“You!” Nick said. “Every menu was based on local ingredients, every menu was different except for one thing. The ham that you provided. That’s it. Athens was the only dinner to have the fresh pork you provided but all dinners had the ham. Other than that they have nothing in common. So if I’m the common denominator, you’re the common supplier.”

“So,” Blake began, “what are you saying? Don’t mince words Nick.” Blake knew his relationship with Nick was over. He and Terry had already slaughtered all the pigs other than a lethargic sow they couldn’t get to before light gave out on them. Blake would kill her himself later even though he knew he wouldn’t get paid for it. He just didn’t want any more evidence left on the mountainside. The two encounters with the sheriff, not to mention having the sheriff preach to him, had scared him to the core. It wasn’t worth it. He couldn’t risk the sheriff seeing him haul any of it, not with the Facebook pictures he reported seeing.

“I’m saying,” Nick began, “that if they do come and ask me any questions, it will be you that I point them to. Your phone number, your address.” Blake hung up on Nick. Hung up and then slammed the phone repeatedly against the palm of his hand.

The talking head on CNN continued reporting on the damage from the storm. “We have a report from the prime minister of the Bahamas who says that Hurricane Isabel has resulted in no deaths and, so far, no reported injuries as it has marched through the chain. He said the Bahamas is well prepared for storms and he doesn’t expect any deaths but does anticipate widespread power outages.”

“See?” Blake said as he reached over to touch Angelica’s knee. She placed her hand on top of his.

The footage of the hurricane on the screen was replaced with a graphic that read “Foodborne Illness.” Blake didn’t want Angelica to know that this was the story he wanted to see, that he was afraid to see. That he had been controlling his fear and only appearing calm as he had learned to do when it was late in the game and his team was trailing on the road. But Blake’s fear finally got the best of him. The words on the screen, combined with Nick’s spoken words, panicked him. He pulled his hand away from Angelica’s and leaned forward, his chin resting on his fists.

“This just in. CNN is able to confirm that Anthrax has been identified as the cause of death and illnesses in Athens, Georgia, Trenton, New Jersey, Boston and six other cities,” the talking head said as she read the teleprompter. Blake’s mouth hung open, air suspended somewhere between his lungs and the air in the room as he sat perfectly still, the word still resonating inside him. “A-N-T-H-R-A-X.” The graphic behind the talking head changed to the capitalized word ANTHRAX, the motion graphic causing the letters to slowly expand and move away from one another to heighten the sense of drama. As if the word ‘anthrax’ itself, not to mention five dead bodies so far, necessitated more drama.

What the hell is anthrax? Blake asked himself. I thought that was a weapon or something.

“We turn now to CNN correspondent Drew Hunter for more on the story.” As the talking head spoke, the camera panned to show a thirty-something reporter seated on the other side of the glass table, opposite the first talking head. As he began to speak, Blake zoomed into the studio with him from the privacy of his sofa in Clayton, just as Nick did from a dimly lit office in his Buckhead mansion.

“Details are only now beginning to surface, Candace,” Drew said, before staring straight into the camera for a close up. “Five deaths and eighty-four hospitalizations have been attributed to anthrax thus far. The source of the anthrax is still under investigation, but the suspected cause is tainted meat.”

Blake felt his heart stop and then explode as the graphic behind Drew changed to “Tainted Meat.” He was sucked into a tunnel that connected him to the graphic, one that threw off his equilibrium like he was stranded alone, trying to make his way across a bridge in the vortex tunnel of a haunted house.

“What exactly is anthrax, Drew?” Candace asked.

“Candace, anthrax is one of the oldest diseases known to man,” Drew began. “In fact, many Bible scholars believe that anthrax was the fifth and sixth of the ten plagues of Egypt.”

“Do they know what causes it?”

“Yes, Candace, the organism that causes anthrax, Bacillus anthracis, can poison the soil for decades, even hundreds of years. In fact, it’s so common to find anthrax in soil that deadly outbreaks among grazing animals occur frequently, although not so much in the U.S. Normally, humans contract anthrax only by coming into contact with livestock or infected animal hides and carcasses.”

As the reporter spoke, footage scrolled on the screen of dead cows, pigs, and sheep lying on the ground. Stiff carcasses with their legs spread out dissolved into pictures of humans with gruesome, widow-black blisters that covered their entire arms or faces. Drew continued to narrate as the CNN horror reel played.

“There are three forms of anthrax, Candace. Cutaneous, gastrointestinal, and the most deadly and rare form, pulmonary or inhalation anthrax. Gastrointestinal anthrax generally comes from eating meat infected with anthrax. Conversely, when a person inhales the spores of anthrax they settle deep into the lungs, forming inhalation anthrax. Once there, the bacteria multiply rapidly and produce very deadly toxins. It’s the inhalation form that’s most associated with bioterrorism, as was the case in the 2001 attacks on the United States.”

The background footage stopped and the camera panned back to show a third talking head join the other two.

“Dr. Chandak, do we know which form of anthrax caused the deaths?” A graphic appeared under the new talking head that read “Dr. Sachi Chandak, Neurosurgeon and CNN Medical Correspondent.”

“Candace, we’re told that it was inhalation anthrax that was the cause of death for the victims near Boston and Athens, Georgia, and for the fifth victim in New Jersey,” Dr. Chandak said. “Now I’d like to stress that there is no evidence of bioterrorism and that anthrax isn’t a contagious disease. You have to come directly in contact with it.”

The graphic to the right of the talking head changed to read “Woolsorter’s Disease.”

“As Drew said,” Dr. Chandak continued, “inhalation anthrax is the most rare human form of anthrax and is almost never seen in a foodborne illness since, normally, one doesn’t inhale their food. It’s also known in other parts of the world as Woolsorter’s or Ragpicker’s disease because, throughout history, the inhalation form was most associated with those who sorted wool. The most famous case of woolsorter’s disease was in Bradford, England, where the disease killed many of the town’s workers for decades throughout the 1800s. Today, the disease even shows itself sometimes at music festivals, when drums made from animal hides infected with anthrax are beaten, thereby aerosolizing B. anthracis spores that may be inhaled.”

“What is the prognosis for victims that contract anthrax, Dr. Chandak?”

“Unfortunately Candace—I’m afraid that it isn’t good at all for victims of inhalation anthrax. Most estimates show eighty percent to ninety-five percent fatality rate, even–”

“Ninety-five percent fatal?” Candace interrupted. The graphic behind the doctor changed to read: “DEATH IN 24 HOURS.”

Dr. Chandak dropped his shoulders solemnly. “Yes Candace, up to ninety-five percent fatal even with antibiotic treatment,” he said. “And inhalation anthrax acts very fast, sometimes killing its host within 24 hours. As for gastrointestinal anthrax, which would likely result from consuming tainted meat, the fatality rate is twenty-five to sixty percent. Cutaneous anthrax is very treatable and generally not fatal.”