Parasite (Parasitology, #1)(22)

The man—her master—was walking toward us with his arms held out for balance, a blank look on his utterly slack face. He looked like the people Joyce and I had seen at the mall; he looked like he was sleepwalking. All around us, people were shouting and pointing at him. Many of them were filming his shambling approach with their phones. The footage would be all over the Internet before the news crews even showed up.

This time, when Nathan pulled on my shoulder, I didn’t pull away. Instead, I scrambled to my feet, grabbing the dog’s leash at the same time. She whined, but she came willingly as the three of us turned and ran, as fast as we could, away from the Embarcadero.

We arrived back at the hospital winded and sweaty, having run the first two blocks and walked the rest. Only the dog seemed unaffected, probably because she belonged to a jogger—keeping up with me and Nathan had to seem like a walk in the park to her.

Just thinking the word “park” made that uneasy feeling in my gut reappear. I staggered to a stop just inside the lobby, catching myself against the wall with my free hand as I gasped for air. The dog sat down by my feet, assuming the patient waiting posture that has been the characteristic of the Labrador retriever since the breed was born.

Nathan stared at the closed door, and then turned to stare at me. “Did you see that?” he asked needlessly. I looked at him without saying a word. He grimaced. “I’m sorry, I know you saw that, of course you saw that, but that was—he was perfectly normal, and then he was just…”

“Gone,” I whispered. I pushed away from the wall and knelt next to the dog. She had a full set of tags. I dug through them until I found the one with her name. “He was gone, and Beverly here was all alone. Weren’t you, Beverly?”

The dog—Beverly—looked up at me with warm, trusting brown eyes. I was a human. I had her leash, and I knew her name. Clearly, I was going to make everything okay. It must be nice to be a dog.

“I have to notify the ER. They need to send someone to pick him up…” Nathan raked a hand through his hair before whipping around to look at me. “Can you wait in my office for a few minutes? I promise, I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

“Right now, I’m not going anywhere that isn’t in this hospital, and neither is Beverly,” I said, and straightened.

Any protest Nathan might have been considering died when he saw the way I was holding the leash. He nodded. “Okay. I’ll be right there. I love you.” He kissed my cheek, and he was gone, speed walking toward the nearest set of doors.

The nearest security guard frowned in my direction as soon as Nathan was out of sight. I was disheveled, and I was with a dog who didn’t have a service jacket on. I offered the woman a wavering smile and turned to walk quickly toward the nearest bank of elevators, hoping that she’d let me go off and become someone else’s problem.

Luck, or maybe laziness, was with me; the guard kept glaring until I was safely in the elevator and bound for Nathan’s floor. Beverly walked easily on her leash, with none of the pulling or foot-dragging that I’d witnessed when she was being walked by her owner; she even heeled naturally, settling against my leg like she’d been born there.

“You’re a good dog, aren’t you, Beverly?” I asked her. “You’re a good, good dog. A good dog like you shouldn’t be treated like that. I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again. You have my word on that.”

Beverly turned her big brown eyes on me and believed every word I said. I could see it in her face, and belief is in the nature of dogs.

The elevator let us out on Nathan’s floor, where everyone was much more familiar with me, and hence more inclined to be forgiving. Nathan’s research assistant, Devi, still raised an eyebrow at the sight of my new black shadow. “Sal, I don’t mean to sound like I’m prying here, but… is that a dog?”

“She’s a dog,” I confirmed needlessly. “Beverly, I want you to meet Devi. Devi, this is Beverly. She joined us in the park.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Beverly,” said Devi to the dog, as politely as if she were addressing a human. Her eyes flicked back to me. “Still not trying to pry, but you look a little flushed. Can I get you a glass of water or something?”

The unspoken Are you okay? in her words was loud enough that she might as well have said it. I mustered a smile and said, “A glass of water would be good.” A fainting couch would be better, but if I asked for that, I was going to find myself getting more medical attention than I wanted—and there was no telling what would happen to Beverly, who really wasn’t supposed to be in the hospital.

“Uh-huh.” Devi rose, still watching me. “Are you going to tell me why you look so tired, or are you going to let me spin wild stories to amuse myself? You’re secretly an international spy who’s been faking amnesia while you waited for your contact to meet you with the goods.”

“ ‘The goods’?” I echoed.

“You know. Information that can be used to prevent the next World War.” Devi walked into the small nurse’s closet behind the desk as she spoke, and called back, “It’s probably on a thumb drive hidden inside the dog. That’s why you have her, right?”

I’d seen enough bad spy movies to know where Devi was going with this, and decided to play along. It would make us both feel better. “Yes, but I’ve decided to abandon my mission,” I deadpanned. “I just can’t bring myself to cut open a dog to get to the secret plans.”