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"What kind of research?" There were bits and pieces in her head of what went on down here, but none of it would come into focus.

"The illegal kind. Genetic—viral. My sister was going to smuggle out a sample of the virus they were developing. I was meeting her today."

"I can help you get the virus."

Suddenly things got much much more complicated.

Swallowing, Alice asked, "How was she going to get out of here?"

"She had a contact within the Hive, someone I never met. They had access to security codes, surveillance, everything she'd need."

"I have access to security plans, surveillance codes, the works."

Thinking she needed to be very careful, she slowly asked, "So then why didn't she make it?"

Matt shrugged. "Maybe it was bad luck. Maybe she trusted the wrong person. Maybe they set her up, kept the virus for themselves." He seemed to visibly shudder. "Do you have any idea what something like this T-virus would be worth on the open market?"

Alice was stunned. She looked around at the devastation, thought about the creatures, both human and canine, that were stumbling around down here.

"Worth all this?"

"To someone."

Alice wasn't sure what scared her more: that there was someone out there who believed there was someone like that out there—

—or that she herself might be that person.

Twenty-one

KAPLAN THOUGHT HIS HEART WAS GOING TO stop when the door opened. How the hell had the beneath-the-earth road show of Night of the Living Dead managed to enter the right codes?

Rain whipped out her Colt, but then Kaplan saw that it was Alice and Matt. Kaplan guessed that Alice finally remembered the security code for the door.

"Don't shoot, don't shoot!" she cried as she and Matt entered.

"Close that door!" Spence yelled, running for the door to force it shut again.

"They're right behind us!" Alice added, as if that was some kind of surprise.

No, to Kaplan the surprise was that they made it here alive.

One of the zombies grabbed Spence's arms even as he tried to shut the door. Matt and Alice managed to pry the thing's death-grip off him.

Spence backed off quickly, rubbing the spot the zombie had snagged. "Son of a bitch!"

"You okay?" Rain asked Alice.

"They're right behind us," Alice muttered. Then she moved toward the other door. "What about that one?"

Kaplan ran after her. "They're waiting out there, too."

She stopped, turned, and moved toward the glass-walled corridor where four people had met their grisly deaths thanks to Kaplan's own incompetence.

"That way?"

"It's a dead end." Kaplan winced at his choice of phrasing. "There's no way out of the Queen's chamber."

"So we wait," Spence said. "Someone doesn't hear from you, they'll send backup or something. Right?"

Kaplan and Rain exchanged glances. It looked like they didn't remember Procedure Three.

"What?" Spence asked. "What's wrong?"

"We don't have much time," Kaplan said evasively.

Rain was more direct. "You know those blast doors we passed on the way in from the mansion? They seal shut in just under an hour. If we're not out of here by then, we're not getting out."

"What are you talking about?" Spence, who had been Mr. Unflappable up until now, suddenly started sounding as panicky as Kaplan felt. "They can't just bury us alive down here."

Sitting down on the desk, Rain started to massage her bandaged hand. "Containing the incident is the only fail-safe plan they had against possible contamination."

Spence looked at her incredulously. "You're only telling us this now? When we're trapped half a fucking mile underground?"

"We have to find a way out of this room." Alice spoke with finality. Then she grabbed Kaplan's duffel from the desk.

"What're you doing?" Rain asked as she shouldered the bag and went into the corridor to the Queen's chamber.

"Where are you taking those?" Kaplan asked, though the answer was obvious.

"I'm turning her back on."

Following her down the corridor, Kaplan said, "That's not a good idea."

"She'll know a way out of here."

Alice set down