Page 88 of Savage Beauty

“You texted someone to come here, didn’t you?”

“I didn’t sign up for this.” Her lips remain clenched and her eyes narrow. Her hands are steady. She’s determined. It’s the determination I need to be hyperaware of. All she has to do is squeeze her finger.

“What, exactly, is this? I don’t get it.”

“You really don’t know, do you? That’s exactly what I fucking told them, too.” The words are bitter.

I inch back, and her arms straighten.

“One more inch, and I pull this trigger.”

“If I’m going to die anyway, can you tell me what this is all about? I don’t understand.”Keep them talking. It’s Sam’s voice. His training. His coaching.

“I told them you didn’t realize what you uncovered. But it was too big of a risk. You wanted to submit it for peer review. If they opened an investigation, it would have catastrophic implications.”

“For organs?” The latest report I saw showed the organ transplant industry to be at two to three billion a year, tops. As far as medical industries go, it’s relatively small.

“Use that brain of yours. Everyone thought you’d figured it out. But I was right. You only cared about the organs, right?”

Optimistic headlines flash before me. Headlines touting FDA approvals for drugs Lumina tested. Record breaking profit. Stock prices surging.

“The people in the compound. Lumina International is doing first round tests on them. And when they get sick, they sell their organs. That’s why the incidence of cancer is so high on black market organs.”

“For select products with tremendous promise, they’ll do initial in vivo rounds in alternate locations before testing goes to India and China. It’s a way to speed drugs to market.”

Everything clicks. “Faster and cheaper than any competitor. And if someone gets sick, you harvest the organs. Which is a contributing factor to the transplant success rate stemming from the black market being so behind US rates. My report highlighted all the data and would’ve led regulators to Lumina’s door. Eventually. Or…was there evidence in the data that would lead them to drugs already on the market?”

Her gaze flicks to the clock hanging on the wall.

I raise my hand. Wrapped around my fingers is a blade.

“Honey. Don’t fight me on this.” The literal meaning of honey is sweet, but her expression is mean.

“How many are involved?”

“Too many. I don’t know them all. There’s no way out of this.” She actually sounds sad. “I don’t have a choice.”

I position my legs for stability and lift the blade.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to bring a knife to a gunfight?” Her lips curve into an almost smile, but nothing about this situation is smile-worthy.

“I throw knives to relax. I don’t miss. Let me leave. If the people you work for are so powerful, they’ll find me, right? Just let me go. Like you said, you weren’t supposed to be the one to kill me. You are not a killer.”

“There’s too much at stake. I don’t have a choice. I’m sorry.”

Her trigger finger flexes.

A flick of my wrist. The blade spins through the air.

My hand is back in my bag, retrieving a second blade. Cool, smooth metal against my fingers.

The first blade strikes.

Directly into her throat.

The gun fires.

It’s loud. So loud. I cover my ears.

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