It was a sort of intuition they’d both experienced, over and over, since those few hours in Ashland. The daisy chain of memories—even if only fragments sometimes returned. They took them all as they came.

Dryden felt his way in the dark, until his hand brushed the surface of the table. A moment later they were lying atop it, side by side, the sky full of stars above them. There were probably better places for this than Malibu, but it was dark enough for shooting stars—dark enough to spot the occasional satellite, even.

Every clear night these past two weeks, they had done this for hours. There was something about it that was hard to pin down—some feeling that transcended age, Dryden thought. Under the sky on a night like this, maybe everyone was still twelve.

His focus went to a bright star almost straight overhead.

Vega? Deneb?

Those two names kept coming to him—it had happened last night, too. He didn’t know why, and had no idea if either of them was right. He had only a passing knowledge of astronomy.

“I remember something,” Danica whispered.

Dryden heard a mix of emotions in her voice: pain and wonder at the same time, somehow. She took hold of his hand, interlaced her fingers with his. He could feel a tremor in her grip, her body tense like a wire.

“I remember her laugh,” she said.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It would be impossible to fully thank the people who made this book happen. Their work, encouragement, and patience (a whole lot of patience, this time around) made all the difference. Thank you to my agent, Janet Reid, and my editor, Keith Kahla, who each read several drafts of this one—and whose input improved it greatly at every pass. Thank you to Alice Pfeifer, and so many others (more than I’ll ever know, I’m sure) at St. Martin’s Press and Minotaur Books: Sally Richardson, Jennifer Enderlin, Andy Martin, Kelley Ragland, Paul Hochman, Hector DeJean, Rafal Gibek, Lauren Humphries-Brooks, and Joe Brosnan.

Also by Patrick Lee

ALSO BY PATRICK LEE

The Sam Dryden Novels

Runner

Signal

The Travis Chase Novels

The Breach

Ghost Country

Deep Sky

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PATRICK LEE is the author of the previous Sam Dryden novels, Runner and Signal, as well as three previous bestselling novels: The Breach, Ghost Country, and Deep Sky. Patrick Lee lives in Michigan.

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