1: Project Chimera Was Never Destroyed

Daphne's pov

My hands wouldn't stop shaking, so I clutched the bag of medicine like it might bolt.

Emmeline's fever had worsened overnight. I'd changed the cloth on her forehead four times before dawn, and every time it came away warm. Edward had offered to go in my place. I'd kissed his cheek and told him to stay with his parents, and I'd thought it was sweet, how hard he tried to sound brave. So I went out, past the pharmacies that had been stripped bare in the first month, until I found a clinic with one locked drawer nobody had bothered to break.

The city was quiet in a way I'd never gotten used to. No engines, no voices, only the wind pushing a plastic bag along the gutter.

The mall was two streets away when I heard voices drifting from an alley.

"Do you have anything left to say, Adrik?"

I stopped so fast my boots skidded.

Adrik. I knew that name.

General Adrik Hale.

I crept to the corner and peered around the brick.

A man in a black military coat stood with a gun aimed at a kneeling officer. The officer's hand was slick with blood, but his back stayed straight, even with the barrel inches from his head.

I knew that face. It had filled every television in the early days of the outbreak, telling us all to stay calm and follow instructions. We had stayed calm. We had followed instructions. And then the world had ended anyway.

But why was a junior officer pointing a gun at his superior?

"After everything we've done, you chose to betray me," Adrik said, the words rough in his throat. "You know what Project Chimera was supposed to accomplish. You know what it became."

The shooter said nothing.

"People died because of that project. You can't possibly believe you can hide what happened forever."

"Project Chimera was never destroyed," the shooter said.

I barely had time to understand the words before the gunshot cracked through the alley.

I clapped a hand over my mouth.

Adrik fell.

I stumbled back, my teeth clamped down on my knuckles to hold in the scream. Every sensible instinct told me to run. My legs didn't get the message. The shooter lowered his weapon and turned toward the spot where I was hiding.

I froze.

He was coming closer.

Then something burned against my chest.

I gasped and grabbed the necklace beneath my shirt. The pendant was scorching, and a bright blue light spilled between my fingers. My father had made me promise never to take it off. Months of nothing, and tonight it chose to wake up. I pressed it flat against my ribs and covered it with both hands, as if I could smother the glow like a flame.

The footsteps stopped.

I held my breath until my lungs ached, the light leaking warm between my fingers, and counted. One. Two. Three.

Then the footsteps moved away, fading down the street.

I stayed pressed against the wall until my knees stopped feeling like water. When I finally dared to look, he was gone.

I crept to Adrik's body. Blood spread beneath him, darkening the ground. His eyes stared up at the sky, empty.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, though I had no idea why I was apologizing to a man I had never met.

My fingers trembled around the pendant. It was still warm, like something alive. I couldn't stay there.

I ran. The whole way back, questions crowded my head, and not one of them had an answer.

The hideout smelled of candle smoke and boiled beans. Someone had shoved a dozen mannequins into a corner to make room for the blankets, and I'd stopped noticing their blank faces months ago. I dropped the bag on the table, my hands still shaking, and Edward crossed the room in three strides.

"Daphne, sweetheart, what happened?" He took me by the shoulders. "You look terrified."

"I—I saw something."

He guided me to a chair and knelt beside me, holding my hands. "Take a breath. Tell me."

"Adrik Hale," I said. "The general from the television. I just watched a junior officer shoot him. He was kneeling, and the man pointed the gun at him like it was nothing."

John frowned. Emmeline shifted beneath her blanket.

"There's something else. When the shooter came toward my hiding place, my necklace started burning. It glowed bright blue. I had to cover it so he wouldn't see."

The room went quiet.

Edward's gaze dropped to the pendant at my throat. Emmeline and John exchanged a quick look.

I saw it. Before I could ask what it meant, Edward squeezed my hands.

"What was that light?" I asked. "My father gave me this necklace months ago and told me never to take it off. He never explained why."

"Perhaps it was just a reaction to something," Edward said, his smile returning. "You've had a frightening experience. Don't worry about it now."

I wanted to believe him. His thumb was already moving in slow circles over my knuckles, the way it had every night since the first bombings, when I woke gasping and he was there before I'd finished opening my eyes.

I leaned into it. God help me, I leaned into it.

Emmeline pushed her blanket aside. "Daphne, darling, I haven't even thanked you properly. Please, let me do something for you." She reached for a cup on the table. "Have a drink. You look exhausted."

Edward smiled. "Go on, sweetheart. Mother wants to thank you."

I took the cup without hesitation.

One sip.

Pain exploded in my chest.

I coughed, and the cup slipped from my fingers and shattered against the floor.

"Edward!" I gasped, clutching my throat.

Something warm spilled over my lip. Blood.

I slid from the chair onto my knees, fighting for air, and caught his trouser leg. "Water," I choked out. "Please, Edward. Help me."

For a heartbeat, I believed he would. That was the worst part.

He crouched as though he meant to. Then he calmly pushed my hand away and stood.

I stared up at him, my hand still hanging in the air where he'd left it.

Behind him, Emmeline rose from her sickbed. Her trembling hands had gone steady, and the weakness she'd worn for days slid off her like a coat.

"About time," she muttered.

Four days of fever. Four days of me running errands for a woman who'd been faking.

My fingers dug into the cold tile.

"Edward?" I whispered. "What's happening?"

He looked down at me without any of the tenderness I knew.

"Tell me something, Daphne. Why do you think I married you?"

My lips trembled. "What?"

"Why did you really think I married you?"

Tears blurred the room. "Because you loved me."

Edward laughed, short and dry. I had never heard him laugh like that. It sounded like something he'd been saving.

"I married you for your father's money. And I couldn't even enjoy it before the apocalypse began." He crouched beside me, his face hardening. "Your father built a bunker with enough supplies to keep you, your brother, and your grandmother alive. There was no place for me. Ronald Alistair made certain of that."

I searched his face for the man who had held me through nightmares. Every feature was the same. None of it was him.

"So you're killing me because my father wouldn't save you?"

"I need your necklace," Edward said. "You would never have given it to me willingly."

He reached for the pendant. I clutched it with both hands. "No!"

He yanked at the chain, and I fought him with whatever strength I had left.

"Why?" I sobbed. "Why would you do this to me?"

"Because I want what your father left behind."

I tried to crawl toward the door, but he caught me by the hair and dragged me back. Something cold touched my throat. A knife.

With one brutal pull, he tore the necklace from my neck.

I collapsed.

The broken cup lay near my hand, the last of my kindness soaking into the floor. My vision narrowed to a dark tunnel, and at the end of it Edward closed his fist around the pendant. Emmeline and John stood behind him. Emmeline smoothed her sleeve. John glanced at the door, already thinking about leaving.

I had loved this man. Trusted him. Risked my life for his family.

And they had repaid me with poison.

If I could go back, I would save my father. I would protect Gavin and Viola. I would never let Edward Blackwood into my life.

Most of all, I would find out what Project Chimera really was before it destroyed the world.

My last breath left me in a thin, quiet sigh.

Then everything went black.