ledge beneath his feet continued to crumble, sending rocks and debris into the abyss below. If he didn’t resist this blow, he’d be joining them soon.
Then the bees began to buzz and a ripple in the air rolled toward him. He focused on it, trying to stop it in its tracks, to will it away, but it was no use. This wasn’t a fair fight. He didn’t have the skills he needed to compete with Gunderson. Not here.
It smacked him head-on like a big rig at high speed. The impact ripped him away from his perch and he was once again falling, arms flailing, the sparks below crackling wildly.
Above, Gunderson turned and flung his arms upward toward the whirling wormhole, waiting for it to snatch him away.
Donovan closed his eyes, knowing this was it, he’d lost, Jessie gone from him forever.
“Forgive me,” he whispered as he plummeted deeper and deeper into the pit.
Then a voice in his ear said, “There’s nothing to forgive, Jack,” and something or someone grabbed his wrist, stopping his fall.
Coming to an abrupt halt, he slammed into the abyss wall. His eyes flew open and there, crouched on the rocks, arm outstretched, hand gripping his wrist — was Jessie.
Not his daughter Jessie, but Jessie-Anne, his sister. And she was smiling at him, her face lit up as he’d never seen it before. A face at peace.
The face of an angel.
“It’s not too late,” she said. “It’s never too late.”
Donovan felt a choke of emotion rise up from his chest. Her hand released him and he clutched the wall, wanting instead to throw his arms around her.
“Jessie-Anne…” he said, but couldn’t find words to follow it.
“Lead with your heart, Jack. Always remember that. If you lead with your heart, nothing can stop you.”
And then, without warning, she began to fade from view, leaving only the trace of a whisper in his ear. “Glass half full,” she said.
Then she was gone.
Donovan clung to the rocks, feeling tears well up, her words swirling through his head.
Lead with your heart, Jack.
And with sudden clarity, he understood. Although his physical heart had been stopped, everything that had happened to him here, every change, the baggage he carried, had been based not on intellect-but emotion.
It was Gunderson’s hunger for vengeance, a fully formed, unadulterated hate, that had fueled his ability to control and manipulate this world so easily.
The power of the heart, not the mind.
That was the currency here.
And armed with that knowledge, and the desire that accompanied it, Donovan felt a renewed sense of hope.
Just as Gunderson had said in that train yard as he lay in Donovan’s arms…
This wasn’t over yet.
Hands stretched toward the sky, Gunderson stared up at the wormhole, waiting for it to take him. Another loud thunderclap and the now familiar jolt to the chest told him his wish was about to be granted.
“Come on, goddammit!”
The swirling black maw widened in response, wind kicking up around him, and he felt its power take hold. His feet lifted off the ground and he began to rise.
“Yes!” It was finally happening. The moment he’d been waiting for ever since that cop had put a bullet in him. “Take me,” he shouted. “Take me!”
But then, from out of nowhere, a voice said, “I don’t think so, Alex” — and Donovan appeared directly below him, wrapping his arms around his legs.
What the fuck?
Gunderson kicked, trying to shake him off, but the bastard had a lock on him so tight, he could barely move. One look into Donovan’s eyes and Gunderson realized that something had changed.
Donovan knew. He understood.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was not part of the program.
Feeling himself being pulled back toward the ground, Gunderson fought desperately against it, trying to break Donovan’s grip. But Donovan was a bulldog, would not let go, and a moment later they hit the earth, a tangle of arms and legs.
Pain shot through Gunderson as rocks dug into his flesh, scraped his bones-a sensation he wasn’t accustomed to.
They rolled to the edge of the precipice. Then, all at once, Donovan was straddling him, hands around his neck, an intense, unstoppable fury in his eyes.
“No more puzzles, Alex. Tell me where she is!”
Gunderson brought his arms up, trying to break Donovan’s grip, but was powerless against his rage. The earth beneath them began to rumble and crack, steam hissing up from newly formed fissures.
“Tell me, goddammit! Now!”
“Fuck you!” Gunderson croaked, and the ground shifted, another fissure opening up directly beneath him, the earth crumbling away on either side.
Electric tentacles reached up and wrapped around him, pulling at him. Donovan jumped back, narrowly avoiding the widening fissure. There was another loud thunderclap, and above, the swirling wormhole sucked at Donovan, his hair whipping wildly in the wind.
“Where is she, Alex? Tell me!”
But Gunderson ignored the command, watching in horror as the wormhole enveloped Donovan.
“No!” he shouted. “No!”
Then the wormhole swallowed Donovan whole and whisked him away.
And the agony Gunderson felt was so deep that he was almost certain it would last an eternity.
J UST WHEN SHE thought they’d lost the fight, that the epinephrine had been a bust, Jack’s body bucked wildly beneath the paddles and his eyes flew open as he gulped a bucketful of air. Feeling a rush of sweet relief, Rachel burst into tears and threw her arms around him.
“Oh, my God,” she said. “Oh, my God.”
She glanced at Wong, who was now leaning against the wall, his body slack, face full of shock, looking like a man who was seriously considering a career change.
“The hospital,” Jack croaked. “Take me to the hospital.”
“We’ve already called,” Rachel told him, hugging him close. “The ambulance is on its way.”
“No,” Jack said. “That isn’t what I mean.”
“What, then?”
“The convalescent hospital. Saint Margaret’s.”
“What?” Rachel said. “Why?”
Jack looked at her, a look she knew all too well. A look that meant she wasn’t going to like what he was about to say.
“Sara’s window,” he told her. “I have to find Sara’s window.”
Part Four
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