Infected (24 page)

Joe maneuvered his considerable bulk out of the car and
waited for Tanner to follow. Tanner got out and came directly to Carina, putting his arms around her.

“Hey,” Baxter said, but Tanner ignored him, holding Carina close.

“Are you really okay?” Carina whispered, inhaling his scent and pressing her face into his neck.

“Yeah, I feel almost normal. Still a little amped up, like I’ve had five cups of coffee. Nothing worse than that. I bet I’m in for a hell of a crash, though.”

Carina winced at his word choice. She wished she could communicate her plan to him—but she couldn’t say anything in front of Joe or Baxter.

“What about you?” he murmured.

“Fine,” Carina lied as firmly as she could, gritting her teeth and tensing her muscles so that Tanner wouldn’t feel the trembling and tics, and forced a smile.

Baxter gave Tanner a disgusted shove. “Enough of that. Joe, help our friend here pay attention.”

Joe put his hands under Tanner’s arms, picking him off the ground as though he weighed no more than a bouquet of flowers. Tanner’s feet dangled but he didn’t react, didn’t say anything, and after a second Joe let him drop. Just proving a point.

“You first,” Baxter told Carina, pointing to the fire escape. “Then Joe. I’ll climb up behind Tanner. You won’t give me any trouble, will you, buddy?”

Tanner didn’t answer, even though Baxter had his gun out. Not taking any chances, even though Tanner was no longer infected.

Smart move, Carina thought; she wouldn’t count Tanner out.

She led the way to the fire escape, her heart racing in a ragged rhythm. Sawhorses and caution signs had been set up around the bottom. Joe picked them up like toothpicks and tossed them out of the way.

“Up you go,” Baxter said.

Carina put her hand on the lowest rung, the metal cold and rough in her grip, and turned to look at the others. If she were alone, she’d have risked making a dash for it—her supercharged body could have easily tackled the climb in record time. She’d bet she would have had a fifty-fifty chance that Baxter could take aim and hit her before she got to the roof, and if she’d managed to get a head start she could probably have beaten Joe too. He was bigger than her, but that might actually have worked against him, all other things being equal, once they were on the flat ground of the roof. Carina would have sprinted like hell, and she just might have been able to outrun him.

But with Tanner on the ground, she couldn’t even consider bolting. Not when Baxter might shoot him out of spite as quickly as he would for cause.

Carina climbed slowly. She felt the structure shudder when Joe pulled himself onto the bottom rungs; moments later it did so two more times when Tanner and Baxter started to climb.

Joe stayed within inches of her, silent except for the clanging of his hands and feet on the metal rungs. Behind him, she could hear Tanner’s and Baxter’s breathing as they
ascended with less precision and efficiency. With her heightened senses, Carina was conscious of the stark differences between those like her and ordinary, uninfected humans. To her acute hearing, the breathing of even fit men like Tanner and Baxter sounded labored.

She reached the top and pulled herself up and over the low wall at the edge. Her foot slipped when it hit the roof, trembling so badly that it had buckled on impact. Her body was beginning to deteriorate. Carina swallowed down her panic; if she couldn’t depend on her reactions, how could she carry out her plan?

She took a couple more steps and waited. Joe, cresting the edge, looked unruffled. His footsteps were sure, his motions perfectly economical. He’d probably received his injection right before climbing into the trunk of the car; he couldn’t have been infected for more than a few hours.

Joe stared directly into her eyes. His expression betrayed no emotion at all.

“You proud of yourself, picking on kids?” Carina asked. She knew she ought to keep her mouth shut, that nothing she said could help in this situation. “How much did he have to pay you, anyway? And why are you so sure he’s going to take care of you afterward? That he’s going to give you the antidote?”

The man just stared at her, hands hanging loosely at his sides. Over the side of the building, she heard Tanner and Baxter approaching the top of the ladder, their labored breathing punctuated by grunts of effort. They’d made the climb quickly—much more quickly than she and Tanner had
a few nights ago, when it felt like they had all the time in the world—and they would be winded when they reached the top.

Good.

“You know what happens, don’t you, if you don’t get the antidote?” she demanded. Joe lifted one thick eyebrow and regarded her curiously.

“Qepe gojën.”

Carina gasped. The man was foreign. Albanian, she’d bet. He hadn’t been following Baxter’s commands at all, but rather directions he’d been given before coming on this mission.
Don’t let the girl escape
, no doubt—and probably
Kill anyone who interferes
. Simple, really, when it came down to it.

What had happened since she and Tanner had left one Albanian in a pool of his own blood and the other choking in a drainage pipe? Clearly, allegiances had shifted. A deal had been brokered. Baxter was full of surprises: somehow, in the space of hours, he’d convinced the Albanians not to kill Carina and gotten an extension on the exchange timetable—and they’d thrown in a strongman to sweeten the deal.

Tanner came over the edge, panting. He looked exhausted, deep purple pockets under his eyes, his skin pale
and sheened with perspiration. No wonder: he hadn’t slept, and he’d been putting his body through exertions that—chemically enhanced or otherwise—would take time to recover from.

But he smiled. The minute he saw that she was unhurt, he smiled as though nothing was wrong. He reached for her hand and squeezed, and when Joe shoved him hard enough that he stumbled against the parapet, the smile still never left his face.

Baxter was another story, scowling with annoyance when he finally came up on the roof. Getting shown up by a girl, perhaps, or having to keep Tanner alive long enough to get what he wanted from Carina, was wearing on his nerves. Whatever the case, he didn’t look happy.

“Okay,” he said, breathing hard. “So where is it?”

This was it—the moment of truth. If Carina pulled this off, Tanner was safe. If not … well, there simply couldn’t be an
if not
.

“This way,” Carina said. “Around here.”

She led them toward the cluster of HVAC equipment near the center of the roof, all enclosed in a boxy, painted metal structure. It was only a few yards away from the door leading into the stairwell at the top of the building, the one that promised escape for Tanner. Thankfully, lodged in the space between door and frame was the same crusty paint can that had been there the other day.

Carina moved slowly, making sure the rest of the little group was keeping pace. Joe was shadowing her so tightly that she wouldn’t be able to get away with anything. Once
she started fumbling around among the curved pipes that made up the HVAC exhaust system, she’d have little time; it would soon become obvious that she’d been lying.
I can’t imagine what happened to it
, she’d say.
It was here two days ago, I swear
. Sure. That might get her a few extra minutes. But the end was inevitable: the minute Tanner made it inside the building and locked the door, she was finished. She wouldn’t even risk a last look in his direction; she’d race straight to the edge.

Over. Down. Dead.

And the virus would finally be finished. If Tanner made it out, he would call the major, the investigation would be launched, the lab shut down; and if the Albanian connection somehow escaped notice, it hardly mattered. Baxter was right about one thing: evil would continue to exist in the world no matter what happened today.

They arrived at the HVAC unit. Carina laid a hand on the side, feeling the warmth of the sun on the metal. She looked at Tanner, who was lagging back just as he needed to. Good—so he understood. She stared pointedly into his eyes and then at the propped-open door, then down at the metal assemblage, making her meaning clear: when she started searching for the item that wasn’t there, Baxter’s attention would be diverted, and Tanner could run for the door. He only had to cross a distance of about five yards, and the second he was behind the door—reinforced metal, with a heavy dead bolt—he was safe. Baxter wouldn’t be able to shoot through it, at least not in time to catch him, even if he was a normal teenager now. Baxter wouldn’t send
Joe after him until she was disposed of, so all Tanner had to do was race down four flights of stairs and out any exit. That would set off the building alarms, so with any luck at all, the police would arrive in time to find Baxter and Joe before they could make it off the roof.

And Carina’s body, broken and bleeding on the ground below. But there was no point to thinking about that.

She knelt. “Well, let’s see, I put it behind one of these vertical pipes,” Carina said, making a show of sliding her hands behind the filthy metal pieces.
Now
, she willed Tanner.
Go
. He edged carefully back from Baxter—good.

But he wasn’t moving toward the door.

Carina’s heart seized with horror as she saw that he was moving toward a stack of construction debris near the edge of the HVAC enclosure. What was he doing? There wasn’t any way to get down on that side, no ladder, no door.

“Maybe it was over here,” Carina mumbled, running her hands into each recessed space between the bars, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. She had only seconds before they realized there was nothing here, that she had led them on a wild-goose chase.

Tanner took off, sprinting the last few feet to the pile of lumber and rusting metal. Joe pivoted instantly at the sound of footsteps, responding with virus-heightened instinct. As Tanner crouched down in front of it he yelled, “
Run
, Car!” at the top of his lungs. Baxter yowled with frustration as he tried to find a shot, but Tanner had taken cover just in time.

Carina stood, tearing her eyes away from Tanner. For one second her gaze locked on Joe’s. His eyes were clear,
intent, and bright; his neutral expression had given way to the slightest smirk.

Try me
, it said.

Carina ran.

She focused all the skittering energy that pulsed through her veins and synapses and nerves. She imagined them as strands dancing and jerking with life, and in her mind she drew them all together to make one strong cord, knitting the virus’s powerful side effects into a single rope of pure strength and determination. By pushing herself as hard as she could, she managed to stop the spasming and twitching in her muscles. She knew she couldn’t sustain her pace for long, but she only needed a few seconds more.

Her takeoff was flawless, and each step landed exactly where it needed to. Her arms pumped at her side. Her hair streamed in the wind, the unfamiliar sensation of her shorn strands fluttering against her neck. She had a lead of a few yards on Joe, and she suspected he could close that gap, given his greater musculature and the fact that he was earlier in the infection’s course. But she had a fighting chance.

Because when she reached the edge of the roof, she was going to jump. The space between the main building and the auditorium was about five yards, a little less than the women’s long-jump record. It didn’t really matter, of course, whether Carina landed the jump or not; she was still as good as dead, but getting to the other roof might buy her a few more minutes that she could use to find out what happened to Tanner. Because now it was him against Baxter, and even though Baxter had a gun, she figured it
was an even fight. Tanner might not be armed, and he was exhausted, but he had a few things Baxter didn’t: heart, and courage—and love.

The edge. The parapet rose up three feet, its surface slick with tar and bird droppings. The top was curved and would not provide good purchase, but she needed to anchor on it nonetheless for her leap. She could hear her coach’s voice in her mind:
The greater the speed at takeoff, the longer the trajectory of the center of mass.…

She hurtled forward, her feet striking the ground in perfectly spaced strides. She pushed off and hit the top of the wall with her right foot, imagining every winning approach and every record-breaking jump she’d ever landed.

And then she was airborne.

As she passed over the space below, time stretched and somehow made room for a stream of memories: arriving at the doors of the high school on the first day of freshman year, her new backpack still stiff and stuffed with supplies and books, her hair soft and shiny from an hour with the blow dryer, wishing she could both disappear and be noticed. Eating lunch with Nikki and Emma under the sycamore tree during their sophomore year. Surrounded by kids the day she came back to school after Madelyn’s funeral in her junior year, the center of a hug that seemed to encompass a hundred students. Hanging out on the benches near the entrance after school the Monday after she met Tanner last fall, telling Nikki and Emma about the amazing boy from the climbing gym.