Play dead

ONE HUNDRED SIX

6:10 AM

It was a familiar voice, but one she couldn't quite place. WAs IT her father? Her brother Michael? It seemed to be filtered through a thick wad of wet cotton, like someone trying to shout through a mattress. For the moment she was underwater at Wildwood, her father yelling at her from the beach to watch out for the undertow.

But it couldn't be the beach. Something was burning. She had to "Jessica. You okay?"

Jessica slowly opened her eyes. It was Kevin Byrne. The world came swirling back. She nodded, even though she did not know the answer to this question.

"Can you talk?" he asked.

Another stumper. Jessica nodded.

"Who's inside the house?" Byrne asked.

Between gulps of oxygen. "An old man," she said. "A girl."

"What about our guy? What about the Collector?"

Jessica shrugged. Bright bolts of pain shot through her shoulders, her collarbone. She recalled falling from the window, falling. She didn't remember hitting the ground. "I don't know. I think they're all dead." She looked down the length of her body. "Broken?"

Byrne glanced at the paramedic, back. "They don't know. They don't think so. Your fall was broken by the hedges behind the house." Byrne patted her hand.

Jessica heard the sirens approaching. Moments later she saw the first ladder company arrive. She breathed more easily. Taking off the mask-over the objections of the paramedic-she slowly sat up. Byrne and Josh Bontrager helped.

"Tell me about Logan Circle," she said.

Byrne shook his head. "You don't want to know."

Jessica tried to smile. It hurt her face. "It's kinda my job."

Jessica got unsteadily to her feet. Even from across the road, the heat was intense. Faerwood was an inferno, flames shooting fifty feet or more into the sky. Somehow, Josh Bontrager found a cold bottle of spring water. Jessica drank half of it, poured the other half over the back of her neck.

Before she could make her way to the EMS van, she caught a shadow to her left; someone walking up the middle of the smoke-hazed street. Jessica was too shaken, too exhausted to react. It was a good thing she was surrounded by what seemed like the entire police department.

As the figure got closer Jessica saw it was Graciella. Her gown was covered with soot and ash, as was her face, but she was fine.

Kevin Byrne turned and saw the girl. Jessica watched the reaction on his face. It was the same reaction she'd had when she saw the girl in the hallway mirror. Graciella looked exactly like her mother, exactly like a young Eve Galvez. Byrne was speechless.

Graciella walked right up to Byrne. "You must be Kevin. My mom mentioned you." She stuck out her hand. It was bleeding.

Byrne gently took her hand in his. Sticking out of the young woman's palm were small shards of glass. The smell of a strong chemical filled the air.

"My name is Graciella," the girl added. At that moment the girl's legs gave out. Byrne caught her before she hit the ground. She looked up at him in a daze. "I think I need to lay down."