For Carson O’Connor-Maddison and her husband, Michael Maddison—she the daughter of a homicide cop, he the son of industrial-safety engineers—the past two years were the busiest of their lives, with considerable homicide and little safety. As New Orleans police detectives, they discovered that a supercilious biotech billionaire named Victor Helios was in fact Victor Frankenstein, still rockin’ at the age of 240. In league with the 200-year-old Deucalion, who sought his maker’s destruction, Carson and Michael survived numerous violent encounters with members of Victor’s New Race, saw horrors beyond anything Poe might have hallucinated in an opium fever, did a significant amount of chasing and being chased, shot a lot of big noisy guns, and ate mountains of fine Cajun food at establishments like Wondermous Eats. Carson drove numerous vehicles at very high speeds, and Michael never kept his promise to vomit if she didn’t slow down. They destroyed Victor’s laboratory, put him on the run, ate even better Cajun takeout from Acadiana, attended Victor’s death, and witnessed the destruction of his entire New Race. They acquired a German shepherd named Duke after saving him from monsters, and they were present when the enigmatic and strangely talented Deucalion cured Carson’s then twelve-year-old brother, Arnie, of autism. Seeking a fresh start, they turned in their badges, got married, moved to San Francisco, and considered opening a doughnut shop. But they wanted work that allowed them legally to carry concealed firearms, so instead of running a doughnut shop, they obtained licenses as private investigators and soon launched the O’Connor-Maddison Detective Agency. They busted some bad guys, learned to use chopsticks, ate a lot of superb Chinese food, spoke wistfully about the doughnut shop that might have been, and had a baby whom Carson wanted to name Mattie, after the spunky girl in the movie True Grit. But Michael insisted he wanted to call her Rooster or at least Reuben, in honor of Reuben “Rooster” Cogburn, the character played by John Wayne in that film. Eventually, they named her Scout, after the splendidly spunky girl in To Kill a Mockingbird.
An hour before dawn, just over four weeks before Halloween, and less than two years prior to the end of the world—if you believed the most recent doomsday scare being advanced by the media—Carson and Michael were sitting in the cab of a delivery truck, in a row of fourteen identical trucks, in a dark parking lot between two huge warehouses, near the docks. They were conducting surveillance in an industrial-espionage case, and talking about, among other things, baby wipes.
“They aren’t too caustic,” Carson disagreed. “They aren’t caustic at all.”
“I’ve read the ingredients.”
“I’ve read the ingredients, too. Aloe vera, lanolin, herbal extract—”
“What herbs did they get the extracts from?” Michael asked.
“An herb’s an herb. They’re all natural. Herbal extracts clean without leaving harmful residues.”
“So they say. But they don’t tell you the specific herbs. When they don’t tell you the specific herbs, the cop in me smells a rat.”
“For heaven’s sake, Michael, no company’s going to set out to make dangerously caustic baby wipes.”
“How do you know? Anybody could own the company. Do you know who owns the company?”
“I’m pretty sure it isn’t owned by al-Qaeda.”
“‘Pretty sure’ isn’t good enough when we’re talking about our little girl’s bottom.”
She sighed. Michael was still adorable, but fatherhood sometimes brought out a paranoia in him that she had not seen before. “Listen, sweetie, I care about Scout’s bottom just as much as you do, and I’m comfortable with using baby wipes.”
“They contain baking soda.”
“Pure baking soda. It eliminates odors.”
“There’s baking soda in fire extinguishers,” he said.
“Good. Then we don’t have to worry about Scout’s bottom catching on fire.”
“Baking soda,” Michael repeated, as if it were a synonym for rattlesnake venom. “I think we should use cotton cloth, water, and soap.”
She pretended horror. “Soap? Do you know what’s in soap?”
“Soap is in soap.”
“Read the label and then tell me about soap.”
“What’s in soap that’s so terrible?”
Carson didn’t know what might be in soap, but she figured at least half a dozen ingredients would alarm Michael and make baby wipes a lot more acceptable to him.
“Just check out the label—but don’t expect ever to be able to sleep again once you’ve read it.”
Out there in the unlighted parking lot, a dark figure moved.
Leaning toward the windshield, Michael said, “I knew this was the place.”
From the seat between them, Carson picked up a camera with night-vision technology.
“What do you see?” Michael asked.
Eye to the viewfinder, she said, “It’s Beckmann. He’s got an attaché case. This is the swap, all right.”
“Here comes someone else,” Michael said. “Pan left.”
Carson panned and saw another man approaching Beckmann from behind a warehouse. “It’s Chang. He’s carrying a shopping bag.”
“Is there a store name on the bag?”
“What does it matter? It’s just something to carry the money.”
“Chang wears cool clothes,” Michael said. “I’ve been wondering where he shops.”
Zooming in with the camera, clicking off a series of shots, Carson said, “He’s talking to Beckmann. Beckmann is putting down the attaché case. Chang is taking something from the bag.”
“Make sure you get a clear shot of the bag. We can enhance it till the store name is readable. Hey—something just happen?”
“Yeah. Chang pulled a gun from the bag and shot Beckmann.”
“I didn’t see that coming.”
“He just shot him again. Beckmann’s down.”
“I don’t hear any shots.”
“Silencer,” Carson reported.
“This is so not right.”
“Chang just knelt, shot him a third time, back of the head.”
Putting down the camera, Carson said, “You know what.”
“I’m too dad for this stuff.”
Drawing the pistol from her shoulder rig, she said, “And I’m too mom. But baby needs new shoes.”