Burke looked at him curiously.

“I don’t understand you,” he said, reaching for Humphrey’s motorized wheelchair. Instinctively, Humphrey pulled on the control stick and backed up, but in the small apartment, there was really no place for him to go. Burke, at once bemused and repulsed, watched his efforts. After creating a couple of feet between them, Humphrey pawed at the medical emergency alert device linked around his wrist. The killer moved to stop him, then paused and grinned. His prey, at least for the moment, was helpless. Beside Humphrey, Cassie’s blood glistened on the hardwood floor, and filled the room with a nauseating, coppery smell.

“This must be horrible for you,” Burke said. “Help is just a button push away and yet you can’t even do it. Why in the hell do the Neighbors want you so much anyway?”

He ambled across the room, grasped the emergency bracelet, and ripped it off Humphrey’s wrist with one hard yank.

“Who pays for all this?” he asked, holding up the bracelet, and using it to gesture around the room and down at the lifeless woman on the floor. “Who pays for this whore to come to your apartment and tend to you? Wait, don’t answer that. I already know.”

“What … what … do you want?”

Humphrey continued to quake.

Burke ignored the question, quite possibly because he could not understand it.

“Where is your family?” he demanded. “How come they don’t take care of you? Wait, don’t answer that. It’s because it’s easier for Uncle Sam to foot the bill, that’s why. Fucking leeches. Entitlement. That’s what’s made such a mess of this country. Your mother boozed or smoked or drugged or all three when she was pregnant with you, and we all end up paying for it for as long as you live. Trillions of dollars. That’s what your entitlement programs cost the rest of us. Trillions!”

“What do you want?”

“What do I want? Is that what you said? Hey, I understood what you said. Okay. I’ll tell you what I want. I want you to get your materials related to the Janus bacteria together so you can make us an antibiotic that works. Our scientists and our laboratory are waiting for you.”

“No … I don’t know…”

Burke slapped him violently across the face. Bright blood began coursing from one nostril over his lip and into his mouth. Grabbing one handle and the control stick of his wheelchair, Burke drove him over to his computer. There was a large gym bag nearby. The killer, virtually out of patience and composure, emptied the clothing from the bag, swept up the mass of papers and articles covering the cluttered desk surface, and jammed everything into it. Then he pulled open the drawers and a file cabinet, and did the same. The bag was bulging by the time he finished.