2.
It was midnight. Logan was alone in his apartment.
He'd spent part of the evening at a holiday party hosted by the owner of the industrial park where he lived, socializing with his neighbors—the men and women who designed t-shirts, repaired electronics, and sold vacuum-press coffee brewers. There had been craft beer, mulled cider, appetizers, cookies, desserts. Christmas was two weeks away.
A few people remarked that he'd been away during the past months, and he said he'd been away on business. When they asked what line of work he was in, Logan told them he was a corporate security consultant. After the third time he gave this answer, he realized it was more true than it would have been a few months earlier.
It felt good to be home. There had been some concerns from both Holden and Zoe about him returning to his apartment. The address would be on file with their old employers, and anyone left alive might want retribution for what Logan had done to their organization. For the people he'd killed. For the property he'd destroyed. For the catastrophic financial loss wrought by his actions.
But no one seemed to be left alive. No one that mattered, at least. Paradime had recently acquired a private intelligence agency and focused all of that agency's attention on Logan and Zoe's former employers. The antimatter bomb Zoe had dropped on the shipyard and the bloodbath outside the facility in Antarctica had reduced the entire organization to a handful of names. Logan had seen the reports. The surviving members of the company were middle management, workers who were interested in nine-to-five workdays and retirement plans and paid time off. They were people who had probably cheered when they'd heard the executive board had been blown to gray particles. They were more likely to track Logan down to buy him a drink than they were to come knocking at his door seeking revenge.
Holden's intelligence network was still monitoring for updates, but Logan wasn't concerned. He'd slept well since his return, confident in the locks on his doors and his security system and his own ability to defend himself, and even more confident in the idea that he was in no immediate danger.
He saw the headlights approaching from a long way off, through the big windows that faced the single road that led to and from his apartment.
***
The last of his neighbors had departed an hour ago. Logan didn't rule out the idea that the approaching vehicle was someone who worked nextdoor, coming back for something they'd forgotten or to check on something in their shop. He'd lived here for five years and this happened from time to time. From the headlights, the vehicle looked like it might be a jeep or a compact SUV, but he couldn't discern anything beyond that.
He went outside, a handgun and two spare magazines concealed inside his coat.
He waited in the shadow of the building next door, beyond the reach of the exterior lights inside the industrial park. The air was cold and the ground was half-covered with snow that had been melting during the day and refreezing at night.
The vehicle moved closer at a cautious speed. If it was one of his neighbors, Logan would say that he was out for a walk, enjoying the night sky.
The vehicle was a compact SUV. It rolled to a stop outside his building, not between the lines of a parking space, but out in the middle of everything. The reverse lights flashed as the car shifted from drive to park. The engine went silent. The headlights went out. The door opened.
The driver got out. It wasn't one of Logan's neighbors, but it was someone he recognized. She was wearing a heavy coat and had her blonde hair pulled up inside a knitted cap, not that different than how she'd been dressed the last time he'd seen her.
He stepped out of the shadows, but kept his distance.
"Hello, Sam," he said.
Most people would jump at the voice of someone unseen calling from the dark, but Sam just turned, as if she'd known he was there.
"Hello, Logan."
She held something in her hands. A long tube covered in wrapping paper and a ribbon.
"When did you get back?" he asked.
"Earlier today."
"You came straight here?"
"I stopped to take a nap and a shower. But yeah, I still have all my gear inside the car."
Once production of the treatment was up and running, Logan had handed control of the facility over to a CDC security team. Some of the staff had left with Logan. Some had stayed at the facility. Sam was one of the people who had stayed.
"What do you have there?" Logan asked.
"A Christmas present."
"Do I open it now, or wait until the twenty-fifth?"
"Invite me inside and open it there."
***
Something rattled inside the gift as it passed from Sam's hands into Logan's. He pulled off the ribbon and then the wrapping paper. Underneath there was a cardboard tube with plastic caps at each end, like the kind of package a poster would be shipped inside. He pulled off one of the caps and tilted the tube. The object that slid out into his hand was a long thin stick of black fiberglass. It had fletching at one end and a sharp point at the other. It was an arrow.
Logan felt the blood leave his face.
He looked up at Sam. There was a smile buried somewhere underneath the serious expression she wore.
"That's the same arrow I used to anchor the line when I pulled you out of that crack in the ice."
Logan turned the arrow in his hand, remembering that blue wall of ice, the wire, the person in thick white clothes, hauling him up, saving his life. Remembering how she'd come to his room that first night at the facility. Remembering all the other conversations they'd had. The hours they'd spent together. The attraction he'd felt, a feeling she'd probably been nurturing all along.
He smiled, "I should have figured it out sooner. You were keeping me close."
Sam looked hurt. "It wasn't like that. It's not like that."
"What's it's like, then?"
"My job with the Corporation, the CDC… the lab work, the research, my degrees, the papers I've published… all that is real. But I had another role at the facility. I was a failsafe. In the event that something in the lab got loose and couldn't be contained, it was my job to kill everyone there, to make sure nothing got out. And that meant I had to remain an outsider, that I could never get close with the people around me, because one day I might need to kill them and incinerate their bodies. The Corporation trained me for it. I spent months working with a psychologist before I went, learning techniques to maintain emotional distance, to manage the feelings of isolation. But it got to me, eventually. The loneliness of that existence. And then you arrived. And you were an outsider, like me."
Logan said, "I can deal with being alone better than most. But I appreciated having a friend."
Sam smiled.
Logan asked, "Who infected Smith with the virus?"
Sam said, "The guy who did that was working with your former employers. A double agent. He was killed in the plane crash on the island where you recovered Smith."
"What are you doing here, now? Besides the gift."
"Two reasons. The first is official CDC business. I was asked to come here and tell you that the Corporation will not be taking any action against you, legal or extralegal. And they would also like to extend an unofficial 'thank you' for your role in protecting its employees and property."
Logan chuckled at that. "I've never had a company thank me for taking its employees hostage before. What's the second reason you're here?"
"I've… got some time off. I don't go back to work until February. I had a vacation planned, but I have room for one more. And I thought, if you weren't busy, you might want to join me."
"When would we leave?"
Sam smiled. "I'm already running a little late."
She waited while Logan packed a bag.
Twenty minutes later, the doors and windows were locked, the security system was online, and the apartment was empty.
END.
For my dad.
&nb
sp; ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First and foremost, this book would not exist without the help of my dad, who was the first person to read any of this story, back when all I had were the first five chapters and no idea of what to do next. The notes he gave me—what he liked, the lines that stood out, what he wanted more of—were my guidebook as I found my way through the next fifty chapters.
This book also owes a tremendous amount to my friend Alexis. Someone once said the best feedback tells you what's wrong with a story without telling you how to fix it. Alexis knows exactly what to say and how to say it.
And in no particular order:
Krista, for listening to me think out loud about this story (and many others) for the past several years.
Gary, for having an eye for detail and helping me sand out some of the rougher edges.
Kane, for being the kind of friend I can sow an early draft of something to.
Jeanette and Eric, for Monday night Filipino martial arts classes, which were the most fun part of researching this one. Also, Gary, William, Wilson, and Tony.
Johnny, Kevin, Jess, Ginger, Liz and all the other people who've read and supported the other books I've written.
Mom, for teaching me to read, taking me to the library, and for always having a shelf full of books in the house when I was growing up.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jameson was born in 1983 and grew up on monster movies, cheap paperbacks, and action figures. A professional writer for over a decade, he has attended the Sundance Film Festival with press credentials and written advertising copy for everything from luxury resorts to pharmaceuticals. He is the author of the novels SIREN and THE GARDEN, as well as the CLOCK WORK series of one-hour stories. He likes fast-pacing, big ideas, memorable characters, and gruesome details.
When he isn't writing, he likes to read, travel, cook and run long distances.
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