Flood Rising (Jenna Flood #1)

“I don’t give a rat’s ass whose fault it is. She’s dangerous, and you know it.”


Jenna raised her hands, placed her palms flat against Noah’s chest, and pushed him away. A pained look creased his face, and he let out a soft grunt. It wasn’t the hurt of rejection but real, physical pain. Cray’s bullet had not killed him, but it hadn’t simply bounced off either. She forced down the upwelling of concern and addressed Cort. “You’re right. I’m dangerous, and so are all the others. You have no idea what you’re facing.”

“That’s why you’re still alive, kid. You’re gonna explain it to me.”

“And what do I get in return?”

Cort flashed a mirthless and insincere smile. “Anything you want. I’ll write you a blank check.”

“What you will do,” Noah interjected, “is guarantee her safety. And if I have even a moment of doubt about whether you’ll keep that promise—”

“Stay out of this,” Cort leveled his venomous gaze at Noah. “You’ve caused enough trouble for one lifetime. But you know, you’re right. She was just defending herself. You’re the one who’s really to blame for all of this. We let you get away with it fifteen years ago, because we thought you could handle it. I guess we know better now, don’t we?”

“You’re wrong about her.”

“She’s dangerous,” Cort insisted. “She’ll turn on you the first chance she gets, and then we’ll all be screwed.”

He turned to Jenna. “Here’s what’s going to happen, little girl. You are going to start talking. If I like what I hear, you get to keep breathing. You’ll be taken to a secure facility—I won’t tell you where—and that’s where you’ll spend the rest of your life. How long that might be will depend on how good your information is. That’s as close to a guarantee as you’re going to get.”

“Everything is going to be all right.” Jenna realized that Noah was speaking to her. “I know you’ve been through a lot. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you, but now I am. We’ll get through it together, okay?”

Cort let out a low growl of displeasure.

“Okay?” Noah asked. “You trust me?”

Jenna didn’t know how to answer. Was this another trick? Were Cort and Noah working together, playing some kind of good-cop/bad-cop game? She couldn’t tell. She would never be able to tell. These two men were as skillful at deception as they were at violence.

Listen to your gut, but make up your own damn mind.

Her gut told her that she had no choice but to trust him.

You have to live.

Yes. I think I do.

She held his gaze. “Aren’t you worried about what I might do?”

“Should I be?”

“You tell me. You’re the one who said I was a ticking time-bomb.”

“That’s not what I said...” He inclined his head, ceding the point. “But I do know a thing or two about defusing time-bombs.” He managed a wan smile. “I said that to get you away from Soter, but I don’t believe it. Nobody is born evil. The universe doesn’t work that way. Those others—the clones—might have your DNA, but they aren’t you. Soter raised them to be what they are. I raised you.”

“Nurture wins over nature?”

“Exactly. I’d like to think I raised you pretty well.”

She nodded. “I trust you.”

“Tell him what you know.”

Jenna faced Cort and took a deep breath. “For starters, you’re wrong about what’s going on here. This isn’t some Cold War Soviet disinformation campaign, and what’s happening right now has nothing to do with the Russians.”

“So, what then?” Cort asked. “Aliens?”

Jenna nodded, and with more certainty than she felt, continued. “The messages Dr. Soter received came from an extraterrestrial intelligence that wants to take over the Earth. They think that we’re a disease, and that if they don’t step in, we’ll make the planet unlivable. They want the Earth for themselves, but before they can take over, they need to get rid of us, and what better way to do it than to have us destroy ourselves. The things that have been happening—what you told me the others like me are doing—that’s just the first step.”

“You were here for what, half an hour?” Cort’s demeanor remained skeptical, but his question was sincere, and Jenna wondered if the Agency he worked for had not already secretly reached the same conclusion. “How do you know all this?”

“The second transmission received by Dr. Soter contained an entire human genome, which he used to create…us. What you call ‘clones.’” Jenna paused. She would have to choose her words carefully now to avoid raising questions she wasn’t willing to answer. “Our DNA includes instructions from the aliens, and the message itself contains the trigger to bring our memories of those instructions to the surface.”