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I smell smoke and tell myself it's from outside the building, just like when I smelled wood smoke last night when Charlene and I first entered our cabin.

But I know that's not the case.

I try the doorknob. It turns, but the door won't open.

Oh, not good.

Not good at all.

“What's going on?” Dr. Tanbyrn asks.

“Grab your things. We're getting out of here.”

Glenn lit the other stack of chairs.

Lit the dead black woman.

Then he splashed the rest of the gasoline on the floor as he backed toward the exit door.

I slam my shoulder against the door, but it stays firmly in place. Smoke is beginning to curl beneath the door and billow down through the vent above my head. It's acrid and black and it's coming in fast.

“It's the project.” Dr. Tanbyrn coughs. “‘L' and ‘N.'”

“What's it about?” Charlene urges him. “What makes the twins so special?”

I go at the door again, harder, hoping to jar loose whatever is jammed up against it.

Glenn lit the pool of gasoline on the floor. Stepped out the exit door. Pulled out his remaining chain, lock, and key, threaded the chain through the door handle, wound it through the metal post of the fence beside the walkway, and snapped the lock shut.

There was no way out of the building's lower level.

Nothing.

The fire alarm goes off, the sprinklers on the ceiling do not.

I search for something to smash against the door.

The desk is too large to move, or at least too large for me to push with enough momentum to take out the door.

“Communication. Physiology—” Dr. Tanbyrn's explanation is chopped up by hoarse coughing. “Identical twins are much more effective than individuals. I was providing feedback to help them direct and focus their alpha waves, studying the negative . . . the effects . . . if they were . . .”

Charlene has snatched up Tanbyrn's desk phone, but the line must be dead because she drops the receiver again. Pulls out her cell.

Smoke is quickly filling the room. “Get the papers,” I tell them. “On the desk. Project Alpha. And the iPad.”

“Eleven o'clock.” His voice is harsh. “When the eagle falls at the park . . . The twins said—I don't know what it . . .”

I back up and try a front kick against the door, directly beside the doorknob.

A tremor runs up the door, but that's all.

No reception. Charlene pockets her phone.

Tanbyrn is coughing. He's stopped trying to explain the research and is just trying to breathe.

Go. You have to get out now!

With the thick smoke filling the cramped quarters, it isn't going to take long at all for the air to become too toxic to sustain life. I pull my shirt up over my mouth, shout for Charlene and Tanbyrn to do the same.

The vent above us is far too small to climb through.

Back to the door. I try a side kick, but whatever's holding the door shut doesn't budge.

Flames snake down through the vent on the ceiling.

Charlene is supporting the doctor. “Hurry, Jev!”

No windows. No other doors. This is it.

You need to get this door open.

Now.

I try to think of what might be holding it shut.

If this fire was started by a professional, it might be an angled door jammer, a rod with suction cups on its two ends, one that attaches to the door, the other to the floor, so the harder you press on the door, the more firmly the other end suctions to the floor. I did an escape from a room sealed shut with one in a show in Denver a decade ago—

A chair? The end table, a doorstop of some kind?

Impossible to know.

Whatever was there, I can think of only two ways to get out: pop the hinges off the door or slide something through the space beneath the door and push it hard enough to break the seal and knock the jammer—or chair legs, or whatever—out of the way.

The door's hinges are on the other side, so that's not an option. Instead I'd need something thin enough, long enough, strong enough to push under the door and shove whatever was there out of the way.

And I know exactly what that is.

I turn away from the door.

Toward the thick sheet of glass covering Dr. Tanbyrn's desk.

I sweep my arm across the desk, knocking everything to the floor.

Glass is fragile when dropped on end or when pressure is applied to the middle of it, but lengthwise, a sheet as thick as this might just do the trick.

As long as it's not too wide to fit under the door.

Dr. Tanbyrn is coughing harshly and leaning awkwardly against the bookshelf.

“Help me get this glass,” I shout to Charlene. “We need it over by the door!”

As Glenn limped away from the building, he could see a dozen or so people stream down the front steps. None of the three people he'd sealed in the office were among them.

He ducked out of sight behind a tree to watch the place go up in flames.

And fingered the folded-up copy of the front page of the current issue of
USA Today
he had stuffed in his jacket pocket.

Charlene and I have to slide the desk aside to make enough room to get the glass onto the floor.

We position it in front of the doorway, I push it forward, and—thank God—it fits beneath the door. It's at least five feet long, surely long enough to reach the bottom of whatever is lodged against the doorknob. I guide the glass forward a few feet until it meets with resistance.

Dr. Tanbyrn slumps to the floor. Charlene hurries to his side.

Okay, this is where things either went right or very, very wrong. There's nothing else in this room we could use to get out of here.

If the glass cracks or shatters, you're going to die in here.

You're going—

Stop it.

I pull the glass toward me, then press it forward again, nudging the far edge firmly against whatever's holding the door in place. I don't have a great grip, but it seems like it should be sufficient enough to give me the force I need. I push harder, but the glass goes nowhere, the object it's touching doesn't move.

I try again. Nothing.

“Slam it,” Charlene calls urgently. “Jar it loose!”

No choice. I have to try.

Praying the glass won't crack, I grip the end firmly, draw it toward me, and then as swiftly and solidly as I can, I shove it forward.

This time I feel a brief bump of resistance, then the glass keeps moving. Whatever was propped up on the other side of the door clatters to the floor.

Yes!

By now the doorknob will undoubtedly be too hot to touch. I leap to my feet and bunch up the front of my shirt around my hand, but as I'm about to open the door, Charlene yells to me, her voice coming from the floor beside the desk. “Jevin, get over here! It's Tanbyrn! He passed out!”

I kneel beside the doctor.

He's lying still. Breathing but unconscious. Charlene tries to shake him awake, but he doesn't respond.

I shake him myself, call his name. Nothing.

The room is nearly filled with smoke.

You need to carry him, get him out of here.

Yes, but how would we—

The glass will be too hot to hold.

Maybe not, maybe you can get past the fire.

Quickly, I tug off my leather jacket.

“What are you doing?” Charlene is gasping for air herself.

I hand her the jacket, then hurriedly guide the glass back into the room and prop it upright against the desk.

“Jevin, what's the jacket for?”

“Hold the glass in front of you.” I can barely see her through the smoke. Both of us have to yell now to be heard. “I'll carry Tanbyrn, follow you out the door. Tilt it, slide it across the floor, use it like a shield to protect you from the flames.” I help her pull the jacket sleeves over her hands to protect them from getting burned. “Keep your head low and move fast!”

I lift Dr. Tanbyrn, drape him over the back of my shoulders, fireman's carry. Charlene holds the edges of the glass, her hands protected by the leather sleeves of my jacket. The glass plate is heavy, but she should be able to lean into it, move it in front of her along the floorboards, even with her injured arm. At least I hope she can.

With my shirt bunched up around my right hand, I reach for the doorknob.

“Will the flames rush in?” Sharp concern in her voice.

All fires are hungry for oxygen and it's possible the flames would pour in, but we don't have a choice. I needed to open this door.

They might, yes—

“I don't know.”

I grasp the knob.

Turn it.

And open the door.