I, Alex Cross (Alex Cross 16)

Chapter 113

SHAKEN AND EXHAUSTED, I got home around four thirty that morning, maybe the last of my vampire hours for a while. If Bree wasn’t already up, I was going to wake her and tell her what had happened—

But she wasn’t even there. Bree wasn’t anywhere in the house.

I realized this as soon as I saw Aunt Tia’s big knitting bag on the floor by the kitchen table. Tia had come to stay with the kids, and Saint Bree had gone to cover my overnight at the hospital. Of course she had. She wouldn’t have wanted Nana to be alone any more than I did.

I almost got back in the car, but it made more sense to spell Bree first thing in the morning and let Tia go home then. We were stretched thin as it was.

So I went upstairs and lay on top of the covers, wide awake and buzzing with everything that had happened, not just tonight but in the past few weeks. The scope of it all was going to reverberate for months, even years, I was sure. We still didn’t know how many others like Caroline there had been, and maybe never would. Nor did we know the extent of the cover-up for Zeus, or who had been doing the covering. Theodore Vance had been a successful and very rich businessman on his own. He’d had the resources to do whatever he wished or fantasized about. Apparently that’s exactly what he had done.

Later in the day, I’d have to call my sister-in-law, Michelle. I’d also have to decide how much of her daughter’s story I was going to tell her. Some of the details had no place in a mother’s memory. Sometimes I wonder about the place they have in mine.

It hadn’t been half an hour since I’d gotten home, if that, when the phone rang out in the hall.

I jumped up to catch it before a third ring. Considering the events of the past twenty-four hours, it might have been any number of people looking for me.

“Alex Cross,” I answered in a whisper.

And just like that, life changed again.

“Alex, it’s Zadie Mitchell calling from the hospital. How soon can you get over here?”

Chapter 114

I RAN.

I ran out to the car in the driveway.

I ran my siren all the way to St. Anthony’s, and I ran up four flights of stairs to Nana’s room.

When I came in, Bree was there with tears streaming down her face. And next to her, in the bed, with eyes like slits—but open—was Nana Mama.

Regina Hope Cross, the toughest person I’ve ever known in my life, wasn’t done with us yet.

Her voice was just a crackle, static almost, but it nearly bowled me over. “What took you so long?” she said. “I’m back.”

“Yes, you are.” I was beaming when I knelt down to kiss her as gently as I could. She still had two IVs and the A-V line to her heart, but the vent and feeding tubes were off, and it was like seeing someone I hadn’t laid eyes on for weeks and weeks.

“What did I miss?” she asked.

“Nothing much. Hardly a thing. The world stopped spinning without you.”

“Very funny,” she said, although I was kind of serious. Everything else could wait.

Zadie and one of the cardiologists, Dr. Steig, were in the room monitoring Nana’s condition. “Regina’s going to need what we call an LVAD,” the doctor said. “A left ventricular assist device. It’s the next best thing to a transplant, and it’ll help get her home sooner rather than later.” He put a hand on Nana’s shoulder and spoke up a little. “Looking forward to anything in particular, Regina?”

She nodded groggily. “To not being dead yet,” she said, and I laughed with everyone else.

Her eyes fluttered closed again.

“She’ll be in and out for at least a few days,” Steig said. “Nothing to worry about.”

He took a few more minutes to go over the care plan with Bree and me, and then gave us some time alone in the room.

As we sat together by the bed, Bree told me she’d seen the overnight news. All the major channels were broadcasting live from the Kennedy Center, the White House, and the Vances’ home in Philadelphia. Already, a kind of awkward mourning had begun and was spreading around the country.

“So, is that really it?” Bree asked. “Is it over?”