Black mud. Cold. It filled her nose. Rot and salt.

  Frankie hit the ground hard. She didn’t stick the landing. The sludge was too slick, a mixture of harbor silt and that alien, thick slime dripping from the ship. Her feet slid out from under her. She went down on one knee, the impact jarring her teeth.

  Her red silk dress—the one meant for candlelight and soft jazz—soaked up the filth instantly.

  Great. Just great.

  She gasped, pulling air into lungs that felt too tight.

  Above her, the SS Borealis blocked out the sky. The iron hull was a wall of black, groaning as it settled deeper into the crushed pier. Metal shrieked against stone.

  Skreeeeee.

  The sound from the bridge rang in her ears. That dinner bell.

  She scrambled to her feet. Her knee throbbed. Human pain. She could ignore it.

  She needed to move. That thing—the crewman with the worms in his face—was up there. And he wasn’t alone.

  Run, her brain said. Run to Damon.

  But the sound held her.

  Thrum. Thrum. Thrum.

  Down here, at the base of the ship, the vibration was worse. It wasn’t just a noise. It was a drill pressing into her temple. It rattled the fillings in her teeth. It made her vision swim.

  It was coming from inside the hull. Specifically, from a jagged tear in the metal plating just above the waterline.

  The crash had ripped the ship open like a tin can.

  Frankie wiped a glob of slime from her cheek. It burned slightly, acidic.

  She stepped closer to the breach.

  The fog swirled around the opening, thick and white, pulsating with the rhythm of the thrum.

  The jagged metal of the tear tangled something.

  A shape. Blue fabric. A boot.

  Another one.

  Frankie approached slowly. The mud sucked at her bare feet. Schluck. Schluck.

  It was a woman this time. Or what’s left of her.

  She was hanging halfway out of the breach, caught on a piece of twisted rebar. Her arms dangled loosely, swaying in the wind.

  Frankie grabbed the railing of the shattered boardwalk and pulled herself up to eye level.

  “Hey,” she whispered.

  No answer.

  Frankie reached out. She touched the woman’s hand.

  Papery. Dry.

  She turned the hand over.

  No puncture marks. No neat little vampire bites on the wrist or neck.

  Frankie leaned in, squinting through the gloom.

  The skin wasn’t just pale; red lines tracked under the skin. Burst capillaries. Thousands of them.

  “What did this to you?” Frankie murmured.

  She looked at the woman’s eyes. Open. Frozen. The whites were gone, filled with pooled blood that had dried black. A rictus of agony locked her mouth, lips pulled back from gums that were gray and shrunken.

  Vampires took the blood. They left a corpse that looked like it were sleeping.

  This… this was different.

  This thing had boiled her from the inside out. It had pressurized her veins until they popped.

  Frankie dropped the woman’s hand. It swung back, hitting the metal with a hollow thud.

  The thrum spiked.

  Frankie clutched her head. A spike of pain shot behind her eyes.

  Inside the breach—inside the cargo hold—something was glowing. A faint, rhythmic blue light.

  It called to her. Not with a voice, but with a sensation. A pull. Like a magnet dragging iron filings.

  Come closer. Come see.

  She gripped the jagged edge of the hull. She put one foot on a bent girder.

  “Just a peek,” she told herself. “Assess the threat. Then run.”

  She pulled herself up.

  The darkness of the cargo hold smelled of ozone and rotten meat. The blue light pulsed deep within. Light hit shapes. Rows of containers? Or pods?

  She leaned forward.

  WHAM.

  The world turned white.

  Frankie flinched, throwing her hands up to shield her eyes.

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  The light wasn’t blue. It was harsh, halogen white. It didn’t pulse. It blinded.

  “FREEZE!”

  Loud and anger amplified the voice.

  “Step away from the wreckage! Put your hands where I can see them!”

  White light. Blindness. Spotlights. Four of them. Cutting through the fog like lasers.

  Thump. Thump. Thump. Rotor wash hit her. Sand stung her eyes.

  “I said freeze!”

  Frankie let go of the hull. She dropped back down into the mud.

  She raised her hands.

  “Don’t shoot!” she yelled back.

  More lights snapped on from the boardwalk wreckage above. Red and blue strobes.

  Sirens wailed, piercing the heavy air.

  Figures emerged from the fog. Armored figures.

  Black tactical gear. Helmets. Assault rifles raised and pointed directly at her chest.

  SWAT.

  Seriously?

  “Get on the ground!” a voice bellowed.

  Frankie recognized that bark. Sheriff Burke.

  “Sheriff!” Frankie shouted, keeping her hands visible. “It’s me! Frankie Rivera!”

  “Get her down!” Burke shouted back. He was standing behind a barricade of rubble, megaphone in hand. “Seal the perimeter! On the ground! Face down! Now!”

  A red laser dot appeared on Frankie’s chest. Then another on her forehead.

  Okay. Not joking.

  Frankie slowly lowered herself to her knees. The mud soaked through the silk instantly. Cold. Wet. Humiliating.

  “There’s something on the ship!” Frankie yelled. “Sheriff, listen to me! The crew is dead! It’s not safe!”

  “We know it’s not safe!” Burke roared. “That’s why you’re under arrest for violating a federal quarantine zone!”

  “Quarantine?” Frankie spat the word. “The ship crashed five minutes ago! How do you have a quarantine already?”

  Two SWAT officers advanced on her. They moved like robots, heavy boots crunching the debris. They wore gas masks.

  Gas masks.

  “Biohazard protocol,” one of them muffled through his mask. “Do not resist.”

  They grabbed her. Rough hands. Too tight.

  Frankie’s instinct flared. Fight.

  She could snap the handcuffs. She could toss these guys into the harbor like sacks of potatoes. She could be back in the shadows in three seconds.

  But she couldn’t.

  Not with the lights on her. Not with the helicopter overhead.

  If she fought, she exposed everything. The strength. The speed. The hybrid secret she’d kept for two years.

  She went limp.

  “I’m not resisting,” she said.

  They hauled her up. One officer kicked her legs apart. He patted her down, checking for weapons.

  “She’s clear,” he shouted.

  “Cuff her,” Burke ordered. “And bag her.”

  “Bag me?” Frankie snapped. “I’m not a sandwich.”

  The officer spun her around. Flex-cuffs bit into her wrists. Plastic. Tight.

  They marched her up the embankment, dragging her through the sand.

  The thrum faded slightly as they moved away from the hull, but the headache remained. A dull, throbbing reminder.

  They crested the broken boardwalk.

  The scene was chaos controlled by yellow tape.

  Police cruisers parked at jagged angles, lights spinning. Fire trucks sprayed foam onto the smoldering remains of The Gilded Anchor.

  And the people.

  A crowd had gathered at the edge of the police line. Survivors from the restaurant. Looky-loos from the town. Kids who had run down from the bonfire.

  Frankie kept her head down. Mud, slime, and dust covered her. Her expensive dress was shredded. She looked like a swamp monster in couture.

  “Move it,” the officer shoved her.

  They walked her past the flashing lights.

  Sheriff Burke was waiting by his cruiser. He looked pale. Sweat beaded on his forehead despite the cold. He wasn’t wearing a gas mask, but he held a handkerchief over his mouth and nose.

  “What were you thinking, Rivera?” Burke muffled through the cloth. “Running toward a crash site?”

  “I was looking for survivors,” Frankie said. She stood tall, refusing to shrink. “There aren’t any. Just bodies. Dried out. They’re dried out.”

  Burke’s eyes narrowed behind his aviators.

  “Desiccated?”

  “Drained,” Frankie said. “But not by….. Sheriff, something is wrong with that ship. There’s a sound—”

  “Quiet,” Burke snapped. He looked around nervously. “You saw nothing. You heard nothing. You were in shock.”

  “I know what I saw.”

  “You saw a biohazard leak,” Burke said, his voice hard. “Chemical spill. That’s the official line. And if you want to sleep in your own bed tonight instead of a CDC tent, you’ll stick to it.”

  He leaned closer. He smelled of fear and stale coffee.

  “This is above my pay grade, Frankie. And it’s way above yours. The Feds are already on the line. They say that ship was carrying… experimental materials.”

  “It’s not chemicals,” Frankie said. “It’s an infection.”

  Burke blinked. Then he snorted.

  “Get her in the car. Now.”

  The officer grabbed her arm again.

  “Wait,” Frankie said.

  She scanned the crowd.

  Damon. Standing near the ambulance.

  A silver blanket wrapped around his shoulders. He was arguing with a paramedic, pointing toward the ship.

  He saw her.

  His face crumpled with relief, then hardened with anger. He ran toward her.

  “Frankie!”

  A deputy held him back.

  “Damon, stay back!” Frankie yelled. “I’m okay! Just… go home! Go to my mom’s!”

  She didn’t want him near her. She didn’t want him near the slime on her dress. If it was contagious…

  To the left of the ambulance, a girl stood on a concrete planter box.

  Pink coat. Pristine hair.

  Tasia Moreno.

  She was holding her phone up, the camera lens pointed directly at Frankie. The flash went off. Once. Twice.

  Frankie saw the screen. Tasia was live-streaming.

  Tasia lowered the phone slightly. She caught Frankie’s eye. She smiled. It wasn’t a friendly smile. It was the smile of someone who just won the lottery.

  She mouthed words that Frankie could read perfectly.

  Monster.

  Nausea hit her.

  It wasn’t the aliens. It wasn’t the Sheriff.

  It was the caption. Frankie could practically see it typing out in real-time. Frankie Rivera arrested at scene of disaster. Covered in blood? What is she hiding? #Freak #NorchesterPlague.

  “Get her in,” Burke barked.

  The officer shoved Frankie’s head down.

  He forced her into the back of the cruiser. The hard plastic seat was uncomfortable. The door slammed shut, cutting off the noise of the sirens, the helicopter, and the crowd.

  It was quiet.

  Except for the thrum.

  It was still there. Faint. Persistent. Ringing in her ears.

  Frankie leaned her head against the plexiglass divider. She watched the SS Borealis through the window.

  The fog was swallowing it again.

  But for a second, high on the bridge. A flicker. Blue light.

  A shadow. Wings.

  It wasn’t a man. It was too tall. Its wingspan was too wide.

  It watched the police cars. It watched the crowd.

  Frankie shivered.

  The quarantine wasn’t to keep people out.

  It was to keep the food inside. And the dinner bell had already rung.The jagged metal of the tear tangled something.