minute for her to realize that the passenger seat was occupied. There was also someone in the back. But worse was the sight of an enormous revolver pointing at her.
Marissa tried to reverse her direction, but it was as if she were caught in a heavy, viscous fluid. Her body wouldn’t respond. She saw the gun coming up at her, but she could do nothing. She saw a face in the half-light, and she heard someone start to say “good-bye.” But the gun went off with a fearful concussion, and time stopped.
When Marissa regained consciousness, she was lying on something soft. Someone was calling her name. Slowly opening her eyes, she realized that she’d been carried back inside to the couch in the CDC lobby.
Flashing red and blue lights washed the room like a tawdry, punk discotheque. There seemed to be many people coming in and out of the room. It was too confusing. She closed her eyes again and wondered what had happened to the men with the guns.
“Marissa, are you all right?”
Her lids fluttered open, and she saw Dubchek bending over her, his dark eyes almost black with fear.
“Marissa,” he said again. “Are you all right? I’ve been so worried. When you finally made us realize what was going on, we were afraid they’d try to kill you. But you never stayed still long enough for us to find you.”
Marissa was still too shocked to speak.
“Please say something,” Dubchek pleaded. “Did they hurt you?”
“I thought you were part of it. Part of the conspiracy,” was all she could manage to utter.
“I was afraid of that,” groaned Dubchek. “Not that I didn’t deserve it. I was so busy protecting the CDC, I just dismissed your theories. But believe me, I had nothing to do with any of it.”
Marissa reached for his hand. “I guess I never gave you much chance to explain, either. I was so busy breaking all the rules.”
An ambulance attendant came up to them. “Does the lady want to go to the hospital?”
“Do you, Marissa?” asked Dubchek.
“I guess so, but I think I’m okay.”
As another attendant came up to help lift her onto a stretcher, she said, “When I heard the first bang, I thought I’d been shot.”
“No, one of the FBI men I’d alerted shot your would-be killer instead.”
Marissa shuddered. Dubchek walked beside the stretcher as they took her to the ambulance. She reached out and took his hand.
Epilogue
MARISSA WAS UNPACKING FROM a two-week vacation, taken at Dr. Carbonara’s insistence, when the doorbell rang. She had just returned from Virginia, where her family had done everything they could to spoil her, even giving her a new puppy that she’d immediately named Taffy Two.
As she walked downstairs, she couldn’t imagine who might be at the door. She hadn’t told anyone the exact date of her return. When she opened the door, she was surprised to see Cyril Dubchek and a stranger.
“I hope you don’t mind our turning up like this, but Dr. Carbonara said you might be home, and Dr. Fakkry from World Health wanted to meet you. This is his last day in America. Tonight he is flying back to Geneva.”
The stranger stepped forward and dipped his head. Then he looked directly at Marissa. His eyes reminded her of Dubchek’s: dark and liquid.
“I am deeply honored,” said Dr. Fakkry, with a crisp, English accent. “I wanted to thank you personally for your brilliant detective work.”
“And with no help from us,” admitted Dubchek.
“I’m flattered,” said Marissa, at a loss for words.
Dubchek cleared his throat. Marissa found his new lack of confidence appealing. When he wasn’t making her furious, she could admit that he was actually very handsome.
“We thought you’d like to know what’s been happening,” he said. “The press has been given as little detail as possible, but even the police agree you are entitled to the truth.”
“I’d love to hear everything,” said Marissa. “But please come in and sit down. Can I get you something to drink?”
When they were settled, Dr. Fakkry said, “Thanks to you, almost everyone connected to the Ebola conspiracy has been arrested. The man you stabbed in San Francisco implicated Dr. Heberling the minute he recovered from surgery.”