"Which is what? I still don"t understand."
"No, of course not."
The moment he had experienced the deja vu that had convinced him that he had been in this house before, he had made the decision to let this play out. These vague, amnesia-stifled memories he was experiencing were really very strange, and, if they were true, then he was potentially looking at a whole hidden life, and he had no intention of not exploring it.
"I need to know more. A lot more. Are there any records of what we studied in the cla.s.s? Video? Even just a syllabus. What did we study?"
"I need to leave."
"Oh, wonderful! Leave me with an insoluble mystery and an inst.i.tution to run during the worst social collapse since the fall of the Roman Empire."
"Your memories will come back to you."
"And if they don"t?"
"Oh, they must! Young man, you see the stakes. They must must!"
A moment later, she was heading toward the door of the office. He was appalled.
"What about Dr. Ullman? Was the fire really an accident? Am I in danger?"
For a long moment, she was silent. Then she said, "David, we don"t know. Maybe it was a fire set by resentful townies. Could be. Or it could be something worse."
"I need to know more!"
"You have your security force and Glen MacNamara is very, very good at what he does. Start there."
As she spoke, she hurried away across the large room.
"Wait! The fingerprint reader? How do I get programmed into it?"
"You"re already in it."
"n.o.body took my fingerprints."
"Of course they did-in cla.s.s. Your fingerprints, your DNA, we have it all."
She neither spoke again, nor wished him well, smiled-any of it. She simply went stalking off down the hall.
Her hidden timeline was strict, clearly.
"Mrs. Denman, wait! I need help! I need my questions answered!"
Her footsteps sounded on the stairs, quick, clattering away into the silence of the house.
As he heard the enormous car start up outside, he ran down the stairs, but by the time he reached the front of the building, she was already well down the driveway.
He yanked his cell phone out of his pocket and jammed her number in-and got nothing. The d.a.m.n phone was deader than dead. He glanced up at the spotted, angry sun and threw it down onto the elegant brick driveway.
A moment later, there was a flash, followed at once by a sound so loud that it was like a body blow from a wrecking ball, an enormous, thundering roar.
He had never been close to a large explosion, and so did not know the effects and did not immediately understand what was happening. Then he did.
Shocked, disbelieving, he watched the smoke rising. She had been right and more than right. This place had enemies, and so did he. And he felt sure that they had just taken from him his most important ally.
From behind him, a siren began to wail. No police came, though, no fire department, no EMS. The siren was the clinic"s alert system, and it would be the only siren, because the Acton Clinic was alone. And he was alone, and they were all alone.
Not their enemies, though, hidden, aggressive, and lethally effective. Obviously, they were not alone.
2.
THE ENEMY.
In the disoriented silence that followed, a fireball erupted above the wall from the other side, then disappeared into the roiling pillar of black smoke. The car"s gas tank had exploded, ending any thought that its armor might somehow have protected the occupants.
Two white Jeeps came bounding down the driveway, with discreet ACTON SECURITY ACTON SECURITY signs on their doors. They raced through the gate. signs on their doors. They raced through the gate.
Finally absorbing the reality of the situation, David began running behind them. At once, though, powerful arms stopped him. He struggled but he could not escape from hands like great stones.
"You can"t help her now."
Then another man ran past them, a tall man in an improbably elegant green crushed-silk suit.
"Mack, stop," the man holding David shouted. "STOP THERE!" Then, more softly, "s.h.i.t!"
A small fire truck left the gate, and a moment later white steam began rising, and the sound of water hissing from its pump.
The man holding him released his grip. "I"m Glen MacNamara," he said as David turned around. David was startled by a sense of recognition. He"d seen Glen before. His voice, even, contained an echo of familiarity.
"I"m David Ford."
The patient called Mack came back with his minder, who was introduced by MacNamara as Sam Taylor.
"I"m sorry I manhandled you like that, Doctor," Glen said between breaths. He was pale, his eyes shocked. He looked to Taylor, who shook his head. No survivors.
"The car-you mean Mrs. Denman"s car? That"s what blew up?"
All three men, Sam, Glen MacNamara, and the patient, looked at him with careful eyes.
"It was a bomb," Mack said.
Aubrey Denman had certainly been right that there was a security problem, but this was far, far worse even than her warning had suggested.
"They"ve been killed," he said faintly, trying to grasp the catastrophe, trying to understand. But he could not understand, could not even begin to. "Why? An old lady like that? Why? Why?"
"Doctor," Glen MacNamara said, "I"d feel a lot better if we could go inside."
Two security guards went toward the gate carrying freshly opened body bags.
"Don"t bag them until I"ve inspected," Glen said. "I"ll be back shortly."
Glen insisted on accompanying him to the house.
"I need to get in touch with the rest of the board," David said.
"You"d best ask Katie Starnes about that."
The tone of Glen"s voice, his choice of words, brought more recognition. Normally, he would have simply asked him outright if he"d been in the cla.s.s, but he wasn"t about to do that now.
"Glen, you look familiar. Have we met before?"
Glen stared back, his eyes steady.
"We have, haven"t we?"
He did not say no.
"And you remember, and thank G.o.d. What else do you remember?"
Glen grabbed his shoulder so hard he stopped talking immediately.
"Never speak about it," he said.
"No, obviously not directly."
"Not at all."
As they walked, Glen took something from his pocket, then slipped it into David"s hand. David felt a small capsule.
"If you"re captured, bite down on it and breathe deeply. It takes ten seconds. No pain."
"But-"
"Do it without fail."
He jammed the thing down into his pocket, and then they were through the main door and immediately confronting a silent, frightened crowd.
Staffers, patients, workers-the whole front half of the house was filled with people. A couple of security men kept them back.
David realized that he was going to have to make an introduction of himself here and now. No waiting on this.
He raised his voice. "Obviously a tragedy," he said. He found himself clutching the cyanide capsule, as if it represented rescue, or needed protection. Then, afraid that it might open, he took his hand out of his pocket.
A sea of faces, eyes wide, silent, looked back at him. Here and there, somebody exhibited inappropriate behavior, grinning, bobbing their head, dancing to some inner music.
But these people weren"t really crazy, at least not all of them. Induced psychosis as a means of concealment. And now what was he to do?
"I"m Dr. Ford. David Ford. I"m your new chief psychiatrist. I-we-we-" But what did he say? "The security team will handle this," he finally blurted out. "Mr. MacNamara-here-here he is."
Now, there was a great speech. Very dynamic and take-charge. Idiotic.
"Thank you, Dr. Ford. We"ve informed the Raleigh County Sheriff"s Office," he told them. "Right now, we"re a.s.suming that criminal activity was involved." He drew himself up. "There will be an investigation. The perpetrator will be found."
"Was it one of us?" a voice called.
"There will be an investigation. That"s all. Thank you."
David said, "Attendants, please accompany the patients back to routine. Back to routine, please."
He went slowly up the grand staircase, into the fabulous painted sky, with its birds and its heavenly clouds.
I made believe I could hear those birds sing.
He had never felt this alone. He had not known that such a feeling-like falling and being buried alive at the same time-was possible.
He entered his office, filling now with evening shadows, as silent as death.
There was one h.e.l.l h.e.l.l of a security problem here, and Jesus, he had to be a prime target. That other guy-Ullman-had been burned to death. of a security problem here, and Jesus, he had to be a prime target. That other guy-Ullman-had been burned to death. Burned. Burned.
His stomach was sharp with acid, his mind racing. He needed a gun, he needed a bodyguard, but how to tell who was reliable?
Then he realized that somebody was in the room. He turned. A lovely young woman had entered and was standing in the doorway, silently watching him.
"h.e.l.lo."
"I"m Katie Starnes."
That was to be their only introduction.
"Miss Starnes, I want a list of all the other members of the board. And I want us to start trying to get in touch with them immediately."
She stared at him.
"Please!"
"Dr. Ford, there are no other members of the board. Mrs. Denman-she"s the board."
"That"s impossible!"
"I"m sorry."
"Then get hold of her secretary, her accountant, whoever you can locate. I need to talk to anyone I can!"