Chapter five

I walked into the Evercrest Shelters showroom with a signed contract in my hand and found my ex-husband's family begging at the sales counter.

"Your card was declined again, Mr. Rook," the salesman, Mr. Sable, said politely. "As were the other two."

"It's a temporary freeze!" Caspian's voice cracked. He looked thinner. The gold watch was gone from his wrist, and his shirt hung wrong, as if it had been borrowed. "My father will clear it by tomorrow. Just hold the unit. The family unit. The one for six."

"That unit is no longer available."

"What do you mean no longer available?"

"It's been reserved."

Mrs. Rook swayed, clutching her handbag. Uncle Barrett loomed behind her, jaw clenched, one hand shoved in his pocket. And at the edge of the counter, pale and smaller than I remembered, stood Odalys. She wore yesterday's clothes. Her hair hung uncombed. There was no pearl in her throat.

I stopped three steps from them. For a moment nobody noticed me.

Then Odalys looked up.

Her whole face changed. It was the same look as in the lift, the second before the gate closed, but inverted, like a photograph turned to negative. Not triumph. Hunger.

"Tam," she whispered.

Caspian spun around. Relief flooded him so fast I almost felt sorry for him. "Tamsin! Thank God. Babe, listen..."

"Don't call me that."

"Tam, then. Please. You have to help us. Something's happening, the news, the hospitals, people are saying..." He lurched forward. "You always know things. I don't know how, but you always do. You've been buying everything. We saw your name on the Redwall order. Let us in. Please."

Mrs. Rook stepped past her son, chin lifted, the old lacquered smile hanging by a thread. "Tamsin, dear. We were all so hasty. Families say foolish things. Surely a woman of your... generosity..."

"I'd love to help," I said.

Hope broke over their faces like sunrise.

"But I'm afraid there's a space problem," I said, gently, and turned to the salesman. "Mr. Sable. Is the Redwall family unit finalized?"

"Yes, Ms. Orrey. Signed and secured this morning. All six units in the compound, the surface farm, the generator array, and the armed perimeter." He bowed slightly. "Everything is yours."

Caspian made a sound like someone had hit him in the stomach.

"All of it?" Mrs. Rook whispered. "All six?"

"One hundred and fifty million," I said. "Cash. I paid for the whole compound so no one else could take a unit." I met Caspian's eyes. "I didn't want anyone I didn't choose inside my walls."

"You can't," he said hoarsely. "That's not possible. Where did you get..."

"Grandmother's money. The money you called selfish." I smiled, small and tired. "And a ticket I bought for ten dollars. You'd have liked the odds."

"Tam." Odalys had started to cry. Real tears, this time, runny and ugly. "Please. We grew up together. You said you'd never leave me."

"I didn't." I held her gaze. "You did."

She stared at me, bewildered, mouth open, searching for the memory that wasn't hers.

"I'll try not to take up too much room," I said softly, to all of them. "I know how much supplies cost. I'd hate to slow anyone down."

Something flickered across Mrs. Rook's face, a ghost of a thought she couldn't catch. Her handbag slid from her fingers and hit the carpet.

Then she dropped to her knees.

I have thought about that moment more than I should. Marguerite Rook, seventy years old, with her silk blouse and her lacquered nails, sinking down onto a showroom floor to wrap both hands around my ankle.

"Please," she sobbed. "Please. I'll do anything. I'll apologize. 

Caspian will apologize. Take us in, don't leave us out there, you can't, you can't..."

The memory of a hand around my ankle rose in me like a tide. I looked down at her, and my voice, when it came, was perfectly kind.

"It's just math, Mrs. Rook."

She went white.

I bent and unwrapped her fingers, one by one, as gently as I could.

The showroom doors opened.

Two plainclothes detectives and four uniformed officers walked in without hurry. Behind them came Ines Varga, my lawyer, carrying a thick file and wearing the faint, satisfied look of a woman who had spent three weeks building a very good case.

"Caspian Rook," said the lead detective. "Barrett Rook."

Uncle Barrett's face drained. "What is this?"

"You're both under arrest for fraud, forgery of a life insurance policy, and conspiracy to commit murder." The detective produced handcuffs. "Mr. Rook, you were photographed outside the courthouse, threatening Ms. Orrey. We also have the call log from the investigator who was hired to arrange an accident."

"I had nothing to do with..." Caspian started. His voice splintered. "It was Odalys's idea! She drew it up! She said we could..."

"You said it first!" Odalys shrieked.

The two of them tore at each other in the middle of the showroom, screaming, while the officers snapped cuffs around Caspian's wrists. He twisted to look at me, eyes huge, mouth shaking.

"Tamsin," he sobbed. "Tam, please, I'm your husband..."

"Ex," I said. "The case is closed."

They dragged him toward the door. Barrett went quietly, cursing under his breath. Mrs. Rook stayed on her knees on the carpet, rocking, murmuring prayers.

Odalys alone remained, pressed against the pedestal, face streaked, mascara black down her cheeks. She looked at me for a very long moment.

"I don't understand," she whispered. "Why do I feel like I did something unforgivable?"

I opened my mouth. I closed it.

"Go home, Dally," I said. "Find people who still owe you something."

I walked out. The light outside was thin and white. Emrys stood beside the truck with his phone against his ear, listening, his face grim.

He lowered the phone slowly. "That was my old squad. St. Aldric's has gone into lockdown. A nurse bit three patients in the isolation ward."

My hand went to my chest. The cold thread inside me had gone tight and electric, humming north.

[Outbreak parameters changed. Estimated time to onset: seven days.]

Seven.

I looked up at the sky, at the thin pale sun, at a world that had no idea what was coming.

"Then we move tonight," I said.