He turned in a slow circle facing away from them. The foul smoke had blown away. Bodies littered the ground. As far as he could see, everything was dead still.
It was no dream.
Why am I the only one still alive? I was supposed to die. Not Mom and Dad.
He looked down again at their bodies. His grief was deeper than weeping. Deeper than all the times he’d mourned his own death.
It was wrong. He was the sick one, the defective one. He had known for a long time that his death was coming. But his parents were supposed to carry on memories of him, frozen at the age of fourteen in a thousand snapshots. The grief was supposed to be theirs.
He fell to his knees with a sob, thrusting his hands toward the sun, his palms upraised, both beseeching and cursing God.
But God wasn’t done with him yet.
As his arms stretched to the sky, one sleeve fell back, baring his wrist, pale and clear.
He lowered his limbs, staring at his skin in disbelief.
His melanoma had vanished.
About the Authors
JAMES ROLLINS is the New York Times bestselling author of thrillers translated into forty languages. His Sigma series has been lauded as one of the “top crowd pleasers” (New York Times) and one of the “hottest summer reads” (People magazine). Acclaimed for his originality, Rollins unveils unseen worlds, scientific breakthroughs, and historical secrets—and he does it all at breakneck speed. Find James Rollins on Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter, and at www.jamesrollins.com.
REBECCA CANTRELL’s Hannah Vogel mystery novels have won the Bruce Alexander and Macavity awards and been nominated for the Barry and Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice awards. Her critically acclaimed novel iDrakula was nominated for the Appy Award and listed on Booklist’s Top 10 Horror Fiction for Youth. She and her husband and son just left Hawaii’s sunny shores for adventures in Berlin. Find Rebecca Cantrell on Facebook and Twitter, and at www.rebeccacantrell.com.
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Also by James Rollins
Bloodline
The Devil Colony
Altar of Eden
The Doomsday Key
The Last Oracle
The Judas Strain
Black Order
Map of Bones
Sandstorm
Ice Hunt
Amazonia
Deep Fathom
Excavation
Subterranean
Also by Rebecca Cantrell
A Trace of Smoke
A Game of Lies
A City of Broken Glass
A Night of Long Knives
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from The Blood Gospel copyright © 2013 by James Czajkowski and Rebecca Cantrell.
CITY OF SCREAMS. Copyright © 2012 by James Czajkowski and Rebecca Cantrell. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition NOVEMBER 2012 ISBN: 9780062262561
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