I could feel the emotion radiating off them like something physical, and I knew everyone else could, too. It might as well have been the last kiss in the history of the world.

I couldn’t help but wonder what it felt like to have someone kiss you like that.

They parted. Alex took a half step back, stifling a sob.

Patrick slid the mask back into place.

Chatterjee twisted the valve open, set the dial to eight liters per minute, and said to Patrick, “Take a deep breath. And blow out.”

Patrick did. Then he inhaled.

“You are now breathing only from the tank,” Chatterjee said.

“Just in case,” Ben said, raising the stun gun and resting it on Patrick’s forehead. “For everyone else in here.”

One minute.

The bag bullfrogged beneath Patrick’s neck, expanding and collapsing with each breath.

The seconds counted down.

I plucked the Stetson from the floor and put it back on Patrick’s head. I couldn’t stand for him not to have it on right now.

He had Alex’s hand, their fingers intertwined. He reached for me with his other hand.

Fear shone from his eyes. I’d never seen him look like that.

I clasped his other hand.

We stood there bracing ourselves, Alex and me on either side of Patrick, Ben before him, that wicked steel rod pressed right between his eyes.

And everyone else watching.

Ten seconds.

Five.

It was one o’clock.

Patrick exhaled, his shoulders lowering a good two inches.

“We don’t know the exact time,” Ben said. “It’s sometime after one. So let’s not celebrate yet.”

He lowered the gun from Patrick’s head but kept it at the ready.

We stayed like that, breathing hard, for five minutes and then five more. A short time later, Chatterjee looked at his watch and said, “He was born by now. I’m sure of it. The time frame has passed.”

Ben shoved the stun gun back into his jeans. “You’re only putting off the inevitable,” he said. “How much time’ll that tank buy him anyways?”

Chatterjee crouched and checked the readings. His face changed. He rose unsteadily. Ben leaned over and read the dial.

“This only gets you five hours,” he said.

“I only need five hours,” I said.

For once Ben looked taken aback. “For what?” he asked.

Entry 25

ENTRY 25

At the edge of town square, Patrick and I bellied down beneath an ambulance, facing the hospital, watching shadows move in the first-floor windows. He wore his mask. His cowboy hat scraped against the undercarriage, so he kept his chin low to the ground. At one side lay his oxygen tank. At the other his shotgun.

Getting here had been hell.