by Kira Peikoff
After setting a helmet-sized machine on his chest that began to deliver hard and fast compressions, Chris intubated him and connected him to a portable oxygen tank. Then he touched a finger sensor under the rubber floor pad that unlocked a compartment in the roof. Cracks materialized in the white overhead space and a door slid open. Inside was a vial of a clear liquid next to a bag of saline and a plethora of medical devices.
He retrieved a red tool that resembled a handgun, with a long thick needle sticking out the barrel. He was moving so rapidly there was no time to explain anything, so she just watched in fascinated silence as he pressed the gun against Richard’s left shoulder and fired a pin into the bone. He repeated the process with the other shoulder and both knees.
Then he reached up into the compartment and carefully removed the glass vial, cradling it in both hands like it was a baby bird.
“This is it,” he said. “This is everything.”
“The X101?”
“Yes.”
She noticed his hands were trembling as he drew about two ounces of the liquid into a clear plastic dropper, emptying the vial, and injected it straight into Richard’s left shoulder pin. Without further ceremony, he deposited the empty vial back into the compartment and hastened to the next step: injecting the right shoulder with a slurry of ice.
“Is there anything I can do?” she asked, desperate to be useful.
“Yeah.” He paused for a split second. “Drive us back to the ship. And make it fast.”
The ambulance shrieked down the street so quickly that there was no time to notice the silver Toyota Camry rolling twenty yards behind it.
The driver inside was gaping in disbelief, holding a cell phone at his ear.
He spoke in a hushed voice as though to soften the blow:
“I have bad news, sir. She’s alive.”
“Yeah, right,” said the voice on the other end. “That’s impossible.”
“It’s her. I’m sure of it.”
There was a pause. The voice seethed with accusation. “You saw her dead body with your own damn eyes, didn’t you? Carted off the beach to the morgue?”
“I—I thought so.”
“You’re losing your mind. Find me her death certificate ASAP. And if you want any cut of the payout, make it today.”
“Yes, s—”
But the line clicked off. The phone dropped to his lap.
He wasn’t crazy no matter what the boss said.
Isabel Leon, the prime target of all the “lives,” had somehow cheated death.
Her ambulance was barreling through a stoplight two blocks ahead, its lights flashing red and blue. He floored his own gas pedal.
No way was he letting it out of his sight.
CHAPTER 24
Joan
New York
The busy hum of the hospital carried on around Joan as if she wasn’t even there. Nurses and doctors bustled past her, consulting charts, shouting commands, assisting patients on stretchers who required actual care.
Now that she was no longer in distress from her “chest pains,” she was a nonentity. Greg’s colleague Dr. Yardley had written her a prescription for a muscle relaxant and pointed her toward the exit. But his odd denial of any familiarity with Greg’s near-death experience piqued her suspicion. What was he hiding? Did any of the other staff know?
She stood in the hallway outside the triage room, thinking fast. This was her only conceivable opportunity to be inside the hospital, behind the scenes, without anyone tending to her. She consulted a map on the wall. To the left, down a hallway, was the reception station and exit. To the right, around a corner, was the on-call room, and next to that, the nurses’ locker room.
A plan formed in her mind. Before she had time to iron out the details, she was striding to the on-call room, her chin held high. In her black pants, cream cashmere sweater, and impeccable makeup, she could have been an executive. She knocked on the white door. No one answered.
She went in and locked it behind her. The space resembled a cramped dorm, if the students who lived there were slobs. Next to a closet were a bunk bed and two cots. Sheets were tangled and bed covers kicked to the floor as if the prior occupants had fled in a hurry. In the corner, blue scrubs were overflowing out of a hamper whose top was askew.
She saw her opportunity right away. It would be risky, but she needed to act fast if she was going to do it. Any minute someone else might try to come in. She tore off her sweater and pants and stuffed them into her oversized handbag. Then she pawed through a pile of clean scrubs in the closet, looking for a woman’s size medium. When she found a set, she threw it on, along with a fresh pair of hospital-issue shoe covers from a stack in the corner.
She looked at herself in the mirror hanging over the door. Her cheeks were flushed and a few mussed tendrils of blond hair hung around her face. Her red lipstick was all wrong, though. What nurse had time for that? She rubbed it off with the back of her hand. Not bad, she thought. She removed her pearl stud earrings for good measure.
Then she stuffed her purse under a heap of clothes in the closet and slipped out, heading to the adjacent door down the hall: the nurses’ locker room. Here she didn’t bother to knock, just walked right in like she belonged.
This room was larger, like the locker room at her gym. Two nurses around Joan’s age were chatting near a row of sinks with their backs to her—from the sound of it, not just chatting, but gossiping.
“Well, that’s not what I heard,” said one, a plump woman with tortoiseshell glasses. “I heard that he—”
Joan coughed. They turned to stare blankly at her. Before any skepticism set in, she plastered on a bright smile and stuck out her hand, walking toward them.
“Hi,” she said, “I’m Jane. I don’t think we’ve met yet. I’m from Presbyterian uptown. Just started here in the ER.”
“Welcome,” said the other nurse, a raven-haired woman with judgmental brown eyes. “I’m Louisa, from OB.” They shook hands.
“And I’m Sharon, from peds,” the matronly nurse said in a friendlier tone. “Whose service are you usually on?”
“Dr. Hughes,” she said. It felt oddly formal to refer to Greg that way, but the other women didn’t seem to notice her self-consciousness.
“Oh!” Sharon exclaimed with a knowing look. “Lucky you.”
Joan raised her eyebrows in real curiosity. “Yeah?”
“He’s kind of a rock star around here. We all have a little crush on him,” Sharon admitted. She sighed, pushing away her bangs, and Joan saw that her left finger was bare.
“He’s a total professional, though,” Louisa said, as though this annoyed her. “He’ll barely flirt with anyone.”
“We’re used to it.” Sharon shrugged. “He must have one hot wife.”
Louisa smirked. “Or at least a talented one.”
Joan gave her a tight smile. “I’ll bet.” Then she lowered her voice in a conspiratorial manner. “Hey, can you ladies keep a secret?”
They nodded and moved in closer, even though no one else was around. “You can trust us,” Sharon soothed. “What’s up?”
“Well.” Joan bit her lip, as if deciding whether to tell them. “I overheard something kind of scary actually . . .”
They stared at her with open intrigue. Louisa crossed her arms. “Go on . . .”
“I happened to hear Hughes and Yardley talking. Apparently Hughes sold his life insurance policy and then almost got hit by a car after some stranger pushed him.”
Their mouths fell open.
“Wait.” Joan held up a hand. “It gets creepier. Then Yardley told him one or two patients at this hospital died in weird accidents after selling their life policies . . . And he wondered if maybe the incidents are all somehow connected. . . ?”
They both recoiled with looks of horror. Joan couldn’t quite read the glance they exchanged.
“Jesus,” Sharon breathed. Louisa said nothing.
“Could that be true?” Joan said. �
��Have you heard anything?”
Sharon shook her head firmly. “I haven’t.”
“And she would,” Louisa said. “She always has the inside scoop.”
“Weird.” Joan couldn’t press further without giving herself away, so she just lifted one shoulder as if to say Who knows?
“Well,” she said, “I’ve got to get back to a patient, but it was nice meeting you guys.”
She turned around before they could see the extent of her disappointment—and her mistrust. Why was the staff denying rumors that Greg said were swirling around the entire hospital? Were they scared to talk?
No matter how tough, she was going to dig up the truth before it was too late. Before Greg was next.
CHAPTER 25
Isabel
Key West
Isabel stared at the contours of Richard’s face. His skin was no longer tinted gray. Signs of life had returned in his pink lips, the black stubble pricking his chin, the twitching of his closed eyelids. She felt his forehead. It was warm. Anyone else might have mistaken his state for a peaceful sleep. The crisp bedsheets were pulled up to his chin, and his head had fallen to its right side on the pillow. His breathing was deep and even through his nose. But no matter how normal he looked, Isabel knew not to be deceived. If his mind was gone, then he was still just a body, albeit a living one.
In the three days since his emergency resuscitation procedure, she’d kept vigil near his body with competing sensations of awe and terror. The events over the last seventy-two hours were remarkable to witness. Even though she knew that reversing death was possible—that she, herself, was proof—she was still astonished to watch firsthand how far science had advanced in this hidden corner of the world.
When they first arrived on the ship, Dr. Quinn immediately took his corpse into surgery, pumping his stomach of toxins and clearing the clogged artery near his heart. Over the first twenty-four hours, as Quinn raised his temperature by a quarter of a degree Celsius every hour, Richard’s pulse had returned—followed by faint brain waves. He briefly opened his eyes and let out inarticulate moans. Isabel panicked about his mental capacity, but Dr. Quinn reassured her that the drugs caused incoherence at first, and would wear off in two days.
Then it would become clear if he was doomed to a minimally conscious state—not dead, but not properly alive either. Isabel hadn’t slept since, fearing Chris might have been right all along. She was grateful to him for cooperating with her pleas, but his warning echoed in her mind with the frightening ring of truth: If he comes back brain-dead, that’s on you. How could she forgive herself if that was his future—one she had insisted upon against his will?
Would the Network be forced to support a shell of a man indefinitely? Would he have to suffer for the rest of his days? That would be intolerable, especially since he wanted to die in the first place. If he was brain-damaged, maybe they could withdraw life-sustaining nutrients from his IV, allowing him to die passively. But starving him seemed cruel. Maybe they could euthanize him with a painless injection? But then they would be killing him like an animal.
Each thought made her squirm more than the last. From her perch on a stool beside his bed, Isabel glanced at the clock on the wall. The time marked 4:35 P.M., almost exactly forty-eight hours since his initial awakening. If he was ever going to come out of his stupor, it would happen any minute now. The longer it took, the lower his likelihood of ever regaining normal brain function.
She tried to distract herself from the ticking clock on the wall by thinking about her mom and Andy. With Galileo’s help, she had called them from the ship using a satellite phone and explained everything. Incredulous at first, but at last accepting, her mother agreed to Galileo’s offer to move to the safe house until the mastermind behind her murder was found. As soon as the plan was made, her family packed up their things, closed up their house, and drove straight to their new address. From there, her mom would take every safety precaution—pulling Andy out of school, bringing him to work with her at the bookstore—until Isabel had an update to share. Her mom also did her the favor of contacting her television agent and the producers of Wild Woman to let them know she was extending her medical leave until further notice.
It was torturous on her family to be separated. But her mother complied without argument, since Isabel’s only other strategy was to leave the Network and go to the official authorities, which risked Andy being found out and deported back to Cuba—his worst nightmare. At least at their temporary house, they were out of harm’s way, so Isabel could worry about her other problems: Richard, her killer, and her own disturbing new symptom that she hadn’t told anyone about yet.
A knock on the door startled her. Galileo and Dr. Quinn walked in, both wearing drawstring shorts and T-shirts, but their concerned expressions were far from casual. She greeted them with a nod as they somberly approached Richard’s bed. They came to a stop on either side of her stool.
“No change?” Dr. Quinn asked her.
“None.” She sighed. “I’ve been watching him like a hawk.”
Galileo put a hand on her shoulder. “How are you holding up? Remember, you have your own recovery to focus on.”
“Your body’s in a delicate state right now,” Dr. Quinn added. “We want you to cut down on stress as much as possible.”
She gave a snort. “Why not run a marathon while I’m at it?”
“I know it’s hard,” Galileo said, looking from Richard to her. “But you’re not alone. Don’t think I’ve forgotten our deal.”
“That’s great, but how can you find someone who doesn’t want to be found?” She shook her head. “It’s impossible.” And I can’t hide out here forever, she thought.
Plain and simple, she was screwed. Staying here was only buying time until her inevitable return to the outside world. Even if she and her family permanently relocated somewhere—easier said than done—she’d always look behind her shoulder, wondering when the next hit was coming.
“I’m working out a strategy,” Galileo assured her. And then, without irony: “Trust me.”
She almost snorted again. That was like commanding a blind person to look. But she didn’t expect him to understand how deeply she’d been scarred. Even the most brilliant scientist couldn’t change the fact that the world was a dark place, crammed with disease and heartbreak and evil. Things didn’t work out just because you wanted them to.
“Okay,” she said anyway, to humor him. “When will you start?”
“As soon as I’ve figured out the best approach. But in the meantime, we’re worried about you. You’ve been holed up here for two days. Have you even slept?”
She said nothing, just kept her eye on Richard’s chest rising and falling under the blanket. The clock read 4:51 P.M. Any minute now, she thought. Come on.
Dr. Quinn cleared his throat. “Isabel, as much as we want to learn from your recovery, we’re also here to help guide you through it.”
“I’m not exactly thinking about myself right now.”
“Understandable,” Galileo said, “but you should be. If you’re having any side effects besides generalized weakness, it’s important to tell us. Especially if something doesn’t feel right.”
She hesitated. The symptom she’d started to notice was so strange and unexpected that she wondered if she was hallucinating it. The possibility terrified her—was she losing her mind? If so, she didn’t want confirmation from the doctors. But she had to uphold her end of the deal, too.
“There might be one,” she began. She kept her eyes on Richard’s sleeping face.
Dr. Quinn’s white eyebrows shot almost to his hairline. “What?”
“I have this, like, sudden hyperawareness. Like my senses are on overdrive.”
Copping to it made her face burn; she felt like a freak.
“How so?” Galileo asked.
“Well, when we went to Richard’s house, we couldn’t get in at first, and then I heard the sound of his TV through a side window that was bare
ly open. Chris didn’t notice at all, but I did without trying. That’s just one example. Even now, it’s happening. I can’t turn it off.”
The intrigue was palpable in Dr. Quinn’s tone. “What are you sensing now?”
“You had a tuna sandwich for lunch,” she said, “before you brushed your teeth with peppermint toothpaste.”
He sank to the edge of Richard’s bed. “How could you know that?”
“I smell it on your breath. And you think I didn’t catch the look on your face just now, but I did.”
“What look?”
“Validation. You expected this, didn’t you?”
Dr. Quinn exchanged a rueful glance with Galileo, who was still standing at her side. “You’re right. I’m not surprised. In the dog trials, the X101 strengthened parts of the cerebral cortex involved with sensory perception.”
“So I’m not imagining it,” she said.
“Not at all. It shouldn’t do any damage, but I can understand if it’s unsettling.”
She let out a breath. “Will it ever go away?”
“It should, once your body metabolizes the drug.”
“How long?”
He rubbed his nose as a distant look came into his eyes. “We don’t exactly know. We’ll keep testing its concentration in your blood every day. My best guess is about two weeks.”
“I think some car was following the ambulance the other day,” she blurted out. As long as she was telling them her symptom, she might as well disclose all her fears.
Galileo’s reaction was swift and fierce. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought the hyperaware thing might be making me paranoid. Anyway, I got rid of it pretty fast driving through red lights.”
“So no one saw you pull into the harbor?”
“I don’t think so. But I can’t go back out there anytime soon. Someone’s definitely still after me.”
“Well, we can’t stay here anymore,” he said, heading for the door. “Time for the open ocean.”
“I’m sorry.” She looked down at her hands folded tightly in her lap. “I don’t want to complicate your whole operation . . .”