test on humans, this time on a group trained not to respond to fear. A team of U.S. Rangers on a training exercise in a swamp in Florida."

Cavanaugh recalled being troubled by a recent report about fifteen Rangers who had drowned in Florida.

Sweating, Kline kept his eyes shut. "Maybe the hormone had the wrong strength. Or maybe men trained to use weapons do just that when they're overwhelmed with panic. They started shooting at anything and everything. Most of them didn't drown-they were hit by cross fire."

Sickened, Cavanaugh found himself leaning back, taking the syringe from where he'd pressed it against Kline's jugular.

Except for Kline's labored breathing, the room became silent. It took several moments before Kline-pale, taped to the chair, lying sideways on the floor-seemed to realize that the syringe had been removed. Slowly, apprehensively, he opened his eyes, evidently not believing that Cavanaugh sat across from him, the syringe next to him on the carpet. "Keep talking," Cavanaugh said.

"Two things happened." Kline tried to raise his head so he could look at Cavanaugh straight on. "First, my employer learned about the experiments." "How?"

"One of Prescott's researchers was an informant for us." "And the second thing?"

"The informant wasn't cautious about the way he spent what we paid him. Prescott's controllers became suspicious, interrogated the man, and discovered that the research had been compromised, that an unfriendly foreign government wanted the weapon. In tandem with the dead Rangers in the failed experiment, that security lapse made the military officers decide it was too risky to continue. Before anyone in your government could learn about the research and make trouble about it, they aborted the program."

Kline let the implication hang in the air. "You're suggesting Prescott's controllers worried about him, about whether they could trust him?" Cavanaugh asked.

"Our informant knew the nature of the fear hormone but not how to produce it. Only Prescott had all the details. He was synonymous with the research. To shut down the program fully-"

"Prescott had to be eliminated," Cavanaugh said.

"Especially because his controllers knew we wanted to get our hands on him. He suspected the danger he faced. He fled-with us and his controllers after him, one group trying to capture him, the other trying to kill him. We managed to track him to that warehouse. Then you showed up, and here we are," Kline said.

"But how did Prescott's controllers learn where we were taking him?" Cavanaugh asked. Abruptly, the answer seemed evident. "They must have followed you to the warehouse."

"We were careful."

"Perhaps one of your men informed on you."

"Then why did it take so long for Prescott's controllers to try to get him?" Kline asked. "They made their move only after you became involved."

Cavanaugh felt his face turn cold. "I was followed? Someone at Protective Services told them we were helping Prescott?"

"Your firm protects the rich and powerful. It makes sense that various intelligence agencies would keep tabs on your company's activities."

Again, Cavanaugh began to lose focus on reality. He didn't know what to think, what to depend on. Then he looked at Jamie, whose beautiful yet worried gaze was directed toward him, and he knew very definitely what to depend on.

"To hell with it." Cavanaugh raised Kline from the floor and pulled out the Emerson knife.

"What are you doing?" Kline flinched.

"John's going to phone the Justice Department and have your companions picked up for a heart-to-heart chat about unfriendly foreign governments."

Kline stared at the knife. "But what's going to happen to me?"

"We're going sight-seeing."

"What?"

"A quiet drive in the countryside."

"With you?" Kline looked pleadingly toward Rutherford. "Can't you see this guy's crazy? He'll take me out to the woods. God knows what he'll do to me there. No one'll ever find my body."

Rutherford studied Cavanaugh. "Can I talk to you a minute?"

"Keep your pistol aimed at Kline," Cavanaugh told Jamie. He followed Rutherford into the bedroom.