Blood Pact

further, he stood, reluctantly releasing her hand.

    Tap. Tap. Tap.

    Very lightly, he brushed his fingertips across her hair then turned.

    Celluci met him at the door. Together, they glanced back at the couch. Vicki had removed the shades from both end-table lamps and, in the harsh light, the area around her mouth and eyes looked both bruised and painfully tight.

    "Don't leave her alone," Henry murmured, and left before the detective could decide on a reply.

    The sound of the pencil tapping followed him out of the building.

    * * *
    The door almost stopped her; the latching mechanism was almost beyond her abilities. The line of stitches just above the hairline gaped as her brows drew in and she forced her fingers to push and pull and prod until finally the door swung open.

    There was something she had to do. Perhaps it was on the other side of the door.

    Most of the overhead lights were off and she shuffled along from shadow to shadow. She was going somewhere. The halls began to look familiar.

    She passed through another doorway and then into a room so well known that, for an instant, chaos parted and she knew.

    I am . . .

    Then the maelstrom swept most of it up again and she was left with only scattered fragments. For a single beat of her mechanically enhanced heart, she was aware of what she'd lost. Her wail of protest throbbed against the walls, but even before the last echo died, she'd forgotten she'd ever made it.

    She crossed the room to a pair of desks, pulled one of the chairs out, and sat. It felt right. No, not quite right. Frowning, she carefully moved the World's Greatest Mother coffee mug from the center of the blotter over to the far right side. It always sat on the right side.

    Something was still wrong. After a moment of almost thought, she scrabbled at a silvery frame lying facedown, finally managing to grab hold and lift it. With trembling fingers, she gently touched the face of the uniformed young woman whose photograph filled the frame. Then she stood.

    There was something she had to do.

    She shouldn't be here.

    She had to go home.

    He didn't know where the other one was, so he walked, following the path of least resistance, until he bumped up against a tiny square of reinforced glass that showed him the stars.

    Outside.

    He remembered outside.

    Face pressed to the glass, eyes on the stars, he pushed at the barrier, sneakers pedaling against the tile floor. More by luck than design, his hands clutched at the waist-high metal bar. Another push, and the fire door swung open.

    The alarm drove the stars from his head. He moved away from the hurting as fast as he was able, onto the dark and quiet pathways that ran between and behind the university buildings. He would find her. Find the kind one. She would make it better.

    "Now, then, don't you feel better?”

    "I suppose so.”

    "You suppose so?" Donald sighed and shook his head. "The best pizza in Kingston, not to mention my congenial company, and you'd probably rather have stayed in the lab, munching on a stale sandwich, if you'd remembered to eat at all, exchanging wisecracks with the dead stooges.”

    "Did you leave the door open?”

    "Did I what?" He peered down the dimly lit hall at the door angled out into the corridor. "You sure that's ours?”

    "Of course, I'm sure.”

    "Well, I closed it when we left and I heard the lock catch.”

    Catherine broke into a run. "If something's happened to them, I'll never forgive myself.”

    Donald followed considerably more slowly, half inclined to bolt. Although Security kept an eye on entrances and exits, they didn't bother to patrol the interior. The old Life Sciences building was a rabbit warren of halls and passageways and strangely subdivided rooms and, had the university budget extended to demolition, it would have long ago been turned into a much more useful three-story parking garage. While Donald had occasionally wondered if they were the only clandestine lab operating, he'd never been worried about discovery.

    Except that he knew he'd closed the door.

    And Dr. Burke, who carried the only other set of keys, would never leave it open.

    So it appeared they'd been discovered.

    The question is, he mused, bouncing on the balls of his feet, uncertain whether he should go forward or back, have we advanced far enough that the end will justify the means in the eyes of the authorities? Numbers one through nine, after all, had been bodies donated for research purposes.