Riptide

voice seemed so breathless, so very high, it almost didn't sound like Johnny. Malin heard a thump, and the floor of the tunnel shivered violently. As dirt and sand rained down in the darkness, filling his eyes and nose, he thought he heard another sound: a strange, strangled sound, so brief that it might almost have been a cough. Then a wheezing, dripping noise like a wet sponge being squeezed.

'Johnny!' Malin cried, raising his hands to wipe the dust out of his face and dropping the matchbox in the process. It was so very dark, and things had gone wrong so suddenly, and panic began to overwhelm him. In the close, listening darkness came another noise, low and muffled. It took Malin a moment to realize what it was: a soft, continuous dragging. . .

Then the spell was broken and he was fumbling in the dark on his hands and knees, hands outstretched, searching for the matches, bawling his brother's name. One hand touched something wet and he snatched it away just as the other hand closed on the matchbox. Rising to his knees, choking back sobs, he grabbed a match and scratched it frantically until it flared.

In the sudden light he looked around wildly. Johnny was gone. The door was open, the seal broken—but beyond lay nothing except a blank stone wall. Dust hung thickly in the air.

Then wetness touched his legs and he looked down. In the spot where Johnny had stood there was a large, black pool of water, crawling slowly around his knees. For a crazy moment, Malin thought maybe there was a breach in the tunnel somewhere and seawater was leaking in. Then he realized the pool was steaming slightly in the flicker of the match. Straining forward, he saw that it was not black but red: blood, more blood than he ever imagined a body could hold. Paralyzed, he watched as the glossy pool spread, running in tendrils across the hollows of the floor, draining into the cracks, creeping into his wet Keds, surrounding him like a crimson octopus, until the match dropped into it with a sharp hiss and darkness descended once again.

Chapter 2

Cambridge, Massachusetts Present Day

The small laboratory looked out from the Mount Auburn Hospital annex across the leafy tops of the maple trees to the slow, sullen waters of the Charles River. A rower in a needlelike shell was cutting through the dark water with powerful strokes, peeling back a glittering wake. Malin Hatch watched, momentarily entranced by the perfect synchronicity of body, boat, and water.

'Dr. Hatch?' came the voice of his lab assistant. 'The colonies are ready.' He pointed toward a beeping incubator.

Hatch turned from the window, reverie broken, suppressing a surge of irritation at his well-meaning assistant. 'Let's take out the first tier and have a look at the little buggers,' he said.

In his usual nervous way, Bruce opened the incubator and removed a large tray of agar plates, bacterial colonies growing like glossy pennies in their centers. These were relatively harmless bacteria—they didn't need special precautions beyond the usual sterile procedures—but Hatch watched with alarm as the assistant swung the rattling tray around, bumping it on the autoclave.

'Careful, there,' said Hatch. 'Or there'll be no joy in Whoville tonight.'

The assistant brought the tray to an uneasy rest on the glove box. 'Sorry,' he said sheepishly, standing back and wiping his hands on his lab coat.

Hatch gave the tray a practiced sweep with his eyes. Rows two and three showed good growth, rows one and four were variable, and row five was sterile. In an instant he realized the experiment would be a success. Everything was working out as hypothesized; in a month he'd have published another impressive paper in the New England Journal of Medicine, and everyone would be talking yet again about what a rising star he was in the department.

The prospect filled him with a huge feeling of emptiness.

Absently, he swiveled a magnifying lens over to make a gross examination of the colonies. He'd done this so often that he could identify the strains just by looking at them, by comparing their surface textures and growth patterns. After a few moments he turned toward his desk, pushed aside a computer keyboard, and began jotting notes into his lab notebook.

The intercom chimed.

'Bruce?' Hatch murmured as he scribbled.

Bruce jumped up, sending his notebook clattering to the floor. A minute later he returned. 'Visitor,' he said simply.

Hatch straightened up his large frame. Visitors to the lab were rare. Like most doctors, he kept his lab location and telephone number under wraps to all but a select few.

'Would you mind seeing what he wants?' Hatch asked. 'Unless it's urgent, refer him to my office. Dr. Winslow's on call today.'

Bruce went off again and the lab fell back into silence. Hatch's gaze drifted once again toward the window. The afternoon light was streaming in, sending a shower of gold through the test tubes and lab apparatus. With an effort, he forced his concentration back to his notes.

'He's not a patient,' Bruce said, bustling back into the lab. 'Says you'll want to see him.'

Hatch looked up. Probably a researcher from the hospital, he thought. He took a deep breath. 'Okay. Show him in.'

A minute later, footsteps sounded in the outer lab. Malin looked up to see a spare figure gazing at him from the far side of the doorframe. The setting sun was striking the man full force, modeling the sunburnt skin drawn tight across a handsome face, refracting light deep within a pair of gray eyes.

'Gerard Neidelman,' the stranger said in a low, gravelly voice.

Couldn't spend much time in a lab or the OR with a tan like that, Hatch thought to himself. Must be a specialist, getting in a lot of golf time. 'Please come in, Dr. Neidelman,' he said.

'Captain,' the man replied. 'Not Doctor.' He passed through the doorway and straightened up, and Hatch immediately knew it wasn't just an honorary title. Simply by the way he stepped through the door, head bent, hand on the upper frame, it was clear the man had spent time at sea. Hatch guessed he was not old—perhaps forty-