“Fana would want us to let them go,” Jessica said.
“Fana is yet a child,” Teka said.
“Fana would never keep prisoners,” Jessica said. “She ran away to protest the imprisonment of Caitlin and Justin O’Neal. You know Fana’s heart, Teka. She wants our blood used to help humankind, not to hold families against their will. This is a perversion of her ideals.”
Teka walked back to the table and sat beside Lucas. “They should leave the boy.”
This time, Nita stepped toward Teka, flinging her arms for emphasis. “Oh, hell no! We’re not leaving anybody.”
“She’s damned right about that,” Cal said.
“I’m going with them,” Hank said, his voice unwavering.
Teka turned his laserlike gaze to Hank. “You are at a tender age to forget so much.”
“I’m not scared,” Hank said. “If I forget stuff, I’ll learn it again.”
“Experiences and learning are not the same thing, Hank,” Teka said. “The things we learn are like streams through our conscious mind. Experiences are the ocean within us. They shape our perceptions in ways we cannot predict. You will be the most changed.”
“Then let him go, but leave him his memories,” Nita said, a mother’s plea. “Only him.”
Teka closed his eyes again. “That,” he said, “I cannot do.”
Again, silence sank across the room. Nita bit her lip, her face shining with rage and tears. When Teka opened his eyes next, he was looking at Cal. “Your position is now so precarious with my Brothers that it would be inhumane to keep you here. I will wash your memories, preserving what I can. You will not remember the healing or the Blood. After the memory wash, Yonas will drive you to town. You will have no awareness until you wake on a bus on your way to SeaTac airport. Unless you are detained, you will fly to Antigua.”
“You can do that?” Nita said, sounding like a young girl seeing Santa Claus. Breathless.
“I will do my best,” Teka said. “I will leave as much as I am able. Especially for the boy.”
“Jared?” Lucas heard himself say, and Jared’s eyes darted to his as if Lucas had spied on his thoughts. Lucas felt his heart crumbling, but he went on. “What about you?”
Jared shook his head, firm. “No, Dad. I’m staying. This is my family.”
Thank you, God, Lucas thought, all the while despising his selfishness.
“We’ll wire money as soon as we can,” Jessica told Nita. “But you won’t know—”
“There is no time for these sentimentalities,” Teka snapped. “I must begin.”
Jessica hugged Nita. The women cried together, eyes closed, swaying in a silent dance.
Lucas brought himself to his feet again as Cal walked toward him. Lucas had never seen so many expressions woven on one man’s face: Relief. Joy. Terror. Grief.
When Lucas had first committed himself to the colony, the Life Brothers had insisted that he cut off contact with his old friends and colleagues. Jessica and Alex had made the same sacrifice. He had been stunned when Cal and Nita had said they would move to Washington to be near him, and even more stunned when Dawit had convinced the Life Brothers to agree. For fourteen years, they had been each other’s family, eating their meals together, godparents to each other’s children. Before that, they’d been neighbors on Okeepechee Road.
Without Cal, Jared would have been dead today, and Lucas might never have found the blood. Cal had given him the magazine article that had led him to Botswana, when Jared’s illness had made them all feel desperate enough to believe in miracles.
“You’ll be fine,” Lucas said, assuring himself as much as Cal. “Jess and I saw the footage of Justin O’Neal at the airport. He seemed fine afterward. Just a little confused.”
Cal nodded, grateful for a hopeful image. “Hope to Heaven I’m doing the right thing, especially for Hank. We just can’t live like this. Not another day.”
“I’m sorry, Cal.” Lucas’s words were too weak for the occasion. What could he say to a man he had cost so much? “I wish I’d known….”
“Don’t be sorry,” Cal said. “Teka may take away most of it, but”—he patted his chest, above his heart—“we’ll always know, Doc.”
Lucas Shepard hugged his best friend goodbye.
Their colony really was at war, he realized. But it had nothing to do with the Department of Homeland Security. Their war was between those who had the Living Blood, and those who didn’t. Mortal and immortal. Just like the oil wars in the desert, their war would be a long one.
The Duharts were the first casualties, but Lucas knew they would not be the last.
Twenty-five
The white Spanish Mission–style church looks like a palace atop the hill, encircled by dead, craggy trees. The sky’s clouds are thick, aflame with twinkles of green lightning. The skies are preparing for a hurricane. In the bell tower, two bronze bells toll in cacophony, swinging in opposite directions. Roaring winds devour their sour music.
Townspeople flee the thrashing rains, but the doors to the church are locked. A man and woman lean out of the dome’s window, only their silhouettes visible in the Shadows as they gaze down at the people below. The townspeople surge to a throng. Many of them hold small children above their heads, begging for shelter. Others are thin and frail, reeking of illness.
In the church dome, the man and woman open their arms to welcome the storm, which drenches the townspeople. Their upturned faces are pelted with raindrops.
The rain is the color of blood.
Fana woke, locking a gasp in her throat as the car rocked on a bump in the road.
She expected to find herself riding in the Orbit with her parents, Gramma Bea, Aunt Alex and Uncle Lucas, surrounded by evergreens. But that was childish wishful thinking. Instead, Caitlin and Johnny sat in the front seat of a strange car while the radio screamed hysteria.
Caitlin had left the highway. Now they were in a nearly deserted warehouse district.
Had Fana dozed off while she’d been meditating? She’d been trying to reach Teka to tell him what she had learned, since it might be too late by the time she had access to a secure phone. Sometimes her teacher felt so physically close to her that he could have been in the car with them.
“Was I sleeping?” Fana said.
The radio was loud, burying Fana’s words. Neither of her friends turned around; they only gazed ahead through the dust-spattered windshield.
A warm, soothing arm tightened around Fana’s shoulder. “Shhhh. It’s all right, negra.”
Charlie’s scent plied Fana’s nostrils; his skin mimicked honey in every way, from its coloring to its smell. Charlie’s smile greeted her, and his eyes that promised peace.
Charlie had found a straw cowboy hat painted with a snakeskin pattern in the car, and it fit him. The sight of him quelled some of her misery. Fana rested her head on Charlie’s shoulder, and his soft slope of muscles met her cheek. She heard the whisper of his heart beating inches from her ear. He wore an old trace of cologne, but his skin smelled perfect by itself.
“How long was I out?” she said.
“Not twenty minutes,” he said, stroking her hair. “I didn’t have the heart to wake you.”
Fana settled against him, nestling, and he lay back to make a bed for her. The backseat with Charlie felt like her cocoon. Fana wished the world could vanish and let her rest. She was exhausted from the day, but this wasn’t the time to sleep.
“Where are we?” Fana said.
“Nogales,” Charlie said. “On the Arizona side. Near the border.”
Fana could just make out the blue numerals on the car’s dashboard: 1:15. Was that all? One day felt like five or six, and it was only halfway done.
Fana raised her voice, hoping Johnny would hear her. “You OK, Johnny?” she said. She resisted the urge to probe him. She had abused her gifts too much already.
Johnny shrugged, not turning around. “Fine,” he said, barely audible over the radio.
Cai
tlin laughed, startling Fana. Caitlin didn’t laugh often anymore. “Those assholes thought they’d catch us with those checkpoints!” Caitlin said. “Huh, Charlie?”
Charlie grinned. “Nobody’s catching us today.”
The man on the radio was talking nonsense about a link between Glow and bio-terrorism. His voice was full of authority. Fana hadn’t realized how easy it was to make lies sound plausible.
“Can you turn that off, please?” Fana said.
A flick of Caitlin’s wrist, and the car was silent. A loud, low-pitched horn sounded outside, and suddenly a cargo train with brown cars sped alongside them, in the opposite direction. Fana stared out at the passing train until its countermotion made her dizzy. The chunk-chunk sound of the train’s wheels charging across the tracks made her anxious, as if the train was an omen. Was she going the wrong way?
She had dreamed while she’d slept. Something about a church, but not like any she knew.
“Caitlin, where are we going?” she said.
“Close your eyes and count to ten,” Caitlin said. As if it was all a game.
Charlie suddenly held her cheeks and kissed her lips. His mouth jolted her skin with tiny ripples. “I’ve been dying to do that for the past twenty miles,” he said, and kissed her again.
Fana felt self-conscious with Caitlin and Johnny so close, but then she realized how silly a worry that was. Anything might happen today. Why should she deny herself her first kisses?
When Charlie turned his hip toward her, she felt his urgent, hidden arousal against her stomach, which fluttered a nervous response. She had seen nude men in movies and photographs, some of them aroused, but nothing captured the raw potency of what she felt buried in Charlie’s jeans. If they had been alone, her hand might have ventured there to sate her curiosity.
Instead, Fana touched the warm nape of Charlie’s neck and basked in his mouth and tongue, lingering, cleaving herself to him everywhere their skin wanted to touch.
Caitlin was so pleased with herself that it was hard to suppress a smile.
She’d always had a good memory, committing names and telephone numbers so she wouldn’t leave a trail, but today her memory was perfect. She had visited Nogales only once, but every street sign and building felt as familiar as her home neighborhood. She avoided Highway 19 and International Street, since there were sure to be checkpoints near the border. Instead of panicking every time a police car or white border patrol van came into sight, she nearly laughed. She could walk up to a cop and kick him in the nuts, and just maybe she would.
She had Charlie on her side.
Every time she’d glanced at Charlie in the mirror during the drive from the casino, she’d learned something new and fascinating about him. Charlie wasn’t his real name, for instance. He hadn’t revealed his name to her yet, but he would if she proved herself. And Charlie wasn’t Puerto Rican, as he’d told Fana: He was an Italian, born in Tuscany. His face looked younger than hers, but he was as old as Dad. At least fifty.
For the first time since Caitlin O’Neal had known Fana, she was the one who knew things. She was the one who could hear what was unspoken and see what was hidden. Charlie had given Caitlin that, asking so little in return. Charlie only wanted to take Fana far from the reach of authorities who would imprison her and abuse her blood. They both wanted to keep Fana safe.
Nelson Avenue. They were close!
Caitlin slowed. The squat concrete building was sandwiched between large warehouses, with lettering painted in red on the darkened windowpane: Clinica de Esperanza. Clinic of Hope. Beneath that, a list of services: VIH/SIDA Pruebas y Medicinas. Maternidad. The small parking lot outside was empty, and Caitlin felt a pang of sadness from her old self.
Maritza had worked here two summers ago. The Nogales clinic had cleaned out at least fifty HIV and AIDS patients, under the supervision of Dr. Raul Puerta. But even without help from Charlie, Caitlin could see that the clinic was closed. Dr. Puerta and his staff were gone, in hiding. No one had been cured in Nogales since Maritza’s death.
Caitlin hoped the tunnel was still here.
Caitlin pulled the car around to the rear of the building, out of sight. She heard glass crunch beneath the tires. Luckily, they didn’t need the car now.
In the mirror, Caitlin saw Charlie kissing Fana, and she studied them, transfixed. Then Caitlin saw her own eyes in the mirror, and she felt her mind wriggle. Her elation dissipated.
Instead, cold terror pooled across Caitlin’s heart.
What’s happening to me?
As the car inched to a stop, Caitlin O’Neal felt her mind quietly dying.
He was gone.
From the first instant Johnny had realized he hadn’t been able to move on his own, he had been aware of a sensation like an immovable weight sitting on him, holding him still—Charlie’s weight, crushing him. But the weight was lifting.
Johnny shifted his eyes right, then left. He blinked once. Twice. His chest heaved as he breathed faster, gaining control of his lungs.
Oh God please please please please help me.
Sensation returned, slowly. Johnny concentrated until his head hurt, and his index finger rose. Johnny’s heart thundered to life. He might have a small chance! Everything in him cried out to run, but he couldn’t. Not yet. He might have the strength to open his car door, but he knew that as soon as Charlie saw him move, he would be a prisoner again. What, then?
The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want He leadeth me beside the still waters.
Johnny glanced toward Caitlin. She was gripping the steering wheel with both hands, staring at the rearview mirror with unblinking eyes. Charlie had Caitlin too; Johnny could see it in her face, slack with confusion. Charlie had her in a different way, but Caitlin was Charlie’s now.
A tear slipped from Johnny’s eye.
Johnny almost sobbed, feeling hopeless, when he saw a metallic gleam from the back of Caitlin’s waistband. A gun! It was partially concealed under her shirt, but the butt lay not a foot from him. Johnny wriggled his fingers, one by one. He remembered the vision of Charlie’s face covered in bees, and he had never been more sure of anything.
Please Lord give me the strength Please Lord let it fire.
A warming sensation shot up and down each of Johnny’s arms, as if in response.
Johnny flung himself toward Caitlin. His motion was clumsy and uncontrolled, so he fell against her with more force than he’d intended, knocking her forward against the steering wheel. His left arm splayed awkwardly behind him, but his right arm reached out toward the gun. The gun didn’t come free from Caitlin with his first tug, but he pulled again, and he had it!
Johnny’s shock that his plan had worked nearly froze him in place.
“Hey—,” Caitlin said. But her reflexes were slow.
Charlie and Fana were so absorbed in each other that neither of them moved, as if a bubble separated them from the world.
Johnny was afraid he would drop the gun; his palm shook so much that he could barely keep it in his hand. Still, he pointed squarely at the cowboy hat slanted across the back of Charlie’s head. Johnny tried to command his trembling finger on the trigger, and he felt it tighten.
“Fana, move!” Johnny shouted from numb lips.
Fana shifted suddenly, her face clear of Charlie, and her eyes went wide.
Johnny squeezed the trigger. His ears rang with an explosion and the sound of shattering glass. Fana screamed.
Even before Johnny saw Charlie’s head intact and untouched, he knew his chance was gone. His body was lost to him again, submersed and useless in numbing cold. Johnny watched his own arm with horror as it swung back toward Caitlin, aiming the gun at her head instead.
“Stop it!” Fana screamed.
Caitlin grabbed his wrist with both hands, and her strength seemed superhuman only because he felt so weak. But he wasn’t weak. Somehow, the barrel trembled toward her face.
Charlie reached toward him from the backseat while Caitlin wrestled w
ith Johnny, still clasping his wrist, and Johnny could no longer tell where his limbs ended and theirs began. He only realized where the gun was when he felt the cold nozzle against his side, right below his ribs.
Thank God it’s not Caitlin—
Johnny didn’t finish his thought before the explosion.
His body’s numbness gave way to searing, incomprehensible pain. Fire tore at his insides. Johnny’s mouth was locked tight, mute, but his mind screamed.
WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG? Charlie’s voice said. YOU KEPT ME WAITING.
Then, Charlie took mercy on him.
Johnny Wright’s mind sank into blessed darkness.
“Shit, shit, shit. What the fuck?” Caitlin stared at her bloodied hands, shaking with sobs. She dropped the gun to the floor.
Fana would have been certain she was dreaming except for the painful throbbing in her ears and the smell of blood and gunpowder. Fana covered her mouth, feeling sick to her stomach as her mind danced in a frenzy. How had this happened?
Charlie opened his car door and jumped out. He ran to Johnny’s door and pulled it open. Johnny nearly fell out before Charlie caught him with a grunt.
“Is he dead?” Caitlin said, red-faced. “Shit! I d-didn’t mean t-to…”
Charlie checked Johnny’s pulse, and relief washed over his face. “He’s just passed out,” Charlie said. “Come on! We’ve got to take him and get ghost.”
The backseat was covered with glass from Johnny’s wild shot, which had broken the window. Fana noticed a new, singed hole in back of Johnny’s seat. A matching hole had left a trail of cottony stuffing only inches from Fana’s leg. The bullet had passed through Johnny and barely missed her. The ringing stopped as Fana’s eardrums healed, but sulfur stung her nose.
Dammit. Fana knew she would have sensed such a violent impulse from Johnny if she hadn’t been fooling around. This was her fault! Again.
But she would make it right.
Fana nearly tripped over her feet as she scrambled out of the car. Already, she could hear a distant siren, coming fast. She glanced at the buildings around them to see if anyone was watching. Just an alley and loading bays for warehouses. No one in sight.