Jack Eisley rolled over to drape his arm around Theresa, like he did every morning to see if she was awake yet. But his hand dropped straight down to the mattress. Funny—the mattress was rock-hard.
His eyes popped open. Short-term memories rushed back: drinks, blonde, cab ride, hotel room, Mary Kates, San Diego …
You’ll be joining the dead, all because you kissed me. No, not because of that. Because you kissed me and you didn’t believe me. Do you believe me novo, Jack?
“You okay, buddy?”
Jack rolled over to the other side. His neck and head were throbbing.
Oh, man …
It was the hotel security guy, on his knees next to Jack. This guy was just waking up, too. The black name tag pinned to the man’s uniform read VINCENT. Was that a first name or a last?
“Look, stay right here. I’m going to get us some help.”
Jack nodded, but he heard faint alarm bells go off somewhere. In the hotel? No. It was more a tingling sensation. A high-pitched tone, like an audio test from grade school. Tones, cycling higher and higher, clunky headphones pasted over your ears, school nurse asking you to raise your hand if … No.
Wait.
… 35 seconds
Kelly White—which wasn’t her real name, at least not the one her parents had given her—knew she was going to die.
It would take only eight seconds, and the throbbing of the veins in her head would grow worse, the Mary Kates rushing north to expand and destroy all they encountered, and then the gushing …
And then it would be over.
She knew it would happen sooner or later. At least she had been able to choose it.
The elevator car continued its ascent.
But in the passing of one second to the next, her brain ignored the invading swarm of nanomachines, and a series of synapses fired.
An idea.
… 36 seconds
There was screaming in Jack Eisley’s head, and he’d never felt it before, but now he could … the blood in his veins. On fire. And the throbbing in his head growing stronger with every heartbeat, and the screaming whine in his brain growing louder.
Jack shook his head, pounded his fists on the carpet.
Listen to me. I am infected with an experimental tracking device. If I am alone for more than ten seconds, I will die.
Christ, she wasn’t kidding.
This is real.
This is real.
This is real.
… 37 seconds
Guy with the ice bucket for his Diet Coke. Up on five.
She jabbed forward with her index finger.
Collapsed to her knees.
Found the button for five.
Screamed.
Pounded the floor of the ascending elevator car.
Button five was lighted; the digital readout above the doors ticked upward in concert with the seconds.
She screamed louder, as if it would give the Mary Kates pause.
It didn’t.
… 38 seconds
Jack Eisley pounded furiously at the carpet with the wild idea that he could pound right through the floor and fall into the next floor, and the weight of his body and the chunk of floor would cause that floor to collapse, and then another and another and another, until he was in the lobby, surrounded by people, and the Mary Kates would know that and stop the screaming and throbbing in his head….
It was his only chance.
Jack pounded and pounded and pounded….
… 39 seconds
On the fifth floor, the elevator doors opened, and Kelly White was screaming, she knew she was, but she couldn’t hear sound anymore, and all she could do was fall forward, and she collided with skin and plastic and she saw the ice tumble and scatter across the carpet and heard “Jesus!”
And she smiled, because she was worried about his Diet Coke, and here was a man to save her, finally, but it was too late, and …
And then it was over for Kelly White.
Which wasn’t even the name she had been born with.
… 40 seconds
And on an upswing, Jack Eisleys hand slapped flesh. The guard’s hand. The guard named Vincent.
“Buddy, buddy, what the hell…”
Jack reached out and clamped on Vincent’s forearm…. Vincent, be it his first or last name, it didn’t matter, but he clung to the man like he was never going to let go.
… 41 seconds
Brian Burke forgot the ice bucket, forgot the Diet Coke, held the woman in his hands, looked at her beautiful face … beautiful, except for the blood trickling from her nose and ears.
… 42 seconds
If I’ve only one life, let me live it as a blonde!
— CLAIROL ADVERTISEMENT
2:50 a.m.
Sheraton Lobby
For the last time, Kowalski reassured the desk clerk that he was fine. “It’s just a sprain. Feeling a little tipsy. You know how it is.” All the while, he was scanning the elevator car to see where it stopped. He already had an idea of where that would be. Floor five. Diet Coke dork with the ice bucket.
You need to keep her within ten feet of you at all times, but do not allow her to get too close.
It was coming together for him: All night, she had been in the company of others. Made a point of it. Pick up one guy at the airport, ditch him for another. A new guy with a hotel room to himself. She needed someone close.
I don’t want to die, but if I have to …
She gets alone, she dies.
Never mind how. Figure that shit out later.
She’d kicked him out of the elevator, made a suicide run back up the shaft.
But maybe it wasn’t suicide. Maybe she was going for that Diet Coke dude on five. Hoping he’d still be there. Keep the company of another man. Stay alive another couple of hours.
“Sir, I’d feel a lot better if you sat down here and let me call someone to take a look at your wrist.”
But that made no fucking sense. What kind of government-created disease, plague, or virus—and it had to be one of the above; otherwise, CI-6 wouldn’t be having him traipse around Philadelphia with a severed head in a gym bag for shits and giggles— worked only when the victim was alone?
No wonder the handler wouldn’t tell him anything. This kind of thing went beyond spurned ex-lover territory.
What was CI-6 messing around with now?
Kowalski ignored the desk clerk and walked over and punched the up button. He knew he’d probably find a dead body up on five, if she’d made it that far. Which, okay, was not a great situation. He’d rather have Kelly tell him more. But if need be, he could liberate her pretty head from the rest of her body, give her a little reunion with Ed in the Adidas gym bag, and search for answers elsewhere. His handler and CI-6 weren’t the only people in the United States with access to a laboratory.