“You think you’re going to save me, Daniel, but you’re wrong.”
She looks out across the dark expanse of the city. The wind pulls at her clothing.
“I don’t need to be saved. I just need to finish what we started.”
“We?”
“My family. My legacy,” she says, and she steps off the building.
I rush to the edge, and I see her falling back into space.
Few people could do what she’s attempting. A fall like this would cause most people to flail, spinning out of control. They might pass out before they hit the ground or even have a heart attack.
But Miranda expertly adjusts her body in the air, spreading her arms and legs in the classic arch position of a skydiver. A falling object does not accelerate indefinitely. It reaches a terminal velocity and cannot fall any faster. By taking the arch position, she controls her descent, creating wind resistance and increasing the time it takes for her to reach terminal velocity.
There is no way that she will survive, but she’s not trying to survive.
She’s trying to complete her mission.
In the last seconds I see her pull her arms together above her head, the cell phone still clutched tightly in one hand, the other reaching to press the keys.
I turn away before she hits the ground.
A second later I feel the deep rumble of explosives detonating far below me.
The vibration travels up the steel of the building like a great shiver, and then the roof suddenly tilts to one side as a critical support lets loose in the structure far below. The angle steepens as another support gives way.
This is not a professional demolition, a neat series of explosions that will collapse one floor upon the next. It’s an enormous blast in one corner of the building that sends it leaning sickeningly to one side.
There’s no way for me to get out of the building in time.
The best I can do is to run in the direction of the building’s fall.
My mind is racing, calculating angle and distance as it changes moment to moment.
There are perhaps thirty feet between this rooftop and the next nearest building, a smaller tower across the street.
Thirty feet away and a seventy foot drop. An impossible jump.
But as the federal building tilts, the space between the buildings decreases.
If I can time it right, it will be like jumping from one falling domino to the next one that has not yet fallen.
If I can time it.
Metal screams and windows explode beneath me. I hear bolts snapping and people shouting from the ground below.
Terror beats in my chest. I imagine jumping into space and falling, plummeting to the ground like Miranda.
Twenty-five feet between rooftops now.
That’s what my eye is telling me, but I might be wrong. Under this amount of duress, judgment can falter. I’m trained to work under pressure, to make significant and life-changing decisions under the most extraordinary circumstances.
Fifteen feet might be an acceptable risk. But twenty-five feet?
I’ve got seconds left to decide.
I’m too afraid to move. I’m frozen in place with the calculations racing through my mind, the distance, the possibility of making the jump, the likelihood of making a mistake.
The building tilts farther, knocking me to the rooftop. I manage to get back to my feet.
If I stay here I’m going to die. If I jump, at least I’ll have a chance.
Certain death or uncertain life.
Suddenly distance doesn’t matter.
I propel myself forward, running for the edge. I wait until the last possible moment, and then I jump into space—
I’m more than halfway across when I realize I’m not going to make it.
I’m descending faster than I’m moving forward, and even though I elongate my body and reach with my arms, there’s no way I will get to the other side.
I flash back to a week ago, the camp in Vermont, a beautiful summer day, a dark-green lake. I was leaping from a cliff, trusting fate as I dove into the water.
It’s easy to trust fate when you think it’s on your side.
But sometimes fate turns against you.
The way it did me, the day I met Mike.
The way it does to the people I meet on my missions, the people who breathe their last breaths in my arms.
The way it’s turning against me now.
Because now I am falling.
There is open air beneath my feet. I take a final breath, filling my lungs with oxygen, preparing myself for the terrifying drop to the pavement below.
Fate will have its way with me now in the form of a last fall.
My training doesn’t matter anymore. I’m falling, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
That’s when I see it.
A rope.
It appears in front of me seemingly out of nowhere, bright-orange knots in intervals down its length.
For a moment, I think I’m imagining it. A visual hallucination from a desperate boy who is about to die.
Illusion or not, I reach for it.
My fingers wrap around hard nylon cord. Real cord.
I grasp it and my hands slip. It takes every bit of strength I have to hang on hard enough to stop my fall.
But I am strong. I don’t let go.
My hands burn down the length of the rope until I come to a stop near the very end. Suddenly I go from falling to rising into the air, the rope swinging from side to side as I’m buffeted by strong winds from above.
I look up, following the length of nylon upward, craning my neck until I find its source. The rope has been dropped from a helicopter.
I stare up at its belly as it rises slowly, the rotors catching air and pulling me away.
When I look below, I see the Federal Building collapsing onto a downtown street, a rolling dust cloud enveloping several city blocks. It is an image that is terrible and familiar at the same time.
With the building gone, the darkness in the city is complete. Boston is a black void beneath me. Above me is open air.
I climb.
I reach the skid of the helicopter, then pull myself up into the cargo hold. I recognize this helicopter. I flew one just like it in Vermont less than a week ago.
I flop onto the floor and pull the door closed behind me.
The pilot looks back at me, a concerned expression on his face.
It’s Father.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR
“WELCOME BACK,” HE SAYS.
“Where did you come from?”
“What does it matter? I’m here. Dropping you a lifeline.”
Lifeline.
It’s the same term Francisco used.
“Why now?” I say.
“Because you needed one now, wouldn’t you say?”
“And before? When I was cut off in Camp Liberty, trying to communicate with you?”
“That’s a longer conversation,” he says.
I watch Father, his face impassive as he scans my body, assessing my health.
“You weren’t injured,” he says.
More a statement than a question.
“I wasn’t injured,” I say.
“Then let’s get you out of here.”
CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE
I USE A FIELD DRESSING TO WRAP MY BLEEDING HANDS.
Then I climb into the passenger seat next to Father.
I look at the sky through the windshield. A moment ago it looked like death. Now it looks like the opposite.
“I haven’t been able to get ahold of you for four days,” I say.
Father won’t look at me. His focus is straight ahead as he monitors the helicopter’s controls.
“I tried to contact you,” I say angrily. “We had contingencies in place, a safe house, a plan—”
“I know,” Father says.
“But you disappeared! Why?”
“I was under orders,” he says. “I had no choice but to cut you off.”