Vanished by Kathryn Mackel Read Free Book Online Page A

automatically."

    "It's bright. Too bright for the lights." Chloe stepped back,
her eyes wide. "The stairwell is on fire."
    "It can't be," Jon said, no scientist now as he tried to pretend
that what he saw was not what was. A steady flame filled the stairwell, casting tremendous light but little heat. "There's no smoke."
    "Too hot for smoke. Pure combustion."
    "It's not hot at all. Do you feel any heat? And precisely what is
burning? The stairs are cast in concrete and the railing is steel."
    "We go by facts, Jon. We see fire. Therefore, there is fuel for
it to burn."
    Jon looked at his feet, expecting to see the walkway shift
under him as reason slipped sideways. His stomach roiled, and
he had to swallow hard to keep from vomiting. He bent over,
taking deep breaths.
    "Are you OK?" Chloe patted his back. Always cool in crisis,
though the worst crisis they had faced up to now was telling her
traditional parents that they had eloped.
    Nothing like this-whatever this was. "The numbers don't
add up," Jon muttered.
    "What?"
    "Nothing, just thinking." He couldn't figure out this atypical
fire simply because he didn't have all the facts. There was no
mystery-no impossibility. Just a calculation still waiting for its
variables to be plugged in before he could solve it.
    "Come on. We have to get away from this until we know
what it is."
    "Yeah. OK."
    "We should follow the train west. To the next access stairway.
That's what-four kilometers?"
    "Yeah." Jon turned with her, heading in the direction of
the New York line. "Just for something to do. While we wait
for someone to come."
    "Will someone come?"
    "I promise they will," Jon said, not daring to make it absolute.

     

chapter thirteen
    EN RACED AWAY AS FAST AS HIS BATTERED BODY WOULD
allow. He could outrun the cops but not the scent of
Jasmine's perfume on his shirt, the feel of her touch on
his skin.
    The image of her being blown apart.
    Not just her. Other people, bodies lying around, scorched
and broken. The worst ones were those who were still alive and
moaning. Deep, guttural sounds, like wounded animals. At
least jasmine had been spared that, though Ben would live with
the smell of burnt flesh for the rest of his life.
    Which might not be much longer.
    How terrifying had this Luther been to send her running
into the bomb? Or had she simply not believed Ben when he
said the mound of clay was plastique and the tiny wires and
Blackberry-type device a detonator?
    He'd be blamed for the whole thing.
    Even if no one remembered Ben carrying the knapsack,
witnesses would recall him warning people away from the
Circle. How long would it be before his description was on FOX
News, along with a sketch of a geek with thick glasses and a
Celtics shirt?
    Slow down, don't run. People would notice running. Ben
shoved his glasses into his pocket and hunched his shoulders like
most kids in the Flats. As he cut down a side street, no one even
gave him a second look. Almost everyone moved in the opposite
direction, more interested in seeing danger than fleeing it.

    Was that something in the shadows? Maybe just the wind
ruffling the leaves of a small birch tree. Or-maybe not. Maybe
Luther had spotted him and wanted to turn him into the same
red mist jasmine had become. Would a bullet to the head be
more merciful than getting blown up by a bomb?
    Ben ran down another block and into the alley next to
Pizza King. He climbed onto the Dumpster and hopped onto
the roof of the shop. When he, Cannon, and Tripp were little
kids-in those innocent days before they had to worry about
their status on the "street"-they used to shoot acorns down
on people coming out of the store, then flatten to the shingles
and try not to laugh.
    The street in front of Pizza King was empty. The quiet gave
him goose bumps. Where were the fire trucks and the bomb
squad people? It was almost ten minutes since the blast. Had
bombs exploded somewhere else in Barcester? That would