Risky. Dangerous. Downright stupid.
Xin glanced at her mother—a jiangshi—at peace only because she was unconscious. I can’t lose you. Not yet. Not without a fight.
Whatever the risk.
She gritted her teeth. “All right. Let’s get back to the lab. You work on the antidote. I’ll figure out a way to contain the jiangshi.”
A wry half-smile tugged at Danyael’s lips as he gathered the unconscious Ching Shih in his arms.
“What is it?” Xin asked.
Danyael shook his head. “Nothing.”
He carried Ching Shih through the blood-drenched courtyard to the car. Xin sat in the front passenger seat so that Danyael could sit in the backseat with Ching Shih, but she cast repeated glances through the rearview mirror. Danyael kept his fingers entwined with Ching Shih’s, but his attention locked on the passing view outside the window. He slipped his hand into the pocket of his jacket. The thin sound of glass clinking against glass was barely audible above the purr of the car engine.
Something about his eyes made Xin’s breath catch. “Danyael?”
He glanced up at her.
“I’ve seen that look on your face twice—the first time before you went to rescue Lucien from what you knew was a trap set for you.”
Danyael turned his face away.
Damn it. She was right; Danyael was planning something stupid, something suicidal. “The second time was before you confronted Sakti, certain you would not survive the encounter.” She drew a deep breath and prayed it would steady her voice. “What are you doing now?”
He remained silent for several moments, and when he finally spoke, his voice was calm and matter-of-fact. “When we get back to Excelsior, I’ll infect myself with the two variant strains of shuang kuangxi.”
Xin’s mind blanked. Seconds passed before she found her voice. “The antibodies.”
Danyael nodded. He said nothing else. He did not look at her.
“Absolutely not.” Xin’s tone was flat. “The only thing that could possibly make this situation worse is an alpha empath driven mad by shuang kuangxi.”
“You said you were willing to contain the jiangshi while I developed a cure.”
“That was before you told me you were the cure.” She shook her head sharply. “I can’t allow it. The risk is too high—”
“There’s no other way. If I don’t try, if I don’t succeed, the jiangshi—they’ll have to be killed. All of them. Thousands of them.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does.”
“Your life matters.”
Danyael stiffened. Surprise flared into his dark eyes, as if her words had struck him hard in a way he had not expected. Had he thought she would sacrifice him for the greater good?
Of course he would believe it. I’ve done it before. Xin spoke through gritted teeth. “I came to China…” She shook her head sharply; why would Danyael care why she had followed him to China? “It doesn’t matter why I came to China. What matters is the situation is already completely out of control. I can’t add you as a variable—”
“This isn’t algebra. I need you to trust me to come through for you, to come through for everyone affected by this, including your mother.”
Their eyes met. Xin swallowed through the lump in her throat. Breathing through the heavy pressure against her chest hurt. “This isn’t about my mother.”
“No. It’s about us. I can’t salvage this situation on my own.”
“I can’t either,” Xin whispered.
Danyael’s voice was quiet, but the soft, low pitch could not conceal the hope that bordered on despair. “Can we do it together? Can you live with the choices I make?”
Could she? Could she trust him to make the call—Danyael, whose moral compass did not point the same way as hers; who, even when they agreed on end goals, could not agree on the best way of getting there?
His words echoed through her mind: “The broken fragments keep getting smaller, and I worry I might miss something each time I put myself back together.”
She had come to China to keep him safe.
She could not have failed more utterly, not when Danyael seemed determined to place himself in harm’s way. Slivers of fear layered into a hard knot in the pit of her stomach. If Danyael died, what then? What could she possibly tell Zara? How could she live with knowing that she had let him go to his death?
I need you to trust me to come through for you, to come through for everyone affected by this, including your mother. Can we do it together? Can you live with the choices I make?
Trust…
Xin stared down at her fists. Slowly, deliberately, she unclenched them. Her reply wrenched from her like a page tearing away from the spine of a book. “Yes.”
The relief in his eyes reflected in the soft exhalation of his breath. He relaxed against the leather seat and turned his face away from her. His dark-eyed gaze was inscrutable. He was consciously withdrawing from the world, refocusing his energy inward, where he needed it most. The hint of bleakness she saw in his set features told her what his chances were—minimal, at best, impossible, at worst—but he was the only person insane enough, courageous enough, compassionate enough to attempt it.
Why did he always have to pay the price?
Xin squeezed her eyes shut to close out the sight of Danyael. She swallowed against the bitterness clogging her throat. He pays the price because no one else can or wants to.
I have to trust him.
And I have to make it worth the risk he’s taking.
She caught occasional glimpses of the jiangshi, but the car was too fast for them. The rapid-fire patter of the radio hosts confirmed that entire neighborhoods had been overrun by the creatures. The hospitals were inundated first with the injured, and then transformed into jiangshi nexus. The city’s emergency personnel, trying to save others from the jiangshi, were the first to place themselves in danger. They were among the first to succumb to the spread of shuang kuangxi. As the problem grew, the city’s resources and ability to contain it shrank.
Xin’s mind reeled, struggling to wrap around the enormity of the chaos as it swelled and grew. Her breath heaved in short bursts. It’s completely out of control.
Danyael’s hand gripped her shoulder. She glanced back, and their eyes met. “Don’t fall apart on me,” he murmured. “I may need you to push me over the starting line.”
“You’ve never needed the push.” She shook her head. Her voice wobbled. “No one’s braver or crazier than you.”
He chuckled, but it was a sad sound, edged with quiet irony. “I’m afraid.”
She laid her hand over his. Their cold fingers entwined, and her chest shuddered as she exhaled. “So am I.”
When they arrived at Excelsior, Ching Shih was settled in a private room and secured to the bed. Danyael cleaned and bandaged her open wound, before placing his hand against her forehead. Her restless stirring melted into the stillness of rest. “She’ll sleep for a few hours,” he told Xin quietly.
“And then what?”
“Keep the lights down. Don’t let anyone into her room. It won’t halt her transformation, but it’ll reduce the pain from her sensory overload.”
“Until there’s a cure.”
Danyael nodded. His gaze flicked away. He brushed past Xin on the way out of the bedroom. “We have to get started.”
“I know.” Xin followed him to another room where Dr. Shen and the lab technicians were already waiting. The bright florescent lights glinted against the array of monitoring equipment surrounding the metal frame bed.
Danyael paused at the doorway and inhaled deeply.
“Something wrong?” Xin asked.
He chuckled, the sound without humor. “I hate being restrained.”
It had been in his psychological evaluation too. Xin’s gaze darted to the steel cuffs on the bed. “They have to.”
“I know.” He turned his head in Xin’s direction but kept his eyes downcast. “
If I don’t make it…”
“I’ll make sure Zara understands.” Although she could not imagine how she could ever explain it to Zara when it barely made sense to her.
Danyael nodded. “Thanks.” He straightened, drew a deep breath, and walked to the bed. The technicians locked the restraints around his wrists, waist, and ankles, before stepping aside for Dr. Shen.
She held two syringes in her hand. Deep lines furrowed her brow. “The original shuang kuangxi formula, or the mutated one?”
“Both.” Danyael forced the word out through gritted teeth. His hands clenched into fists; every muscle in his body was taut.
Xin held out her hand. “Danyael, are you sure?”
“We need antibodies for both, and I don’t have the strength to do it twice. I’m not that crazy.”
Xin drew a deep breath. “Danyael, wait. There’s something I have to tell you.” Oh, hell. How could she find the words? “It’s about ADX Florence.”
“What about it?”
“I set up the trap for General Howard. I talked Alex Saunders into signing the arrest warrant that sent you to prison.”
Danyael’s expression did not change. “And?”
His tone was so casual he could have been inquiring about the weather instead of the fourteen months he had spent in a super-maximum security prison. Did he even understand what she was saying?
“I was responsible. I’m sorry.”
Their eyes met, and Xin braced herself to lose his trust and his friendship.
A faint smile eased across Danyael’s face. “Apology accepted.”
Apology accepted. How could it be so simple? She frowned. “You knew.”
“Zara told me when I was released from the hospital after the Sakti attack on D.C.”
“You’ve known for years.”
He nodded.
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“What was there to say? It was done.”
“Do you understand why I did it?”
He shook his head. “No, but I think I understand you, Xin. You’ll sacrifice individuals for the greater good—whatever you’ve decided it is—but not on a whim and not out of cruelty. I don’t need to understand the reasons or the rationale of your decisions to know that you’re not in this for yourself.” His faint sigh married an ironic chuckle with a wistful smile. “Most days, I can live with it.”
“And the other days?”
He shrugged. “I just hold on through the rough parts until life starts making sense again.”
“Has it? Has life started making sense?”
“No, but I’m learning how to enjoy the ride.” Danyael smiled again, but sadness seeped into his dark eyes. “If it’s my forgiveness you want, you don’t need it, but if it helps you feel better, you have it.” A faint smile touched his lips. “I’d wondered about the guilt that has lingered about you for years. I didn’t think it would be over me.”
She arched an eyebrow. Her psychic shields were obviously doing a shoddy job of containing her emotions, but Danyael had told her that base emotions leaked through, and what could be more elemental than guilt? “And you didn’t ask?”
“I’ve learned not to ask what women do to inspire guilt. Zara’s convinced me I won’t like the answer.”
Xin laughed. “Probably not. I think I understand you a little better now—the personal stakes that make you go against reason, against logic, to do the crazy things you do.”
“Like your mother inspires you?”
She nodded. The heaviness in her chest made it hard to breathe, to speak.
Danyael’s smile was faint. “I’m glad you found it, and Xin…” Their eyes met. With wisdom far beyond his thirty years, Danyael spoke. “Everybody will never be that somebody for whom you’ll risk everything, and it’s okay.”
“But we’re friends, and if not for you, then—”
“Not every friend is going to make the cut.”
“You’re giving me permission to be selfish.”
Danyael chuckled, the sound laced with sadness. “No, I’m giving you permission to be human. Who you think those people should be won’t always match who you feel those people should be.”
Xin managed a thin smile. “My head and heart won’t agree?”
“They rarely do.”
“And what do you do in that case?”
“I make the choice I can live with.”
Xin glanced at the vials in Dr. Shen’s hand. “Or live through?”
Danyael smiled. “Surviving’s a part of the plan.”
She bit her lip. “Make sure you stick to the plan.”
He glanced at the doctor and nodded.
His breathing remained even when Dr. Shen injected the two vials of serum into his veins. Only then did he look up and meet Xin’s eyes—when the deed was done, when he could no longer back out.
The hint of dread in his eyes had vanished; quiet serenity replaced it. Beyond the crossroad, he was at peace once more.
Awe pierced Xin’s heart and clogged her throat. She blinked hard to hold back the tears.
A faint smile tugged up at his lips. “Go. It will take a while, and you have things you need to do.”
She touched his arm—his bicep tightened beneath her hand—and she summoned a wan smile. “Be strong. For all of us.” Xin glanced at Dr. Shen, and the older woman nodded; she would stay to monitor Danyael. Xin reached for her smartphone as she stepped out of the room and placed a secure call back to Fort Meade. In a few terse sentences, she explained the situation to the director of the NSA.
“What do we do?” General Lysander asked.
“Contain the bad press. Zhengzhou has a hell of a problem to solve, and it doesn’t need the world peeking over its shoulder the entire way. I’m not interested in explaining myself or justifying my decisions.”
“You want a media blackout in a world rampant with social media?” the general grunted. “It’ll be tricky.”
“But it can be done. We’ve planned for a situation like this.”
“In America where we can control the wireless and cellular signals.”
“I put together similar plans for China about a year ago.”
“You did?”
“They’re filed next to the plans for North Korea.”
The general was briefly silent. “It’ll reveal our capabilities.”
“For a good cause. I promise the Chinese government will be deeply grateful.”
“Xin—all right. I allowed you to go to China because I trust you. It wouldn’t do to second-guess you now. What else?”
“Send a SEAL team into Tehran. Extract Zara, now, and put her on a plane to Zhengzhou. The world needs Danyael to build the antibodies to shuang kuangxi, and Danyael will need Zara to get through the hell he’s putting himself through.”
“Done. Expect a call from her when she’s on the plane to China. She’ll be furious.”
“I know, but I suspect she’ll also understand.” She hung up and called Yu Long. The phone rang for an interminably long moment before he snatched it up. “Where are you?” she asked.
“In hell.” His voice rasped. “Fuck. I don’t even know where…how to begin. It’s all gone to hell.”
Hell was an understatement for her logistical nightmare. The best antibodies in the world were pointless if they could not be deployed against an uncontained jiangshi population. Danyael was working on his part of the problem; she had to work on hers.
Xin shoved Danyael out of her heart and mind. The whirlwind of her thoughts stilled and cooled into focus. “I have a plan.”
19
As heavy as a veil, the muggy heat of an Iranian summer night hung around Zara Itani. Indifferent to the humidity, she lowered her face to her sniper rifle. Her cheek brushed against the cool steel casing of her scope, and a world—too distant for human eyes—zoomed into view. In a building more than a mile away, an attractive young woman opened the door of her apartment. Her smile broadened as she invited an older man into the
room.
Zara traced their progress from the living room into the bedroom. Dispassionately, she watched as he stripped off his shirt and pants. The woman lay down on the bed, naked, her legs spread to welcome him.
Zara could have killed him then, but it would be a bummer to die before an orgasm, so Zara—being the kind and considerate soul that she was—waited. The man’s rhythmic pounding into his lover’s willing body became more urgent, and suddenly, he stiffened, his back arching, his face effused with ecstasy.
A fraction of a second later, a bullet pierced his skull, and he collapsed like a marionette with cut strings. His lover screamed and scrambled away from the puddle of crimson forming on the bed.
Al-Hamid, a militant warlord who controlled most of northern Iran, was dead.
Her mission completed, Zara dismantled her sniper rifle and returned it to its case. Movement at the base of the building led her to look over the rooftop. A military jeep pulled up at the entrance and several men clambered out.
Wow. She arched an eyebrow, more curious than impressed. When did the Iranian police become that efficient? Her heartbeat scarcely altered, she reached for her handgun; she would have to fight her way out. She entered the waiting elevator. Even before the doors closed and the elevators began their downward motion, she had pushed open the ceiling panels in the elevator and climbed out of sight.
The safety on her weapon was off when the door opened on the ground floor. “Miss Itani?” a male voice with a distinctly American accent said. “I’m not armed. I’m coming in.” A man with the bearing of a warrior and clad in black military fatigues stepped into the elevator, his arms held out at his side, away from his body. He looked up at the ceiling panel, and their eyes met through the patterned grate. “Lieutenant Hicks. Navy SEAL Team Three. The NSA sent us to extract you. You’re needed urgently in Zhengzhou.”
Zhengzhou. Danyael.
The possibility of fighting her way out of Iran had not fazed her, but the thought of Danyael in danger coated her chest in icy panic. “Stand aside,” she ordered as she shifted the grate aside. She tossed her rifle case to the lieutenant and then leaped down to land in a battle crouch. “Let’s go.”
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