Chapter 3 - Lazarus
“What is Lazarus?”
Nobody answered.
Alessandro was lying on a portable medical table while a gray-haired doctor cut through his bloody bandages.
Marco stood beside him.
Two dozen armed men surrounded the warehouse.
And still, somehow, I felt as if I were the dangerous person in the room.
“What is Lazarus?” I repeated.
The doctor glanced at Alessandro.
“Not now.”
I stepped closer.
“You died.”
Alessandro’s eyes remained on mine.
“So I’m told.”
“My husband says something called Lazarus brought you back.”
The doctor froze for half a second.
That was enough.
I pointed at him.
“You know.”
He turned away.
“Mrs. Winters, your son needs food and rest.”
“My son needs his father.”
Logan sat on a couch across the room eating crackers Marco had found somewhere.
Captain Bear rested beneath his arm.
He watched us with the solemn concentration children used when adults forgot they were listening.
I lowered my voice.
“Tell me what Lazarus is.”
Alessandro finally nodded toward a steel office at the back of the warehouse.
“Marco, take Catherine upstairs.”
“No.”
“You wanted answers.”
“I’m not leaving Logan.”
Marco pointed.
“We bring Logan.”
Three minutes later, we were inside a windowless office.
Alessandro had refused the doctor’s orders to remain flat and was now seated in a leather chair, skin gray beneath the fluorescent lights.
I sat with Logan on my lap.
Marco locked the door.
Alessandro folded his hands.
“Lazarus is a classified resuscitation project.”
I waited.
“That sounds like science fiction.”
“So did organ transplantation once.”
“What does it do?”
“It began as military research. Emergency treatment for traumatic cardiac arrest. The goal was to extend the period between clinical death and irreversible brain injury.”
I looked at the monitor wires still attached beneath his open hospital shirt.
“You’re saying someone injected you with something?”
“I’m saying my doctors have carried a modified protocol for eighteen months.”
“Why?”
“Because people try to kill me.”
That was disturbingly reasonable.
“But you didn’t know it was used tonight?”
“No.”
Marco cleared his throat.
“I authorized it.”
Alessandro looked at him.
“You what?”
“You were gone for almost four minutes.”
The room changed.
Alessandro’s voice became very quiet.
“You were told not to use it outside the facility.”
“You were dead.”
“That was not your decision.”
“Yes, it was.”
For the first time, I saw something beyond obedience between them.
Loyalty.
The ugly, absolute kind.
Marco looked at me.
“We obtained Lazarus through David.”
My stomach dropped.
“Of course you did.”
“He stole part of the research archive when he vanished,” Alessandro said.
“Why?”
“Because Halcyon funded it.”
That didn’t fit.
“Why would a security company fund medical research?”
“Because Lazarus was never only medical.”
A cold sensation spread through me.
“What else?”
Alessandro looked toward the closed door.
“It can also be used to create a very convincing death.”
I stopped breathing.
David.
“You mean…”
“Lower body temperature. Suppress heartbeat to nearly undetectable levels. Reduce respiration. With the right monitoring, a person can appear clinically dead long enough to be transported.”
My voice was barely audible.
“That’s how David disappeared.”
“Yes.”
I stood so fast Logan nearly slid from my lap.
“You knew.”
“Not until months later.”
“You keep saying that like it matters!”
“It matters because I did not help him abandon you.”
“No, you just helped him stay gone.”
Alessandro looked away.
That answer was worse than denial.
I walked toward the door.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
Marco actually laughed.
I turned.
“Something funny?”
“Your apartment is under surveillance.”
“Then the police.”
“Half the Baltimore task force is compromised.”
“You expect me to take your word for that?”
A phone rang outside.
Marco opened the office door.
One of the guards entered.
“We have a problem.”
Alessandro raised an eyebrow.
“They found Winters’ apartment.”
“Who?”
“Fire department.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
The guard looked at me.
“Building’s burning.”
For a moment I couldn’t understand the words.
Then I pushed past him.
“Show me.”
A television in the warehouse had switched to local news.
Live footage showed flames pouring from the third floor of a brick apartment building.
My building.
My window.
Logan’s bedroom.
A reporter stood behind yellow tape.
“…firefighters were called shortly after three o’clock this morning…”
I couldn’t hear anything else.
My knees folded.
Marco caught me.
“No.”
I stared at the screen.
Everything David had ever given me was in that apartment.
His letters.
Our wedding photographs.
Logan’s newborn clothes.
The cheap blue mug David always used.
Gone.
Logan pointed.
“Mommy, our house?”
I pulled him into me.
“It’s okay.”
It wasn’t.
Nothing was okay.
“Captain’s other shirt is there.”
My heart shattered over something as stupid as a teddy bear shirt.
“I’ll get you another one.”
“I want that one.”
“I know.”
Alessandro stood behind me.
Whoever he had been before his near-death was gone.
His face looked carved from stone.
“Any casualties?”
“No.”
“Good.”
He turned to Marco.
“Find who entered the building before ignition.”
The guard nodded.
“Already on it.”
I spun around.
“You knew this would happen.”
“No.”
“Someone texted pictures of my apartment.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t send anyone?”
“I did.”
I stared.
“There were two men outside your building.”
The guard lowered his eyes.
“They’re missing.”
The warehouse fell silent.
Alessandro’s jaw tightened.
Then a new voice came from the television.
“We’re also receiving reports that investigators have located what may be human remains inside apartment 3C…”
My blood froze.
Apartment 3C.
Mine.
The reporter continued.
“…authorities have not identified the victim.”
I turned slowly toward Alessandro.
“There was nobody in my apartment.”
He stared at the screen.
“Someone wants police to think there was.”
“Why?”
His eyes shifted to me.
“To make you disappear too.”
The pattern clicked into place.
David’s burned car.
A body.
False identification.
Now my apartment.
Another body.
Another death.
“They’re going to say I died.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“So nobody looks for you.”
“That sounds helpful.”
“Until you realize dead people can’t report crimes, claim property, access accounts, or retain custody.”
I instinctively hugged Logan tighter.
“Custody?”
Alessandro’s expression darkened.
“They want your son.”
The entire world became quiet.
“No.”
“I think that has always been the objective.”
“Why would anyone want Logan?”
A small voice answered before Alessandro could.
“Because Daddy said I’m special.”
Everyone turned.
I looked down.
“What did you say?”
Logan squeezed Captain Bear.
“Daddy said I’m special.”
My heart pounded.
“When did Daddy say that?”
Logan looked confused by the question.
“Sometimes.”
I stared at him.
“What do you mean, sometimes?”
“He comes when you sleep.”
There are moments when the brain refuses reality because accepting it would hurt too much.
This was one of them.
“Logan.”
I knelt in front of him.
“Has Daddy visited you?”
He nodded.
My hands went numb.
“Where?”
“My room.”
Alessandro and Marco exchanged a look.
“How many times?”
Logan shrugged.
“Lots.”
I struggled to breathe.
“What does he do?”
“He hugs me.”
I closed my eyes.
David had been inside my apartment.
While I slept.
He had held our son.
Then left before morning.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to vomit or kill him.
“Did Daddy ever give you anything?”
Logan thought.
Then nodded.
He lifted Captain Bear.
“Daddy fixed him.”
I took the stuffed animal.
Captain Bear had belonged to David as a child.
A brown teddy bear with one crooked ear.
I examined the stitching.
One seam along the back looked newer than the rest.
Marco noticed too.
“Knife.”
A guard handed him one.
“No.”
I pulled the bear away.
“That’s his favorite toy.”
“We can repair it.”
I hated every second of this.
But I handed it over.
Marco carefully opened three inches of stitching.
His fingers went inside.
Then stopped.
“What?”
He slowly pulled out a thin black object.
A memory card.
No bigger than my fingernail.
Alessandro leaned forward.
“David.”
Marco inserted it into an isolated laptop.
The screen asked for a password.
One hint appeared.
THE DAY SHE SAID YES.
Alessandro looked at me.
I knew immediately.
Our wedding date.
I typed it.
A folder opened.
Hundreds of files.
Photographs.
Documents.
Bank transfers.
Names.
Then one video.
FOR CATHERINE.
My hands shook as I clicked.
David appeared on screen.
Not the David from two years ago.
His hair was longer.
A scar crossed his cheek.
He looked exhausted.
But alive.
So terribly alive.
“Cat,” he said.
I covered my mouth.
“If you’re watching this, then something went wrong.”
He looked down briefly.
“I need you to know that everything I did after Logan was born was to keep you alive.”
My eyes filled.
“That doesn’t mean you should forgive me.”
I whispered, “Good.”
David continued.
“Halcyon isn’t after Alessandro.
Not really.
And they’re not after me anymore.”
He looked directly into the camera.
“They’re after Logan.”
My arms tightened around my son.
“Because Lazarus was tested on adults for years with limited success.”
David swallowed.
“Until doctors discovered something in one child’s bloodwork.”
I stared at Logan.
No.
“Your child.”
David’s voice broke.
“Our son.”
The video froze.
May you like
Then the warehouse lights went out.
A second later, the first explosion hit the gate.
