Well always have poison, p.1
We'll Always Have Poison, page 1
We’ll Always Have Poison
A Dr. Lily Robinson Novel
BJ Magnani
Encircle Publications
Farmington, Maine, U.S.A.
We’ll Always Have Poison Copyright © 2024 BJ Magnani
Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-645990-525-8
Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-645990-524-1
eBook ISBN-13: 978-1-645990-526-5
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher, Encircle Publications, Farmington, ME.
This book is a work of fiction. While the science and toxins are real, names, characters, places and events are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual places or businesses, is entirely coincidental.
Encircle editor: Cynthia Brackett-Vincent
Book and cover design by Deirdre Wait
Cover images © Getty Images
Published by:
Encircle Publications, LLC
PO Box 187
Farmington, ME 04938
info@encirclepub.com
http://encirclepub.com
In memory of my beloved daughter Knina,
who saw the world in all its beauty—and with all its faults.
Though she rests now with the blue-green jewel of the universe,
Mother Earth, she will remain in my heart—forever.
CHAPTER 1
The Northeast Coast of Australia
Mountainous clumps of staghorn coral littered the seafloor like remnants of an exposed grave. The diver edged along the reef. He remained focused. Determined to capture the growing destruction, staccato flashes from his underwater camera reflected off the remaining bright purple sea fans. Delicate air bubbles floated above while he photographed the masses of stark white ‘bones.’ Closer to the shore, waves crashed over adjacent brain coral without effect. The coral sat unmoved; their pale fissures lifeless, devoid of thriving soft polyps.
Diving off this isolated stretch of beach had once been wondrous—all varieties of colorful aquatic life captured by the camera lens. Gone were the majestic manta rays that swam at his side, their broad wings flapping as they searched for zooplankton. Only a few remaining ornate butterflyfish, glorious in their brilliant orange-yellow stripes, darted in and out of the coral in search of polyps.
The change was undeniable. Bleaching had progressed. How could the Great Barrier Reef come back from this latest insult? The diverse ecosystem he had documented over the last fifteen years continued to collapse. He stopped. His fins fanned through the water, stirring the sand below. The ocean gasped for breath.
Tiny coral polyps had taken fifty million years to build the reefs. By comparison, human impact took less than two hundred years to unravel Mother Nature’s work. If these bastions of marine life died, the world would lose fifty to eighty percent of its oxygen emitted via plankton and photosynthesizing bacteria. A quarter of the planet’s marine life would lose their habitat, as coral reefs provide food, shelter, and protection for spawning. And, as lower organisms disappeared, those higher up the food chain, too, would be threatened.
The discouraged diver headed back to shore, lost in thought, believing the Great Barrier Reef was on the precipice of death. Only the sounds of his breathing filled his ears. Soon, he planned to meet with the Climate Council and deliver his report. What he would say would turn the world upside down. He made a mental note to call the Council Chair and request the presence of a security service at the conference.
Another diver hid, and watched, within the mounds of bleached coral. Her mask and snorkel allowed her to see the seafloor yet stay undetected—no bubbles to give her away. Strapped to her left leg, a diving knife remained ready. She took a few shallow breaths and waited. When her target stopped to remove his fins so he could step the remaining yards through the shallows, she made her move. The pouch at her side writhed in undulations. Using a set of snake tongs, she pulled the sea serpent from the bag, and with her own fins beating like a dolphin’s tail, she swam silently to the unaware diver and positioned the head of the snake at his exposed ankle. The bite was swift. The snake, agitated from its journey in a blind pouch, squirmed and lunged with a second bite. The man stumbled. Gravity pulled him face-first into the water, his mask slipping off the top of his head.
The woman returned the snake to the pouch, grabbed her victim’s camera, and swam along the shore with the deftness of a water ballerina. When she reached a dense cluster of orange mangroves, she rose from the ocean like a sea creature adapted to land. Hidden behind a tree, she dropped the writhing bag onto the sand and loosened its opening. In one swift gesture, she sliced off the serpent’s head. A spurt of dark fluid missed splashing her face—the turn of her head, too quick. Picking up the still wriggling pieces, the lithe diver cast them into the ocean, knowing the fish would finish off what she had started.
Damp, blond tresses curled in ringlets spilled from under her diving cap as she prepared to change. She took a deep breath and, with some difficulty, stripped off her dive skin to expose a royal blue print bikini. Gathering her things, the shapely diver waited for her contact’s arrival and thought, one down.
Back down the beach, gentle waves pushed the man’s body toward the sandy shore, nudging curious ghost crabs in its path. Their scurrying etched tiny trails in the sand, defining their movements. Overhead, squawks from silver gulls filled the quiet as they eyed the lifeless form below. Circling blowflies landed on the salt-soaked corpse, depositing eggs in the eyes, nose, and mouth. By now, the sky was a glorious red with streaks of purple, blue, and gold. Polluted air created a spectacular sunset as particles of smoke and dust reflected beams of brilliant light. And when the bright was replaced with the dark, only a ribbon of stars lit the heavens.
CHAPTER 2
Boston
My name is Lily Robinson, and I’m on the upside of my recovery from a gunshot wound suffered at the hands of a terrorist. Remnants of my past stay with me, plague me, tangled in what’s to come. It’s the past I now hear knocking at my door. And maybe the future, too.
Rose and Kelley stand before me—young, hopeful, hand in hand.
“Oh, Dr. Robinson,” Rose says, her tight hug engulfing me, “I’m so happy to see you.”
I let her arms linger, and when we break the embrace, my daughter is beaming—a full smile, rosy cheeks, and dark hair tucked behind her ears. Her coat covers the navy sweater that drapes her slim frame. She seems happy. But would her smile disappear if I told her my secret? Our secret—that I’m her biological mother.
“So good to see both of you.” I take their jackets and hang them in the closet. “Let’s sit.” Her wide-legged pants appear to float across the living room as Rose enters while Kelley, my former fellow, gets us some drinks so Rose and I have a few minutes alone.
“Rose, you look well.” Yet her downturned eyes and brief parting of the lips tell me otherwise. “How does it feel to be back in medical school after your leave of absence?”
“Fabulous.” She shifts in her seat and pulls at an imaginary thread on her slacks. “I’m loving every minute.”
Kelley appears handsome today—his dark hair clipped at the sides, the slide of his shoes across the tile heralding his entrance. He casts a sideways glance toward Rose, his tight grip and steady hand tells me he grasps the situation. He hands us our drinks. “Thank you, Kelley.”
“You’re looking well, too, Dr. Robinson,” Kelley says before taking his seat.
We make small talk about the university and our colleagues, and after a bite to eat, Kelley is eager to hear my thoughts about the string of recent overdose deaths filling the morgue. Once a student of mine, he now takes his place as a full-time physician helping run the toxicology service. My university job dwindled to a trickle when my knowledge of poisons became more than academic as the U.S. Government demanded more of my time as a covert assassin.
Kelley settles in his chair and spills a medical case he’s been working on. “I want you back on service full-time, Dr. Robinson. We need you.”
He waits for my reaction, and all I do is stare, knowing that I’ve been consumed by a clandestine sideline job that has vexed me since my daughter Rose went missing from my life more than twenty years ago.
Kelley starts again, moved by my silence. “Here it is. A twenty-six-year-old male, found down in one of the local eateries in Boston. When EMS got there, they gave him naloxone, assuming it was a drug overdose. He responded poorly, so they gave him multiple doses to reverse the opioid effects. But he seized and started flailing about; now he’s in our Neurointensive Care Unit.”
“I can almost anticipate how this will end,” I tell Kelley.
“I’m sure you can,” he says, nodding. “When he regained consciousness, he told us he had used cocaine, but when we tested his urine, it showed he had taken cocaine, and fentanyl.”
“Of course. So let me guess, prolonged hypoxia caused Lance-Adams syndrome?”
“Exactly.” Kelley nods, and places both hands on his thighs.
Rose leans forward and interrupts. “Okay you two doctors. I’m not following. What’s Lance-Adams syndrome?”
“Sorry, Rose. Lance-Adams is relatively rare, but sometimes after a person has a cardiopulmonary arrest and is resuscitated, they develop myoclonus and even dysarthria.” I pause at the puzzled look on Rose’s face.
Kelley jumps in before I resume. “Look, heart and breathing stop. The brain gets no oxygen, and if the time interval before the patient is revived is too long, they can develop uncontrollable jerks called myoclonus after the heart starts pumping again.”
I raise an eyebrow at Kelley. “That’s what I said.” Turning to Rose, I continue, “the muscle jerks interfere with motor functions, so limbs move uncontrollably, darting in all directions, sometimes hands swinging in the air, punches landing on the face. The patient also has trouble speaking, that’s dysarthria, and some short-term memory impairment.”
“Oh, I see. That sounds awful.” Rose scrunches up her nose and shifts in her chair.
My voice softens. “What’s awful is the aftermath. How long the person is deprived of oxygen before the brain damage makes coming back worse than the original problem, in this case, drug use.”
Kelley captures my look and nods. “Our hope is he’ll regain some of his function.”
On cue, Rose frowns, her arms crossed in front of her, her fingers blanched. “So, it’s more about the lack of oxygen rather than the drug use, per se,” Rose says.
“Yes.”
Her eyes glisten. A young woman still coping with her own depression, and trauma. I put my arm around her. “Rose, there’ll always be those cases with bad outcomes. All we can do is our best.”
She nods, her lips pursed, and her green eyes look past me. It’s hard to read her thoughts, and I won’t pry.
Rose and Kelley stir in their seats and make plans to leave. Kelley grabs my elbow, the pressure of his fingers anchoring me. “Come back,” he says.
“I’ll be back at the hospital soon. I need a little time off to reflect on my life,” I tell him.
“Reflect on your life?” Kelley tilts his head to one side, his eyebrows close together. “What’s to reflect on?”
I laugh, give them each a big hug, and kiss Rose’s cheek. “I’ll see you both soon.” My hand brushes Rose’s arm, and she doubles back for another hug. I feel her warmth against my body, and the floral scent of her hair jostles my memory. Does she sense our blood connection and, like me, choose to remain silent?
Rose was a rare bloom, the child of an indiscretion between a research fellow and her older professor. While I gave Rose her dark hair and green eyes, she had the shape of Charles’s mouth and his stormy view of the world—even as a toddler. I wasn’t in love with Rose’s father, but I did love him. At least twenty years my senior, he was my mentor, and in some ways, I was his.
The nurses were supportive when I went into labor. ‘Take a deep breath during your contraction, and slowly let the breath out,’ they said. I felt the impending birth. I had to push. Sounds from the fetal monitor rang in my ears—fast-paced tapping—thump, thump, thump, thump.
“Lily, I can see the head crowning. Just a few more pushes,” the doctor said. His gray hair spilled from under his surgical cap, his green scrubs fresh in the morning light.
“Good job, keep going. Almost there, Lily. That’s it.” The nurse spoke her words of encouragement, held my hand, and rubbed my back.
I gave one final push.
“It’s a little girl, Lily. And she’s perfect,” the doctor said. His excitement bounced off the walls, turning the delivery room’s tension into joy.
The nurse’s face beamed. I pulled at her elbow before she took my baby aside, and she laid her upon my chest—Rose’s eyes barely open, her pink skin mottled from her struggle to leave the watery environment and trust one with air. I stroked her damp hair, and a sweet odor—an intoxicating newborn smell that lingered for months—filled my senses. I searched for the right words, words Charles might have said if he were in the room with me. If he hadn’t died. A covalent bond came to mind, the strongest chemical bond in our world. “My little love, our connection is an unbreakable bond.” I felt the surge of endorphins kick in, a blinding euphoria sweeping away the remainder of childbirth.
I held her tiny hand in mine. A love forever. Yet in one fleeting afternoon when Rose was just three, she disappeared in the jungles of Colombia. Only images of a red-soaked earth and the smell of death in humid air stayed with me, waiting for me to regain my memory. For more than twenty years, I couldn’t remember what had happened. Or maybe I just didn’t want to. It’s hard to know where the truth lies.
Those early days, I found myself going through the motions of life. Not living life, just pretending. I was a passenger, not a driver. Brain fog inhabited my mind like the June gloom in a California spring. I squelched the overpowering guilt I felt while waiting for the clouds to part. Buried it. My logical mind and supreme focus blocked my emotions. I thought I would never love again. I could never love again.
It’s hard to shake that way of life. Living less in the moment, guarded and suspicious. But then, that makes me who I am—the Queen of All Poisons.
CHAPTER 3
Washington, D.C.
A car hit the brakes just as a ball rolled into the street. The man with wispy brown hair ran out, picked it up, and threw it to the wide-eyed boy before turning into a white stone building. The sign out front read Society for Climate Intervention, the cover name for the team’s headquarters, while the inner door required a retinal scan to enter. Inside, men and women, computers at their fingertips, monitored potential global threats.
Chad Jones stroked his chin and settled behind his desk. The call he’d just received had stoked more than concern. It had planted the seeds of a plan to get his frayed team back together. A scientist, Daniel Williams, found dead on a beach off the northeast coast of Australia, had been expected to speak in front of the Climate Council in Brussels. According to his known itinerary, he first planned a trip to South Africa to meet with Graham Harmon, another scientist, before going to Belgium. Yet, he failed to connect with his assistant to review the last-minute details the day before his departure. So, his staff looked for him in all his favorite places. And they found him.
His bloated body clung to his wetsuit. Intact diving gear and air tanks, two-thirds empty, indicated the scientist was likely on his way back to the beach when he died. When Chad had asked about the cause of death, his contact reported there had been some speculation the man may have encountered a sea snake. And although Chad knew little about these underwater serpents, he knew they were poisonous. Lily Robinson came to mind.
A knock at the door jostled Chad back to the papers on his desk. He arranged them in a neat stack before he shouted, “one moment,” combed his brown hair with the tips of his fingers and straightened his blue-striped tie. Then he rose from behind his desk and got the door.
“Right on time,” Chad said to the middle-aged man standing in the door frame. “Come on in, JP, and take a seat.”
They shook hands, and Chad thought JP’s hair had gotten even grayer since their last meeting. Jean Paul, or JP as they all called him, had sported a thick head of dark hair not all that long ago. But Chad knew full well that the stress of the job took its toll. He had worked with JP for years as his director and recognized him as one of the best field operatives on his team—a team primarily responsible for suppressing terrorist threats by any means. A controversial position, yet one with global acceptance within the consortium of those charged with overseeing world order.
“Merci, Chad. Good to see you again.” JP scanned the room, eyed the ticking clock on the shelf above Chad’s desk, and checked his watch hidden by his cuff. “Alors, what have you got for me?” He sat in the chair opposite Chad and observed the orderly pile of papers, then brushed the pleat in his charcoal slacks.
Chad cleared his throat. “Ha. No small talk. I should know better. You come right to the point.” He evened out the corners of the pile. “We’ll get to that in a moment. First, have you been in contact with Robinson?”
