Resonance, J. B. Everett [the top 100 crime novels of all time txt] 📗

how she could in the middle of all this. “But you won’t be.”

 

His mouth quirked behind the chestnut stubble that was a full shade darker than the sunlightened length on his head. “Trust me, I’ll fall back asleep quickly enough.”

 

She couldn’t very well say yes - there was no way they’d both fit unless she just climbed right on top of him, so she changed the subject. “Do you think the reversal has gotten this far since yesterday? They grow pretty fast now, and it was really close when we drove in. We could be in it right now.”

 

“Don’t change the subject on me.” He lifted the blanket and made every attempt to scoot back to one side of the cot. But he was thwarted at every motion, sliding back into the center of the sling. Jillian raised one eyebrow at him, never making even the first motion to leave the confines of her finally warm cocoon.

 

“Fine.”

 

But he didn’t say anything more than just the one word. He simply stood to full length, stretching his tall form and revealing sun-brown skin where his t-shirt lifted from the edge of his boxers for just a moment. His eyes scanned the room and settled in the corner on a pile of two spare blankets. He turned his cot on its side and motioned for Jillian to do the same.

 

With great reluctance she stood up, her bare feet draining their heat into the cold carpet again. She pushed the cot out of the way as she saw that he was layering the blankets on the floor. He put his own blanket as the top layer then kneeled down on it. “Come on.”

 

It was only slightly softer than a rock slab, but she sank onto it willingly, letting Jordan pull the blanket from her shoulders, and trusting that she’d be heated again within moments.

 

Stretching out along the rough blankets, Jillian had only long enough to shove her hair back out of her face, before Jordan was there and the covers were pulled over them. Lord, the man was better than a space heater. Suddenly she understood why women married men they didn’t even love. God, the sleep!

 

“Jordan?”

 

“Shh.”

 

Her stomach rolled and her jaw clamped to stop the sensation, but she didn’t even get that far. She was falling backward into the black abyss.

 

David walked the hallway, lined with ugly green lockers, looking like the fresh paint hid layers of abuse. The worn linoleum on the floor had not yet been replaced, the black scuffs still not erasable. His own high school had been so much more pristine than this. The lockers and carpeting replaced if they had worn even slightly.

 

Even the children had been removed if they were too frayed, not quite up to snuff. He wondered what other differences his father’s money had bought him.

 

Jordan and Jillian were sleeping in a classroom further down this hall. He didn’t know which one, but relied on the handwritten pages taped beside each door, designating the CDC’s purpose for each.

 

He almost walked past the one that read: Abellard, Brookwood, Carter. For a moment he smirked at the irony, that even in print Jillian was caught between the two of them, but then he turned the knob, pushing open the heavy door, the wired glass lined with a shade so he couldn’t see in.

 

As the dim room slowly came into focus he was caught up in the cozy scene - Jillian snuggled into the grasp of Abellard’s arms. Both of them sleeping like babies.

 

Son of a bitch.

 

The thought took him by surprise in its vehemence. He’d been telling himself that it didn’t matter.

 

But maybe it did.

 

He knelt on her side of the makeshift lover’s nest and reached out, taking just a moment to be sure that he only touched her. “Jillian. Baby. Time to wake up.” He nudged her shoulder a little, thinking that this was a first even for him. He’d slept with married women. He’d broken up more than one couple along the way. But he’d never, until just now, called a woman ‘baby’ while she was literally in another man’s arms.

 

His thoughts stopped as she stirred, rolling away from Abellard to face him. “Whhaaat?”

 

The word was soft and low.

 

“We’re wanted out front.”

 

He could see her chest move with a long sigh as she blinked and carelessly shoved the hair from her face.

 

She rolled back into the space she had vacated, and for a moment David was certain he’d been given the ultimate brush off. But she grabbed Jordan’s shoulder and gave a gently shake.

 

“Jordan. Wake up. We have to go.”

 

David cut her off. “No. Let him sleep. They want you and me.”

 

“Huh?” She rolled again to look at him, but her job had already been accomplished. And Jordan was looking at him, too, through clear eyes.

 

“They want you two? Why?”

 

“We’re going to go in.”

 

Abellard shot upright, revealing a t-shirt, and letting David’s brain breathe a sigh of relief that it wasn’t even cozier than it had looked. “No.”

 

David rocked back on his heels. Why was Jordan fighting back? He slung what he had.

 

“Not your decision.”

 

Abellard’s eyes turned to ice. “Then whose?”

 

David wanted to smile. Jordan and Jillian were Landerly’s babies, lackeys, peons, whatever. But the word had wound up in his hands. And that felt good. “Landerly’s.”

 

David watched while Jordan put a hand on Jillian’s shoulder, gently holding her back.

 

“Don’t go. We’ll talk to Landerly first. I’m not sure I believe this.” He rolled up and off the floor on the other side, diving into his pants pocket for the cell phone.

 

Surprisingly it was Jillian who came to David’s rescue. She sat with a slight shake to remove the last of the sleep from her head. “Jordan, Landerly ordered it.”

 

David wanted to grin, but schooled his features the way he always did. Better to give away nothing. It hadn’t been any great importance to him. But David knew himself well enough to know that he was a Carter through and through. And if the challenge was issued it was always answered. And as his father had said, it had damned well better be won, too.

 

Abellard had thrown down the gauntlet. And in David’s mind that meant it was just a matter of time before Jillian was his.

 

He watched while Jillian did his work for him and he bottled the pleasure at it.

 

“What do you mean Landerly ordered it?”

 

She sighed, leaning out to Jordan. But bless him, Abellard wasn’t having it. “When we were in Nevada, all the wardens and officers walked right into the reversal and fell under. But not us. We had been in for longer than any of them and had no effects. We’re fairly certain that we’re immune.”

 

“You’re what?”

 

Jillian shook her head again, but continued, while David sat back and enjoyed watching the distance between them grow. “Immune.”

 

Abellard’s eyes narrowed and Jillian warily slid back at the menace. “You’re willing to risk your lives because you did it once before and were okay?!?”

 

She was on her heels by now, too, and fighting back.

 

That’s it Jillian, give him hell.

 

“No, I’m not. But we have to stop this or we’ll all die from it. Landerly ordered it. And I have to admit that I don’t know what else to do.”

 

Jordan raked and hand through his hair, thinking hard and fast for a few seconds. “Then I’m going, too.

 

Whatever immunity you got, it’s likely I got it, too. It’s probably because of the way we’ve been exposed to the reversals.”

 

David thought that was a reasonable argument, and was cursing himself for not foreseeing it, when Jillian again solved his problems.

 

“No, you have to stay out here. David and I were together the whole time. We know we got the same exposure. We don’t know that for certain about you.”

 

Abellard’s jaw clenched. David wasn’t even sure if the good Dr. Brookwood noticed. But he sure did. She just kept talking. “We need you out here, in case … in case anything happens.”

 

“What!?” He was on his feet, furious at her and adding distance. Bless the powers that be.

 

“I’m supposed to sit out here and wait by the sidelines in case you slip into a coma and die? While I watch?”

“Jordan-”

 

But he cut her off before she could begin. “Do you know what I did in Minnesota? …” He didn’t wait long enough, just barreled ahead, “I watched every last member of my family go under. And I’m supposed to sit here and watch you purposefully throw yourself into it? No way in hell!”

 

With an angry snap of his arms he whipped the pants off the floor, stepping into them and buttoning the fly as he stalked out the door.

 

Jillian’s mouth hung open, but that was okay. David stepped up to fill in the void. “He’ll get over it. He’ll have to. We don’t even know if he can survive going in.”

 

She turned slowly to him. “We don’t know if we can.”

 

“But who else can go?”

 

God, he had never been one to play the hero. But hey, there was always a first time, right? The way he figured it they were all radiated toast anyway. He might as well get the girl before he bit the big one. It wouldn’t matter. If there was a hell it likely already had a parking spot with an engraved nameplate for him.

 

She didn’t answer. So he smiled. “Well, then let’s get ready to go.”

 

Two hours later, they had swallowed a complement of horse pills. And Abellard was still nowhere to be seen. Good.

 

David was in full gear, compasses and magnetic field readers strapped to and stuffed in a toolbelt around his waist. He’d never felt so working-class before. Jillian had cell phones, and paper and pencils, a stethoscope hung around her neck. David wasn’t sure if that was because she thought she might need it, or if it was just as much a part of her as the scrubs. He peeled his eyes away from her and looked out at the town in front of him. It looked enough like any other. But he knew it wasn’t.

 

They stood at the new edge of the reversal, twenty feet closer than it had been last evening. The fuzzy edges were wide and getting wider. They shouldn’t encounter any people in here.

 

Everyone should have been evacuated. And if they did find anyone, well, then, that would be Jillian’s problem.

 

Jillian took deep breaths, as though she were preparing to walk underwater. It was all he could do not to do the same. But his job here was to be a calming rock for her, let her think he was unaffected.

 

“Ready?” He asked it nonchalantly. Or he tried to, not that Jillian even left her mental space to notice.

 

“As I’ll ever be.” She sucked in a lungful of air. “But I’m warning you, I’m not that ready.”

 

He stepped in, waiting, as he always did, for the feeling of getting kicked in the gut. Of having all the air sucked out of him. Or maybe tingling in his fingers. But his stomach didn’t even roll.

 

But he was past the yellow flags, delineating the new boundaries. He was in the wide edge. Without looking back for Jillian he took another few tentative steps, then started walking. Jillian skipped to catch up, like a swimmer who knows that the water is cold and it’s better to just dive right in.

 

She slipped a small street map from the back of her notebook, showing him the highlighted line. He took the page from her and frowned at it. “How far is this?”

 

“About three miles.” He could see her throat work, but resisted the urge to ask if she was okay. “They recalculated the center this morning. The edges keep shifting.”

 

“Hm.” Not really in the mood for conversation, he felt around the things at his waist. The weights hanging from his belt took him back to his digs, back to fist-sized rock chips in tough Ziploc baggies and midnight runs down the grid to see if the idiots had fucked up