by Rachel Caine
Patrick finally snapped out of it long enough to say, “Everyone in the van on the east side. We’ll leave Mercer’s car behind.”
“Everyone? Including these two?” Liam looked down at Freddy and Mercer, who were struggling against their bonds.
“I’m not leaving anyone for Jane. Not even them.” Patrick, to prove it, grabbed Fast Freddy under the shoulders and dead-dragged him to a door Bryn hadn’t even noticed.…It was small, inset, and he had to hunch to get through it as he shoved it open with Freddy’s shirt collar crushed in one fist.
Liam grabbed Mercer and towed him toward the same exit.
Bryn didn’t move for a moment. I could just run, she thought. I could just run and get away from all this.…
But she needed the shots, didn’t she? In the end, it always came down to that, to one more day of survival. She didn’t want to be in the same vehicle with Patrick right now; she didn’t want to know how all this shook out. She didn’t want to hear about his life with Jane.
She wanted it to not be true at all.
Liam paused in the doorway and looked back at her, and said, “You can’t stay, Bryn. Come on. Hurry.”
“Who is he, Liam? Really?” It burst out of her in a rush, and she wished she could take it back, because the fact was, she really didn’t even want to know. She already knew too much.
Liam shook his head. “Not the time. Come on. Now, Bryn—we have to clear the estate as well. Your sister’s still there.”
That got her moving, finally; the idea that she’d let anything happen to Annalie was unthinkable. She’d done enough to her sister already—and once again, she’d plunged her into something uncontrollable, and dangerous. Mr. French. She thought about her dog, too; she couldn’t leave him behind. Jane would love to find something Bryn loved, just so she could take it apart.
She took a step, and—to her surprise—stumbled. Her thigh muscles felt weak, and trembled unsteadily as she righted herself. Her arms were tingling, too. Bryn knew this feeling all too well; she felt chilled now, too, as the nanites exhausted their power and stopped their very necessary repairs to the ongoing destruction. Death couldn’t be stopped, only delayed, and she could feel it creeping through her body like shadows.
Liam knew it, too; she saw it in his face. “I’ll give you the injection in the van,” he said. “Hurry.”
She stopped and said, “No.” Even Mercer, being dragged, looked taken by surprise. “Give me a shot right now. I’m taking Mercer’s car. I’ll get Annie.”
“And go where?” Liam asked. “If the people who held you have the tracking frequencies…”
“Then I’ll lead them someplace they can’t go,” Bryn said. “Right to the gates of Pharmadene.” It was the only logical choice; if she couldn’t hide, she could make it next to impossible for Jane and her bosses to get their hands on her and Annalie. Let Patrick and Liam find their own hole to crawl in. He lied to me. He should have told me about Jane, about his wife.…
She didn’t say it, but she didn’t have to—Liam knew. He opened a pocket in his vest, took out a syringe, and crossed the room to deliver the injection.
She hardly felt it at all. Her scale of pain had widened quite a bit.
When it was done, Liam smoothed his hand gently over the injection site, a gesture of comfort, but even that made her flinch. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Be careful. I’ll tell him—something.”
“He should have told me something, too,” Bryn said. “Liam—thank you. For everything.”
Then she turned and walked away.
The one shot that Liam had given her helped her maintain, but healing was at this moment beyond her reach. Bryn drove fast and recklessly, and swore under her breath at her lack of a cell phone with which to call ahead to Annie. She’ll be all right.
She’d better be all right, or I’ll kill Jane for that, too. Over and over and over.
Upon her tire-screeching arrival, the mansion looked the same as it ever had—gates shut and locked, everything right and proper. The gardeners were finishing for the day, and rolling the plastic bins down toward the pickup point on the street; they waved to her as she drove in. All very normal.
Except her skin still looked gray and slack over her muscles, and she could feel the wrongness inside her. The big industrial refrigerator in the kitchen held the lockbox with the last of Manny’s special-formula shots; she’d grab those, inject two, and take the rest with her. And the box of inhibitors—she and Annalie would need those if they were to rely on the Pharmadene formula of Returné. The idea of being under the control of those built-in Protocols didn’t sound like something Bryn could handle. Not now.
Her self-control was like a thin, fragile crust over a vast abyss of betrayal; she tried not to think of what was going to happen when she finally broke through it and fell into that boiling cauldron of emotion. She’d loved Patrick, really loved him, and the damage he’d done to her was as great, in its own way, as Jane had managed.
Bryn parked Mercer’s sedan and ran up the front steps—or tried. Her legs felt clumsy, as if the nerves were making only partial contact with the muscles. It took three tries to fit her key into the locks on the door. She heard Mr. French barking on the other side.
As she stepped in, his glad rush toward her skidded to a stop, and he backed up a couple of tentative steps with a whine of puzzled distrust.
“Oh, sweetie,” Bryn said. “It’s okay. I’m still me.”
Mr. French took another step back, still whining. From the library doorway, one of the house’s Rottweilers—Maxine, Liam’s favorite—advanced stiff-legged and growling.
“Annie!” Bryn yelled. “Annie, get down here!”
“Bryn?” Her sister’s voice echoed faintly from somewhere upstairs. “Oh thank God, I was so worried. Patrick was going out of his mind—” She appeared at the railing on the second floor and paused, eyes going wide. “What—?”
Maxine was steadily advancing on Bryn, who stood very still, trying not to look like any more of a threat than she already did. The Rottweiler was normally very sweet, but she was in guard mode now, and Bryn no longer smelled like someone who belonged here.
She smelled like danger.
“Call her off,” Bryn said. “Hurry.”
Mr. French had backed all the way to the stairs, clearly torn by confusion—he wanted to protect her, but his instincts were all in conflict with his senses. Maxine wasn’t conflicted at all. She just wanted Bryn gone.
Annalie hurried breathlessly down the stairs. “Maxine!” She clapped her hands sharply. The Rottie didn’t even glance her way. Liam was her master, and the others were just tolerated guests. “Maxine, stop!”
She grabbed the dog by her collar just as Maxine’s growl dipped down to a truly menacing range. Maxine, surprised, tried to lunge forward, but Annalie held on and dragged her back over the slick marble floor, into the library, and blocked her way out until she could slide the door shut and trap the dog inside. Maxine wasn’t one for barking, but she did then, deep-throated and vicious sounds of alarm. The scrabble of her claws against the wood made Bryn wince. “Jesus!” Annie said, and backed away from the door, then turned to look at her. “Oh. Oh God.”
“I need shots,” Bryn said. Her throat felt horribly dry, and her voice sounded thin. This was happening much faster than she was used to, but then, she’d been through a lot; the stabilizing influence of the single shot Liam had given her was wearing off incredibly fast. “Mr. French—”
He was huddling against Annie’s leg. Her sister knelt and petted him, then picked him up. Mr. French didn’t generally like being carried, but he didn’t resist this time.
And he never stopped watching Bryn with that dark, confused, betrayed stare.
“Come on,” Annie said. “Let’s get you fixed up.” She sounded less bothered than Bryn would have thought, but then again, Annie had been through six months with Mercer and Fast Freddy. “Where were you?”
“At a nursing home.”
/> “I’m serious.”
“So am I,” Bryn said. She followed Annie into the back kitchen, spotlessly clean as always. “I can’t believe they left you alone here.”
“Well, there wasn’t much choice, apparently. Liam said he couldn’t let Patrick run off by himself, and Joe—”
Annie pulled the lockbox from the refrigerator and put it on the table, then frowned. “I don’t know the combination.”
Bryn punched it in, opened the box, and uncapped one of the syringes before rolling up her sleeve and plunging the needle home. The burn of the nanites was especially tough this time, and she sank down into one of the dining chairs until the pain subsided enough to breathe. “What about Joe?” She uncapped a second shot and rammed that one home as well. She just managed not to convulse this time, or scream. When the pounding faded from her ears, Annie was talking.
“…kids,” she said. “I don’t know where they went, but he was definite that he’d be back once they were safe, but I haven’t seen him or heard from him. It’s been…quiet.” Annie blinked, and Bryn saw tears shining on her cheeks before she hastily wiped them off with the back of one hand. “Why is this happening to us? Is it me? Are these people after me?”
“No, not—It’s not you, Annie.” She managed to get that out, somehow, even though the agony burning through her from head to toe was so great she thought her flesh might start to smolder. Then it started to fade, thankfully. Bryn felt a rush of warmth instead, the billions of tiny machines rushing through her body, searching for all the million things to put right again. It’s going to be okay, she told herself. “Pack a bag. We have to go in about five minutes.”
“Go? Go where?”
“The place I used to work. Pharmadene.”
“But—you said that was the last place I should ever go!”
“I know. But things have changed. It’s the only place we’ll be safe. They can protect us there.”
“I don’t know, maybe—maybe you should talk to Liam. Or Patrick. Here, I can call—”
Bryn grabbed her sister’s arm and forced it down to the table, and took the phone out of her hand. “No,” she said. “No calling. No discussion. Go pack, now. In five minutes, meet me at the car.”
Annie stared at her, frowning, and pulled her arm free to rub it resentfully. “I hope you know what the hell you’re doing,” she said. “Jesus, Bryn. What’s eating you?”
Fear, Bryn thought. Reality. “Just do it.”
Her sister left, taking Mr. French with her. Bryn cleared the used hypos and put them into the biohazard container near the trash can, then went upstairs herself to grab a few things. She didn’t bother with anything she could replace—just the necessary overnight accessories and a couple of changes of clothing. A zip-up pair of low boots that provided both comfort and traction. She looked around the room a little blindly, but everything else was just noise now, just distractions she couldn’t afford in this moment.
She took the bag downstairs and put it in the trunk.
Maxine had gone quiet behind the library door. Bryn checked her own skin; it still had a gray cast to it, but didn’t look quite so off as it had. “Max?” she said, and tapped on the wood. “Maxine?” She got a low growl in response. Taking Maxine out of here would be difficult at best, and being trapped in a car with an angry, suspicious Rottweiler didn’t seem like a very good plan. But the dogs didn’t deserve what was likely to come calling here. If she wouldn’t leave Mr. French, she couldn’t leave the other dogs, either.
So she got the rest of them rounded up—the greyhounds, the pug, and the other Rottie, who was much less suspicious—and put them in the backseat of the car together. Annie came back with her bag, and Mr. French tagged at her heels; he sniffed at Bryn suspiciously, then barked and seemed comfortable enough to settle in near her again, though he didn’t beg for a petting.
When Annie let her out, Maxine kept her distance, too, but she didn’t growl or attack. Still, there was something in the Rottweiler’s steady attention that kept Bryn on her guard. “Put her in a crate,” she said. There were travel crates, folding ones, stacked in the utility room off the kitchen, and Annie put one together and got Maxine inside; she and Bryn managed to fit the crate into the back of the car, barely. It was an uncomfortable fit with all the other dogs, even with the pug and Mr. French up front—one on Annie’s lap, one at her feet on the passenger side.
But it wouldn’t be a long trip.
Bryn headed for Pharmadene.
“What happened to you?” Annie demanded as Bryn drove. Bryn didn’t reply; her attention was focused around them, looking for any signs that Jane might already have locked on to her location. She was hyperaware now of the danger, and the ticking clock. “Hey! Bryn, you’re scaring me! Where’s Patrick? And Liam? They went to meet you.…Are they okay? What happened?”
Annie wasn’t going to shut up until she got some kind of answer, even a half-assed one, so Bryn finally said, “I met them. Everything’s fine. This is part of the plan. I can’t tell you the details right now.”
“Oh,” Annie said, and sat back, crossing her arms. She got that thundercloud frown on her pretty face. “I see. So you don’t trust me. Still.”
“Jesus, Annie, why does everything have to be about you?” For a wild, bitter moment, Bryn almost regretted making the trip to get her sister, but then she felt a surge of shame. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you, but—things are bad right now.”
Annie’s frown faded, and she said, much more gently, “Is that why Patrick’s not here with you? Has something happened?”
“No.” Yes. “Patrick’s fine. Everybody’s fine, we just…need to split up right now. For safety.” Because I might kill him if I hear him say Jane’s name again. “It’ll be okay. We’ll be safe here. The FBI will protect us.”
“Okay.” Annie didn’t seem too convinced, but she contented herself with calming the excited, agitated pug wiggling around in her lap. Mr. French was maintaining a dignified sitting position at her feet, leaning on her leg. The greyhounds and free Rottweiler prowled restlessly in the back, as nervous as Bryn herself felt.
She phoned Zaragosa when she made the turnoff for the Pharmadene front gates, and got his well-dressed assistant. “This is Bryn Davis,” she said. “I need to talk to your boss. Right now.”
“I’m sorry. Mr. Zaragosa is in a meeting,” the assistant said. She could almost see his expression of total indifference. “I can have him return your call, but he has a full calendar—”
“Tell Zaragosa that I am half a mile from the facility, and I’m coming in the front gate. It’s his choice how that happens. I’ve got my sister with me—”
“Tell him about the dogs,” Annie whispered.
Bryn ignored her. “—and we need admittance to the grounds and a pass to get inside. It’s important.”
“I’m sorry, but I was told your employment with Pharmadene had ended. That means you’ll need to make an appointment to visit Mr. Zaragosa, and your sister needs to undergo all the usual background checks.…”
“Jeremy. You’re not listening. Closed or open, I am coming in the gate. Make that happen so nobody has to get hurt in the process. And tell Zaragosa that people will probably be tracking me to your front door. Bad people who aren’t going to be nearly as concerned about the well-being of your people as I am. Understood?”
“Hold,” he said, and she heard the soft, New Age music start playing. Bryn fought the urge to curse him, and didn’t let up on the gas as she took the curves heading up the hill to where the Pharmadene property began.
“Bryn?” Annie said. The gates were in sight. Bryn didn’t slow. “Um, Bryn? Those are closed. And there’s a guard.”
The hold music went off. “Mr. Zaragosa wants to speak with you, but you’re going to have to wait.”
“Tell him I am one minute from crashing into his gate at seventy miles an hour. See if he can make a hole in his schedule for that.”
This time, she got ho
ld without music. Annie, who was sitting tensely now, arms protectively around the pug, said, “Bryn, slow down.”
“I can’t,” she said. “We’re playing chicken, Annie. The first one who blinks loses, and we can’t be left out here. We’re dead if they don’t let us inside.”
“But—”
Mr. Zaragosa’s voice came on the line. “Bryn, you can’t just—”
“Thirty seconds from the front gates,” she said. “It’s going to take at least ten seconds for them to roll back. Your choice, but you’ve got a max of fifteen seconds to get it done once I stop talking.”
He wasted only one second in silence, then said, “Gate’s opening.”
“Not yet, it isn’t.”
“Jeremy’s calling the guard. Slow down, Bryn. I swear, we’re working on it.”
“Work faster.” Instincts were trying to pull her foot off the gas, but she fought them and kept going. She needed to see the guard making the effort, or it would be for nothing.
The guard ducked back into the shack and picked up the phone.
They were less than fifteen seconds from hitting the gates. “Bryn!” Annie shouted, and Mr. French barked, responding to the alarm in her voice. The greyhounds and the loose Rottweiler were moving agitatedly in the backseat, worried by the tension thickening the air.
I’m going to kill us all.
The guard hit the controls, and the gates began to roll back. Bryn hit the brakes, slowing fast, but even; then the front right bumper of the car caught the metal and crumpled. The car scraped through, but only just, and then the guard reversed the course of the gates behind them to wheel them shut as Bryn brought the vehicle to a skidding stop.
And then, of course, heavily armed guards surrounded the car as it came to a stop—a battalion of them, looked like. Bryn dropped the phone, killed the engine, and held up both hands. Annie looked frozen in place. “Pretend like you just got busted by the cops,” Bryn said. “Do exactly what they say. Don’t argue, don’t resist.”
