Mindsurge (Mindspeak Book 3) (30 page)

“You heard him?”

“Yeah.”

I watched Jack’s breathing even out, become almost peaceful. I faced Kyle. “I love him more than I ever thought possible.”

“I know.”

“If he dies…”

Kyle rested his elbows on his knees, bowed his head. He had to be thinking of Dani.

I walked over and added a blanket on top of Jack and tucked it in around him. I brushed my fingers along his forehead and trailed it down along his cheekbone. “I’m going to destroy that woman,” I whispered. I turned to Kyle. “You in or out? And don’t say in unless you’re
all
in.”

“I’m in,” he said without hesitation.

I nodded.

Jack moaned in his sleep. I sat down on the bed beside him and picked up his hand. “I’m sorry, Jack. But you’re wrong. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I let Sandra get away with killing the last person I’ll ever love.”

Beautiful azure skies welcomed us on our second day in tropical paradise. As I looked out over the vast open water, my hand kept feeling for the starfish that usually hung around my neck—my last gift from my father.

It had been there last night. But when I awoke that morning, it was missing. I’d searched my bunk for it, ripped off all the sheets, but it wasn’t there. I wondered if losing it was some kind of sign.

If it was, it wasn’t good.

I blinked back the coating of moisture in my eyes. I had bigger things to worry about now. Hopefully the necklace would turn up. And I couldn’t wear it where I was going anyway.

To my left, Briana was sunning in an oversized lounge chair on the deck as if we were just a group of tourists out for a private cruise. Coach, Seth, and Alyson sat at a nearby table, and by the way they hugged their coffee mugs, it looked like it had been a late night for them. Their occasional glances in my direction told me they were discussing my life without me. Typical.

“Bree,” I whispered.

She raised a hand and shielded her eyes from the harsh early morning sun. “Well, well, well. If it isn’t Little Miss Trust Fund Baby herself.”

“Cut the crap.” I glanced over my shoulder to make sure no one was listening. “I need your help.”

“With what?”

“I need you to put red streaks in my hair. I need to look exactly like Maya.”

~~~~~

The captain and I stood on the bridge, located on the upper level of the expansive and exotic yacht. A host of crystal clear windows offered a panoramic view of the Pacific Ocean. Below the windows were a multitude of gauges and navigational instruments that would have given a passenger jet cockpit a run for its money. I had requested a personal tour of my high-priced transportation, and the captain had been thrilled to personally play the role of guide.

“Can you show me on a map exactly where we are?” I asked, hoping to disguise my simple question as common curiosity.

“We’re here.” He pointed to a spot in the middle of the blue, far from any landmass. “That, of course, is Hawaii, where we started. My instructions were to sail toward American Samoa, which is about twenty-six hundred nautical miles from our origin. We should be at about the halfway point by first light tomorrow.”

Palmyra Atoll lay at the halfway point between Hawaii and American Samoa.

We were almost there.

~~~~~

The crew hustled about, setting a table for nine on the deck. We would have dinner under the stars. And afterward, I would allow my mother to insert one of Sandra’s trackers into my neck.

We’d be near Palmyra by morning, and I needed to be ready.

Dressed in jeans and a loose white button-down, sleeves rolled to the elbows, Jack stuffed his hands in his front pockets and stared out toward the ocean. His coloring looked better in the dim light of the lanterns. I circled the deck, admiring the set of his jaw, the lines of his shoulders and how, though sick, he still stood with an air of confidence.

I stayed hidden in the ship’s shadows as I memorized everything about him in that moment. My hands shook at my sides. I couldn’t tell him that tomorrow I would leave him to face Sandra.

I felt the soft touch of a hand on my arm. “Lexi.” Seth pulled me backward into the shadow of a balcony overhead. He looked straight out into the dark depths of the ocean, not making eye contact with me for even a second.

“What is it?”

“I ran blood tests on Jack.”

“Yeah? Did you find anything?”

He rubbed his hand back and forth across his unshaven jaw. Finally, he met my stare. Hope spilled from his eyes, leaving them dull and empty. “Yes. His white blood count is through the roof.”

“What does that mean? Infection of some sort? Can we give him stronger antibiotics?”

“It can mean a huge number of things, but based on how fast his white blood cells are crowding out his red blood cells, his body seems to be acting like a person in the late stages of leukemia.”

“Leukemia? As in cancer? How could Sandra have given Jack cancer?”

“I don’t think he has cancer. I think his body’s been instructed to
act
like it has cancer. Or as if it’s been overtaken by a severe infection. And if we don’t stop the multiplication of these diseased white blood cells, or force his healthy cells to crowd them out, he’ll die.”

My heart constricted, leaving me nearly breathless. “Do you have any ideas?”

“A few, but we aren’t at a hospital, and I’m afraid that even if we were, we would still need a miracle.”

“A miracle,” I repeated. I grabbed onto a railing and looked out across the ocean. There wasn’t a single light anywhere other than from our own boat. Waves and crests of water lapped against the hull, rocking us in a soothing motion. “Or perhaps a clone who has the ability to heal cancer or diseases of the blood.”

“Jonas.”

I whipped around. “What did you say?”

“Jonas is supposed to have that ability.”

“Supposed to? Why didn’t I know this? He never mentioned it.”

“I had been working with him. It’s a tricky power—healing cancer. He hasn’t been successful at it yet.”

“If he can heal such medical catastrophes, does that mean he could also cause them to happen?”

Seth remained silent as I stared at him with eyes that could drill through steel.

“Could he have instructed Maya to do this to Jack?” The same way Ty instructed Jonas to almost drown me?

I took Seth’s continued silence as confirmation. But why would Jonas do this? Sandra had to have forced him, which meant he had been unable to fight her invasion through his tracker. I lightly grazed Seth’s arm before turning to find Jack. Now, more than ever, I had to get to Palmyra.

I padded softly up to Jack and slid my arms around him, resting my chest against his back and my cheek between his shoulder blades. He had lost so much weight so quickly. His hand lifted and caressed my forearm.

You’ve been busy today. I haven’t seen you much.

I swallowed hard, working hard to keep all of my thoughts private.
I’ve been sunning and enjoying all that this floating country club has to offer. Besides, you needed rest.

Jack turned in my arms.
Don’t lie to me, Lexi. I know you’re going to Palmyra despite my begging you not to.
He lifted strands of my hair, revealing the red streaks Briana had helped me with.

Let’s not talk about that right now.
I linked my fingers with his.
Follow me. I’ve got something a little more private planned for us.
I flashed my best attempt at an easy smile.

I led Jack past the others and up the stairs to a higher deck on the bow of the boat. There, a table was set for two. Several lanterns cast a soft, candlelit glow around the table. Soothing music came through several hidden speakers.
 

“Dance with me,” Jack said.

“Of course.” I walked into his arms.
 

He drew my hand in and linked it with his over his heart. We swayed to the sounds of the music and the lapping of water below.

“What a strange world we’re sailing through,” he said. “On one hand, we’re experiencing an adventure aboard the kind of boat most people never even see from a dock. On the other hand, we’re here because we’ve faced terrible loss, the kind I wouldn’t wish on many of our worst enemies.”

I chuckled at his wording. “Yeah, we might wish the pain of loss on
some
of our enemies, but we’d be picky about it.”

Jack crooked a finger under my chin and angled my face toward his. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“What are you sorry for?”

“I’m sorry that I’m sick. I’m sorry that I didn’t take you away from Wellington the moment I figured out that we were both part of some giant government cloning project.” He looked up toward the stars then back down at me. Moisture pooled in his eyes until a single tear slid down his cheek. “Most of all, I’m sorry that our time together is going to get cut short.”

“Don’t say that,” I whispered. Tears threatened to fall—tears I had been fighting since the moment Sandra told me Jack would die without her help. I swallowed against an unforgiving lump in my throat. “I’ll fight for you. I’ll fight for us.”

“I know.” He pulled back just enough to reach into his back pocket. He pulled out a small, slender, silver box with a thin ribbon tied into a bow. “A present.”

I tried to smile, but my lips tugged downward. I opened the box to discover three hairpins, each decorated with beautiful red stones. “Rubies?”

“To match your new hair.” He fingered the streaks of bright red hair that extended behind my normal brunette. “But there’s more.” He took a barrette from the box. “Each pin has a rubber coating at the stick end of it. Pull that coating off like this.” He demonstrated by sliding the rubber covering away from the pin and holding it up in front of me.

“And it becomes a needle,” I said softly. “Does it have the paralyzing agent inside?”

“Yes. Enough to take down twenty or so people with each pin. It doesn’t take much.”

Conveniently, I had a ponytail holder on my wrist. I quickly wove my hair into a long side-braid, then, one by one, stuck the pins into the braid. Each had a protective clasp to secure it into my hair.

As I was clipping the third pin into the braid, a horn sounded below. I faced Jack, his eyes wide.

“What was that?” I grabbed Jack’s arm and held tight.

“Sounds like another boat.” He grabbed the silver box.

From below, we heard yelling, followed by a man’s voice through what sounded like a megaphone.

I ran to the side of the boat and leaned over the railing. Sure enough, another boat, one smaller than ours, had pulled up alongside our stern.

“It’s the Coast Guard. We have to go.” I started toward the stairs to the lower deck, but Jack stopped me.

“Wait.” He pulled something else out of the box. Something red.

“A ribbon? Jack, we don’t have time.”

“It’s not just a ribbon.” Any other time it would have been funny that Jack was giving me a silly red ribbon for my hair. “See the wire running through it? It’s a GPS tracker. Turn around.”

I did as he ordered. He inserted the wire through my hair and seemed to sew it into place throughout the braid.

“It’ll hold, and it’s waterproof. This will tell us where you are at all times—in case you decide to leave the boat.”

I cocked my head. “You knew I planned to leave in the morning, didn’t you?”

“I didn’t know when, but I knew nothing was going to stop you. Not even me, which is why—”

A loud, shrill scream cut through the air.

Jack and I stared at each other, our eyes panicked. We both went quickly to the stairs and practically fell as we scurried down them. At the bottom, we slowed, trying to assess the situation before we showed ourselves.

Out on the main deck, a body lay on its side, and Addison was draped over top of it.
Jack! It’s Anita. Why would the Coast Guard bring Anita to our boat, unless—

That’s not the Coast Guard. And Sandra knows we’re here.

Is she alive?

Addison cried over her mother’s body. Her mom seemed to move her hand, but only barely.

“We have a message for Sarah Roslin from Dr. Sandra Whitmeyer,” the man with the megaphone announced. “We know you’re listening. Sarah, if you have not arrived at Palmyra in two days, Jonas Whitmeyer will be terminated, along with your clone twin and the twin of your best friend. Every hour after that time, if you have still not arrived, we will terminate an additional clone.”

I have to go,
I mindspoke to everyone capable of hearing.

I know,
Jack answered.

I’m ready.
Addison sat up from comforting her mom and turned her tear-streaked face toward where Jack and I stood. Her power of knowing where we were at all times always caught me off guard.

I have to go, now,
I said only to Jack. I turned and kissed him hard on the lips. He pressed his palm to the back of my braid. We kissed like it was our last. When he released me, I searched his eyes.
Promise me you’ll hang on. I’m going to get that cure. That’s my promise to you. Promise me you’ll keep fighting. I won’t say goodbye to you. Never goodbye.

He leaned his forehead against mine.
I’ll see you soon.

Soon.

~~~~~

Addison, make me invisible to the men on that boat.

Done.

The captain of the other boat—the boat that I didn’t believe for one second was actually the Coast Guard—returned to the bridge. They were leaving. I had to get on that boat.

Without giving myself time to think, I slipped behind Alyson. “Don’t turn around,” I whispered. “Addison has made me invisible to those men. I’m getting on that boat.”

Her back tightened. She started to turn her head toward me, but stopped herself. Her jaw hardened. “You can’t. You don’t have the tracker inserted yet. Besides, they’ll kill you.”

“They won’t know we’re there. Give me the tracker and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Alyson hesitated, but then reached inside her jeans pocket and pulled out the tracker. “But… How are you going to insert it?”

“I’ll manage. Sandra told me at The Farm that the trackers were self-directing once they slipped beneath the skin.”