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Through the torrential downpour, he could barely make out the base of the crane in the distance. He was being lowered into a fenced-in area, on the lawn next to the school. Barbed wire ran along the top of the tall chain-link fences. The only thing inside the fenced-in area was an Airstream trailer. It looked like an aluminum Twinkie. His descent ended as his sneakers sank into the moist grass.

Will unfastened himself. He was glad to get the harness off. The wind surged again, blowing the rain sideways for a second. The harness rose back into the sky. He watched it go until he couldn’t see it anymore.

He was freezing. There were lights on in the trailer. The square windows with rounded corners glowed a faint orange. He hugged himself and hurried over to the door. The rain sprayed off of its rounded roof.

He found the door unlocked. He opened it cautiously and poked his head in. There was no one inside, but a single lamp was on, filling the interior with warm, butterscotch-colored light. There was a bed, a small bathroom, a tiny kitchen with a stove and oven. Cereal boxes and bags of trail mix were arranged neatly on the kitchenette’s counter. He saw a pile of books. The inside of the trailer was dry and he was about to walk inside when he heard someone shout his name.

“Will!”

He turned. There was a figure standing just beyond the fence. Will shielded his eyes from the rain. He couldn’t make out anything more than the shape of a man, but he knew what this was. The second Will had realized that he was holding Sam’s disembodied head in front of Sam’s father, he knew he’d be in serious trouble when he hit the ground. He was going to have to talk his way out of this before Sam’s father pulled out that rifle again.

“Sam was already dead! I didn’t do it!” Will shouted to the man.

“That’s good to hear,” the man said.

Will swore he could feel his heart stop inside his chest. He knew that voice. Will ran toward the fence. The hazy figure brought a scuba mouthpiece up to his face as Will got closer. The mouthpiece stretched his lips out of shape, and his hair was brown now, and his eye patch was black instead of white, but it was him. Will had to hook his fingers through the holes of the fence to keep from falling over.

David was alive.

Copyright

EGMONT
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First published by Egmont USA, 2013

443 Park Avenue South, Suite 806

New York, NY 10016

Copyright © Lex Thomas, 2013

All rights reserved

www.egmontusa.com

www.lex-thomas.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Thomas, Lex.

The Saints / Lex Thomas.

pages cm — (Quarantine ; book 2)

Summary: The world inside an infected Colorado high school quarantined by the government takes a startling turn for the worse when a new gang enters the school and starts gaining power.

eISBN: 978-1-60684-337-6

[1. Survival—Fiction. 2. Gangs—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 4. Virus diseases—Fiction. 5. High schools—Fiction. 6. Schools—Fiction. 7. Science fiction.]

I. Title.

PZ7.T366998Sai 2013

[Fic]—dc23

2013008605

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

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