The Hot Zone (A Rainshadow Novel Book 3) Read online

  “Trust me, Sedona Snow, you’re not crazy. An off-the-charts talent, probably, but not crazy.”

  He turned and started to walk away into the night.

  “Mr. Jones,” she called softly.

  He stopped again and looked at her over his shoulder. “Cyrus.”

  “Cyrus.” She sounded as if she was test-driving the name, waiting to see if it felt right to her. “What makes you think I’m an off-the-charts talent?”

  “Got a feel for those, too. Lots of them in the Jones family. Our history makes us a little more open-minded when it comes to dealing with unconventional talents, conspiracy theories, and secret labs where strange experiments are conducted. Good night, Sedona Snow.”

  Chapter 5

  He walked back to his cottage through the fog, unclipping his phone as he went through the front door. Marlowe answered on the second ring.

  “Jones and Jones,” Marlowe said. “And for the record, cousin, it’s getting late here in Frequency City.”

  “I found her,” Cyrus said. He shut the door, rezzed the light, and lowered himself onto the sagging sofa. “You were right, Sedona Snow is here on Rainshadow. Whatever happened to her during those three weeks, it was bad. She described a real nightmare experience to me.”

  “Assuming her memories are accurate and not the by-product of a bad psi-burn.”

  “Assuming that, yeah.”

  There was a short, tight silence on the other end of the line.

  “She’s still alive?”

  “Alive and looking quite fit.”

  “It’s been nearly a month now since she surfaced. Maybe she somehow managed to get hold of a fresh supply of the drug.”

  Cyrus thought about his impressions of Sedona. “It’s possible. We don’t know much about the latest version of the formula. It might not show any outward indications at this stage.”

  “But she’s still alive,” Marlowe repeated.

  “And looking damn stable, as far as I can tell.”

  “Any sign that she might be more powerful than she was before she was kidnapped? Any indication that she has acquired additional talents?”

  “No, but give me a break here. I just met her this evening. Somehow asking her if she has become an unstable multi-talent didn’t seem like a good way to introduce myself. She did give me a brief rundown of what happened to her last month when she disappeared for a few weeks.”

  “What’s her story?” Marlowe asked.

  “She claims that she was kidnapped in the Rainforest while on a job for the Gold Creek Guild. She says she was held in a waking dreamstate somewhere in the catacombs where a Dr. Blankenship ran experiments on her.”

  “What kind of experiments?”

  “She didn’t describe them,” Cyrus said. “We haven’t had what you would call an extensive discussion of the subject. She’s a tad anti-Guild at the moment. Thinks Kirk Morgan, the boss of the Gold Creek operation, may have conspired with the kidnappers.”

  “That’s not beyond the realm of possibility,” Marlowe said. “How did she escape?”

  “I don’t have the details on that angle, either. But she did say that Lyle helped her get out of the Underworld.”

  “Lyle?”

  “Lyle is a dust bunny.”

  “Really?” Marlowe’s voice brightened. “She’s got a dust bunny companion?”

  “Yep, just like you.”

  “That could be significant.”

  “Why?”

  “Well,” Marlowe said, “I can’t see a dust bunny bonding with one of the monsters.”

  “That’s because you’ve got your own dust bunny sidekick. Marlowe, dust bunnies are cute and smart and some of them seem to enjoy human companionship, but that doesn’t mean they only bond with the good guys. Lots of bad guys have pet dogs.”

  “Dust bunnies are more particular than dogs.”

  There was no point arguing the subject with Marlowe, Cyrus told himself. His cousin adored her own dust bunny pal, Gibson. Time to get the discussion back on track.

  “About this Dr. Blankenship,” he said.

  “I’m already working on it. I’ll see what I can find.”

  Cyrus heard the clicking of computer keys in the background. He pictured his cousin at home with her new husband, Adam Winters, the powerful CEO of the Frequency City Guild.

  Cyrus got up and went to the window to look out at the view of the graveyard. He was aware of a wistful sensation. Marlowe and Adam were clearly very much in love. The bond between them was so strong, even those around them were aware of it. He knew his own odds of achieving that kind of long-term relationship were very slim, indeed. They called him Dead Zone Jones for a reason.

  “I’ve got one other small piece of information for you,” he said. “Sedona remembers that some of the lab equipment she saw while she was being held was tagged as the property of Amber Crest Para-Psychiatric Hospital.”

  “Amber Crest?”

  There was more rapid clicking followed by a couple of pings.

  “Hmm.” Marlowe sounded thoughtful now. “It’s a psi-burn hospital run by the Gold Creek Guild.”

  “Kirk Morgan’s operation.”

  “Right. Hang on. Nope, no Dr. Blankenship on the staff.”

  “Keep looking,” Cyrus said.

  “Don’t worry, I will. This is the first real break we’ve had since we heard those rumors awhile back. Every other lead has been a dead end.”

  Cyrus was amused by the enthusiasm in Marlowe’s voice. “You’re really into this investigation, aren’t you?”

  “Are you kidding? The possibility that someone has come up with another version of that old Arcane formula is huge. Jones and Jones hasn’t had a case involving the drug in the two hundred years that we’ve been on Harmony. That formula is a legend in the Arcane archives.”

  “Don’t get too excited. The thing about legends is that there are always a lot of lies mixed in with the truth.”

  “That’s what makes them legends. Speaking of which, how’s the monster-hunting going there on Rainshadow?”

  “I haven’t even started. I arrived on the island two hours ago. I haven’t unpacked.”

  “And already you have confirmed that one of Arizona Snow’s many-times great-nieces is there and that she was involved with some folks who sound like they have reformulated the drug. Nice work, cousin.”

  “Gosh, thanks. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to get some sleep.”

  “Lucky you. I’m going to be working all night on these new leads.”

  There was a click as someone else came on the line.

  “No, she is not going to work all night,” Adam Winters said. “We just found out she’s four weeks pregnant. She is going to get the sleep she needs.”

  “Pregnant?” Cyrus said. “Hey, that’s great. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks,” Marlowe said. “We’re excited. Don’t tell anyone else in the family, though, okay? We haven’t made the announcement.”

  “I’m stuck here on Rainshadow,” Cyrus said. “Who am I going to tell? Good night, and let me know as soon as you find anything, Marlowe.”

  “Will do,” Marlowe said. She paused. When she spoke again, her voice gentled. “Don’t worry, Cyrus. You’re going to find the right woman someday.”

  “Tell that to Arcanematch, will you? Congratulations, again, and good night.”

  He ended the connection before Marlowe could offer him any more crumbs of comfort and reassurance. Unlike legends, there were some things in life that were impossible to change. The nature of his talent was one of those things.

  Arcanematch, the society’s exclusive matchmaking agency, didn’t give up on very many clients, but they had given up on him.

  Chapter 6

  Sedona watched through the window until Cyrus disappeared into the
fog and the trees. It didn’t take long. She caught glimpses of the beam of his flashlight for another moment or two and then he was gone.

  She turned away from the window and went to the small kitchenette. Opening a cupboard, she took down the bottle of brandy that she kept there. For medicinal purposes only. Tonight she definitely needed a little medication.

  She splashed some of the brandy into a glass and de-rezzed the living room lamp. The little night-light that she had installed the day she moved into the cottage automatically came on, casting a pale glow that illuminated the entrance to the hallway. She sank down into the big, overstuffed reading chair and propped her feet on the hassock.

  Nights were very dark on Rainshadow. The heavy presence of the densely forested Preserve, which occupied most of the island, cast a long shadow. That shadow was most intense after dark. It was a fact of paranormal physics that psi-energy of all types was strongest in the absence of sunlight. It wasn’t a supernatural thing, simply one of the immutable laws of nature. Sunlight and other forms of normal light interfered with the energy from the paranormal end of the spectrum.

  She sat in the deep shadows of the living room for a while, thinking about Cyrus Jones. Mostly she wondered if he was telling her the truth when he said he didn’t think that she was a whacko. There was no reason to trust a Guild boss—every reason not to trust one—but she had the sense that he believed that she was stable.

  Then again, it would be really dumb to try to second-guess a Guild boss’s strategy. They were by nature inclined to be extremely secretive. In her experience, the powerful men who ran the Guilds were also dangerous. Traditionally, they controlled their various territories with a degree of ruthlessness that would have done credit to the leaders of organized crime syndicates.

  Some of the Guild CEOs were more notorious than others. It was true that the Chamber was under new management. It claimed to be determined to clean up the reputations of the organizations it oversaw. But old habits die hard. Most of the high-ranking Guild men she had met protected their privileges, perks, and powers with all the money and manpower at their command. There were a few women in the Guilds but they tended to be in the rank and file. They were rarely promoted into the higher echelons.

  The vast majority of ghost hunters at every level of the organizations were male. The reason was simple. One of the greatest hazards down in the tunnels were the so-called ghosts—unpredictable manifestations of highly unstable dissonance energy. The talent required to control that kind of energy was linked to testosterone. Ergo, most ghost hunters were male.

  But other sorts of talents were needed on the tunnel teams, as well—her kind of talent, for example. Maybe Cyrus Jones really did want to get on her good side because of the possibility that he might require her services in the Rainshadow catacombs. Still, there were other high-rez gatekeepers. He could have brought one of them along with him to the island. But he hadn’t brought one because he had known that she was here and presumably available.

  Coincidence? I think not.

  Never trust a Guild boss, she reminded herself. Nevertheless, the thought of working underground again stirred her senses. It also raised some unsettling questions. Why would Jones be so willing to risk the safety of a team by employing a gatekeeper who might be unstable?

  Even as she asked herself the question, the answer whispered through her thoughts. Jones knew something about the Disaster—maybe something that she did not know. Maybe she was the real reason he was on the island.

  Watch it, she thought. You’re becoming as paranoid as the other residents of Rainshadow. Then again, paranoia had some definite survival value. She had taken a risk telling Jones about the file that she had set to release to the media in the event anything happened to her. But it was all she had in the way of a threat.

  She drank some more of the brandy and forced herself to confront the very real possibility that Jones was on the island because he wanted to use her in ways she could not yet fathom.

  If that was the case, it probably made sense to play along, at least for a while. Maybe Jones had answers to some of the questions that had haunted her since the Disaster. But what would be the price she would have to pay to get them? Guild bosses were not known for their compassionate and understanding natures. One thing you could depend on when it came to a Guild exec—he had his own agenda.

  She had to hand it to him; he had certainly known what he was doing when he had offered her the prospect of going back down into the tunnels. Everyone who worked the Underworld knew how addictive the catacombs could be. The stronger the talent, regardless of the nature of that talent, the stronger the rush. There was nothing else like it—except going into the Preserve. But the forbidden area of the island inside the high-tech security fence was off-limits unless you were lucky enough to accompany one of the Foundation-sanctioned research teams.

  The Underworld was the undisputed territory of the Guilds, however, and they took their right to police the Alien tunnels very seriously. Not that they actually had any legal rights to the vast network of glowing green tunnels. But tradition was a powerful thing on Harmony—probably because humans had only been on the planet for a couple of centuries. Two hundred years ago traditions of all kinds had taken on new meaning to a bunch of stranded colonists who had found themselves cut off from their home world. The First Generation had established a lot of traditions and their descendants were stuck with them.

  Take marriage and family, for instance, Sedona thought glumly. She rolled the brandy glass between her palms. Now, there the colonists had outdone themselves with traditions—traditions they had locked down with mag-steel laws that were only now starting to loosen ever so slightly.

  Why in the world was she thinking about the marriage laws tonight? Marriage was the last subject she wanted to contemplate. Her track record in the romance department had been deplorable even before she had metamorphosed into some kind of weird multi-talent. In a culture where family was everything, a person who could not claim strong clan relationships was something of an outcast. In theory, those born of an illicit union were not supposed to pay for the sins of their parents, but the reality was that a bastard faced a very difficult time socially, and that went double when it came to finding a lifetime marriage partner.

  And now, of course, she wouldn’t dare register with a matchmaker. If being a bastard was a problem when it came to finding a match, being an unstable multi-talent bastard made for impossible odds. She would likely find herself hauled off to a para-rez psych hospital as soon as she completed the questionnaire.

  Her phone rang. She picked it up and glanced at the screen. FENWICK NASH REED. She’d lost count of the calls she’d had from the law firm. Her grandfather’s lawyers did not give up easily, she reflected. Then again, they were well-paid to follow Robert Snow’s orders. She disconnected the call without answering and put the phone down on the end table.

  She finished the brandy, got to her feet, and went back into the tiny kitchen where she rinsed out the glass and set it on the counter.

  When she crossed the living room and looked out the windows she saw that the mist had blanketed the entire town of Shadow Bay now. Even the lights of the Halloween lanterns and the Haunted Alien Catacombs attraction near the marina had been swallowed up by the dense fog.

  She walked into the short hallway that led to her bedroom, reaching out to rez the light switch.

  The light did not come on. She made a note to install a new bulb in the fixture first thing in the morning.

  She felt her way into the bedroom doorway and groped around the edge of the door for the light switch. She found it and rezzed it. Nothing happened.

  Just her luck that both bulbs had failed at the same time. What were the odds?

  The damned wind chimes clashed, loud and discordant.

  She felt a small object under the carpet.

  “What in the world?”

&
nbsp; Her first thought was that Lyle had hidden one of his toys under the small rug. She bent down, intending to lift one corner to retrieve the object.

  Dark energy feathered her senses.

  “Crap.”

  Instinctively she backed away toward the living room, her talent flaring wildly. But by then it was too late. Currents of cold, heavy dreamlight energy exploded in the atmosphere, plunging her into a nightmare.

  Terrible images of formless horrors materialized around her. Ghostly, nerve-shattering voices called to her.

  She tried to retreat but she was off-balance and already badly disoriented. Strange images from a landscape lit with a freakish, psi-green radiance swirled around her, trapping her.

  The dangerous dreamlight worked rapidly. Hallucinations seethed in the shadows. She tripped, staggered, and nearly went down. At the last instant she managed to flatten one hand on the wall to steady herself.

  She knew that the only reason she was not already unconscious was because of her powerful talent. But it could not protect her for long. At least, she thought, her old talent could not hold out against the trap energy.

  Frantically she groped for the flicker. It took a huge amount of concentration just to get it out of her shirt pocket. But at last she had it clutched in one hand. She rezzed it with a desperation she had not experienced since the night she escaped from the lab.

  A paranormal firestorm erupted in the hallway, forming a protective circle of energy around her. The dream images receded. Then she smelled smoke and realized that some of the fire energy in the atmosphere was coming from the normal end of the spectrum. In another second or two she would set fire to the cottage.

  She pulled hard on her talent, dampening the flames from the normal end while the paranormal circle of fire continued to burn around her. She did not know what to expect. Most people discovered the nature of their paranormal senses more or less by accident when they first came into them. Until you knew what you could do, you couldn’t do it very well.