“Who are you?” she whispered.

“Drake Sebastian,” Drake said. “This is my wife, Alice. We can talk this out later. We need to get out of here.”

The woman flinched, frowned in confusion, and then pulled herself together with visible effort. “I don’t understand.”

“Neither do I,” Drake said. “We’ll deal with it later.”

Alice heard something stir in the shadows. Houdini growled again.

Drake grasped one of the woman’s arms. Alice took the other. They ran back toward the fence line. Houdini dashed after them.

They plunged through the psi-barrier. When they were on the far side, Alice allowed herself a small sigh of relief. Drake stopped and turned to look at the woman.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“Karen,” the woman said. “Karen Rosser.” She swallowed hard. “Are you going to arrest me?”

“Why would I do that?” Drake asked.

“We were told that any member of the staff who violated the terms of the contract would be subject to arrest.”

Alice frowned. “What contract?”

“The one we signed with the company,” Karen whispered. She pointed to the logo on her green uniform shirt. “I know that the Dream Chamber Project here on the island is supposed to be top secret. But I just couldn’t take it anymore.”

Drake was looking at the logo on Karen’s shirt. Alice followed his gaze. Clearly embroidered was a familiar company name: Sebastian, Inc., Rainshadow Foundation.

“Looks like we are going to have an interesting conversation on the hike to Shadow Bay,” Drake said.

Chapter 14

THEY SET OFF IN A SINGLE FILE, DRAKE AND HOUDINI in the lead. Karen fell in behind Drake. Alice brought up the rear. The walking was difficult in places but not impossible. The sky remained leaden. The dark fog crouched just offshore, waiting for the energy of the night to summon it. The ominous sensation in the atmosphere did not fade, even though they were putting distance between themselves and the cove.

“All right, Karen, let’s start at the beginning,” Drake said. “Tell me about the Dream Chamber Project.”

“I don’t know where to begin,” Karen said. “It’s all been such a nightmare.”

“You said you were working for the Rainshadow Foundation arm of Sebastian, Inc.”

“That’s right. I was hired as a research assistant a few months ago. I’ve got the paperwork to prove it.”

“And you were employed here on the island,” Drake said.

“Until I couldn’t take the stress any longer. We tried to quit.”

“Who is we?” Drake asked.

“The other research assistant, Pete Banks. Like I said, we tried to quit but she wouldn’t let us. When we tried to leave she had the security people lock us up. I managed to escape this morning but—”

Drake stopped and looked back at Karen. “Who had the security people lock you up?”

“Dr. Tucker,” Karen said.

“Dr. Zara Tucker,” Drake said, repeating the name very precisely, making sure.

“Yes,” Karen said.

“Damn,” Drake said. “Well, that certainly answers a few questions.” He looked at Alice. “I knew she wasn’t dead.”

“But what has she been doing for the past three years?” Alice asked.

“Isn’t it obvious? Zara Tucker spent the last three years plotting her revenge against me and my family.”

Chapter 15

DRAKE LOOKED AT KAREN. “LET’S START WITH A BASIC fact. Neither Sebastian, Inc. nor the Rainshadow Foundation has authorized any research projects here on the island.”

“I don’t understand,” Karen said. “Dr. Tucker made it clear that we were signing up as research assistants at a Foundation-approved excavation project.”

“Dr. Tucker is not affiliated with the Foundation,” Drake said. He started walking again. “Officially she isn’t even alive. She was declared dead three years ago.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Karen said. “A woman named Dr. Tucker is running the project here on Rainshadow. She’s got lab equipment that carries the Foundation logo. Her security people wear Foundation uniforms.” She glanced down at her shirt. “Pete and I were issued Foundation gear.”

“Zara Tucker is a brilliant but mentally unstable scientist,” Drake said. “She spent a full year working in the Sebastian labs. She also has a way of convincing others, usually males, to do what she wants them to do.”

“You’re telling me,” Karen said grimly. “I’ve seen the way men respond to her. Even Pete thought he was in love with her for a time. He wanted to be her hero. They all do.” Karen glanced at Alice. “You know how some women just seem to have a talent for making men fall all over themselves to please them?”

Alice hid a rueful smile. “Oh, yeah.”

Drake’s jaw hardened. “Keep talking, Karen.”

“Well, the good news/bad news is that after a while Tucker’s charm seems to wear off,” Karen said.

Out of the corner of her eye Alice saw a pained expression come and go across Drake’s face. But he said nothing.

Karen did not appear to notice.

“Personally, I knew there was something a little weird about her from the start,” Karen said. “But, hey, she’s some giant-brained scientific type, right? They’re probably all a little weird. I figured she was really, really focused on her research project. In any event, it wasn’t like I could just walk away from the excavation ruins.”

Drake glanced back over his shoulder. “Why not?”

Karen waved a hand to indicate the dark woods. “It’s somewhere out there in the frickin’ Preserve. Ten steps outside the ruins and you’re lost. The only people who can come and go on a regular basis are the security guards. Besides, Pete and I had signed those contracts and the money was really good. We planned to get married and buy a house when the project was finished. Anyhow, a few weeks ago Dr. Tucker really started losing it.”

“Define losing it,” Drake said.

“She was temperamental from the beginning, but when it became obvious that the Chamber was overheating, she became full-on whacko,” Karen said. “That’s when two of the security guys took off. That made her crazy for a time.”

“What happened to the security guards?” Drake asked.

“Pete and I heard them talking just before they left. They knew the situation inside the Chamber was deteriorating. We heard them making plans to take the boat that they kept in Deception Cove. They used it to bring in supplies.”

“There’s no boat back there except the one we arrived in,” Drake said.

“I’m assuming they got off the island.”

“How many guards are left?” Drake asked.

“Only one, the boss of the security team. His name is Quinton. Pete and I are pretty sure that he and Dr. Tucker are lovers. Well, he thinks he’s in love with her, at any rate. I doubt if Dr. Tucker has ever loved anyone but herself in her entire life. Quinton is definitely under Tucker’s spell, though. I think he’d do anything for her. He pretty much proved it by sticking around after the other two guards took off. Now he’s trapped here on the island, same as everyone else.”

Drake looked back at Karen again. “How did you get away?”

“With this.” Karen took a small crystal flute out of her pocket. “Pete managed to steal it. Dr. Tucker found a few of them when she excavated the underground ruins. The two guards used them to bring in supplies. They used one to get away the other day.”

Alice took a closer look at the flute. “What is it?”

“Alien technology,” Drake explained briefly. “Harry told me that they turned up a few of these in the aquarium. The flutes can be used to navigate the Preserve to some extent, but their usefulness is limited because they have to be tuned to specific locations.”