by M. C. Sutton
“Why? What happened?”
He helped her back into bed, piled several pillows behind her so she could sit up, and sat down in front of her. “You mean you don’t remember?”
“The last thing I remember is falling asleep in the Dallins’ room.”
Sarah had told him amnesia was one of the side effects of the sleeping pills, but Jon wondered if something else had caused Emma to suddenly forget.
“Em,” he said, taking her hand. “You downed a half a bottle of Ambien this morning.”
Emma’s face twisted in horror. “What? I did not!”
“Yeah. You did.”
“Jon, I would never do something like that, and you know it!”
Jon delicately explained to Emma what Bennett had said to her in the hall that morning, the state in which he’d found her on the couch, and what he’d done to get her to throw up the medication. He agreed there was a possibility it had been slipped into her tea, though he didn’t mention how unlikely that was, given how little had been absorbed into her system. Either way, he assured her it didn’t matter. He knew she hadn’t purposely taken it herself.
Emma pulled her knees up to her chest. “Well, I guess that would explain why my throat burns,” she said quietly, her eyes beginning to tear. “I’m so sorry, Jon. I never should have agreed to come here.”
“You did what you felt like you had to do, sweetheart. Just like always.”
“Yeah, and a fat lot of good it did! Bennett is probably downstairs right now convincing everyone in that conference room of the superiority of the GOG and how unreliable the federal government can be—all while using me as a perfect example.”
“Well, you’ll get your chance to prove him wrong. Jack rearranged the convention. You’ll be speaking at three o’clock this afternoon.”
When lunch was delivered to their door a half hour later, courtesy of Jack, neither of them were even remotely interested. They just lay there in bed, not really awake and not really asleep. Every now and then Jon would feel Emma shudder next to him. She would then scoot closer to him and pull his arms tighter around her. Eventually he must have finally fallen into a deep sleep, because the next thing he knew it was after two o’clock and Emma was standing at the end of the bed getting dressed.
Jon got up and dressed as well. Jack arrived to escort them down to the lobby shortly after. A full entourage of Secret Service and FBI accompanied them.
As they walked, Jack glanced sideways at Jon several times, as if there was something he wanted to say but was waiting for the right time to say it. Jon guessed his hesitation had something to do with the nervous expression on Emma’s face. Her heart was beating so fast he could feel it through her fingers.
The lobby was emptier than it had been since their arrival. Other than when Jon had been downstairs at night, there were typically quite a few people milling around and talking, even during the presentations. Instead it looked as if anyone wandering around was being ushered into the conference room by guys in FBI jackets.
They stopped just outside the conference room doors. Emma closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
Jon put his hands on her arms. “Hey, I want you to know that no matter what happens in there, you tried your best, okay? After all, you can only ever hope to lead the horse, right?”
She gave him a small, uncertain half-smile.
“You’re giving them an option, Emma. That’s all you’re here to do. It’s still ultimately their choice what to do with it.”
She sighed. “Yeah, I know.”
“Here,” said Jon, untying the white-shell bracelet he almost never took off. He took Emma’s hand and tied it around her wrist.
Emma wrinkled her forehead. The bracelet had been given to him years ago, though she didn’t know by whom. All she did know was that the shells were supposed to bring the wearer safely home, and that the only time Jon ever took it off was when she was going out into the field and there was a possibility she might not come back.
“What’s this for?” she asked.
Jon shrugged. “Luck, I guess. Certainly can’t hurt, can it?” He held her tight and kissed her forehead before releasing her.
“And Em,” he said just before she walked through the door. “Whatever you do, just please don’t say ‘I told you so.’”
Emma smiled and disappeared into the conference room, an FBI agent close behind her.
Before Jon could follow her, Jack grabbed his arm and whispered, “Jon, Anna Korvaire is dead.”
Jon snapped his head around. “What?”
“Heart failure, just this morning,” said Jack, then added before stepping into the conference room, “Something is very wrong.”
Great, Jon thought as he walked through the door behind him. And you tell me this now?
Emma was already up on the stage, taking her seat at the table next to the podium. Jon stood against the wall across from the bottom of the stairs. He was joined by Aaron, who nodded to him silently.
The conference room was fuller than it had been for the earlier presentations. Or at least, the ones he had been to. Even some of the hotel employees were lined up against the back of the room. As he looked out across the somber faces, his gaze rested momentarily on Bennett sitting up on the stage just to the left of the podium. Jon couldn’t help but wonder if the slimeball had had this kind of a turnout. Then again, even though Emma was a well-known speaker, it did seem a little odd that so many people had made a point of showing up for her presentation. He wondered exactly what they were all expecting—and what rumors Bennett had floated about Emma since that morning.
As Jack introduced Emma as the final speaker, the color drained from her face. She stood and walked to the podium unsteadily, apparently shaken from the effects of the medication and a lack of food. As she stared down at her notes, Jon tried to determine whether she was concentrating on what she was going to say or on not throwing up. Off to the side, Bennett watched her with an oddly intense look of concentration that made Jon uneasy.
Emma took a deep breath.
So did Jon.
“Good afternoon. As Vice President Allred indicated in his very gracious introduction, I am Dr. Emma Grant, Associate Professor of Psychology and Head of the Emergency Management Department at Franklin University. I have served as an instructor and researcher at the Emergency Management Institute in Maryland, as well as an Incident Commander for the organization formerly known as FEMA. My research and contributions to the fields of Emergency Management and Crisis Psychology span two decades, and yet…”
She bit her lip and looked down at the podium.
“I find myself at somewhat of a loss. You see, ladies and gentlemen, the fact of the matter is, we were not prepared. We were not prepared to deal with the extensive loss and damage resulting from the natural disasters that continue to ravage our planet. We were not prepared for the widespread economic downturn in the aftermath of a world war. Nor were we prepared for the extended energy crisis that we now find ourselves faced with. As we all have seen, the effects of these occurrences are global and extensive. Something must be done, and it must be done now.”
Jon shook his head. So much for not saying, “I told you so.”
“First and foremost, we must awake to a sense of our awful situation. Those present on this stage with me today, as well as those men and women standing out in the street just beyond the doors of this building, would attest to the severity of it. My colleagues and I have been asked only to present you with options. Invariably, it is up to you to make the final decision. By the end of this convention, you will no doubt have heard many compelling arguments. I ask only that as you consider each one of these solutions, you keep in mind those whom you are obligated to represent. For ultimately it is they—your neighbors and friends, brothers and sisters—who will be most affected. It is they who will either benefit or suffer from your choice.
“Any experienced emergency manager will tell you that the most efficient way of dealing with a c
risis is through the process of mitigation. Just as prevention is the best medicine, systems and processes put into place beforehand to help reduce the impacts of a disaster are always the most effective. However, we are long past that point. We are now faced, instead, with the impending task of picking up the pieces of a failed system and working together to build a new, more sustainable one. We are now faced with the task of recovery—and recovery is exactly what I would like to speak to you about today.”
While Emma delved into the background of how the Cuban people flourished after the collapse of the Soviet Union—a story Jon had heard more times than he could count—Aaron leaned over and whispered to him.
“Hey, do you smell that?”
“What?” Jon turned to look at him. For some reason, it was difficult to focus on his face.
“That smell.” Aaron sniffed the air. “It smells kind of like my dentist’s office.”
Before Jon could conclude that Aaron had lost his mind, he picked up on the scent too. They both scanned the room, trying to determine where in the world the faintly sweet odor was coming from.
As Jon looked around, he noticed that Emma had stopped talking. She stood on the stage, staring intently at the podium, her hands clasped tightly around its edges. The entire room had fallen into an eerie silence—aside from a faint hissing sound.
“Jon, look!” Aaron grabbed his arm and pointed at the ceiling. A thin, gray mist floated down from the vents.
One of those vents was right above the podium.
Jon looked down at Emma just in time to see her knees buckle beneath her. She collapsed to the floor. Several of the other presenters up on the stage were already slumped over in their chairs.
A voice deep inside Jon’s head told him to get everyone out of the room. But no matter how much he willed himself to act, he simply couldn’t. He was faintly aware of Aaron shouting his name, but the urge to act had almost instantly given way to euphoria. Jon suddenly didn’t care at all about what was happening to the people around him. For a brief second he even got the distinct feeling he was the only one there, even though across the room he could still make out the blurry images of several of the hotel employees and FBI agents passing out.
Then his body became heavy, and everything went dark.
CHAPTER 17
Matt was just about ready to give up.
If he thought he felt bad before, he felt terrible now. His fears had been confirmed as he spoke to his father in the few minutes before leaving Daniel’s apartment. Something was wrong, and Matt knew it. Whether his dad would admit it or not. His mother was sick, or hurt—or worse—and it had to be bad if his dad felt like he needed to hide it.
He didn’t even care about going to class anymore. But somehow his feet managed to put themselves one in front of the other until he found himself at the classroom door. Ultimately, it was for the best. What he needed right now was a distraction. Something cold and hard and emotionless to take his mind off everything.
Ninety minutes of calculus proved to be perfect for that.
Afterward, Matt had an hour before English Lit to grab a bite to eat. He wasn’t hungry, but skipping a meal would only make him feel worse. Normally he would just go to the café, but he wasn’t ready to face Alex, in case she was mad at him for not returning to work after seeing Professor March.
So he stopped into the student union for a sandwich, which he forced himself to finish. As Matt sat quietly in a corner, he noticed there weren’t as many students wandering around as usual, even for a summer term. His mom had said enrollment had dropped because of the economy, but he’d had no idea it was this bad. Sheltered in their small town in south Missouri, it had been easy to overlook just how far things had gone downhill. But after what he’d learned that morning, it was all beginning to make sense.
He couldn’t help but feel a twinge of anger toward his mother. She had known all along that something was going on, even before these last few months. That was why she had been so careful in all her preparations. Why she had pushed their father so hard to uproot their entire family and move them to the middle of nowhere after the war.
She knew it would be safer.
Matt forced himself back out into the afternoon heat. The storm clouds that had rolled in that morning hadn’t lasted, and there was now nothing left to offer any relief from the intense rays of summer. The sun burned through his dark hair and the back of his neck like some great judge that had weighed the world and found it wanting. He wiped the sweat from his brow as he walked.
He made a special point not to step into the classroom until just before class started. That way, if Alex were already there waiting for him, she wouldn’t have time to corner him. Matt slipped through the door and scanned the large, auditorium-style room. Alex was sitting toward the back. He glanced away quickly before she could give him a look of… well, whatever way she was planning on looking at him. He grabbed a seat in the front row.
“Good afternoon, class,” said Professor Churchill. “Please turn your textbooks to chapter five so that we may begin our in-class discussion.”
Matt had read the assignment, and he tried to concentrate on the discussion. But his mind wasn’t cooperating. He couldn’t, for the life of him, remember anything he had read. As he sat there silent, his classmates around him actively participating in the class, he began to rethink his decision to sit in the front row. It gave the professor a chance to stare directly at him, as if she were waiting for him to jump into the discussion at any moment, like he usually did. It also made it easy for Alex to glare at the back of his head, and Matt didn’t have to turn around at all to know she was doing it.
Somehow he managed to make it through the class discussion, and Professor Churchill began her lecture. Matt glanced at his watch. It was almost three o’clock. He only had to get through thirty more minutes. He might actually make it.
Or so he thought.
Out of nowhere, Matt was overcome with another intense wave of anxiety and nausea. It crept across his skin like the unwelcome brush of a stranger in a crowded room, a gesture that would go unnoticed by anyone else but him. It was even worse than what he had felt that morning in the café. This time, he didn’t think he was going to pass out. He knew he was.
He closed his eyes and grabbed the arms of his chair. He had to get out of there. But he couldn’t do it until he got control of himself. If he stood up now, it would be only a matter of seconds before he hit the floor.
He tried to steady his breathing, to calm his heart. It didn’t do any good. A cold wave washed across his skin, as if all the warmth had been drained from his body, the way it does when you go too long without eating and your blood sugar drops.
He wasn’t going to make it.
“Matthew,” a voice said quietly.
Matt opened his eyes. Professor Churchill was standing right in front of him.
“Matthew, are you all right?” She reached out a hand to put on his shoulder.
Matt hopped up before she could touch him. “I, uh…” The room started to spin. He grabbed the back of the chair to steady himself. “I’m fine. I just… I’m not feeling well, is all.”
“Well, I’d say so, dear.”
Matt could feel the entire class staring at him now.
“You look absolutely dreadful.” Professor Churchill pulled her purple, horn-rimmed glasses from her nose and scanned the room. “Miss Romano,” she said. “Perhaps you would be so kind as make sure that Mr. Grant actually gets to the Health Center this time?”
“No!” Matt shouted.
Professor Churchill snapped her head back around.
“I don’t… I don’t need any help.” He could feel his face burning with embarrassment. “I just…” He turned to look at Alex. “I’ve got to go.”
He grabbed his backpack and kept his eyes on the floor as he stormed out of the classroom.
As the son of a department head, he was certain he’d be the topic of conversation at the next faculty meeting
. But at least the adrenaline rush of having so many people focused on him at one time, and the anger of Professor Churchill having pointed him out—especially to Alex—was enough to get him halfway up the hall.
“Matthew Grant!” A door slammed behind him.
Oh, come on, Alex.
If he could have gotten his legs to cooperate, he would have broken into a run to get away from her. But he had never been good at making his body do what he wanted at the time he really wanted it.
Alex apparently didn’t have that problem. “Matt!” She jumped into his path. “What the heck is wrong with you? You should have seen the look on Professor Churchill’s face when you walked out.” She folded her arms and glared at him.
Well, I guess that means she’s mad. “Look, Alex.” He had to put a hand on the wall to steady himself. The adrenaline rush was wearing off. “I can’t…” He grabbed his head. “I can’t do this right now, okay?”
“Hey.” Alex uncrossed her arms. “Matt, are you all right? You look terrible.”
Why does everyone keep reminding me?
“What happened to you this morning, anyway? I kept waiting for you to come back to the café and let me know you were okay, but you didn’t.”
She put a hand on his face. The warmth of her palm was calming against his cool cheek.
“I was really worried about you, Matia.”
Matt took her hand from his face, but didn’t let go of it. Instead he intertwined his fingers with hers and held her hand to his chest.
“I’m sorry, Lexi.” He had been too concerned about whether she was mad at him to even consider the fact that she might be worried. But he had scared her, and he didn’t have to be an Empath to know it. He could see it in her eyes. She was terrified at the thought of something happening to him—and he hated that. He didn’t want Alex to have to worry about him. He never wanted Alex to be scared, or sad, or upset. He didn’t want her to ever be anything but happy.
He was so tired of being a constant source of pain for the people he loved.
“Oh, Matt,” said Alex, biting her lip.