The Protégé, page 10
The room starts to blur. For a few seconds, my body shuts down. I lose all sense of time.
Suddenly, Mick Lynch is standing next to me on stage. The screen behind him has gone dark, though the moans and grunts of copulation continue. He gestures to Toby in the booth, yanking a finger across his throat. The sound cuts out, and there’s a deep, chilling silence.
“One of the hazards of working at a cutting-edge university is that sometimes our students are too smart for their own good,” Lynch says.
More nervous laughter.
“It would seem Dr. Bryers is the victim of a practical joke. I assure you we’ll get to the bottom of it.” There are a few snorts at the double entendre. Lynch cringes a little but soldiers on. “In the meantime, I’m going to assist my esteemed colleague in her presentation.”
I gaze at him, wide-eyed, too numb with shock to utter a sound.
“You were about to tell us what makes Dr. Matsumoto’s lab unique.” His eyes hold mine, willing me to snap out of it. “Can you elaborate?”
I swallow hard. My mouth is so dry my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. I dislodge it with effort.
“Take your time.” He’s soothing, solid. Everything in him wills me to recover. He’s like a brave fireman coaxing a frightened kitten from a tree.
“Dr. Matsu—” My voice breaks. I start again. “Dr. Matsumoto has developed a diagnostic tool the likes of which the world has never seen.”
“Interesting. What is it that sets this tool apart?”
I clear my throat. I can do this. “He’s refined a technique called direct analysis in real-time with high-resolution mass spectrometry, or DART-MS for short.”
“Fascinating.” Lynch really does look intrigued. “Tell us more.”
I glance at the audience. Though a few people continue to whisper behind cupped hands, most of them seem to have regained their composure. I risk a look at my boss, Eli Balderstone. He’s watching Lynch with undisguised admiration. I’m torn between pure, unadulterated relief that Lynch is saving my ass and resentment about needing to be saved.
“Matsumoto has demonstrated that entomologists can now instantly differentiate between various fly species, based on the amino acid profiles of the eggs.”
“What specifically allows him to accomplish this?”
Just like that, we’re off and running. Lynch interviews me for the better part of an hour. Though I hate to admit it, the interactive element makes it a more engaging presentation than I could have managed on my own. He forces me to bring it down to a human level when I get too technical. He even manages to coax humor from me. A skilled straight man, he never lets the audience laugh at me; he simply sets the comedic moments up for me, leading me toward the punchline.
When we finally wrap up, the audience seems to have forgotten about that mortifying video.
But I know they haven’t.
And I never will either, as long as I live.
* * *
Winter
As Cameron and I leave the auditorium, he’s visibly shaken.
“Well, that was interesting.” I keep my tone neutral, not wanting to set him off.
Cameron is protective of Bryers. When my masterpiece came up on the screen, I saw how his jaw tightened. His knuckles went white as he gripped the arms of the chair like a passenger in a plane that’s going down.
“That was seriously messed up,” he corrects.
I bite my lip. This is my least favorite side of Cameron. He’s so damn fond of her. So worshipful. I was afraid he’d react like this—like a kid who’s just seen his favorite superhero humiliated.
“I mean, who would do that?” He’s beyond indignant; he’s enraged.
I tread carefully. “Not everybody loves Bryers, you know.”
“But to sabotage her like that? In front of her bosses? In front of everyone?” We pass under one of the old-fashioned lampposts. Lit from above, Cameron’s eyes are cast in shadow, making it hard to read his expression. “That’s insane. I can’t imagine what kind of monster thinks that’s funny.”
For a second, I almost lose it. I have to dig my nails into the tender flesh of my arm to keep from screaming. To slow my pounding heart, I remind myself of four important points.
1. Cameron doesn’t know Bryers, not really.
2. He has no idea what she did to me, what she did to Ella.
3. If he did know, he’d want to see her suffer as badly as I do.
4. He can’t know; that would ruin everything.
I say nothing. We walk in silence for a few minutes. I’m acutely aware that if I open my mouth right now, a tirade will come spilling out. I’ve been looking forward to this all day—my hour of triumph. For weeks, I’ve been planning it. I had to scour the dark web for somebody skilled enough at deepfake and seedy enough to do what I wanted without asking too many questions. I had to provide him with enough video footage of Bryers to make a passable three-minute clip. Then I had to plot how to access Bryers’s laptop at just the right moment. The app I installed on her phone helped with this. I knew she’d been preparing her presentation for weeks, so it was crucial that I embed the video at the last possible second, or she might rehearse and spot it. I’ve plotted this move with the skill and finesse of a master chess player.
And now Cameron is shitting all over my victory.
“You sure are quiet.” Cameron glances at me. It’s not suspicion in his face so much as confusion. He wants me to seethe with him.
I realize I have to deliver. “I’m just so furious about this. She must be mortified.”
“I know.” He exhales, his breath steaming in the cold night air. “It’s disgusting. In this day and age, for a woman of Dr. Bryers’s standing to be objectified like that.”
“You don’t think it was really her, do you?”
He scoffs. “No way. Are you kidding? Some kind of bullshit photoshop thing. Have you heard of deepfake?”
I widen my eyes, all innocence. “No. What’s that?”
“I don’t know much about it. I read an article online, though—it’s basically photoshop for moving images. Some douchebags on Reddit were making celebrity porn that way. There’s an app for it. Most sites are officially banning it, but some are conveniently slipshod about enforcing their own restrictions. I mean, you’ve got Scarlett Johansson in a three-way with aliens or whatever the hell these mouth breathers want to watch. It’s going to get hits. Hits mean money.”
“How do they do it, though?” I need to know how much Cameron understands about the process.
“Something to do with AI creating the seamless integration of images.”
“AI?” I seize on this. “You don’t think Lynch …?”
“No way. Never. You saw how he stepped in. Maybe one of his students, though.”
I pretend to consider this. “If he did do it, hopping on stage to save her ass would be an excellent way to deflect.”
“That’s ridiculous. Why would Lynch want to mess with her like that? They’re colleagues.”
“Come on, Cam.” I give him a sidelong look meant to convey how naive he’s being. “Academia’s cutthroat. I hear faculty bashing faculty all the time. They’re petty and competitive as high school cheerleaders.”
“I don’t see it.” His tone is flat. He’s not buying what I’m selling.
I shrug. I can’t afford to push this agenda too hard; it will look like I’m invested. “Maybe not.”
He shakes his head. “Poor Dr. Bryers. She froze. You could tell she was totally freaked out.”
“Had to be a shocker.” I turn away to hide my smile. Some of the delicious thrill comes back to me, skittering along my skin like champagne bubbles.
Cameron doesn’t notice my pleasure. He keeps talking, oblivious. “They better launch a full-scale investigation. Whoever did this has to be expelled. They should be banned from attending any university anywhere. It’s bullshit to let this kind of violation slide.”
I say nothing. A hot ember of fury smolders inside my ribcage. I should get a goddamn medal for what I did tonight. Exposing Bryers, step by step, is a noble endeavor. It’s my life’s mission, in fact—my raison d’être. It’s no coincidence I’ve focused on Bryers and not the handful of others involved in the case: the detectives, the social workers, the lawyers. If it weren’t for Bryers, Ella and I would have gotten away with our attempt to balance the scales of justice. We had every right to do what we did. Nobody should have to put up with the abuse we endured with Nana. We had everyone else fooled. Bryers was just starting her career back then, but she breezed in and uncovered the one piece of evidence that sealed my sister’s fate.
Ella and I were prisoners in our grandmother’s creaky, antebellum home, stuck in her sadistic web. Nana Jones was a terrifying woman, a victim of her own mood swings and dark impulses. She possessed a bizarre need to see other people suffer—even, or maybe especially, the people she loved. No doubt, if psychologists had ever gotten their hands on her, she would have been diagnosed with several personality disorders. In the south, though, Nana Jones was just a quirky old woman from a fine family that had fallen from grace. We still had the grand old mansion in Apalachicola, but we’d long since lost the ability to fight its alarming decay. The town accepted us as disgraced nobility, politely looking the other way while Nana got crazier and crazier.
In my dreams, I’m always following Ella. She leads me through the rotting rooms of our childhood home, where the mildew blooms like dark flowers across the ceilings. Her face is always turned away from me, and she can never hear me calling for her. No matter how loudly I yell her name, she’s forever slipping away from me, flitting like a ghost around corners, up stairwells, through doorways. She leads me into scenes we survived together, past the men Nana brought there, into the basement where we suffered the ugliest indignities any human can expect to endure. Somehow, though, I’m left to face these horrors alone, denied even the comfort of my sister’s hand in mine.
Cam knows nothing about any of this. It galls me to think the guy I’m sleeping with is so deeply ignorant. And okay, yes, I work to keep him in the dark, but that’s no excuse. If he had even an inkling of intuition, he would see right through Bryers and her holier than thou Margaret Mead persona.
He’d see her for what she is: a murderer.
CHAPTER
11
Hannah
THE MORNING AFTER my Fulbright presentation, I’m in the lab by seven. I didn’t sleep, of course. Humiliation had me tossing and turning all night, replaying the horror of watching that sickening video fill the screen. Who would go to such great lengths to make me a laughing stock? Fresh suspicion is gaining strength in me, as inexorable as a hand closing around my throat: someone is out to get me.
I’m not falling prey to wild conspiracy theories. Last night’s debacle proved it beyond a shadow of doubt. The dread, sitting like silt in the pit of my stomach the other night with Joe? That wasn’t indigestion. It was premonition, pure and simple. Somebody wants to humiliate me, to drag my name through the mud. First there was the incident with my office door, now this.
In all my years working here, I’ve never felt so vulnerable. What’s changed? We have new students every year, so that cast of characters is constantly in flux, but that doesn’t explain it. Surely if this were the work of some demented, angry student, I’d have noticed their bad attitude in class. I mentally scan the sea of student faces, some of them familiar, some little more than shadowy figures at the back of a large lecture hall. Would any of them go to this much trouble to humiliate me? It seems unlikely.
The only real change since last year is the newly formed Artificial Intelligence Department, spearheaded by Lynch. This type of thing never happened before he arrived last semester. I recall the little prank he played with his “killer robot.” He’s obviously got a proclivity for practical jokes. And okay, yes, he did step in and save me when I froze on stage last night, but isn’t that the sort of thing a narcissist might do just to make himself look good? What a brilliant plan: sabotage me, then save me. I saw the look of hero worship on Eli Balderstone’s face when Lynch jumped up on stage and seized control of the situation.
I try to ignore these inconvenient distractions and concentrate on John Doe.
The lab is only a few degrees warmer than the frosty morning air outside. Turning on the lights, the sterile white space with its gleaming silver autopsy tables springs to life under a flood of fluorescents. I breathe in the comforting smell of disinfectant and pull on my lab coat. The cool, distant analysis required for my work is my only weapon against the swarm of suspicions and paranoid second guesses crowding for space inside my mind.
Taking a deep breath, I locate John Doe’s cadaver storage cabinet, type in my code, and open the door. The tray comes sliding out soundlessly. Using tweezers, I pull away the blackened flesh to examine the spine more closely. The five lowest vertebrae are fused, so that tells me he was probably at least twenty-three. By that age, the vertebrae that form the sacrum have become a single unit. Analysis of the cranial suture closures indicates he was most likely between the ages of twenty-three and forty when he died. Since the missing deputy was thirty-eight, it’s not out of the question that these remains are his.
Something’s nagging at me, though. My instincts tell me John Doe was on the younger side of the range I’ve established. I grab a magnifying glass and peer more closely at the pubic symphysis, a secondary cartilaginous joint between the left and right superior rami of the hip bones. In early adults, the pubic symphysis is usually rugged in texture, traversed by horizontal ridges and intervening grooves. By the time someone reaches their mid-thirties, these bones get smoother and are bound by a rim. They continue to deteriorate as the person matures. In John Doe’s case, there’s still plenty of roughness on the surface of the pubic symphysis, indicating he probably died in his mid-twenties.
Armed with this information as well as the discovery I made yesterday when examining the ribs, I grab my phone and call Sheriff Brannigan to give him an update. He picks up after just one ring, jumping right in without any chitchat.
“What have you got for me, Dr. Bryers?” His voice is terse and a little distracted, as if he’s in the middle of something.
I appreciate the lack of small talk, so I follow suit. “I found a chipped area on one of the ribs. It looks like an old injury. Do you know if your deputy was ever wounded on—”
I haven’t even finished the question when he cuts me off. “I’ll be right over.”
Before I can answer, he’s hung up. I sigh, annoyed. He’ll assume I’m in my office, which means now I have to leave the lab and meet him there. Humans make things so complicated.
He must have been nearby, because by the time I lock up and walk down the hall to my office, he’s already waiting by my door. Brannigan’s a little younger than me, I’d guess. His dark hair is threaded with silver, but it’s thick and healthy looking. He stands about six feet tall, his khaki uniform pressed and crisp. His brown eyes study me, searching my face for information. He clutches a couple to-go cups from Magnolia Café.
“Good morning, Sheriff.” I unlock my office door and gesture for him to go in.
“Dr. Bryers.” He walks inside and offers me one of the cups. “I was getting coffee. Figured I might as well bring you some. Black okay?”
I take it from him. “Thanks.”
Brannigan’s good-looking in a conventional way. He has the swagger of a high school quarterback, a man who’s used to charming people without trying. His body is still strong and lean, but there’s a slight softening around the edges—the jock going to seed in slow motion. It’s not very generous, but I can’t help thinking he probably peaked in high school. There’s something a little bitter about the curve of his lips, like life hasn’t panned out the way he thought it would.
“Really hoping you’ve got some answers for me.” His orbital palpebral muscles push his brows into a hopeful triangle. “We’re all on pins and needles about Dan.”
“I understand,” I say. “You’re emotionally involved.”
He takes a sip of his coffee. “You could say that.”
I sip my coffee to be polite. It’s dark roast, something I abhor. Though I try to hide it, the disgust must register on my face.
“Everything okay?” He throws me a concerned look.
“Sure. Fine.” I put the coffee on my desk.
Brannigan takes a long swig of his and tosses the cup in the trash. I remind myself how essential it is to get my head back into work. All of this mulling over who’s trying to ruin me has to stop. One of the sheriff’s men is missing. It’s my job to tell him if the decaying corpse in there is the one he’s looking for. It’s a serious task. My answer will dictate the people he notifies and what he tells them. If my calculations are off, somebody could be told their son or husband, or father or brother, is dead, perhaps erroneously. I know I come off as cold, but I do think about these things. It’s part of what gives my work meaning.
“As I said on the phone, there’s a small, chipped area on one of the ribs. It looks like an old injury. Do you know if your deputy was ever wounded on his left side—perhaps a bullet grazed his ribcage, right about here?” I gesture to the relevant area on my own torso.
His lips tense as he considers. “I don’t think so. But he hasn’t been with us for long. Could’ve happened back in Texas.”
“The teeth weren’t recovered at the scene, which makes my job harder. My guess is he died a month ago, maybe more.”
Brannigan doesn’t say anything. The distant look in his eyes tells me he’s running this against the timeline of his missing deputy.
“So you think it could be him?” Brannigan says at last, his eyes meeting mine.
“Could be, but I have reason to believe this man was younger than the one you’re looking for. You said he was thirty-eight, correct?” I flip through my notes.
