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Slade sat back in his chair, his feet propped up on his desk, eyes closed and hands behind his head. He mentally processed the events of the day. First of all, they'd spotted several men at Camilla’s funeral, but the chase had gone nowhere. Then, the RPD had fished a body out of the James, a man who had been repeatedly poisoned, a virtual experimental corpse. Then, at lunch, Henry had seen someone stalking or at least loitering behind Dottie's house. Police had chased the guy for over an hour but once again, he’d gotten away. What the hell was going on? He’d never known perps who wanted or needed a front row seat in all aspects of their crimes. It scared him. These were psychopaths. It was pretty obvious they didn't care much about their own lives but were simply killing for kicks. Slade continued to reflect on the day and became more concerned about the inevitability of what was going to happen next.
These guys were terrorists, they were going to launch a terror attack in Richmond and it was going to happen soon. But, when? Who did they work for? The Feds were right. They’d been saying the same thing for two days most likely based on intelligence they hadn’t shared. He needed to ask Chief Herndon to have the governor activate the Virginia National Guard. He opened his eyes when his fax machine beeped. He walked over to the machine and pulled the paper out of the fax. It was the preliminary autopsy report on the floater. Before he could read the report, his cell phone rang and Peggy Grey’s name flashed on his digital display. He grabbed the phone on the first ring.
"Dr. Grey. What have you got? I'm sure you're not calling to tell me how nice it was to see me at lunch today," he joked, a note of doubt in his voice.
Peggy smiled. She liked Slade McKane. Even though he was short tempered and had the personality of the black Irish, he was a damned good cop. "It was good to see you today as well, Detective McKane. As a matter of fact, it's always good to see you, but you’re correct. I have some information to share with you," she said pleasantly, but Slade knew her voice was guarded.
"I'm sure it's not good, not if you have to call me at ten o'clock at night," Slade mused. "Spit it out."
Peggy sighed deeply and said, "It's not good. I just got off the phone with SAC Burnley and Dr. Duncan from the Fed’s poison team.” She paused and asked, "Did you get the fax I just sent you?"
Slade felt a knot form in his belly and said, "Yeah, just got it. It's in my hand as we speak."
“Well, it's the preliminary autopsy of the fluids from the floater they pulled out of the river today."
"Yeah, I figured that," Slade said as the knot in his belly intensified. He could feel the blood rushing through his heart and to his brain as his blood pressure skyrocketed. "Break it down for me, Peggy. How bad is it?"
Peggy was silent for a moment and said, "It's bad. It's pretty bad, Slade."
"Spit it out," he ordered. “Whatever it is, we gotta figure out how to deal with it."
“We’ve got several different poisons in the body of the floater,” she said. "He was full of another lethal plant toxin. It’s often referred to as heartbreak grass."
Slade’s brain exploded. "Isn’t that the stuff they used to assassinate that Russian exile — the guy that was going to testify against the Russians? The man who was killed in London last year?”
Peggy smiled to herself. Slade was a good cop. "Yeah. It's the same. Heartbreak grass leaves a chemical calling card in the stomach that we can identify easily now, particularly if we're looking for poison. Of course the floater was full of other types of poison as well... the belladonna that we identified in Camilla and the others. We think now that the murdered kids had heartbreak grass in them as well. We’re gonna go back and check."
Slade was appalled that someone would use heartbreak grass on a bunch of school children. His heart raced with anger and he didn’t reply. Peggy continued to speak as Slade got his anger under control.
"Heartbreak grass blocks the transmission of impulses where the muscles and nerves meet. It causes quick respiratory depression and death. Victims can die immediately depending on the dosage, or within an hour. They often complain of dizziness, nausea, and vomiting. They may say they can’t walk or stand so they fall to the floor. Generalized instability of their feet is common. It's a very lethal poison," she ended in a soft voice.
Slade was working out the response in his mind. He hated to even suggest it because he was afraid it was correct. “Sounds like we may have a Russian terrorist here in Richmond."
"We can’t rule that out," Peggy said, a note of resignation in her voice. “Heartbreak grass is a main assassination tool of the Russians and the Chinese. We know it’s a weapon of the Russian Secret Service. We also know it’s made or perhaps refined is a better word, in the poison labs of the Russian Secret Service, known to some as Kamera."
Slade gritted his teeth, every curse word he knew jumping through his mind. “Could this get any worse?" he asked, terror riveting his body as he ran his fingers through his dark curly hair. He quickly assessed the possibilities of a heartbreak grass terror attack in Richmond. It would be deadly.
“Well,” Peggy said slowly, “It can always be worse, but this is bad, quite bad in fact. There’s an early meeting down at FBI headquarters in the morning so you need to be there... unless they move it up to tonight,” she added.
Slade’s intestines went into spasm. He asked, "Anything else I need to know, Peggy?"
"Heartbreak grass, along with cyanide, is the main component in the ‘suicide pills’ you see in spy movies and in real life."
"That's great, that's just great," Slade muttered sarcastically. He paused for a second and asked, “What about the stuff used at Mic’s restaurant? Is it the heartbreak grass or the belladonna?”
“Don’t know. Probably a combination of a bunch of stuff. We haven’t analyzed it yet. We’ve got to get them, Slade, we’ve just gotta get them,” Peggy said quietly. “Or, it’ll be the end of life as we know it in Richmond, Virginia.”
“Yeah, I know,” Slade said as he wiped sweat from his face with his handkerchief. He hadn’t realized he was sweating so much.