“What happened?” I asked when I reached the medical wing and saw one of the workers carrying a small, tow-headed boy.
“He just collapsed,” said Keoki, a teacher from the island’s school.
Six or seven years old physically, he was one of the many clones created by Sandra in her clandestine factory. To think I’d once called that monster “Mom.”
“Put him on the examination table,” ordered Dr. Sallee, the island’s best doctor. Here was a woman I’d initially thought was a devout follower of Sandra Whitmeyer’s evil ways. But she’d begged me to give her a chance, and I had. So far I had no regrets.
Keoki, a young, dark-skinned man from Hawaii who’d been on the island for the past couple of years, laid the boy on the table, and Dr. Sallee pulled back the kid’s eyelids. One, then the other, shining a light in each eye. She ran an instrument along each of his feet. Neither foot flinched.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“Tamati,” Keoki answered.
I brushed the boy’s hair off his forehead. His skin was burning up. I scanned the inside of his body. Neural activity fired through his brain and along his spinal cord, as it should. His heart was collecting and dispersing blood throughout his body, though slightly faster than usual. “I don’t see anything wrong,” I told the doctor. “Besides the fact that he’s burning up.”
I had barely gotten the words out when Tamati began bucking against the table.
“He’s seizing!” Dr. Sallee said. She pushed my hands against his shoulders. “Hold him down.” She ran to the foot of the exam table and lifted up the table itself. When the boy’s feet were elevated higher than his head, he calmed.
“What do you think?” I asked. The doctor lowered the table, then proceeded to hook Tamati up to a heart rate monitor and several other machines.
“Same as the last two: I just don’t know.”
“Is he paralyzed?”
“I’ll know more after some tests, and when—if—he wakes up.”
I wanted to throw something. This was the third cloned child to collapse in this manner. And we had watched the first two die within a week of falling ill.
“Jonas?” Bree said from the doorway. Under different circumstances, the fact that she had covered her bikini in a shirt, shorts, and pair of flip-flops would have disappointed me. “Is everything okay?”
I looked to Dr. Sallee.
“I’ll call you when I know something more,” she said, but there was no hope behind her words.
I draped my arm across Bree’s shoulders and led her from the room.
“Who was that?” she asked.
“One of the clones.”
“That originated from the incubators?”
“Yeah. All of the clones living in the building behind this one were created right here on the island.” I dropped my arm.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“We don’t know.”
I led her away from the medical wing of the building toward the halls of small apartments that housed the people who lived and worked on the atoll. She stopped in the middle of the hallway several yards from the apartment she was staying in. “Where are we going? Don’t you want to stay close and make sure the clone is okay?”
I did, but for some reason I didn’t want Bree involved. I didn’t want her to get vested in the lives of the people here. The closer she got to the clones and others on the island, the more she’d want to remain—and there simply was no future for her here. “Dr. Sallee will call when she knows more. I thought you might want to take a shower. And I need to call Lexi and Kyle.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why do you need to call both of them?”
“Something’s going on in Costa Rica. Kyle needs Lexi’s help. And I might have to join them there.” Plus, I had promised to update Lexi on everything happening here. Especially if another child collapsed.
Bree squeezed the bridge of her nose. “You might be leaving?”
“I don’t know yet.” I recognized the look in her eye, and I could sense the change in her heart rate. I had to think fast, or I was going to ruin our last bit of time together. I didn’t want to fight with her.
I stepped closer and slid a hand to the small of her back. “Look. Why don’t you take a shower? I’ll make my phone calls. Then I’ll cook you dinner.”
She smiled. Her heart rate slowed. The muscles in her back relaxed beneath my hand, making me want to hold her even closer. So I did. I lifted my free hand and played with the red curl that had escaped from the messy bun on the back of her head. I smiled, and I tried to put a matching emotion behind it, even though I was worried about Tamati.
“You will cook me dinner?” she asked.
“I can cook. And you’ll love it. How much time do you need?”
“An hour?”
“Perfect.” I leaned in and kissed her cheek, lingering there for a second or two before I let her go.
When the door to her apartment was closed, I let out a held breath. What the hell was I doing? I had the most beautiful woman in the world right here on Palmyra. She was even offering to stay here. But as much as I wanted to let her, I knew I couldn’t. This was not the place for her. I had to set her free. And I had to do it tonight.
~~~~~
I tried reaching Kyle and Lexi, but had to leave messages for both. I was starting to worry that Kyle was in over his head in Costa Rica. It sounded like he’d met a cute chick at least—although I wasn’t sure he’d find a way to enjoy her company since he was still mourning the loss of his girlfriend, Dani.
I then headed back to the medical wing to check on Tamati. He was just a child, and I didn’t want him to wake up scared.
When I got there, Keoki was sitting with him. He stood when he saw me. His shirt hung loosely against a skinny chest. “Mr. Jonas,” he said nervously. “I can leave if you’d like.”
“No. I’m glad you’re here. Where’s Dr. Sallee?”
“She was just here. She took more blood.”
I nodded. “I’m going to grill dinner on the beach. Will you send word if anything changes?”
“Of course.”
I stared at the small boy lying in the hospital bed. His skin was lightly tanned; his hair was bleached by the sun; his nose was freckled. He was so young. And he was trapped, like the rest of Sandra’s experiments, in a world that was beyond the ordinary. I hoped to teach him, and others like him, that they could still choose to make something of their lives despite having such an extraordinary start.
I exited the hospital room and headed toward the kitchen, still torn about what could have caused Tamati and the others to collapse this way.
The cloned children here on Palmyra were all very young; as they neared the age of eleven, we would transfer them to Wellington Boarding School, the same school where Lexi, Bree, and Kyle had lived for the past seven or so years. Lexi hoped to keep Wellington running in such a way that would allow the clones to learn about their origin, learn how to use any abilities that they may have received in the cloning process, and receive an education from teachers who understood what they were going through.
Lexi and Bree had both known when they were young that they’d had minor unnatural powers. Lexi could manipulate the thoughts of others, and Bree could enhance or alter what others saw. But each had only skimmed the surface of their true mind powers, and though Lexi had come closer in the last year to discovering the full extent of her abilities, Bree was still in discovery mode.
I stopped in the hallway outside the kitchen and placed a hand on the wall to steady myself. I wanted badly to guide Bree, to lead her on this journey of self-discovery. Hell, I just plain wanted her. But this wasn’t just about what I wanted. It was about what was right for her.
I pushed through the kitchen doors. Several cooks were rushing around, making dinner for the residents of the island.
“Jonas.” Barbara, head cook and best hugger on the atoll, pulled me in for a giant squeeze. Her plump, dark-skinned arms held me the way I had always imagined a grandmother would hold her favorite grandkid. “Where’s that tiger of a lady you’ve been spending all your time with?”
“Bree? She’s showering.”
“She’s quite the catch, isn’t she?”
I raised a brow. “Catch?”
“Don’t break an old woman’s heart and tell me you and her ain’t an item. Honey, I seen the way she look at you. If I ever had a man look at me that way, I’d hold on tight and never let go.”
“Barbara.” I stepped back and waved her off. “I’m a gentleman. I’m not telling you anything.” And there was nothing to tell. It didn’t matter how attracted I was to Bree, she wasn’t staying. I had to make sure of that.
“Oh, a gentleman, huh? Tell someone who believes that shit you’re spewing.”
I chuckled. “How about you fix me up with some food to impress my tigress.” I could at least make sure Bree had a memorable last night on Palmyra. She’d obviously come here for a break from life, and no matter what, she and I were friends. I would make sure I didn’t ruin that aspect of our relationship.
Barbara set about the kitchen, stuffing this and that in a big basket, including some fresh-caught sea bass on ice.
When she presented the basket to me, I kissed her on the cheek. “Thank you.”
“Go get ’em, tiger.”