Outbreak: A Nightshades Novel

by Melissa F. Olson

  They had been going over the sketches and photographs Hadley had collected. Beside them, the laptop was still open to CNN’s website, which had been playing clips of “Rosalind’s” interview nonstop.

  Alex’s watch beeped. “It’s ten,” he said, glancing down at it. “Time to switch on the phone?”

  “Yeah.” Lindy went over to the counter and retrieved the cell phone that she’d brought from Roza’s apartment, the one Hector had left for her. She reattached the battery and powered it up, wondering how long it would take Hector to call.

  The phone rang before she even settled back into the chair. Lindy made eye contact with Alex and Hadley, who nodded that they would be quiet. She answered the phone on speaker.

  “Hello?”

  “You bitch!” her brother shouted. “What the hell are you doing?”

  Across the table, Alex grinned. “Right now? Or you mean like in general?” Lindy said sweetly.

  There was the sound of something breaking. “You are ruining everything! How dare you?”

  “How dare I?” Lindy said, her voice rising now. “You killed innocent people, including my friend.”

  “You stole her from me!”

  Lindy sighed. It was so like him to skip right over Bartell’s murder to complain about her taking his toys. And that’s what Reagan was to him: a toy. “I didn’t have to steal her, she came to me. How long did you really think it’d be before someone told her that you were the one who turned her?”

  There was a long moment of silence. “I would have told her myself, eventually,” he declared. “But now you’ve brainwashed her, made her your stalking horse.”

  “So you’re upset that I brainwashed her before you could?”

  “You two don’t even look that similar!”

  This was also true—Reagan was a little scrawny and usually looked more like a guitarist in a grunge band than anything else. But dyeing her hair blond, reshaping her eyebrows, and padding her bra had helped, and as Alex had noticed the previous night, their cheekbones and the shape of their chins were actually pretty close.

  Most importantly, Lindy had segregated herself from shades for decades now. Very few of them, if any, would remember exactly what she looked like, and shades changed their appearance in subtle ways all the time. As long as no one confronted Reagan physically, or noticed that she couldn’t stay awake all day yet, they could get away with this indefinitely.

  A voice spoke to Hector in the background, and Lindy ground her teeth. “Is that Ambrose?”

  Hector was back. “Why do you care? Looking to poach more of my people?”

  Lindy snorted. “Hardly. You and that little worm were made for each other. I’d never get in the way of that.” Before he could respond, she added, “But I’m glad you called. I wanted to offer you a deal.”

  Alex raised his eyebrows at her, but Lindy gave a tiny head shake and said into his mind, Stay with me. I need to push him a little further if we want him to come here. “Run away,” she said, echoing his words from their last call. “The United States belongs to me now.”

  “Is that so.” His voice was soft now, and dangerous. Fear lanced through Lindy, but she pushed it away. She would not be afraid of her own brother. Or at least, she wouldn’t let him know if she was.

  “You failed, Hector,” she said. “Again. And we both know you’d never win a straight fight with me. So go, lick your wounds in Romania or Luxembourg. I won’t even follow you.”

  There was a long pause, in which the other end of the line was utterly silent. He hadn’t hung up, though, and Lindy knew he was probably in a room with other shades who were suddenly terrified of the shift in Hector’s mood. They were all waiting to see what he’d do.

  “You want to play games, Lindy?” he said finally. “I can play games.”

  “You’re not hearing me,” Lindy said in a bored voice. “You know what your problem is, Hector? You haven’t learned any new moves since 1983. It’s the same boring game, and I’m tired of playing. I still have one card left, though: a real nice picture of you.”

  A pause. “You wouldn’t.” But he was just saying it. They both knew she would.

  “How do you think your little minions will feel about you if I give this to the TV stations and start an international manhunt?” she said. “I’ll give you twenty-four hours. Get out of America, or I will make sure every fucking screen in the world has a picture of your face on it. You’ll finally be notorious, just as you’ve always wanted. And then you’ll be dead.”

  Lindy hung up the phone and detached the battery again. When she looked over, she saw Alex and Hadley staring at her. Hadley’s eyes were very wide. She didn’t look in any particular danger of falling asleep now. “What?” Lindy asked. Wasn’t that pretty much what they’d discussed?

  Alex cleared his throat. “You, um, you just sounded kind of scary at the end there.”

  “Oh. Sorry.” She looked at both of them. “Listen . . . just to be on the safe side, I think you should call your family, any close friends. Say whatever you have to say, just get them to take an overnight trip.”

  Hadley and Alex looked at each other for a second, then Alex turned back to Lindy with a little shrug. “Everyone I care about is already in this room,” he said.

  Hadley was looking down at one of the new burner phones. “My parents should be fine; they’re in Palm Springs. But can I . . .” She trailed off for a moment, then started again, more sure of herself. “Can I bring Faraday in on this?”

  Lindy tried to hide her smile. Hadley had gone to high school with the state cop, and reconnected only the night before. It was unlikely that Hector would know about their relationship, or be able to find out in time. This was a good thing—Faraday’s recent involvement made it unlikely that Hector would have gotten to him. They could use another ally. “It’s fine with me,” she said.

  Alex added, “Have him meet us near the shoreline around four, and make sure he doesn’t bring electronics, okay?”

  “Okay. Should I wake up Ruiz and Eddy, so they can call their families too?”

  “Don’t worry about Chase,” Alex answered. “His sister and parents are in Phoenix, but he got them out of town yesterday afternoon after he figured out that Hector’s been mesmerizing him. They’re safe.”

  Hadley nodded and stood up, stretching. “I’ll tell Ruiz.”

  “Then get some rest,” Alex called after her.

  Lindy looked at him carefully. He needed to do the same, but she knew why he was stalling. “You should make the call,” she said.

  “I know.” He sighed and picked up a burner phone. Hadley had done some computer magic that would make it harder to pinpoint the call—not impossible, but harder. He dialed a number from heart and asked for the deputy director. It was Sunday morning, but she would have gone into the office after the first broadcast started.

  The second he identified himself, he was put through—which was a really bad sign. “Alexander Michael McKenna!” Harding shouted over the phone. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  Chapter 21

  ALEX WINCED, pulling the phone away from his ear for a second. Ordinarily he’d be annoyed that she was talking to him like a mother chastising a child, even if she had babysat him back when his mother ran the Bureau. But under the circumstances, he’d let her have that one.

  “Good morning, Deputy Director. I take it you saw the broadcast.”

  “Is it true? Is she really the queen of vampires?”

  “It’s true,” he said. “And it’s also true that she had nothing to do with Hector killing Tymer and the others.”

  There was a pause. When Harding came back on the line, she was speaking quietly. “Is she with you now?”

  He glanced at Lindy, who was listening to the whole conversation. “Yes.”

  “Alex, I believe she may be mesmerizing you. Can you get away from her?”

  Lindy raised an eyebrow, slightly amused. “If I wanted to,” Alex said. “But she can’
t mesmerize me. Trust me on that.”

  “How can I?” Harding cried. “You went to the media, Alex. We don’t do that. We’re the goddamned Bureau.”

  “We’ve used the media before to guide the direction of a case,” Alex argued.

  “With some idiot kidnapper in Kentucky, sure. But you just poked one of the oldest vampires on the planet with a stick. He’s going to come after you.”

  “That’s the idea,” Alex said simply.

  Her voice softened. “Where are you, Alex?”

  “If I told you, what would you do?”

  “Send help,” she replied promptly.

  Alex wavered for a second. Lindy’s voice spoke in his head. Do you trust her, that she’d just send help?

  He lifted his hand and tilted it back and forth. Harding might send help, but she also might just have him and Lindy both arrested. “I’m sorry, Marcia,” Alex said quietly. He hadn’t used her first name in over a decade. “But listen, if you want to go on TV and publicly renounce me as a renegade agent . . . would you mind waiting until tomorrow?”

  There was a heavy sigh. “Oh, Alex.” He waited, and more than thirty seconds ticked by.

  “All right,” she said, sounding tired. “Tell me your plan.”

  * * *

  Alex ran her through most of the last two days, leaving out only sleeping with Lindy, the escape from her brownstone, and Chase’s unwilling involvement with Hector. With Lindy’s permission, Alex also told Harding more about Lindy and Hector’s relationship and background.

  In the end, the deputy director reluctantly agreed to let them go ahead with the plan. For now, the FBI’s press office would be vague about the Bureau’s reaction to the interview—but she warned Alex that if any more lives were lost, she would deny knowing about his actions in advance.

  “But Alex, even if you get Hector, your little stunt this morning has changed the landscape,” she added. “Ms. Frederick is going to have to go through with her promise to work with Congress, and become the public face of shades in the US. Is she up for that?”

  Alex glanced at Lindy, who looked a little guilty. She was pawning off what was ultimately her own responsibility on Reagan, who was young and untested.

  I’ll help her, Lindy said in his head. If we really do get Hector, we’ll figure out how to make this work.

  Alex nodded and reached across the table to squeeze her hand. Into the phone, he said, “Let’s do this one step at a time, Deputy Director.”

  “Fine.” Alex recognized her tone: she was getting fed up with him. “I can’t publicly back you—unless, of course, your operation is successful,” she said wryly. “But behind the scenes . . . what can I do?”

  “Keep the Coast Guard away from the Byrne water crib tonight,” Alex said immediately.

  Another heavy sigh. This might be a new record, even for him. “I can do that.”

  “And, um . . . maybe don’t look too closely at the actions of some colleagues at the Chicago FBI this weekend,” Alex suggested. “One or two of them may have given us a hand with some details.”

  * * *

  After he hung up, Alex couldn’t help but release a huge yawn. “You should get a few hours of sleep,” Lindy said, looking anxious. “I’ll keep an eye on things here.” They both knew it was unlikely for Hector to be in Chicago already, and equally unlikely that he’d find them at the cabins, at least not so quickly.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” he said, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand. Before he got up from the table, however, he glanced over his shoulder at the far end of the room. Ruiz had made whatever phone calls he needed to, and now he, Hadley, and Chase were all passed out on portable cots. They looked like they were at summer camp.

  Two additional cots were already set up, currently empty. Alex yearned to sleep, but there was something bothering him. He turned back to Lindy. “Do you mind if I ask you something personal?”

  You’ve seen me naked. Aren’t we kind of past that? But out loud, Lindy said, “You want to know why I don’t want to be the queen of shades.”

  “Well, yeah. Don’t get me wrong, I think Reagan can do a great job,” he rushed to add. “But . . . not as good as you. You’re stronger, smarter, and centuries more experienced. So why send her?”

  “Because she wants it,” Lindy said simply, but almost immediately she added, “Oh, it’s more complicated than that, of course. Ultimately, it’s probably just selfishness on my part. I’ve been hiding from Hector for a long time, and before that, I was his reluctant accomplice. I’ve spent lifetimes as a witness to such terrible things—from humans and shades.” She gave him a sad smile. “Reagan is young and idealistic and hopeful. I haven’t been those things for a long time.”

  Alex glanced at the others again to make sure they were sleeping, then he reached across the small table and took Lindy’s hand, tugging her up and gently pulling her hand so she came around the table. When he put his arms around her, she climbed into his lap, wrapping her arms around him and leaning forward to rest on his shoulders.

  Alex found himself marveling that he was even allowed to touch her.

  Part of him had been worried that she was sending Reagan because of him. Arrogant, he thought now. But he didn’t want to be the reason the world lost Lindy as their leader. “Lie down with me,” he murmured into her hair.

  Alex . . .

  “I know. Just . . . lie down with me.”

  So she did.

  Chapter 22

  FBI labs

  Sunday afternoon

  GIL PALMER SNAPPED THE rifle grip back into place and checked the cartridges one last time. Well, it wasn’t actually called a rifle, but he refused to use Noelle’s preferred term: Franken-gun. It looked like a rifle and fired much like a rifle, so he was going to think of it as a rifle, dammit. He needed a kite string back to reality, given how weird this whole situation was.

  At two o’clock that morning, shortly after Liz Bassett and her charge had left the lab, a British shade named Sloane had presented himself at the office door and said that he was the evening’s designated pincushion. Noelle had been delighted. After making sure that a little injected saline wouldn’t hurt him, she had spent the next two hours shooting Sloane with her dart guns, making adjustments each time. The darts must have hurt, but Sloane never complained, only wincing a little in a stiff-upper-lip, British kind of way. After the first half-hour, he began actively trying to evade her, and by the time she was done, Noelle could pull the trigger before he could move out of the way. Sloane warned her that Hector was faster, but Noelle was satisfied that the rifle was as good as it was going to get.

  Later, around four thirty, Sloane had unenthusiastically agreed to let Noelle try the methamphetamine on him. They had taken precautions first: she called Alex and warned him, Palmer drew his own weapon, and Noelle lit a small handheld propane torch and placed it on the table right next to her, in case Sloane attacked. She had been tinkering with the dose and formula on and off all night, and yet she seemed completely shocked when the methamphetamine injection did exactly what it was meant to do: after the dart hit, Sloane blinked, wobbled forward for two slow steps, and collapsed.

  Noelle started to rush over to him, but Palmer made her wait, having her stand back with the propane torch until he could fasten a number of zip ties around Sloane’s wrists, just in case. When he was positive Sloane couldn’t break free, Palmer let Noelle come forward to take his temperature and check his vitals. He had none.

  “Is he . . . dead-dead?” Palmer asked.

  “I don’t think so,” she said, not sounding entirely certain. “Start the timer.”

  Palmer wasn’t actually a lab assistant, but he had learned by now that there was no point in reminding Noelle of this. He started a timer on his phone. Noelle, meanwhile, set about teaching him how to modify the dart guns.

  It was delicate work, and Palmer was fully absorbed when, two hours and forty-five minutes later, Sloane began to twitch.

  “Hey
, kid!” Palmer yelled, and Noelle came racing from behind her desk.

  Sloane sat up with a gasp. “Interesting,” said Noelle.

  “What?” Palmer asked.

  “He doesn’t need to breath as often as we do, but his body needs to pump oxygen in order to recover from the meth,” she explained.

  Sloane, meanwhile, had found his voice. “Bloody fucking hell,” he gasped, still taking in big lungfuls of air. “And humans like this stuff?”

  Noelle grinned at him. “You’d be surprised how much. Are you in pain?”

  “No, not really, just feel a bit wonky. And also like I just rose from the dead. What time is it?”

  “A little after seven,” said Noelle.

  “Bollocks. I’ve got to go meet Lindy and Reagan.” He looked down at his arms. “Can we get these off now?”

  * * *

  After Sloane left, they had focused their energy on their weapons. Just before lunch—which they’d ordered in, like all the other food he’d eaten for the last day—Palmer had received a phone call from Deputy Director Harding on her personal cell phone, telling him to help McKenna however he could—but to keep it quiet. She explained a little bit of Alex’s plan to stop Hector, and he made a decision: he was going with them. Palmer had lost six of his men on the first attempt to apprehend Hector; he wasn’t about to miss the chance for a round two. Harding had told him to keep it quiet, so he wouldn’t bring in the rest of his team, but . . . yeah. There was no way he was staying home. So he reconfigured the guns while Noelle did the fussy work of loading the darts with the right dosages.

  Now it was almost four p.m., roughly two hours until sunset, and they were nearly finished. Noelle wanted a rifle and a sidearm for each person going to the water crib: Alex, Chase Eddy, Hadley, Ruiz, Sloane, Reagan, and Lindy. She didn’t know that Lindy had turned down using a gun . . . because Palmer hadn’t told her. He was planning to use those weapons himself.