Mistress of Justice

there is.”
    She nodded. “I think he got it from Genneco Labs.”
    “Our client?”
    “Yep.”
    “I was talking to a pathologist here. He told me Genneco does a lot of research into antitoxins—you know, like antidotes.”
    “So whoever killed Clayton stole some culture—or told the killer about Genneco and
he
stole it?”
    She nodded.
    “I was feeling a lot better last night but I called Donald and told him I was almost dead, in a coma.”
    “You what?”
    “I wanted word to get around the firm that I was almost dead. I was afraid the killer would try again. I called and pretended I was my doctor.” She gave a faint laugh. “I called my parents and told them that whatever they heard I was fine—although I have to say I was inclined to let my father stew a bit more. Carrie Mason’s the only one who knows I’m okay.”
    Reece stroked her cheek. “Botulism … that could’ve killed you.”
    “The doctor told me that, ‘luckily,’ I ingested too
much
of the culture. I got sick immediately and, well, the word they used was, quote,
evacuated
most of the bacteria. Man, it was unpleasant. I’m talking Mount Saint Helens.”
    He hugged her hard. “We’re not going to have to worry about anything like this happening again. I talked to Sam, my friend at the U.S. attorney’s office, yesterday afternoon. He’s coming down tomorrow with a special prosecutor from Washington. We’re going to meet with him at the federal building at three—if you feel up to it.”
    “I’ll feel up to it. Whoever’s behind this … we’re going to stop them.…” Her voiced faded. “What’s wrong, Mitchell?”
    “Wrong?” His eyes were hollow and troubled. “You almost got killed.… I’m so sorry. If I’d known—”
    She leaned forward and kissed him. “Hey, I lost those five pounds I gained at Thanksgiving and then some. Call it an early Christmas present. Now, go on, get out of here. Next time you see me I promise I won’t look like Marley’s ghost.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
     
    The girl walked sheepishly into the hospital room, hiding behind a bouquet of exotic flowers that she’d probably hand-selected from an Upper East Side florist.
    “Whoa,” Taylor told Carrie Mason, laughing at the massive arrangement. “Anything left in the rain forest?”
    The chubby girl set the vase on the bedside table and sat in the functional gray chair near Taylor’s bed, studying her carefully.
    “You’re looking a thousand times better, Taylor,” Carrie said. “Everybody’s like, ohmagod, she’s dying. I wanted to tell them but I didn’t. Not a soul—like you said.”
    Taylor gave her a rundown on her condition and thanked the girl for staying with her just after she’d been admitted.
    “It’s, like, no problem, Taylor. You looked … You were pretty sick.”
    Attempted murder does that to you.
    “Well, I’ll be getting out soon. May not eat for a week or so but it’ll be good to get vertical again.”
    The girl avoided Taylor’s eyes. She stood and arranged the flowers and it was this compulsive activity that told Taylor that she was troubled by something.
    “What is it, Carrie?”
    The girl paused, her back to Taylor, then sat down again. Tears were running down her cheeks. She wiped her face with the back of her fleshy hand. “I …”
    “Go ahead. Tell me. What’s the matter?”
    “I think I know why Mr. Clayton killed himself. I think it was my fault.”
    “Your fault?” Taylor said. “What do you mean?”
    “Well, okay … You know Sean.”
    One of the firm’s busier spies. Taylor nodded.
    “Well, what it was … see, last week Sean asked me out. I went over to his place. And I thought he wanted to go out with me and I was really, really excited about it. ’Cause I’ve had this crush on him for, like, a while. But it turned out … I mean, the thing was he just wanted to go through my purse.”
    “Why?”
    “To get my log-on pass code for the firm computers. One of the operators told me he went on the system with my user name.”
    Taylor remembered the gum-snapping computer operator and the blank screen that should have had information about taxis and computer time and phone records. This was interesting. She nodded for the girl to continue and listened carefully.
    “When I found out what he did I got totally mad. I asked him how could he do that? I mean, he way used me. Anyway he got all freaked out and apologized. But I was so mad.… Well, I wanted to get even