Chapter 3 3

The alarm was deafening. Beep-beep-beep-beep.

Mia moved with a speed that would have been impossible to track with the naked eye.

She placed her left thumb on the center of Lucas's forehead, anchoring his head. With her right hand, she drove the first needle into the Baihui point at the very top of his skull.

Lucas's body jerked. A spasm ran through his limbs.

Mia didn't flinch. She grabbed two more needles. She felt for the base of his skull, finding the Fengchi points where the neck muscles met the hairline.

Thwip. Thwip.

She inserted the needles deep, twisting them slightly to engage the fascia.

Outside, the pounding on the door had turned into heavy thuds. They were using a ram or their shoulders. The wood splintered.

"Come on," Mia whispered, sweat beading on her upper lip.

She flicked the ends of the needles with her fingernail. The vibration traveled down the metal shaft, sending a micro-electric current directly into the dormant nervous system.

She watched the monitor.

28... 28...

"Breathe, you arrogant bastard," she hissed.

35.

42.

50.

The red light on the monitor turned green. The frantic beeping slowed to a steady rhythm.

Crack!

The door lock gave way.

Mia instantly swept her hand across Lucas's head, pulling the needles out in one fluid motion. She palmed them, sliding them into her sleeve.

She threw herself onto Lucas's chest, grabbing the lapels of his silk pajamas.

"Wake up! Please, wake up!" she wailed, shaking him.

The door burst open. Katherine, Dr. Hamilton, and three nurses stumbled in.

Katherine saw Mia on top of her son. She shrieked. "Get off him! You're killing him!"

She rushed forward, grabbing a handful of Mia's hair and yanking her backward.

Mia let herself be thrown. She collapsed onto the floor, burying her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking. She wasn't crying; she was hiding the intense focus in her eyes.

"Code Blue! Get the crash cart!" Dr. Hamilton yelled, rushing to the monitors.

He reached for the paddles, then froze.

He blinked. He tapped the screen.

Heart rate: 75. Oxygen saturation: 98%. Blood pressure: 110/70.

Stable. Perfectly, impossibly stable.

The room went silent. The only sound was the steady beep... beep... of a healthy heart.

Katherine stood frozen, a clump of Mia's hair still in her hand. Her mouth hung open.

"Doctor?" she whispered. "Is the machine broken?"

Dr. Hamilton checked the leads on Lucas's chest. "No... no, it's reading correctly. He's... he's back from the brink. It's a spontaneous recovery."

Mia sniffed loudly from the floor. "I... I just prayed," she stammered, her voice trembling. "I saw him stop breathing, and I just shook him and told him he couldn't leave."

Dr. Hamilton frowned. "Shaking a patient doesn't reverse bradycardia." But he had no other explanation.

A cane tapped against the floor tiles. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Winston Kensington, the patriarch, stood in the doorway. He was eighty years old, bent with age, but his eyes were sharp as diamonds. He looked at the monitor. He looked at Mia, huddled on the floor in her ugly gray dress.

"The girl is a variable," Winston croaked, his eyes narrowing as he analyzed the data on the screen. "His vitals spiked the moment she touched him. It's a physiological response. She stays."

Katherine dropped the hair she was holding. She fell to her knees beside the bed, sobbing over Lucas's hand.

"Get out," Winston ordered the medical staff. "Let him rest." He pointed a gnarled finger at Mia. "You. You stay. You watch him tonight. If that line goes flat again, scream."

The room cleared out.

As Julian walked past Mia, he paused. He looked at her tear-stained face, then down at her chest rising and falling.

"Lucky charm," he muttered, his voice thick with something that wasn't gratitude. It was hunger. "Maybe you can bring me some luck later."

The door closed.

Mia waited until the footsteps faded. She slowly stood up. She wiped her face. Her expression was dry and cold.

She walked to the bedside. Lucas was breathing deeply now, color returning to his cheeks.

"You owe me a life, Lucas," she whispered.

She leaned in to check the needle marks. They were invisible, hidden by his dark hair.

Suddenly, the hair on the back of her neck stood up. She felt eyes on her.

She snapped her head up. In the corner of the ceiling, a small red light blinked on a security camera.

Shit.

If they reviewed the footage frame by frame, they might see the glint of silver.

Mia turned her back to the camera, pretending to adjust her dress. She moved toward the medical cart, spotting a high-powered magnetic resonance tool used for calibrating the sensors. With a sleight of hand she had perfected in the favelas of Rio, she palmed the magnet. She walked casually toward the corner of the room, pretending to inspect the crown molding. When she was directly under the camera, she reached up, as if stretching, and held the magnet near the housing. The interference field would create a localized distortion-a few seconds of static on the recording, just enough to blur her earlier movements if anyone looked too closely.

She sat in the armchair next to the bed. She reached out and took Lucas's hand. To the camera, it looked like a devoted wife holding her husband's hand. In reality, her fingers were on his wrist, monitoring his pulse, counting the seconds until she could find her son.