Chapter 19 - The River Does Not Forgive

Lena jumped before she had time to think.

The water hit like concrete. Cold stole the air from her chest, and the current rolled her beneath the surface. She opened her eyes to darkness and moving bubbles.

"Nora!"

The river swallowed the word. Lena kicked toward a flash of pale fabric. Her hand caught Nora's jacket, slipped, caught it again. She pulled the girl against her and fought upward with everything she had.

They broke the surface beside a concrete bridge support. Nora coughed and clung to Lena's neck.

"I got you," Lena gasped. "Hold on to me."

Above them, Cole shouted for a rescue line. A firefighter who'd arrived with the first state troopers lowered a rope. Lena hooked an arm through it, and they were pulled toward the bank, one painful foot at a time.

On the bridge Vale was on his knees in handcuffs. He'd tried to run while everyone looked at the river. Cole had put him down before he reached his ambulance.

Nora threw herself into Maya's arms as soon as they reached solid ground. Maya had come with the paramedics, her burned hands wrapped in white dressings. The sisters held each other so tightly Lena had to turn away.

A state investigator approached Cole. "We found the B4 patients. Seven alive. We're still searching the hospital records. Rourke's in custody. Pike too."

"And Shaw?" Lena asked.

The investigator lowered her eyes. "He didn't make it."

Lena pictured the security guard on the dock, stepping aside. That one decent act hadn't erased what he'd done. But it had mattered. So had the last one.

Michael Keene arrived at the emergency entrance just before dawn. Daniel came out in a wheelchair, thinner than the man in the beach photograph but smiling through tears. They held each other without a word. Anna's name was still on the missing list, and no one offered false hope.

For one heartbeat, it seemed they had won.

Then Maya swayed. Her smile vanished. She pressed a hand to her chest and collapsed against Nora.

"Maya?" Nora cried. "Maya, stop playing."

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Lena knelt beside her. Maya's pulse was faint, then gone. Paramedics moved in, pulling equipment from their bags as Lena shouted for help.

On the monitor, the line flattened.