20

“This is Matt Easter at the Agrilabs building. I got a woman here suffering from hypothermia. . . . I don’t know how to answer that.”

Kit’s eyes fluttered open. “No . . . I’m fine.” As she struggled to a sitting position from where she lay on the floor, Easter turned from the wall phone and looked down at her. “Oh man, am I glad you woke up. But we can’t be sure you’re okay. You may have frostbite or something.”

Kit’s hands and feet were so terribly cold, she couldn’t say he was wrong. Though her mind was working poorly, she was also aware that whoever had trapped her in the freezer might still be in the building and that Easter’s presence alone might not prevent them from a more direct attack. By all means, get more people in here. “You’re right. Ask them to come.”

Easter recited the institute’s address into the phone and hung up. He came to Kit’s side and squatted on his haunches. “I got some instant coffee in my lab. It tastes like shit, but I can make it, well, instantly.”

Matt Easter . . . Kit vaguely remembered meeting him on her first day when Jenny had shown her around. “What kept the freezer door from opening?”

Easter gestured to a point behind her with his chin. “That cart full of crap. Someone must have moved it and accidentally wedged it against the door while you were in there.”

There was no point explaining things to him, so she didn’t respond to this.

“How’d you make the alarm go off?”

“I breathed on it. I think that’s why I passed out—from hyperventilating.”

“Lucky for you I was here and had things in the freezer I couldn’t afford to lose if the thing failed.”

“Yeah, everything’s going my way. Thanks for the help.”

“You never answered me about the coffee.”

Kit didn’t want to stay in the building a second longer. “I’d rather just go out front and wait for the ambulance.”

Easter assisted her to the front entrance and out onto the steps. By now her circulation had improved to the point where she was convinced she didn’t need medical assistance. Nor did she want any well-meaning paramedic discovering the Ladysmith. “Actually, you know . . . I’m feeling much better. I don’t think I need that ambulance after all.” She began backing away. “I’m just going home. I appreciate what you did . . . really. Thanks a lot.”

As she turned and hurried to her car, she saw only one other vehicle, which she presumed belonged to Easter. That was good, because it meant she wouldn’t be followed.

It was only when she reached her car that she realized she didn’t have the keys. Damn. After putting the serum in the freezer, she’d planned to dump her lab coat in her locker and get her bag. Damn.

Fortunately, Easter had been so puzzled at her rapid departure, he was still on the front steps when she returned.

“Change your mind about getting checked out?”

“My handbag is in my locker, but I don’t want to go back in there. Will you get it for me?”

“Which locker?”

She told him the number and the combination of the lock and he went back inside. But now she was left alone outside the place. Surely no one would try anything out in the open like this where a passing motorist might see it. Of course, this late, there wasn’t all that much traffic going by. If they waited until just the right moment . . .

Suddenly feeling far too vulnerable, she thought about going back inside and waiting in the reception area. But then that seemed worse. In the distance, she heard the wail of a siren.

Come on, Matt, get me out of here.

Finally, Easter came out with her bag. Leaving him with a hurried thanks, she ran to the car and piled in. She pulled onto the street just as the ambulance arrived.

“HOW FAR BACK IN here is this cabin?” Broussard asked.

Noell inched the car to the left to avoid a large branch from a tree that had fallen beside the two dirt tracks they’d been following for the last twenty minutes. “We’re almost there.”

The tracks made an abrupt right turn around a rotted stump and then dropped into a moist hollow filled with ferns. Fifty yards farther on, they followed a gentle rise into an old-growth forest of great oaks. A few minutes later, when the canopy overhead thinned and the dirt tracks curved both right and left around a poplar that had probably been a sapling long before Broussard was born, Noell eased the car off the tracks into a patch of scrubby weeds.

“Is this it?” Broussard asked, seeing no cabin.

“That’s got to be the tree they described.” She looked to her left, where the land sloped sharply. “And there’s the footpath to the cabin. But where is everybody?”

“Could be they finished and left.”

“Damn . . . of all the times to be without a radio.”

She was referring to the already-discussed fact that they had come in her personal car because the official car she’d been driving had developed a mechanical problem earlier in the day and the department had not been able to come up with a replacement. “I wonder if some of them are still down at the cabin?”

Not one to speculate on an issue when direct data could be easily obtained, Broussard reached for the door. “Only one way to find out.”

Noell followed his example.

Enjoying his role as a man of action, Broussard quickly headed for the path.

“Andy . . .”

He noted the odd tone in Noell’s voice even as he turned. This did not, however, prepare him for the shock of seeing a 9 mm Beretta leveled at his heart.