Different people, happy lives.
My happiness was seeing the light in my wife’s face. I saw that light when she was holding our daughter. And when she was lying next to me in bed. I saw that same kind of light in my own eyes, too, whenever I looked in the mirror. That was a new experience for me.
Peace.
“Do you want to go dancing?” Karly suggested.
“I want to do absolutely everything with you. Where should we go?”
Karly kept watching the people in the park come and go, her eyes traveling from face to face. “How about the Spybar? We can pretend we’re still young and hip.”
“The Spybar,” I murmured darkly.
I looked away at the lake, where the water glistened with reflected lights, and I tried to swallow down a moment of anxiety. Karly was too preoccupied to notice my hesitation. I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about my coma dreams anymore, but the very mention of the Spybar took me back to that night when music pounded in my ears and my beautiful, beautiful wife was bleeding to death in my arms.
Some moments you just can’t shake. They are with you forever. I had to remind myself that, as vivid as it was, that moment had never actually happened. It was a fantasy played out inside my head while I was lying in a hospital bed.
“Sure,” I replied. “The Spybar. Let’s go.”
Karly didn’t answer. Her stare followed the blond jogger who had passed us on the grass. The woman disappeared at a steady run toward the bright arena lights of Grant Park. I could only see the jogger’s back as she went in and out of the shadows.
“Karly? Are you okay?”
My wife came out of her trance and gave me a dazzling smile. “I’m fine.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No, nothing’s wrong. That was just weird.”
“What was?”
Karly shrugged. Her head swiveled again. From a distance, she eyed the jogger in the purple sports bra, who was nearly out of sight now, one more runner among hundreds in the Chicago night.
“That woman over there,” she said. “The blonde who ran past us. It was the strangest thing. I saw her as clear as anything as she went by, and I swear, she looked exactly like me.”
Acknowledgments
I’ve published more than twenty thrillers in my life, but Infinite is the most unusual story I’ve ever told. I hope you enjoyed following Dylan Moran on his incredible journey.
When I was a teenager in the 1970s, one of my favorite novels was The Magus, by British writer John Fowles. It’s the story of a schoolteacher who winds up enmeshed in surreal erotic mysteries on a Greek island, at an estate owned by an enigmatic “magus,” or magician. Ever since I read that book, I’ve had in the back of my head the idea of writing a thriller that pushes the boundaries of reality, much as Fowles did with his literary novel. Infinite is the result. Fowles died in 2005, but I remain grateful to him for the inspiration he gave me as a boy dreaming of being a writer.
I also appreciate the support of my agent, Deborah Schneider, and my editor at Thomas & Mercer, Jessica Tribble Wells, both of whom saw the potential of this concept from the very beginning. Their excitement and enthusiasm for the book really helped me bring my vision to life. I’m also grateful to Charlotte Herscher for her great work in the editorial process, to Rex Bonomelli for the amazing cover, and to Gracie Doyle, Sarah Shaw, Laura Barrett, Susan Stokes, and everyone on the team at Thomas & Mercer who has helped get this book into your hands.
My longtime readers know that my wife, Marcia, gets the first read on every new novel. She’s my editor, my sounding board, my psychology expert, and my proofreader — and her insights and feedback make every book better long before I ever submit it. My other advance reader is the wonderful Ann Sullivan. Together she and Marcia challenge me to make sure that the words on the page deliver what was in my head.
Of course, I want to give a big thanks to all of my readers, too, for joining me on this ride for more than fifteen years. You can write to me with your feedback at brian@bfreemanbooks.com. You can also “like” my official fan page on Facebook at facebook.com/bfreemanfans or follow me on Twitter or Instagram using the handle bfreemanbooks. For a look at the fun side of the author’s life, you can also “like” Marcia’s Facebook page at facebook.com/theauthorswife.
If you enjoyed Infinite, be sure to check out all my other thrillers, too. Visit bfreemanbooks.com to join my newsletter mailing list, get book club discussion questions, and find out more about me and my books.
Finally, I hope you’ll post your reviews online at sites like Amazon, Goodreads, Audible, and other sites for book lovers — and spread the word to your friends, too. Publishing is still a word-of-mouth business from reader to reader! Thanks!