“I don't report to Nelson Artleby.”
“But he sees your reports on this situation.”
“That's over my pay grade, Dr. Reynard. Do you have any further information for us?”
“Nope, just a complete regression of all symptoms.”
“Okay.” Williams hung up on her.
Heather resumed sifting through the megabytes of data on her laptop, everything she was allowed to know about the events in Fallen Oak and in Charleston. It looked like an endless pile of useless information, but somewhere in there could be a clue that tied together Jenny Morton, the riot in Charleston, and the mysterious young man who could apparently raise the dead.
She had no idea what that clue might look like, though.
About an hour later, her cell phone rang. It was her husband Liam, calling from Atlanta. Heather felt very jittery about answering the call. She'd managed to push her personal fears away while in her professional working mode, but now they came shoving back.
Her daughter, Tricia, had been suffering a fever and swollen glands. Liam took the four-year-old to her pediatrician, who went on to order a CBC, though he'd assured Liam that it was only a precaution.
Now, here was the call, the one where she learned whether Tricia had any abnormal blood cells.
She answered before it could ring a second time.
“How is she?” Heather asked.
“We're moving on to a lymph node biopsy,” Liam said.
“Oh, God. What did he say?”
“It looks like...he said there's a very high probability...”
Heather nodded. Liam was avoiding the word leukemia.
“You might want to come home,” he said. “If your work's not too important.”
Heather felt her heart clench. She looked at her laptop, all the little folders containing medical histories and police reports. The threat of Jenny creating a massive outbreak, somewhere in the world. The investigation that led only to dead ends.
“No, my work's not important,” Heather whispered, seeing Tricia's face in her mind. She was already fighting the urge to cry, but she managed to hold her voice steady. “I'm coming home.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Jenny and Kisa walked through a tianguis, an open-air market crowded with venders selling wares from rugs and tents. They were in Comitán de Domínguez, the closest city. Manuel had driven them more than two hours from Alexander's house, at high speed, barely touching the brakes the entire time they wove through the narrow, potholed mountain roads. Alexander himself was away in Tijuana, visiting with Papa Calderon himself, to give a report on their progress with the crop.
Over the past few weeks, Jenny and Alexander had traveled to one coca patch after another, to check on his zombies and to fire them up with Jenny Pox. They had greatly accelerated the harvest, and Alexander expected his boss to be pleased.
Jenny still struggled with her feelings about Alexander. She was deeply attracted to him, in a way that made her physically ache. Sometimes the thought of his dark eyes and his suntanned face kept her up at night. His hand on her skin intoxicated her. She managed to resist her feelings most of the time, though she'd broken down and kissed him more than once.
Though Alexander had been kind and taken good care of her, she found her emotions too overwhelming and dangerous. She still thought about Seth, how perfectly innocent and sweet their time together had seemed, until things went sour. She missed him, but she was angry at him.
Alexander was a lot of things, but innocent and sweet were not among them.
“Look!” Kisa said. She took Jenny's hand and drew her toward a shaded table where a man fried a pot of full of tamales. They smelled like chiles and saffron. “Are you hungry?”
Jenny's stomach was growling, so she nodded. “Good idea.”
Kisa spoke with the cook in Mayan, and he served them each a tamale. Jenny bit into the fried corn crust, and the spicy pork and salsa filling spilled into her mouth.
“Yum, that's so good!” Jenny said to Kisa. She nodded to the man who'd cooked them. “Muy buena.”
The Mayan cook scowled at her a little.
“Spanish is language of los conquistadors,” Kisa whispered. “I don't think he likes to hear it.”
“Oh!' Jenny said. “I mean, hatsutz. Very good.”
Now the man smiled again. He poured a cloudy fluid into two small porcelain cups and offered these to the girls.
“Yum botic,” Kisa said, thanking him. Then she held her cup toward Jenny and grinned. “Cheers.”
“Cheers!” Jenny clinked her glass against Kisa's, then drank from her cup. It tasted very sweet, with a strong alcoholic bite. “What is this?”
“Posh,” Kisa said. Her English vocabulary was slowly expanding, as was Jenny's knowledge of Mayan. They had plenty of time to teach each other, loafing around Alexander's estate. “From the sugar...” Kisa circled her thumb and fingers together and moved her hand in up and down strokes, to indicate a staff of sugar cane.