Jack nodded. "Because there's no chance of my mutation getting paired with another like it."

"Correct. But should you impregnate a woman with a similar mutation, there's still a fifty-fifty chance of producing a carrier, but also a one-in-four chance of producing a child with cystic fibrosis. This is why first-degree relatives—parents, children, siblings—shouldn't mate."

"More chance of sharing recessives."

"Right. Hemophilia is a recessive that ran rampant through the royal families of Europe due to intermarriage."

They sat in silence for the moment, then he noticed Jack refolding the printout and slipping it into a pocket.

"Hey, you can't have that."

"I'll need it to show Christy. She'll never believe me without it."

Aaron felt a stab of panic. It had "Creighton" printed in large, boldface type across the top of the sheet.

"No! If she shows it to Bolton he'll know it was me!"

"Relax. I'll show her a Xerox with the logo folded out of sight. You'll have no connection."

Not good enough.

"But it won't help you! It has no names!"

"I've got to show her something, doc, and this is better than nothing. Be cool. 1 don't want to see you hurt. You're my man on the inside. I'll keep Creighton out of it. Trust me."

Trust him? He didn't know if he could trust anyone at this point. Except maybe this man.

Not that he had a choice. He couldn't very well take it from him.

More silence as Aaron wondered what Jack was thinking. Then he realized he hadn't got an answer to his previous question.

"Why didn't Thompson impregnate Dawn? Did Bolton want to bed his own daughter?"

Jack shrugged. "Maybe he's sterile. Maybe they don't know about recessive traits. But then again…" His voice trailed off.

Watching him, Aaron saw a look of growing wonder on Jack's face.

"What? What is it?"

"Maybe they want to match up certain recessive genes. Maybe that's been the whole purpose of this scheme all along." And then he shrugged. "And maybe not." He smiled. "Too bad I can't simply ask Bolton next time I run into him."

Aaron opened his mouth, then closed it again. Here was the perfect time to say something to Jack about Julia giving Bolton his description. He should say something. Really he should…

But he wanted that showdown, wanted Bolton hurt.

Of course it might be Jack who wound up getting hurt, maybe even killed.

Bolton could walk up behind him and gun him down just like he did the abortionists.

But he held his tongue. He'd have to trust that Jack had more street smarts than Bolton. A good bet, since Bolton had been off the streets for the last eighteen years.

Still… all the street smarts in the world wouldn't stop a bullet in the back.

Sometimes Aaron hated himself.

5

Jeremy watched Hank as he stood at a window and peeked through the blinds.

"You sure you weren't followed?"

"Absolutely."

No way was Jeremy absolutely sure, but he was reasonably sure. He wasn't exactly an expert at this sort of thing. But he'd made a lot of turns coming down here to this Lower East Side Kicker crib, and he'd watched carefully the whole way. He hadn't seen anyone following him.

Hank let the blind slat drop and turned to him.

"All right, what's so important that we couldn't discuss this over the phone?"

"Like I told you, someone's been testing my DNA and knows I'm related to Moonglow."

"So she knows—?"

"Yeah, she knows. Question is, how long before he tests my DNA against the girl's?"

Hank pressed his palms against the sides of his head and began to walk in a circle about the room.

"Oh hell! Oh damn! Oh shit! Who is this guy? We've got to get to him, make him stop!"

"Vecca and Levy already tried that. Paid him off but he still keeps snooping. Almost like he's got some sort of hard-on for me. I mean, like it's personal."

Even though Jerry Bethlehem hadn't been around long enough for anyone to have something personal against him, the thought didn't sit well.

"Yeah. Funny, I've run into someone like that too."

Here we go. Can't let this get too far from rich, famous, too-important-to-get-my-hands-dirty Hank. His attitude sucked. Jeremy resisted the urge to pop him one.

"Well, unless he's threatening to take a shit in the Bloodline, like my guy, maybe we should forget about him for the moment."

"Okay, okay. What do we do?"

"Well, since I've never seen him, we'll have to try to beat him at his own game. That's where you come in."

Hank's tone turned cautious. "Yeah?"

"Well, he's been following me. So what we do is have you follow me too, only you'll know where I'm going so you can hang back and watch for anyone on my tail."

Hank was nodding. "Sounds like a plan." Then he frowned. "But what do we do when we find him?"

"Then we follow him. And we convince him that he doesn't want to stick his nose in my life anymore."

"And if he doesn't listen?"

Jeremy shrugged. "Then he disappears."

Hank was shaking his head. "Oh, no. Not while I'm within a hundred miles. Include me out."

Jeremy felt his temper heating.

"You gonna let me down again, bro? You gonna let Daddy down again too?"

He remembered his talks with his daddy whenever he'd come to visit. A scary man, Daddy, what with that patch over his bad eye and the way he'd fix him with the bright blue of his good one. But once he got talking, his smooth voice would wrap around Jeremy and caress him like a warm breeze, making the scaredness go away. Jeremy knew he'd inherited some of Daddy's gift for persuasion, but only some.

Daddy knew things no one else knew, saw things with his dead eye that no one else saw. He'd talk of gods—not the gods that everyone had heard of. Those were just stories, he'd said. He spoke of other gods, the Others, locked out from the world, waiting for ages to return.

He told of the special blood that ran through his veins, and ran through his children's. They all were part of a special Bloodline that made them shine in the eyes of the Others, but their Bloodline had been diluted and polluted over the ages. It had to be concentrated and purified.

Daddy would tell him over and over about his Plan to do just that, and about the parts Jeremy and his half brother Hank were to play, and how together with a girl named Moonglow they would create the Key, a pure-blooded child who would unlock the gates that prevented the Others from returning to the Earth and reclaiming it.

And when they did return they would reward those of the Bloodline who had made it possible. Daddy would ascend to the throne of Earth and Jeremy and Hank would be his princes.

Daddy's soothing voice had stayed with Jeremy, repeating the story and the things they must do to bring the Plan to fruition, and left him with never a moment's doubt of its truth. But then Daddy stopped coming around. He'd warned that there might come a day when that happened, and he'd made Jeremy swear by the blood of the prince within him that he'd see the Plan through to its finish.

Jeremy had sworn. So had Hank. But obviously Hank's promises didn't mean much.

"We're not going to get into this again, are we?" Hank said. "I told you—"

"You told me you had your own thing going and that Daddy could shove his Bloodline up his ass!"

"I never said anything of the sort. What I'm doing is just as necessary to the Plan as what you're doing."

"Bullshit! The Plan was this: I knocked up Moonglow, so you were supposed to knock up her kid."

Hank rolled his eyes. "I know, but I'm identified with the Kicker movement—right now the movement is me—and I can't risk getting involved with knocking up an eighteen-year-old."