Chimera (35 page)

The recuperation, Michael’s and mine, gave me time to think. Jericho had never conquered genetic replacement at all, on himself or anyone else. All his successful work must have gone on in the same way it had begun . . . with embryos. Perhaps he did it with surrogate mothers. Or, hell, for all I knew, he could’ve learned to grow the kids in jars in a lab. Regardless, as he’d said on the beach, he’d made them from scratch. I’d wondered if John had been a relative of Jericho’s, his son maybe. Now my best guess was that Jericho, the ultimate egotist, had cloned himself. If he couldn’t have that fucking festive power of killing with a touch, he’d make another Jericho that did. Only it hadn’t turned out that way. John had had a mind and a will of his own. He’d had a soul; made in a lab, of man and not nature, and he’d had the soul Jericho had lacked. Funny how things worked out—funny enough to break your goddamn heart.

Naturally, toward the end, Michael was up and around before I was, but in the beginning . . . heavy doses of painkillers and an unswerving belief in him were all that kept me sane, although that sanity was something my father would have debated.

Anatoly did as I asked; it wasn’t as if he had much choice. I was deadly serious in my threat to him. If he made one misstep, said one wrong word, I would’ve been nothing more than a memory to him. I can’t say he came across as World’s Best Dad, with a mug and shirt on order, once Michael woke up. That had never been him to begin with, but he tried, in a cautious way, to include Michael. If not as a son, he treated him as a rarely seen nephew, with courteous and cautious charm. My father was nothing if not charming . . . when he wanted to be.

As for Michael, he kept his distance. He’d just embraced a brother; he wasn’t quite ready to welcome a father with open arms. It was for the best, all the way around.

But when it came to me, it was different. In his eyes, I was his family. And he committed himself to that in the same way he committed to any project or endeavor, be it research or finding the best fast-food burger ever made. He did it with a wholehearted and stubborn ferocity. It was a humbling thing to see. It made it difficult for me to mourn Lukas. I should have, but in the bright light of day I couldn’t. To my conscious mind, Michael was my brother, recovered memories and unfeeling reality be damned. It was only when I slept and the nightmares came that I was able to give Lukas his due, and I gave it to him over and over again.

Those nightmares in turn brought to mind Michael’s dreams, the ones of sun and horses that he’d mentioned. They hadn’t been his dreams at all; they’d been mine. Or, a more comforting thought, they’d been Lukas’s. He’d had a heart, Lukas . . . far bigger and better than mine was. If he could’ve sent a message of hope to another lost boy, he would have. And if anyone could have received that gift, it would’ve been Michael. Jericho had tried to accelerate psychic growth in his subjects, and he’d succeeded in the darker areas. It could be he had as well in ways not measured in dying cells or exploding organs, but in light and luminous promise.

What had happened might never be explained, and that was all right. Faith in the unknown can be a tenuous thing for people like me. It was best to let it be what it was—a warm glow close enough to be seen and just far enough away not to be marred by a skeptical touch.

But faith went only so far. With the Institute still out there, even without Jericho at the helm, I thought it prudent to continue to play rabbit for a while, hiding from any unseen hawks. When the national news carried a piece on a noted St. Louis scientist disappearing, it only cemented my determination.

In a time of hypersecurity, there were still certain borders that were crossed easily and anonymously enough if one had the cash. With what Anatoly gave us when we left, that wasn’t going to be a problem for a long while. He made me swear to stay alive long enough for him to find us once he wrapped up business for good. I said I’d do my best, but I had my doubts that my father’s elusive day would ever come. I hoped it would. Michael would want a father someday, and a retired crime boss might be better than nothing at all—at least theoretically, as Michael would say.

Weeks passed, then months, until one day I was sitting at a small table in the hot sun when a suitcase was deposited unceremoniously beside my feet. The dust cloud from it hung in the unmoving air as Saul dropped wearily in the chair across from me. Dressed in an impeccable if impractical white silk shirt and pair of eggplant purple linen pants, he lifted a straw hat from his head to wave before his sweat-beaded face. “This place is like the Everglades on steroids,” he said with wheezing outrage as he ducked a large mosquito. “Jesus, even the bugs are pumping iron. The women though . . . Nice. Very nice.”

“Nice to see you too, Saul,” I said dryly, moving my cane out of his way and leaning it against the table. Michael, who stood at the cantina door, was flirting shamelessly with our waitress. In addition to fluent horny teenage-ese, he spoke flawless Spanish. Me? I tended to point and grunt a lot. When Michael caught sight of Saul, his face hardened perceptibly into a scowl and he started for us. He’d become rather protective of me, punk-ass kid that he was. I waved him off and flashed an “okay” sign.

Saul caught the exchange and raised eyebrows over five-hundred-dollar sunglasses. “Hmmm. He’s grown. He must eat you out of house and hovel.” Commandeering my untouched beer, he finished off the bottle in four parched swallows. Afterward, he pulled a handkerchief, an actual English gentleman’s handkerchief—which I was positive they hadn’t made since my grandfather’s time—from his pocket and fastidiously mopped sweat from his neck. Finally, he relaxed, put his feet up in the spare chair, and said calmly, “I have the information you wanted.”

I knew he had. He wouldn’t have come all this way to deliver bad news. But the statement still had the power to make my pulse jump and my eyes narrow. “You found them?”

He nodded and cracked a triumphant grin. “They can run, but they can’t hide. I found them, Smirnoff. I found those bastards and I found the kids.”

We hadn’t forgotten the others, Michael and I. It might take years to be able to go after them, but now we knew where they were. Now we had a start. “Thanks, Saul,” I said with grim satisfaction. “Thanks a whole helluva lot.”

“Yeah, yeah. Thanks are nice, but I’ll wait for that bonus you promised before I get too excited.” He grunted as he gestured desperately for another beer. “So, Bolivia, eh? It’s not exactly a vacation spot to the stars, is it? What brought you here?”

“Butch and Sundance,” I said obliquely, a faint smile hovering on my lips.

He gave me a sideways glance and, fearing the heat had gotten the best of me, held up two fingers for the waitress. She ignored him and, not put off in the slightest by the ferret on his shoulder, continued to give Michael the undivided attention of a pair of stunning dark eyes. His hair was brown again and it suited him. Certainly most of the local girls seemed to think so. Snorting in disgust, Saul turned back to me and commented, “He looks good. Healthy, happy. You guys getting along all right? Like each other okay? Hugs all around?” He grinned again at my exasperated groan, all humor and blinding white teeth. “What? You’re family. That doesn’t mean you’re obligated by law to love each other.”

The exasperation faded as I watched Michael laugh and take the girl’s hand in his own. He took it with ease. There was no hesitation; no concern that he might lose control and hurt her; no fear that he was a monster. He held her hand as if he were nothing more than an infatuated teenage boy.

“What’s not to love?” I said simply. “He’s my brother.”